“Way things are going,” he nodded towards the rifle that was still pointed at his heart, “figure you still might.”
***
Elizabeth lowered the rifle with a snort. Damned cowboy could have been shot. That would be all she needed. And he’d nearly given her a heart attack, creeping up on her like that. As if she wasn’t spooked enough by the wildlife and the price tag attached to her head.
She wrapped her fingers around the stock and the barrel, held the rifle loosely in front of her. She wasn’t scared of him, not that way, and that freaked her out. But she was determined she wasn’t going to look at every man from a victim’s viewpoint. As if nightmares and insomnia didn’t already make her one.
“Don’t tell me...” Nat squinted down at her, those midnight blue eyes almost black in the shadow of his ash-colored cowboy hat, “...it’s that bear thing again, right?”
She found herself smiling, could feel bubbles of laughter spill from her mouth. She’d kept her emotions locked down tight for so long she didn’t know how to deal with simple things like laughter or joy anymore.
Her heart rate began to return to normal and the adrenaline rush was receding. She hadn’t heard a thing before he’d announced himself. Even in the thick snow. Now that was scary.
“How’s the foal?” she asked, noting the lines of strain that etched Nat’s face. His bruises were fading, but he still looked tired.
Nat tipped his hat to the back of his head, rested his hands on his hips. “Got a young morab mare feeding him. Little devil went straight in there and tucked into dinner. Never really gave her the option to say no.”
He shrugged, smiled, looked up at the sky. Eliza followed his gaze and noticed for the first time that it had clouded over to a tin metal gray.
“Shame about the mare though,” she added and Nat nodded, looking away.
Something rustled in the bushes and she instinctively reloaded her weapon. A snowshoe hare hopped out, unconcerned by their presence, burrowing away at the snow looking for something to eat. Elizabeth turned back to Nat and found him watching her.
She shivered, but not from cold. There was something about Nat Sullivan, with his long rangy legs and broad shoulders that made her nerves quiver. Not to mention those sapphire-blue eyes that twinkled with hooded amusement blended with something else she couldn’t quite decipher.
“Where’d you learn to shoot like that, if you don’t mind me asking?” Nat looked past her to the balloons that dotted the pine tree.
She did mind, but she answered anyway. “Gun club.”
Despite the easy smile and charming manner, Nat Sullivan wasn’t as country as he wanted her to think. Those laser blues missed nothing, even if he was too polite to comment.
“Why?” Nat asked.
Maybe he wasn’t so polite.
Elizabeth glared at him, irritated by the questions that forced her to lie—if he just minded his own damned business. “Because I wanted to.”
She was being rude again, but it didn’t seem to faze him. He just curved his lips into an amused smile and changed the subject.
“How ‘bout a wager?” he asked.
Elizabeth rested the gun over her shoulder and looked up at him suspiciously. “What sort of wager?”
“A dollar,” Nat said, his smile grew wider, “we take it back another fifty-yards and give it the best of three.”
She really hated that smile of his. It dazzled her like the morning sun.
Another fifty yards would be about the limits of the range of the Marlin. She eyed his rifle and knew if he were any good, he’d wipe the floor with her. But the balloons made for big targets. She might be able to take him.
Elizabeth was doomed and she knew it. If she had a weakness, and God knew she had many, it was the inability to back down from a challenge. That was how she had gotten into this mess in the first place.
She nodded and watched satisfaction light up his face. Stuck out a hand. Nat spat in his palm and shook hers before she could stop him.
Yuck!
“That’s how we do it in the mountains,” he said. The sparkle in his eyes suggested he meant to rattle her any way he could.
Elizabeth handed him her rifle while she went to set up more balloons. Her Glock was hidden under her jacket. Walking back to him, she smiled and felt the skin stretch tightly over her cheeks in the cold air, but she was in top form and she intended to whip his ass.
“How you wanna play it, ma’am?” Nat asked. He tipped his hat to the back of his head.
The ‘ma’am’ thing was beginning to irritate her. Like she was his granny or something.
