Too Sexy for his Stetson (29 page)

Brandy lowered her shoulders and body–slammed him. He staggered, but not before he squeezed off a shot.

“No!”

Brandy stared at the clump of deathly still marsh grass where she’d seen Rambo. Dear
God. Rambo!
Fisting her bound–together hands, she swung her arms sideways, ramming Morrisey in the gut.

He grunted, recoiled, and smashed his pistol into her wrists. Shockwaves rippled up her forearms. He grabbed her, lifting her off her feet, and threw her into the boat. Her spine and the back of her skull crashed against unyielding wood.

Clutching his midsection, Morrisey wheezed, his eyes simmering from some evil force within. “God damn bitch! McKee is right. Women are only good for one thing—to service men. White men.” He grabbed the oars from the boat and flung them to the ground.

“Bon voyage, Deputy. Maybe you’ll wish you’d treated me a little nicer when you suck in that last lungful of water.” He untied the boat and used his foot to shove it into the Shoshone’s deadly current.

Her surroundings blurred. The distance between the boat and shore expanded. Brandy’s head lolled back and thudded once more against the wooden seat as the storm–swelled river frothed and carried the bedraggled skiff into the current leading straight toward Scuppernong Falls.

****

Blade’s insides clenched the instant he heard the first gunshot. Scuttling across large rocks and vaulting over boulders, he sprinted, Tonya chasing after him. Once he reached the clearing that surrounded the cabin, he took off in a dead run. Tonya stuck with him. He crept up close to the side of the building.

His signal to Rambo, the soft trill of a bird call, went unanswered.

Movement from to the rear of the cabin caught his eye. Coogan scrambling toward the woods.

“Hold it, Coogan.” Facing down his mentor with a Glock aimed at the man’s chest caused Blade’s heart to pound. “Where’s Brandy?”

Coogan met his gaze with an air of confidence. “Don’t worry about her, son. She’s no good for you anyway. And put away that gun. You know you’re not going to shoot me.” He turned his back, and started to walk away.

Blade zeroed in. Center mass. Was Coogan really going to force him to shoot?

Then, from the river’s edge, another shot rang out. Blade jerked his head to the left and spotted Morrisey, a pistol in his hand. In that split second, Coogan made a break for it, sprinting in a zigzag pattern. Blade fired just as Coogan dove into the trees. But the dirty cop didn’t go down.

Blade swung around and zeroed in on Morrisey.

Where was Brandy?

His Glock aimed, Blade ran toward Morrisey, who dove to the ground, hammering out multiple rounds in Blade’s direction. Blade ducked and crouched behind a boulder. The sound of an ejecting cartridge snicked. Morrisey was out of ammunition. Maybe reloading.

Blade charged the fucking creep, slamming into him, knocking him to the ground, shoving his gun aside. Blade pushed to his feet. With a two–handed grip on his pistol, he targeted Morrisey. He looked around. Brandy was nowhere in sight.

Morrisey quivered, eyeing him with a thousand–yard stare. The stupid bastard was totally out of it.

“Where’s my deputy, Morrisey?”

“Your deputy? Is that what you call your little bitch?”

Blade squeezed the trigger. His bullet grazed the edge of Morrisey’s boot, lopping mud onto his jeans. It got his attention. “Now, start talking before I aim for what I’m really itching to hit.”

The creep eyed his gun, then focused on Tonya as she broke from the cover of the building, her rifle sighted on him.

His mouth curled in a sneer. “I see you get around, Lieutenant. Hope this one’s better than your little blonde bitch, cause she ain’t much of a lay.”

Tonya fired a shot.

Morrisey howled, grabbing the side of his head. “Damn you, squaw. You nicked my ear. You’re not the law, Crawford. I’ll sue your ass for this.”

Blade lunged forward in two long steps, dropped to the ground and slammed the muzzle of his Glock into Morrisey’s gut. “You sick bastard.
I’m
the law. And I’m not fucking around with you. Where the hell is Brandy?”

Tonya racked another shot.

Morrisey’s already–pale face faded to ghost white. “You’re my witness, Lieutenant. She’s a civilian, she can’t shoot me. She’ll go to jail.”

Blade grabbed the creep by his shirt, then crawled behind him and locked his arm around Morrisey’s neck, barely able to keep himself from wringing it. “Where’s Brandy?”

