Will of Steel (11 page)

“Learning how to tame the beast, aren't you?” he whispered in a teasing tone.

She looked up at him with soft, loving eyes. “How to calm him down, anyway,” she said with a little laugh. “I think marriage is going to be an adventure.”

“So do I.”

He stood and tugged her up, too, helping to rearrange her disheveled clothing. He grinned at her. “We both love maps and the tango. We'll go dancing every week.”

Her eyes brightened. “I'd like that.”

He enveloped her against him and stood holding her, quietly, in the silence of the snow-covered woods. “Heaven,” he whispered, “must be very like this.”

She smiled, hugging him. “I could die of happiness.”

His heart jumped. “So could I, sweetheart.”

The endearment made her own heart jump. She'd never been so happy in her life.

“Saturday can't come soon enough for me,” he murmured.

“Or for me. Ted, Sassy bought me the most beautiful wedding gown. I know you aren't supposed to see it before the ceremony, but I just have to show it to you.”

He drew back, smiling. “I'd like that.”

They walked hand in hand back to the ranch house, easy and content with each other in a way they'd never been before. They looked as if they'd always been together, and always would be.

Sassy, busy in the kitchen with the cook, grinned at them. “Staying for lunch, Ted? We're having chili and Mexican corn bread.”

“I'd love to, if you have enough to share.”

“Plenty.”

“Then, thanks, I will. Jillian wants me to see the wedding gown.”

“Bad luck,” Sassy teased.

“We make our own luck, don't we, honey?” he asked Jillian in a husky, loving tone.

She blushed at the second endearment in very few minutes and squeezed his hand. “Yes, we do.”

She opened her bedroom door and gasped, turning pale. There, on the floor, were the remains of her wedding gown, her beautiful dress. It had been slashed to pieces.

“Stop right there,” Ted said curtly, his arm preventing Jillian from entering the room. “This is now a crime scene. I'll get the sheriff's department's investigator out here right now, and the state crime-lab techs. I know who did this. I only want enough proof to have him arrested!”

Jillian wrapped her arms around her chest and shivered. Davy had come right into the house and nobody knew. Not even Rourke. It was chilling. Sassy, arriving late, took in the scene with a quick glance and hugged Jillian.

“It will be all right,” she promised. But her own eyes were troubled. It was scary that he'd come into the house without being seen.

 

Rourke, when he realized what had happened, was livid. “That polecat!” he snarled. “Right under my bloody nose, and me like a raw recruit with no clue he was on the place! That won't happen again! I'm calling in markers. I'll have this place like a fortress before Saturday!”

Nobody argued with him. The situation had become a tragedy in the making. They'd all underestimated Davy Harris's wilderness skills, which were apparently quite formidable.

“He was a hunter,” Jillian recalled. “He showed me how to track deer when he first started working with Uncle John, before he got to be a problem. He could walk so nobody heard a step. I'd forgotten that.”

“I can ghost-walk myself,” Rourke assured her.

“He used to set bear traps,” Jillian blurted out, and reddened when everybody looked at her. “He said it was to catch a wolf that had been preying on the calves, but Uncle John said there was a dog caught in it…” She felt sick. “I'd forgotten that.”

The men looked at each other. A bear trap could be used for many things, including catching unsuspecting people.

Jillian stared at Ted with horror. “Ted, he wouldn't use that on Sammy, would he?” she asked fearfully. Davy knew how much she loved her calf.

“No,” he assured her with a comforting arm around her shoulders as he lied. “He wouldn't.”

Rourke left the room for a few minutes. He came back, grim-faced. “We're going to have a lot of company very soon. All we need is proof that he was here, and he won't be a problem again.”

 

Which would have been wonderful. Except that there wasn't a footprint in the dirt, a fingerprint, or any trace evidence whatsoever that Davy Harris had been near the Callister home. The technicians with all their tools couldn't find one speck of proof.

“So much for Locard's Exchange Principle,” Ted said grimly, and then had to explain what it meant to Jillian. “A French criminalist named Edmond Locard noted that when a crime is committed, the perpetrator both carries away and leaves behind trace evidence.”

