In the heart of Ransom Canyon, sometimes the right match for a lonely soul is the one you least expect

Dan Brigman may not lead the most exciting life, but he’s proud of what he’s achieved: he’s a respected lawman, and he’s raised a bright, talented daughter on his own. But finding a lone, sparkly blue boot in the middle of a deserted highway gets him thinking maybe the cowgirl who lost it is exactly the shake-up he needs.

After losing her baby girl, Brandi Malone felt like her soul died along with her daughter. Now singing in small-town bars to make ends meet, she’s fine being a drifter—until a handsome sheriff makes her believe that parking her boots under his bed is a better option.

College grad Lauren Brigman has just struck out on her own in downtown Dallas when a troubling phone call leads her back home to Crossroads. Her hometown represents her family, friends and deepest hopes, but also her first love, Lucas Reyes. Will Lauren’s homecoming be another heartbreak, or a second chance for her and Lucas?

Praise for Jodi Thomas and her RANSOM CANYON series

“Compelling and beautifully written, it is exactly the kind of heart-wrenching, emotional story one has come to expect from Jodi Thomas.”

—Debbie Macomber, #1 New York Times bestselling author, on the Ransom Canyon series

“Jodi Thomas is a masterful storyteller. She grabs your attention on the first page, captures your heart, and then makes you sad when it’s time to bid her wonderful characters farewell. You can count on Jodi Thomas to give you a satisfying and memorable read.”

—Catherine Anderson, New York Times bestselling author, on the Ransom Canyon series

“Thomas is a wonderful storyteller.”

—RT Book Reviews on Rustler’s Moon

“Western romance legend Thomas’s Ransom Canyon will warm readers with its huge heart and gentle souls.”

—Library Journal

“Thomas sketches a slow, sweet surrender.”

—Publishers Weekly

Wild Horse Springs

Jodi Thomas

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Praise

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

Midnight

Friday

DAN BRIGMAN HAD been sheriff for half his life. He knew the county, the people and the potholes for miles around Crossroads, Texas. Now that his daughter, Lauren, was grown, being a lawman filled his time. He’d settled into a comfortable aloneness and counted himself lucky.

When he turned onto the county road on the third Friday in November, featherlight snow circled in the cruiser’s headlights as if the beams caught winter’s breath dancing in the dark along the silent stretch of highway. The first freeze of the season was whispering across the flatland, but Dan feared a storm would rage in a few hours.

He smiled. He loved this time of year. Most folks complained about the cold, the short days, the colorless landscapes, but he liked coming inside after a long day and warming by the fireplace. He loved napping through football games and craved all the food that came with the season. Green chili enchiladas, Hopkins County Stew, spicy pork ribs simmered all day in a slow cooker.

The sheriff laughed out loud. He was starting to sound like an old man. True, there was a brush of gray along his temples, but inside he felt like he was still young. In twenty years, if he kept getting reelected, he’d retire and have time to fish off his dock at the lake house. If he got bored, he’d drop by his old office to tell the next sheriff how to run the county. He’d never run with the bulls or climbed Everest or seen a foreign country, but he’d had a rich life.

Something bright blinked in his headlights just in front of him.

Dan hit the brakes.

With his beams on high, he climbed out of the cruiser, a flashlight in one hand and the other on the butt of his service weapon. The county road might be silent tonight, but this was 111, the stretch of highway where he’d been ambushed four years ago.

That day flashed through his mind more in sounds than pictures. Bullets pinging against the sides of his cruiser like hailstones. Tires popping as they went flat. Brakes squealing while he fought for control. Glass shattering across the windshield and raining onto the pavement.

Then, when all the noise stilled, all he’d felt was pain.

Three bullets were dug out of his body a few hours later. The six months of recovery seemed endless. Four years of peace since, and yet he could still hear the sounds of that one day. He’d watched his blood snake across the highway like a tiny river and pool into the dirt. He’d counted his heartbeats as if needing to know how many were left.

If it hadn’t been for one kid pulling him away from the gunfire, he’d be buried in the Ransom Canyon Cemetery, his grave covered in snow tonight.

Dan pushed the memories aside as he focused the flashlight’s beam on a sparkly blue object in the road.

A boot. One tall blue woman’s boot stood proud on the center stripe. The kind of fancy boot with rhinestones and stitching in the leather from the ankle up. One like cowgirls wore to dance in until the bar closed. One that would never be worn to work cattle.

Dan relaxed as he stared down at the boot. County Road 111 was mostly traveled by locals, and none of the ranch folks wore fancy footwear like this.

“It’s a mystery,” he said aloud. Dan was fully aware that he was talking to himself, but then who was around to object?

He picked up the boot and walked back to his car. If someone had tossed it out, which wasn’t likely, it probably wouldn’t have been standing straight up on the center line. No one would have thrown away just one even if they hated wearing them. A pair like this probably cost five hundred dollars or more.

By the car light he examined his find. Deep blue, like the sky turned just before it rained. The sole was worn. No other scrapes. Whoever wore this never shoved it into a stirrup.

Dan put the boot in the passenger seat and pushed the car into gear. “Well, pretty lady,” he said with a laugh. “How about riding along with me tonight?”

Any woman who wore a boot like this one would show it off. She’d have on tight jeans tucked into the top. She’d be outgoing, maybe wild. She’d laugh easy and probably yell when she argued. She’d take big gulps of life.

That kind of woman would never be attracted to him. Dan was as solid as the canyon walls, probably borderline boring if he thought about it, and as his daughter often reminded him, predictable.

Dan never allowed himself to daydream. He was always serious, a man who was his job, not one who just wore the uniform. But tonight, cloudy starless skies made the world seem more fantasy than real, and the rich blue leather sparkled in the dashboard lights.

“I guess I better start looking for Cinderella, because some cowgirl princess has lost her slipper.”

He remembered how Lauren was always telling him he needed to go out now and then. Maybe he could text her a picture of the boot and tell her he’d made the first step. Lauren had probably meant he should date one of the church ladies who asked him for favors, such as judging the jams competitions for charity, or invited him to the Wednesday-morning breakfast because they “needed more men.” His daughter had not meant for him to step out with the kind of woman who’d wear a rhinestone boot.

It was almost one o’clock when the sheriff pulled into the Two Step Saloon’s dirt parking lot. The bar was outside the city limits of Crossroads, but Dan swore he could hear the bass beating some nights from his office a few miles away. Most Friday nights he would have already had at least one call from the bartender before now. But since the Nowhere Club opened thirty miles south of Crossroads, business had dropped off along with arrests in Dan’s county.

Grabbing the boot, Dan walked into the Two Step. Maybe, if the place wasn’t too loud, or the folks too drunk, someone would remember seeing a lady wearing blue boots.

He relaxed. The main room was only half-full and most of the crowd looked far more interested in talking than fighting. Ike Perez, the owner, had put in a big-screen TV. If a game wasn’t on, he played reruns. The drunks didn’t seem to care. They cheered and bet as if they hadn’t seen the game before.

“Evening, Sheriff,” the bartender said as she reached for a cup and the coffeepot. “Wondered if you’d make it in tonight.”

Dan stood at the corner of the bar, his back almost touching the wall. It was the only spot in the room where he could see the whole place. “Evening, Kimmie.” The bartender might have been in AA for ten years, but she was still working making drinks. She reminded Dan of an old bull rider who walked among rough stock on the night before a rodeo. Kimmie might not take the ride anymore, but she stayed near the noise and the excitement.

When he set the fancy boot next to his cup, Kimmie winked at him. “If that’s your date, I’d say you lost a bit of her on the way in.”

Dan shrugged. “Story of my life. I start out with a woman and end up with a boot.”

Kimmie crossed her arms and leaned against the railing of the bar that was just right to be boob-resting height to her. “It might help, Sheriff, if you didn’t wear your gun and uniform on a date. You’re one fine-looking man, tall, lean and just enough gray to tell a lady that you probably know what you’re doing, but, honey, all that hardware around your waist won’t encourage any woman to cuddle up.”

Dan took a gulp of the coffee. He never added any comment when Kimmie started telling him how to live his life. She might be in her late thirties, which made her dating age for him, but she’d never be his type.

In truth, Dan had decided he must not have a type. Near as he could tell, any women he liked usually ran the other way. The first and the noisiest being his wife twenty years ago. When he’d refused to move to Dallas, Margaret packed a bag and left him with their only child. He’d raised Lauren and kept loving his wife for a long while, hoping she’d come back, but she only called monthly to lecture him on all the things he was doing wrong with his job, the town and most of all with raising their daughter.

It took him years to try even talking to a woman other than to ask for her driver’s license. And then, none seemed right. Some never stopped talking; others expected him to carry the conversation.

Finally, when he decided to date a little, no woman felt right in his arms on the few occasions he managed to stay around long enough to hug her. Or, worse, she didn’t seem that interested in him. At first he’d thought it was because he was divorced and raising his daughter or because of the career he loved, but lately, there just didn’t seem to be a woman in the state he wanted to go out with.

Dan got to the point of his current problem. “I found the boot out on 111. Thought you might have seen someone wearing it.”

Kimmie shook her head. “I found a cowboy boot under my bed once. Worn and muddy. Never did remember who it belonged to.”

Dan didn’t want to hear more of the bartender’s love life. If she ever got around to writing down just the facts she’d been sober enough to remember, she’d have a shelf full of steamy encounters. Since she’d quit drinking, talking about sex had become her favorite pastime.

“Where’s Ike?”

“He went over to check out that new bar. They call it the Nowhere Club like it was something fancy. What kind of name is that for a bar? Someone said they got a real singer over there. Can you imagine someone trying to sing to a bunch of drunks?”

Dan picked up the blue boot. “Maybe I will go check it out sometime.”

Kimmie cleared his empty coffee cup and wiped down the bar. “I’ll keep my eye out for a woman hobbling around on one boot. If I spot her, I’ll send her your way.”

“Thanks.” Dan left thinking about what the owner of the boot must look like. Tall, he’d guess, to wear this high a boot. And wild as the West Texas wind. His imagination filled in the rest of her through the night when he should have been sleeping.

* * *

MONDAY MORNING HE carried the boot into his office and set it on the corner of his desk, still thinking about what kind of woman would own it. It might be nice to meet her when he wasn’t in uniform. Maybe, halfway through his life, it was about time he did something unpredictable.

All morning he worked on the paperwork that always piled up over the weekend like leftovers from Sunday dinner.

The blue boot kept crossing his line of vision as if whispering to him.

Pearly, the county secretary, came in a little after eleven with the mail. She spotted the boot. “You thinking of cross-dressing, Sheriff?”

Dan simply stared at her. Pearly hadn’t asked a question worth answering in years.

“I have to leave.” He stood. “I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

“Might as well eat lunch while you’re out, Sheriff.” Pearly started planning his day. “It’s already almost lunchtime, and you know when you get back you’ll have calls to return, and by the time you’re finished it’ll be too late to catch a lunch special. Next thing I know, Lauren will be home from Dallas complaining about how thin you look and telling me I should take better care of her father, like she left you in my charge.”

“And the point of this discussion, Pearly?”

She puffed up. “Eat!” she shouted as if he needed to be addressed in single syllables.

