His Defender

by Stella Bagwell

  While he studied it, Isabella stepped over to Juggler to make sure the horse hadn’t injured himself. Other than trembling and being wet with foamy sweat, the only thing she could find wrong with the gelding were a few cuts and scratches on his legs.

  “It looks as though Juggler only has a few superficial cuts on his legs,” she told Ross with relief. “I’m so glad.”

  When he didn’t reply, she turned around to see he hadn’t heard a word she’d said. He was staring in horror at the cinch strap in his hand.

  “Someone tried to kill you, Bella!”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Wh-what?” Dazed, Isabella stepped back to Ross and stared down at the piece of latigo he was holding.

  Ross looked up at her, his eyes glittering with dark fury. “Who saddled this horse? I’m going to kill the bastard!”

  Stunned and confused, she knelt down beside him and clutched his arm. “I—Ross, no! What are you talking about? What are you saying?”

  “This latigo has been cut with a knife! He must have left just enough to keep the saddle upright until you rode away from the ranch.”

  Isabella swallowed as she remembered Naomi’s vision the day she’d visited her godmother. A knife. Cutting. The Apache woman had foreseen this accident.

  Shaking her head, she said, “But Ross—Juggler was already saddled when I went down to the barn. Skinny said you were going to use him this morning and then you decided otherwise.”

  The muscles in his jaw twitched as he digested her words. “Juggler was still saddled? That was hours ago. He was supposed to have been unsaddled and turned loose.”

  “Well, he wasn’t. He was in the remuda pen. Skinny said the boys must have gotten busy or something. Anyway, I don’t know who saddled him. And surely—surely someone didn’t—why would they want to harm me?”

  He lifted his eyes to hers and for a split second she thought she saw love in his eyes. Love for her. But that was crazy. He’d said he’d never love any woman. He was just emotional, she told herself. And so was she. Emotional. And scared.

  “I was wrong, Bella. He wasn’t out to get you. Whoever cut this cinch believed I was going to be riding Juggler this morning. He left him saddled, hoping I would come back to the ranch for a fresh mount.” Lifting his injured hand to her, he tilted her face toward his. The scratches on her beautiful skin filled him with a murderous rage to get at the person who’d done this to her. “I’m not sure who saddled Juggler, but I have a pretty good idea.”

  “Who?”

  His expression was suddenly sick. “Damn it, Neal was right all along.”

  Unable to follow his line of thought, she stared at him, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “It’s one of my men. I wanted to give him a chance here on the ranch. I thought he was my friend. I trusted him to work safely with the other men, to care for my livestock. I—” He looked away from her as his head swung back and forth with disbelief. “I never dreamed he had anything against me.”

  “How do you know that he meant this to happen?”

  “Bella, you were almost killed just now! If I hadn’t come upon you—” Closing his eyes, he breathed deeply through his nostrils and tried to calm the rage boiling up inside him. “Oh, but he thought it was me that would be on Juggler,” he continued, his low voice tight with fury. “It was me he tried to frame with murder. And in trying to get to me, he came close to killing Jess and now you. It was probably him last night that dumped the hay out of the loft.”

  Isabella looked at him as she tried mentally to assemble all the little clues she’d gathered over the past couple of weeks. Of all the men she’d met and tried to read through their actions and conversations, one had not stood out among them. She wanted to ask Ross who he suspected of this heinous crime. But she could see he was deliberately avoiding telling her the man’s identity.

  “The person who saddled Juggler might not be guilty. Someone else could have cut the girth without him knowing,” Isabella reasoned.

  “Maybe,” he growled. “But I doubt it.”

  “Why? What does he have against you?”

  “I didn’t know he had anything against me. Until now,” he added grimly.

  Shaken by the hard resolution on his face, she grabbed his arm. “Ross…what are you going to do?” she asked desperately.

  He reached for her hand. “Can you ride double with me?”

  She nodded numbly.

  He said, “We’re going back to the ranch and I’m going to have a little squaring off with the guy. If he did this, I’ll get it out of him.”

