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Hunter glared at him again, then back at Pritch. “Ricky Stall is only sixty-two points behind me in the Cup race.” There was a calm to his voice now, as though he was confident that he could win this by pointing out the obvious. “If I don’t drive today, he’ll gain the lead.”
“Has anyone told you that you’re insane?” Pritch asked. “Stall might well take home the Winston Cup this year. You’re not getting in a car again for at least another month.”
The idea was so absurd that Hunter didn’t even hear it. “I’ll hang back in the pack today. I don’t have to win. Anywhere from fifteenth to twentieth place will do me. I just have to finish so I can keep the points close going into next week.”
“I talked to Alan Carver this morning about running your car. Damn it, Hawk, you’re going to need four weeks to recover from all this—six before your body could tolerate another crash.”
“I heal fast.”
Exasperated, Pritch put down his paper cup. “People won’t forget you if you come in second for the Cup. Is that what you’re afraid of?”
It wasn’t fear, Hunter told himself. It was loathing. Free time was the antithesis of everything he was made of. He hated being still.
Especially now.
Free time meant not losing himself in the pressures of the race as he had done for more than a week now. Free time meant that there would be nothing to quench the fire of fury that burned in his gut whenever he thought about Liv and that little girl.
People wouldn’t forget him because of a few weeks off—and if they did, he could remind them again in a hurry. But he was afraid of what he would find when—if—he had time on his hands to corner Liv Slade for a few answers.
Damn you, Livie, what did you do?
“Find Chillie for me,” he said to Pritch, his throat more raw than ever.
“Your business manager? Why?”
“If I’ve got to take a month off—”
“Six weeks would be my recommendation,” the doctor interjected.
“Stay out of this,” Hunter growled. Then he turned back to Pritch. “I need Chillie to find me a place to stay in Arizona for a little while.”
He’d checked into it once, years ago. She was still living there. She’d left Flag and had opened up a bed-and-breakfast in Jerome with a partner.
It was time to pay Livie a visit.
Liv let her mare choose her own footing down the trail off Cleopatra Hill. Daisy was a champion climber, and all she needed from her rider was to leave her alone and let her do her thing. Liv gave her her head and kept her own attention on the sixteen people riding single file in front of her.
Six of them were guests of the inn. The others were tourists visiting town for the day or staying at one of the more modern hotels. The tours were a side business she’d begun two years ago after being peppered by questions about the area at the tea they served each afternoon at the Copper Rose. Liv knew a lot about Jerome, about Arizona in general. Her knowledge came free with a stay at the inn, but then she started wondering, why not charge the other tourists? Why not combine local lore with a little Western riding?
Riding had never been her strong suit, but she was better at it than most, thanks to Hunter’s relentless tutoring. Her horseback tours of the area had become a thriving success.
Don’t think about him, she warned herself. But her mind had worried over him ever since he had disappeared from the Michigan hospital two days ago. News reports said he was “recovering” at an undisclosed location.
Hunter wasn’t the type to lie about and heal. Liv had the nagging, unsettling feeling that he was up to something.
The walkie-talkie at her waist suddenly crackled and spat noise. Bourne was riding at the head of the pack and his voice came through. He thought that an overweight woman wearing a voluminous pink blouse was starting to seem short of breath. Her poor horse was doing all the work, Liv thought, but she also suspected that the woman’s nerves were screwed up just about as tightly as they could go. She decided it was time for a scenic break.
She told Bourne to stop the group at the next clearing. A few minutes later the riders gathered in a rocky enclave with a spectacular view of the Verde Valley beneath them. In the opposite direction, the homes and buildings of Jerome climbed up the hill like diligent ants.
Liv dismounted. “A hundred and twenty-five years ago, this area was nothing more than a settlement of tents,” she began conversationally. She’d learned never to sound as though she was lecturing. “Our Native Americans were the first miners on these hills, then the Spanish came along, looking for gold but finding copper instead. Along about 1876, Anglos staked the first legitimate claims and Jerome sprang to life. It called itself the wickedest town in the West.”
“Why?” someone asked as Bourne began handing out juice packs.
“The men who came here were—for the most part—young and single and rowdy. They were drawn from all over the world—Mexico and Croatia, Ireland and Italy and China—by the prospect of finding their fortunes here. Jerome became the darling of investors, and there was always some corporation willing to buy these guys out. Then, of course, the men needed something to spend their money on, so more people moved in to provide that. At one point Jerome boasted twenty-one bars and eight houses of…well, ill repute.” She grinned. “And where there are liquor and loose women and men of different cultures, there are bound to be a few fights and a handful of murders.”
“Especially if one of those women played her man like a fiddle.”
The voice was smoky, an idle notch above dangerous. Recognition jolted through Liv. She turned quickly.
Hunter.
Liv had the bizarre thought that at least she knew where he was now. He sat on a black horse just at the mouth of the path. Already his hair seemed vaguely longer than it had on television a week ago. But everything else about him was treacherously familiar.
How many times had he ridden up to her hogan looking just like this? With that careless, masculine slouch on a gelding with no saddle…his movements making his hair shift and catch the light. But this time he didn’t grin at her. She had the half-hearted hope that he was in pain—it hadn’t been that many weeks since his accident—and maybe that glare didn’t mean that he had every intention of destroying her for what she had done.
Liv flipped her own hair behind her shoulder. “If she got what she wanted, then I’d say she was a wise woman.”
“Or the man was a fool. I’m no fool, Livie.”
“Don’t call me that.” No one but Hunter had ever called her that.
“Folks are ready to move on here, Liv,” said Bourne.
