New York Times bestselling author Virna DePaul thrills with this story of a killer in waiting and a brother in hiding. Could they be the same person?

Dylan Rooney is out of his element. A U.S. marshal and city-wrangler at heart, he must adopt a new cover—and a new client—in the heart of Texas. The assignment: protect Rachel Kincaid, a widow with a young son who realizes her struggles are just beginning when her ranch hand is killed. Posing as the new ranch hand, Dylan quickly learns that catching a killer may not be so simple—especially when Rachel’s fugitive brother is the prime suspect. And when the woman he’s vowed to protect is the same woman he’s falling in love with.

Her chin rose, and slowly, so did her gaze, until she made visual contact.

She cleared her throat, the sound delicate yet deliberate, then spoke. “Like you said, we’re attracted to each other. I thought my reaction to you was a fluke. But this…”

“But this was real,” he finished for her. “No aberration. No fluke.” He knew not to press her, but rather to let her draw out her own conclusions.

She shook her head, sending her hair flowing in the gentle evening breeze. “I want you and you want me.”

He wove his fingers under her hair and stroked the soft skin covering the back of her neck with the pads of his thumb. “That’s a truth I would never deny. But my job. Your brother. Our feelings complicate things, Rachel.”

“I know.” She took a step back, breaking their contact, and blew out a sharp breath. “So while this was fun…” She waved her hands in the air, as if gesturing to their momentary lapse of judgment.

“So while this was fun, it’s over now,” he said firmly.

“Exactly.”

Yeah, they could both wish that were the case. But he knew in his bones it simply wasn’t true.

Dear Reader,

The last few books I’ve written for the Mills & Boon Romantic Suspense line have involved heroes in law enforcement, and this one is no different. Dylan Rooney is a U.S. marshal who is tracking down a fugitive in Texas—a place very different from where he grew up in California. That’s just one of the reasons Dylan feels thrown off balance throughout the book.

The other big reason is Rachel Kincaid, the heroine, who just happens to be the sister of the man Dylan is hunting. Rachel is a strong, independent single mother who believes deeply in her brother’s goodness, so when Dylan shows up accusing him of murder, it’s natural for Rachel to view him as the enemy. Then the real enemies show up.

As Rachel is forced to rely on Dylan for protection, the more she begins to like and respect him, and this includes his dedication to upholding the U.S. Marshals motto: Justice, Integrity, Service. Throughout the story, Rachel and Dylan face a similar dilemma: how to reconcile one’s duty with feelings of desire and love that seem to conflict with that duty.

I hope you enjoy their story as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Wishing you much love and happiness always,

Virna DePaul

Texas Stakeout

Virna DePaul

www.millsandboon.co.uk

VIRNA DEPAUL

was an English major in college and, despite a passion for Shakespeare, Broadway musicals and romance novels, somehow ended up with a law degree. For ten years, she was a criminal prosecutor for the state of California. Now she’s thrilled to be writing stories about complex individuals (fully human or not) who are willing to overcome incredible odds for love. She can be found on Twitter at @virnadepaul or at virnadepaul.com.

MILLS & BOON

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For James. I miss you!

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Extract

Copyright

Chapter 1

U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney was on a stakeout. Only in the hill country of Texas a stakeout didn’t mean sitting in an unmarked sedan, drinking coffee and eating donuts. Nope. A Texas stakeout meant sitting on the back of a horse. And Dylan, who was a mediocre rider at best, had drawn the short straw in more ways than one. As a marshal, it wasn’t uncommon for him to work away from his home base in California. It was, however, uncommon for him to be this bored. And this sore.

He much preferred traveling by plane, train or automobile—the faster and sleeker the mode of transportation, the better—than relying on a four-legged best from hell.

While two other marshals from Dylan’s five-member team, and several other marshals from various states, scoured the country for Jackson Kincaid, a prisoner who’d recently escaped transport in California, Dylan was on his third day in Nowhere, Texas, binoculars trained on the ranch owned by Jackson Kincaid’s sister, Rachel. Besides the sheer boredom of it all, it wouldn’t have been a bad assignment, but he hadn’t counted on his damn horse having anxiety issues. Ginger, the horse he’d rented from an adjacent farm, wouldn’t stop dancing in the red Texas dirt, kicking up a cloud of dust in Dylan’s face.

It would be the height of stupidity for Kincaid to run here, especially given that it was where he was first taken into custody, but it still had to be covered. Dylan and his team would do whatever it took to apprehend Kincaid, even if it meant endless hours of watching Kincaid’s ten-year-old nephew popping soda cans off fence posts with a BB gun.

The kid wasn’t a half-bad shot, Dylan thought just as his mother came into view. Dylan sat up higher on the horse and pressed the binoculars tighter to his face, watching as she made the long hike up the western fence line and across the field to where her kid stood, BB gun at his side. Just as it had when he’d first seen her picture—hell, every time he’d caught a glimpse of her in the past few days—Dylan’s pulse accelerated. Rachel Kincaid was nothing like the sophisticated women Dylan normally dated, but she was hands-down gorgeous. Willowy and tall, she had a dark Texas tan and dark eyes that clashed with the vibrant near white of her blond hair. She worked hard—too hard—and there was no doubt she loved her son, Peter, to distraction.

Too bad she had lousy taste in men, her brother and deceased husband included. Her husband’s alcohol problem and subsequent drunk driving accident had left Rachel a widow.

And her brother?

He’d taken everything his sister had sacrificed for him and flushed it down the toilet the minute he’d agreed to transport drugs across state lines.

Now Rachel was basically running the ranch by herself. She had some help, but not much.

Earlier, the woman had been conferring with her only ranch hand—records listed him as Josiah Pemberly, age sixty-three—down at the natural spring. Though Dylan hadn’t been able to hear their conversation, it had appeared pleasant, with both parties smiling a lot. Now that Rachel had reached her son, the conversation going on between them seemed far from pleasant. As Rachel spoke, the child stood motionless, his back to her. Frowning, Rachel lifted a hand as if to reach out to the boy, then stopped. Shaking her head, she wheeled around and strode quickly back to the ranch house, her entire posture stiff with frustration.

The woman was sexy as hell, Dylan thought, but it was obvious she had no control over her kid. And she’d obviously lost control of her brother, whom she’d essentially raised, a long time ago. Dylan just hoped her kid didn’t end up taking the same path in life that his uncle had.

Dylan dropped the binoculars so they hung on their leather strap around his neck. Day three in the stakeout for Jackson Kincaid, and all Dylan had seen at the Kincaid ranch was one gorgeous yet overworked woman, her sullen brat, one elderly ranch hand and a bunch of weird-looking llamas. At least, he figured they were llamas. Texas was getting too froufrou. Whatever had happened to sheep and cattle ranching?

The next fifteen minutes passed in a drone of boredom. The ranch hand kept mending the fence. The kid continued popping soda cans off fence posts. Dylan gulped down water until the wind picked up, snapping more dust into his eyes and sending a tumbleweed straight at his horse.

“Whoa,” he murmured, tightening his grip on the reins with one hand and wrapping his other hand in Ginger’s mane. The mare shied, as expected, but Dylan managed to hang on and focused on maintaining his seat and keeping his feet in the stirrups. He fought for control, working to recall the instructions his camp counselor had taught him the year the state had sent him to summer camp in the boonies.

“Keep your seat. Don’t yank on the reins. Dig your heels down.”

And then he heard a shriek wend its way upward from the valley below.

The kid? The mother? Dylan wrapped the reins around his fist to control the horse and brought the binoculars back to his eyes. The kid had dropped his BB gun and was running toward the house. Dylan panned the lenses over to the house but didn’t see the porch door swing open. In the few days that he’d been spying on the Kincaid Ranch, Rachel had always come running whenever the kid wanted her. Now? Nothing. Had something happened to her?

“Mom!”

The single word caught on the edge of the wind and whipped up the ridge to Dylan. Desperation filled the boy’s single word.

Dylan loosened his grip on the reins and squeezed with his knees, yelling, “Yiya!”

Ginger responded by leaping forward. Immediately she settled into a gallop and headed down the ridge to the valley. The ranch house was only about a quarter mile away as the crow flies, but the trail down the ridge zigzagged like a pinball machine. Still, even with all the switchbacks, he’d probably be able to reach the kid in time to help.

Assuming he didn’t get thrown and break his neck first, of course.

* * *

Rachel Kincaid let her long hair drip water down her back. The cold shower had felt good and had taken the biting edge off her nerves. With their higher elevation, the Texas heat usually stayed away from the ranch, but not this summer. This summer the heat got to her. Or maybe it was that Peter kept getting to her.

God, she loved her son, but he’d never been an easy kid. Often affectionate and sweet and funny but also hyperactive. Defiant. Impulsive.

Six months ago he’d been diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. At the time, she’d been relieved to have an explanation for his moodiness that didn’t come with being labeled a failure of a parent. But she’d also been overwhelmed and uncertain of her ability to do right by her son. After doing tons of research on the subject, she’d reluctantly agreed to get him on medicine, something that had seemed to help right away. Putting Peter on a schedule that still provided him lots of downtime had helped even more. By the time the school year had ended, he’d been doing so much better and their relationship had become downright rosy.

