Undercover Cowboy

by Lynde Lakes

  Tears pushed at the back of her eyes. Oh, God. A woman was dead. Was she alive before the killer sliced away her face? The tears Sara Jane fought to hold back escaped and rolled down her cheeks. Angry at her weakness, she roughly brushed them away and forced her mind onto her encounter with the urban cowboy with the dangerous green eyes. She’d left him alone with the body. That would give him time and opportunity to destroy or steal evidence. Darn. She should have grabbed the bracelet. But after seeing the raw flesh…She gagged, and forced the horrible image from her mind. Thank the Lord she’d escaped with her life. It proved she could take care of herself.

  She couldn’t wait to tell her dad that! A chill slipped up her spine. Was Dad psychic when he’d ordered her not to leave the compound alone? Even with his ties to the FBI, he couldn’t have known about the murder, yet something had him worried. He’d bucked like he had a burr under his saddle when she’d merely asked for the keys to the horse-trailer.

  After galloping about two miles, Sara Jane abruptly pulled back on the reins. Demon stopped and glanced back at her with soulful brown eyes. “Sorry, Demon,” she said as she flipped open her cell phone. She usually held the reins lightly, guiding her champion horse with only the slightest movement of her hands, legs, and weight. But something in her had snapped, and she couldn’t calm down. If she alerted the sheriff now, he could meet her at the ranch house, and they could ride back together to where the body waited.

  She punched in the number. All she got was static. Blast it. She was in one of those pockets where the cell phone was useless. She felt like throwing the danged contraption into the nearest ravine. But when it worked, it made life a heck of a lot easier on a huge spread like theirs. She dug her heels into Demon’s side, urging him onward again. She glanced toward the rolling rocky formation called Endless Cave. The cave was another place Dad had forbidden her to go. No resentment came at the thought. This was one time she wished he was riding alongside her. Finding a body on Ryan land was bad enough. But to find one with the face torn off gave her the willies. Who was the redhead, and what was she doing on Ryan land? And why did she have a bracelet that looked identical to her missing one?

  Earlier Sara Jane had believed that her dad was totally unreasonable and paranoid when he restricted her to the compound. After all, she was a grown woman with an A.A. in animal husbandry, a slew of rodeo medals, and her own horse-training business. A venture that could be on solid ground in no time if he would stay the heck out of her way.

  Today was the first time she had out and out defied her dad. Following rules had always been a way of life in the Ryan family. Her dad and Uncle Luke had always cautioned both her and her slightly older cousin Alicia about going out alone in the scrub. They had to have a ranch hand or family member with them on all of their trail rides. Dad’s explanation was that even the best riders get thrown.

  While true, she and Cousin Alicia didn’t buy it as the real reason. Alicia often claimed that they had been kidnapped when they were little and that two kidnappings in one family had made their parents more paranoid than most. Sara Jane loved her cousin too much to outright call her a liar. But Alicia did have a tendency to dramatize, and no one backed up her story. Two children kidnapped in the same family didn’t sound likely, but her parents’ over-protectiveness from babyhood might explain her own inherent distrust of strangers.

  Up ahead, beyond a low place in the trail, lay a circle of giant boulders, the leavings of an ancient glacier. Devil’s Circle had always been a place of intrigue and mystery. The whinny of a horse carried on the hot breeze. A chill slid down her spine. She stiffened. Fighting goose flesh, she fumbled for her cell phone. With trembling fingers she once again punched in the sheriff’s number. Still nothing.

  Galloping hooves thundered toward her. Gusts of dust spiraled up from the desert floor as two men with red bandannas over their faces charged her from the front and wedged her horse between theirs. The wiry rider with long arms grabbed for her. She fought him off while trying unsuccessfully to draw her gun. The brawny guy lifted his rifle and swung it at her. She ducked. The butt grazed the side of her forehead. Fighting dizziness, she gave Demon the quick signals to stop, rise, and twist. The rodeo trick she and Demon had made famous at Buck’s rodeo last year worked. The men’s horses reared and backed away. She dug her heels into Demon’s flanks and reined him into a U-turn and headed back the way she’d come, with the bushwhackers in hot pursuit.

  The thunder of hooves pounded behind her—and toward her!

