“Listen to me, Nina. I don’t have time to explain. I’m at the cabin—the one above Dead Man’s Road.”
“Dead Man’s Road?”
“It’s the road out to the crime scene. The cabin is on the ridge above. Daniel told me to come here—”
“Daniel told you? Marcie, were you here? Did you see who shot Daniel?”
“I was…in the basement, taking a nap. I heard the shot, and then I heard a vehicle start up. When I came upstairs, Daniel was on the floor.” Marcie took a shaky breath. “I swear, Nina, I wanted to call a doctor, but Daniel told me to take his truck and get to safety. I didn’t want to leave him.”
“Marcie, tell me what…” Nina suddenly found herself empty-handed. Wyatt had grabbed her phone.
“Marcie,” he snapped. “It’s Wyatt Colter. Where are you?” He listened for a second, then turned his head toward the sheriff, who had pulled out his cell phone and was about to dial. He shook his head violently and held up a hand. “Don’t call anybody. Who’s at the crime scene this morning?”
“Shane,” Hardin replied.
Wyatt cursed. “Marcie, can you see the crime scene or the road? No? Well, Shane is on duty over there. You want us to call him?”
Nina heard Marcie’s terrified voice through the phone. “No! Please. Not Shane.”
“Okay, okay. I understand. We won’t. You stay put. I’m on my way.” Wyatt hung up and handed the phone back to Nina. “Damn it.”
Hardin spoke up. “I’ll get Kirby to head over there—”
“No. I’m going. Marcie knows I’m coming. Just be ready, in case I need backup.” Wyatt already had his keys in his hand and was headed for the door.
Nina followed him.
At the door, he turned, pinning her with those intense blue eyes. “What the hell are you doing?”
She stood up to him, refusing to be intimidated by his expression or his attitude. “Marcie was dead. Now she’s alive,” she said. “I have to see her.”
“There’s no way I’m taking you into such a potentially dangerous situation,” Wyatt replied.
She lifted her chin and gave him back stare for stare. “I will steal a car if I have to,” she said. “But I will see my friend. The only way you’re going to stop me is by arresting me or knocking me out.”
His eyes glinted dangerously, and for a small space of time, she almost believed he might accept her challenge. But in the next split second his gaze wavered, and she knew she’d won.
She didn’t have time to even sigh with relief, because Wyatt was out the door and loping to his Jeep. She barely made it into the passenger seat by the time he had the engine running and in reverse.
Neither one of them said anything on the way. Wyatt’s Jeep ate up the roads, kicking up clouds of white dust. It hadn’t rained since that first night.
Nina’s seat belt strained against her midsection as Wyatt careered onto Dead Man’s Road and immediately took an abrupt turn up a steep back road.
Several bumpy, dusty moments later, Nina saw a weathered cabin through a stand of trees.
Wyatt stopped the car. “Stay here.”
“Fat chance, cowboy.” Nina’s heart was pounding in anticipation of seeing her friend. Marcie had lied, she’d broken the law, she’d pretended to be dead, but Nina still loved her.
Marcie was her friend.
Wyatt grunted but didn’t say anything else until they were out of the Jeep and headed toward the front door. “You think you can stay by my side?”
“It would be my pleasure,” she murmured.
Wyatt sent her an intense sidelong glance. An odd expression lit his face, but as soon as it had appeared, it was gone, and he was back to being the tough, brave Texas Ranger. He drew his weapon. “We’ll go in on this side of the cabin. There’s only one window, so there’s less likelihood that they’ll spot us.”
“It’s just Marcie. Why…?”
His hand went up, palm out. “Follow my orders or go back to the car.”
Nina bit her lip. “Yes, sir.”
“When I move, you move. Not before. If I do this—” he held up his fist at shoulder height “—you stop, and don’t move until I wave you forward. Got it?”
“Got it.”
Nina’s answer was drowned out by the crack of a gunshot, which shattered the silent air around them. She heard a thud to her right. A puff of dust or smoke rose from the trunk of a tree not three feet away.
Before she could react, two more shots split the air. One of them came close enough that her heart jolted hard in her chest—so hard it could have been a blow.