  Isabella shivered with fear, yet she knew it would do no good to tell him to let the sheriff’s department handle things from here on out. Ross had been wronged. He’d been targeted by someone he’d trusted, and he wouldn’t rest until he had retribution.

  She looked down at the saddle that had been meant to be Ross’s death trap and had very nearly ended up being hers. “What about that?” she asked, pointing to the saddle as cold shock threatened to overtake her.

  “It’s evidence. We’re going to leave it where it is and let the law do what they need to do with it.”

  Taking her by the elbow, he helped Isabella into the saddle of the sorrel horse he’d been riding, then gathering up Juggler’s reins, he climbed up behind her and took a seat on the saddle skirt.

  The unaccustomed weight of two riders caused the horse to go into a sideways dance. Since Ross had the job of leading Juggler, Isabella was responsible for the reins and though her nerves were already frazzled, she gritted her teeth and brought their mount under control.

  Smoothing a hand over the back of her hair, he asked, “Are you okay? Or do you want me to go on to the ranch and come back for you with another saddled horse?”

  She wasn’t about to let him face the traitorous ranch hand without her. In his state of mind there was no telling what he might do. “I’m fine. I’ll make it,” she assured him.

  “Good. He’ll settle down in a minute,” he said of the horse. “Just put him into a trot and keep him there.”

  “A trot?”

  “Hell, yes! I want to get there as fast as we can. Before the guy decides it’s time for him to fly the coop.”

  Fifteen minutes later, they trotted into the ranch yard and Ross directed her to head the horse toward the cattle barn.

  “There’s Skinny!” she cried as she spotted the older cowboy walking out of the horse barn. “Maybe we should ask him—”

  “No! Don’t bring Skinny into this. Ride on around to the front of the barn!”

  She did as he ordered, while behind them she could hear Skinny calling out to them, “Hey? What happened?”

  When they rounded the corner of the barn, they saw Steve and Tim spreading cattle cubes in a long metal feed trough.

  Tim was the first to notice their approach. He nudged an elbow in Steve’s ribs and pointed in her and Ross’s direction.

  The moment Steve lifted his head their way, Isabella knew with sinking certainty that he was guilty. Fear was frozen on his face as he took in Isabella’s scratched, bedraggled appearance, Juggler without his saddle, and last but certainly not least, Ross, his expression that of a man on a dark and dangerous mission.

  Since the two cowboys were inside a huge cattle pen, Isabella pulled their mount to a stop just outside the fence. Ross slid off and motioned for the two men to come to him.

  Immediately, Tim dropped the sack of feed he was holding and sauntered toward his boss. However, Steve began backing up until his legs hit another feed trough and he staggered and nearly fell.

  “Come here, Chambers. Or I’m coming after you.”

  Glancing wildly around him, Steve made a dash for the opposite fence and the pickup truck parked beyond it.

  Like lightning, Ross bolted into the pen to race after him. By a fraction of a second, Steve managed to make it over the fence before Ross climbed after him. But he wasn’t as lucky when he stopped long enough to jerk open the truck door. />
  Ross grabbed him by the arm and spun him around. “You’re not going anywhere, you worthless bastard!”

  Desperate to escape, Steve attempted to jerk away, but he was no match for Ross’s strength or agility. His fist a blur, Ross sent a cracking right to the cowboy’s jaw that put the other man flat on his back and sprawled in the dirt.

  Ross stood ready and waiting as Steve sputtered for air and dragged himself to his feet.

  “I’m gonna kill you for this, Ketchum!” he growled and made a staggering lunge for Ross.

  Sidestepping Steve’s grappling arms, Ross reared back and landed an uppercut to the cowhand’s chin. The powerful blow landed Steve back in the dirt, and this time he didn’t move.

  Tim and Isabella reached the two men in a matter of moments. She snatched a hold of Ross’s arm. “Ross, are you okay? Your hand—”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll see to it later.” His chest still heaving from the tussel with Steve, he glanced at her. “What about you? Are you okay?”