  Stunned, she blinked at the rider galloping her way. It was the urban cowboy she had thought she’d left stranded. Was he with the men chasing her? Three against one made lousy odds. He pulled a gun and, to her surprise, fired at her pursuers. Not one to look a gift-horse in the mouth, she abruptly reined Demon to her left and headed through a grove of mesquite. She fought down a twinge of guilt for abandoning her knight-in-dude-ranch-clothes. Likely, the whole rescue was a setup. Probably shooting at those guys was a ruse to make her feel safe so she’d let her guard down. Once she cleared the low trees, she headed down a gully in a fast gallop.

  ****

  Cursing his bad luck, Nick took cover behind a boulder and returned fire. What was it about Rodeo Girl that drew trouble to her at every turn? And what force kept dragging him into the middle it? When he managed to wing one of the men, both took off, obviously finding him more potentially deadly than a lone girl. He looked around. There was no sign of her. Saving herself was smart. But it would’ve been an even fight if she’d stayed. He was still mad as hell at her for running his horse off and leaving him stranded. Thank God he could count on Jazgirl. He shook his head. He hadn’t expected a tough cookie like that little miss to back down and leave him in the lurch. Again. Maybe she believed he was part of the ambush. That thought didn’t make him like Miss Rodeo one bit more.

  ****

  Finally feeling safe and knowing that she was now within cell phone range, Sara Jane reined in Demon and called the sheriff. Her gaze scanned the countryside as she gave him the details of everything that had happened and the general locations. “Your nose and the buzzards should lead you right to the body. But meet me at the ranch house, and I’ll show you exactly where it is.”

  “Take you up on that,” the sheriff said, with a heavy dose of Texas twanging in his voice. “Me and my men will fly in by chopper. Have your vaqueros saddle us a half dozen mounts. Should be there by two.”

  She flipped her cell phone closed and looked at her watch. That would give her plenty of time to explain everything to Dad before the lawmen arrived. He’d be home. He had planned to spend the day in his den, working on the ranch books. Besides that, he expected a couple of friends to show up, one from California, the other from Washington, DC, guys he’d worked with on a hush-hush FBI assignment last year. She hated that secret part of her dad’s life. Mom insisted that the family had to live with it, that our country needed him now and then. She was proud of him, but when he went off on some mission, she never slept well until he returned. Sure as heck, she’d never marry a FBI man; even occasional assignments wouldn’t work for her. The worry about her dad’s safety had always been too great.

  Only when the family home—a massive Spanish villa standing off by itself on a small knoll, with pillars, wraparound porch, and balconies—came into view, did Sara Jane allow herself to wonder again about the tenderfoot. What if he wasn’t with those men and she’d left him alone to be hurt or killed? It wasn’t like her to abandon someone in trouble, especially someone who’d helped her, but she couldn’t take a chance that he was with her attackers.

  Minutes later, Sara Jane rushed into her father’s den high on adrenaline and breathing hard. “Dad, there’s a dead—” Her throat constricted as her dad and the man with him turned. It was the urban cowboy! “What’s he doing here?” she demanded.

  The tenderfoot she’d left stranded twice narrowed his eyes. “It’s you!” An angry red blotch crawled up his jaw.

  �
��Hold up,” Dad said, frowning at the spot on her face that was sore as the dickens. “We’ll sort this all out in a minute.” He crossed the room, his expression tight with worry. He held her at arm’s length and swore under his breath. “Your face is bruised!” He reached for the phone. “I’ll get the doc.”

  “No!” She stepped back. “I’m fine.”

  He tightened his jaw. “Are you sure?” When she assured him she was, he said, “You wouldn’t have gotten that if you’d listened to me.”

  “I listened!” Heat burned her cheeks and she fought to rein in her temper. “But I’m twenty, Dad, not two. Why are we discussing me in front of a stranger?” She tilted her head toward the greenhorn whose red flush had been replaced by an amused look. She’d like to slap that self-satisfied expression right off his face. She lifted an eyebrow. “Did this urban cowboy tell you about the woman he killed? I called Sheriff Bemis. He’ll be here by two.”

  “I know,” Dad admitted. “I talked to Cody after Nick told me about the murder.”

