The Texan (29 page)

“Get your hands … off me.”

Blackjack jerked his hand away when he heard the venom in Billy’s voice.

“What are you … doing here?” the boy demanded.

“I want you gone from Bitter Creek.”

“Go to hell.”

“I’ll give you enough money—”

“Put it where the … sun don’t shine.”

Blackjack’s lips flattened. He saw the insolence, the obstinance, and the determination of a dozen generations of Blackthornes in his bastard son, and admired him for it. But nobody—not even this newfound son of his—told him no.

“You’re leaving, Billy. Make up your mind to it. One way or another.”

“My mother needs me.”

Blackjack saw the concession of pride it took for the boy to make such a plea, humbling himself for the sake of his mother. And acknowledged two more Blackthorne traits in
Bad Billy Coburn—duty and responsibility. And damn Dora again for letting that no-good Johnny Ray Coburn beat the crap out of her son—and, by God, his son—until Billy got big enough to stand up for himself.

“I’ll pay whatever you think she’ll need to make ends meet,” Blackjack said.

Billy was already shaking his head, and Blackjack could see it physically hurt him to do it. “I won’t be … bought off.”

Blackjack knew damn well what was keeping Bad Billy Coburn in Bitter Creek, Texas. He knew what he had to say to get the boy to leave.

“I’m your father.”

He hadn’t meant to blurt it out that way. He saw the shock in Billy’s eyes. The need for denial.

“Can’t be—” the boy rasped.

“It’s true,” Blackjack interrupted. “I didn’t find out until today. Your mother came to me, wanting to know how I could beat up my own son.”

He recognized the moment when Bad Billy Coburn realized the significance of being Jackson Blackthorne’s son.
He was related to Summer Blackthorne by blood
.

The guttural sound that issued from Billy’s throat was filled with such anguish, such incredible suffering, that Blackjack hurt inside. When he stepped forward to offer comfort, the boy lurched upright, grabbing at his ribs, biting his already wounded lips to hold back his cry of agony.

Blackjack was stopped in his tracks by the virulence in his son’s voice as he spat, “You’ve delivered … your message. Now … get out.”

It was clear Bad Billy Coburn didn’t want a damned
thing from him. But he wanted something from his son. He wanted his silence. And he wanted him gone.

“You can see how it wouldn’t be smart for you to see my daughter anymore,” Blackjack said. “She doesn’t know who you are. And I’d like to keep it that way.”

“I’ll bet you would,” Billy muttered.

“I don’t want her hurt,” Blackjack said. “And I don’t think you want that, either.”

Billy looked at him with dull black eyes. The fight had gone out of him. “No,” he said. “I don’t.”

“Like I said, I’ll take care of your mother and sister. And I want to do something for you, if you’ll let me. I—”

“There’s nothing—”

Blackjack held up a hand. “I wasn’t going to give you something for nothing.”

“I don’t—”

“Let me finish,” Blackjack said irritably. “Then, if you don’t want what I’m offering, you can turn me down.”

Billy gave a jerky nod.

Blackjack took a deep breath and said, “I’m a past president of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association. I’ve got a lot of favors owed from friends. If you want, I can set you up as a field inspector for the Association.”

“You need … a college degree to—”

Blackjack waved him into silence, but he was surprised that Billy knew the requirements for the job. “I can have that requirement waived,” Blackjack said. “At least temporarily. You’d probably have to go back nights and get a degree, if you think you could handle that.”

Billy said nothing. But he wasn’t interrupting, so Blackjack kept talking. “A field inspector enforces the law—hunts down rustlers and horse thieves, carries a
gun, and has the power to arrest wrongdoers. Think you can handle that?”

Instead of responding to the question, Billy said, “You said there’s … a price … to be paid.”

“I want you working as far from Bitter Creek, Texas, as it’s possible to get. And you will make sure my daughter hates the sight of you before you leave.”

“Done.”

