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“Someone in a blue pickup is shooting at us. We’re on Bluebonnet Street, coming up near the Corral Bar.” It was a risk since there’d be customers still inside, but Lucas didn’t plan on stopping or even slowing down. “I’ll turn back on Main Street and head in your direction. Please tell me you found the first shooter.”
“Not yet. But I’ll send Dade and Josh your way to help,” Grayson said, and he ended the call.
Good. Dade and Josh were both cousins, both deputy sheriffs, and maybe having backup would cause these thugs to quit firing.
The parking lot of the Corral Bar was lit up better than the rest of the street, and Lucas glanced in his side mirror at the truck. Definitely two men. And the one on the passenger side was doing the shooting.
“I can return fire,” Hailey insisted, already climbing into the seat and lowering the window. “Please don’t stop me. This is all my fault, and I have to do something to stop them.”
“No way.” And he meant it. It might indeed be partially her fault for not coming to him sooner, but she wasn’t sticking her neck out to fire any shots.
Hailey didn’t get a chance to argue with him. That’s because the sound of sirens stopped anything she was about to say. In the distance, behind the truck, Lucas saw the flashing blue lights of a police cruiser.
Dade and Josh, no doubt.
The driver stopped following Lucas and took a very quick turn off a side street. A street that would lead them straight to the highway.
No, hell, no.
Lucas didn’t want these clowns getting away, but it wasn’t smart to go in pursuit with Hailey in the vehicle. Besides, Dade and Josh went after them, and Lucas could only hope they’d catch them.
“Keep watch for the other shooter,” Lucas told Hailey.
He hated to rely on her for help, but with the glass in the front, back and side windows cracked and webbed, they had reduced visibility. That would make it hard for them to see the guy hiding between one of the buildings where he could shoot at them as they drove by.
Lucas held his breath, going as fast as he could, and he didn’t release that breath until he made it back onto Main Street. Definitely no sign of the shooter, so he headed for the sheriff’s office.
“Can you run?” he asked her.
“I’ll try,” she assured him. Which meant she couldn’t. “I had to use a cane to walk to your SUV.”
Definitely couldn’t.
The SUV squealed to a stop directly in front of the door to the sheriff’s office, but he didn’t get out. Lucas waited until Grayson hurried to the door and threw it open.
“I’m carrying you in,” Lucas insisted, and he didn’t leave any room for argument.
He scooped her up in his arms and rushed her inside the building, with Grayson locking the door behind them. But Lucas didn’t stop there. He hurried her past the squad room to the hall that led to Grayson’s office and the break room. That way, if someone did come in with guns blazing, she’d have some protection.
“Dade and Josh are in pursuit,” Lucas told Grayson. “Arizona plates, but there was something covering the numbers. Mud, I think.” Probably not an accident.
“Arizona?” Hailey repeated.
Lucas knew the reason for her concern. DeSalvo had been from Arizona, which meant his son, Eric, likely was, too. So, had Eric sent those goons after Hailey?
Now that they weren’t in the SUV, Lucas got a better look at her. Especially a better look at the fear in her eyes. And the fact that she was having to grip the door to steady herself.
“As soon as it’s safe, I’ll have the doctor come over to see you,” Lucas told her.
But she was shaking her head before he even finished. “I can’t trust Dr. Parton. Or anyone in the hospital. Someone planted that bug on the table next to my bed.”
Lucas certainly hadn’t forgotten about that. The device needed to be checked, but that would have to wait, because Grayson no doubt had every available deputy on this manhunt for the shooters.
“When there’s time, Hailey will need to give you a statement,” Lucas told Grayson.
Grayson nodded. He still had his gun drawn, was still keeping watch on the area just outside the building. “Is she in WITSEC?”
“Yes,” Hailey answered. “But I don’t want the marshals to know I’m here.”
Grayson mumbled something Lucas didn’t catch, but he didn’t need to hear the words to know that Grayson wasn’t pleased about all this going on right under his nose.