Wyatt’s hand wrapped around her wrist and pulled her down beside him. She hadn’t even noticed him crouch down.
“That was close,” she whispered, putting her hand over her heart. “I nearly jumped out of my…” She drew back her hand and looked at it. The fingertips were coated with red paint.
Then her eyes lost focus and she felt dizzy and faint. What if it wasn’t paint? she thought.
What if it was blood?
“Wyatt?” she whispered.
Chapter Eighteen
Wyatt looked in horror at Nina’s stained fingers, then at her shirt, where dark red blood was spreading.
She’d been shot.
“Nina!” He shoved his gun into his shoulder holster and dove toward her. He ripped her shirt apart, popping the buttons.
Blood coated the area between her shoulder and neck, and dripped down around her left breast.
“Oh, God, Nina!” He took a piece of her shirt and used it to wipe away as much blood as he could. “I knew it,” he groaned. “I knew something would happen to you.”
He’d gotten her shot. The thing he’d most feared had come true. He’d sworn to protect her, and he’d failed.
He peered at the wound. It was her shoulder, in that sweet spot between the shoulder joint and the clavicle. Thank God, it hadn’t pierced any organs or broken any bones. He folded the cloth and pressed it against the entry wound.
Mere inches above his head, a bullet whizzed by. And another. Whoever had shot Nina hadn’t stopped. He was still shooting. Still aiming to kill.
“Hey, Professor,” Wyatt muttered. “You’re going to be fine. All I need to do is lift you up a little bit so I can see your back. It might hurt, but I promise you you’re going to be okay.”
“I trust you,” she whispered.
His arms shook as he slid them around her back and lifted, giving her as much support as he could. He didn’t feel any wetness. A good sign? Or a bad one?
She moaned as he shifted her slightly so he could see her back. No exit wound. That meant the bullet was still in there. He ran his palm along her skin.
There. The small lump he felt had to be the bullet. He needed to get her to a hospital now and get that bullet taken out.
But he couldn’t. His priority, once he’d assured himself that Nina wasn’t in mortal danger, was to stop the gunman and save Marcie.
This time.
Another shot rang out, too close. Wyatt ducked and covered Nina with his body. “Don’t worry. I’ve got you,” he whispered.
“I know.” He heard the strain in her voice. She was in pain. A lot of pain, and there was nothing he could do about it.
“Listen to me,” he whispered in her ear. “I need you to stay here. Stay hidden. Can you call Hardin for backup? Because whoever shot you is in there. And I’ve got to stop him.”
Nina nodded. Her lips were pressed together and white at the edges. Her eyes were closed. But she held out her hand for the phone. “I’ll call him. You save Marcie,” she mumbled.
Wyatt pressed his lips to her forehead. “I’m going to save both of you.”
“I know.” When he gave her the phone, she grabbed his hand and squeezed it. “Wyatt, be careful.”
Wyatt squeezed back. Then he moved carefully, staying low, until he was twenty feet away from Nina. He didn’t want the shooter in the cabin to have any idea where she was. He needed to draw the
fire away from her.
And he needed to get inside that cabin.
He raised himself up enough to aim and shoot at the open side window of the cabin. Then he ducked. The shooter responded with three quick rounds.
Wyatt stayed low, sneaking from one scrubby tangle of sagebrush to another. He fired at the window once, twice, three times. Then he took several shots at the front porch. He knew that, although the bang would sound in the same place, the bullets would hit or ricochet off the wood on the front corner of the cabin. The shooter’s perception of where the sounds came from would be confused, unless he was very experienced.
Sure enough, the shots from inside the house stopped.
Wyatt used the lull to duck and roll, ending up next to the rear corner of the cabin. He pushed himself to his feet, his back against the rough plank wall. Then he sidled toward the back and peered around the corner.
Sure enough there was a rear door. Beyond it he saw the nose of a white pickup.
Damn. The shallow print of boots in the dust led from the pickup to the wooden stoop. Someone had used this door recently. Someone who’d driven a white pickup.