Dan dug his fingers through hair in need of a cut and put on his Stetson. “Thanks, Mom, I’ll remember that.” He grabbed the boot and walked past Pearly. Dan hated being mothered, but some women had that gene wired in them.

He was two miles out of town when he glanced at the boot and grinned. “Where you want to go, babe?” he asked as if a woman were beside him.

Funny. Something about the boot riding shotgun made Sheriff Dan Brigman feel reckless.

CHAPTER TWO

Noon

Monday

BRANDI MALONE WATCHED a sheriff walk into the Nowhere Club as she worked in the shadows of the small stage. The place wouldn’t be open for hours. She’d planned to rehearse for a while, but now she couldn’t do that until the sheriff left. Somehow having someone watch her work out the kinks in her performance seemed like singing to a voyeur.

She liked this time of day in the bar when all was quiet and the air felt almost clean.

Growing up in a big family was noisy, and living close to them as an adult always made her feel like she was being watched. Her two brothers’ and sister’s families had settled within sight of the house they grew up in. But even when Brandi had moved back in her twenties, Malone Valley wasn’t where she’d wanted to be, and when she’d left the second time, she’d sworn, as she had once before, that she’d never return.

The road had been her home for fourteen months. Brandi didn’t have a house, an address, or anyone to report in to, and that was just fine with her.

Gig after gig on the road was her living room, and at night she stepped out onto her front porch, which was her stage. Brandi Malone was butterfly free and wanted it that way.

She stood perfectly still, no more than a shadow, and waited for the man in uniform to vanish from her world.

The sheriff disappeared down the hallway to the owner’s office. She wasn’t curious. Her job was to be onstage for three sets a night. That was all. This was a bar; of course lawmen would drop by now and then. The sheriff was probably only checking the new liquor license, same as another sheriff did last week, or maybe he was looking for an outlaw, though this place didn’t seem much like an outlaw bar.

She moved the mic closer to the piano, where she’d lined up her songs for tonight. Though she knew them all by heart, she always kept the sheet music close, just in case her mind wandered.

Brandi didn’t worry about much, not where she lived or what she ate, or even what town she was in, but she wanted every performance to be perfect. It had to be. It was all she had left that mattered in her world.

Maybe she wanted, if only for a few minutes, for all those who were sober enough to listen, to forget about their problems and just enjoy. She wanted them to step into the music and dance on the sawdust floor or in their minds. That’s what she did. For a few hours, if her songs were just right, she forgot all about the cavernous hole in her heart and swayed to the music. Her thoughts would slow to match the beat those nights, and for a short time she’d drift. She’d breathe deeply and almost believe life was worth living.

“Brandi!” Hank, the owner, yelled. “Sheriff’s got something for you.”

The tall man in a tan uniform moved toward her, and for a moment she considered running. But he was between her and the door, and the guy’s face, framed in the shadows of his hat, looked like he operated strictly by the book.

She had no outstanding bills or fines or tickets. She hadn’t committed a crime. There was no reason the law wanted her, so the sheriff must have questions about the bar, or maybe her old van parked outside...

Brandi stood and waited as the sheriff neared. She was stronger than she’d been months ago. She didn’t have to run from questions.

When she’d first hit the road, she hated strangers asking where she was from or anything about her family. She didn’t want to talk about anything but her music. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed.

Only, when this stranger in a uniform raised his eyes to look up at her standing on the small stage, he smiled as if he was happy to see her. “Morning, ma’am,” he said.

She didn’t miss that the lawman’s eyes ran the length of her body before he reached her face. Could he have been checking her out? Surely not. Not if he called her ma’am.

“Morning,” she managed to say. “What’s the problem?”

“No problem.”

He smiled again, and she had the feeling that he was a man who didn’t smile often. Brandi relaxed slightly. He had honest blue eyes.

“This wouldn’t happen to be yours?” he asked as he lifted a boot. “It kind of looks like something you might wear.”

Brandi exploded. “Yes! Someone stole them out of my van two weeks ago. In their hurry, they dropped the left one in the parking lot.” She bounced down from the two-foot-high stage. “I loved those boots. I thought I’d lost this one forever, but I couldn’t bring myself to toss the other one away.”

The sheriff stood as stiff as a mannequin while she hugged him.

“Thank you. Thank you.” She reached for the boot.

He pulled it away. “Now wait a minute. I have to have proof.” He was smiling again, obviously enjoying himself. “Maybe you need to try it on. The slipper needs to fit. I think it’s the law, or maybe just a rule.”

She looked down at the tennis shoes she was wearing. “I have to have that boot. I own the match. One boot’s no good without its mate.”

“I’ll need to see the left one first before I hand this one over.”

“Follow me.” She shifted and straightened as if planning to march, playing along with his game.

Her long legs made it easy to make the step onto the stage. She rushed behind a black curtain and opened an almost invisible door. She hoped the sheriff carrying her boot was following her. Guessing that he was watching her every twist, she slipped quickly into a narrow hallway, then left toward her dressing room.

He was right behind her.

The sheriff was in his forties, maybe five or six years older than her, and definitely interesting. She’d always liked talking to men with honest eyes. They were rare.

Brandi grinned as she tried to guess what the sheriff might be like out of uniform. He was that kind of handsome most women didn’t notice. There was something so solid about him he seemed hard, except maybe for his mouth. The man had kissable lips, she decided, but she’d bet he’d never had an irresponsible thought.

And he wasn’t for her. Forget that “attracted at first sight” thing. She no longer acted on impulses. Brandi had not only sworn off men, she’d sworn off family and friends, as well. For months she had simply drifted in the emptiness and the music, telling herself there was no future or past, just now. If she worked hard on just getting through one day at a time, she could survive and almost forget that her reason for living had gone.

Fourteen months and counting. Now wasn’t the time to break her streak even to make one friend or take a lover. The very thought of having a lover after all these years made her smile. If she ever did take another lover, he would have blue eyes like the sheriff’s. True blue.

She opened the door to a small room that doubled as her dressing room and the paper storage for the bar and bathrooms.

The sheriff followed her in.

“Leave the door open,” she ordered.

“Of course,” he answered, as if it were a rule he already knew.

He seemed to take up half the space in her small quarters as she tossed clothes around looking for the other boot.

“I’m not very organized,” she admitted.

“I’ve seen squirrels better at it.” He crossed his arms and waited.

“The boot is here somewhere.” She was loaded down with clothes and still saw no sign of it. “Maybe it would be easier to try on the one you have.” She plopped down on the room’s only chair and tugged off her tennis shoe. The leggings she wore were warm and fit like second skin. “If it fits, I get to keep it, right?”

To her shock, he knelt on one knee and helped her with the boot. His hand slid along her calf as he pushed her foot gently into the leather.

Brandi couldn’t move. His hand glided ahead of the boot until his fingers rested just above her knee. She could feel the warmth of him through the material as he pressed gently into her flesh as if he was testing to see if she were real.

“It fits perfect,” he said. “I guess I’ve found Cinderella.”

“Thanks for bringing it back. I’m really grateful, Sheriff.”

“You’re more than welcome. Just part of the job.” He stood and offered his hand. “Dan Brigman.”

She took his hand and stood, noticing he was only a few inches taller than her as she balanced on the one boot. “Can I buy you a drink, Sheriff, to say thank you?”

“No, thanks.”

He hadn’t turned loose of her fingers, and she wondered if she should ask for her hand back. When she looked down, she spotted the blue toe of her other blue cowboy boot and squealed as she jerked her hand away from him. She dropped to the floor so she could crawl under the card table that served as her dressing table.

He tried to step out of the way, but her bottom bumped into him several times before she backed out from under the flimsy table. Then she hopped around trying to tug on the second boot while accidentally bumping into him again.

He gripped her waist and steadied her as she finally got the boot on.

When she straightened, he let go of her, but one hand rose to brush her hair from her face.

“You have a mass of long hair, pretty lady. It seems to fly around you like a midnight cloud. I’ve got a daughter who has hair as long as yours, but hers is straight and the color of sunshine.”

“Sorry.” She shook her head back. “My hair’s always had a mind of its own. I not only kicked you while I was trying to pull on the boot, you probably got a mouthful of curls.”

“I’ll survive.” He laughed.

“Sure you won’t take that drink? I feel like I owe you one, Sheriff.”

“No, but I might let you buy me lunch. The best Mexican food place for a hundred miles around is right across the street.”

Brandi wasn’t looking to be picked up, and she couldn’t tell if the sheriff was trying to start something. If so, he was so far out of practice with this switch from a drink to lunch thing. She needed to cut this off quick. “Wouldn’t you rather go home and have lunch with your family?” The last thing she needed was to get involved with a married man.

He hesitated but didn’t back away like a man who’d been trying to flirt might. “My wife left me twenty years ago, and my daughter is grown and now lives in Dallas. If you don’t want to come along, I’m still planning on eating Mexican food. Pearly, my secretary, told me to eat lunch before I came back, and she’s not an easy woman to cross.”

Brandi felt like a fool. The sheriff wasn’t using a line on her. If he thought he was, it came pretty close to the worst one she’d ever heard. He’d given her the facts of his life as small-town people did. As people who have nothing to hide did.

“My name’s Brandi Malone.”

“I guessed that. Saw it on the board out front.” He backed a few steps to the door. “It was nice to meet you, Miss Malone. Maybe I’ll come hear you sing sometime.”

“Do that,” she said, noticing neither bothered with goodbye.

After he disappeared, she decided that the sheriff was shy. She’d embarrassed him by insinuating that he was trying to flirt, or maybe he felt like he’d dumped too much information on a total stranger.

She dug through her pile of clothes and pulled on her leather jacket with fringe. It wasn’t warm enough for today’s weather, but she didn’t have time to find another coat.

Five minutes later she stepped out of the Nowhere and walked across the street. One car, the sheriff’s cruiser, was in the café’s parking lot. The lunch run was long past being over. She wasn’t surprised he’d kept to his word.

Brandi was shivering when she made it to the table in the back where he sat alone. “This place still open?” she asked.

He looked up from his cell phone. She caught the surprise in his eyes before he glanced away.

“I’m buying your lunch, Sheriff. You have a problem with that?”

“No.” He stood and moved his hat off the empty chair. “You think you could call me Dan? I don’t think of myself as on duty while I’m eating.”

She slowly slipped into the place across from him and stared at the menu. Most men, including her father, were liars or manipulators. But this one had something about him that said he could be trusted, at least as long as lunch, anyway. All she had to figure out was if Sheriff Dan Brigman was what he seemed. Not that she planned to stay around long, but at least if those honest eyes were true, she might start to believe in people again.

It might be fun to eat a meal with someone for a change. She could pretend to be happy, and interested and normal.

She glanced at the menu for a few seconds more, then ordered the lunch special when the waitress appeared. The girl looked tired, or maybe bored, and wasn’t overly concerned with the last two customers in the place.

When the waitress went back through the kitchen door before it stopped swinging from her arrival, Brandi was suddenly aware that she was alone with the sheriff.

“You look exactly like the woman I pictured would be wearing that boot,” he said, as if trying to start a conversation.

“How’s that?”

“Wild and free. Beautiful.” He glanced down, twirling a chip in the tiny bowl of hot sauce.