Now, however, the prolonged time they’d been spending together over summer vacation was beginning to take its toll. So was the fact that Peter missed his uncle Jax; even if he didn’t know the real reason Jax had left last year, he was confused by Jax’s failure to visit or call. Peter missed him, and he was bored with just her and Josiah for company. And Rachel? She missed her brother, too. Missed him terribly. She was also tired from working the ranch. From working Jax’s appeal. From her frequent battles with Peter. It made her feel guilty, but she wanted summer to be over. Wanted the heat gone. Wanted Peter back in school where he could sass his teachers for part of the day instead of her.

She stepped into a worn but clean pair of Levi’s jeans and pulled a tank over her still-dripping hair, knowing it wasn’t fair to compare Peter to what her brother, Jax, had been like at ten but doing it, anyway. Jax had been...easy. Then again, Jax hadn’t had ADHD. And, when Jax had just turned ten, their parents were still alive and she was in her first year in college; she probably wouldn’t have noticed if Jax had given her parents attitude, anyway. Afterward, with their parents gone before he turned eleven, Jax had been so grief-stricken it had taken months before he’d smiled again, let alone thrown attitude.

Peter, on the other hand, had been offering up enough sass to fill a silo. The way he’d turned his back on her earlier when she asked him to stop shooting the pellet gun and fill up the alpacas’ water trough had just about driven her out of her skin. She’d had to walk away before she lost it and started yelling at him.

She grabbed her boots but stopped when she heard something.

Peter calling her. The tenor of his high-pitched voice came through the open bedroom window, urgent and scared.

Her heart leaped into her throat. Her baby needed her.

She didn’t bother with the boots, and instead rushed down the stairs and burst out onto the porch, looking for her son.

There, racing from the western fence line where she’d left him only fifteen minutes ago, came Peter. And coming toward him from the opposite direction, in a cloud of red dust, rode a stranger on a galloping chestnut quarter horse.

“Peter!” she screamed, and ran to him. She stumbled as the rocks on the drive bit into her feet but kept on going.

“Mom, you’ve gotta help!” Peter cried out when she reached him. He wrapped his arms around her and sobbed into her shoulder.

Heart pounding, Rachel held her son tight and faced the rider who brought his horse to an ungainly stop next to them. He seemed about her age, or maybe just a few years older—maybe early thirties. Wide shoulders, legs long against the barrel of the horse. Blue jeans, a plaid snap-front long-sleeved shirt rolled to the elbows and his Stetson said cowboy, yet his unscuffed boots and the clean felt of his hat screamed of falsehood.

Wait. She knew his horse: Ginger. A horse from her neighbor Aaron Jacobson’s herd. The same neighbor harassing her about the fence line. Hell. Today of all days she didn’t need to deal with a stupid land dispute. And she didn’t need some city slicker to give her a hard time about the spring.

“I don’t know who you are or why Aaron sent you to hassle my kid,” she snapped out at the stranger, “but I swear to God, if you don’t get off my property, I’ll call the sheriff on you. You and Aaron leave my kid alone,” she nearly growled, holding a sobbing Peter even tighter. “Whatever issues that man has with the property line can be handled in court—not by intimidating a child.”

The man slid off Ginger in an awkward motion and stepped forward, palms held upward in a universal gesture of peace. He came closer and she stood shaking, watching his every step, until he stopped a few feet in front of her. His deep blue eyes were steady and without malice. Didn’t matter. He was tall—at least six foot two—and he towered over her and Peter; his wide shoulders and military posture screamed intimidation.

But she was a mother. She wouldn’t let him intimidate her. Not when her kid was crying against her shoulder.

“My name’s Dylan, ma’am,” the man said. “Dylan Rooney. And I’m not here about your neighbor. I was riding the ridge, uh, bird-watching, and I saw the kid playing with his BB gun. Next thing I knew I heard him screaming and running to the house. I figured something had happened and came down the hill to help. Kid—” he directed his statement to Peter, who’d raised his tear-streaked face away from her shoulder “—are you hurt?”

Peter pulled away from Rachel and swiped futilely at the tears that kept streaming down his face. “No, it’s not me. It’s...it’s...” Anguish froze his expression, his mouth gaping and open, shutting off whatever he’d been about to say.

Rachel reached for him, but Peter took another step away from her. The distance, a mere two inches, ripped yet another hole in Rachel’s heart. He’d needed her—and then he hadn’t. She couldn’t help thinking of all the family she’d lost—her parents and even her brother in a way. She swallowed the lump of emotional pain down and said, “I heard you ask for my help, Peter. What’s wrong?”

The man—Dylan—came forward and placed a solid hand on Peter’s shoulder. Somehow the masculine grip held Peter together in a way Rachel’s soft hold hadn’t, because Peter took a shaky breath and the tears stopped flowing.

“It’s Josiah...”

Josiah. Her ranch hand. And friend. A sensation like a cold hand slid up her back. Twenty minutes ago she’d checked in on him as he repaired the fence on the property line she shared with Aaron Jacobson. Had Aaron gone too far this time? Was Aaron causing Josiah trouble?

Her neighbor had been a real pain in the neck ever since he discovered a natural spring right on her side of the fence line a couple of years ago. He’d been digging around the courthouse records, trying to prove the spring was actually on his own land. She’d been too preoccupied with running the ranch, keeping Peter in line and working on the appeal process for her brother to deal with Aaron’s constant haranguing, but she’d finally referred him to Julia Rickel, her friend and lawyer, who’d threatened lawsuits and police action and whatnot if Aaron didn’t back off. Aaron had made it clear he hadn’t liked what he considered to be Julia’s threats.

She opened her mouth to speak, but the stranger beat her to the question she was about to ask.

“Kid,” Dylan said, “what happened? Where’s Josiah?”

Peter hitched a breath and pointed back to the fence line. “He’s over there. B-b-but it’s too late. We’re too late.”

The cold hand on Rachel’s back now gripped her throat. No.

“Too late for what, Peter?” she whispered.

“Too late to help. Josiah’s dead.”

Chapter 2

Rachel’s face had turned so white that Dylan expected her to faint at any moment. He reached out a hand, offering to steady her, but she waved him away. Of course she did. He was a stranger. She had no reason to trust him.

He turned to Peter, whose expression was still alight with panic. Had Jackson Kincaid snuck on the property without Dylan noticing? Seemed unlikely, but...

He followed the kid’s pointing finger with his line of sight.

The boy’s voice shook as he said, “Way up the fence line, next to the spring.”

“Did you see anyone up there with him?” Dylan asked.

The boy shook his head.

“Are you certain he’s...dead?” Rachel’s voice came out on a whisper of a breath.

Peter swallowed and nodded, his eyes filling back up with tears. “He has a big hole in his head and there’s a lot of blood and his eyes are open and not moving and he doesn’t have a pulse,” he said breathlessly. “I checked. Then I ran to get you.”

Oh, hell. This wasn’t some kid making a desperate bid for attention. This was real. “You and the kid get into the house and lock yourselves in,” he ordered even as he mentally cursed. As if that would do a lot of good if Jackson Kincaid was on the ranch. He was her brother, for God’s sake. It wasn’t as if she’d view him as a threat to her or her son. And truth be told, Dylan had no reason to think Jackson would hurt them. Still, the man had proven himself to be violent and if he’d killed Josiah...

Rachel started, staring at him with wide brown eyes, pupils dilating. “What— Why?”

“Just to be safe. Call 911. Use the landline. Tell them to get an ambulance here immediately.”

Rachel looked from Dylan to her son, then raised her chin. “Peter, do as he says. Lock all the doors and wait for the ambulance, okay? I’m going to check on Josiah.”

“I can do that—” Dylan began, but Peter was already running into the house.

“Not without me,” she said. She watched the house until Peter had slammed the door behind him, then strode toward Ginger. She put a bare foot into the stirrup and easily swung herself up onto Dylan’s horse, then kicked her feet out of the stirrups. “You coming?” she asked. “Because I’m not leaving you here alone with my kid.”

Dylan struggled with indecision. He wanted to insist he check on the ranch hand by himself, but this was her private property and what reason could he possibly give for thinking there might be something or someone dangerous out there? Not the truth, certainly. Not yet. Not when the most likely explanation was that her ranch hand had had some kind of accident.

When Rachel raised her eyebrows impatiently and leaned forward, he slid his booted foot in the stirrup and pulled himself up behind her. Ginger danced for a few seconds, then settled as he used his knees to nudge her forward. He wrapped an arm around Rachel’s waist and pulled her in tight to his chest. She was stiff but didn’t resist. The quarter horse, her hooves steady despite the added weight, settled into an easy lope.

“So, are you a friend of Aaron’s?” Rachel asked over her shoulder. “Did he send you out to spy on us? Did he tell you about the crazy widow and her bratty kid?” Bitterness edged her words, which came out jumpy and breathless as Ginger continued to cover the uneven terrain.

Not exactly, Dylan thought. The Department of Corrections had told him about her brother and his brazen escape, and research had informed his team about Rachel, the sister whom Jackson Kincaid thought of as his mother, and Rachel’s son. Of course, Dylan didn’t tell Rachel that. Lying to her wasn’t his first choice, but he also didn’t want her clamming up and getting irrational when there was a potential crisis to deal with.

“He just loaned me a horse. We’re not friends. Does Josiah have a history of any sort of heart condition? Stroke?”

