by Bonnie Vanak
Men! How could such an intelligent guy be so dumb? She switched tactics. “Are you going to sell the ranch after you find out who the saboteur is?”
His expression shuttered. “I don’t know, Shel. I promised I would give it one month to see if we can come up with the money.”
Timmy appeared in the doorway, clad in his Star Wars pajamas. “What if you don’t find the bad man by then? What will happen to the horses if you sell? To Macaroni?”
Shelby’s heart twisted at the hurt expression on Timmy’s face. Lord, he loved that pony, even though he knew it wasn’t his.
Before she could say anything, Nick squatted down to Timmy’s eye level. “Tim, I’ll find out who’s doing this. And I promise, Macaroni will have a good home, no matter where he goes.”
“With lots of oats? More than Fancy?”
He smiled and patted his shoulder. “As much oats as he wants.”
They sat at the table with their mugs. Timmy asked Nick about the places he’d seen. Without revealing too much, Nick regaled him with tales of adventure, G-rated, of course, until the boy’s eyelids drooped. Nick picked up Timmy very gently and carried him to bed, and Shelby tucked him in. They returned to the kitchen, but Shelby paced the tiny space, looking agitated.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that, Nick.”
He blinked. “Put him to bed?”
“Tell him your grand tales of your travels. You get him all starry-eyed, wanting to travel and be a Navy SEAL.”
Nick’s gaze flattened as he sipped his tea. “There are worse choices for a career.”
“Not for him!” She whirled, her long hair flying out. “He’s spent the past year wondering if his mom and dad will come home. I’ve curtailed his watching the news, but I can’t supervise everything, especially when the kids at school tell him how bad things are in the Middle East. I promised his parents I’d take care of Timmy. That means not stuffing his head full of dreams about adventures. They want him to be an engineer, with a nice, safe position in tech, not a hot dog.”
He inhaled sharply. “SEALs aren’t hot dogs, Shel. We’re highly trained, and each op we take on means even more training.”
Nick’s keen gaze probed her, as if he could see inside her. “What’s the real problem? You saying these things about Timmy because you’re afraid he’ll have the chance to dream, and explore the life you’ve denied yourself?”
He always did push her buttons. How could he cut straight to the heart of what really troubled her? “I haven’t denied anything.”
He softened his voice. “Then why are you planning to move in with your sister after she returns? All your life you’ve taken care of your family. Your parents. Your sister. And now your nephew. When is it your turn to see the world?”
Shelby’s lower lip wobbled precariously. She pushed at the long fall of her hair, feeling her emotions unravel.
“It’s not too late. Paris can be more than a dream.”
Hope flared inside, and then she stared at her china mug. It had a small crack on the cup’s edge.
“I can’t do that. I have work. It’s a long way off and I have responsibilities.”
“Excuses,” he murmured.
Shelby glared at him. “What about you, Nick? Hopping around the country from job to job, no real place to call home, no settling down. You were a SEAL. When are you going to live your dream? Why did you quit?”
Nick set down his mug carefully. “I would have stayed in the teams if I hadn’t been injured.”
Her voice softened. “What happened?”
Nick stared at the table as if it held all the answers to the universe. “My teammates and I met up with a little explosion while on patrol. Two men were killed. I survived and so did the guy I saved. I spent time in the hospital and then was released. After that, it was obvious.”
“You were too injured to stay a SEAL?”
“No. The leg functioned, with intense therapy. My CO wanted to assign me to a special training unit for cyberterrorism.”
“Why did you quit?”
His dark gaze narrowed. “I didn’t quit. I didn’t re-up.”
Shelby’s brow wrinkled. “Why? You had a great career with the navy. Everyone back here kept talking about you, how you risked your life to drag your injured teammate to safety. What have you done after you left?”
Innocent question, but anger tightened his face. “It’s over. Done. Don’t want to talk about it.” Nick pushed back from the table. “I’ll get my gear from the house. Lock the door behind me.”
Shelby stared after him as the front door slammed. She sensed her questions had touched a sensitive issue. But she didn’t understand. How could Nick, who’d once written to Silas that his life was the navy, and everything was the navy, leave the navy, the one thing he loved most?
* * *
Nick couldn’t sleep. Shelby’s innocent question taunted him like the long-ago school bully who had beaten him up when Nick refused to surrender his lunch money.
Why did you quit?
He pulled the sheet up to his chin and shifted to his side, avoiding the spring that stuck out in the pullout sofa’s middle. Coming home was hard enough. Coming home to that hometown-hero label was even tougher. The navy had called his father after Nick had almost bought it in Iraq. When he’d been shipped Stateside to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Jarrett had called Silas personally to tell him.
Silas never showed up at Nick’s bedside. Since Nick was stabilized, there was no need. When he was finally released, Nick didn’t make the mistake of asking the old man for a place to lay his head while he got his act together.
When had he ever done anything right in Silas’s eyes?
The IED nearly killed him and a bullet punctured his leg, while another nearly kissed his head as he struggled to lift his teammate from the wreckage and carry him. He was alive. Yeah, that mattered. But the man who stood tall and proud the day he received his SEAL pin wasn’t the same. He’d promised to give his all, be the best.