There was that shy smile again, she thought. Another hint that the sheriff might be one of the real people in this world of marionettes. “You don’t mind if I’m wild, do you? I’d think a thing like that might make a sheriff nervous.”

“Nope. I don’t mind. You’re the kind of beautiful that could haunt a man’s dreams, Brandi Malone. Being wild just adds spice to perfection.”

No one had said such a nice thing to her in years. He seemed to be seeing her as she wanted to be. Wild and free, she almost whispered aloud.

To prove him right, Brandi leaned over and kissed him on the mouth.

When she pulled away she whispered, “You taste like salsa, Sheriff.”

He just stared, and she swore she could be hypnotized by those steel-blue eyes.

Brandi ate one of his chips dipped in the hot sauce, then took a drink of his iced tea. He just kept watching her. No one had accused her of being wild and free for years, and she loved it. She loved the version of herself she saw in his eyes.

She glanced around the empty café. The lone waitress was probably in the back warming up the last two specials. “Aren’t you going to say something about me kissing you?”

He leaned back and spoke so low even if people had been at the next table they wouldn’t have heard. “I wouldn’t mind if you decided to do that again.”

Before she could decide, the waitress swung through the kitchen door with two plates of enchiladas.

“Maybe later.” She grinned like the wild woman he thought she was. “If I’m still around and you’re still available.” After all, how much harm could one more kiss do?

As they ate, the sheriff asked her where she was from and how she ended up at the Nowhere Club.

She avoided answering and asked him how long it had been since he’d been kissed.

Unlike her, Dan answered directly. “Three years ago on New Year’s Eve.”

Brandi nodded. “The midnight kiss. Openmouthed or closed?”

When he didn’t answer, she knew. Closed, she decided. She would have sworn the handsome sheriff was blushing.

“You’re right about me, Sheriff. But I’m drifting more than free. I live out of a suitcase and travel whenever and wherever I like. I’m not looking for a man to tame me or tie me down or tell me he loves me. I make no promises, but if you’d like to share a meal or something now and then, I might be interested.” Brandi couldn’t believe she was stepping out of her comfort zone to even think of getting together with him. But one kiss with him was like one taste of salsa on a salty chip. She wanted another.

Dan took a long drink of his iced tea.

She knew she’d shocked him, but if she was going to spend a while with a man for the first time in years, she wanted all the cards on the table. And, she decided, she wanted to be remembered as being someone’s unforgettable encounter, no matter how brief. She’d like to be the one woman, the one memory that would always make Dan Brigman smile.

He ate, and she picked at her food.

Finally, he broke the silence. “What time is your last set over tonight?”

“Eleven. Why?”

“I’ll pick you up for a late supper.”

“If you can find a place around here still open, I’ll be hungry.”

He left a twenty on the table and stood.

“I...” She’d told him she’d pick up the check, and she planned to.

“It’s not happening,” he answered, as if he knew what she was about to say.

She followed, already wondering if she’d done the right thing to join him here. She hated bossy men, but then maybe there was some kind of rule that sheriffs can’t accept gifts, even a lunch.

She’d been just fine staying away from men. She liked being alone. She hated strings and planned to live the rest of her life without getting attached to anyone. So why had she hinted at another promise? Another meeting? Why had she offered to spend time with him before she knew what kind of man he really was? Maybe honest blue eyes lied? She hadn’t been around enough to know.

Brandi mentally slapped herself. She was overthinking this. Just go with it. She was wild, remember.

Maybe it was enough that he had kissable lips and he made her feel young like she had ten years ago when she’d first been on the road. She’d been twenty-five then and loving the gypsy life of a singer.

When they stepped out of the restaurant into the little tin windbreaker foyer, the sheriff turned and helped her with her coat. The plastic window in the entryway door looked like it was shivering as wind howled over the cloudy day.

He lifted part of her curly hair, caught under her collar. “Before we step out I want to give you something back.”

Before she had time to say a word, he pushed her against the rattling, icy tin wall and kissed her full out. Openmouthed.

Her sheriff might be quiet, but he definitely wasn’t shy.

Brandi forgot all about being cold. For the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt alive. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back like this one kiss might be the last in her lifetime.

His arms tightened around her. She leaned into him. This wasn’t a first-time, hesitant kiss. She could feel him breathing, his heart pounding next to hers. A tiny spark came alive inside her where only dead embers had lain for so long.

When he broke the kiss, he didn’t say a word; he just circled his arm around her shoulders and held her tightly as they faced the wind and rushed back across the street.

Just inside the club, the whole world lost all sound. No one around. No music. He held her for a moment as though unable to let her go. Though he hadn’t moved, she could feel him pulling away, turning back into the in-control sheriff. His lips pressed against her forehead in a quick peck. “You’re unbelievable.”

“You, too,” she whispered, swearing she could see passion sparkle in his blue eyes.

Then, with a very formal nod, he turned and walked away without a word.

Brandi grinned as she watched him climb into his cruiser and thought she’d add that Toby Keith song “A Little Less Talk and a Lot More Action” to her last set tonight. If the sheriff wanted someone wild and free, she could make it happen.

In a few weeks she’d drive away from this place. Maybe she’d take a memory of her own with her. But that was all she had room to pack.

A memory. Nothing more.

CHAPTER THREE

RAINY NIGHTS IN DALLAS were never as beautiful as they had been when she was a kid growing up at the lake house just outside Crossroads. There, the old cottonwoods whispered when the wind blew, and the rain tap-dancing on the water twenty feet from her window often lulled her to sleep.

Her hometown seemed a million miles away tonight. She stared out her apartment windows at the solid brick wall of the condo next door. No view.

If her pop wouldn’t think she was a failure, she’d load up all she owned in a U-Haul and drive back home. She could be there in five or six hours. She’d cook her father’s breakfast and then follow him to the county sheriff’s office, where she’d work all day organizing his files. They’d eat lunch at Dorothy’s Diner across the street and pretend she was sixteen again with the world waiting on her to grow up, and not twenty-five, waiting for the world to realize she was a failure.

Lauren pulled out her cell, thinking she could call her pop. It was almost nine. He’d probably be finishing up his day, heading home with his supper in a bag, looking forward to eating in front of the TV, which would be tuned to a football game. In an hour he’d be sound asleep in his recliner.

Pop was so predictable. When she was growing up, he cooked the same meals every week. Chili dogs on Monday, pancakes with burned sausage on Tuesday, grilled chicken and baked potatoes on Wednesday, meat loaf or spaghetti on Thursday. They had take-out pizza on Friday and leftovers, if there were any, on Saturday. Sundays they ate out or warmed up cans of soup. Oh, she almost forgot, they usually had hamburgers if he got home late. If she hadn’t learned to cook early, he probably would have stuck to that menu until she left for college. She was twelve before she knew appetizers could be something besides potato chips.

Now, their conversations were the same. For her, work was always great, yes, she was making friends, no, she didn’t need any money. For him, he’d tell her about the weather, talk about the folks in town who’d ask about her, and say no, he wasn’t lonely, he was doing fine.

Lauren shoved her cell back into her pocket. She didn’t call. Tonight she wasn’t sure she could stand to hear him tell her one more time how proud he was of her.

His Lauren was moving up, honing her skills as a writer. It wouldn’t be long until she finished a book and was on the bestseller list, he’d say. Crossroads just might have to open a bookstore in town with Lauren’s first book about to hit any day and Tim O’Grady working on his fourth novel.

She’d heard Pop brag to everyone, and she hadn’t said a word. She’d had three jobs in a year, all ending in being laid off. None in publishing. She was not moving up or working on her book. The chance of anyone from Crossroads filling a bookstore shelf was highly unlikely, with her manuscript unfinished and Tim’s novels all ebooks.

If the Crossroads Bookstore ever opened, the “local author” shelf would be empty.

Lauren jumped out of her self-pity when her phone buzzed.

Tim O’Grady’s name flashed along with his smiling face. She grinned and answered.

“Hello, Hemingway, don’t tell me you’ve just finished another book.” Lauren tried to sound happy. He always called to celebrate over the phone when he finished anything. The outline. The edit. The final draft.

She always acted excited, and she suspected he always tried his best to sound sober.

“Hi, L.”

For once he actually did sound sober.

“You able to talk? Not on a date or anything?” He paused. When she didn’t answer, he added, “And no, before you ask, the book’s not finished. Tonight I’m dealing with real life.”

“I’m home.” She dropped to the couch. “Alone. What’s up? Talk to me.” She needed a little bit of home, and talking to the boy she’d grown up next door to might help.

“I don’t know what you can do about it, but I need help. We’ve got a real mess here, and I don’t know how to handle it.”

“What’s happened?” She could feel bad news coming and wished someone would invent an umbrella that could protect her for just one breath so she would be ready.

“Thatcher Jones is in jail.” Tim said the words fast, as if he had to get them out of his mouth. “He’s eighteen, so no juvie for him. He’s locked upstairs at the county offices.”

“What! Does Pop know? What happened? Is he okay?”

“Slow down, L.” Tim’s laugh didn’t have much humor in it. “Of course your pop knows. He’s the one who arrested him. Which was lucky for the kid. Thatcher’s easygoing, but when he gets mad, he blows up. Your pop can handle him.”

“Facts, Tim, give me the facts.”

“You know that truck stop on the Lubbock Highway? The one where we used to stop because you couldn’t make it all the way home from college without a potty break, then you’d complain about how dirty it was?”

“I remember. It has a little grocery store on one side. Carries two cans of everything, including motor oil.”

“Well, I don’t know why Thatcher was out there. It’s the opposite direction from Charley Collins’s place, and he said he was heading home from school. You’d think Charley would be a good influence on him. But I guess some people are just destined to cross with the law.”

Lauren rolled her eyes. Charley Collins had been as reckless as they come when he was in high school. His own father disowned him, but Charley was a good man and so was Thatcher. “Tim, stop sounding like a line from a book. Get back to what happened to Thatcher.”

She swore she could almost hear Tim nodding. “Right. Thatcher was in the store out at the truck stop with a backpack full of groceries that hadn’t been bought. He said he was bringing them back, but old Luther, who owns the place, didn’t believe him. Called Thatcher nothing but a lying thief. Said he’d known three generations of his people, and they were all trash.”

“What happened next?”

“Thatcher swung. Knocked Luther out, I heard.”

Lauren closed her eyes, almost able to see the scene in her mind. “Go on,” she whispered into her phone.

“Thatcher was the one who called 911. When the sheriff and medics got there, Luther said he was pressing charges for assault and robbery. The medics took Luther to the clinic to be checked, and your dad took Thatcher to jail.”

“No!”

Tim swore. “Believe me, L, your pop wasn’t happy about it. He looked like he was thinking of strangling the kid for making him do it.”

“When did this happen?”

“A couple hours ago. When I heard the sirens, I drove over to the county offices thinking whatever was happening might give me a plot idea. I could hear Thatcher yelling the minute I walked in the door. He was mad and scared and all wrapped up in nervous energy.”

Tim finally paused. When he spoke again, his words came slowly. “We can’t let him go to prison, L.”

She thought of mentioning that they were not his parents, but in a strange way the whole town was. Thatcher Jones had been over a year behind in school and living on the fringes of right and wrong when Charley Collins at the Lone Heart Ranch took him in. Anyone could see that the kid had a heart bigger than Texas, but he was proud and had a stubborn streak.

