Satin & Saddles (10 page)

“Okay.” Carly took a deep breath. “I’ll send it on to you and you can see it for yourself.” She opened her laptop and logged in. “Are you at your computer?” she asked as she went to her email program. Without looking at the email itself, she forwarded it to Sabrina’s email address.

“Just a sec.” A few moments later, Sabrina said, “Opening my email now.” A pause and then Carly heard Sabrina suck in her breath. “That sonofabitch.”

“Don’t say anything to him.” Carly fought back more tears.

Sabrina paused. “All right. I won’t.”

“Thanks for talking with me about it.” Carly sighed. “I just needed to get it out.”

“You know you can talk to me about anything, anytime.” Sabrina’s voice softened. “I’m really sorry, honey. Are you going to be okay?”

“I’m fine. He’s just a man.” Carly tossed her hair back. “I’ve had my fill of them.”

“There are good men out there,” Sabrina said. “I thought Dillon was one of them.”

“I did, too.”

Geoff grinned and lowered his binoculars and let them hang around his neck as he hid in the shadows and watched Cameron drive by. Geoff had only been able to hear the cowboy’s side of the conversation with Carly, but it had been good enough for him. He’d set his plan in motion and it was working.

Before the sun rose, while the cowboy had been sleeping at Carly’s, Geoff had been sitting in Cameron’s desk chair, putting spyware on the cowboy’s computer and setting up a remote access program.

When he’d gone to the cowboy’s house, he hadn’t known what he’d find, but when he located Cameron’s computer, he’d known he’d hit pay dirt. He had a black market high-tech passcode breaker on a USB drive he kept on his keychain that had cost him major dough, but had been worth it on several occasions.

As soon as he’d finished, he’d left the house in a hurry. He’d heard cowboys were up at the crack of dawn so he’d wanted to make sure he was out of there before Cameron returned home.

When Geoff got to his own house, he’d accessed Cameron’s computer and read through everything he could find.

The email had been a stroke of genius. He could imagine how torn up Carly must have been after receiving the email. When he’d dated Carly, he’d known that her previous boyfriend had cheated on her. From Carly’s mother he’d learned that the ex-husband had done the same.

What he’d done would have hit her where it hurt the most. He hated the fact that he had to hurt her, but she was the one who’d screwed around with the cowboy last night. She had to pay, too.

Finding the picture of the bastard with an old girlfriend on the cowboy’s hard drive had been a stroke of luck and using it had been genius, too. All he’d had to do was send it to Carly with a fake message and Cameron was as good as gone. He could just imagine how torn up she must be.

And how ready she would be for a friend to comfort her.

Working remotely on his iPad, Geoff had read through Cameron’s sent folder and had seen the emails from the cowboy to Carly over the past couple of weeks. It had been perfect making the email similar to what Cameron had sent her before. It would make her feel even more betrayed, and any good feelings she might have had when she received those other emails would be gone.

Geoff had deleted what he’d done off of the cowboy’s computer. He gotten rid of the copy of the email he’d sent from the sent folder then emptied the trash folder. Cameron would never know what hit him.

He raised the binoculars and looked toward Carly’s house again, then took a drink of the Coke he’d brought with him and tossed the empty can into the brush. After checking to make sure no one was around, he left his hiding place. His athletic shoes crunched gravel and dirt as he walked back to where he’d parked his SUV.

The journey to his house was quick and he whistled as he unlocked his door and went into his home. He tossed his keys on the table beside the door and tugged off his jacket and tossed it onto the couch. He made his way to his office where he’d left his iPad.

With an amused smile, he looked at the picture of Cameron and the blonde that was still on his iPad. The picture was so damning that there was no way the cowboy would ever gain back Carly’s trust.

No way at all.

What the hell just happened?

Dillon dragged his hand down his face as he drove his truck the last leg of the twenty-five minute drive back to his ranch, his mind going over and over everything.

He’d been worried about Carly when she hadn’t answered his calls or returned them, and didn’t respond to the email he sent from his phone. When she didn’t answer the door even though her Jeep was there, and then he’d heard her phone when he called it, he’d been worried out of his mind that something had happened to her.