Do everything his father said he could never do—be a winner, not a quitter.
When the IED exploded, it sent him to the hospital. When he emerged, he couldn’t run as fast. Be as strong as before. Oh, he still had his brain, but something died inside him the day he lost two teammates and could have lost his leg. He didn’t re-up, much as his CO kept nagging him. Didn’t want to train other SEALs.
Silas’s words echoed in his mind. You’re a quitter.
SEALs never quit.
You did.
Loser.
He drifted into sleep, and suddenly he was back in the Hummer. An explosion, his eardrums ringing as he struggled with panic to lift Vinny out of the Hummer... But instead of tango bullets, his father was there this time, laughing and shaking his head. “I knew you’d never amount to anything. Some hero you are, Nicolas. Loser.”
Silas laughed again, then grabbed the weapon out of Nick’s hands and tossed it aside. It landed on the ground with a bang.
Nick sat up with a start.
No longer overseas, in the Hummer. No, he was in Shelby’s apartment, and that noise wasn’t coming from his head, but downstairs.
Nick pulled on his corduroy jeans and slipped into the soft-soled shoes he’d left by the sofa bed, then pocketed a slim flashlight he’d placed on the side table. He slid his SIG Sauer from under the pillow and glanced out the window. The twin carriage lights over the garage were out. He’d made a point of leaving them on.
He opened the front door and stepped outside, then quietly padded down the porch steps, holding his pistol out. Gravel crunched in the distance, as if someone was running away. Nick raced down the steps, squinting in the darkness, but saw nothing. And then he heard a motor turning over and tires squealing as the driver raced away.
Too far away to p
ursue. He took out the penlight and swept it over the ground outside the garage. Nothing. But someone had removed the light bulbs to the carriage lights, leaving the area totally dark.
All the vehicles on the ranch, including the two ATVs and Nick’s motorcycle, were locked inside the garage. Shelby’s older model truck sat outside, all four tires slashed. Nick rubbed the bristles on his chin. Someone had made a point of incapacitating Shelby so she had no vehicle to drive. It was more than a malicious act. He suspected whoever did this wanted to warn her to stay out of ranch business.
Tomorrow, he’d fix the security cameras and add two new ones to this area. With a little luck, he’d catch the perpetrator.
And then there would be hell to pay.
Chapter 7
Sunday mornings were church mornings around the Belle Creek for everyone but Shelby. For her, it was the one time of the week when she had peace and quiet, and the place to herself.
While Timmy was at church and Sunday school, she’d catch up on paperwork and balancing the books. Not today.
Not today.
After Felicity and Dan picked up Timmy for church, she’d phoned the sheriff and Jonah Doyle promised to send someone over later to investigate. Next she called repair shops near Nashville to replace the four slashed tires on her truck. Not one of them could give her a price she could afford on her slim savings.
Depressed over her truck, knowing she had to now find a ride to work, she went to the stables to talk with Nick.
Jeans riding low on his narrow hips, his Western shirt loose and untucked, he looked natural and at home in the barn as he forked fresh hay into each horse’s stall.
Joining him, she began the familiar routine. They worked in tandem for a while, Nick asking about the horses and their health. The mundane conversation eased the tension between them. When the horses were all fed and watered, they released them into the pasture.
Shelby dusted off her hands and began mucking out the stalls as Nick brought the wheelbarrow to deposit the manure. She’d use it later as fertilizer for the garden.
“Any luck with replacing your tires?” he asked.
She shook her head. “The truck is old and barely running. I can borrow Dan’s when he doesn’t need it and get a lift tonight to work with Ann.”
“Anyone who has a grudge against you who’d want to do that to your truck?”
“Only Natalie Beaufort. She can’t stand me. I think she’s looking for a good reason to get rid of me, but so far, I haven’t done anything at work that warrants her firing me.”
He frowned as he removed the work gloves. “Shel, I need to show you something.”
When they were inside the tack room, he pointed to the nearest bridle. “When I came into the stables this morning, I found this.”
Alarmed, she examined the leather. The straps were cleanly cut, as if someone sliced them with a sharp knife.
“Oh, no.” Shelby looked at the others. All of them had been cut in half. Ruined. Without the tack, they couldn’t rent out horses for trail rides.
“Whoever slashed your tires may have done this. How much will it cost to fix this?” Nick fingered the broken bridle.
Her heart sank. “More than we have right now. I have a group coming in tomorrow, a big group staying at the Huckleberry B and B. Ten people who wanted a trail ride, and two more groups later this week. I was counting on that money to help meet payroll for the month.”
“Things are really bad if you need trail rides to pay the staff.” He looked around the neatly organized room. “I’d bet my bike that whoever did this didn’t leave prints, either.”
“The sheriff might be able to catch whoever did this. Put the person in jail.”
Nick’s gaze hardened. “Shel, when I catch who’s pulling all this crap, I’ll deal out my own sense of justice. No one messes with me and mine.”
A shiver raced down her spine. He looked like the fierce warrior everyone in town had talked about, the Navy SEAL who risked enemy fire to save his buddy from death. Shelby was glad Nick was on her side.
