The Black Sheep and the Hidden Beauty

by Donna Kauffman

  “Your boyfriend is still alive.” He wiggled the gun. “But we could change that.” His face brightened when she immediately started down the ladder. “Ah, I see we’ve found your bargaining chip. Well, I believe that will work both ways.”

  “You won’t get away with anything here,” she said.

  “I’m fairly certain I already have,” he said, then shocked her by suddenly grabbing her hair and yanking her against him, her back to his chest. Her scalp on fire, an instant later she also felt the cold muzzle of his gun against her temple. His voice next to her ear made her shudder. “Do not test me more than you already have.” His fist was still in her hair, and tears sprang to the corners of her eyes as he gave it a vicious twist. “Now, I will release you, and you will do as I say, when I say. Are we understood?” To underscore the question, he tugged her even more tightly back against him.

  “Yes,” she choked out.

  “Good,” he said quite pleasantly, and released her as suddenly as he’d grabbed her.

  She staggered forward and landed hard on her hands and knees on the packed dirt floor of the barn.

  “Get up. Time is precious. We must go.”

  She scrambled up, wanting to keep her eye on him at all times. “Go where?”

  “Why, to retrieve your horse, of course.”

  Relief filled her. Springer was okay. “Where is she?”

  He frowned and waggled his gun at her. “Don’t think to toy with me on this. I’m quite clear on the situation, and the pawns involved. I’ve removed two. I can remove more.”

  Two. That was the second time he’d said that. Kenny! “Who—” She had to break off, clear the sudden lump from her throat. “Who is the other one?”

  Now his eyes widened. “Which do you know about?”

  “Johansson,” she said, not seeing the point in keeping that information secret. “Who else did you shoot?” She’d said it perhaps a bit too stridently, but her heart was pounding so hard she could hardly hear over it, and hysteria was edging up her throat, squeezing it tight.

  Perhaps sensing this, he gave her what she asked for. “Your boyfriend’s errand boy.”

  Mac? No, that couldn’t be. “Aaron,” she blurted out, as she realized who else it could be.

  “Is that his name? Matters little now.”

  “Is he—”

  “Dead? Perhaps. Though I’d hoped not, as I planned to use him for leverage. I’ve looked into your boyfriend’s little business here, and it seems he has a thing for loyalty. I am counting on that going both ways. However, now I have a much bigger piece of bait to dangle. Come on now, we’re wasting precious time.”

  “Where is he? Where is Aaron?”

  “Somewhere safe.”

  “Where is Kenny? Is he with Springer?”

  He just looked at her for a moment, then laughed. “Very good. But don’t try your amateur tactics on me.”

  “I’m very serious. Where is he? Where is Springer? Where did you take them? Are they okay?” It all fell into place, or part of it did, anyway. JuanCarlo had access to huge horse trailers at Charlotte Oaks. Between an Oaks rig and Kenny’s, the horses could all have been moved in just a couple trips. “Did Kenny help you?”

  “Hardly. But then, you know of that very well. I will not tell you again—do not toy with me regarding this, Elena. You and your vet friend have made your good attempt, but it will not succeed.” He stepped closer, aiming the gun at her chest, then lifting it to her head. “So let’s stop wasting time, shall we?”

  “But, I—”

  She wasn’t given time to finish her sentence before JuanCarlo grabbed her elbow and shoved her roughly ahead of him. “Walking, no talking. Not until we are clear of this place. Given the ridiculous amount of security set up here, I do not trust your boyfriend and his cohorts not to have wired every last square foot.”

  He kept insisting Rafe was her boyfriend, and the hairs on her neck stood up as she wondered how long JuanCarlo had been skulking about. He had to have seen them together, and that had only been for a short time now. “How did you get onto the grounds?”

  “You want something badly enough, you find a way.” He spun her around and shoved her roughly with the muzzle of the gun. “No more questions. Only answers. Don’t play games, Elena. Too much is at stake. For you.”