But then she’d come to the door, and without opening it had told him exactly where he could go.

He’d never been so damned confused in all his adult life. Things had been great this morning when he’d left and the next thing he knew she was telling him that he knew what he’d done and to never bother her again. What did the hell did he do?

He set his jaw as he neared his home. His truck bounced over ruts in the road and his tires thrummed over the cattle guard. It was getting dark and his lights reflected off the windowpanes as he drove up to his house.

After he killed the engine and the lights, and climbed out, he barely managed to avoid slamming the door to his truck. Right now he had the desire to punch walls, or better yet to go out alone and bust Wildfire, the bronc that he’d just bought from Mike Sharpe.

He stomped up the stairs to his porch and unlocked his door. The hinges moved silently as he opened it. He flipped on the light then shut the door behind him, tossing his hat on the nearby rack.

Women. The older he got, the less he seemed to know about them. He’d been hurt before, but Carly… It stung like nothing he’d ever felt and he didn’t know what in the hell he was supposed to do now.

As he went through his house, he scowled. This morning, when he’d gotten home, his front door had been unlocked and he was sure he’d locked it before he left. When he’d walked in the door he’d had the strange feeling again that someone had been here. Then he’d found his computer at an angle and he never left his computer that way. And his computer had been on when he always turned it off.

Had someone been in his house on his computer? He had it password protected, but could someone manage to get past that?

Carly… If someone had into come to his house, could it have been her and had she found something? There was really nothing to see, though. Nothing that would make her upset with him.

As far as her coming into his home without his knowledge—that didn’t seem like her style at all.

What was it that she was so upset about? He ground his teeth and pushed his hand through his hair in frustration. This whole damn thing was driving him crazy.

He knew what he was going to do. In the morning he was going to go back to her house and make her tell him exactly what was wrong.

* * * * *

The day dawned bright and clear and Dillon took care of morning chores, his mind on Carly. He fired up his computer when he got back in to make some notes on the new filly when his email program chimed, telling him that he had a message.

It was from Carly.

He clicked on it and read the message.

Dillon,

It’s best if we don’t see each other or talk. I know you will want to talk but I don’t. So don’t call me or stop by my house again.

Carly

His hand clenched on his desktop as he read the note. Hell if he was going to give up without knowing what it was that he supposedly did. As soon as he finished taking care of a few things, he was heading back to Patagonia to have a talk with her and make her tell him what was wrong.

He was on his way out of the house when his brother, Wyatt, drove up and parked his red truck next to Dillon’s. He waited for Wyatt to get out of his truck and saw that his brother had a grim expression when he climbed out.

“What in the hell is going on?” Wyatt walked toward Dillon. “You sent a picture of yourself and Sue to Carly.”

“What?” Dillon frowned. “I didn’t send anything like that to Carly. Why would I do that?”

Wyatt braced one hand on his truck as he looked at Dillon. “You apparently sent it to Carly by mistake because it was addressed to Sue.”

Dillon pushed up the brim of his hat, feeling a wave of confusion pass over him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t send anything to Sue. I can’t remember the last time I even spoke with her.”

“I saw the email myself.” Wyatt eyed Dillon steadily. “Carly let Sabrina see it.”

“I’m telling you,” Dillon said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Wyatt reached into his back pocket and pulled out two folded pieces of paper and handed them to Dillon. “Printouts of the email and the picture,” Wyatt said.

Dillon opened the papers and narrowed his eyes as he read the email message. The second page was a printout of the old picture of him and a past girlfriend, a picture he had completely forgotten about.

“I didn’t send this,” Dillon said, even as he saw that the email had come from his email address. He looked up at Wyatt. “I don’t know who sent this, but it wasn’t me.”

Wyatt frowned. “What you’re saying doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.”

“No, I can see that it doesn’t.” Dillon’s mind whirled. “Even if someone hacked my email address, how would they have gotten a copy of that picture?”

