COWBOY ROMANCE: Justin (Western Contemporary Alpha Male Bride Romance) (The Steele Brothers Book 1) (166 page)

Chapter Four

The next morning Liam woke with Cat in his arms and stared at the peak of her tent.  Last night had been the most passionate of his life, and no woman had ever made him feel as good.  He felt like going out and shouting that to the mountains.  Then he might have to find a bear to wrestle.

“Do we have to get up?” Cat murmured sleepily.

“Everyone has the day off.”  He kissed her temple.  “But we need to go talk to the police.  Have them come out and look at that pit.  Then decide what to do.”

“We don’t know it was meant for me.  Maybe it was here before we came.”  She sat up and looked at him.  “A rancher could have thrown that wire in it, I don’t know, to get rid of it.”

“Let me tell you what I do know,” Liam said.  “That’s brand-new, long barb razor wire.”  He put his arm around her shoulder.  “That particularly grade runs about a hundred bucks a roll.”

“You mean no rancher would have thrown it away,” she said.

He shook his head.  “No more than they’d burn a stack of hundred dollar bills.”

“This is what I get for chasing killers, I suppose.”  She climbed out of bed and began to dress.  “All right, we’ll call them.  But can I at least work a few hours this morning surveying the area around the grave?  I want to mark the sites we need to check for remains before the cops come out here.”

“They might end up declaring the whole area a crime scene,” Liam said as he tugged on his trousers.   

“No, I’ve already filed all the proper permits.”  She sighed.  “They may want to try to find living relatives once we’re finished, but the victim died a long time ago, so it will be difficult to identify her.”

He felt a surge of impatience.  “I’m talking about your stalker, Catriona.  This woman who keeps calling you and sending the hate mail.  Maybe she’s here.  She could have dug that pit.”

She went completely still and stared at him.  “I never mentioned anything to you about the hate mail.”

He rubbed his jaw.  “No, you didn’t.  Your father did.”

Cat walked out of the tent.  Liam pulled on his shirt to follow her.  “Doc, wait.”

“Oh, we’re back to Doc now.”  She whirled on him.  “My father didn’t send you here to work.  He sent you to spy on me.”

“He asked me to watch out for you,” Liam corrected.  “He thought this stalker might try to hurt you.  Last night proved he was right.”

She folded her arms.  “Okay.  If this is all so innocent, why didn’t either of you tell me?”  When he didn’t reply, she strode off again.

Liam caught up with her.  “You’re over-reacting.”

“You think?” she countered.  “Who are you, Boone?  Homeless guy?  Bodyguard?  Mercenary killer?  I just realized I really don’t know anything about you at all, do I?”

He pulled her to a stop.  “I’m not homeless.  My family has a ranch on the other side of Ghost Lake.  I did serve in the Army, under your father’s command in Afghanistan.  Other than that, I’m just a regular cowboy.”

“Well, thank you for finally telling me.”  She marched off again, and then stumbled abruptly and fell down in some shrubs.

“Cat.”  Liam went to help her up.  “Just calm down, okay?”

“I tripped over something.”  She bent down to pick up a length of rope.  “This.”  As she pulled it out of the ground more soil began to shift.

“Stop.”  Liam took the rope from her.  “You don’t want to do that.”  He moved aside some brush to show what was on the other end of the rope.  “Another Reaper Victim?”

Cat stared down at the desiccated skull, and the bright blonde hair still covering the back of it.  “Not this time.”  She crouched down to gently brush the dirt away from the skull.  “Liam, she has braces on her teeth.”

#

              Jason arrived an hour after they’d found the body and paled as Cat filled him in.  “That’s horrible.  What are you going to do?”

              “I need you to stay here with the body,” she told him.  “Liam is going to drive me into town to give a statement to the police.”

              “Well, what if this murderer comes back?”  Jason swallowed hard.  “I’ll be all alone here.”  He turned to Liam.  “Can’t I take her into town?  I won’t let her out of my sight, I swear to you.”

Liam nodded.  “You’d best get going.”

Cat eyed him.  “When I get back, you and I are having a serious discussion about my father, and you, and -- trust me, I’ll have a list.”

A short time later Jason took the dirt access road that led out to the highway and offered Cat a stick of gum. 

“Thanks, I’m good.”  She sighed as she looked out at the pasturelands they were passing.  “I’m sorry about all this, Jason.  I know how much this project means to you.  And I want to apologize if I’ve hurt your feelings.  Sometimes I talk before I engage my brain.  You’ll find another dig to work on.”

He sniffed a little.  “I wanted to write my thesis about The Reaper, but I needed a fresh angle on the murders.  I guess now that you found this dead girl they’ll shut down the site permanently.”

“They’ll have to, for the investigation.”  She rested her cheek against her knuckles.  “I wish I understood why the killer had to bury her out there.”

“Maybe the guy knew about the Reaper burying his victims there,” Jason suggested.  “He figured he’d do the same, maybe as homage or something.”

