by Gayle Wilson
The mustache moved again, and there was a flash of very white teeth beneath it. “It’s so hard to get good help these days,” he said, echoing that frequent above-the-border complaint.
“What went wrong?”
“Too many gringos,” he said mockingly, and then the smile widened. “Kincaid’s messenger should have been prominently out of place. Instead…” He shrugged.
“Tourists,” Chase said. “Too many tourists there for the sale that day.”
“My messenger approached three different people,” he said, amusement still coloring his voice. “None of them knew anything about a ransom. The last time he tried to approach someone, the couple was praying. Obviously, he explained to me, he couldn’t conduct a criminal activity in a church. He grew frustrated, and then he grew frightened that someone would call his activities to the attention of the authorities, so…he left.” The kidnapper’s voice mocked his helper’s scruples.
“He wasn’t the only one who was frustrated.”
“My apologies. I will meet you personally on Saturday. You have my word. Nothing will go wrong.”
“You’re the one who called the hotel?”
“Of course. Things seemed to be falling apart. I couldn’t take a chance on that. When my courier returned and explained what had happened, I made him describe the people who had been in town that day. I recognized you from his description. I suppose I should have known who Kincaid would send.”
Another indication that what Samantha had suggested was true. Too many people now knew what he did down here. Too dangerous.
“Someone else recognized me,” he said. “Someone who tried to stop us from reaching you. He took the other part of Sam’s money.”
“Then it was not a matter of difficulty in raising the ransom.”
“No, you were right about that, of course. Sam Kincaid is a man of honor. A man of his word.”
The man with the mustache nodded.
“I’d like to know who shot at us,” Chase said. He could see the surprise in the dark eyes. “I know you had nothing to do with that, but…Whoever it was tried to kill us, and he didn’t care about the possible consequences to…the child. He endangered all of us, and I’d like to know his name.”
“I don’t know who shot at you, Mr. McCullar.”
“Maybe you could find out,” Chase suggested. That request was what he’d been working up to. Apparently this man had connections in this part of the country. It was worth a shot.
The man’s face didn’t change. The pleasant smile had already faded at the mention of the attempted murder, and he seemed to be considering what Chase had asked of him.
“I’ll see what I can do,” he said finally. “I can ask some questions, talk to some people who might know.”
“That’s all I’m asking. I need a name.”
“It seems to be important to you. Revenge?”
“A little girl’s life was at stake. He didn’t give a damn about putting her in danger. I’d just like to know his name.”
The dark eyes held his, and then the man with the mustache and the beautiful smile nodded. “I, too, have a daughter,” he said softly.
Then he cleared whatever emotion had been in his voice and pointed to the wall of the canyon beyond the end of the deserted town. “The border is due north, perhaps less than three miles on the other side of that ridge. The miners had a trail across it. That should make it easier for the three of you. There’s a ferry two miles downriver that will take you across. You can be back in the States in a few hours tomorrow, even having to carry the child. I’ve left provisions for you in the last building.”
He turned and, the silver chains on his heels softly jingling, disappeared between the two buildings where Amanda had been waiting for his permission to join her mother. There would have been someone else waiting with her, Chase knew, but it didn’t matter. The dealing was over. The negotiation. He had finished the business that had sent him into Mexico. Amanda was safe.
But he still had some unfinished business, Chase thought There was a whole hell of a lot of unfinished business between him and Samantha Kincaid, and he knew that finishing it was probably going to be the most painful thing he’d ever done in his life.
SAMANTHA HAD WATCHED Chase give the Mexican the money. She had held Mandy’s small, warm body safe against her heart and had seen him hand over the ransom to the kidnapper. That had been the easy part, she thought, watching the man with the mustache disappear. And now…
When Chase turned, she felt the tears well. His face was ravaged. She couldn’t read any anger, although that had been what she’d anticipated. She had already acknowledged that he would have a right to be angry. She and Sam had tricked him. They had used him and played him for a fool all along, but until this moment she hadn’t realized what this would do to him.
Nearly five years ago he had taken her virginity and then had never called her again. He had treated her like a one-night stand, and through all those years she had held on to her bitterness over that as her due. Now, for the first time, she realized that in doing what she had done, she had denied Chase the right to know his daughter. Denied him the right to the endless delight that having this little girl had been to her and even to Sam.
As angry as she had been with her father, as resentful as she had been over his continued interference in her life, she had never even considered doing to Sam what she had done to Chase. And only now, now that it was far too late to do anything to rectify that terrible mistake, did she realize exactly the extent of the wrong she had done him.
He walked back to where they were, but he didn’t say anything. He just stood there, looking down at the two of them.
“Chase,” she said softly, trying to think of something that might make a difference. There was nothing. No explanation or excuse for what she had done. Losing her daughter, even for a few days, had made her realize what he must be feeling right now.
Mandy was so like him. Too many times she had pushed that recognition aside, banishing any remembrance of Chase McCullar because she had been hurt by his indifference to what had happened between them. But what she had done wasn’t right There was no justification for denying this man, any man, the right to know he had fathered a child. There was no excuse she could make.