“No health issues. He’s older, but healthy. He’s repaired the fence line time after time. I don’t know what could have harmed him.”

Dylan immediately thought of her brother again. “Maybe your son is wrong about him being dead.” In his arms her body loosened fractionally, and she twisted her torso to face forward again. Whether she completely believed him or not didn’t matter—she trusted him enough to help her ranch hand.

“I’m not holding out hope. Peter’s been raised on a ranch. We raise alpacas for wool, so we don’t do a lot of butchering, but he’s seen dead animals. He knows what lifeless eyes look like.”

So did Dylan. Personally and professionally.

Professionally? The duty of a marshal was to bring in fugitives whether they claimed to be innocent or not. It wasn’t his job to investigate their crimes, nor to believe them or not believe them—that was for the cops, the courts and the jury system to decide. Fugitives didn’t see it that way. They wanted their freedom. Sometimes they fought to keep it

Sometimes they died.

Personally...

He fought to erase the dead eyes staring dully at him in his mind’s eye, but he couldn’t.

Dead eyes all looked the same: unblinking and missing life’s sheen. But the first set of dead eyes he’d ever seen—his mother’s—haunted him every day of his life, reminding him of what could happen to a person who refused to accept the bad in others before it was too late.

“So your son’s name is Peter. And you are?”

“Rachel. We’re almost there,” she said. “Down the gulley to the right. Then the spring’s a few hundred yards south.”

He knew how to get to the spring already but kept silent, and instead neck-reined Ginger in the direction Rachel had given. The horse headed downhill and Rachel leaned back to compensate for her weight on the horse’s shoulders. Her still-wet hair brushed his face and he breathed in the scent. Soft and floral, with a hint of freshness. Ginger stumbled and Dylan tightened his grip on Rachel, appreciating the soft weight of her breasts on his forearm. Get a grip, he mentally chided himself. Yeah, Rachel was one hot woman, but she was also the sister of the fugitive he was hunting, and they were on the way to find out if her ranch hand still lived. Appreciating her sweet smell or the luscious weight of her breasts was the last thing he should be doing.

He reminded himself it had been three long months since he’d bedded a woman. Before that, he’d been in a long-term relationship with Ashley, a deputy D.A. back in San Francisco. They’d dated for several years and she’d been pressuring him for more. She’d wanted to move in together. Wanted to move toward marriage. He hadn’t been able to commit. He’d cared about her. Appreciated her in bed and out. But he’d known she wasn’t the one, just as the handful of women he’d dated before her hadn’t been the one. The ones he’d dated after her?

They’d been beautiful. Smart. Urban chic. But they’d bored him. Body, mind and soul. It had been far easier to immerse himself in work. Now there was Rachel Kincaid. Stimulating him in so many different ways and distracting him from his duty. It not only surprised him. It was beginning to piss him off.

Dylan grabbed his binoculars and scanned the surrounding area. It looked clear, but he was still conscious of the presence of his firearm inside his boot. Knew it would take mere seconds to draw his weapon if he needed it.

“There!” Rachel exclaimed, pointing to a spot of blue, deep down among the green rushes that surrounded a bubbling spring. She grabbed the reins herself and pulled Ginger to a halt.

Dylan swung himself off the horse, then helped Rachel to her feet. She stumbled and he caught her—their faces inches from each other. Her eyebrows swung together in a V before she pulled away.

“Josiah?” she called out, pushing through the rushes, gray mud sucking at her bare feet.

She came to a halt next to the bright spot of blue they’d seen, and Dylan came up behind her. When she sank to her knees in front of the crumpled figure, Dylan knew Peter had been right.

The man was dead.

* * *

On her knees, Rachel swallowed against the heave in her stomach. Josiah lay at an odd angle, a few yards from where the spring water bubbled to the surface. Coagulated blood stained his face, no doubt from the severe wound on the side of his forehead. Next to his head, a large jagged rock protruded from the ground. He must have slipped. Hit his head.

She hated that Peter had seen Josiah’s open eyes, so devoid of life. Was that what Jax saw when the school bus had dropped him off and he’d come home to find their parents, dead from carbon monoxide poisoning? She reached a hand out to close his eyes but was stopped by a firm grip on her elbow.

“Don’t touch him,” Dylan growled.

For a second, the timbre of his voice and the weight of his touch made fear shoot through her. This was a stranger, a stranger who’d appeared as suddenly as Josiah had been hurt. Killed. Dylan Rooney claimed he’d been riding after Peter because he’d only wanted to help, but what if that wasn’t the case?

But just as panic and fear started to choke off her breath, she reminded herself that he’d told both her and Peter to stay at the house to call 911. Someone bent on trouble would hardly want more witnesses to deal with, and he would most likely have tried to separate them.

After taking a deep breath, she slowly pulled her arm away from his grip. “I only want to close his eyes. Give him some dignity,” she argued.

“We can’t disturb the scene any more than we already have. This man is dead. We need to back up and wait for the authorities.”

Dylan’s words buzzed inside her head. Two phrases hung in the air, as if a spotlight was on them. Disturb the scene. Wait for the authorities. Then she remembered the way he’d initially ordered her and Peter to go inside the house and lock the doors after them. As if he’d wanted to make sure whatever had hurt Josiah couldn’t hurt them.

Aaron had been beastly over the past month, demanding rights to the water he’d found on her land. Even before that, he’d always been a bit of a jerk, which was why she’d initially wondered if Aaron had been causing Josiah trouble.

But she hadn’t been thinking murder. Now, based on the position of Josiah’s body next to the rock, the most logical assumption would be Josiah had fallen and hit his head.

Clearly this man suspected foul play.

Why?

Dylan held out a hand and after a slight hesitation, she took it. He tugged her upward and she came to standing, facing him.

“Why can’t I touch him?” she asked hoarsely. “What do you mean, ‘disturb the scene’?”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he soothed. “It looks like he fell, but it’s always possible something else happened to him.”

“Like what?”

His fingers tightened around hers right before he ran his hands up and down her arms in a comforting motion. Her first instinct was to push him away and tell him she needed answers, not sympathy. But that would be a lie.

She suddenly felt on the verge of collapse. Wanted nothing more than to rest her cheek against his chest and beg him to hold her. Comfort her.

He sighed and lifted one hand to run his knuckles against her cheek. “There are always those who want to hurt others, Rachel. There’s always a possibility that there’s danger where we think we’re the safest. But I’m here. And I’ll help you. You just need to let me.”

Chapter 3

“I don’t understand,” Rachel said even as she pulled away from him. Fear had made her large eyes grow rounder, and Dylan barely suppressed a curse. Scaring her was the last thing he wanted, but he couldn’t dismiss the possibility that her brother had killed this man. For all he knew, Kincaid was still on the property somewhere, a threat to them all.

And yet for all Rachel knew, Dylan was the threat. He needed to extinguish the fear in Rachel’s eyes. Sometimes only the truth could do that.

“I told you my name is Dylan Rooney, ma’am. What I didn’t tell you is I’m a U.S. Marshal and I’m here on important business.”

Rachel backed farther away from him, her bare feet sinking even deeper in the mud that his boots protected him from. She winced, and once again he held out a hand to provide stability. This time she ignored it, staring at him warily.

“Business that has something to do with what’s happened to Josiah?”

“Could be. I’m not certain.”

“But you think he’s been murdered.”

“That remains to be seen,” Dylan said. She shifted, then winced again, reminding Dylan she’d run out of the house barefoot. She had to be in pain. “Here, let’s get you back up on the horse while we wait for help. No sense in you continuing to beat up your feet if you don’t have to.”

He moved toward her, but she held out her hand. “Stop. You think I’m going to just take your word you’re a cop? That you have any legitimate business being here?”

“I can show you my credentials. Will that help?”

She frowned, then nodded. Slowly, he reached into his back pocket for his wallet. He held it out and she took it. As soon as she flipped it open, she saw his badge and official ID. Her shoulders seemed to relax somewhat and she held the wallet back out to him. When he’d pocketed it, she turned and started walking toward Ginger, limping the whole time.

He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Let me help you, ma’am. Please.”

She looked up at him, silent and looking a little lost, obviously numb from the shock of finding her ranch hand dead. She didn’t protest when he scooped her up in his arms and walked her the few yards back to Ginger, who was calmly grazing on green grass. Tall as Rachel was, she didn’t weigh much, but she did remain stiff in his arms while he raised her up onto Ginger’s back. Apparently dead bodies had no spook value the way tumbleweeds, bees and the occasional butterfly did, because the horse stood still.

When he settled Rachel onto Ginger’s back, she slumped in the saddle, as if all the strength had seeped out of her bones. “You were spying on us. Josiah? Or me?” she asked, her voice hollow, as if she’d forced the words out using what little energy she had left.

That was an answer he didn’t want to give just yet. Not until after Josiah was dealt with and he knew he’d have some uninterrupted alone time to explain everything to Rachel.

The sounds of sirens in the distance gave him an out. “Will Peter be able to lead the EMTs here?” he asked.

Rachel nodded, then sat up straight, agitation showing in her blanched face. “But I don’t want him to see—”

“I won’t let him near the spring. I’ll make sure he stays back, okay?”

A faint smile of gratitude curved the corners of her lips upward. Dylan realized that was the first time he’d seen even the hint of a smile on the woman’s face.