Wyatt crept over to the door and gingerly turned the knob. It turned easily and quietly. A little surprising for such a dilapidated cabin.
He could hear shots coming from the front of the cabin. His stomach clenched. Nina wouldn’t have stood up, would she? Not after he’d told her to stay down.
Surely not. Still, she was stubborn and bullheaded. Just about as bullheaded as he was. But she was wounded, damn it.
He suppressed the urge to yell out a warning to her. If he did that, he’d be handing the shooter a lot of valuable information on a silver platter. Where he was, and that there were two of them at least.
Not knowing what to expect, he pushed open the door and angled around it, leading with his weapon. He found himself in a mudroom, which led to the large main room. The interior of the cabin was bathed in shadow, the only light coming from two bare windows.
On one side of Wyatt was a short hallway. He started that way but stopped when he heard a muffled curse and the unmistakable sound of a magazine being ejected from a semiautomatic handgun.
The shooter was out of bullets. He stiffened and laid his back against the wall, preparing to round the corner with his weapon ready to shoot. Before he could make his move, he heard a magazine being slapped into place. The man had reloaded.
More shots rang out.
At least the guy didn’t know Wyatt was behind him. After all, it hadn’t been more than two minutes since he’d left Nina, and it was an understatement to say that he’d been sparing with his shots.
But if another minute passed without a response from outside, the shooter would suspect that something was up. So Wyatt had to move fast.
Fast and smart.
He decided to take a chance and peek around the door into the main room, to get an idea of where the shooter was. From the sounds, he figured the man had moved from the side window to the front, which meant his back should be to Wyatt.
Carefully and quickly, he took off his hat and peered around the corner. What he saw shocked and sickened him.
Sprawled on the floor near the fireplace was the body of a young woman with blond hair. Wyatt didn’t need a long look to know the woman was Marcie James.
Or to know that she was dead. Her sightless eyes caught the light from the windows.
Standing beyond her, at the open front window, was Shane Tolbert, straining to peek through the heavy curtains, his weapon aimed at something Wyatt couldn’t see.
At that instant, Wyatt’s ears picked up the faint sound of a car engine. Without wasting precious time assessing whether Tolbert had heard it, he acted.
“Tolbert, don’t move.” He kept his voice low and steady.
Tolbert tensed, then started to turn.
“I said don’t move.”
“Lieutenant Colter?” The deputy raised his hands slowly and let his gun dangle from his index finger.
“Drop the gun.”
“Thank God it’s you,” Tolbert said, lowering his arms.
“Slowly!”
Tolbert set the gun on the floor and straightened. His face was pale. His eyes were wide, and a trickle of blood ran down his neck.
“Did you catch whoever was shooting at me? I thought I was dead, too.” His gaze dropped to Marcie’s body, and he shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe his eyes.
Wyatt frowned. Tolbert was acting like Wyatt had rescued him. Like they were on the same side. But Wyatt didn’t have time to waste on questions. Nina was out there, wounded, hurting, possibly bleeding to death.
The vehicle’s engine got louder, and Wyatt heard the crunch of tires on limestone rocks.
“Put your hands behind your back and turn around,” Wyatt ordered.
“What? You think I did it? Are you nuts?”
Wyatt gestured with his gun barrel. “Don’t push me, Tolbert. Do it! And spread your legs.”
The deputy obeyed. “I understand how this looks. Believe me. But you’ve got to listen to me. Marcie called me. She wanted to meet me up here. I couldn’t believe it was her—after all this time.”
Wyatt snapped the cuffs shut around the deputy’s wrists just as a second vehicle roared to a stop outside.
God, let it be the ambulance.
“Colter, you’ve got to believe me. Somebody hit me over the head as soon as I walked in the door. When I woke up, I saw Marcie lying there…” Tolbert’s voice broke.
The door burst open, and Reed Hardin stepped in, brandishing his weapon.
“Sheriff! Tell him I loved Marcie,” Tolbert yelled.
Hardin’s surprised gaze took in the scene before him. “What the hell?”
“Why were you shooting at us?” Wyatt prodded.
Tolbert drew in a shaky breath. “I thought whoever killed Marcie was trying to kill me.”