“This is Amanda,” she offered softly. “Mandy, this is…Mr. McCullar.”
“Hi,” Mandy said, looking up into blue eyes that were a mirror of her own.
Chase swallowed, the effort of the motion visible and painful to watch, but he didn’t speak. He nodded instead, a simple, wordless acknowledgment of the child’s greeting.
When he didn’t say anything else, Mandy turned back to Samantha. “I learned a new.song,” she said. “It’s about a cat. I can teach you.”
“Okay,” Samantha agreed, but she wasn’t looking at her daughter. Her focus was still on the face of the man standing before her, its harsh lines seemingly carved from granite.
“Why?” he asked. His voice was too soft.
There wasn’t an answer, and she didn’t attempt one.
“You told me…” he began and then he paused before he went on, still gathering control. “That night…You told me it was taken care of.”
“I know,” she said. “I was afraid if I didn’t, you’d send me away. And I guess…I just thought it wouldn’t matter,” she whispered. Finally they had been together, and if she had thought about consequences, it had not been with fear, but with joy at the possibility of a baby. Even Sam wouldn’t stand in the way then, she remembered thinking. But nothing had worked out as she had thought it would.
“Wouldn’t matter?” he repeated, his tone incredulous.
He hadn’t understood. She didn’t mean that having a child wouldn’t matter, but that it wouldn’t change anything. That night they had finally acknowledged what had always been between them. She had believed that after that, nothing could ever separate them, nothing could come between them. Except…it hadn’t worked out that way. She
had always believed that was because Chase hadn’t wanted it to. Because he hadn’t cared. He had meant what he’d said. Just satisfy the itch and then get on with their lives.
Now, so many things seemed to argue against that long-held belief. The way he had treated her this week. The way she would sometimes look up and find him watching her, the same look in his eyes that had been in them then. And now his reaction to Mandy.
“How could you have thought…this wouldn’t matter?” he asked again.
“Because I thought we’d be together,” she admitted softly.
He laughed, the sound of it as harsh and bitter as before, when she had told him that Jenny was dating someone. “I guess that’s why you married someone else instead of telling me what was going on,” he said. “Your choice or Sam’s?”
“You don’t understand,” she whispered.
“You’re damn straight about that. I don’t understand. No matter what you and Sam felt about me, it seems I had a right to know—”
“Please, Chase,” she begged. “Not now. Not here.” Deliberately she glanced down at the little girl who was listening to this. Mandy wouldn’t understand, of course, but she had sensed the tension. Her eyes were wide, moving from her mother’s face to his.
Not in front of Amanda, Chase realized. She was right. As much as he wanted to scream out his outrage at what they had done, it couldn’t be with their daughter listening.
“I’ll find us a place to sleep,” he said instead. Then he turned his back and walked away from them.
“Mama?” Mandy questioned.
“It’s okay,” she soothed, tugging gently on the nearest ponytail. “Everything’s going to be okay, Cupcake. I promise you.”
Wishful thinking. A promise she wouldn’t be able to keep. Because watching Chase walk away from them made her know that without him, nothing in her life would ever be okay again.
THE KIDNAPPER HAD BEEN right about the miners’ trail. It was still faintly visible and that made what they had to do possible. Chase carried the little girl, her soft arms locked trustingly around his neck. It would have been easier to carry her on his back, but his left shoulder was too bad now to manage that.
Instead he held her on his right hip, his arm around her bottom. He could smell the sweet, sun-touched fragrance of her hair, blond curls brushing against his face when she turned her head to watch her mother’s progress.
Most of the time she sang, not singing to him, Chase gradually realized, but under her breath, entertaining herself. He recognized most of the usual children’s songs, but some were new to him. Her favorite seemed to be a Spanish song about a cat Her new friend with the mustache had taught her, she confided when he asked about it, and she was afraid she’d forget the words. Rosita would help her remember when they got back to Granddaddy Sam’s.
Her natural faith in the goodness of people had not been damaged, it seemed, despite her ordeal. That trust came from the love that had always surrounded her, Chase knew. He would have to give the Kincaids credit for that, in spite of the fact they had decided that he should have no role in her life. Again he buried the bitterness and listened to his daughter’s singing as he carried her back to the safe and secure world the Kincaid wealth had created for her.
WHEN THEY FINALLY reached civilization, Samantha called to give her father the good news that they had Mandy and to ask for his help in getting them the rest of the way home as quickly as possible. Sam dispatched one of the ranch’s choppers to pick them up, and Jason Drake arrived less than an hour after Samantha had placed the call.
Judging by the quickly concealed shock in Drake’s eyes when he saw them, she thought it was probably a good thing that her father hadn’t come himself. She had known the three of them were the worse for wear and apparently they looked it. The mining camp might not have been far from the border, but the terrain they’d had to cross to reach the river would have been hard enough for experienced adults to manage traveling alone, much more so with the added burden of a four-year-old child.
Despite whatever was now obviously wrong with his shoulder, Chase had carried Amanda most of the way. He hadn’t complained, of course, but she had been aware of the care he took when he had to move his left arm. She could only imagine the cost of carrying the little girl up and down the challenging rock face they’d crossed.