Rachel Kincaid was beautiful, but when she smiled it made him long for the rest of the world to disappear so he could spend hours simply staring at her.

“Thanks for that,” she murmured. “He’s just a kid. Seeing death at a young age can be so harmful. So destructive.”

Yeah, he knew.

In less than a minute, they heard the voices of the EMTs and he left Rachel to clamber up the gulley, intent on holding Peter back from going to his mom. From seeing Josiah’s body again.

But Peter wasn’t with the EMTs, who said they’d instructed the kid to go back to the house after he’d brought them close enough so they could find their own way to the spring. Silently, Dylan cursed. Now that he’d confirmed Josiah was dead, he was regretting letting the boy go off on his own. He wanted him near. To ensure his safety, yes, but also to settle Rachel’s worry about him.

Dylan showed the EMTs his badge. They confirmed Josiah Pemberly was deceased and made the appropriate calls to the police. Within a few minutes, a deputy from the sheriff’s department showed up. Dylan and the other man, whom Dylan had met days earlier, exchanged tense looks.

Deputy Mark Todd was one of the three sheriff’s deputies Dylan and his team had contacted when they first arrived in town. He knew who Dylan was and why he was here. Thank God he also knew better than to say anything in front of Rachel.

By the time a half hour had crept up and passed them, the deputy had agreed to make sure the body made its way to the medical examiner. He’d also agreed to call in another deputy so they could do a thorough search of the property together.

Dylan walked Ginger back to the house, an emotionally drained Rachel still perched on her back. He’d get her into the shower, bandage up her feet if need be and check in on the kid. Then he planned to see if Rachel had any whiskey in the house, pour her two fingers and tell her why he was in Texas, scoping out her house with high-powered binoculars on the back of a borrowed horse.

The odd thing was, part of him didn’t want to tell her. Instead, he wanted her to smile again. And he wanted to do whatever it took to keep that smile going, not extinguish it.

* * *

Rachel wasn’t sure what to make of Dylan Rooney. Correction: U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney. By the way the sheriff’s deputies had deferred to his authority, he appeared to be law enforcement, just as his credentials indicated, but was there truly any reason for him to think Josiah’s death had been the result of foul play? Some reason to think that she needed his help?

Maybe he was simply being paranoid because of the work he did. At least that was what she told herself as the marshal led Ginger, with Rachel in the saddle, back to the ranch. When they got there, he gently lifted her off the horse and put her on the front porch, then told her he’d take off Ginger’s tack and set the mare up in one of the empty corrals.

Rachel immediately went in search of her son. She found Peter sitting on the floor in a corner of his room, his arms wrapped around his knees. “I was right. He’s dead, isn’t he?”

“Oh, baby,” she whispered, knowing there was no easy way to break the news. Peter had loved Josiah. She fell to her knees beside her son and reached out to place a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Peter, but yes, Josiah’s dead.”

“I knew it,” he choked out. Shooting to his feet, he pushed her arm aside and bolted away.

“Peter,” she called, jumping to her feet to follow him. But her feet hurt and she was blinded by tears and her son was so much faster than she was. By the time she reached the top of the stairs, he’d barreled down them and had slammed out the back door. She had covered her eyes with one hand, choking back sobs, when the front door opened and Dylan Rooney stuck his head in.

“You want me to bring him back?”

She shook her head. Peter often hid out in the huge cottonwood by the creek—he’d always liked to process difficulties alone, and she’d always respected his needs even before she came to understand that because of his ADHD, giving him extra space was important. Now, however, she wanted him by her side. Safe. She’d shower, get some clothes and shoes on, deal with Dylan, then find Peter and keep him with her so they could grieve Josiah’s passing together. “He’ll be fine,” she said. “I—I just need to clean up and then we can talk. You can wait in the living room.”

Before he could reply, she headed into the master bedroom and quickly shut the door behind her. Then she rushed to the bathroom and shut that door behind her, as well. Only then did she lean back against the door and allow herself to break down, trying her best to stifle the sounds of her sorrow. She cried for Josiah, taken too soon. For Peter, who’d seen the stare of death. And she cried for her parents and for Jax. Jax, too, had seen empty, lifeless eyes when he returned home from school and found their parents. She hadn’t been able to protect him from that pain any more than she’d been able to protect her son.

Some mother she was turning out to be.

For the second time in as many hours, she stepped inside the shower and let the cool water wash her clean. Her feet were a mess, cut by the sharp stones she’d run across on her way to comfort her crying son, then sliced again by the knife-sharp reeds at the spring. Jackson Pollock-ish designs were painted in gray clay from her feet to her calves.

Numbly, Rachel stared at the water sluicing down the drain and, even though part of her hated herself for it, her thoughts drifted to the practicalities of Josiah’s death. After her husband Phillip’s death so long ago, the only way she’d been able to afford a ranch hand was that Josiah had been happy to do extra chores for a place to sleep and three meals a day. He’d been with her for years, and was the only alpaca shearer her flock tolerated. Between her and Josiah, they’d been able to shear the entire flock in a couple of days. With spring upon them and shearing season right around the corner, she’d have to find some way to come up with the money to hire a professional outfit.

Money she didn’t know where she’d find. Money had always been scarce; Phillip’s parents were still alive, adored Peter and would help if they could, but they barely got by on a minimal fixed income as it was. Rachel had used what little money she’d had in her bank account for Jax’s appeal. Her friend Julia had insisted on taking on Jax’s second appeal pro bono, but even with Julia offering her services for free, money was tight. And Josiah had no one in his life besides her and Peter—she’d need to pay for a funeral. It was the least she could do to pay homage to a man who’d been a loyal employee for years. A man who’d tried to steer her son right when Peter acted out. A man who hadn’t deserved to die.

A man who, according to a U.S. marshal, could have been murdered.

Broken and choked sobs wrenched their way out from her body, the harsh sounds clashing with the soft raindrop lullaby of the shower spray. Her legs turned to jelly and she dropped to the tiled floor of the shower with a crash.

Strength seemed to have left her, so she sat, knees tucked in tight under her chin and arms wrapped around her shins, and sobbed. She closed her eyes, only to see Josiah’s vacant stare as he lay in the green reeds, his blue-checkered shirt covered in wet mud. “No, no, no,” she choked out, repeating the word until it became a mantra. Something that took her away from this place. Something that let her drift away from conscious thought, into the ether of nothingness where she could feel no stress, no pain. No fear.

“Rachel.”

Dimly, through the fog of pain and anguish, she became aware of someone calling her name.

“Rachel.”

There it was again. Her name. Spoken in a soft, male voice. A voice full of compassion and sorrow. A voice close by.

She forced her eyes open to see the shadow of a tall form standing outside the steamed-up glass shower walls.

U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney. In her private bathroom. Invading her space. How dare the man? “Get out,” she managed to say. Instinctively, she cringed, then realized she was curled into herself, all the important stuff covered up, even if he could see anything more than her shadow through the foggy glass.

“I heard a thump and you crying out. Are you all right?”

“My son just saw his first dead body, and you told me my ranch hand and friend has possibly been murdered. No, I’m not okay.”

Silence followed her statement. Finally Dylan spoke again. “I meant, are you okay physically? I want to make sure you didn’t hurt yourself.”

“I’m fine,” she sniffed.

“Yeah, right, and I’m Santa Claus,” he muttered. A deep exhale of breath followed his words, and then he said, “I guess you sound okay. When you’re done crying—I mean, when you’re done taking a shower—I’ll be in your kitchen. We need to talk,” he said, his voice grim. “You need to know why I’m here. And why I think Josiah may have been murdered.”

With dread, Rachel listened as he walked out of the bathroom.

Her mother had always told her to be careful what she wished for. Learning the truth about why U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney was here was what she’d wanted.

But now she wasn’t so sure. Now she’d give almost anything to believe he really had been bird-watching...and she desperately wished he’d turn around and leave—not just her house, but her ranch— just as abruptly as he’d appeared.

Chapter 4

Rachel stared at the man who’d claimed to want to help her only to then deliver the killing blow that might finally defeat her. “No,” she said. “I don’t believe you. Jax would never have escaped prison.”

Rachel’s heartbeat thudded so heavily her chest ached. She glared at Dylan, who sat across her kitchen table, flicking a thumbnail against the rough-hewn wood. Her father had made the table when she and Jax were young. Jax had insisted on using the hand planer and ended up slicing off the tip of his finger, right on the spot Dylan was toying with.

Innocent, sweet Jax, who’d followed their father around as though their dad was his own personal hero. Rachel knew that sweet boy was still inside her brother even though he’d refused to show him in the past year. Even though he’d confessed to police that he’d knowingly transported drugs across state lines, a crime that had landed him a prison sentence.

According to police, Jax had been contacted by someone who’d heard he was looking to make a quick buck. All Jax had to do was drive a package from Texas to east L.A., give the package to the man at the drop site, receive a package in return and drive back to Texas. All for two thousand bucks and the cost of gas. He’d been told the package contained vital documents needed for signatures to sell some high-level computer tech company to a big conglomeration. But he’d known better than that. He’d known the package contained drugs.

When he’d arrived at the drop site, men with guns came storming into the warehouse. Jax had managed to escape and had hopped a freighter back to Texas.