“What do we do?” Tim asked in a dull tone, as if he really didn’t expect her to answer.

“You’re right. We have to fix this. Thatcher saved Pop’s life once. He might have been only fourteen or fifteen then, but he ran through gunfire to get Pop to safety. Pop will do his job, he’s always played by the book, but he’ll help where he can, too.” Her logical mind began to put all the pieces she knew together. “Why would Thatcher steal food? I’ve heard Charley’s place is going great.”

“He swears he didn’t. Says he was just bringing the canned goods back, but he says he doesn’t remember who he got them from. Wouldn’t even tell the sheriff if it was a man or woman who must have stole them in the first place. Just says he can’t say.” Tim laughed. “While Luther was out cold, Thatcher put the food back on the shelf, so there is some confusion as to exactly what was taken.”

“So there is no evidence of a crime?”

“Right, unless you count the shiner on Luther’s face.” Tim hesitated. “L, you were in law school once. You’ll figure out something.”

“I never took the bar, remember. I decided to be a writer. Only that doesn’t seem to be working out so well for me. I don’t think taking customer complaints at the mall counts as training.” She didn’t want to go into all the reasons she was failing. Part of her wanted to simply say she was failing to thrive out in the real world.

“Come home.” Tim ended the silence, his voice already pulling her. “Thatcher needs you and I miss you.”

“I’ll see if I can get off by noon tomorrow. I’ll be there by five.”

“Great.” Tim hesitated. “How about staying with me this time? I’ve completely remodeled my folks’ old place on the lake. You’d like it. Plus, your pop knows you’re an adult. He’d understand. You could just say we’re having an adult sleepover.”

“I’ll think about it,” she answered. Tim had asked before, but she wasn’t ready for any commitment between them. Staying over at his place meant sleeping together. “I’ll call when I’m close to Crossroads so you can meet me at the county offices.” She hung up without saying goodbye, then sat very still thinking of Tim, not Thatcher.

She’d grown up with Tim O’Grady, gone skinny-dipping in the lake with him when they were ten. Spent a thousand hours talking with him. He was her best friend.

A friend with benefits, she thought, though she could count their nights together on her fingers. Of course she loved him, but not in the way he wanted her to love him. When they occasionally slept together, it was more out of a need not to be alone than passion. She hated that she thought of his loving as vanilla, but somehow she wanted more. Everyone said they were right for each other, a match. Only everyone was wrong.

Tim loved her, really loved her, but she couldn’t love him back. They never talked about it, but somehow they both knew the truth, and that one silent truth broke both their hearts.

She’d go home. She’d find a way to help Thatcher. But this time she wouldn’t sleep with Tim. Even though it felt good for a while. Even though they both understood the silent rules.

She wouldn’t sleep with Tim because she couldn’t bear the look he’d give her when she had to walk away. Every time. Always.

CHAPTER FOUR

Tuesday

WEAK AFTERNOON SUNLIGHT filtered through the blinds, reminding Dan Brigman another hour had passed without sleep, and the day was only getting worse. He’d barely had time to hug his daughter before she was storming up the steps toward the third floor of the county offices. The tapping rain off and on all afternoon had already given him a headache, and having Lauren show up to interfere with his job wasn’t helping.

He’d left the sexy singer yesterday after lunch, looking forward to seeing her again before midnight, but a call came in an hour after he got back to the office that ended that possibility. Since four o’clock yesterday, he’d had to arrest a kid he cared about for assault, then field a dozen calls from people telling him how to do his job. Midnight passed with him sitting up in the third-floor lockup with a teenager who refused to talk about what he’d done. Now, after he’d had no sleep for nearly thirty hours, his daughter arrived, demanding to know if he’d lost his mind.

At this point, Dan wasn’t sure his ears still worked. The whole town could take turns telling him how to be sheriff, and he still wouldn’t let Thatcher Jones out until the judge set bail. Once he knew how much it would take, Dan had already decided he’d pay it himself.

His daughter was running through facts he already knew about the crime, so Dan simply followed one step behind as she headed upstairs.

“Now calm down, Lauren,” he finally commented when she breathed. “We’re doing all we can. The judge says he can bail out if he’ll give a statement, but Thatcher isn’t cooperating.”

“Did you offer him a lawyer?”

Dan huffed. “I did. He said he didn’t need a lawyer to tell me that he’s not talking. He can do that himself.”

She wasn’t listening, and he didn’t blame her. If they were doing all they could do, Thatcher Jones wouldn’t still be locked up in the first place. His daughter always thought the world had to be balanced and fair, but it just wasn’t.

If it had any fairness at all, he’d be sleeping off a wild memory and not putting in a forty-hour workday.

He almost swore. If the world were fair, he would have picked up that singer, Brandi Malone, last night like he’d planned, and not be stuck babysitting Thatcher. The kid was so wild he probably would have gnawed through the steel bars if he’d been left alone.

Dan unlocked the third-floor door, deciding that Lauren’s anger was all his fault. He’d raised her. “We’re working on it. We’ll figure this out,” he said as she stormed past him.

Before he opened the second door to the county lockup, he waited for his daughter to calm. The sound of Tim O’Grady tromping up the stairs echoed through the building. Tim was like the Ransom Canyon County Offices’ resident ghost. He came, night or day, if he thought something was happening. He claimed it helped him with his writing, gave him ideas, but since his last two books were postapocalyptic thrillers for hormone-crazed teens, Dan didn’t see that his research at the sheriff’s office was doing much good. The young writer was interesting, though, and he’d been Lauren’s friend since they could both walk, so Dan tolerated O’Grady even if it did irritate him that Lauren called him Hemingway.

Of course, Dan wasn’t the least bit surprised that Tim was with her today. He’d probably called her to notify her about Thatcher.

Finally, Lauren turned and faced him. “Why is he in jail, Sheriff? Give me the facts.”

Lauren only called him that when she was too angry to remember he was her father.

“He won’t talk. No one believes he stole food from Luther’s old truck stop, and nobody believes his story about not remembering how he got the backpack full of can goods obviously from the store.”

Thatcher must have heard them because he yelled from twenty feet away, “I ain’t telling who I got the stolen groceries from, and that’s final. I took them back, isn’t that good enough? I’ll rot in this place before I talk. And I didn’t attack Luther. He insulted me and my whole family. I’m not arguing that my no-name dad and run-off mother were trash, but that don’t give him the right to remind me.”

Lauren stormed into the next room, which had one cell on either side of a wide-open space in-between. “Stop talking like an idiot, Thatcher. We’re trying to get you into Texas Tech this fall, and you’ll never make it talking like that.”

Dan left the doors open for O’Grady as he leaned against the opposite cell and enjoyed watching his daughter yell at someone besides him for a while.

Tim O’Grady and Lauren might not be more than six or seven years older than Thatcher, but they’d thought of themselves as his substitute parents since they’d all three worked together one summer. Thatcher had been painting the county offices, working off fines. Tim was collecting ideas for his writing. Lauren was organizing her father’s office, something she’d done every summer since she was ten.

Thatcher might be four years older than he’d been that summer, but his respect for Lauren was obvious as he stood and gripped the bars. He’d grown a few inches since Lauren had been home, but he was still bone-thin. His hair was as wild as prairie grass, and he was tanned so deep his skin hadn’t lightened even if winter was settling in for a long stay.

Part of Dan hoped no one ever changed the kid. He was a blend of Tom Sawyer and Billy the Kid with a little bit of a young Abe Lincoln mixed in. He’d been born two hundred years too late to be understood and damn if the kid cared.

Thatcher smiled suddenly, that easy smile that would melt hearts someday, but Lauren didn’t smile back.

He lowered his voice. “Hell, look at me, Lauren. I’m in jail. The chances of any college taking me are not looking too good right now.” He bumped his forehead against the bars. “But double damn. I got to make it to Tech for Kristi’s sake. If I don’t get there and save her, she’ll find some brainiac like O’Grady and start hanging out with him. They’ll probably marry and have a dozen little redheaded kids with not one of them having a lick of common sense.”

Tim finally caught up with the sheriff and Lauren. “What’s wrong with red hair? And what makes you think my kids wouldn’t have common sense?”

Thatcher sighed. “You superglued your fingers together that summer I met you. You hooked your ear the last time we tried fly-fishing. You—”

“I’m not in jail,” Tim interrupted.

Lauren slapped at Thatcher’s knuckles and flashed Tim a dirty look. “Shut up, the both of you. We’ve got to get organized and get you out without some kind of record hanging over you. If we just knew who did steal the food, maybe we could clear this up.”

“I already told you I ain’t telling. Not even if you torture me.”

The sheriff leaned over Lauren’s shoulder. “Don’t give me any ideas, kid.”

Tim swore as he paced the space between the cells. “I’ve already tried getting him to talk, Sheriff. Nothing works. We always end up back at square one. The kid is tormenting me. Maybe I should file a complaint. I’ve been here all morning talking to him, and all that’s happening is my red hair is falling out.”

Thatcher reached out and almost grabbed the front of Tim’s sweatshirt. “I’m not a kid, O’Grady. Call me that one more time, and you’ll be swallowing teeth. The sheriff’s the only one who can call me that. I’m eighteen.”

“What are you going to do?” Tim shouted. “Knock me out, too, like you did Luther when he accused you of stealing? At the rate you’re going, you’ll have to do double time in prison to ever see daylight.”

Lauren shook her head. Her long, straight blond hair waving down her back reminded Dan of how Brandi Malone’s dark hair had seemed to come alive when she moved. Had it only been noon yesterday when he’d touched those dark curls and thought he’d see her by midnight? It seemed like a lifetime since he’d kissed the singer on the forehead and left the Nowhere Club.

He should have kissed her that last time on the mouth. The way his luck was running right now, Dan might never see his wild, beauty again.

Tim’s loud lecture drew the sheriff back from his thoughts. O’Grady was overreacting as usual. If he wrote as fast as he talked, he’d have a dozen books out by now.

When Lauren glanced in Dan’s direction, he winked at her, silently letting her know that the world was not as dark as she thought it might be.

She finally realized that her father, not just a sheriff, was right beside her. She leaned close to him so he’d hear her over Tim’s rant. “Okay, Pop, what do we do now?”

Tim gave up talking and listened for a change.

“I tried talking Luther out of pressing charges,” Dan began. “I had no luck. But he used to give you free ice cream even after I’d already said no. Maybe you and Tim should go out to the truck stop and give it a shot. Since the stolen goods were found in the store, that charge won’t hold, but the assault might.” Dan was too tired to think of any other option.

“But—” Lauren started to argue.

Dan pushed his only option. “Talk to him. It might not change anything, but who knows, it might help.”

“What about Thatcher?”

“I’ll be right here.” Dan glanced at the kid. “He’s not going anywhere for a while. Charley Collins has already talked to him and is out trying to get him a lawyer. The Franklin sisters called to tell me I’d better not even think of feeding him prison food. They’re bringing his meals from the bed and breakfast.”

“You have prison food?” Lauren smothered a giggle.

Dan shook his head. “That’s not the worst of it. I’ve had half a dozen blankets delivered and threats called in that I’d better not let the boy freeze in a cold cell.”

“You let people threaten you?”