  Although she was trembling with aftershock, Isabella nodded. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Why, he’s out cold!” He looked up at Ross, clearly stunned by this development. “What in heck did he do, boss?”

  Ross circled his arm around Isabella and gathered her trembling body close. “He picked on the wrong man, Tim.”

  The next two days passed in a haze for Isabella. Once Ross had called to report the whole incident to Sheriff Perez, Under-Sheriff Hastings and a number of deputies swarmed the T Bar K. Steve was arrested on the spot and charged with attempted murder, among other things.

  The details of Steve’s motives hadn’t completely come to light yet, but this afternoon Jess had called Ross into town to the sheriff’s department. She suspected that by the time he arrived back home, he would know more about the case.

  As for herself, Isabella had spent most of the past two days answering questions put to her by Sheriff Perez and his men. And when she wasn’t being questioned, she’d been trying to work the soreness from her bruised body.

  Riding almost upside down beneath a horse’s belly was not what her muscles were accustomed to. But Victoria had given her a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and she was beginning to feel more like herself, thank goodness. And just in time, too. Ross had planned a dinner party for tonight and already the house was filled with the good smells of Marina’s special cooking.

  Victoria and Jess would be coming, along with their cousin Linc, sister-in-law, Maggie, and nephew, Aaron, and the T Bar K attorney Neal Rankin. And, to Isabella’s surprise, Ross had invited her mother and godmother, too. Not just to eat dinner, but to spend the night on the ranch so that the two women wouldn’t be forced to travel after dark.

  His thoughtfulness had touched Alona. It had touched Isabella that he would even think of her family on this special night. But then, he was a happy man, she reasoned with herself. Steve’s arrest had solved a good deal of the ranch’s problems, and that had been enough to put Ross in a celebratory mood.

  With a heavy sigh, Isabella pulled a red dress from the closet and held it in front of her. As she’d told Marina, red was considered a lucky color by Apaches and she certainly needed all the luck she could get. But she’d worn red to the Cattlemen’s Ball, so she put the dress back and pulled down a cream-colored sheath.

  Ross might consider tonight a celebration, but as far as she was concerned, she’d decided the evening would be the final curtain call for her stay here on the ranch. Her job was completely finished. Now all she had to do was find the strength to tell Ross she couldn’t hang around and have an affair with him.

  This was the way the ranch should be, Ross thought, as his gaze took in the family and friends crowded around the festive dining table. This was the way the T Bar K had been while both his parents had still been living. Filled with happy, laughing people, rich food and the sense that tomorrow would be good, as would all the tomorrows after that.

  From his seat at the head of the table, Ross turned his gaze to his immediate right where Isabella was listening intently to Neal’s account of the day he took his bar exam.

  The scratches on her face were beginning to fade, yet the faint marks were a continual reminder to Ross of just how close she’d come to having a serious or fatal injury. Just the thought was still enough to put him in a panic, and these past two days he’d found himself wanting to be near her even more, wanting and needing to make sure she was safe and close at hand.

  He’d never believed that any woman could have such a hold over him, but since Isabella had come to the ranch, he’d not even thought of other women, much less wanted to see one. She was changing his life, and there didn’t seem to be a thing he could do to stop it. Moreover, he didn’t want to stop it.

  “Ross? Everyone is waiting.”

  The impatient sound of his sister’s voice finally reached his deep thoughts and he turned to look at her bemused face. “What were you saying?”

  Victoria exchanged a knowing look with her husband. “We were talking about Steve. None of us can understand why he went so…crazy.”

  “Well, he never was one of the sharpest men I’ve known,” Jess commented.

  Ross shrugged, still reluctant to accept the fact that an employee and friend had turned on him in such an evil way. “No. I guess some people would call Steve a little slow-thinking. But he was a decent worker and I liked him.”

  The sadness in his voice prompted Isabella to reach over and touch his arm. He looked at her and smiled, grateful that she understood the mixture of anger and hurt he was feeling toward Steve.