At least neither of them had had breath to spare for conversation. The explanation she had promised would have to wait until they’d reached the ranch. All the time she was physically struggling over the ridge and trudging stoically across the final stretch of grassland to the Rio Grande, her mind had also been struggling with what she could possibly say to Chase McCullar.
What words should come after You have a daughter, bright and loving and beautiful, and I have kept her existence a secret from you? What words could ever change the reality, the selfish cruelty, of that? None of the things she had felt about Chase’s desertion seemed to amount to much in the face of what she had done. And it was no excuse, she acknowledged, that she truly hadn’t realized what she had done until she had seen his face the day he learned he had fathered this child.
“Almost there, Mrs. Berkley,” Drake said reassuringly.
“Thanks,” she said, smiling at him. She had always admired Jason Drake for putting up with Sam’s sometimesirascible demands and peppery temper. Today she appreciated his calm efficiency and the care he was taking of them. A good man, she thought, and a good friend, just as her father had said.
Amanda was asleep in her arms, exhausted by the journey they’d made. She couldn’t see Chase because he was sitting behind them. He hadn’t said anything to her in the last eighteen hours. His conversation after they’d met up with Drake had been almost monosyllabic, definitely noncommunicative. She couldn’t decide if that was from anger or exhaustion or pain. She would make Sam have a doctor look him over, she decided. Mandy, too, of course, just as a precaution.
She cupped her hand behind the head of her sleeping daughter and touched her lips to the smooth forehead, keeping the pressure of the kiss too light to chance waking her. She had Mandy back and that should mean all was right with her world. Only it wasn’t—not anymore—and she knew why. She just didn’t know what to do about it.
As they approached the ranch’s landing strip, she saw that Sam was waiting for them, the hot afternoon wind blowing through his shock of white hair. He had one hand up to shade his eyes, watching as the helicopter began its descent. He was too stubborn to wear sunglasses, even in the strong Texas sun, even with the threat of cataracts. She waved at him, and he lifted his hand in response. Drake gave him a thumbs-up through the windshield. All’s well. Everyone safe.
She didn’t protest when Jason reached to take Amanda from her to carry her to where Sam was waiting for them. Her own knees felt weak, and she wasn’t sure she was up to even that short journey carrying the sleeping child. Chase was obviously hurt, so it seemed to make sense to let Drake take Amanda.
But it had been another mistake, she realized when she met the coldness in Chase’s eyes. Amanda was his daughter. He had carried her through the mountains despite his injury, and now Jason Drake was handing the little girl to Sam as if he’d had something to do with the rescue.
When Samantha reached her father, for the first time in years she had the urge to run into his arms. Sam must have sensed her unusual reaction. He was still holding Amanda, so he just pulled Samantha to him and squeezed her hard against his other side.
“You all right?” he asked.
She nodded, laying her cheek against the almostforgotten starch-fragranced comfort of her father’s plaid shirt. It felt good to be hugged. It had felt good to let someone else carry the burdens for a while, to handle the planning and see to all the details. Just as it had felt good to have Chase’s quiet strength beside her while they searched for Mandy.
The irony was that this was what she had always fought against in the past—not being allowed to stand on her own feet. She found herself
wondering why she had thought through all those years that she couldn’t accept anyone’s help. Now she felt only a deep sense of gratitude to the men who had cared for her and Mandy when they had needed them most. She was immensely grateful to both of them.
“Thank you,” Sam echoed that gratitude, his voice directed over her shoulder. She turned, almost but not quite moving out of the circle of her father’s arm, and found Chase watching them. “Thanks for bringing them home safe. A good job, McCullar. I want you to know I’m grateful. I don’t forget those who do right by me and mine.”
Chase said nothing for a moment, his eyes on the old man, and then he glanced at Samantha. The look was too brief to allow her to identify the flash of emotion that had been in the blue eyes before they moved back to Sam.
“I lost half your money, Mr. Kincaid. Half a million dollars. I let it be taken away from me, and then I had to promise the kidnapper I’d deliver another half million to him in order to get him to give us Amanda. I gave him your word that I’d bring the money. And my word,” he added. The recital of events had been almost emotionless, as were his harsh features.
“Somebody ambushed us,” Samantha said, trying to explain what had happened. The version Chase had told wasn’t anywhere near the truth. Or maybe it was just the truth without the details, without all the mitigating circumstances. “They shot out the tire and the Land Rover went over a ravine, and then they tried to kill us. We had to leave part of the ransom and run or we would have been killed. What happened wasn’t Chase’s fault,” she added. “And I’m the one who offered the kidnapper the money.”
Sam nodded, his eyes still on the cold blue ones.
“I’ll get the other half million,” he said. “I’ll get to work on gathering it up right away. And your fee, of course.”
“No fee,” Chase said. “That’s for when I’m successful, not when the whole thing goes to hell.”
Sam turned his head slightly, his chin touching against the blond curls of the sleeping child. “Seems like this qualifies as success. At least to me it does. It never mattered what it would cost to get her back. You knew that And I always pay what I—”