“Hell, you worked for me,” Grayson added.
She nodded. “I figured it was a way to keep an eye on what was happening in town, just in case something went wrong.” Hailey paused. “And something did go wrong.”
Yeah. And Lucas wondered if sleeping with him was in that something-gone-wrong category.
“I’ll call Mason and give him an update,” Grayson said after he shot Hailey a glare.
Hailey dropped back a step, holding onto Grayson’s desk. Lucas was volleying his attention between her and the outside. However, she got his complete attention when she made a soft gasp.
Lucas hurried to her, following her gaze to the computer on the desk. It was obviously the security feed that the doctor had sent Grayson. In the shot, the tall, lanky man was coming through the glass doors of the ER. Grayson had paused it and zoomed in on the man’s face.
Darrin Sandmire, no doubt.
Lucas had no trouble seeing the renewed fear in Hailey’s eyes. “That’s definitely the man who came to my house three months ago. And the man who ran me off the road that night.”
Lucas hadn’t needed to hear anything else about the guy to know that he wanted him caught, questioned and punished.
Hailey touched the screen to get the security feed moving again. Darrin disappeared from view when he walked past the camera and to the hall. Since it would have taken him several minutes to get to her room, Lucas sped up the footage, watching for Darrin to reemerge.
He did.
But the man wasn’t alone.
There was a woman with him, walking right by his side, and it was obvious they were talking. The woman was a blonde, and she kept her head down. Right until she was close to the camera.
Now Hailey’s gasp wasn’t so soft.
“I know her. That’s Colleen Jeffrey.”
The name meant nothing to Lucas, and he didn’t recognize her, either. “Who is she?”
There were tears shimmering in Hailey’s eyes when she looked up at him. “My half sister.”
Damn.
Lucas was about to assure her that maybe this was a coincidence. But it didn’t look like that to him. He needed to get this woman in for questioning right away.
He heard the footsteps. Hurried ones, and they put Lucas right back on alert again. Though he hadn’t exactly been relaxing.
“We’ve got a problem,” Grayson said, stepping into the doorway. “Someone tripped the security sensor near the back fence at the ranch. One of the ranch hands spotted a gunman.”
Chapter Four (#u22dc40c6-d642-5aab-bd04-820e082802cd)
Hailey’s breath froze. She wanted to scream, to shout out for Lucas to hurry to the ranch so they could protect their son, but the words and sounds were wedged there in her throat.
No. This couldn’t be happening. This monster couldn’t get to her baby.
Even without her warning, Lucas thankfully understood just how dangerous a situation this could be, because he took off running toward the front of the building. Hailey followed him. Or rather, she tried.
Lucas must have remembered she was still hobbling, because he spun around, scooped her up in his arms and hurried toward his shot-up SUV still parked just outside the door.
“We need to use a cruiser,” Grayson called out to them. “Because this could be a trap to lure you into the open.”
Lucas stopped, and while everything inside Hailey wanted to move, to hurry to the ranch, she knew Grayson was right.
“Wait right here for me,” Grayson insisted. “I’ll bring the cruiser around to the front.”
Hailey didn’t want to waste precious minutes while he did that, but they didn’t have many options here. Lucas and she waited, the time crawling by slower than a snail’s pace, and it seemed to take an eternity for Grayson to drive up. Even before the cruiser came to a stop, Lucas and she jumped into the backseat, and Grayson took off again.
“I’ll call the ranch and get an update,” Lucas said.
As much as she wanted to know what was going on, Hailey didn’t want anyone there distracted right now. She wanted all the focus on protecting the baby.
Camden.
The name seemed foreign to her. Probably because she’d yet to see her son, but maybe that would change soon. Maybe they’d get to the ranch and put an end to the danger.
“Tillie,” Lucas said to whoever answered his call.
