Clandestine Christmas. Elle James

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ she’s been dead almost six months.”

      “Still hurts, doesn’t it?” Chase slipped an arm around the older woman and hugged her to him as they walked to the little room behind the stage where Sadie had left her faux fur jacket hanging on a coat rack.

      Sadie stopped in front of the coat rack and waited for Chase to gather her coat and hold it out to her. As she slipped her arms into the sleeves, she said, “A mother should never have to bury her own child.”

      Jake let his hands rest on Sadie’s shoulders for just a moment. “You never told me what happened to Melissa.”

      “She ran her car over the side of a cliff. The police ruled it an accident, but the people who knew her said she’d been acting funny, almost paranoid.”

      Jake shrugged into his coat, his eyes narrowing. “Do you think she committed suicide?”

      “I wouldn’t put it past her. But then, she exacerbated her problems by continuing to put herself front and center of trouble.” Sadie’s shoulders sagged, making her appear every bit of her forty-something years. “I should have spent more time with her when she was a teen.”

      “If she was like every other teen, she wouldn’t have wanted you around.”

      “You don’t have any kids scattered across the country, do you?” Sadie pinned him with her stare. “You were the wild one for a while there.”

      “No, I was sure to protect the women I’d been with...and any child that might have resulted, from getting a father he couldn’t count on.” Fishing his keys from his pocket he held the door for Sadie.

      She touched his cheek as she stepped through the door. “You would make a good father.”

      “I don’t know why you think that. My father was never home. He and my mother never settled for long.”

      Sadie smiled. “I know because I can see what a good man you are.”

      Chase led the way out the back door and around the side of the building onto Main Street. The wind had picked up, sending a chilling blast from the snowcapped peaks surrounding them down to the streets. Bowing his shoulders, Chase did his best to block the wind from Sadie as they crossed Main Street, their feet making sharp clicking sounds on the icy pavement.

      “When are you going to find yourself a woman to share your life with?” Sadie asked.

      “Again, my parents weren’t the best advertisement for marriage. I’m not the least in a hurry to find a woman to settle down with. I like my solitude and I’m beginning to like the seclusion of the Lucky Lady Ranch.”

      At the middle of the street headlights shined in Chase’s eyes. He lifted his hand to block the brilliant glare blinding him. “We’d better hurry.” Chase gripped Sadie’s arm and guided her toward the other side of the street.

      Before they reached the sidewalk, tires squealed and the vehicle sped up, aiming directly for them.

      “Run!” Chase shouted, shoving Sadie toward the sidewalk, then he turned to face the oncoming vehicle.

      * * *

      KATHERINE RIVERS BLINKED tired eyes as she entered the outskirts of Fool’s Fortune, the quaint Colorado town in the middle of the Rockies. It was well past eleven o’clock, Texas time, and she’d been on the road since four that morning.

      All she wanted was to get to the Lucky Lady Saloon, find a bed to crawl into and save the introductions to her new assignment, Chase Marsden, until after she’d had a decent night’s sleep. She wasn’t even due in until tomorrow. Surely a good night’s sleep would boost her spirits and set her on the right path with this new job and her first CCI assignment.

      The streets, cheerfully decorated in bright Christmas lights, were pretty much deserted with the occasional car passing. Small town life would suit her fine after the insanity of Houston traffic and crime.

      Her GPS indicated she was two blocks from the saloon on Main Street. She could see the neon lights of a building ahead and presumed it was her destination. Two shadowy figures emerged from the entrance and started across the street. Good. Maybe the place would be empty and she wouldn’t have to speak to anyone but the desk clerk.

      Her back ached and the scar on her belly twinged at the enforced inactivity of driving across Texas and New Mexico all day. She needed to move, to perform the stretching exercises the physical therapist had armed her with after her surgery.

      She snorted. A broken-down Texas Ranger, medically retired after a shoot-out gone wrong. Some bodyguard she’d be.

      Faced with finding a job sitting behind a desk, Kate had been more than happy to accept Hank Derringer’s offer of employment in his supersecret organization, Covert Cowboys, Inc. Although, being female, she wasn’t sure how that worked. Technically, she was a cowgirl, born and raised in the panhandle of Texas on a four-thousand-acre ranch.

      She knew her way around horses, cattle and a barnyard. The fourth daughter of a rancher, she had never felt she was a disappointment to her father, who would probably have preferred sons to carry on the Rivers name.

      Her father treated her like any other ranch hand, only with a whole lot of love and care. She could ride as well or better than any man on the ranch and she’d done her share of roping, branding and castrating steers. Her sisters had preferred to work in the house, but knew how to ride and feed the animals.

      Her father boasted she was as good or better than any son he might have had and he wouldn’t have changed a thing. When she left the ranch to join the Texas Rangers, Kate Rivers wasn’t afraid of anything.

      All that had changed in one night, one fateful shoot-out.

      Resisting the urge to floor her accelerator and finish this trip, Kate pushed away thoughts of that night eight months ago and maintained her speed, her goal in sight.

      A dark SUV darted out in front of her from a side street.

      Kate slammed her foot on the brake pedal and skidded to a halt.

      The SUV’s tires spun, screeching against the pavement, and then it sped toward the saloon.

      Kate fired off a round of curses and hit the accelerator, her adrenaline pumping, angry at the idiot’s disregard for other traffic on the road.

      As quickly as her heart leaped, it came to an abrupt halt when she noticed the two people who’d left the saloon running toward the other side of the street.

      The SUV driver seemed to head straight for them, increasing his speed instead of slowing to allow them to make it to the other side.

       No.

      Kate punched the gas pedal, a gasp lodged in her throat as she watched the scene unfold, unable to stop it.

      One figure pushed the other toward the sidewalk and then turned to face the oncoming vehicle.

      “Fool!” Kate yelled inside the confines of her truck cab. She slammed her hand onto the horn. “Get out of the way!” she screamed.

      The SUV swerved at the last minute, ran up onto the sidewalk, clipped the man in the СКАЧАТЬ