  She didn’t say anything, but kept walking in front of him. The feel of the gun muzzle against her spine was enough to insure her silence. She hated having her back to him, but she tried to use the few minutes she had left before he took her away from here, to figure things out. It was a struggle just to think clearly. If JuanCarlo was the person behind this, then what was his motive? Unless he was working for someone else, but that someone could only be Gene, and if he knew she had Geronimo’s unborn foal, he’d have come for her directly, and probably personally, as it was rightfully his.

  People were dying, and people were missing. Horses were missing, namely hers. Which meant whoever wanted the baby had no more right to it than she did. And she had no doubt it was the baby they wanted. Or they’d have gone to Gene, or the police, and reported it.

  Something else was going on here.

  Think, Elena, think. As they left the barn and entered the rear paddock, she tried like hell to formulate any scenario that worked, but raw terror made clear, linear thought next to impossible. Being on the far side of the barn, her view of the pool house was blocked. Why, oh why, hadn’t she left a damn note? She had no idea how long Rafe would sleep, having only spent the one night together.

  Perhaps their only night, she thought, then immediately quashed that line of thinking.

  Likely he’d be up early, due to their situation. She could only hope he figured out that she’d been taken and hadn’t willingly gone off after her horse or something equally stupid. Except she had been stupid. Royally, and potentially fatally, stupid.

  They left the paddock and JuanCarlo pointed her in the direction of the trees that bordered the far side of the property. “That way.”

  “It’s still too dark—I can’t see. And I—”

  “Walk.”

  She stumbled over the uneven ground, thinking maybe there was some way to fake a fall, then wrestle the gun from him, but the risk was too high. She wasn’t sure how badly he needed her, and she wasn’t willing to find out the hard way.

  “Do you have a vehicle on the property?”

  “Through the trees,” he ordered, not answering her question.

  Her eyes slowly adapted to the shadows, but she still had to put her hands out in front of her to keep from getting hit with low branches. Twigs and leaves scratched at her arms and face, but she kept moving. Once they left the property, she knew her chances of survival greatly diminished. She knew who he was, knew he was involved. And he’d already killed. No way was he letting her go.

  Which meant she was dependent on Rafe to find her…or she had to find a way out herself. Since JuanCarlo wasn’t even on their radar, she doubted Rafe would come to the rescue. Which meant her survival, and possibly Springer’s, once again depended solely on her.

  Chapter 27

  Rafe rolled over and laid his arm across his bed. His empty bed. He came wide awake instantly, though it took him a second or two longer to process why he’d been so alarmed when sleeping alone was the norm for him. His subconscious had already adapted to having Elena by his side. Except, at the moment, she wasn’t.

  He looked to the bathroom, but no light shone. He slid his feet off the bed and stood, trying not to panic, despite what his gut was telling him. Then he noticed his shirt wasn’t lying on the floor, and smiled. Picturing her in his kitchen, wearing nothing more than his shirt, made him happy. It was going to be a difficult day at best. So perhaps starting it off with some alone time wasn’t such a bad idea.

  He stuck his head in his office, but there were no lights flashing, indicating incoming messages. So he wandered out to the kitchen, already formulating his plan for getting her back into his bed for a littl
e while longer.

  Only the kitchen was dark.

  As was the rest of the pool house. Without wasting another second, he moved swiftly and silently back to his bedroom, checked the bathroom, then immediately got dressed. He noted her overalls gone from the floor, and prayed like hell she’d just decided to get some air.

  Exiting the house, he saw right away that she wasn’t around the pool area. He looked down to the barns, the beginnings of sunrise casting it in an otherworldly glow. No sign of movement down there. Then he looked out to the far barn and realized she’d probably run home to get a change of clothes and maybe shower in her own place. He could understand her need for that, but he planned to make her aware, in no uncertain terms, that he really didn’t want her traipsing around alone, even on Dalton Downs property, until they resolved this. More than likely he’d meet her heading back; still, a note would have been nice.