  “Confession’s good for the soul,” she said, lifting her chin and glaring at Nick. “Is Nick your nickname or an alias?”

  Nick just glared back.

  Dad arched a severe eyebrow. “Cool it, Sara Jane.” As usual, her father intended to control the conversation. “As you’ve no doubt started to figure out,” he told her, “Nick isn’t a murderer.” Silver glistened in Dad’s salt-and-pepper hair as he nodded toward his guest. “He’s my friend from LA. Meet Nicholas Reed, one of the Bureau’s best agents.” He met Nick’s gaze. “And this is Sara Jane, the light of my life and the reason I’m prematurely graying.”

  “Thanks, Dad. Shall I fetch some rocks from outside so you can throw them at me along with your not-so-subtle barbs?”

  Dad laughed. “Didn’t I tell you she was a spirited girl?”

  “Woman!” she corrected.

  Frowning, Nick stuck out his hand, looking like he’d rather stick it in flames. She considered ignoring his gesture, but he was, after all, her father’s guest and her ingrained Texas hospitality won over her desire to show the hostility that he seemed to bring out in her. Her eyes widened as he clasped her hand in a warm, sliding grip that ended in a near bone-crushing squeeze that registered as both warlike and strangely sensual. She yanked her hand back as heat and electrical currents charged up her arm.

  Furious, she looked him up and down, noting with some displeasure that Nick-the-green-horn had the same tall, lean good looks and wide shoulders as her dad, who, according to Mom, still looked as handsome as the day she’d married him. Dad was handsome, all right, but his controlling ways could be a royal pain, and Sara Jane had a hunch that Nick was even worse.

  “Thanks for saving me from those bushwhackers today,” she muttered, not certain how she could feel resentful, grateful and guilty all at the same time. She refused to admit, even to herself, that the thrill that slithered through her was a more dangerous emotion than the other three. “I would’ve hung around to help, but I thought you might be with them.”

  He gave a humorless laugh. “That’s as good an excuse as any.”

  Dad held up his hands like a referee. “Hey, would you too quit tongue-dueling long enough to—”

  “Tongue what?” Sara Jane’s mom, Molly, demanded, as she sailed through the doorway, her clean, flowery scent following her. Her tone rang with her usual curiosity and a hint of mock outrage.

  Red crawled up Dad’s neck as though he hadn’t realized that his comment had a sexual connotation. Sara Jane fought to conceal a smile. What made it so darn funny was she knew he didn’t ever want to think of her even kissing a man, let alone French kissing one.

  Mom laughed as though the same thought occurred to her. “The sheriff and his men are here,” she said, never missing a beat. “They’re waiting on the porch, raring to go.” Obviously planning to go along, Mom wore jeans and boots and had her camera bag slung over her shoulder. To reporter-mom, viewing a body was right down her alley. She gave Sara Jane a brief hug and spied the bruise. “Honey, what happened?”

  “It’s nothing.” She refused to give them an excuse to leave her at home.

  Mom rolled her eyes and touched the French knot of her auburn hair, sprinkled with silver threads and exchanged one of those looks with Dad that always made Sara Jane feel like an outsider. She wanted what they had with each other and probably would never find it.

  On that discouraging note, Sara Jane spun and rushed out to greet the lawmen, her parents and Nick following.

  Her best buddy, Uncle Luke, tall, lean and handsome, in spite of the tip missing from one of his ears, was deep in conversation with Sheriff Bemis. Bemis, short with a roll of fat around his middle, had a pig face that miraculously his young wife found attractive. Some people thought money had drawn a girl twenty years his junior to him, but Sara Jane didn’t think he had enough real wealth to account for the attraction. In her book, Margie really cared for the ol’ guy. Why not? He was honest, completely faithful, and treated the blonde beauty like a queen.

  The sheriff’s men, who were in the process of saddling up, were between thirty and forty years of age. She wondered which one of them would be appointed sheriff when Bemis retired in six months to take that tour of the world that he promised his young bride. Not that it mattered to her. All the deputies were very married, as were most of the men around these parts who were worth their salt. Ed Carper and Joe Fredericks, the forensics specialists on the sheriff’s team, loaded their bulky equipment bags onto a packhorse with practiced efficiency.

