by Cassie Miles
Carolyn glanced over at Burke who seemed totally focused on devouring his raisin roll. His dark eyes took on a glaze of contentment. His jaw relaxed as he chewed. The other FBI agent was likewise transported.
“These are great,” Burke said. “Ma’am, you’ve got to come back tomorrow.”
Polly pinched his cheek. Actually pinched Burke’s cheek! Carolyn couldn’t believe that Special Agent I’m-In-Charge would stand for such familiarity. Then she remembered his kiss on her forehead. Underneath the tough exterior, he was kind of a marshmallow.
“I’ll be back in time to throw together some breakfast.” Polly turned to Carolyn. “The guest bedrooms are made up with fresh sheets and towels. Call me if you need anything else tonight. G’night, y’all.”
She headed out of the kitchen toward the front door.
“Nice woman,” Burke said. “Must have been good for you to have Polly around while you were growing up. She’s real motherly.”
“I have a mother,” Carolyn said quickly. “Her name is Andrea. She and my father divorced when I was seven.”
“Does she live around here?”
Thinking of her stylish mother choosing to stay in rural Colorado amused Carolyn. “Not hardly. She runs an art gallery in Manhattan where she lives with her second husband and my twelve-year-old half sister.”
“Big change in lifestyle.”
“Yeah, she traded in her cowgirl boots for designer stilettos.”
Carolyn regretted that she hadn’t spent more time with her mom when she was growing up. Andrea had wanted to take her and Dylan with her when she left, but they both chose the ranch. It was their home, their heritage. “I should call Mom and tell her what’s going on.”
“Tomorrow is soon enough,” Burke said.
He was probably right. There was nothing her mother could do from New York, and Carolyn had more pressing concerns for tonight. “I need to get on the phone with my financial officers. And my bankers. I’ve got to start putting together the money for the kidnappers. Maybe I should—”
“Later,” Burke said. “First, I want to know more about Sam Logan.”
“Like what?” The sugar rush from Polly’s raisin rolls had energized her. The inside of her head churned with dozens of things she needed to handle ASAP. “There’s not much to tell.”
“When you broke up with him were there hard feelings?”
“Some,” she admitted. “It was a long time ago, right after grad school. I’d come back to the ranch and I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my pretty new MBA.”
For lack of any other plan, she’d started dating Logan, who was a great guy to party with—handsome, charming and sexy. When their relationship started to get serious, she was uncomfortable. Her father, who had been ailing, sided with Logan, telling Carolyn it was high time she settled down.
But she’d just returned from school in New York where she had a chance to watch her career-focused mother. The corporate lifestyle appealed to Carolyn, and she figured she had the rest of her life to make babies. Now, almost ten years later, she wondered if she’d waited too long.
“Logan wasn’t the right guy for me.” She exhaled a sigh. “And I wasn’t the barefoot-and-pregnant type of woman he was looking for.”
“Do you think he holds a grudge?”
Taken aback, she grasped what he was suggesting. “If you think Logan kidnapped Nicole to get back at me, you’re wrong. His ego is too big to realize that I was dumping him as much as he was dumping me.”
“He could be nursing bad feelings toward you.”
True, her former boyfriend had a petty streak. “He wouldn’t sabotage the ranch. Our cattle-raising process is natural and organic. We’re not his enemy.”
“Are you sure about that?” Burke raised an eyebrow. “Carlisle Ranch is an international corporation. Big business. That’s what he hates.”
Burke’s logic made a certain amount of sense. The success of her family’s business might be a slap in the face to a loser like Sam Logan.
IT WAS AFTER MIDNIGHT when Burke and his men completed their interrogations of the employees of Carlisle Ranch. Once these cowboys got talking, they were as gossipy as a bunch of hens with ruffled feathers.
Burke still didn’t have much to go on. Only a basic assumption: the kidnapping had been unpremeditated and was related to the recent vandalism at the ranch.