Rachel hadn’t known any of this was happening. Jax had told her he was going out of town to look for work. She’d been so proud of him she’d been willing to let him go off for a few days, even though the ranch desperately needed his help.

Then DEA agents and the local sheriff, Howard Ryan, had arrived at the ranch a few days after Jax had taken off, scaring the hell out of her and Peter with their guns and yelling and stomping about. The sheriff had found Jax near the barn and handed him off to the DEA. With her crying and begging them for information, the agents had handcuffed her brother and hauled him away, leaving her with unanswered questions. Jax had refused to look at her. He’d refused to say one word to her. After he’d confessed, he’d refused to say another word to the police.

The last time she’d seen her brother was the day of his sentencing, before they took him away. The two times she’d tried to visit him in prison, he refused to see her.

She didn’t know why—whether he was ashamed of what had happened to him or whether he blamed her for his troubles. One thing was for sure in her mind—Jax’s confession had to have been coerced.

No matter how bad things looked, she had faith in her brother. He was a good man. And he had to know Rachel was doing everything in her power to get him out of prison—legally. He’d never put everything she’d done for him on the line by escaping his prison sentence.

Numbly, she stared at the bottle of whiskey and two tumblers Dylan had placed on the table. He’d obviously thought she’d need something to soften the news he was about to give her. The mistaken news, she told herself again. He was wrong about Jax. He had to be.

“There must have been a mix-up in the head count or something,” she insisted. “The wrong name answered during roll call. Jax didn’t run off.”

“Rachel,” Dylan said, setting an elbow on the table and leaning closer to her. “Your brother’s a fugitive. Has been for a few days now even though we’ve managed to keep his name out of the press. The U.S. marshals—including my team back in California—got the notification he was being transported from High Desert State Prison to San Quentin for overcrowding when he escaped custody. I’m the one who ended up stuck out here on top of Ginger with binoculars glued to my face and no bathroom for miles, on the off chance Jackson turned up.”

“And what were you planning on doing if he did?” she asked, anger revving her words to a fast tempo.

“The same thing I’m still planning to do. Watch and wait until capturing him doesn’t present a danger to you or your son, then nab him and bring him back into custody.”

“What do you mean wait until capturing him doesn’t present a danger to me or Peter? Were you planning to come in with guns blazin’? Have the big shoot-out at the O.K. Corral on my property?”

Instead of answering, Dylan stared at her, holding her gaze with his. She’d noticed before how startlingly blue his eyes were, but the expression he held now, one mixed with pity, compassion and a hint of fury, made the blue seem all that brighter. He shifted, and his plaid snap-front strained against the breadth of his shoulders. Under different circumstances, she’d label him a hunk. If she’d met him at the grocery store or the post office, she’d probably check for a wedding ring. And if she was being completely honest, she’d admit she’d already done the labeling and checking several times.

She mentally chided herself when her gaze once again dipped to his left hand. His ringless left hand. Damn it! This was not some friendly guy seated next to her at a Back to School Night. This man was the enemy.

She pushed her glass forward and waited as Dylan unstoppered the alcohol and poured her a drink, then used a finger to push it back across the wooden table to her. Despite wanting to down the entire glass in one gulp, she forced herself to sip elegantly, letting the firewater drift down the back of her throat, wishing she could be sharing the drink with Josiah. Tears filled her eyes and she tipped her head upward. She cried easily, always had, but she didn’t want He-Man to see her tears. Not after he’d watched her sob, naked, on the floor of her shower. Granted, the glass of the shower surround had been so fogged Dylan hadn’t actually seen her naked. But still...

Dylan cleared his throat. “I don’t understand why you think it’s so unbelievable your brother would run from the law. He’s a convict.”

“A convict who was falsely accused. A convict whose case is under appeal. A convict who will win that appeal and be fully acquitted.”

Dylan shook his head slowly, his gaze piercing hers. “You can’t possibly be that naive, Rachel.”

“And you can’t possibly claim to know me. Just because you did the whole gallant-knight thing today, riding in on a charger, coming to the rescue, doesn’t make you the good guy. It doesn’t make you right.”

The corner of his mouth tipped upward in a crooked smile. “So I was a gallant knight, then?”

Funny how that curl relieved some of the tension of the day. The man probably made women melt and teenage girls swoon. But Rachel was far from a teenager, and she wasn’t in a melting or swooning mood. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to rip Dylan’s head off for being against her brother or spend the night crying into her pillow over Josiah’s death.

She let out a deep sigh, allowing the alcohol to blur her emotions, smooth the jagged edges. But then a thought suddenly occurred to her, and the jagged emotions were back with a vengeance.

“Josiah,” she breathed. “You implied he might have been murdered. You can’t possibly think...”

But he did. She could see it in his eyes.

“Josiah fell,” she said baldly.

“Maybe,” Dylan said. “Maybe not.”

She stood abruptly. “I think you’ve said all you needed to say. My brother’s escaped, and he might be on his way here. The U.S. marshals have my place staked out. Now I need to find my son and go about our evening chores. Tomorrow’s a big day—I have a funeral to start planning, and I need to figure out how to hire a ranch hand I can’t afford. So I think it’s time I thank you for your help with our crisis today.” She gestured to the front door.

The man remained seated.

“Seriously, did you not get what I said? I’d like you to leave now.”

He nodded. “I heard you. And yes, I understood the subtext without the need for added direction. But I’m not leaving. Not until you understand what kind of threat your brother truly represents. Not until you understand that you and your son may be in mortal danger from Jackson Kincaid.”

* * *

Dylan figured no one wanted to hear someone they loved could hurt them, but he’d seen too many instances of domestic violence not to know that sometimes the ones you loved the deepest were the ones who could cause the most harm. He also figured Rachel Kincaid had heard and experienced all she should have to in one day. Unfortunately he couldn’t give her the reprieve he wanted to.

He had a duty to the citizens of the United States to keep them safe.

Justice. Integrity. Service.

The motto of the U.S. marshals wasn’t simply words on letterhead. Those words meant something to him. If he did his job, fugitives were brought to justice. He did his job with integrity, respecting the rights of all concerned, be it family, victim or the fugitive himself. And he did it all for personal satisfaction, yes, but mostly to be of service—to his country and to its inhabitants.

Right now being of service meant convincing Rachel Kincaid her brother could harm her.

He wished he didn’t have to. The woman had gotten under his skin in just a few hours. If he were a lesser man, he’d say his connection to her was simply physical. The woman was a looker, no doubt. And although those glass walls in her shower had been steamed up pretty well, he’d seen the swell of her breasts, the roundness of her naked hip, when he went to check on her.

But he knew there was more to his feelings for Rachel than physical attraction. He admired her. She certainly put up with a lot from her son. Before that... According to the files he’d read, she’d taken over running the ranch when her parents died, and had raised her younger brother, Jackson. He’d been ten and she’d just turned eighteen. She’d quit college and moved back to the ranch. Six months later she’d married a local boy—Phillip Wright—who’d killed himself a few years later in a drunk driving incident, leaving Rachel a widow with a three-year-old son to raise even as her teenage brother got himself into more and more trouble. She’d been struggling to do the right thing for all of them ever since.

“I know you raised him, Rachel. That you were little more than a child yourself when your parents died. You had your hands full with him, didn’t you?” he asked.

She shot him a hard look. “Jax was like any other teenager. He got screwed by life and screwed things up in response.”

“Detention throughout high school. He didn’t even graduate—had to take his GED. Then two DUIs and a few minor drug busts followed. All that I could see blaming on losing his parents so young. Typical messed-up kid stuff.”

“So?” Rachel snapped at him.

He paused before going on. “Then a B-and-E that he got a light sentence on because he was a juvie. Then another B-and-E. Again, maybe you could blame the loss of your parents on him acting out. Being stupid. But then there was the bust for possession of marijuana for sale. His first potential felony. He got off on that one on a technicality. Still sounding like a screwed-up kid to you?”

Rachel sagged back down in her chair and let her hands fall into her lap. She stared at the floor. He followed her gaze to the cracked checkerboard floor tile that had her transfixed. At least she was listening. Not running. Not fighting.

He sucked in a deep breath. Time to wake up Rachel Kincaid. “But what convinces me he isn’t some stupid screwed-up kid anymore was the drug deal gone south. Your brother took a job delivering heroin to a drug dealer in Los Angeles. When the DEA showed up to raid the place— Well, you know what happened.” He let his words hang in the air.

“Jax never had a chance to fix the tile,” Rachel said, dully, still staring at the floor. “That week Peter had the flu. We needed money desperately—I couldn’t even afford to take Peter to the doctor. I was exhausted, trying to tend to Peter and the livestock. Jax was trying to help. He was making me a sandwich when he dropped the mayo jar and shattered that tile there.” She nodded to the broken tile. “Three days later he was arrested. Poor Jax. He hadn’t even turned twenty before he was taken from me and now he’s barely twenty-one. He’s spent the past year in prison. He’s been without his friends. His family...”

“Rachel,” he said softly, “Jax isn’t a victim. He admitted he knew what he was doing. He confessed. His first appeal was rejected for that very reason.”

She raised her gaze to meet his, her eyes nearly as dull as Josiah’s earlier in the day. “He was harassed into giving that confession. Scared.”