“You take your three shots, then I’ll take mine,” Elizabeth offered.
Nat shook his head and waved his hand. “Ladies first.”
“Alternate shots then,” Elizabeth suggested, watching Nat handle his rifle—like he’d been born with it.
Oh, shit.
Nat nodded.
Elizabeth offered him a warm up, but he declined. She swore under her breath. He was getting to her all right.
Elizabeth stood for a good minute, settling herself down and getting used to the new distance. She recalculated the trajectory in her head, took control of her breathing and balanced her body. Then she took the first shot. The balloon burst with a crack and she stood back waiting to reload.
Nat’s eyes followed her. Revealed nothing as she moved away to stand behind him.
At the mark, she watched him cycle the bolt, raise his gun to his cheek and settle his breathing. He let his breath stop, body still and then took the shot. The bullet went straight through the center of the balloon, smashed into the slope behind the targets.
Nat moved away and didn’t say anything. The competition was on.
Elizabeth walked back to the mark, loaded and cycled a fresh round into the chamber. Her next shot bounced the edge of the balloon, effective enough to make it burst. She turned around, disconcerted to find Nat standing right next to her, like a second shadow. Startled, she jerked back, dropping her rifle into the snow as she stumbled.
Shit.
Nat caught her with his free arm before she hit the ground.
“I’ve got you,” Nat said, steadying her on her feet.
His arm wrapped around her waist and held her firmly against him. She could feel his heat and hated herself for craving that warmth. Shivers ran all the way down to her toes. She found herself staring into the bluest eyes she’d ever seen, deep aquamarine like the ocean, framed by pale lashes and heavy brows.
“S-sorry,” Elizabeth said, unnerved. She stepped out of his embrace, frustrated that she’d let him unsettle her. If she wasn’t annoyed at him, she was apologizing. Or falling over or tripping up or tumbling off things. She’d turned into a goddamned klutz, her cool self-possession a thing of the distant past.
He nailed his second shot through the middle of the balloon with less effort than it took to raise his head.
Elizabeth was acutely aware of him, but he didn’t seem even vaguely disturbed by her. She didn’t want this sexual awareness, not with him and not with any man.
Damn.
Despite the frigid air, she unbuttoned her jacket.
The bottom line was that Nat Sullivan bothered her, put her on edge. She didn’t fear him physically; it was her mental health that worried her. She tried to settle her breathing, but her concentration was shot. She snatched the trigger and the bullet pulled low and right. The balloon bobbed about with cheerful mockery.
Swearing under her breath she moved away and let him take his final shot. This time he clipped the balloon, but it burst nevertheless. Elizabeth was sure he did it just to make her feel better.
She huffed out a big sigh, and though she hated losing, she had to admit he was one hell of a marksman. She checked to make sure her gun was unloaded and turned towards him.
He was watching her. Intelligence lit up his eyes—shining with questions, and the answers he’d found.
The wager had been some
kind of test and Elizabeth realized she’d just failed it. She’d been worried about being attracted to the man while he’d been sizing up Elizabeth Reed, IT specialist.
Her low self-esteem and lack of confidence had her measuring her worth in terms of physical abilities and old skills. She was a damned good shot, but he was better. This wasn’t just some hick cowboy from way out west and she’d do well to remember that.
“You’re a hell of a shot, Mr. Sullivan.”
***
“So are you Mizz Reed, so are you.” Nat had thought she’d go off in an angry snit. Hell, he’d wanted her to go off in a snit. Elizabeth Reed had been outgunned six ways to Sunday and she knew it, but she’d still taken him on.
He tipped his hat and eyed her thoughtfully, watched her hand slide down the smooth denim of her jeans and into her pocket. She brought out a shiny silver dollar coin, held it out toward him.
“Your dollar, Mr. Sullivan.”
Was that her lucky coin?
Freckles stood out like constellations against pale skin, her green eyes flecked with tiny pieces of glittering gold. It intrigued him that someone from the city could shoot the balls off a rat at two hundred paces. ‘Course, there were plenty of rats in the city.