Coughing, thrashing, Morrisey croaked, “Let go—I can’t talk.”

Blade tightened his hold.

“The bitch is up the river.” He coughed the words, then broke free and crab–crawled backward, belly up on his hands and feet. “Without a paddle.” He wheezed. “About to face judgment day, I suspect.”

Blade swung around and scoured the surroundings to the west—the agitated Shoshone River. He didn’t doubt Morrisey, but there was no boat, no sign of Brandy anywhere.

“Aren’t you wondering what happened to your dog, lawman?”

“What about my dog?” Angry fire seared Blade’s gut.

“You’ll find him in those weeds over there.” He gestured with his head. “Belly up like a beached fish, I suspect.”

“You better hope to God you’re wrong.” Blade aimed at Morrisey’s heart. “Rambo,
hier!
”

Tonya raced toward the weedy bank. “Rambo! Come!”

A black veil of silence hung in the fog and smothered Blade’s heart.

CHAPTER TWENTY–SEVEN

Y
ou’re a fighter, Brianna. Don’t give up. Don’t let Coogan win again.
Her mother’s voice rang in her head.

Brandy struggled against the minimal slack she’d created in the rope when Morrisey had bound her hands. She kept maneuvering. Water sloshed over the top edge of the tiny boat as it bobbed in agitated water. God, if she fell in with her hands tied, that would be the end. Frantically, she twisted and worked her hands. Harsh twine ate into her wrists. It seemed like forever, but she finally slipped her hands free.

The sound of water crashing over rock roared in her ears. She pushed her drenched hair away from her face and watched the landscape and water rush by, then looked ahead. Scuppernong Falls loomed. Too close. Should she bail? Or go over in the boat?

Several yards away to the side of the boat something bobbed in the water. She blinked and rubbed her eyes. For a moment, she thought it was—it couldn’t be. Rambo? She shook her head. Seconds ago, she’d heard her mother’s voice. Now she saw Rambo, whom just minutes ago she’d thought Morrisey had shot.

She was hallucinating.

But—

There he was, Rambo, his nose rising above the surface, paddling toward her in a sea of foam, wearing one of Tonya’s doggie lifejackets. How on Earth? But clearly, he was closing the distance between them.

“Rambo!” Her heart swelled as he swam closer and came alongside the skiff. She reached out for him, leaned over the side, and thrust her arms into painfully cold water. She stretched until her numb fingers met the life jacket’s smooth plastic handle. Somehow, she grasped hold and felt the power of seventy pounds of determined dog. He woofed, and she realized it was time to jump.

She leapt over the side into an ice bath.

And lost contact with Rambo.

Her body instantly went dull from the freezing water. Her arms flailed against the impossible force of the rain–swelled Shoshone. She pushed harder. Plowing through what felt like iced Jello, she finally latched onto Rambo and wrapped her arms around his neck.

The water’s roar turned deafening. The rocky precipice that formed Scuppernong Falls came up to greet her.

****

Blade’s heart pitched and rolled as he watched Tonya scavenge through the weeds. She glanced at him and said, “He’s not here. Your dog’s not here.”

His throat tightened.

A voice from nowhere caught Blade’s attention.

“Tonya.” A Native American man nosed a canoe into the bank at the river’s edge.

Dressed in jeans and a sleeveless T–shirt, his weather–beaten face pulling into a glower, the man stepped out of the canoe and advanced with a bow drawn and an arrow aimed at Morrisey.

“White Elk, what are you doing here?” Tonya glanced at Blade. “My uncle, the rebel.”

“Watching out for you, little one.”

Blade recalled the name White Elk as the tribesman who’d been hauled in last week after a confrontation at the bar in Little Chute. Had he been the one who’d targeted Brandy and him with an arrow a couple of days ago?

The man directed an irritated sneer at Morrisey. Turning to Blade, he said, “This asshole stole a batch of arrows from me last week and tried to make it look like I shot at you and your deputy.” The hint of a real smile broke through. “Maybe I am a troublemaker, but I haven’t taken aim at anything other than wild turkey or mule deer in years. Not that I didn’t have a notion to go after this punk when he started hassling Tonya.”

Blade nodded. It figured that White Elk wouldn’t be stupid enough to target the law with his own handcrafted arrows. “Now that you’re here, I’m putting you and Tonya in charge of watching Morrisey.” Blade tossed him Morrisey’s pistol, and then he scurried toward the raft, hit the bank, and took a flying leap.