They stared at each other until Dylan sighed. The day had settled into evening. His teammate Eric Haynes had the night shift and would probably already be in position to spy on the ranch. No sense in staying any later. He didn’t want to ride Ginger back to Aaron’s ranch in the dark.

Besides, if Rachel was naive enough to believe her brother wasn’t the drug-dealing scumbag he knew the kid to be, he knew nothing he could say right now would change her mind. Hell, his own mother had been handed irrefutable proof that his brother was bad to the core, time and time again, and she’d never accepted it, even up to the day she died.

“I can see you’ve got your mind made up about Jax. But sooner or later, Rachel, you’re going to have to face the truth.” Dylan stood and headed toward the door.

“Where are you going?” she asked, her voice catching in her throat.

Hand on the door handle, he stopped. “The Sleep-E-Z Motorcoach Lodge.”

“So the U.S. Marshals will be leaving me alone now?”

“Nope. The sheriff’s deputies swept your property—it’s clear. They’re gone, but my teammate Eric is already in place. He’ll keep watch until I show back up in the morning.”

“Jax is a good kid,” she stated. “He’s innocent. And if he did escape, and I’m not saying he did, he must have had a good reason, if only that he was scared.”

At that, he turned and caught her gaze with his. “A good reason? He—” He bit off his words. He was pretty certain that Rachel would collapse under the weight of any more bad news. He’d be back to tell her the rest of the story. Until then, maybe some rest would enable her to see reason come morning. So Dylan contented himself with saying, “Good night, Ms. Kincaid.” He stepped outside into the humid Texas evening air, frustration crawling around inside his skin. As he slammed the door behind him, he heard a crash and the breaking of glass.

Then he heard her crying.

Again.

He stood there a long time before he found the will to walk away.

Chapter 5

After Dylan Rooney left, Rachel threw herself a very brief pity party and then went looking for her son. Just in case he’d snuck back inside without her knowing it, she combed the inside of the house first. When that proved fruitless, she headed outside and to his favorite tree. Down at the creek, even with dusk not yet set and cool light still diffusing the air, Rachel could tell the cottonwood’s branches hung empty. No Peter.

She called Peter’s name, but only the trickle of the creek and the rise and swell of the cricket and frog chorus rose around her. A nearby bullfrog stopped its low bellow, but no boy’s voice responded. She doubted Peter was in the barn—the grass hay gave him allergies—but she’d try there.

She’d crumbled when she saw Josiah’s dead body. Peter had to be freaking out. He liked to be alone when he got upset, but still, this was going on too long.

Fifteen minutes later, with all the light from the fading dusk gone, she headed back to the house. Peter hadn’t been in the barn, either. Nor in the toolshed, or in the woodshed or in any of the corrals.

Upstairs, she paused in front of his closed bedroom door. She’d deliberately left it open before she headed outside to look for him. Relief swamped through her even as she braced herself and knocked on the door. “Peter?” No answer. She knocked again. “Peter, honey, I know you’re upset, but we need to talk. Peter?” When there was still no answer, she opened the door.

She let out a cry of dismay upon seeing it was still empty. Immediately she saw the piece of paper propped on Peter’s pillow. There, in Peter’s dismal scrawl, was a note addressed to her.

Mom. I wasn’t paying attention to where I was shooting the BB gun. I think I killed Josiah. I don’t deserve to live here and decided to be a railroad bum. I have a hat and extra socks and I took five dollars from the cookie jar. I’ll pay you back some day. Your son, Peter Kincaid.

An empty ache filled her heart as she realized what Peter must have felt, thinking he’d shot Josiah. She’d seen the wound on Josiah’s head. No BB could have done that kind of damage. It had never dawned on her that Peter could have assumed he’d killed a man.

“Oh, God, Peter,” she murmured, staring at the note she now held in her hand. She’d thought she was doing the right thing by leaving her son alone to work through his pain, when she really should have been seeking him out, making sure he was okay. Instead, she’d spent time wallowing in her own grief and arguing with a U.S. Marshal over her brother.

What kind of mother was she?

And where the hell was the rulebook on how to be a parent? Why didn’t kids come with a user’s guide?

Within minutes she called the sheriff’s department and reported Peter missing. The call didn’t go well. Sheriff Ryan expressed frustration over how many times Peter had run off in the past few years and how many times he’d been caught trespassing. Disturbed by the edge of warning in the lawman’s voice, Rachel listened with growing trepidation and worry for her son, then called her best friend, Julia. Her brother—and now maybe even her son—needed a lawyer.

Rachel needed more than that.

She needed a friend. A break. A hint of hope that her life was finally going to take an upward swing.

But given everything that had happened today, given everything that U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney had told her, she couldn’t imagine her life going anywhere but completely downhill.

Hours later, morning brought bright Texas sunlight streaming through Rachel’s kitchen window, but there was still no sign of Peter. She’d searched the surrounding area of the ranch until it got dark, and then she’d paced and worried and paced some more, praying for her son to come home. He’d run off before, but never for this long. The sheriff had called just over an hour ago, indicating his men had searched her property and the adjacent land—no signs of Peter.

Peter knew how to take care of himself, but Rachel’s mom Spidey senses had the creepy crawlies making their way up her spine. Even if Josiah hadn’t been murdered, Texas hosted a number of bad things that went bump in the night. Rattlesnakes, cougars, scorpions and brown recluse spiders. And the occasional bad guy. Scary stuff she didn’t want to think about. Not with her son out there, alone and thinking he’d killed a man.

Rachel busied herself making two foaming lattes. One for her, and one for Julia. Thank God for Julia, who’d shown up fifteen minutes after Rachel called her, then taken over with lawyerly efficiency, querying Rachel about U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney’s presence and why Peter had run off. Then she’d shoved Rachel in the direction of her bedroom and promised to bed the alpacas down. Of course, Rachel hadn’t slept a wink, but she didn’t tell Julia that.

“Thanks again for spending the night,” Rachel said, handing over Julia’s latte. There wasn’t anything she could do to find Peter, and until she heard otherwise, she had to assume he was okay. She needed, however, to distract her mind from her worry, and working on Jax’s case would help. “Did you find anything out?” She nodded to the open laptop on the kitchen table.

“Some,” her friend said, blowing on the foam of her drink. “According to the internet, this guy Dylan Rooney is who he says he is. U.S. Marshal. Part of a special ops team.”

“What makes him so special?” Rachel asked. Besides his wide shoulders, long legs and tendency to rescue kids and widows in need. She gave herself a mental smack. This marshal might be sexy as sin, but he was still after her brother. That meant he might have rescued them, but not because he’d wanted to keep them safe. He’d done it because he wanted something else. He wanted her brother, and she and Peter were just means to an end.

“His team usually goes after the really bad guys. International drug cartel kind of people. I’m surprised they’re interested in Jax. Yeah, the bust was big and two people were injured, but it’s not like Jax held the smoking gun or anything.”

“Have you found out anything about an escape?”

Julia grimaced. “I’m sorry, Rachel. I wish I had different news. But according to prison officials, Jax managed to escape during transport and the only reason they told me that is that I’m on record as his lawyer. He really got himself into a world of trouble with this escapade. Legally, he’s screwed himself, big-time.”

Rachel groaned and slumped against the refrigerator, letting the metal cool her skin. How was it she’d failed her brother so badly after their parents died? “How bad is it for his appeal that Jax took off?”

“Bad. Completely, totally, I-really–hope-there’s-been-some-kind–of-mistake bad.”

“There’s no mistake,” a male voice boomed out. “Jackson Kincaid is bad news. And if you want to keep yourselves and Peter safe, you need to accept that right now.”

* * *

Dylan knew he shouldn’t be staring, but wow—Rachel Kincaid had excellent legs. Dressed in purple cotton sleep shorts and a white ribbed tank, barefoot yet again, and even with her hair in a wild and disheveled ponytail, she looked delicious. His gaze traveled up her legs to meet hers.

She looked delicious and pissed.

And she wasn’t moving from where she leaned against her refrigerator, giving him the glare of death. Only her body had tensed, tightened. As if she were expecting a fight.

“Planning on letting me in, or doesn’t Southern hospitality extend this far west?” he asked, grabbing the handle of the latched screen door and giving it a rattle.

“Southern hospitality is reserved for gentlemen. And since you’re staring like a largemouth bass at a lady in her pj’s, you’re obviously no gentleman,” Rachel snapped out.

She’d shown some backbone yesterday, too, although the ordeal with the dead ranch hand had about done her in. Tough exterior, soft heart, he thought, remembering how devastated she’d been, crying for her friend in the shower. And how heart-wrenching her sobs had sounded as he’d stood outside her door, wanting nothing more than to stride back inside, gather her in his arms, and comfort her.

“Seriously, though, we need to talk about your brother. I’m happy to wait outside while you dress.” There. Gentlemanly behavior, right?

Ignoring him, Rachel headed up the stairs. The woman Dylan hadn’t been able to see popped around the corner and unlatched the screen door and held it open.

“I’m Julia Rickel,” she said. “I know why you’re here. I’m Rachel and Jax’s attorney. And Rachel’s best friend.”

“U.S. Marshal Dylan Rooney. Rachel’s...well...” Rachel’s what? Yesterday, she’d sarcastically referred to his knight-in–shining-armor routine. And that was before he’d told her that her brother was out to get her. Before she’d flipped on him and thrown a bottle of booze at what most likely was his head. “Rachel’s nemesis.”

