Christmas Cowboy

by Claire Adams

  “Holy shit. Where the hell’s it coming from?”

  “Well, my contacts can only go so far since they aren’t the authorities or anything, but Bill had a great deal of debt regarding his farm. Banks were turning him down for loans, and his credit cards were through the roof. At one point in time, he’d taken out and maxed out twelve different card accounts for his ranch alone.”

  “Are you serious?” I asked.

  “As a heart attack,” he said.

  I leaned back into my chair and tried to process all of that. I wasn’t an idiot, but that entire scenario reeked of something illegal. You don’t climb out of that type of debt in a short period of time, and it had to have been quick payoffs in order for Mike to come to me with it.

  “How long did it take to—”

  “He had the debt for four years, then paid it all off within seven months,” he said. “The entire thing smells of money laundering.”

  “How do you know?” I asked.

  “If he’s been doing it for this long, paying off this kind of debt, and not raising any flags, then the money is coming from somewhere that looks legitimate. All that stuff is watched by the government, especially the large transactions he is making on a regular basis. For him to not have already been flagged and had an audit, it would have to have come from a legal source and all with a decent explanation that didn’t raise any flags.”

  “Like funneling money from a charity into a personal account,” I said.

  “Exactly.”

  “Does Bill happen to own any charities?” I said with a smirk.

  “Like I said, my contacts can only dig so far before they start breaching boundaries of legality, but it’s some pretty serious cash.”

  “I mean, that’s all well and good, but what would money laundering have to do with burning a barn down?” I asked.

  “Still convinced it was him that torched your girlfriend’s barn?”

  “Cheyenne’s not my girlfriend, and yes, it’s the only plausible explanation,” I said.

  “Well, I’m honestly not sure. I’m good at digging for information and piecing together facts I can find. Those are the facts, and that’s what it smells like to me. It might not be the motive for burning down a barn, but it sure as hell explains his outbursts over suddenly being in the public eye because of what PETA posted online. It went viral.”

  “And it would raise a flag. Do you think all these people that back him around here are being paid off somehow?” I asked.

  “Like I said, I deal in facts. This is all speculation, but again, it’s plausible,” he said.

  “Well, the security company is coming by tonight to install the cameras, so hopefully something will actually happen so I can catch this asshole on camera,” I said.

  “Have you talked to Cheyenne?”

  “As a matter of fact, I have. I went over there last night to talk with her, and everything’s alright.”

  “Uh huh,” he said with a grin. “Just how alright?”

  “I went over there to check on her and the barn, and I think I convinced her to hold off on the hasty rehoming of her horses,” I said.

  “Wow. That’s progress. Good job, Colt,” he said with a teasing tone. “You think she’ll stay?”

  “I think I convinced her to at least stay through the fundraiser. I told her I wanted to prove to her how much emotional and financial support this community had for her. She’s seen the terrible side of it, and she’s scared, but I convinced her to hang in there a bit longer.”

  “How’d you do that?” he asked.

  “Not the way you think,” I said.

  “You know I was a lawyer, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “So I can tell when you’re lying, right?” he asked.

  “Shut the hell up, Mike,” I said.

  “Anyway, what convinced her?” he asked again.

  “I told her I’d drive by in the evenings and at least check to make sure nothing was going on with her barn. I’m also taking one of my shotguns over just in case.”

  “That’s actually not a bad plan. She know how to shoot?”

  “I taught her a bit,” I said.

  “A single woman like her in the position she’s in needs to know how. Good on ya.”

  “She contact you about the horse at all?” I asked.

  “I told her I’d give her a call. I decided to build a different stall set up for him, and it should be ready in a day or so.”

  “Good, good. She’s really excited to give that horse to someone it’s comfortable with. From what she’s told me, that horse was bad off, and he seemed to be comfortable with you.”

  “He’s a beautiful horse. He’ll be well taken care of. I actually have a nephew that comes down to the ranch quite a bit. He has special needs, and I was planning on making it his horse; that’s why I’m setting up a special stall,” he said.

  “You should tell her that. She’d love that story,” I said.

  “Anyway, let me know how the installation of the cameras goes.”

  “You’ll know when I call you up to tell you he’s being strung up in my tree by his underwear, like a human piñata, and I might be in need a lawyer,” I said.

  Michael got up to leave, but a thought crossed my mind. If his legal contacts came across that information without breaking any laws, it might be enough information about Bill Coates to get the sheriff off his lazy ass and motivate him to actually investigate.

  “Hey, Mike?”

  “Yep?”

  “Did your contacts get all that shit on Coates legally?” I asked.

  “Uh huh. Why?”

  “If you passed it on to the sheriff, it might be enough to light a fire under his ass. You know, inspire him to do some decent investigating,” I said.

  “I like the way you think, Smith. Talk to you later.”

  I knew I needed to go help the kitchen prep for lunch and dinner tonight, but my head was reeling. I wanted to be there when the company installed the cameras, but I was technically supposed to be behind the bar tonight. Tiffany was slowly getting better, but I still had to really rely on Rick to get a lot of things done around the ranch, and I knew it could really use my touch until Tif got herself out of the cast.