  By the time he made it to the barn, he was running. His instincts were on full alert and he wasn’t taking any chances. Her ladder was down, but he didn’t allow himself to feel any relief until he laid eyes on her. He took the rungs two at a time, calling out her name.

  No response. Please let her be in the shower.

  She wasn’t. But she’d clearly changed clothes, as he found his shirt and her overalls on the floor by her closet. There had been no sign of a struggle, nothing looked out of place. He couldn’t even take time to register her personal space and take in whatever else it might have revealed about her.

  He all but leapt off the ladder and raced to the back paddock. Nothing. He slapped his pocket to get his phone and realized he’d left it in the pool house in his panic to find her. Panic was not a normal state for him. Ever. He needed to calm down, think rationally.

  He went back to the ladder, and started to look around for clues, but his racing in and back out had scuffed the dirt floor fairly well. Dammit! The dirt was so hard-packed it likely wouldn’t have told him much, but if there had been another set of footprints…

  He raced back to the paddock, where the ground was much softer, and his heart skipped several beats when he found the proof. Proof he really didn’t want to see. He’d rather be pissed off at her negligence than scared shitless. But there they were, two sets of footprints. Smaller…likely Elena’s. And larger. Clearly a man. But which man?

  He tracked the prints out of the paddock and a few steps toward the trees, but the dirt quickly gave way to grass, and it was still too dark to see any impressions. It looked as if they’d walked off into the woods.

  He swung around, looking back in the direction of the main house. It would be supremely foolish to race off with no form of communication on him. But time might be of the essence, and if anything happened to her because he’d wasted critical minutes retracing his steps, he’d never forgive himself. Torn, he realized that until it grew lighter, there would be no way to track through the trees, and the grove was wide enough, and dense enough, that they could have gone anywhere.

  Most likely, though, they’d gone to the edge of the property boundary, which was fenced with rail and both electric and sensory wire, but wouldn’t be impossible to circumvent. Plus, it was just another fifty yards or so through another stand of trees, then over a ravine, to the main road.

  It was the likeliest route, so that was the one he took. He could figure out where they’d gone over—or under—it after he got there.

  It wasn’t until he reached the fence line that he realized he was also unarmed. Christ, he was losing it. The fence was intact and the wire hot, so either they were still on the property, or whoever did this had figured out how to circumvent it. Going under the fence was the likeliest route, but digging in Virginia’s hard clay and rocky ground was difficult and unlikely to get done quickly or without triggering the sensor wire.

  He had no tools for either. Shit, he had no fucking tools of any kind, except his mind, and that had clearly deserted him the first time he’d laid eyes on Elena.

  He turned and headed back to the house, taking a beating on his forearms and face as he raced through the trees as fast as he could. Less than fifteen minutes later, he was armed and on the road heading out of Dalton Downs. He stopped at the end of the property lane and dialed up Mac.

  He picked up immediately. “What’s going on?”

  “Everything. Elena is gone, and I don’t know who has her, but I do know they’ve left the property. Fence line outside the apple grove beyond the far paddock.”

  “How’d they do that without tripping the sensor wires?”

  “Beats me—”

  “Unless they had help. Or planned this together. You’ve got to at least consider—”

  “Someone took her, Mac. The footprints show it was a man, and that she was walking a few paces ahead of him. Right in front of him. I don’t think they were playing follow the leader.”

  “Shit.”

  “Exactly. Nothing going on there?”

  “Not a peep.”

  Rafe fell silent and willed himself to think clearly, but found it more of a struggle than it had ever been before. Sick with worry, literally nauseous with it, he fought to rein in the panic. “What about Charlotte Oaks? What have you heard from down there?”

  “Nothing. I sent him in to do quick reconnaissance, but nothing out of the ordinary to report. The rebuilding is well under way and the bigger buildings mostly complete, but nothing looked out of the ordinary. No sense of anything awry that he could tell, but he’ll know more when he can get in there and listen to the general buzz from the workers, see if anything is being bandied about.”