Julia flashed him a quick grin, then stuck her hand out. He shook it, noting the lawyer’s strong grip. She looked to be about ten years older than Rachel. Nice looking, with short brown hair and a trim figure, and with very much a lawyer-type attitude, he realized as she checked him out just as thoroughly.

“Mind if I grill you while you wait for Rachel?” she asked, pulling her hand away and then motioning for him to sit at the rough-hewn kitchen table.

No polite chitchat for this woman. But if she was truly Jackson’s lawyer, he probably couldn’t say much in front of her. “Grill away,” he said, anyway.

“What on God’s green earth made you stake out the Kincaid place on horseback? And on Ginger, of all horses?” she asked.

He shrugged. “We didn’t want to call attention to ourselves. Aaron Jacobson had a notice in the paper that he rented out horses, so the team’s operations officer rented one for me, saying I was a bird-watcher.”

“Lame,” Julia said, then focused her attention on her laptop.

“Completely lame,” Rachel agreed, walking back into the room, this time wearing shorts that covered just an inch or two more than the other ones had, and a bra under her tank.

“Agreed,” he said, bringing his gaze from her rounded breasts up to her face. “I would have gone for a hiker so I could have stayed on foot. But at least Ginger got me down the ridge and to your place when Peter started hollering. My partner, Eric, told me some sheriff’s deputies came back to search for Peter. They told him he has a habit of running off. He’s not back yet?”

Rachel’s eyes welled up with tears and her muscles seemed to lose their strength, contradicting her earlier rigidity. “No.”

She turned and crossed the kitchen, then opened the refrigerator door, as if looking for ingredients. But he could see her swipe at her eyes. Once again, the woman was crying.

“Look, if he runs off a lot, then—”

“He doesn’t run off ‘a lot,’” she snapped out, slamming the refrigerator door shut and glaring at him, but tears still glistened in her eyes. “But in addition to being a kid and needing some space sometimes, he’s got ADHD. We’ve been working on different coping skills and it helps being able to run. To move. He knows this land. He always finds his way back safely, but...”

“But he’s grieving,” he said quietly.

“More than that. He came back when I didn’t know it, but only to grab some things and write me a note. He thinks he killed Josiah with his BB gun.”

Holy hell. Dylan shifted on the bench seat. The kid thought he’d killed someone with a BB gun? Those things could maybe take out an eye, but not a human. “The M.E. called late last night. Cause of death was a cerebral hemorrhage. Although we don’t yet know if he fell or was hit in the head, I can assure you, your kid and his BB gun had nothing to do with Josiah’s death.”

“I never thought Peter shot Josiah,” she snapped out. “He fell. He hit his head. End of story.”

“It’s just the beginning actually. He could have been murdered. The coroner’s running more tests. If Jackson is here, there should be—”

“Jax,” Rachel ground out, her face going red. “His name is Jax. No one calls him Jackson. And you’re not going to find any evidence that he’s here or that he killed Josiah. How many times do I need to tell you he’s innocent?” Her words revved up, adrenaline ramping up the speed. “Get it through your thick head—even if my brother escaped, he did it because he was scared. Jax is not a killer.”

He waited, allowing her time to calm down, to get her emotions back in check. Quickly, he shot a glance at Julia. Jackson—Jax’s—lawyer. Like him, she sat on the bench seat, only she’d pulled her knees up to her chin. Her fingers had stopped their dancing across the keyboard and instead she stared at the screen as though riveted. Interesting. Had the lawyer found out the real reason Dylan was there? Did she now know what he knew?

What Rachel obviously didn’t know?

If she did, that meant the information had finally leaked to the press.

“I raised him,” Rachel said, breaking the silence, pulling his attention back to her. “Whatever decisions Jax made, I led him there. I know he’s not perfect. But if he’s made mistakes, it’s partially my fault.”

Dylan snorted. Barely stopped himself from cursing and snapping at her. She was acting just like his mother. Making excuses for someone else’s bad behavior. Blaming herself. “Listen to me—”

On the other side of the table from him, Julia snapped her laptop shut and rose to her feet. “Rachel,” she said, sliding the laptop under her arm and coming around to face her friend. “How long will you keep taking the blame for what Jax did? And are you really going to take the blame for what he’s done now?”

“So he ran away from jail. I know that’s bad, but it’s not like he’s killed anyone.”

“You have to tell her,” Julia said.

Dylan caught the woman’s full-on glare. Worry and not a small amount of anger shone in her eyes.

Justice. Integrity. Service. Those words meant something to him.

Neither Rachel nor Julia could see that. Rachel was worried about her son and brother. Julia was worried about her friend—with good reason. He wasn’t here to hold the hand of a widow who refused to accept her brother was dangerous.

Even so, what he had to say was going to devastate Rachel. He had to tell her, if only to get her to take this situation seriously. To take him seriously.

He had no other choice.

Chapter 6

“Tell me.” The deepness of Rachel’s own tone sent a vibrato through her throat. What did the marshal know that he hadn’t told her? What was her best friend keeping from her?

In front of her, Julia shifted from foot to foot, her laptop slung under one arm, the other arm crossed in front of her chest. As if she was on guard. From Rachel? Or from what they were about to tell her?

Dylan had risen to his feet, as well. Unlike with Julia, his arms were wide—hands fisted and placed on his hips. With his feet apart, he reminded her of some top-notch official in the military. Or a bully.

Neither spoke.

Rachel fought back a swearword. “I said tell me. Tell me what’s happened to Jax.”

Julia took a tentative step forward. “You know what? Maybe I was wrong. You’re dealing with too much, Rachel. Maybe you should focus on Peter right now. Let your concerns about Jax go for a bit. You’ve had a shock, with Josiah passing away and Peter running off. I’ll handle Jax’s situation.”

Rachel turned on her. “I handle Jax. Me. You’re his lawyer, not his mom.”

“And you’re not his mom, either,” Julia pointed out. She’d used a soft tone, but the words pinpricked Rachel’s heart. “Your son needs you. Be there for Peter. Let me and the marshal handle Jax.”

Rachel fought for control. “How did you get my best friend to suddenly be on Team U.S. Marshals?” she snapped out at Dylan. “I know my son needs me. And I know my brother needs me. He’s alone out there, scared.”

“Who are you talking about, Rachel?” Dylan asked, his voice low. “Peter or Jax?”

She slumped. Both, she thought. How was she supposed to be a mother to two boys who needed her—one who was her biological son and still a kid, and the other whom she’d parented for the past eleven years and who could barely be considered an adult?

Tightening her spine, she stood straight, then stalked out of the kitchen and onto the wooden porch, letting the screen door slam behind her. The wind, light and gentle but stronger than a breeze, ruffled the tops of the grass in front of her. Peter needed to run the mower over the lawn. The alpacas needed feeding, the babies needed worming, the chickens and pheasants needed to be fed and watered and to have their cages cleaned. The horses needed to be turned out into the pasture. And it was just her. No ranch hand. No son. No brother.

Tears pricked her eyes. She ached to hold her son in her arms. To rock him and tell him Josiah’s death was not his fault. But the days when she could rock her son were long over. He’d be home soon. He always came home—either willingly or yanked by the ear by one of the deputies. But he wouldn’t want a hug. Would deny comfort, both for himself and for her.

And what of her brother? How could Rachel fix things for him this time?

The squeak of the screen door and the heavy thud of boots on the porch let her know Dylan had joined her. She remained standing, staring into the distance at the faraway creek, at the brush that rose on either side, and at Peter’s favorite cottonwood.

“Julia’s headed back to her office. She said she has some paperwork to file on your brother’s behalf.” Dylan stepped closer, his heat emanating off his chest and meeting her back. It made her feel as if a warm blanket of comfort and care had been placed on her.

Although he didn’t touch her, her hair was up in a high ponytail and the hairs on her neck quivered. She shivered involuntarily as she imagined him touching her—massaging the back of her neck with his strong fingers, his warm palm pressed against her skin.

And her body responded.

Aching in long-forgotten places that emphasized how different they were. How strong and masculine he was. How perfect he was made to press against and inside her softer more feminine parts.

God, how she wanted to lean back and rest her weight on this man. The man who’d come riding to her son’s rescue. The man who’d stood by her when she dealt with the death of her ranch hand and friend. The man who smelled of mint and melon.

The man who thought her brother was a scumbag drug dealer who’d kill an old man and endanger his family.

His very presence was a threat to her and those she loved.

She turned and shifted away from him, making him frown. The rough wood of the porch railing dug into her back. “Tell me,” she said quietly. “Please.”

His jaw clenched before he abruptly nodded. “I’m sorry, Rachel, but there’s not much a lawyer can do for Jax now. I’m afraid it’s bad. Jax didn’t just run off, though believe me, that would be no small matter to deal with. During the escape, two U.S. marshals who’d been transferring him to another prison were shot.”

“Oh, God...are they...” She couldn’t bear to say the word.

“One’s dead. The other’s been in a coma and is in critical care.”

She dropped her gaze to the faded wooden planks of the porch floor. The bones in her legs threatened to break into a thousand pieces and the shaking started. Surely he wasn’t telling her that Jax—

He slid a finger under her chin and tipped her head up.

“Rachel, I need you to look at me. I need you to understand.”