“One of the nannies,” Grayson provided to Hailey, but he didn’t even glance back at her when he spoke. He looked all around, no doubt in case someone was trying to follow them.
Or attack them again.
Hailey couldn’t hear what the nanny was saying, but since Lucas’s arm was pressed against her, she felt his muscles relax just a little. “We’ll be there as fast as we can.” He paused. “Hailey’s with me.”
The nanny perhaps hadn’t even heard she was out of the coma, so this could be a real shock. An unwanted one. Hailey didn’t know Tillie, but she doubted she was going to get a warm reception from anyone at the Silver Creek Ranch. It wouldn’t matter that she thought she’d done the right thing.
Still did think that.
But a family of lawmen wouldn’t see it that way. They would believe she should have trusted them. However, maybe they could see now that all the trust in the world wouldn’t have put an end to the danger.
Oh, mercy.
That reminder came at her hard, like a heavyweight’s fist. The reason she’d tried to escape was to avoid this. To keep her child safe. And now he wasn’t safe because of her.
“Whoever’s behind the attacks will use Camden to get to me,” Hailey said under her breath.
She hadn’t intended to say that aloud, and it stung even more when Lucas made a sound of agreement. He’d finished his call with the nanny and now was keeping watch. Along with glancing at her.
“That doesn’t mean you’re going to try to take him and disappear,” Lucas snapped. There wasn’t a shred of gentleness in his tone. In fact, it was the same tone he likely used with criminal suspects.
“It’s too late to take him and hide,” Hailey agreed. “Too late for me to disappear, as well. Because now that they know I’m awake, they won’t stop, and they’ll try to use the baby to come after me.”
That meant she needed to find out who they were. And fast. For that to happen, she needed to rely on Lucas.
Something that wouldn’t please him.
It didn’t please her, either, but no one would work harder than Lucas to keep Camden safe. Of course, once that happened, and this snake was captured and behind bars, Lucas and she would have another battle to fight.
For custody.
But that was a fight that would have to wait for another day. Right now, Hailey had enough to deal with.
“The fences are all rigged with security alarms?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Grayson and Lucas answered at the same time. It was Lucas who continued. “There are also sensors on the grounds. Cameras, too. Since this clown tripped a sensor, the ranch hands and my cousins will be able to pinpoint his exact location before he can get near one of the houses.”
Good. But pinpointing him wasn’t the same as stopping the threat.
“Hurry,” Hailey said to Grayson. She was speaking purely out of frustration, because he was going as fast as he safely could.
The rural roads that led to the ranch weren’t exactly straight. Plenty of sharp curves and turns, and it certainly wouldn’t help them if Grayson wrecked.
Something she knew all too well.
Hailey couldn’t quite choke back a gasp when the cruiser tires squealed around one of those turns and it felt as if Grayson was losing control of the vehicle. All the memories of that other night came flooding back.
The frantic rush to get away from the person trying to kill her. The adrenaline and the fear. Even the feeling of the impact.
The pain.
But more intense than the pain and the fear had been the sickening dread that she’d failed.
“Flashbacks?” Lucas asked.
She nodded. “I remember that you’re the one who found me that night. If it hadn’t been you...”
Hailey didn’t finish that thought. No need. Lucas had found her, and while it hadn’t made things perfect, it had allowed her to deliver the baby safely.
Grayson took the final turn, and Hailey saw the ranch come into view. To say it was sprawling was an understatement. It’d been huge, but now that the Ryland cousins were buying up the adjacent land and building their own homes, the place stretched out for miles and miles.
They’d also added more security since the last time she’d visited. There was now a large security gate, and she saw several men near it. Ranch hands, probably, since she didn’t recognize any of them.
“Get down,” Lucas told her as they approached the gate. He lowered the window. “Anything?” he asked the men.
“Yep. Just a few seconds ago Sawyer called to say he shot at a guy who’d crossed over the fence. He and two of the other hands are chasing him.”