“But the killer had to know we would find her.”  She sighed.  “Maybe that was the point.”

“Or maybe it wasn’t.  Maybe he’s been trying to get you out of there, Dr. Merlin.  Maybe he’s tried everything to stop you from coming here in the first place.  But you just didn’t get it, did you?”  Jason removed a handgun from his jacket and pressed it into her side.  “Don’t move; don’t scream.  You do and I’ll pull the trigger, you bitch.”

As his shrill, high-pitched shout echoed in her ears, Cat remained perfectly still.  “You’re the one who’s been calling me.”

He nodded. “Calling, and writing, and following you – do you know how long it took me to dig that pit?  How hard it was to keep you from finding it until it was finished?”

Despite her horror she held onto her composure.  “Why have you been doing this?”

              “This is my life,” he screamed at her.  “And you’re trying to ruin it.”

Cat shrank back from him.  “I’m sorry that I didn’t realize how you felt.”  She nearly hit her head into the door as he swerved onto another dirt road.  “Where are you taking me, Jason?”

His expression turned smug.  “You’ll see.”

Jason drove up to an ancient barn and parked the car behind it so it couldn’t been seen from the road.  He then dragged Cat out of the car and marched her inside the partially-collapsed structure. 

“This was my great-grandfather’s place,” he told her, shoving her toward a mound of rotted hay bales.  “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is.”  She glanced up at the rafters, from which dozens of old, rotting ropes hung.  “Did he leave it to your family?”

Jason snickered.  “The bank repossessed it back in the thirties.  The old man had to go live with his kids in California.  When he died he left a box of journals.  No one wanted to read his crap, except me.”

Still holding the gun on her, he picked up a coil of rope with a loop slip-knotted on one end.  “Put the noose over your head.  No,” he said when she opened her mouth.  “You can’t talk your way out of this, Dr. Merlin.  None of them could.  Not with my great-grandfather, and not with me.”

Cat slowly pulled the rope loop over her head.  “He was The Reaper.”

“Yeah, he was.  The real killer.  The guy they hung for it, he was just a drifter.  Wrong place, wrong time kind of thing.  Tighten the loop around your neck.  Tighter.”  When she did, he pointed to the hay bale.  “Climb up on that.”

Tears stung her eyes.  “Why are you doing this, Jason?”

“Because I am The Reaper reborn.”  He grinned broadly.  “And now you’re going to die for me, Dr. Merlin.”

Chapter Five

              Liam took the tarp back to the shallow grave they’d uncovered to drape the body and protect it from the elements.  As he did he noticed a bright flash of something sticking out of the dirt and bent down to examine it.  It appeared to be a small piece of foil.  When he brushed the dirt away from it the way Cat would, he saw it was clutched in the hand of the murdered girl.

              He bent closer to see if it had any markings and smelled a faint fruity odor before he saw the name brand on the foil, which was a wrapper. 

              “Gum?” Liam muttered softly, and then in his head saw Jason, his jaws working, always working . . .  “Oh, no.”

              He ran for his truck, pulling his rifle case out from under the bench seat before he climbed in and took off.  As he drove toward the highway he called Ethan.  “Listen, no time to talk.  There used to be a pig farm here maybe seventy, eighty years ago.  Within five miles of the lake.  Do you know exactly where it is?”

              “The old Sanders place, sure.  Take Tober road off the highway, drive for two miles, and you’ll see what’s left of the barn,” Ethan said.  “What can I do?”

              “Call the police.  Tell them Cat Merlin’s been abducted by a killer and may have been taken there.”  He passed a slow-moving sedan and glanced at the landscape beyond Tober Road.  “I’m going to the high ground to have a look first.  I’ve got my rifle.”

“Be careful,” his older brother said.

              Once Liam got onto the road leading to the old pig farm, he drove until he could see the barn.  He parked the truck, and then ran up the ridge to the east.  Jason’s car sat parked behind the collapsing structure.  As his heart pounded, Liam noted the position of the windows, hay loft, doors and open roof holes.

              The rifle on his shoulder felt calming, and by the time he took position Liam had regained his composure.  He sighted the barn’s remaining roof peak before moving his scope down to look inside.

              On a hay bale Cat stood with a rope around her neck.  Below her Jason walked back and forth and gestured with a handgun. 

              Liam sorted the targets in his head:  handgun, rope, Jason.  If he shot the gun out of Jason’s grasp, he’d likely take off some fingers with it, but that was all.  If he shot the rope to free Cat, Jason might shoot her.  If he shot Jason in the back of the head, Cat would be safe, but Liam would be a killer again.

              Liam spotted the pile of crates on the sagging hayloft platform over Jason’s head.  Two ropes stretched to the platform’s edge, which made no sense to him.  He shifted position to get a better look.

The ropes appeared to be all that kept the platform from collapsing entirely.

Liam settled into a prone position, sited each rope, and then waited and watched.  As he ranted, Jason’s pacing took him directly under the platform roughly every eleven seconds.  Liam waited until the fifth circuit Jason made before he shot the first rope.  As Jason looked up and the crates began to slide, Liam shot the second rope.