On a wide-screen computer in the dining room, Agent Corelli had pinpointed those acts of sabotage on a map of the area. Most of them bunched along the border between the Carlisles and a neighboring ranch.
Corelli, whose black suit still looked crisp, pointed to the red dots. “That pattern can’t be a coincidence. Who lives on that ranch?”
“A young widow and her four-year-old child.” Not likely suspects for a brutal kidnapping. “It’s not a working ranch. Less than a hundred acres.”
“Who’s next to her?”
“National Forest,” Burke said. “There are a couple of oil rigs in that area but nobody lives there.”
Logan’s compound was across the road and further to the east. Burke considered the survivalists his most likely suspects. They were the only ranch who had refused to talk to Dylan’s posse when they had made their search.
Burke needed to get inside the SOF compound. His gut told him Logan had something to hide.
He stepped away from the table and stretched, trying to ease the tension that knotted the muscles in his neck and shoulders. “We need continuous monitoring tonight. In case the kidnappers call again,” he said. “We’ll sleep in shifts. You three go first. Silverman, I’ll see you at three-thirty to relieve me.”
Stretching again, he watched his men troop out of the command central/dining room. Upstairs, Polly had prepared two guest rooms for them with two beds in each. Twin-sized beds were always too short for Burke, but it would have felt good to lie flat, even with his feet dangling off the end of the bed.
In the living room that adjoined the dining room, he’d spotted a big, beige, corduroy easy chair with a matching ottoman. He hauled the chair around to face the battery of equipment on the table and settled in.
The house was quiet but not peaceful. The anxiety of waiting—not knowing what had happened to a loved one—permeated the old walls. The creaking of floorboards reminded him of the crackle of a long fuse, burning slowly toward an explosion. More trouble was coming; he could feel it.
Years ago, when he had started in law enforcement as a street cop in Chicago, he’d learned to trust his gut feelings. Subsequent training with the FBI gave him the tools to analyze.
Eyes half-closed, he did a risk assessment. Two violent crimes—arson and kidnapping—had occurred within two days. If he assumed that the same perpetrators were responsible for both, it was unlikely there would be another attack tonight. Typically, there was a lull after kidnappers made their ransom demands.
He heard a rustling from the hallway and turned his head with his eyelids still drooping. Carolyn entered the dining room, cell phone in hand. When she saw him, she stared for a moment as if deciding whether to wake him. Wispy strands of black hair had come undone from her ponytail. Though she fidgeted, she still looked capable. And damned attractive.
Her hidden vulnerability appealed to him. Behind her facade, he caught glimpses of a touching innocence that made him want to gather her into his arms and promise her the world. Which still didn’t excuse him for kissing her forehead. He wasn’t usually so unprofessional, but he didn’t regret that kiss. Her skin tasted spicy—warm and soft.
“What do you need?” he asked.
She started. “I thought you were asleep.”
“Just resting.”
“I have a question.”
“Shoot.”
She placed her cell phone down on the table and approached him. “What if I can’t put together the ransom by the deadline?”
He’d prefer that she not pay ransom at all. “Problems?”
“We don’t have a m
illion dollars in liquid assets, so the ransom requires a loan against our collateral, which, in turn, requires a ton of paperwork. Also, my financial adviser tells me that the local banks, even in Delta, can’t pull that much cash from their reserves. We’ll have to use a Denver bank and fly the money over here.”
“I’m impressed that you found out that much tonight.”
“I get things done, Burke.”
She wasn’t bragging, just stating a fact. He had no doubt that Carolyn wouldn’t hesitate to wake up the entire Colorado banking community to get what she wanted.
“If you can’t get the money, explain it to the kidnapper. Ask for more time.”
“And if he refuses?”
“He won’t.”
She turned away from him and wandered around the table, checking out the equipment. When she came to the screen with the map and the red dots, she pointed. “What’s this?”
“A map.”