“Sure. One was Miss Bees. She has to be ninety, but she considers it her civic duty to call in a threat at least once a month. Another was Vern Wagner. I don’t think he knew what he was mad about, but Miss Bees probably told him to call in. A few others just dropped off threats with the blankets.”

Lauren tilted her head, looking in the cell. “I don’t see any blankets.”

“Pearly’s examining them now for hacksaws. She learned the word contraband from a TV show last year, and now her new word keeps bouncing around in the office.” Dan realized he was starting to sound like a Saturday Night Live skit. Big cities had gangs and major crime; he had senior citizens and do-gooders. Some days it seemed to Dan he had the roughest beat.

Lauren put her hand on her father’s arm. “Maybe I should come home to help you, Pop? I did study law, even if I did chicken out on taking the bar.”

“I thought you did come home to ride shotgun,” he said with a smile. “Any chance you and Tim could take the late shift, if Thatcher is still locked up tonight? You two are as close to deputies as I’ve got right now. Fifth Weathers is down in Austin for training, so I’m shorthanded. I’ve got something I have to do tonight, and Thatcher is in no danger other than being fed to death or smothered by quilts.”

“You got a date?” she teased.

“Yeah, with a wild, hot lady.” He told the truth, knowing she wouldn’t believe him.

“Sure, Pop.” She laughed. “Any way I can help. You look tired. Go home. Go to bed.”

“My plan exactly.” In his mind, his fingers were already moving into Brandi Malone’s mass of midnight hair.

* * *

FIVE HOURS LATER, Lauren was curled up next to Tim in the empty cell, watching a zombie movie on his laptop.

Thatcher had borrowed her phone and moved to the far corner of his cell. She guessed he was talking to Kristi, the only girlfriend he’d ever had, but Kristi must have been carrying the conversation because Thatcher hadn’t said a word in ten minutes. He just nodded now and then, as if Kristi could see him through the phone.

“This is not what I meant when I suggested spending the night together, L,” Tim whispered as he inched his fingers under her sweater.

“Look at the bright side. We’re almost alone.” Lauren gently shoved his hand away. She gave him a look that silently whispered, not here, not now.

“Yeah, but we’re both dressed and have a teenage jailbird watching over us.” Tim looked more resigned than frustrated. He never pushed, even when they were alone, even when she didn’t bother to give a reason for shoving him away.

She shifted out from under his arm. “We’ve got to do something to help Thatcher. I can’t stand just waiting around to see if something happens. This could go bad fast, Tim, and if Thatcher’s officially charged, it may be too late.”

“What can we do? It’s almost midnight.”

She didn’t look at him when she whispered, “We’ve got to call Lucas.”

Lauren didn’t want to chance Tim seeing how she felt about Lucas, so she glanced away. They’d all been friends in high school, which seemed like a lifetime ago. “If we call him tonight, he could be here by eight in the morning.”

“Lucas is big time, L. I read an article online that says he’s moving up in that fancy firm he stepped into right out of college. A few years from now, I wouldn’t be surprised if he runs for office or becomes a judge or a senator or something. He wouldn’t drop everything and come back home to maybe help a kid he’s probably never met. We might have all been friends years ago, but those days are long gone.”

Lauren closed her eyes, fighting back tears. The Lucas she once knew would come, but the Lucas who worked in Houston now hadn’t called once to check on her since she graduated college. That Lucas, if he came home at all, didn’t call friends from the past when he was in town.

She’d never told anyone, not even Tim, how much she’d loved the young Lucas, the one full of dreams.

Tim would only be hurt if he knew another had been in her heart since she was fifteen. It was better that he didn’t know about what had happened between her and Lucas, the promises they’d whispered once, the few stolen moments they’d shared. As her best friend, Tim would be surprised she’d never told him. As her lover, he’d be crushed that she’d held someone else in her dreams all this time.

Lauren stood and walked to the window. Had anything really happened between her and Lucas? she wondered. Had she simply cobbled together a romance from a few kisses and wishes? At fifteen she’d been crazy about the boy who’d saved her from an accident. At eighteen she’d thought they’d be together through college, but he’d pulled away. At twenty-one they’d shared a passionate kiss that had gone nowhere. Maybe the Lucas she knew was more in her imagination than real.

Stick to the facts, she almost whispered aloud. How she felt about Lucas Reyes didn’t matter. Thatcher needed help, and Lucas was the most powerful lawyer she knew.

Lauren held her hand out toward Thatcher. “I need to borrow my phone back.”

He said a quick goodbye and handed over her cell. “No problem. We were into reruns of the argument anyway.”

Lauren felt sorry for him. “Everything all right with you and Kristi?”

Thatcher shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. She talked for a while and then got real mad because I asked her for the summary. I told her I was too tired to listen much longer.”

He dropped onto his cot, which was padded with several blankets. “I swear I don’t understand her. Every time I think I know where I stand with her, the world shifts and I lose my marker.”

Lauren knew how he felt.

Walking out into the hallway, she sat on the first step. All the offices were closed now, and the wooden steps descended into darkness below. Pushing the number that had been Lucas Reyes’s cell in college, she waited. If he’d changed his number, she had no way of reaching him. If he said no, she could think of nowhere else to turn.

One ring. Two, three.

She shouldn’t have called. Not this late. Not without having thought about what she’d say.

Four, five, six.

“Hello,” a deep, sleepy voice said.

“Lucas?” She couldn’t believe he was on the line. It had been so long. A thousand days, a million dreams.

“Lauren,” he whispered.

For a few moments, they just breathed as if they weren’t hundreds of miles apart.

“Is something wrong?” he asked. “Is there some emergency?”

She could hear his voice hardening, becoming more formal, putting a distance between them that couldn’t be simply measured in miles. He’d whispered once when they stared up at the stars that she was his sky. Did he remember?

Lauren followed his lead. Talk about the problem at hand, not her own feelings. “I need some legal advice.”

“Are you in trouble?”

“No. It’s a friend. A kid in Crossroads. I was hoping you could come help.” She realized she wasn’t the right one to talk to a lawyer about Thatcher’s case. He obviously didn’t even want help, and her father might be mad that she hadn’t waited to see if he could figure things out.

She heard paper shuffling and a click like a lamp being turned on.

The voice that finally came back was cold, a stranger. “Give me the facts.”

She suddenly wished she hadn’t called. “It’s really only an assault charge. I thought you might be able to do something. I shouldn’t have bothered you. I’m sorry I woke you.”

“Give me the facts, Lauren.”

“I shouldn’t have called.” It dawned on her how Lucas probably made sure their paths never crossed. He’d never called. Never texted. She knew he was still on the other end of the phone waiting for her to make sense.

“Goodbye,” she whispered, as she fought not to cry.

Just before she ended the call she heard him say, “I’ll be there tomorrow morning.”

The phone went dead before she could say no.

CHAPTER FIVE

Tuesday night

THATCHER JONES WALKED to the barred window in his cell and looked out at the snowy streets three flights below. Most folks thought of Crossroads as a wide spot in the road and had little reason to slow down as they passed, but he’d always viewed the tiny place as grand. When you’d grown up out in the Breaks where folk hunted their own meat and some did without electricity, the town felt like big time.

Few people who lived between the city-limit signs knew what it was like to check the house for snakes before you turned in at night, or wash your clothes on a board and hang them out to dry. They’d never had to eat a potato or a can of beans and call it supper. Or to grow up, not only without cell phones and computers, but without TV or microwaves or heat in more than one room.

He’d known that life and felt lucky for it, but Thatcher didn’t want to go back. He loved living in his own little place on the Lone Heart Ranch. He’d walk over to the main house for meals, or to work with Charley, or help Lillie, Charley’s daughter, with her homework, then the rest of his time was his. Thatcher heard someone say once that the measure of wealth was being in control of time. If so, he was a rich man at eighteen.

Or he had been, before he ended up here in jail.

He knew some of the people on the two floors below worried about how he was surviving being locked up. They didn’t understand this was a five-star hotel to him compared to living in the Breaks when he was younger. Great meals, company sitting up with him and being toasty warm. If he hadn’t had to give up freedom for the place, he might ask if he could stay awhile.

Crossroads might not have a movie theater or a Starbucks, but the town had stores and a clinic and churches, and, unfortunately, a jail with locked doors. Kristi told him she was ashamed of him because the whole town knew he was there. He guessed she was right. The window’s light reflected out on the crossing of the two main highways, so anyone who looked up could see him.

Staring out over the sleeping town, the porch lights shining like tiny stars and the shadow of a half-finished bandstand right in the middle of it all, he tried to figure out where his life had taken a wrong turn. All he was trying to do was help out, and somehow it ended him up here.

He’d seen a frightened little girl no bigger than Lillie, Charley’s daughter, had been when he’d met her. The girl had on an old red coat that was way too large for her and was trying her best to lug a big backpack along the muddy side of the road.

“Who wouldn’t help?” he murmured to himself. But somehow it had all turned bad, and he couldn’t figure out how to get out of trouble without bringing harm to the little red riding hood.

Lauren and Tim took turns lecturing him after the sheriff left last night, but nothing they could say was as bad as what he was yelling at himself inside. He had his future all planned out. He was focused. He’d saved enough for the first year of college, even though Charley Collins had said he’d pay.

Thatcher had Kristi waiting for him to get to Texas Tech. He figured if he got to Tech and studied hard, she’d plan the rest of their lives. Marriage, a couple kids, maybe a farm.

He looked around, hoping Lauren would bring her phone up and he could call Kristi back. Man, she was mad at him. Like this was all his fault.

The sheriff’s daughter was still somewhere beyond the doors of his prison, and Tim seemed busy writing notes. He’d mumbled that he had to get inspiration down when it hit. Thatcher had read a few of his books, and apparently inspiration came to “Hemingway” more as a dribble than a solid hit.

Maybe they’d left him alone to think, but Thatcher had given up on that, too. What good was it doing him? He might as well become an outlaw. Too bad it wasn’t the Wild West, where a man lived by a code and his Colt. Where right was right and wrong was wrong.

He wished it were that simple now. When he’d stopped to help the little girl, she’d run away from the truck stop, and he knew she’d stolen the food in the old backpack that looked like it weighed as much as she did. It took him ten minutes to get her to trust him enough to talk. He’d taken her to not much of a home, parked way back in a junky trailer park. The run-down model home was in a cluster of others that looked to be in the same shape. She said she lived there, but it didn’t look like any kind of place a child would stay. No toys or bikes. Only old loading crates and empty beer cans.

He talked the girl into letting him take the canned goods back, even gave her a twenty to buy food. But as he stood to leave, a man inside spotted him looking in the trailer window and threatened to kill him for trespassing. A few of his drunk buddies spilled out behind him, offering to help with the murder.

Thatcher took off with them yelling what they’d do if they ever saw him again. The leader even threatened to hurt the kid if Thatcher ever spoke to her again.

The worst part of it all for Thatcher was the shame he felt. There might have been five or six of them and only one of him, but he felt like a coward running and leaving her there. She wasn’t his kin. He had no right to interfere. But somehow it didn’t seem right leaving her there.

Then, when he was thoughtful enough to take the stolen food back, Luther accused him of stealing the cans. Like he’d drive two miles out of town to shoplift beans probably two or three years out-of-date.