  So, I took my contact book of employees and started calling to see if anyone could come in and work this evening. If I had the shifts covered and my chef could keep an eye on things, I could go help Rick before I went to see Cheyenne.

  And then I could use these damn cameras to catch the son of a bitch who I knew was still lurking around my place. There were times I came back from work and just knew I was being watched, but now I was going to be the one doing the watching.

  I just hoped they stuck to my ranch instead of migrating back over to Cheyenne’s.

  It was going to be no help to us if they weren’t doing anything under the watchful eye of my cameras.

  Chapter 29

  Cheyenne

  Colt’s words kept ringing in my head. The passion we shared had nothing to do with it, but it was the fire behind the truth of his words that I couldn’t get past. He was dead set on making sure I didn’t leave town, and the intensity in his eyes when he told me he wasn’t ready to let me go gave me the strength I needed to make the decision to stay. I called the neighboring sanctuaries and told them I was no longer in need of their services, and then I started packing my bags.

  If Colt was getting security cameras installed and he was this set on making sure I didn’t leave town, I felt safer staying with him. If things continued here with my barn and my animals, I had no way to catch who was doing it. But Colt told me cameras were supposed to be installed last night at his house, so if taking the target back to their home was necessary to catch who was doing this, I felt more courageous than ever about taking the fight back to them.

  He made me feel a way that Dexter never had. I didn’t just feel wanted and prized, but I also still felt I had my independence. He was never adamant about interjecting himself
into plans or into my home, and he was always courteous when it came to hearing me out. Even when I was storming off his property a few days ago, he never demanded that I listen. He simply kept trying to get a word in edgewise before he tried to convince me to stay.

  Not to listen to him. Not to do what he was telling me to do.

  Just to stay, and nothing else.

  Every time I saw him, a part of the wall I’d thrown up after I ran to Green Point in the first place eroded. Every time that beautiful cowboy hat came bobbing up my driveway and every time those thick, strong arms wrapped themselves around my body, a part of it crumbled to the ground. He was soaking me in attention I’d never received from a man, and I still felt his equal.

  I was folding clothes and putting them into my suitcase when I heard a loud knock at the door. I’d just gotten off the phone with Tiffany, who was ecstatic that I was heading back to the farm today, and I figured it was probably Colt who’d caught wind of the news.

  But when the knock turned into a bang, I felt the hair on my arm stand up on end.

  “Damn it, Cheyenne! Open this door!”

  Bill’s voice rang out into my home, and I remembered the gun Colt had brought me last night. He came around ringing my doorbell with a shotgun and shells in his hand, and even though I told him I didn’t want a gun on my property, he was insistent that I keep it.

  And now, I was glad he had persuaded me.

  “I know you’re in there! Open this fucking door!”

  I went downstairs and grabbed the gun out of the closet I had stuck it in, and stuffed rounds into it. Then I propped it up in the hallway before I grabbed the doorknob. I wanted it away from me, so Bill didn’t think I was going to be an aggressor, but I wanted him to know it was present so it didn’t shock him if I grabbed it.

  But when I opened the door and saw him, I knew then and there that his strength wouldn’t be an issue. He looked like hell frozen over and resurrected. His eyes were sunken in, and massive dark bags hung underneath them. He’d lost weight, his eyes were red, and he had his shirt on inside out. His hair was greasy, and his nails had dirt caked underneath. Though I’m not proud of this, part of me smiled inwardly with triumph.

  He finally got to understand a bit of how his horses felt when he mistreated them.

  “You’ve ruined me,” he said, with a grumble. “I’m done for in this town. You and your, your phone calls and your pranks and your jokes. You think you can get away with all this shit?”

  I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about, but I wasn’t about to let on to that. As long as he didn’t breach the doorway of my home, I’d be fine. But the moment he stepped foot into my foyer, it was game on.

  “Well, by the looks of it, I’d say you’ve finally gotten a taste of what you put your horses through, Mr. Coates.”

  “You listen here, you little bitch. I know what you’ve been doing around my farm. Sabotaging things and letting my horses out of their stalls. I’ll have you arrested and taken away in chains! You’ve ruined me!”

  I had absolutely no idea why he was acting this way. Letting out his horses? Pranks? It sounded like those damn teenagers no one ever arrested had gotten onto his property. But even if he was talking about the horse he’d killed when he set my barn on fire, it didn’t quite make sense. Yes, the horse brought him money, but it was most certainly not his only money-making horse, nor anywhere near the horse that brought him the greatest income. The part that bothered me was that he had never even told the sheriff, which made me believe they were in cahoots more than I thought before this point.

  While it was a big deal to me that I lost that horse, I had no idea why it had become such a big deal to him. To Bill, everything was about the bottom line, bringing in money and getting the greatest return he could. That horse lost him maybe four hundred a month, if even that. To a man like Bill, who was bringing in enough money to soup up his farm the way he had, what the hell was he complaining about?

  “Bill, I’m honestly not sure what you’re—”

  “Stop with your lies!” he roared.