“But Davy didn't,” she said sadly.

“He's either very good or very lucky,” Ted muttered. He slid a protective arm around Jillian. “And it won't save him. He's the only person in town who had a motive for doing this. It's just a matter of proving it.”

She laughed hollowly. “Maybe you could check his new Bowie knife to see if it's got pieces of white lace sticking to it,” she said, trying to make the best of a bad situation.

But he didn't laugh. He was thoughtful. “That might not be such a bad idea,” he murmured. “All I'd need is probable cause, if I can convince a judge to issue a search warrant on the basis of it.” He pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes, nodding to himself. “And that's just what I'm going to do. Stick close to the house today, okay?”

“Okay.”

He kissed her and left.

 

But Ted came back a few hours later and stuck to her like glue. She noticed that he was suddenly visible near her, everywhere she went around the house and
the barn. It was just after he'd received a phone call, to which nobody was privy.

“What's going on?” Jillian asked him bluntly.

He smiled, his usual easygoing self, as he walked beside her with his hands deep in the pockets of his khaki slacks. “What would be going on?”

“You're usually at work during the day, Ted,” she murmured dryly.

He grinned at her. “Maybe I can't stay away from you, even on a workday,” he teased.

She stopped and turned to him, frowning. “That's not an answer and you know…!”

She gasped as he suddenly whirled, pushing her to the ground as he drew his pistol and fired into a clump of snow-covered undergrowth near the house. Even as he fired, she felt a sting in her arm and then heard a sound like a high-pitched crack of thunder.

That sound was followed by the equally loud rapid fire of a .45 automatic above her. She heard the bullets as they connected with tree trunks in the distance.

“You okay?” he asked urgently.

“I think so.”

He stopped firing, and eased up to his feet, standing very still with his head cocked, listening. Far in the distance was the sound of a vehicle door closing, then an engine starting. He whipped out his cell phone and made a call. He gave a quick explanation, a quicker description of the direction of travel of the vehicle and assurances that the intended victim was all right. He put up the cell phone and knelt beside a shaken Jillian.

There was blood on her arm. The sleeve of her gray sweatshirt was ripped. She looked at it with growing sensation. It stung.

“What in the world?” she stammered.

“You've been hit, sweetheart,” he said curtly. “That's a gunshot wound. I didn't want to tell you, but one of my investigators learned that Harris bought a high-powered rifle with a telescopic sight this morning, after I had his rented room tossed for evidence.”

“He's a convicted felon, nobody could have sold him a gun at all…!” she burst out.

“There are places in any town, even small ones, where people can buy weapons under the table.” His face was hard as stone. “I don't know who sold it to him, but you'd better believe that I'm going to find out. And God help whoever did, when I catch up to him!”

She was still trying to wrap her mind around the fact that she'd been shot. Rourke, who'd been at the other end of the property, came screeching up in a ranch Jeep and jumped out, wincing when he saw the blood on Jillian's arm.

“I spotted him, I was tracking him, when I heard the gunshot. God, I'm sorry!” he exclaimed. “I should have been quicker. Do you think you hit him?” he asked Ted.

“I'm not sure. Maybe.” He helped Jillian up. “I'll get you to a doctor.” He glanced at Rourke. “I called the sheriff to bring his dogs and his best investigator out here,” he added. “They may need some help. I told the sheriff you'd been on the case, working for the Callisters.”

Rourke's pale brown eye narrowed. He looked far different from the man Jillian had come to know as her easygoing friend. “I let him get onto the property, and I'm sorry. But I can damned sure track him.”

“None of us could have expected what happened here,” Ted said reassuringly, and put a kindly hand on the other man's shoulder. “She'll be okay. Sheriff's
department investigator is on his way out here. I gave the sheriff's investigator your cell phone number,” Ted added.

Rourke nodded. He winced at Jillian's face. “I'm sorry,” he said curtly.

She smiled, holding her arm. “It's okay, Rourke.”

“I didn't realize he was on the place, either, until I heard the gunshots,” Ted said.

“Not the first time you've been shot at, I gather?” she asked with black humor.