Thatcher had had enough and he’d swung, not so much at Luther, but at the whole world.

Now, he stared into the night as if he could find an answer. So much for being a Good Samaritan. He knew how it felt to be hungry. He’d wanted to help. Now one good deed might just screw up his whole life.

He’d told people that he wanted to major in criminal justice. Maybe be like the sheriff. Only that was a pipe dream now.

Word was that there was a real hero living around the Panhandle of Texas. A Texas Ranger who’d survived a gun battle on the border. He’d been dealing with genuine bad guys and not some bum smoking pot in a trailer with his buddies while his little girl had to shoplift to eat. Thatcher wanted to fight for right, but yesterday he’d had his chance and ran.

Why couldn’t his life be exciting like the ranger’s? It must have been something to be in a real fight against drug runners. Thatcher guessed he already had most of the skills to be a lawman. He was fast, and much stronger than most gave him credit for. He’d been shooting game for food since he was nine.

Only, people with a criminal record didn’t become rangers or sheriffs. They didn’t become anything Thatcher wanted to be.

Tim must have finished writing his thoughts because he walked to the other side of the cell, the free side, and joined Thatcher.

“I think it’s creepy out on nights like this,” he said, as if he thought Thatcher would welcome conversation. “Town’s growing so much it seems brighter than it used to.”

“Tim, stop talking like you were born before electricity. You’re twenty-five.” Thatcher hated how Tim—and Lauren too—both thought they were so much older than him.

“I know, but the town’s growing. There are two whole new blocks of houses behind the church and half a dozen new cabins out by the lake.”

Thatcher decided he must be brain-dead, because he started talking to Tim. He pointed toward the building project in the empty space between the two main streets. The city council said it would look like a grand town square when they finished, but the land was cut by roads into a triangle and who ever heard of a town triangle? “Does that look like a bandstand or a gazebo to you?” he asked Tim, hoping to avoid talking about jail for a while.

“Nope.” Tim tilted his head one way, then the other, as if the question would make more sense that way. The framed-out bandstand was covered in snow. “It reminds me of a ten-foot-high white spider now, with legs that stretch out thirty feet.”

“You’re right.” Thatcher wouldn’t have been surprised if the monster lifted one of its legs and began to walk. “You think it’ll look any better when they get it finished? Folks say there will be grass and benches and maybe even statues.”

Tim nodded as if finding a topic to discuss. “Sheriff said the construction companies brought in crews to build it and the new baseball field with under-the-stands locker rooms at the high school. Everyone claims the construction crews have caused more trouble than they’re worth. Most of the workers moved into trailers behind the gas station, and word is there’s a party out there every night. We got a crime scene waiting to happen out there. The foreman from across the street complained to the sheriff that his crew either shows up drunk or high.”

Thatcher almost said he knew that for a fact, but telling Tim anything would be telling him too much. He simply wanted to forget what he saw yesterday when he looked in that trailer window; what was going on in there had nothing to do with the trouble he was in now. He shouldn’t have hit Luther.

Thatcher tried to reason it out, but he swore his fist was flying before his brain had time to think about the consequences.

His momma always told him to stay out of other folks’ crimes unless you want to be a part of the next one they commit. She was right. Of course, she also told him she could see him from wherever he was because they shared the same color eyes.

“Mom, if you’re watching now, you might want to look away,” he mumbled to himself. Tim was too busy talking to notice.

Lauren finally came back and Tim abandoned talking to Thatcher, so he moved over to his bunk and tried to sleep, but questions kept running through his brain. Why’d he get involved yesterday? Why didn’t he just mind his own business? If he hadn’t tried to help the little girl. If he hadn’t followed the kid home. If he hadn’t taken the food back, he’d be out at the Lone Heart Ranch eating supper with Charley and his wife and Lillie. He’d be teasing her, calling her Flower and she’d be talking back calling him “That.”

Thatcher smiled. Life hadn’t given him many breaks, but meeting Charley’s family made up for that. Lillie was nine now and thought she knew everything. Only once she’d been small like the kid he’d tried to help yesterday. That thin little girl was vulnerable. She didn’t have parents who cared if she ate, and that was the least of their crimes.

CHAPTER SIX

Tuesday night

DAN BRIGMAN CALLED himself every kind of fool as he walked into the Nowhere Club. He’d asked a woman for a date and then stood her up. He hadn’t even called last night. She’d been everything he needed right now. Someone fun, easy to get to know, great to kiss. A wild, beautiful lady he could spend some time with and not worry about getting involved. No strings. No complications. She’d made that plain from the first.

She was the dream he’d always wanted and never had.

And, thanks to Thatcher Jones, Dan had blown his one chance. She probably wouldn’t bother to speak to him tonight, and all he had was a memory of one great kiss. Maybe the best kiss he’d ever experienced, or ever would.

There was the possibility she hadn’t thought it was a date. She’d just said that if he could find a place open, she’d be hungry. Maybe showing up a day late wouldn’t matter. Brandi Malone didn’t strike him as a woman who made long-term plans.

By the time he’d left the sheriff’s office after one final check of Thatcher and his two babysitters and gone home to clean up, it was almost eight o’clock. If he was lucky, he’d hear her second set, even if she didn’t talk to him afterward.

Any plans of taking the lady back to his place had vanished when his daughter showed up this afternoon. The singer he met might be beautiful and wild, but they were both too old for him to even suggest making out in a car. His old Jeep didn’t have much of a heater, and he was not taking her out to dinner in the county cruiser.

At least he’d switched into civilian clothes and left his gun belt at home. Of course he did have a small revolver strapped to his calf and his badge was tucked into his coat pocket. A lawman was a lawman; it was not just his job.

He almost turned around halfway to the county line. The weather was getting worse. If he stayed a few hours at the bar, he’d probably be fighting snow going home.

“No,” he said aloud as he pushed on the accelerator. He was going. It was about time he made a memory. At the rate he was going, he’d head into old age without having that “once in a lifetime” affair.

Twenty minutes later, Dan climbed out of the Jeep and turned his collar up against the freezing mist. He might as well go in and make a fool of himself. At least he’d have something to regret.

“Evening, Sheriff,” the bartender said with a nod as he shouted loud enough for half the drunks to hear. “You coming in undercover tonight?”

“No.” Dan smiled as if the question didn’t bother him. Dan never went undercover, even though the club was officially in the next county. “I’m just here to have a beer and listen to the music.” He glanced at the bartender’s nametag. “You got any objections, Sorrel?”

“Nope.” Sorrel Douglas shrugged his bony shoulders. “Would suggest you don’t order food. Kitchen’s backed up. We’re getting a lot more folks in here on weeknights since Brandi came. Drunks around here act like they’ve never seen a real country singer, so they come in early and eat during the first set, then hang around way too late for a weeknight to catch the last set. It’ll be closing time before you get anything but nachos.”

Dan ordered a drink and found a table in the back just as Brandi Malone stepped onstage. The crowd settled. Even the drunk who’d been drooling on the next table raised his head and grinned.

The sheriff swore the air in the place settled as conversations stopped and people who had been playing pool in the back moved where they could see a woman in knee-high blue boots take the stage. Her skin looked pale in the lights, and her dark curls floated around her like a cape.

Dan held his breath. Even if she never spoke to him again, it was already worth the drive to just see her.

As he always did, Dan measured the crowd for trouble. Mostly couples, a few small groups of girls-night-out types. A dozen men standing at the bar. Cowboys, oil-field workers, truckers and a few bikers. No one in the place appeared to be looking for trouble, but a few were starting to drool in their beer as they stared at Brandi. She wore a long silk shirt over leggings, and the boots he’d seen before. Her hair wasn’t tied back as it had been yesterday. When she looked down at her hands, she curtained most of her face from view, and he wondered if she did it on purpose.

Dan wasn’t sure what he expected, but when she began a song, he was lost in her world. He wasn’t even sure she could see him in the crowd, but he swore she was singing just for him. Some of the songs were old favorites that anyone who loved country music liked to hear, but others were new, fresh, almost like she was making up the words as she sang.

For once he didn’t watch his surroundings. All he did was listen. Her music drifted around him like a gentle hug, and her words spoke straight to his sleeping heart. The crowd grew quiet as if they all knew just how good the lady was.

Dan caught himself holding his breath, waiting for her to look up, but she rarely did. For her it was all about the music, and he realized something no one else seemed to see—she was playing for herself, not the audience.

Finally, the spell was broken when she finished the last song and lowered her guitar. A roar went up from the crowd and Dan stood with everyone else.

She took one quick bow and vanished behind the curtain that covered the backstage door. Hank, the owner of the bar, was there as guard, making sure the men who moved toward the stage didn’t make it past the door.

Dan remained in the dark corner without taking one step toward her. Part of him was mourning the wild, crazy woman he’d thought about spending a few nights with. She was so much more. Not just attractive—there was something deep inside her that poured out in her music. She was one of those rare people who were truly gifted.

The lady was obviously hurting so deep down she might never heal. There was a richness to her that had nothing to do with money or diamonds.

“Sheriff?” A voice jerked him back to reality.

He frowned and turned. “What do you want, Sorrel?” The bartender’s name matched the color of the few strands of hair left on his head. He reminded Dan of an in-between man. Not tall or short. Not young or old. Not handsome or ugly enough to be noticeable in bar light.

Sorrel Douglas took a step backward as if surprised the sheriff had taken the time to remember his name. “Miss Malone said she’d like it if you’d come backstage.” Sorrel looked like he was trying to piece a puzzle together. “Probably wants advice about this guy who’s harassing her. He comes in a couple nights a week, and by the last set he’s drunk and thinks he’s going to take her home.” The bartender’s head twitched to the left, but when Dan turned, the big guy who smelled of motor oil at the next table was rushing for the restroom.

Sorrel stopped trying to point with his head. “I know you said you’re off duty, but she wants you to come talk to her for a minute. You wouldn’t believe the number of losers who want to get their hands on Miss Malone. Last week we had a drunk in a suit say he was going to stand at the bar and cry until she showed up to comfort him. He claimed he’d known they were soul mates after two songs. A few boys have even offered me money if I’d pass them her phone number.”

“Right.” Dan made up his mind he wasn’t leaving until midnight. “I’ll be happy to advise her.” Maybe it would be best not to mention that he was one of those men Sorrel was talking about. He wanted to know the lady, too.

“You’ll have to go behind the bar. Hank makes sure the stage door is locked after she disappears.”

Dan pulled his coat off the back of his chair. “Any of those guys make it behind the curtained door?” he asked casually.

“You’re the first I’ve seen.” Sorrel laughed as if even the thought of the sheriff going back for any other reason than to answer questions would be ridiculous. “But, it being official business, I guess you don’t count.”

Dan fought down the urge to thump Sorrel in the back of his bald head as he followed the bartender to the sliding door hidden behind the bar. Why was it bartenders and preachers always thought they could read people?

Once Dan stepped through, Sorrel closed the door, leaving the sheriff in almost complete darkness. He felt his way along the littered hallway that smelled of old grease and mold. This part of the club must have been the original space before Hank built on and tripled the size of the place.