Reaching out, he curled her fingers back around the coin. He wouldn’t take anyone’s luck, even though he could use some.
Ryan would have swapped the coin for a kiss...
“Keep it, and call me Nat.” Her hand was cool within his grasp and he tried not to think about kissing her.
At six foot three, it made a nice change not to have to stoop down to talk to a woman. Nina had been tall too, and cocky, and beautiful. Unconsciously his grip tightened.
Jerking her hand away, she stuffed the coin back in her pocket. “Eliza, call me Eliza. I hate being called Mizz or ma’am.” She looked startled by her declaration, a flush rising along her cheekbones and her green eyes going wide.
“Eliza.” Nat thumbed the safety on the rifle, slung it over his shoulder and watched as her eyes widened before she avoided his gaze—again. She was as jittery as hell. He grinned, never having encountered a woman like her before, deadly and jittery—a perfect combination if you wanted to get your head blown off.
She raised her gaze from a spot in the snow and their eyes clashed and held. He stared and watched the shutters come down. A mystery, an unknown. A beautiful woman, full of secrets and contradictions—just passing through. His brother’s prayers answered.
Nat stared at her lips and wanted to kiss her. He’d wanted to kiss her from the moment he’d first seen her standing in the pale starlight. Hell, had this been his fantasy, they’d already be lying back making a four-legged snow angel. But this wasn’t his fantasy and the frozen look of fear in Eliza’s eyes held him still. Fear didn’t belong in a woman’s gaze.
It shook him.
A snowflake drifted past her cheek, then another. Big fat flakes that floated down lightly, catching eddies and twirling around like ballerinas. One landed on her cheek. He brushed it away with his thumb without thinking. She flinched, breaking the spell. Looking up at the sky, she backed away from his touch. He glanced up at the burgeoning heavens and swore softly. This winter was never going to end.
“Better get back,” he said, as if nothing unusual had passed between them.
***
A snowflake landed on her bottom lip, a sharp pinprick of cold that jolted her senses.
A bit like touching the cowboy.
She went and grabbed her gear, shriveled up pieces of balloons and the empty casings. She’d been terrified that Nat Sullivan was going to kiss her—terrified of how she’d react.
When she glanced over her shoulder, he’d disappeared. She ran a shaky hand through her hair, trying to keep it out of her eyes as the wind picked up. She stuffed everything into her rucksack, placed the rifle back into its case and pulled it across her back, grabbed her snowshoes. Turning, she found Nat waiting for her on the back of the gray stallion.
Looking like a Nordic God.
She swallowed, uncertain, as he proffered a hand to her.
Any normal person would jump at the chance of a ride down the mountain, but this man unsettled her more than anyone she’d ever met and she couldn’t afford to get close to him.
Another snowflake hit her nose, melting with a burst of cold, and a moment later she let him pull her up behind him. The snow began to fall in earnest, so thick that she tucked her forehead against Nat’s back as they headed down the mountainside through a dense forest of lodgepole pines. He felt solid and strong and safe. She clutched at his jacket with cold fingers, belatedly realizing she’d forgotten to put on her gloves.
Nat reached down, took her naked hand and placed it between the buttons of his coat, safely inside his jacket—cocooned in warmth. Beneath her fingertips his shirt felt smooth, the muscles hard and flat under the press of her palm. Staying absolutely still, as if the spell would be broken if she so much as breathed, she absorbed his stolen heat.
A raccoon stood between the trees watching them as they rode past, one foot raised as if he’d been interrupted mid-step.
The steep slopes and slippery footing meant she had to hang on tight and she gripped Nat harder. She could smell leather and horse, and the faint scent of sandalwood beneath. The gray slipped over the uneven ground, haunches bunched, muscles straining, and then found better purchase in the gently sloped meadow. The energy of Nat’s body seeped into hers with each step the gray took.
It unnerved her.
It warmed her.
Truth be told, it scared the bejesus out of her.