“Not at all. You usually feel the bullet before you hear the sound,” he added solemnly.

“And that's a fact,” Rourke added with faint humor.

“Let's go,” Ted said gently.

She let him put her into the patrol car. She was feeling sick, and she was in some pain. “It didn't hurt at first,” she said. “I didn't even realize I was shot. Oh, Ted, I'm sorry, you have to wait…!” She opened the door and threw up, then she cried with embarrassment.

He handed her a clean white handkerchief, put her back in the car, and broke speed limits getting her to the emergency room.

 

“It's never like that on television,” she said drowsily, when she'd been treated and was in a semi-private room for the night. They'd given her something for pain, as well. It was making her sleepy.

“What isn't, sweetheart?”

She smiled at the endearment as he leaned over her, gently touching her face. “People getting shot. They don't throw up.”

“That's not real life, either,” he reminded her.

She was worried, but not only for herself.

“What is it?” he asked gently.

“Sammy,” she murmured. “I know, it's stupid to be worried about a calf, but if he can't get to me, he might try to hurt something I love.” She searched his eyes. “You watch out, too.”

His dark eyes twinkled. “Because you love me?” he drawled.

She only nodded, her face solemn. “More than anyone in the world.”

There was a flush on his high cheekbones. He cupped her head in his big hands and kissed her with blatant possession. “That goes double for me,” he whispered against her lips.

She searched his eyes with fascination. “It does?”

“Why in the world do you think I'd want to marry you if I didn't love you?” he asked reasonably. “No parcel of land is worth that sort of sacrifice.”

“You never said,” she stammered.

“Neither did you,” he pointed out, chuckling.

She laid her hand against his shoulder. “I didn't want to say it first.”

He kissed her nose. “But you did.”

She sighed and smiled. “Yes. I did.”

For one long moment, they were silent together, savoring the newness of an emotion neither had realized was so intense.

Finally he lifted his head. “I don't want to leave you, but we've got a lot of work to do and not a lot of time to do it.”

She nodded. “You be careful.”

“I will.”

“Ted, could you check on Sammy?” she asked worriedly.

“Yes. I'll make sure she's okay.”

She smiled. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

 

Sassy came and took her back to the Callister ranch as soon as the doctor released her.

“I still think they should have kept you overnight,” Sassy muttered.

“They tried to, but I refused,” Jillian said drowsily. “I don't like being in hospitals. Have you heard anything more?”

“About Harris?” Sassy shook her head. “I know they've got dogs in the woods, hunting him. But if he's a good woodsman, he'll know how to cover his trail.”

“He talked about that once,” Jillian recalled. “He said there were ways to cover up a scent trail so a dog couldn't track people. Funny, I never wondered why he'd know such a thing.”

“I'm sorry he does,” Sassy replied. “If he didn't have those skills, he'd be a lot easier to find.”

“I guess so.”

 

“I've got a surprise for you,” Sassy said when they walked into the house. She smiled mysteriously as she led Jillian down the hall to the guest bedroom she'd been occupying.

“What is it?” Jillian asked.

Sassy opened the door. There, hanging on the closet door, was a duplicate of the beautiful wedding gown that Sassy had chosen, right down to the embroidery.

“They only had two of that model. The other was in a store in Los Angeles. I had them overnight it,” Sassy chuckled. “Nothing is going to stop this wedding!”

Jillian burst into tears. She hugged Sassy, as close as her wounded arm would permit. “Thank you!”

“It's little enough to do. I'm sorry the other one was ruined. We're just lucky that there was a second one in your size.”

Jillian fingered the exquisite lace. “It is the most beautiful gown I'd ever seen. I'll never be able to thank you enough, Sassy.”

The other woman was solemn. “We don't talk about it, but I'm sure you know that I had a similar experience, with my former boss at the feed store where I worked just before I married John. I was older than you were, and it wasn't quite as traumatic as yours, but I know how it feels to be assaulted.” She sighed. “Funny thing, I had no idea when you came running up to the door with Harris a step behind you that I'd ever face the same situation in my own life.”