Liv glanced at him helplessly. It occurred to her that he had no idea who Hunter was. She planned to keep it that way. “Start out again without me.”
“Not sure that’s a good idea. The insurance—”
“Do it.” Liv swallowed carefully and softened her tone deliberately. “Please.”
“You’re the boss.”
She looked back at Hunter. She heard Bourne’s saddle creak as he mounted again behind her, then the plodding sound as seventeen sets of hooves hit the rocky soil, moving out.
Something strange was beginning to happen in the area of her chest, something airy and light that almost felt like relief. They’d settle this now. Liv discovered that she was ready for combat. It was better than living in dread. She couldn’t go on leaping out of her skin every time the phone rang.
“Boss,” Hunter repeated so softly his voice might have been a caress, but there was nothing warm about it.
“You knew that or you couldn’t have found me. Someone had to have told you I was leading this ride.”
“The desk clerk at the Connor suggested where I might find you. You have a few of his paying customers astride.”
“Yes.” It seemed safest to keep things simple until she could gauge his intent.
“I’m staying there.”
She forced herself to nod. “How nice.”
“I thought the Copper Rose might be a little…too close for comfort.”
“Well, don’t let me keep you.”
He made no move to go. She hadn’t expected him to. “Where’s Johnny Guenther? Back at the inn cleaning the toilets?”
“Don’t you dare disparage him!” Outrage hit her with enough force to take her breath away. “He did more for me than you ever did!”
It was cruel, and his eyes showed it. “I thought he might be the type who would jump to do your bidding. That’s what you wanted, right, Livie?”
She clamped her jaw hard, refusing to rise to the bait. “Right.”
“So where is he now?”
She was all out of lies. And there was no sense in them anymore, anyway. She’d devised them all to keep him away. “Flagstaff, I would imagine. We’re not together anymore. You knew that, too. From Delaware.”
He nodded. “Get up on your mare, Livie. Let’s ride a bit. We need to talk.”
“I have to catch up with my group.”
“Do it later.”
She brought her chin up. “No. You need to go.”
He was off his horse in a flash. She’d forgotten how he could move like that, as though he were part of the wind. Liv back-pedaled quickly enough that she almost stumbled. When he reached out to catch her, she jumped again. “Don’t touch me!”
“Scared you might still like it?”
Yes. “I got over you the day I knew you weren’t coming back.”
“Why would I bother? You were the only thing in Arizona worth seeing, and you closed the door.”
It cracked something inside her and she made a sound she despised, something low and throaty and pained. Liv turned away from him. “I’m leaving.”
“Fine. Then I’ll see you at the Copper Rose tonight.”
It stopped her in her tracks. “Don’t come there!”
“Why? Do you think I’ll figure out that that little girl is mine?”
Liv felt her knees fold. Hearing him say it aloud had her reaching quickly for the saddle horn to regain her balance. Her mare sensed her tension and skittered cautiously out of reach. Liv fisted her hands and turned back to Hunter.
She was many things, but she had never been a coward.
“I’m afraid that she’ll figure out she is.”
It stopped him like stone just as he began to approach her again. Liv wanted to see his eyes, had to know what she’d find there. But when he reached up and pulled off his ultradark sunglasses, all she saw in that dark, dangerous blue was betrayal.
“I could kill you for this.” He nearly snarled the words.
Things inside her went cold. It happened gradually, starting in her heart, then spreading out through her limbs. If he had loved her once—and that was a big if—then he clearly hated her now.
Liv told herself she didn’t care. Not anymore. “Cut me a break, Hunter. You’re the last man in the world likely to spend time shaking a rattle over a bassinet.”
“I never knew I had a bassinet worth rattling over.” He moved in her direction again.
Liv rounded to the other side of her horse. Fast. “Don’t you dare take another step toward me.”
“I want to choke you.”
There was enough of a vibration in his tone to tell her that he meant it. “Which is precisely why I want you to stay right over there.”
“I’m not leaving, Olivia. Not until we settle this.”
“You already left. Eight and a half years ago.”
“That was your choice. This time around, I’ll decide.”
It snatched the air right from her lungs. Liv looked into the dark-blue midnight of his eyes. Midnight was when all the most dangerous animals came out in the desert, she thought, the ones that could kill. “If you drag Vicky into this just to tell the world you had a part in it, I will hunt you down and destroy you.”
“Spoken like a mama protecting her cub.”
“I am.”
His grin was slow and cruel. “Damn, Livie, could it be that you’re capable of loving someone after all?”
Then he closed the distance between them. The mare skittered away, spooked. He brought his hand up to close it around Liv’s throat.
His palm was calloused as it had always been, the splay of his fingers broad, and that was the same, too. The thumb stroking under her right ear made something inside her convulse.
“I’m not Johnny Guenther, babe. I don’t know what you did to him or where he went, but I won’t let you snap your fingers and tell me where to go.”
“I’ve got a few good suggestions.” She couldn’t breathe.
“It’s too hot where you’re thinking. And even the devil won’t have me there.”
“He might be afraid of the competition.”
“With good cause.”
Liv slapped his hand away. “I’m not nineteen anymore. You don’t impress me, and you can’t touch me and make me crumble and forget everything I need.”
“We’ll see.”
She spun away from him to find her horse. This time she managed to get hold of her saddle horn. Liv swung into the saddle.
“Eight o’clock,” he said. “Tonight. We’ll finish this then. Meet me in the Spirit Room at the Connor Hotel. I’ll buy you a drink…for old time’s sake.”
Her gaze whipped to his face. “There really wasn’t anything worth commemorating, Hunter.”
“If you’re not there by eight-thirty, I’ll come looking for you.”