Desperate to remove herself from Nat’s touch—not because she didn’t like it, but because she did—she scooted off the back of the horse as soon as they passed her cottage.
She sensed his eyes on her as she ran with her head-down through the blizzard, up the three wooden steps and across the porch into the cottage. She threw him a quick smile and a ‘thanks’ before closing the door firmly behind her. She was running again, only this time it wasn’t from the mob.
SIX
The smell of lemon polish and saddle-soap overwhelmed even the odor of horse in the small tack-room at the far end of the horse-barn. Bent over an ornately carved western saddle, Elizabeth rubbed the soap into the leather with a soft cloth.
Shaking her head, she blew her bangs out of her eyes. She’d spent the morning being shown the horses by Sarah Sullivan, who wasn’t on duty at the hospital until the afternoon. Sarah impressed the crap out of her. Though small and slight, she was a ball of energy coping with her demanding job, her family, the ranch chores, and on top of that, acting as hostess for their ranch holidays.
Elizabeth sat back and admired the sheen in the dark leather.
The horses were beautiful. The ones she’d ridden had been well schooled and gentle, but she’d been knocked-out by the magnificent Arabian stallion dancing and twirling around a wide corral, showing off to the fillies in the next field. She was entranced and so were the fillies.
There was something incredibly potent about the way the black stallion moved, the fluid grace with which he ran. Muscles flowed like living steel, pouring into each great stride. His neck arched and his long mane danced, the color of midnight against the snowy backdrop. His finely chiseled head and delicately pricked ears shook from side to side as he whirled and chased from one end of the corral to the other.
He was, quite simply, perfect.
Rubbing hard, she buffed the saddle, wrinkling her nose at the smell of polish and enjoying the ache in her muscles from the physical labor.
A creak had her jerking around, knocking a hoof-pick onto the floor with a clatter. Cal Landon stood outlined in the open doorway carrying a saddle, with a bridle draped over one shoulder. Even though it was only mid-afternoon, Elizabeth realized it was getting dark outside. The barn behind Cal looked gloomy and forbidding.
“Sorry, ma’am.” He tipped his battered black cowboy hat and backed up a ste
p, “Didn’t know you were in here.”
Cal didn’t have the startling good looks of the Sullivan men, in fact, if anything, he might be best described as plain or rugged. About five-nine, the same height as Elizabeth, he was whipcord thin from a lifetime of ranch work, or so she assumed. He looked maybe thirty-five, but it was hard to tell, the sun had carved his face heavily, forming those insidious creases that added character to men, and age to women. He had sharp features with bright hazel eyes and short cropped hair that was patchy in color, parts being dark brown like sable and others glinting like dull gold in the sun. He looked like a mongrel—a mongrel in snakeskin boots.
She smiled as she kept a wary eye on him.
They’d come to an unspoken agreement. He didn’t treat her like an idiot and she didn’t expect to be entertained. He didn’t bother to charm or beguile her, the way Ryan did, and he didn’t seem to give a damn about who she was or where she came from. Maybe that was the reason she’d managed to relax around him. Or maybe it was something else she’d noticed in his ultra-calm eyes.
She raised her eyebrow in inquiry. The cowboy was quiet to the point of being mute and this was the first time she’d been alone with him.
“More snow coming,” Cal said, scratching the side of his head.
Elizabeth nodded silently, encouraging him. He still hesitated.
Keeping her eyes locked on him, she reached down and stroked one of the ranch dogs.
Cal moved forward into the small room, leaning close to heft the saddle onto its bracket on the wall. His obvious discomfort with her in close quarters made her own nerves quiet. He had to stand right behind her and almost throw the saddle into place. The saddles were bulky and heavy and she ducked down and tried to make herself as small as possible to give him more room.
Despite the cold, Cal was in his shirtsleeves. The saddle started to slip and Cal lunged forward to catch it before it fell and hit her. He caught it, but not before Elizabeth got a full view of the tattoos that covered Cal’s lower arms.
She froze.
Standard prison issue.
Crimes of Passion Page 37