“My pleasure,” White Elk replied.

“I’m coming with you, Beringer,” Tonya yelled.

The next thing he knew, she had hurdled the distance between land and rubber. Just as the raft jostled away from the bank, she landed next to him like a cat, delicately, on all fours. A cat with a rifle slung over her shoulder.

Blade gritted his teeth, surveyed the horizon, and checked his watch as they followed Mother Nature’s rocket ride downriver. Destination—Scuppernong Falls.

Brandy was nowhere in sight. And how long would it take the terrorists to reach the powerhouse and rig a bomb? Did Thigpen have a chance of getting there and stopping them?

Ahead, water stampeded. The rush filled Blade’s senses as they charged forward. The landscape zoomed by.

Sound thundered in his ears.

All at once, the end of the earth came charging up to meet them.

“Oh Lord, now
this
is going to be an extreme whitewater adventure.” Tonya wore a determined scowl.

As though he could actually be heard above the explosive sound, Blade shouted, “We survived Quicksilver Falls, this should be a piece of cake.”

Tonya braced her feet. Her fingers gripped the handles on the raft’s edge. The booming noise devoured her reply, but Blade read her lips. “Yeah, a piece of cake.”

****

Entombed in cold, unyielding pressure, Brandy tried to propel herself through the darkness. Her lungs burned. Which direction was up? She flailed her arms, kicked her feet, and prayed she was headed upward.

Hold on… hold on… hold on.

It seemed like an eternity before she broke the surface. When she did, it was like waking from anesthesia. She gasped in air, filling her lungs. Euphoria.

A rush of water smacked her in the face. Sputtering, coughing, and spitting out debris, she continued to tread against the impossible force. The Shoshone pulled mercilessly at her and tugged her into a liquid downdraft that sucked her under again.

You’re a fighter. Don’t let Coogan win..

Arms clawing, feet kicking, she struggled. She felt like a leaf caught in a tsunami. Her lungs screamed for air. She couldn’t…

Don’t

Let.

Coogan.

Win.

She touched bottom. Something solid collided with her. She scrabbled, her arms automatically wrapping around a mass of energy. Rambo. Somehow her fingers grasped the doggie flotation jacket, and they shot upward.

Seconds after they broke the surface, a warm tongue kissed her cheek. Then Rambo struggled against the pull of centrifugal force and fought to take them toward land.

Brandy’s hands slipped.

Determined to take her to its depths again, the monstrous Shoshone latched onto her, dragging her down. For the final time?

So cold…

Darkness, like the cloak of a grave, closed in on her.

Consciousness seeped away.

“And Brianna, what happened,” the prosecuting attorney asked, “when you got up during the night?”

“The thunder woke me. I ran to my mother’s room.”

“And?” The large intimidating man pushed for more information.

“I said, Mom, Mom, I’m scared.”

“And what did your mother say?”

“She wasn’t there.” Brianna quickly added, “But she came back later. She was out walking our new dog, Rascal.”

It had been the damning statement that had blown her mother’s alibi.

You have to survive, Brianna.

With every last ounce of strength, she pumped her arms and kicked her feet. Somehow, she surfaced and opened her eyes.

Rambo—solid, unrelenting, Rambo—edged toward her. Squinting, treading against water thick with silt, Brandy reached for him. At the same time, she thought she heard Tonya’s voice. Saying
piece of cake?
She was totally losing it.

Then, as ridiculously impossible as it could be, she thought she heard Blade.
Are you okay, Tonya?

Exhausted, paddling, she twisted and faced the source of her hallucinations.
Oh my God.
At the base of the falls, two heads bobbed in the water. She shook her head, focused, then screeched, “Tonya! Blade!”

“Brandy!” Blade spit out a mouthful of storm–brew and started swimming toward her. “Are you okay?”

“Y–yes,” she answered through chattering teeth.

Tonya started after him, but he motioned her toward the bank.

Snagged in the outer edge of a vortex, Brandy fought the river’s might.

She focused on Blade. He was so close…

“Hang in there,” he yelled. “Hang in there. I’ve got you.”

Treading water seemed impossible, but with Rambo’s help, she held ground.

All at once, Blade’s hand grazed her shoulder, snaring her shirt. He pulled her close. She wanted to weep when his steel–hard arms wrapped around her and helped keep her head above water.