“I don’t know, little brother, but it sure doesn’t look good,” Wyatt said.

It came to Dillon then. “I think someone was in my house yesterday.” He clenched the papers in his hand. “My computer may have been tampered with. If someone did come in, he or she could have sent this email.”

Dillon turned toward the house and Wyatt fell into step beside him. “Don’t you keep your computer password protected?”

“Yep.” Dillon nodded. “I wondered if someone had managed to get past that, but I had no way of telling.”

They went straight to Dillon’s computer and he booted it up. Once it was up, he signed in with his password and went straight for his email program and went to the sent folder. “There’s nothing here.” Dillon shook his head. He went to the trash folder. “That email is not in sent or trash.”

He looked at Wyatt who was frowning, too. “Who would get on your computer, send an email to Carly, then delete it? And how would they have the know-how to get past your password to begin with?” Wyatt said. “Computer geeks aren’t real common in these parts. You’re the closest to it that I know, and I don’t think you’ve developed that skill.”

“Geoff Burnside,” Dillon said slowly as his mind went straight to Carly’s old boyfriend.

“Who’s Burnside?” Wyatt asked.

“He’s some kind of computer tech guy who moved to Patagonia and works remotely from his home.” Dillon gritted his teeth before he continued. “Carly said that he had a hard time letting go of her when they broke up. We’ve bumped into him a couple of times when we were together. I’m guessing now that those times weren’t coincidence.”

Wyatt pushed up the brim of his hat. “Pretty damned elaborate if he’s attempting to get Carly angry with you.”

“Well, he sure did a hell of a good job of that.” Heat burned inside of Dillon. “I need to call Carly. Maybe this time she’ll answer. In the meantime I want to look into this guy.”

“If anyone can track down the man’s past, it’s you.” Wyatt slapped Dillon on the shoulder. “Good luck.”

Dillon glanced at the damning papers in his hand. “I’m going to need it.”

After Wyatt took off, Dillon sat down at his computer and started searching for any info on Geoff Burnside that he could find. He might not be a hacker or have the skills to break into someone’s computer, but he’d always been good at tracking down people and information. He’d always had an insatiable thirst for knowledge and had a high level of curiosity, which was why he read so much, too.

The more dirt he tracked down on Burnside, the grimmer he became. The man had been in hot water on numerous occasions and had done some prison time. Dillon doubted that Carly knew the man was an ex-con or the extent of charges filed against him.

Dillon printed out pages of information, shut down his computer, and headed for the front door. He grabbed his hat off the rack and left the house to head for Patagonia and Carly’s house.

The sick feeling in Carly’s belly wouldn’t leave. Her heart hurt and she wanted to cry, but she refused to shed another tear.

Why was this affecting her the way it was? Because it was one more notch in a belt of disappointments and betrayal?

Or was it because secretly she’d thought, He’s the one.

Disgusted with herself, she showered and got ready for the day. She’d probably just stay home and write, but it would make her feel better, like a fresh clean start. She slipped into her royal blue bra and panties… Dressing up in pretty lingerie was like comfort food.

Speaking of comfort food, she really wanted some peanut butter M&M’s. After she pulled on a T-shirt, jeans, and a pair of sandals, she raided her cabinet and grabbed a handful of the treat she went to when she needed a boost to her day.

Dillon called and she pressed the end button to send the call to voicemail. Would the guy ever give up? Maybe he still hadn’t realized what he did. Maybe he still thought he sent that message to Sue.

Well, he was just going to have to figure it out.

Around ten there was a knock at the door. Heat flushed over her. She’d told Dillon to get out of her life. What was he doing back?

She walked to the door and said, “Go. Away.”

“Carly?” It was Geoff. “What’s going on?”

She sighed and unlocked the door. Geoff stood on the steps, a puzzled look on his face.

“Sorry.” She gave him a half smile. “Thought you were someone else.”

“That cowboy?” he asked.

She shrugged. “What’s up?”

“I’m headed to Nogales for the day.” He smiled. “Thought I’d see if you’d mind keeping me company along the way.”