The owner had spent money fixing up the front, brought in a polished bar made of solid mahogany, but he hadn’t wasted a dime on even lightbulbs backstage. If it wasn’t for the country music whispering through the wall, Dan would swear he’d fallen into a tunnel. Boxes, trash, an old cot, lawn chairs. Finally he saw a beam of light slicing through a slightly open door just beyond the backstage entrance.

Tapping the wood with his fingertips, he slowly pushed the door open.

Brandi Malone was brushing out her beautiful hair in front of a mirror, so he could see both the back and the front of her at once. Her curly hair hung in waves now. She still wore the wine-red silk blouse and tight leggings that she’d worn on stage. For a few minutes he just stared. Women so beautiful didn’t walk through his life often, and he wanted to enjoy every second of it.

Finally, she looked up and her gaze met his reflected in the mirror.

Dan had no idea what to do. Apologize? Tell her how great she was on stage? Run like hell before he got involved? If he had any heart left for love, this lady could break it with a feather. She probably shattered a dozen guys’ fantasies every night.

Brandi stood and walked to him. He loved watching her move. So graceful, as if the music was still in her.

When she stood a few inches away, he breathed her in as if she were the only fresh air he’d known in years.

Without a word, she leaned against his chest and kissed him.

Dan felt like he’d been frozen for so long that he didn’t remember any warmth. Her kiss wasn’t a passionate attack, or a friendly embrace. It was pure need, and Dan couldn’t have turned away if the building caught fire.

He pulled her close, loving the way the feel of her ran the length of his body. The slow kiss he returned was long and hot. Dan took all she offered. He hadn’t kissed a woman like this in years. Correction, he’d never kissed a woman like this. All out. An overload of every sense. Paradise.

When she moved away enough to laugh, he couldn’t stop smiling. He could feel her laughter against his wet lips.

“I missed you, Sheriff,” she whispered as her warm mouth brushed over his cheek. “I knew you’d be back. We’ve haven’t kissed near enough.”

He’d missed her, too, this woman he’d met once, this lady he’d been hoping to find forever. His arm tightened at her waist. “Again,” he whispered.

She settled against him and gave him what he’d asked for, letting the fire build, letting him know she was in no hurry.

Dan took his time moving his hands along her back, molding her closer. He’d felt passion in his life, but he’d never been lost to it.

Finally, she straightened to look at him.

He stared into her green eyes as he slowly moved his hands over her hips. “You feel so good,” he whispered.

She pressed closer and reached around him to close the door, then returned to study him. “I like you out of uniform, Dan. You look more like a man I might be able to handle.”

He thought of saying he’d like her out of everything, but the words wouldn’t come. His hands slowly moved up her back and dug into her hair. Handling her was exactly what he wanted.

She winked, as if reading his mind. Opening her mouth slightly, she neared until almost touching his lips. “I’m thinking you’re a little rusty when it comes to kissing. How about we start with a little practice?”

She didn’t wait for an answer. She kissed him again, taking the lead as before, teaching, demanding, making him feel totally alive for the first time in years.

His life had been about his job and raising his daughter. He’d settled for a comfortable kind of loneliness. Eating meals in front of a ball game. Fishing for hours without really planning his day. Never looking for more than he had.

When she first tried to pull away, he didn’t let her go. He couldn’t. For once he wanted more from life than just settling.

She gently shoved again.

Then he heard someone bumping down the hallway toward her dressing room. Dan nodded once and stepped to the side.

By the time Sorrel tapped on the door, Brandi was sitting in her chair and Dan tried to look as if he was listening while he leaned against one of the storage shelves with his notepad in his hand.

Sorrel let himself in, seemingly unaware that he’d interrupted them. “I brought your nachos, Sheriff, and a beer.”

“Thanks,” Dan answered without looking at the food.

“It’s not any trouble. I always bring Miss Malone a sandwich between the last two sets.”

Dan flipped his notepad closed and accepted the plate. “I’ve a few more questions to ask, Brandi.” He tried to sound official. “Then, when you have time, Mr. Douglas, I’d like to ask you a few.”

“Okay,” Sorrel said as he handed Brandi her tray. “But give her time to eat. It’s a short break, and tonight the crowd is already asking when she’ll be back.”

The bartender turned to Brandi. “Now you tell him all about that creep on the back row who’s been bothering you. The sheriff needs to know.” He turned to Dan. “You wouldn’t believe all the losers and nuts that think she’s singing just for them. The other night after closing one almost knocked the back door down. He was so drunk he thought he had a date with her. Said she was sending him secret messages in her songs.”

Dan nodded. He believed the bartender. After Sorrel left, he set his plate down on the table beside her food. “Much as I’d like to go back to doing what we were doing, I think Sorrel is right.” He turned over a box of paper towels over pulled it up as a chair. “How about we eat as you talk?”

She stuck out her lip in a pout, and he almost withdrew his suggestion.

Before saying a word, she brushed his arm when she reached across and took one of his nachos. “It’s nothing really. Part of the job. If you’re good, the drunks always fall madly in love with you. If you’re breathing, some nut’s going to hit on you. It’s a bar, Sheriff.”

She ate while he stared, knowing what he had to do. If she was really in danger, he needed to make sure he was near. This assignment was no hardship at all. “Tell me the facts, Brandi.”

“This big guy in his forties comes in almost every Tuesday and Saturday. He drinks Jack and Bud until he passes out, or gets generally obscene and Hank kicks him out. I think he’s a trucker because sometimes he looks like he’s put in a long day. He smells of motor oil and fresh-cut wood. There’s no trouble if he only has a few beers. He leaves early, probably going home to his wife, or he’s out of money. But when he settles in for the night, he’s like a wild boar by midnight.”

She shrugged. “I’m not afraid of him, but I hate that Hank and Sorrel have to deal with him.”

Dan brushed her arm when he leaned closer and took half her sandwich. The touch, like hers, had been no accident. There was something very sensual about sharing food. Something lovers did. “And if he had more than a few, is that when he bothers you?”

“No.” She smiled, stealing another chip. “He bothers me all the time. Staring at me. Making obscene signs of what he wants to do with me. Telling anyone who will listen that I’m going to go home with him one night.

“When he’s drunk, he gets loud and starts saying I’m his girl. That’s why Hank started locking the stage door. I step off stage, Hank locks the door from the inside and goes back down the passage to the door by the bar. One night when the trucker tried the door, he pounded so hard they had to throw him out. After that, he’s been better, but he waits outside even after we close.” Brandi bumped Dan’s shoulder with her own. “How can you help?”

“I could talk to him, but unless you want to file a restraining order, there’s not much the law can do.”

She smiled that sad smile again. Like she was forcing sorrow away. Like her whole life was a lie. “I don’t want to think about it right now. I have another set to do. I’ve been hoping you’d come back to hear my songs.”

Dan couldn’t let the problem go. “And if he’s still here later or waiting in the parking lot?”

“Then I’ll sleep here. I’m not driving back to the motel worrying that he might be following.” She stood and fluffed her wild hair, painted her lips, pulled on a vest with fringe that tickled her hips.

He watched, fascinated at how she turned into someone else so fast. The hungry eyes he’d seen when he’d kissed her had frozen to porcelain like a doll’s stare, unreadable, cold. He didn’t know which Brandi was the real one, but both fascinated him.

“I’ll stay until you finish and follow you home, just to make sure.” He hadn’t slept in two days, but Dan knew he wouldn’t close his eyes tonight if he thought she was in danger.

She walked past him and opened the door. When she turned back, no smile curved her full lips. “If you follow me home, Sheriff, you’re not leaving until dawn.”

Every cell in his body wanted to pull her to him, but there was no time. The canned music had stopped. Hank must have unlocked the stage door because his voice blared down the hallway.

Dan stared at her, his words low. “I’m following you home. You’ll be safe tonight.”

“And warm,” she whispered back.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Tuesday night

CODY WINSLOW THUNDERED through the night on a half-wild horse that loved to run. The moon followed them, dancing along the edge of the canyon as they darted over winter buffalo grass that was stiff with frost.

The former Texas Ranger watched the dark outline of the earth where the land cracked open wide enough for a river to run at its base.

The canyon’s edge seemed to snake closer, as if it were moving, crawling over the flat plains, daring Cody to challenge death. One misstep might take him and the horse over the rim and into the black hole. They’d tumble maybe a hundred feet down, barreling over jagged rocks and frozen juniper branches as sharp as spears. No horse or man would survive.

Only tonight Cody wasn’t worried. He needed to ride, to run, to feel adrenaline pumping in his veins, to know he was alive. He rode hoping to outrun his dark mood.

The demons that were always in the corners of his mind were chasing him tonight. Daring him to step over the edge and tumble into death’s darkness. Whispering that he should give up even trying to live. Betting him to take one more risk...the one that would finally kill him.

“Run,” he shouted to the midnight mare. Nothing would catch him here. Not on his ranch. Not on land his ancestors had hunted on for thousands of years. Fought over. Died for and bled into. Apache blood, settler blood, Comanchero blood was mixed in him as it was in many people in this part of Texas. His family tree was a tumbleweed of every kind of tribe that ever crossed the plains.

If the horse fell and they went to their deaths, no one would find them for weeks on this far corner of his ranch. Even the canyon that twisted like crippled fingers off the great Palo Duro had no name here. It wasn’t beautiful like Ransom Canyon, with layers of earth revealed in a rainbow of colors. Here the rocks were jagged, shooting out of the deep earthen walls from twenty feet in some places, almost like a thin shelf.

The petrified wood formations along the floor of the canyon reminded Cody of snipers waiting, unseen but deadly. Cody felt numb, already dead inside, as he raced across a place with no name on a horse he called Midnight.

The horse’s hooves tapped suddenly over a low place where water ran off the flatland and into the canyon. Frozen now. Silent. Deadly black ice. For a moment the tapping matched Cody’s heartbeat, then both horse and rider seemed to realize the danger at once.

Cody leaned back, pulling the reins, hoping to stop the animal in time, but the horse reared in panic. Dancing on her hind legs for a moment before twisting violently and bucking Cody off as if he was no more than a green rider on his first bronc.

As Cody flew through the night air, he almost smiled. The battle he’d been fighting since he was shot and left for dead on the border three years ago was about to end here on his own land. The voices of all the ancestors who came before him whispered in the wind, as if calling him.

When he hit the frozen ground so hard it knocked the air from his lungs, he knew death wouldn’t come easy tonight. Though he’d welcome the silence, Cody knew he’d fight to the end. He came from generations of fighters. He was the last of his line, and here in the dark he’d make his stand. Too far away to call for help. And too stubborn to ask anyway.

As he fought to breathe, his body slid over a tiny river of frozen rain and into the black canyon.

He twisted, struggling to stop, but all he managed to do was tumble down. Branches whipped against him, and rocks punched his ribs with the force of a prizefighter’s blow. And still he rolled. Over and over. Ice on his skin, warm blood dripping into his eyes. He tried bracing for the hits that came when he landed for a moment before his body rolled again. He grabbed for a rock or a branch to hold on to, but his leather gloves couldn’t get a grip on the ice.

He wasn’t sure if he managed to relax or pass out, but when he landed on a flat rock near the bottom of the canyon, total blackness surrounded him and the few stars above offered no light. For a while he lay still, aware that he was breathing. A good sign. He hurt all over. More proof he was alive.