Wyatt had to hand it to the deputy. He was convincing. But was he innocent? “Save it, Tolbert. I’m taking you in for the murder of Marcie James. Shane Tolbert, you have the right to remain silent—”
The sound of an engine interrupted Wyatt. Red blinking lights glanced off the walls.
“Hardin, you got this?” Wyatt asked. “Because Nina’s out there. Tolbert shot her.”
“Sure. Go.” The sheriff sounded slightly dazed.
“I shot Nina? Oh, no!” Tolbert moaned.
Wyatt shoved his gun into its holster as he rushed out the door. But he was too late. The ambulance, carrying its precious cargo, disappeared into a cloud of white dust down the steep back road.
WYATT RUSHED IN THROUGH the emergency room’s automatic doors and headed straight toward the desk. “Nina Jacobson. Gunshot wound,” he snapped.
The woman behind the desk recoiled. “What? Who?”
From the corner of his eye, Wyatt saw a hospital security guard start toward him.
“Lieutenant Colter, Texas Ranger. I need to check on Nina Jacobson.”
The woman looked at his badge, the guard and then the computer screen in front of her. “Uh, cubicle eight,” she said, pointing to Wyatt’s left. “That way.”
Wyatt took off, nearly running into a steel cart. He skirted the edge of the cart and skidded to a stop in front of the cubicle labeled eight. When he shoved the curtain aside, his heart skipped a beat.
Nina was lying on a hospital bed, seemingly surrounded by tubes and wires. Her face was impossibly pale against her ink-black hair. An oxygen tube was anchored to her nostrils, and the electronic display on the box beside her bed beeped in rhythm with her heartbeat.
A nurse finished injecting a yellow liquid into a port on the IV tubing that led from a huge bandage above her wrist to the bag of fluid hanging beside the bed. The nurse, whose multicolored jacket had puppies and kittens cavorting on it, frowned at him.
“I’m Lieutenant Wyatt Colter, Texas Ranger,” he said defensively. “She’s my…my…”
His throat tightened. His wh
at? His colleague? His Professor? His love?
Nina opened her eyes and sent him a ghost of a smile. “Hey, cowboy. Still as eloquent as ever, I see.”
“You forgot charming,” he replied.
“No,” she muttered, “I didn’t forget.” She licked her lips and lifted her left hand to adjust the oxygen tube.
He caught her hand in his. “Can she have some water?”
The nurse glowered at him. “No. She’s about to go into surgery.”
“Surgery?” Adrenaline sent Wyatt’s heart pounding. He knew the bullet in her shoulder had to come out. But knowing it in his head and seeing her—pale and weak and being prepped to go under the knife were two very different things.
“I’ll be right back, Ms. Jacobson.” The nurse left the cubicle, yanking the curtain closed behind her.
Wyatt couldn’t take his eyes off Nina.
She squeezed his hand. “Don’t look at me like that,” she said hoarsely.
He grimaced. The oxygen was already making her throat raw. “Like what?”
“Like I’m about to—”
He stopped her words with his fingers. “Don’t even joke about that,” he said gruffly.
“What happened?” she croaked.
“You don’t need to worry about that right now.”
“Wyatt, I need to know who was shooting at us. It was Shane, wasn’t it?”
He nodded.
“Did he kill Daniel?”
“I don’t know.”
She coughed.
“Now, hush. You need to rest and stay calm.” He bent forward and kissed her. Her lips were dry, so he ran his tongue along them to moisten them.
She laughed softly. “Thank you,” she whispered. Then she kissed him back.
His heart leapt and stuck in his throat. The feel of her lips had sent signals that his body didn’t want to ignore. Signals that were bound to cause him a lot of embarrassment when that nurse came back.
But far stronger than his physical need was the fierce protective urge that filled him.
“I was supposed to keep you safe,” he said, pressing his forehead against hers. “And I didn’t.”
She stiffened. “Oh, Wyatt…”
He knew the leap her brain had made, because his had made the same instantaneous jump. She was thinking about Marcie.
Classified Cowboy Page 17