Blackjack wasn’t sure he’d heard right, Billy’s voice was so soft. When the boy stuck out his hand to seal the bargain, Blackjack knew he’d gotten what he wanted. He was surprised by the strength of Billy’s grasp, and by the directness of his gaze. Until he remembered how Dora had faced him down. There was good blood there, too, he realized. As he shook his son’s hand, Blackjack conceded that Bad Billy Coburn was a man to be reckoned with.

Which made him angry all over again. Not at Billy. At his wife, who’d robbed him of the chance of knowing his son. There was no way to turn back the clock. No way to recapture those lost years. And no way to go forward from here. “Good luck,” Blackjack said.

“Don’t need luck,” Billy said. “Don’t need anything … from anybody.”

Blackjack left the hospital thinking how fast the twenty-five years since Billy’s birth had passed. And how, if he wasn’t careful, he could end up spending the next twenty-five years married to a woman he no longer loved, instead of sleeping at night beside a woman he’d loved for longer than the thirty-three years he’d been married.

It was time he did something to rectify the situation.

When he got home, he found Eve in the study, poring over his business papers, something she’d been doing a great deal lately. Maybe she’d known all along that he would one
day make the choice he’d made in his son’s hospital room. Maybe she’d known all along that when push came to shove, he’d choose Lauren Creed over a parcel of land, even if that land had been in his family for generations.

He stood in front of the desk, his hands balled into fists at his sides, and waited for her to look up and acknowledge him.

She lifted her head, removed her reading glasses, and said, “What is it, Jackson?”

“I want out.”

“I don’t.”

“You can have it all. Take whatever you want. I’m through with you.”

She laid her reading glasses carefully on the desk and looked up at him, her blue eyes wide with alarm. “What is this all about?”

“You heard me. I’ve had it. I’m done with you.”

“What brought this on?” she asked, leaning back casually, resting her elbows on the arms of the swivel chair, and letting her hands fall into a soft knot in her lap.

“I went to the hospital and spoke with my son. The son you kept a secret from me.”

She lifted a brow. “Why would you give a damn about a saddle tramp like Bad Billy Coburn?”

“Because he wouldn’t have been a saddle tramp if I’d known about him twenty-five years ago!” Blackjack raged.

“I did what I had to do. It’s over and done.”

“The hell it is! You let me leave this house today knowing I would be shedding blood of my blood. May you rot in hell for it!”

“If we’re comparing sins, what about Dora?” she demanded, rising abruptly to her feet.

“She was a one-night stand.”

“How many other one-night stands were there?”

“This is getting us nowhere. I want you out of my life.”

“If I leave you, Jackson, I’m taking everything.”

“Take it all! I don’t give a damn. Just get out of my sight.”

“Very well. Summer and I will leave in the morning. My lawyer will be in touch with you.”

“Summer stays here.”

Eve sat back down, carefully crossed her legs, straightening her skirt exactly to her knees, then swiveled the chair slowly back and forth. She met his gaze and said, “Summer goes with me, Jackson.”

“Summer is my daughter and—”

“No, she’s not.”

Blackjack felt his knees buckle and managed to fall into one of the horn-and-rawhide chairs in front of the desk. He couldn’t catch his breath. His heart was pounding so hard he put a hand to his chest to hold it there, as he stared with stricken eyes at his gloating wife.

“Ah,” she said. “Gotcha.”

“When? Who?” Then he knew. The only person it could be. “Russell Handy.” He saw her smile as he said the name of his
segundo
, his right-hand man, the man she’d had an affair with all those years ago.

“Why did you do it?” he asked. “Because of Dora?”

She shrugged. “That was part of it, I suppose. He paid attention to me. He loved me. Loves me still, I believe.”

“Are you sure Summer’s not mine? There’s no chance you’re mistaken?”

“If you’d paid the least attention, you’d have seen that she looks nothing like you. You’re not Summer’s father. Russell Handy is.”