  “We don’t have that much time. What is your gut on that?”

  “I think Dalton and here at Kenny’s are the two hot spots. We’ve got someone in place down there if we need him. My next suggestion for today was to scope out all the spreads between the two places, start looking to where Kenny might have taken his herd. Nothing popped on him at all? Nothing suspicious?”

  “Zip. Elena didn’t really know who he’d gotten close with, neighbor-wise, since moving up here. She doesn’t spend much actual time with him. He’s more old family friend than current confidante.”

  “No way to track who he’s talked to?”

  “I was going to dig into phone records today. It was too late to do anything about it last night.” He thought about that, then said, “I can’t go back in there and just sit and pound keys, Mac. She’s out there, going through God knows what. We have to figure this out, dammit! Where the hell is she?”

  “If we find the horse, we find her. And vice versa. The most common link is, obviously, Kenny. And Rafe, I know you swear she couldn’t be in on this, but—”

  “If I’m wrong, I have to live with it, okay? But whoever walked her out didn’t do it holding her hand. So we handle this as a hostile abduction.” Just saying that out loud almost had him throwing up. “We need the fucking helicopter. I tried to raise Finn last night, every which way I could. Nothing. So he’s either in so deep he can’t risk the communication, or—”

  “Let’s not go there. One of our tribe is already in danger.”

  Our tribe. “Thank you,” Rafe said, never so sincere.

  “I push because I have to, for you, and for her. But I know better than anyone where you are right now, and you have my word we’ll do whatever it takes.”

  “I owe you.”

  “Shut up. Now listen, I talked to Kate, picked her brain to see if she’d ever had any conversation with Elena about who she might still be in contact with besides Kenny, who could have inadvertently blabbed something, but she said Elena stayed pretty private about herself.”

  “She told no one.”

  “I understand, but now, with her gone, maybe we should check all the same, run her phone records, see if there has been any contact with anyone. Maybe we should check at Charlotte Oaks, too. Anything to give us a lead, a connection. If it’s not Kenny, then I don’t know where else to look. We could contact her old boss, use some story, and see wha
t he might know about who her friends were.”

  “If this is related to anything or anyone down there, it could trigger—”

  “She’s already gone, Rafe—I don’t think we can afford to play it safe. Maybe someone there knows something, anything, that might give us a lead as to who is doing this. She was there long enough. Someone might have a clue about friends, where she liked to hang out, who with. It’s a start.”

  “Yeah, yeah, okay.” He was tapping his foot in rapid-fire succession, hardly able to sit still. He realized now how it must have been for Elena all day yesterday, wanting to race across the countryside to hunt down her horse, but not knowing where to start.

  He was staring at the main road, and had no idea which way to turn. It was hours to Kenny’s in one direction, and double that distance to Charlotte Oaks in the other. “Call our standby pilots and get me a damn helicopter. I’ll head back to the house and start making calls. I want a bird on the platform before the sun clears the horizon.”

  “Done.”

  Chapter 28

  “Drive,” JuanCarlo said from the passenger seat.

  Elena was behind the wheel of a beige Charlotte Oaks pickup truck, with a madman next to her, pointing a gun at her head. And absolutely no idea where to take him. Gripping the wheel with both hands, she looked directly at him, and tried like hell not to look at the gun. “I don’t care if you want the baby, JuanCarlo. It’s yours. I just want my horse back. So you have to believe me when I say, if I knew where she was, I’d take you to her. I thought you took her. Or whoever was doing this—I didn’t know it was you. The only thing I can figure is that Kenny panicked for some reason and moved her. But I don’t know where. I don’t know his friends or contacts. We can start with the closest farms, but—”

  He jabbed the gun at her. “Liar! Don’t lie to me!” He was yelling now, and sounded more unhinged than he had since his surprise appearance. That scared her almost as much as the gun.

  “I’m not lying, JuanCarlo. I don’t want to die. I don’t want Springer to die. It’s why I took her away.”