  Aunt Amber, already mounted on Cloudmaker, looked eager to get going. She and Mom, although not related, looked so much alike they could have been sisters and were as close. Dad introduced Nick to the sheriff and his men, praising Nick’s FBI work and his forensics experience. “We’re both ready to help in any way we can,” Dad added.

  It struck Sara Jane how alike her dad and the urban cowboy were. They were both top men in their fields. The difference was—Dad was no tenderfoot. He was a successful rancher who loved the land and the life that came with it.

  Dad helped Mom mount up and tightened her cinch. When he looked up at her, he winked. Mom smiled like there was no one in the world but the two of them. Sara Jane fought her familiar closed out feeling. Aunt Amber was just as in love with Uncle Luke, and his eyes sparkled every time he looked at her. Even Alicia had a boyfriend. Well, actually lots of them. Sara Jane was the only one who had no one. And she liked it that way just fine! She gave a sidelong glance at Nick and lifted her chin.

  Nick swung smoothly onto his mare. Sara Jane rolled her eyes. So, he could mount a horse. Big deal. He was still a greenhorn. The way he slid his lean hips into the saddle sent a surge of desire though her. Darn hormones!

  She joined the lead with the men. After a few minutes, Dad scowled at her. “You ride in the center with your mom and Aunt Amber. It’s safer.”

  Sara Jane blew at a wisp of hair. “But I found the body!”

  “Go. I want to talk to Nick alone.”

  Cursing under her breath, she dropped back with the women. She wanted to tell her dad about the dead woman wearing her missing bracelet. But he didn’t want to hear what she had to say and arguing with him now would only make her sound like a petulant child and amuse Nick, who rode beside him, far too much.

  The sheriff’s five men brought up the rear. Her new position put her right behind Nick. For a tenderfoot, he rode remarkably tall in the saddle. His shoulders were wider than Dad’s and Uncle Luke’s, and that made them really impressive. Too bad Nick wasn’t a real cowboy, someone who loved ranching. What was she thinking? With luck, he’d finish his visit with Dad and be on his way by tomorrow. Good riddance. She hated everything attached to the FBI. It was that bunch who always pulled her dad away for some dangerous job. She hoped that wasn’t what this visit was about.

  She couldn’t keep her eyes off Nick. He rode like he’d been born on a horse, his tight butt riding the saddle leather as thoug
h he were a part of it, horse and man moving in a captivating rhythm. Sara Jane’s heart quickened, and she lifted her gaze to the back of his head. He removed his Stetson and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. Sunlight glistened on Nick’s inky hair. He had no business being so fine looking. Darn it. She didn’t want to have these feelings.

  She took a deep breath, taking in smells of earth and animals. From flat ranch land to rocky bluffs and purple mountains this was her home…but not his. Still, as much as she tried, she couldn’t deny that this FBI urban cowboy fascinated her. And that scared her to death.

  ****

  Nick made it a point to stay close to Matt as they picked up their pace and moved ahead of the others. They hadn’t finished their talk, and he needed to iron out a few details. When he was sure they were out of earshot of the others, he took a deep breath and plunged in. “From what I’ve seen of Sara Jane, I think it’s a mistake to keep her in the dark.” He’d swear he felt the heat of her gaze on him. “If you’d just tell her about the threats, I’m sure—”

  Matt laughed without humor, cutting him off. “You spent less than ten minutes with my daughter and already you know her better than I do?”

  “Of course not, but like she said, she’s twenty and capable of—”

  “She’s capable of getting herself killed,” he growled. “If there’s a fight, she’s always in the middle of it.”

  Nick tightened his jaw. “Maybe you don’t know her as well as you think. When I stepped into the trouble today, she took off, leaving me to handle it. That doesn’t sound like a girl hell-bent to confront danger at all costs.”

  “She thought you were one of them. If you’d been a friend, she would’ve stayed and fought by your side, even if it killed her.”

  Nick didn’t see it that way. Sara Jane seemed like a girl used to having her own way, one who would protect herself first. He ached to tell Matt that, but he didn’t want to destroy a father’s illusions about his courageous, fearless daughter.