“I don’t know how we can get new tack before tomorrow.” She shoved a hand through her hair.
Nick frowned. “Doesn’t the ranch still have an account with Grant’s Western Tack? I could call in a favor. I was good friends with Tyler, Grant’s son, in the navy. Showed him the ropes, watched his six. He could loan us tack until we get ours fixed.”
Relief filled her. “That would be wonderful if he could. I don’t want to turn down the group because they’re with a tour from Miami and it’s our first time offering them trail rides. Repeat business will give us a nice cash infusion.”
“Who has access to this room?” Nick walked around, his boots clicking on the concrete. “Door wasn’t locked when I came in this morning.”
Anxiety churned in her stomach. “It’s always been locked. Spare set of keys hangs in the kitchen in the main house. But the ranch hands have been careless lately, always coming and going to get ready for the fall season.”
“No longer,” Nick said firmly. “No one gets in or out without you, myself, Dan or Jake. If one of the hands needs something from in here, we’ll unlock the door for them.”
Shelby nodded. Bad enough to have their tack ruined, but if the saboteur cut up the borrowed tack, they’d really be in trouble.
When they left the room, locked, the key in the back pocket of her jeans, Nick walked her out of the stables, his boot heels clicking on the concrete floor.
“What are you doing the rest of the morning? Need a lift into town to look for new tires? I’m headed there later to buy security cameras to install over the garage doors.”
She hesitated. Surely he wouldn’t laugh at her. “No. Sundays are my only days when I have free time in the afternoon. I’m looking for Henry’s lost treasure.”
Nick scratched the bristles on his firm chin. “That old fable? You believe it?”
“Why not? People have talked about it for years. It’s part of the ranch’s history.”
“I figured Silas made up that history to get people to go on trail rides, looking for the lost gold.” He gazed at the meadow, and the sun shining in the bright blue sky. “Damn, I forgot how pretty it is here.”
They went to the fence and climbed up on the railing, sitting to admire the view. Indigo clouds scudded over the jagged mountaintops. A cool wind rustled the gold and red leaves in the nearby trees. Shelby sighed. Taking time to enjoy the scenery at the ranch always gave her a sense of peace she’d found hard to capture elsewhere. Certainly she’d never gotten this kind of serenity at the roach-infested, tiny, cramped trailers where she’d spent the first seven years of her life.
Her parents had seldom held down real jobs. Both of them usually passed out in the morning when she’d crept out to the living room to get into Heather’s room so she could help her baby sister dress. Little mama, Silas had called her the day they’d come to live at the ranch. There they had a real trailer, not one propped on concrete blocks. A real job for her daddy, who struggled to overcome his addiction to drink and make the most of the opportunity Silas gave him.
At the Belle Creek, she’d learned what it was like to have warm clothing in the winter and a full belly. Silas had ordered the housekeeper, Candace, to help care for Heather and he’d personally driven Mama to the first few AA meetings so she could stay sober. For the first time in her life, Shelby knew affection and kindness from Silas Anderson. She owed him everything for trying to help her parents straighten up, and giving them all a chance at a real life, a real home.
Her thoughts drifted back to the reality of the present. An oriole that had not flown south yet for the winter warbled in the trees and the notes played a lovely melody to the symphony of colors dancing in the sky. As an adult, she had learned to cherish the quiet beauty of her home, and the wonder o
f a fresh, new start.
Her hand grasped Nick’s. He startled, and looked down at her.
“You should see it out here at sunrise. It’s like nature puts on a new show every morning. You can be whatever you want to be because the sun is rising and it erases all the mistakes of yesterday,” she murmured.
A muscle ticked in his jaw as he squeezed her hand. “Sometimes those mistakes take a lot more than a night to erase.”
She wondered what he meant by that.
Nick pointed to her boots. “If you’re exploring the woods, best to wear sneakers or hiking clothes. Let’s go back to the apartment, then meet me by the hitching post.”
Shelby laughed. “You have hiking boots? You brought only a backpack.”
“My old clothing and boots are still in the basement. Silas said when I left he would burn everything, but he didn’t.” Nick studied his clipped nails. “Silas never got rid of them.”
Judging from his quiet tone, it was a sore spot with him. He’d left this life behind, but his father had waited for him to return. Waited for Nick to swallow his pride and come home to take over the ranch.
He’d died waiting. She knew about parents, how you could spend your life trying to earn their love and never succeed, no matter what you did. But Silas was different from her folks. He was a good man, who was tough but fair to all.
Loved and respected by everyone.
Except his son. Why?
* * *
An hour later, they set out for the beaten path by the creek.
Silly of her to think she could find Henry’s gold, but the same little thrill raced through her as she and Nick navigated through the woods. Silas had woven tales about a treasure that had been lost during the Civil War. His ancestor, Henry, had squirreled away five hundred gold ingots on family land. No one knew how old Henry got the gold, Silas told her. Some said Henry had stolen it. Others more loyal to the Anderson clan said Henry earned it working at the mill house from dusk to dawn. Fact was, no matter how Henry earned the gold, he’d vowed to keep it away from Yankee hands when the war started.