“The law—”

“The law has nothing to do with this. If you want to keep your daughter, you’ll have to keep me, as well.”

“Once I tell her—”

“Tell her what? That her mother had a tawdry affair, and that her real father is in prison for murder? Of course, if you reveal my sin, I’d have to reveal yours. When shall we tell your beloved daughter that she’s fallen in love with a man who should have been her brother—your bastard son?”

Blackjack realized that she meant what she said. If he tried to leave his wife, she would ruin their daughter’s life. He would have given Eve everything he had to escape his marriage. But he couldn’t win his freedom at the price of his daughter’s happiness. He made one last effort to convince his wife of the futility of continuing a marriage that was in ashes.

“Why won’t you let me go? I loathe you. I despise you. I will never spend another night in your bed. For God’s sake, I love another woman.”

Eve smiled bitterly. “She has your love. I’ll have you. I think that’s a fair division of the spoils.”

BAY HAD FEARED THAT OWEN WOULD DEVELOP
a worse infection, or that his fever would get dangerously high, and she wouldn’t have the right herbal medicines to help him. None of that happened. In fact, the morning after his operation, her patient was more ornery than anything else.

“I don’t understand how you can spring back so quickly,” Bay said. “Yesterday I thought you were at death’s door.”

“It’s my superior genes.”

“Oh, please. If anything, it was my superior surgery.”

“From the way you described those stitches in my back, I expect to be able to attend Halloween parties as Frankenstein without wearing a costume,” Owen said.

Bay grimaced. “Not my best work. I thought having a few big stitches without anesthetic was better than having lots of neat little ones.”

“For once we agree wholeheartedly on something.”

“Are you really feeling as okay as you sound?” Bay asked, as she laid her palm on Owen’s forehead to check his temperature.

He pushed her hand away. “Mothers do that. I’m a
grown man. There’s a thermometer in the first-aid kit that’ll give you an accurate reading.”

“I don’t need a thermometer. I’d say your temperature’s 101 degrees. Above normal, but where I expected it to be.”

“You want to make a bet on that?” Owen said.

She opened the first-aid kit, retrieved and shook the thermometer, and handed it to him. “Be my guest. What’s at stake here?”

“Your professional reputation.”

She lifted a brow. “Would you like to put your money where your mouth is?”

“What have you got in mind, Red?”

“We’ve stretched our rations, but now we’re running low on water. If I’m right, I want to know what you think our chances are of getting out of here alive.”

“Done. And if you’re wrong—”

“Stick that thing under your tongue,” she said. “And leave it there till I tell you to take it out.”

Bay poured Owen another cup of mesquite tea and said, “Sit up.”

Since he was lying on his stomach, Owen had to push himself upright with his arms. He hissed in a breath as the stitches in his back protested.

“Be careful,” she said, as she handed him the cup.

“Believe me,” he said around the thermometer. “I’m not making any fast moves.”

She checked her watch, then said, “Okay. Take a look.”

“I’ll be damned. One hundred and one degrees on the nose. How’d you do that?”

“Practice. Now tell me. What are our chances?”

He sipped his tea and made a face. “You’ve got me over a barrel here, Red. I don’t want to lie. But—”

“I want the unvarnished truth.”

He met her worried gaze and said, “What is it you think is going to happen?”

She shrugged, unwilling to admit how scared she was. “I don’t understand why no one’s come looking for us.”

“Lots of folks are probably looking for us. They can’t find us here because of all that overhead camouflage.”

“Why don’t we tear it down?”

“That’s a good idea. Have you figured out how we’re going to get up that high?”

She grimaced as she looked up at the cliffs from which the netting was hung. “Nope.”

“That’s all right. I don’t think we want to do that anyway until I’ve recovered enough physically that I can handle whoever comes through that opening in the cliffs.”

“It isn’t going to matter how healthy you are, if they show up with guns,” Bay said. “We won’t be able to defend ourselves.”