“I can tell it’s a map,” she said with some exasperation. “And not a very good one. If you want more detailed maps of the area, we’ve got plenty. Dylan uses them to keep track of the different fields, pastures and grazing rotation.”
He hauled himself out of the comfortable chair and went to stand beside her. The top of her head came up to his chin. In her boots, she was close to six feet. A tall woman. He liked that.
He pointed to the red markings. “These dots represent incidents of sabotage.”
She counted. “Seven incidents. Since my brother hasn’t seen fit to keep me informed, can you tell me about them?”
Burke had plenty of details. During the interrogations, he’d listened to dozens of complaints from ticked-off cowboys. “Like you said before, it was just petty mischief until the barn burned down.”
Her soft pink lips frowned. “I still don’t understand why. We’re good neighbors. We provide employment to the people in this area. Why would anybody do this to us?”
“You want motives?” He flipped open the notepad where Silverman had recorded their notes. “There are over twenty names listed. People who bear grudges against the Carlisles.”
She leaned over the table. Her manicured fingernail—a feminine contrast to her ranch clothes—skimmed down the list. “I don’t even know half these people. How did you come up with this list?”
“Your employees told us about them. By the way, all the ranch hands were quick to say that they like their jobs and your brother is a good, fair-minded boss.”
She pointed to a name on the list. “Who’s this?”
When he bent down to see where she was pointing, her ponytail brushed against his cheek. The scent of lilacs from her hair distracted him and it took a moment for him to read the name. “He works for an oil company. Your brother wouldn’t allow his equipment access through Carlisle property.”
“That hardly seems like an incitement to vandalism. Or kidnapping.”
Though Burke agreed, he knew better than to overlook any motive, no matter how slight. Some people could work themselves into a homicidal frenzy over a stubbed toe.
She read another name. “Nate Miller. That’s no surprise. He’s hated us forever, blames us for his father’s failure on the Circle M.”
“There are a couple of other ranchers on the list who don’t like the competition from Carlisle Ranch.”
“It’s business,” she said. “Why make it personal?”
“Your success hurts their bottom line. People tend to take bankruptcy personally.”
“But we’re always fair. Always.” She tapped the name with her finger. “Dutch Crenshaw runs the meatpacking plant in Delta. We’ve given him millions of dollars in business over the years.”
Burke considered Crenshaw’s motive to be one of the best. “But you’re thinking about building your own slaughterhouse.”
“I gave him a chance,” she said. “I told him that we wanted to use state-of-the-art humane technology, but he refused to modify his plant.”
“So you’re going to put him out of business.”
She frowned. “Okay, maybe you’ve got a point.”
His focus on the list was interrupted by a loud crash, followed by the sound of gunfire. The shots came from the front of the house.
Chapter Five
Burke’s risk assessment had been dead wrong. They were under attack. He caught hold of Carolyn’s upper arm and turned her toward him. “Go upstairs. Don’t turn on any lights and—”
“The hell I will.” She wrenched free. “Those were gunshots. Somebody’s firing at my house—the house that’s been in my family for three generations, the house my grandpa built. Don’t ask me to hide behind the lace curtains in my bedroom.”
Stubborn woman. “I go first. Stay behind me.”
“Of course. I’m not going to put myself or anyone else in danger.”
He grabbed his handgun from the shoulder holster slung across the back of a chair, aware of seconds ticking away. Whoever fired that shot would be making his escape. Moving quickly through the house, Burke turned off lights as he went. Carolyn followed in his footsteps.
Her brother staggered into the moonlit hallway, rubbing his eyes. “Carolyn? What’s going on?”
“Stay with him,” Burke ordered as he flipped the latch on the front door. “I’ll be right back.”
Leaving Carolyn behind—thank God—he slipped outside onto the veranda. Aware that he might be the next target for a man with a rifle and a nightscope, Burke stayed low. He dodged around the rocking chair and porch swing. At the end of the veranda, he jumped over the railing and ducked into the shadows.
Wind rustled the bare branches of a cottonwood. Nothing else appeared to be moving.