  At the end of the table, Alona said, “I can’t understand why he shot Jess if it was you he had it in for in the first place.”

  Ross turned his attention to Isabella’s mother. “Well, it turns out that Steve has done quite a bit of talking since he landed in jail. And as unbelievable as it might sound, he thought he was shooting at me instead of Jess.”

  “Couldn’t he see the difference?” Naomi asked.

  “I don’t suppose he could,” Ross went on to explain. “He saw Jess and Victoria from a distance through the sliding doors in my bedroom, and, thinking it was me and Victoria riding away from the ranch, he grabbed my rifle from the cabinet and followed.”

  Incredulous, Neal asked, “What were his intentions? To kill you?”

  Ross shrugged. “I don’t know. Whatever his plans were, he must have gotten scared after the shooting and threw the rifle down near the arroyo.”

  Victoria was completely floored. “He was in your bedroom? What was Steve doing in your bedroom?”

  Ross arched a brow at his brother-in-law. “You haven’t told her any of this?”

  The under-sheriff shook his head. “No. I thought you should be the one to tell everyone the details.”

  Drawing in a deep breath, Ross glanced at Isabella and then at the other waiting faces around the table. “Well, I guess you could say Steve resented me for several reasons. One, he wanted Linc’s job as head wrangler.”

  Linc’s head jerked up in complete surprise. “My job? He said he wanted my job?”

  Ross dismissed the notion by batting the air with his hand. “The guy was crazy. You’re family. Plus you know more about horses than any man I’ve ever known. And that includes Tucker. There wasn’t an ice cube’s chance in hell that he could get your job.”

  “You said he resented you for several reasons. What were the others?” Isabella asked.

  Ross grimaced. “He saw me as the rich guy who had everything. Including the woman he wanted.”

  Isabella’s brows lifted with speculation. Victoria’s lips pressed together as she leaned across the table toward her brother.

  “Ross,” Victoria said with a rueful groan, “don’t tell me all this is because of one of your affairs!”

  He held up both hands to ward off his sister’s accusations. “Just stop right there, Sis. I’m not guilty. I’m only slightly acquainted with the woman—Angela Bowers. You al
l know her. She came here to the ranch that day you and Jess rode to the arroyo. If you remember, I’d just come in from my trip that day. When she came to the door, I was trying to have lunch and deal with a horse trader on the telephone. She wanted to talk to me about raising funds for the Cattlemen’s Ball. We talked for about fifteen or twenty minutes and then she left. That’s all there was to it, but apparently Steve saw her here at the house and thought something more was going on between us. From what Steve told the law, Angela apparently wouldn’t date him because she had a crush on me. That’s why he snuck into my bedroom, to see if she’d been in the room with me.”

  Isabella looked at him with sudden dawning. “That night—at the Cattlemen’s Ball—Steve made a comment to me about you getting all the women. He must have been upset about you dancing with Angela. But I—I never made the connection.” She shook her head. “It sickens me now to think that I danced with the man.”

  “Don’t feel bad,” Victoria told her. “Steve fooled all of us.”

  “In any case, he must have been a sick individual,” Neal commented.

  “Something in his head twisted off, all right,” Ross grimly agreed. “But at least he can’t hurt anybody else now.”

  With a satisfied nod, Neal lifted his wineglass. “I’ll drink to that. It’s about time you Ketchums had things going your way.”

  “I’ll second that,” Ross agreed with his old friend.

  Everyone around the table reached for their glasses to drink a toast. From the corner of her eye, Isabella noticed Victoria had turned an especially tender look on her husband.

  “Don’t you think it’s time we told them?” she asked.

  Nodding, Jess reached over and folded his wife’s hand in his.

  Ross’s brows arched with curiosity as he looked at the two of them. “What now? You’ve found something new about Noah Rider’s murder?”

  Victoria’s eyes were suddenly glowing with excitement while Jess smiled with unabashed pride.

  “No,” Victoria said with a smug smile. “It’s nothing about that. Jess and I are going to have a baby.”