The hayloft platform collapsed.

Liam shouldered his rifle and ran down the ridge, not stopping until he was inside the barn.  He found Jason’s handgun still in his limp hand and removed it before he turned to Cat.

“Liam.”

Jason had thrown the other end of the rope around her neck over one of the rafters and secured it to a hook, probably in preparation to hang her.  Liam released the rope and jumped up on the bales to grab her and hold her close.

He held her at arm’s length and looked all over her.  “Did he hurt you?”

Cat shook her head.  “He didn’t have time.”  She glanced up at the ropes he’d shot.  “That was you, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah.”  He helped her down from the bales, and then held her close again.  “I’m sorry.”

“For saving my life?  Again?”  She kissed him, the tears on her cheeks wetting his. 

#

              The next night the Boone brothers gathered around the family table to listen as Liam explained what had happened.

“So this Jason Sanders thought he was The Reaper?” Caleb asked, looking confused.  “Well, then why would he come out here to do the dig?”

“He thought he was the reincarnation of his great-grandfather,” Jonah said.  “Like when he died he was reborn in Jason’s body or whatever.”

“He was only a boy when he found The Reaper’s journals and read about all the women he murdered,” Ethan said.  “I think it must have twisted his mind.”

“That’s messed up,” Caleb said.  “They figure out how many people he killed yet?”

“Just the one poor girl Cat and I found out at the camp so far,” Liam admitted.  “He abducted her on the way out here.  But the police in Barstow are checking to be sure he didn’t hurt anyone out there.  If he ever wakes up, maybe he’ll confess.”

“Or maybe he’ll do the world a favor and stay in that coma,” Ethan said grimly.

“Is that coffee I smell?”  A tall, silver-haired man with keen blue eyes appeared in the doorway. 

“Frank.”  Liam smiled as he got up to shake his former CO’s hand.  “Good to see you.”

The general pulled him in for a quick hug.  “I owe you for life, son.  Anything you need,” he murmured before he stepped back and smiled.  “Well, this is a bit of a nightmare.  Seven versions of Liam in one room.”

“And the next generation on the way,” Becca, Chris’s wife, said as she patted her swollen belly. 

Buck, the old ranch cook, brought a fresh pot of coffee to the table.  “Sit down, General.  We got plenty of Joe, and some chocolate cake to go with it.”

“I will take you up on that, Buck.”  Frank sat beside Ethan.  “Liam, would you mind rousting my daughter out of the car?  I think she’s still on the phone with those archaeology magazine folks.”

“Yes, sir.”  Although Liam had been dodging Cat since the day at the barn, he knew he had to face her sometime.

Outside in the drive, Cat stood beside her father’s rental, a suitcase sitting by her feet.

“Hey.”  Liam glanced down.  “Packed your bag already, huh?”

“Yes, I did.”  She walked right up to him.  “Why have you been avoiding me?”

Liam could think of a thousand excuses, but decided the truth was best.  “Because I’m a killer, Catriona.”

She blinked.  “I beg your pardon?”

“I was a sniper in the Army.  By the time I left I had more kills than any other marksman in my division.”  He nodded in the general direction of the Sanders place.  “That’s how I was able to make those shots at the barn.”

“So you could have killed Jason,” Cat said slowly, and when he nodded she peered up at him.  “Then why didn’t you?”

“I would have, to save you,” he said.  “But I saw another way, and I took it.  I did the same thing when I left the Army.”

“Dad said you were keeping one more thing from me,” she said slowly.  “I thought it might be a girlfriend, or kids, or something like that.”

He shrugged.  “Now you know.”

“Okay.”  She picked up her suitcase and started toward the house.  “Where’s your room?”

Liam caught her arm before she went inside.  “Upstairs, why?”

“Well, I assume you still want to sleep with me.”  She smiled.  “I’m a lot of fun in bed, remember?”

A cautious spark of hope leapt in his heart.  “You don’t care that I was a sniper?  A killer?”

“You were a soldier, Liam – and just so you know, my dad didn’t start out in the Army working on tanks.”  She leaned close to whisper, “He was a sniper, too.” 

Liam sighed.  “So I’m not the only one who had a secret.”

“The good news is, I’m not a sniper.”  She gave him a sweet smile.  “Now will you show me where I’ll be doing terribly wicked things to you at night?”

The spark flared into a flame.  “For how long?”

“Tough to say exactly.”  She thought for a minute.  “After the police finish processing the murder scene, we can start digging again almost right away.  We’ve gotten new funding from the state, so we can take our time there and at the old barn, which is now our secondary site.”  She counted some things on her fingers.  “Three years.  Maybe four.  Probably four.  Unless you marry me.  Then, forever.”

                “Well, your dad was a sniper, so I don’t want to tempt him into having any kind of shotgun wedding.”  He pulled her into his arms.  “Maybe we should plan on forever.”

              She kissed him.  “That sounds perfect.”              

THE END