  He was screaming like a madman. His finger was in my face, and his neck was turning red with anger, and before I could ask him what the hell he was talking about, he reached out and grabbed my arm. I squealed at how tight his grip was, digging into my flesh while his nails broke my skin into bloodied crescents. I tried to wrench away from him, but all he did was follow me into my home. Then, all at once, I felt something inside me snap.

  I stomped my heel down on his foot, and he reeled back in pain. His hand dropped my arm, and I could feel blood rising to the surface of the skin. Before I knew it, the shotgun was propped up onto my shoulder and leveled between his eyes.

  “Get the hell off my property, Coates,” I said.

  “Or what? You gonna shoot me?”

  I fired a warning shot by his feet, and he jumped all the way out to the middle of my porch.

  “You crazy coot! You come onto my property and wreak havoc on my finances and my horses, and then you get to shoot me when I confront you on your property?”

  “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, and I don’t care. Get off my property right now, and I won’t call the sheriff and tell him how I got these marks on my arm. Take another step into my home, and we won’t need the sheriff. We’ll need the coroner.”

  “Tough words from a little lady,” he said.

  “Rough look for a horse killer,” I said.

  “I didn’t set your barn on fire, and I didn’t kill that horse! You did, and you know it! We all know you set your own damn barn on fire just to get the insurance money!”

  “I did no such thing, and you know it. Now, you’ve got one more chance to get off my property.”

  “Or what?”

  I cocked my gun, and he involuntarily took a step back. I walked all the way to the doorframe, and he backed down the steps of my porch. I was done with him; I was done with his intimidation tactics. My next problem was to figure out how in the world I was going to cover up my arm so Colt didn’t see it.

  God help this man if Colt figured out he had made me bleed.

  “If I ever see you on my property again, for any reason, I’ll come out gun first. We don’t do business, we don’t trade transactions, and we aren’t helpful neighbors. Get out.”

  I could see the anger bubbling behind his eyes, but he finally turned and headed for his truck. I kept Colt’s gun trained on him all the way back to his truck. I wasn’t taking any chances that he’d double back and take me by surprise. When his truck finally disappeared in the distance, I felt comfortable lowering the gun.

  The bleeding on my arm had stopped, but now I had to figure out what I was going to tell Colt whenever he saw it. It obviously looked like someone had gripped right down into my arm, and part of me honestly wasn’t sure I wanted to hide it. I told Bill I wouldn’t take it to the sheriff, but if Colt saw it and reported it, maybe it would force the sheriff off his ass to do some investigating into Bill Coates anyway.

  Another problem I had was what to do with the damage I’d done to my floor by firing a shotgun in the house.

  I went back upstairs and grabbed my suitcase before I put the shotgun back in the closet. I’m sure Colt wouldn’t mind if I kept it around a bit longer, just until things calmed down. I stepped over to my kitchen sink and cleaned out the crescent-shaped wounds Bill left on my arm and saw that the bruise outlining his harsh grip was already starting to form on my skin.

  There was no way I’d be able to hide this from Colt, and I had no idea how I was going to manage the situation once he saw it.

  I decided to grab a light jacket for my arms. The fall air was crisp enough for a jacket and smelled of blooming apples and fresh hay, which helped me settle down. I locked everything up behind me before I went out to my barn, and I checked out everything just to make sure nothing was there that shouldn’t be. I didn’t want spiders or snakes or anything else popping up on me before I brought these hor
ses home, and I was excited when I saw the builders were almost done building and painting the barn.

  I didn’t want to bring any of my horses back over from Colt’s ranch until I knew they would be safe with me, and that meant catching whoever was doing all of this.

  I threw my suitcase into the back of my truck and climbed on in. I rolled the windows down and let the air blow through my hair. For the entire drive to Colt’s, the only thing I could think about was how adamant Bill had been about not burning down my barn. While he still had a very serious motive—and I wouldn’t put it past him with his temper—highly emotional situations like our encounter always brought out the brutal honesty in everyone.

  Coupled with the fact that Colt was certain the person that he’d seen around his barn was not Bill, a flicker of doubt caused me to wonder if Coates wasn’t actually the one behind what was going on after all. I figured Bill had initially set my barn on fire because I’d called PETA and that he’d intentionally killed his horse so they couldn’t prove that he’d abused it, but the truth was PETA wouldn’t have come to my farm to investigate that one horse.

  They went to his farm and investigated the rest of his animals, just like they should have.

  I still wasn’t fully convinced, especially considering how aggressive he just gotten against me. The mark on my arm that I could feel pulsing with pain was proof enough that Bill was trouble and nothing else. But I was beginning to waver in my confidence in his guilt regarding my barn for the first time since all this started.

  That’s when I realized I needed to tell Colt about the encounter.

  Which meant telling him about my arm.

  Chapter 30

  Colt

  “He did what?”

  “Colt. Calm down.”

  “Calm down? Cheyenne, he put his hands on you. This is done. He’s crossed a line he should’ve never crossed.”

  Cheyenne pulled up into my driveway, got out of her car, and ran into my arms, and neither of us cared if Tif was watching. All I knew was that she was back on the property and that it meant she was staying, that she trusted everything I’d told her that night, and that I’d be able to take care of her this way.