He’d been near death before. He knew that sometimes the body turned off the pain. Slowly, he mentally took inventory. There were parts that hurt like hell. Others he couldn’t feel at all.

Cody swore as loud as he could, and smiled. At least he had his voice. Not that anyone would hear him in the canyon. Maybe his brain was mush; he obviously had a head wound. The blood kept dripping into his eyes. His left leg throbbed with each heartbeat, and he couldn’t draw a deep breath. He swore again.

He tried to move and pain skyrocketed, forcing him to concentrate to stop shaking. Fire shot up his leg and flowed straight to his heart. Cody took shallow breaths and tried to reason. He had to control his breathing. He had to stay awake or he’d freeze. He had to keep fighting. Survival was bone and blood to his nature.

The memory of his night in the mud near the Rio Grande came back as if it had only been a day earlier, not three years. He’d been bleeding then, hurt, alone. Four rangers had stood on the bank at dusk. He’d seen the other three crumple when bullets fell like rain.

Only it had been hot that night, not cold like now, and then the air had been silent after all the gunfire. He finally heard movement in the shadows and wasn’t sure which he feared more, armed drug runners or demons. If the outlaws found him alive, they’d kill him. If the demons found him dead, they’d drag him into hell. Reality and nightmares dueled in his mind as sanity seemed to drip away with his blood.

Cody had known that every ranger in the area would be looking for him at first light; he had to make it to dawn first. Stay alive. They’d find him, he kept thinking, until he finally passed out.

But not this time. No one knew where he was tonight. Once he lost consciousness, he’d freeze.

No one would look for him tonight or tomorrow. No one would even notice he was gone. He’d made sure of that. He’d left all his friends back in Austin after the shooting. He’d broken up with his girlfriend, who said she couldn’t deal with hospitals. When he came back to his family’s land, he didn’t bother to call any of his old friends. He’d grown accustomed to the solitude. He’d needed it to heal not just the wounds outside, but the ones deep inside.

Cody swore again.

The pain won out for a moment, and his mind drifted. At the corners of his reason, he knew he needed to move, stop the bleeding, try not to freeze, but he’d become an expert at drifting that night on the border. Even when a rifle had poked into his chest as one of the drug runners tested to see if he was alive, Cody hadn’t reacted.

If he had, another bullet would have gone into his body, which was already riddled with lead.

Cody muttered the words he’d once had to scrub off the walls in grade school. Mrs. Presley had kept repeating as he worked, “Cody Winslow, you’ll die cussing if you don’t learn better.”

Turned out she might be right. Even with his eyes almost closed, the stars grew brighter and circled around him like drunken fireflies. If this was death’s door, he planned to go through yelling.

The stars drew closer. Their light bounced off the black canyon walls as if they were sparks of echoes.

He stopped swearing as the lights began to talk.

“He’s dead,” one high, bossy voice said. “Look how shiny the blood is.”

Tiny beams of light found his face, blinding him to all else.

A squeaky sound added, “I’m going to throw up. I can’t look at blood.”

“No, he’s not dead,” another argued. “His hand is twitching, and if you throw up, Marjorie Martin, I’ll tell Miss Adams.”

All at once the lights were bouncing around him, high voices talking at once.

“Yes, he is dead.”

“Stop saying that.”

“You stop saying anything.”

“I’m going to throw up.”

Cody opened his eyes. The lights were circling around him like a war party.

“See, I told you so.”

One beam of light came closer, blinding him for a moment, and he blinked.

“He’s hurt. I can see blood bubbling out of him in several spots.” The bossy voice added, “Don’t touch it, Marjorie. People bleeding have germs.”

The gang of lights streamed along his body as if trying to torture him or drive him mad as the world kept changing from black to bright. It occurred to him that maybe he was being abducted by aliens, but he doubted the beings coming to conquer the world would land here in West Texas or that they’d sound like little girls.

“Hell,” he said, and to his surprise the shadows all jumped back.

After a few seconds, he made out the outline of what might be a little girl, or maybe a short ET.

“You shouldn’t cuss, mister. We heard you way back in the canyon yelling out words I’ve seen written but never knew how to pronounce.”

“Glad I could help with your education, kid. Any chance you have a cell phone or a leader?”

“We’re not allowed to carry cell phones. It interferes with our communicating with nature.” She shined her flashlight in his eyes one more time. “Don’t call me kid. Miss Adams says you should address people by their names. It’s more polite. My name is Melanie Miller, and I could read before I started kindergarten.”

Cody mumbled a few words, deciding he was in hell already and, who knew, all the helpers’ names started with M.

All at once the lights went jittery again, and every one of the six little girls seemed to be talking at once.

One thought he was too bloody to live. One suggested they should cover him with their coats; another voted for undressing him. Two said they would never touch blood. One wanted to put a tourniquet around his neck.

Cody was starting to hope death might come faster when another shadow carrying a lantern moved into the mix. “Move back, girls. This man is hurt.”

He couldn’t see more than an outline, but the new arrival was definitely not a little girl. Tall, nicely shaped, hiking boots, wearing a backpack.

Closing his eyes and ignoring the little girls’ constant questions, he listened as a calm voice used her cell to call for help. She had the location down to latitude and longitude, and described a van parked in an open field about a hundred yards from her location where they could land a helicopter. When she hung up, she knelt at his side and shifted the backpack off her shoulder.

As she began to check his injuries, her voice calmly gave instructions. “Go back to the van, girls. Two at a time, take turns flashing your lights at the sky toward the North Star. The rest of you get under the blankets and stay warm. When you hear the chopper arrive, you can watch from the windows, but stay in the van.”

“McKenna, you’re in charge. I’ll be back as soon as they come.”

Another M, Cody thought, but didn’t bother to ask. Maybe your name had to start with M or you couldn’t be in this club?

To his surprise the gang of ponytails marched off like tiny little soldiers.

“How’d you find me?” Cody asked the first of a dozen questions bouncing around in his aching head as the woman laid out supplies from her pack. The lantern offered a steady circle of pale light.

“Your cussing echoed off the canyon wall for twenty miles.” Her hands moved along his body, not in a caress, but to a man who hadn’t felt a woman’s touch in years, it wasn’t far from it.

“Want to give me your name? Know what day it is? What year? Where you are?”

“I don’t have brain damage,” he snapped, then regretted moving his head. “My name’s Winslow. I don’t care what day it is or what year for that matter.” He couldn’t make out her face. “I’m on my own land. Or at least I was when my horse threw me.”

She might have been pretty if she wasn’t glaring at him. The lantern light offered that flashlight-to-the-chin kind of glow. With her arms on her hips, she had a kind of Paul Bunyan’s little sister look about her.

“Where does it hurt?” She kept her voice low, but she didn’t sound friendly. “As soon as I pass you to the medics, I’ll start looking for your horse. The animal might be out here, too, hurting or dead. Did she fall with you?”

Great! His Good Samaritan was more worried about the horse than him. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. When I fell off the edge of the canyon, Midnight was still standing, probably laughing at me.” He took a breath as the woman moved to his legs. The pain came sharp suddenly. “I tumbled for what seemed like miles. It hurts all over.”

“How did this happen?”

“The horse got spooked when we hit a patch of ice,” he snapped again, tired of talking, needing all his strength to handle the pain. Cuss words flowed out with each breath. Not at her, but at his bad luck.

She ignored them as she brushed over the left leg of his jeans, already stained dark with blood. He tried to keep from screaming. He fought her hand now as she searched, examining where something had to be broken it hurt so much. He knew he couldn’t take much more without passing out.

“Easy,” she whispered as her blood-warmed fingers cupped his face. “Easy, cowboy. You’ve got a bad break. I have to do what I can to stabilize you and slow the blood flow. They’ll be here soon. You’ve got to let me wrap a few of these wounds so you don’t bleed out.”

He nodded once, knowing she was right.

In the glow of a lantern she worked, making a tourniquet out of his belt, carefully wrapping his leg, then his head wound.

Her voice finally came low, sexy maybe if it were a different time, a different place. “It looks bad, but I don’t see any chunks of brain poking out anywhere.”

He didn’t know if she was trying to be funny or just stating a fact. He didn’t bother to laugh. She put a bandage on the gash along his throat. It wasn’t deep, but it dripped a steady stream of blood.

As she wrapped the bandage, the starched cotton over her breasts brushed against his cheek, distracting him. If this was her idea of doctoring a patient with no painkillers, it was working. For a few seconds there, he almost forgot to hurt.

“I don’t have water to clean the wounds, but the dressing should keep anything else from getting in.”

Cody began to calm. The pain was still there, but the demons in the corners of his mind were silent. Watching her move in the shadows relaxed him. She wasn’t petite, but tall and built with curves that her trousers and man’s shirt couldn’t hide.

“Cody,” he finally said. “My first name is Cody.”

She smiled then for just a second.

“You a nurse?” he asked.

“No. I’m a park ranger. If you’ve no objection, I’d like to examine your chest next.”

Cody didn’t move as she unzipped his jacket. “I used to be a ranger, but I never stepped foot in a park.” He could feel her unbuttoning his shirt. Her hand moved in, gently gliding across his ribs. “I put in a few years as a Texas Ranger.”

When he gasped for air, she hesitated, then whispered, “One broken rib.” A moment later she added, “Two.”

He forced slow long breaths as he felt the cold night air pressing against his bare chest. Her hand crossed over his bruised skin, stopping at the scars he’d collected that night at the Rio Grande. The night he bled into the mud. The night he first heard the devils hiding in the shadows.

She lifted the light. “Bullet wounds?” she questioned more to herself than him. “You’ve been hurt bad before, Ranger Winslow.”

“Yeah,” he said as he took back control of his mind and made light of a gunfight that almost ended his life. “I was fighting outlaws along the Rio Grande. I swear it seemed like that battle was almost two hundred years ago. Back when Captain Hays ordered his men to cross the river with guns blazing. We went across just like that, only chasing drug runners and not cattle rustlers like they did back then. But we were breaking the law not to cross just the same.”

He closed his eyes and saw his three friends. They’d gone through training together and were as close as brothers. They wanted to fight for right. They thought they were invincible that night on the border, just like Captain Hays’s men must have believed.

Only those rangers had won the battle. They all returned to Texas. Cody had carried his best friend back across the water that night three years ago, but Hobbs hadn’t made it. He’d died in the shallow water a few feet from Cody. Fletcher took two bullets, but helped Gomez back across. Both men died.

“I’ve heard of that story about the famous Captain Hays.” She brought him back from a battle that had haunted him every night for three years. “Legend is that not one ranger was shot. They rode across the Rio screaming and firing. The bandits thought there were a hundred of them coming. But, cowboy, if you rode with Hays, that’d make you a ghost tonight, and you feel like flesh and blood to me. Today’s rangers are not allowed to cross.”

Her hand was moving over his chest lightly, caressing now, calming him, letting him know that she was near. He relaxed and wished they were somewhere warm.

“You’re going to make it, Winslow. I have a feeling you’re too tough to die easy.” The lights of a helicopter circled above them.

He didn’t want to think about dying or being hurt. He pushed the ghosts who always followed him aside and focused on her. “If I live, how about we get together and talk sometime? Any woman who has six kids, can handle injuries in the dark and recognizes bullet wounds is bound to be interesting.”

She laughed. “You got yourself a date, Cody.”

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