“Over here, Burke.”
Burke followed the sound of the voice and saw a security guard crouched behind a truck that was parked on the wide gravel space beyond a hitching rail. Burke hustled toward him. “Where’s the shooter?”
“Didn’t see him. I was behind the house when I heard the shots.”
His heavy jaw was thrust forward. His name, Burke remembered, was Neville. He’d been in the Secret Service for five years before joining Longbridge Security. “What about a vehicle?”
Neville shook his head. “I didn’t hear a car.”
Cautiously, they peered around the truck. The driveway leading to the house was a long gravel lane. The yard was about an acre of winter-brown grass, separated from the road by a whitewashed fence. On the other side of the road, the land turned rugged with lots of trees and rocks—plenty of hiding places for a sniper.
“He could be dug in behind those rocks,” Burke said.
He nodded. “A decent rifle would be accurate from four, maybe even five hundred yards away.”
After that first burst of gunfire, no other shots had been fired. Likely, the shooter had already hightailed it out of there. “Do you think he’s gone?”
“I don’t want to test that theory by taking a bullet,” Neville said.
“Let’s find him,” Burke said. “You go right. I’ll go left. We’ll meet at the fence by the road.”
As Burke moved across the yard, he scanned the cold, moonlit landscape. There was virtually no cover. Burke longed for the city streets, crowded with parked cars and doorways to duck into. This sniper was probably an expert hunter. Not like the city punks who held their guns sideways, more concerned with looking cool than taking careful aim.
When he reached the fence and no other shots had been fired, he was fairly sure that their sniper was gone. He heard the door to the house open. A mob spilled onto the veranda. Carolyn and her brother were both carrying rifles. The other three FBI agents accompanied them.
Lucas and two other cowboys—also armed—charged toward the veranda from the two-story bunkhouse.
“There are way too many guns on this ranch,” Burke said. This was the land of the Second Amendment where the right to bear arms would not be infringed upon. He turned and looked across the road. From where he stood, he spotted four good positions
for a sniper to hide, if he’d even bothered to take cover. With Neville behind the house and no one else keeping watch, the sniper could have stopped in the road, dropped to one knee, taken aim and fired. But why? What did he hope to gain by rousing the household?
“Sorry I missed him,” Neville said.
“Not your fault. One man can’t patrol an area this size.”
As he and Neville walked up the drive toward the house, Burke shivered in the December cold. He wasn’t wearing a jacket or hat, and hadn’t bothered to put on gloves. Responding to the threat had been his sole focus.
The gunfire bothered him because it didn’t make sense. As a rule, kidnappers kept close tabs on their hostages.
But two men had abducted Nicole. One could be with her while the other came here. Why? By now the kidnappers had to know that the FBI had been called in. Why take the risk of coming close?
He stopped behind the black rental van he and his men had driven from the Delta airfield. The back window was shot out, and there was a neat bullet hole in the rear license plate. None of the other vehicles showed signs of damage. The FBI van had been the target.
Carolyn stepped up beside him. Her rifle rested on her shoulder. “Looks like a pretty clear message, Burke. Somebody doesn’t like you.”
For a moment he grinned. He liked a challenge.
AFTER SHE’D HERDED EVERYONE back into the house, Carolyn took Burke and her brother into the office to talk strategy.
Somehow Carolyn had to turn the situation around and make it work. But what can I do? She couldn’t put in extra hours to get the job done. It didn’t matter that she was smart and strong. She couldn’t change fate.
Pacing on the carpet, she snapped at her brother, “Don’t drink that coffee. Caffeine keeps you awake.”
“Somebody needs to be alert.” He leaned against the desk and faced the sofa where Burke sat. “Looks like we made a mistake.”
“What’s that?” she asked.
“The kidnappers don’t want the FBI involved.”
“Of course they don’t.” Her temper flared. “That’s exactly why Burke and his men are staying here. We need their expertise.”