Unwilling, she met his deep, dark gaze.

Dylan continued, saying, “The reason we have such an intense operation targeting your brother is that he’s dangerous. He’s a killer. And we need your help to trap him.”

* * *

Rachel jerked her head away from Dylan’s touch and barreled into the kitchen, the loud crack of the screen door swinging shut behind her sounding like thunder. Dylan’s entry through the door was notable but much softer.

“Rachel—”

She shook her head as she paced alongside the kitchen table, the floor cold against her bare feet. The sensation was in complete opposition to the heat running through her veins: the heat of anger, of fear and of...denial?

She’d raised Jax since he was ten. Held him in her arms when he’d woken up with nightmares about their parents’ dead and empty eyes. Admonished him and yet felt a sense of pride when he stayed up all night with his favorite alpaca when she was about to give birth. Got annoyed with him over the countless frogs and baby birds he brought into the house to rescue.

And she’d been there when the troubles in school had started. Then the troubles with the law. It hadn’t mattered.

Jax saved baby jackrabbits from coyotes. He didn’t kill people. No way would she ever believe otherwise.

And no way in hell would she help the U.S. Marshals trap her brother.

A whinny came from the barn—a subtle reminder it was well past time to feed the livestock yet one strong enough to act as a lifeline. She grabbed on to it for all she was worth.

Trying to convince Dylan of her brother’s innocence was a waste of time. She knew her brother; he didn’t. She turned, strode outside once more, then headed down the patio steps and toward the barn.

Once again, she heard Dylan following her. Heard him say, “Damn it, Rachel, stop.”

When she didn’t obey him, he gently took hold of her arm, halting her progress and turning her toward him.

With a vicious tug, she ripped her arm away. “Don’t touch me,” she shrilled.

He immediately put his hands up in a placating gesture. “Rachel, you have to listen to me—”

“No! I don’t. Because you refuse to listen to me. No way is Jax a killer. And no way will I help you trap him. Please leave. I have animals to feed. After that, if he hasn’t come back on his own already, I’ll go looking for Peter.”

He put his hands on his hips, his expression radiating impatience. “Have you considered that maybe if you help me, I can help you?”

“I don’t want your help!”

“You sure about that? Because the U.S. Marshals have resources, Rachel. One call and I can get a chopper in the sky, looking for your son.”

An incredulous bitter laugh tore out of her. “You’re telling me you have the resources to find a kid, lost and alone somewhere out in the wilderness of Texas, and you’re refusing to put those resources to use unless I help trap my brother? Isn’t that called blackmail?” When the man refused to answer, she showed him her back and continued marching down the trail to the barn, aware of Dylan on her tail.

“That’s not what I meant. Look—I was going to get the chopper in the sky whether you agreed to help us trap your brother or not. I’d already asked my team administrator to look into it before I got here, just in case Peter hadn’t returned. She’s likely got a pilot at the ready.”

“Ready to move if I do what you want,” she said with a sneer.

“No,” he snapped. “I won’t put your kid’s life in jeopardy by playing games. I’m just pointing out that our relationship doesn’t have to be contentious. You don’t have to fight me because you think I want to hurt your brother. I don’t. I just want him safely returned to custody.”

She stopped and whirled, facing him with arms crossed over her chest. “So you...what? Think we can be friends and do each other some favors? You’ll help me find Peter and you expect me to believe you won’t expect something in return? Something like me handing over my brother?”

He stood only a few feet in front of her so that she could almost feel the fire burning in his eyes. She forced herself not to retreat.

“I know you’ll never hand over your brother,” he said. “All I want is your cooperation, Rachel. No, strike that. That’s all I can ask for. Because anything else I want from you has nothing to do with your brother.”

She sucked in a breath. Looked away. Refused to acknowledge the heat in his eyes that seemed to flare a thousand times brighter as he’d finished speaking. He wasn’t admitting he was attracted to her. And even if he was, so what? Sexual attraction meant nothing; family did. “How, exactly, do you want me to cooperate?”

“Don’t treat me like the enemy. Don’t do anything to warn Jax away. Let me help. Him and you.”

“By putting him back in prison for a crime he didn’t commit!”

“He’s going back to prison,” he said quietly. “He was convicted for transporting drugs. The evidence suggests he shot those marshals, but he hasn’t been convicted of those crimes yet. He still has a chance to tell his side of things. You want to help him? Do it the way you have been doing. By working inside the law. Anything else is going to end badly and you know it.”

She did know it. Jax would never be safe, not labeled an escaped convict.

“You think he murdered Josiah.”

“I can’t ignore that as a possibility, but it’s a slim one in my mind. And I do give great weight to the phrase ‘innocent until proven guilty.’”

She stared at Dylan. Took several deep breaths. Took a couple of steps back to put some distance between them physically even if she couldn’t run and hide from what he was saying.

“So don’t warn him away. That’s all you want from me?”

“Not quite. Let me stay here, on the ranch. Pretending to be a ranch hand. That way if Jackson—Jax—shows up, he won’t be suspicious. He’ll think I’m hired help. We can take him in easily—no ugliness.”

A ranch hand. Dylan was proposing to pretend to be her ranch hand. Right. As if a city slicker like him—a man who didn’t even know how to ride Western, for God’s sake, could be an actual ranch hand. She snorted.

She didn’t need his help. Peter was fine. He’d be home soon and then she’d lock them both inside the house. Away from this man and his ugly accusations. First, however, she needed to get her chores done.

“My answer is no.”

Using all her strength, she strode to the barn and raised the iron bar that held the doors open. When sunlight streamed into the darkened barn, the livestock grew agitated. Usually Josiah had fed, watered and turned them out by now.

“Hungry babies,” she murmured, then grabbed a pitchfork. First went oat hay to the quarter horses, Anchor and Row. Next she distributed pellets down the alpacas’ trough, taking time to ruffle soft necks or murmur to the babies—the crias. All the while she was aware of Dylan following her.

“How much longer will you be?” he finally asked.

She refused to turn around. “I work until sundown. And now that I’m missing two helpers, I’ll be working even longer.”

Behind her, she heard rummaging and the clanging of metal against metal. She craned her neck to look around a stack of hay bales to see Dylan, feed bucket in each hand.

“Tell me what to do.”

“I told you. I’m not betraying my brother by letting you stay here.”

“I heard you. I want to help, anyway, okay?”

She stared at him suspiciously. “Sure you do. Do you think Jax is hiding underneath some hay?”

“I think you need to get that I’m just doing my job, Rachel. If you don’t willingly allow me to stay here, I’ll go right back to sitting on the ridge on Ginger, binoculars trained on every move you make, my teammates at the ready to take your brother down by force if he shows up. Before I do that, why not let me help?”

Help. Hanging around ready to nab Jax wasn’t exactly what she’d consider help. But if she didn’t agree, Dylan and his team would still spy on her. How much of her privacy could she afford to give up? She’d need to call Julia—find out what her legal rights were. Julia’s specialty was appellate law, but she’d probably be able to advise Rachel on the legalities of the U.S. Marshals spying on her property. On her every move. Every move her son made.

Peter.

“Weren’t you going to call a chopper?” she asked. “I mean, I know Peter’s fine. But the sooner he’s back, the better I’ll feel.”

Dylan set the buckets down, then reached into his back pocket and pulled out a phone. Swiftly, he arranged for a chopper to sweep the immediate area around Rachel’s ranch.

When he disconnected the call, he stood silent. Waiting.

Rachel cleared her throat. Forced out, “Thank you. I appreciate you doing that.”

“I want your son found, too, Rachel. I’m not here to harm either of you. I wish you’d believe me.”

But he is here to harm me. How could he think otherwise given what he was accusing Jax of? Her head suddenly started pounding and all she wanted in the world was to lie down, cover her head with something until the world dimmed to nothing and sleep.

That, of course, wouldn’t accomplish anything. Not for Peter. Not for Jax.

And not for her.

She could deny and hide all she wanted.

Dylan Rooney wasn’t going away any time soon.

She swallowed, then said, “I do believe you. It doesn’t change much between us, but I do believe you want to keep Peter and me safe.”

“And your brother, too. I want to bring him into custody but I want to do it in a way that’s best for everyone. Him included, Rachel. Like I said, the best chance I have of doing that is if he thinks I’m on the ranch helping you out.”

“God, you don’t give up.”

“No, ma’am.”

Rachel studied him. “He hasn’t been here and he’s not going to come here. He didn’t kill Josiah.”

“I hope that’s the case. I really do. Even if it is, you can still use my help. Free of charge. What do you say?”

Rachel hesitated. Struggled with the knowledge that if she didn’t give in to Dylan’s request, he’d still keep an eye out for Jax. Maybe the best thing she could do was keep Dylan close and do her best to convince him of Jax’s innocence.

“Fine,” she said. “The alpacas get a full bucket of pellets, sprinkled all the way down the feed trough. There’s a hose on the other side of the barn, outside. Empty the water bucket, scrub it out and fill it with fresh water. Then join me back in the house. I’ll...I’ll think about letting you stay on the ranch and give you my answer then.”

“Yes, ma’am.” For a brief second, she thought she saw a smile quirk his mouth sideways.

What stunned her most was how, despite everything, she felt that smile in her bones. It made her want to smile back. And worst of all, it made her want to feel the press of his lips against hers.

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