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“Yep. You’ve been a mighty sick little gal. If Gabe Burrell hadn’t flown me here, we might have lost you.”
“Gabriel flew you here?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t know he could take passengers. Did he find his horn?”
“What horn? Belle, honey, you’re talking a little crazy. Gabe doesn’t have a horn that I know about. And he flew me here in a helicopter.”
“I guess angels don’t use their wings anymore. They’ve gone high tech.”
Sam laughed. “What in the world are you talking about? Gabe’s no angel. Trust me on that.”
“Are you sure?” Belle asked, but before she heard Sam’s answer, she slipped away once more.
Belle didn’t see her brother again until she was sitting up having breakfast. Nurse Ratched—or her clone—had checked her IV, cranked up the bed and taken the cover off some vile-looking mush.
“Eat,” Nurse Ratched had said before she sailed out of the room.
Belle sneered at the gray glop on her plate. “She’s got to be kidding.”
“Who?” Sam said.
“Nurse Ratched. The warden who was just in here.”
“I thought her name was Vivian Johnson. What was she kidding about?”
“Eating this stuff.”
“You must be feeling better,” said a blond man who followed Sam into the room.
“As compared to what?”
The man chuckled. Belle recognized the sound. “Gabriel? I thought I dreamed you.”
“Gabe, just plain Gabe. Would you rather have a hamburger?”
“No, but I’d kill for a nice, thick milk shake.”
“What flavor?”
“Strawberry.”
“I’ll be right back,” Gabe said.
After he left, Belle said, “Who’s he?”
“An old friend of mine. He’s my insurance agent and fishing buddy. Now that you’re back from the dead, you want to tell me what’s going on with you and Matt? Last I heard after you quit the FBI and married him last Christmas, the two of you had settled down on his ranch in Colorado and were happy as a pair of beetles in dung.”
“We were—or at least I thought we were until he came in one day and announced that he’d been seeing his old girlfriend again.”
Sam looked shocked. “His old girlfriend? Matt?”
“You aren’t any more surprised than I was. They grew up together and were high-school sweethearts. Seems she came back to town after her marriage soured, and she and Matt got together. The ink wasn’t even dry on our marriage license when she cried on his shoulder and one thing led to another. Now they’re in love, and she’s pregnant.”
“The son of a bitch!”
“My sentiments exactly,” Belle said.
“He can’t do that to my sister! I’m going to Colorado and whip that bastard’s ass.”
Belle rolled her eyes. “Simmer down. You’re not going anywhere. If I meant so little to him then I’m glad to be rid of him. We’ve already filed for divorce, and it should be final in a couple of weeks, but I was too sick of Colorado to stick around any longer. And may warts grow on my nose and my ears fall off before I go calf-eyed over a man again.”
Gabriel strolled in, grinning and bearing a tall plastic cup. “At your service, ma’am. You like one straw or two?”
“Just one. Thanks.”
He peeled the paper off the straw, stuck it into the cup and handed her the milk shake. She sucked up pure ambrosia. “Thanks. This is heavenly.”
He looked pleased with himself. Now that she had a chance to examine him more closely, Belle could see that Sam’s friend was far from angelic. He was devilishly handsome and his grin was straight from Old Scratch himself. Good thing she’d sworn off men or she might have been totally captivated by Gabriel. Gabe. She had to remember that—just plain Gabe.
“Gabe,” Belle said, “thanks for flying Sam here. I understand that I might not be around if you two hadn’t shown up. I wasn’t even sure where I was.”
“Glad to do it. It was good that you stopped when you did. There was a nasty storm going on.”
“I remember the storm,” she said, “but not much else after that. Sam, when can I get out of this place?”
“You’ll have to ask your doctor, but I wouldn’t count on it being for a while yet. You’re still on intravenous antibiotics.”
“But I don’t like being sick.”
“Belle,” Sam said, “don’t whine. You’re lucky to be alive.”
She slurped her milk shake. “You didn’t call Mom and Dad, did you, Sam?”
“No. Sick as you were when we got here, you roused enough to get a death grip on my shirt and make me promise that I wouldn’t. I haven’t called anybody. Want me to?”
“Lord, no. You know I can’t stand hovering. Cole nearly went bonkers from all their attention when he was laid up. When I’m feeling better, I’ll call and tell them about—you know, the other.” She slurped on the straw again, but the cup was dry.
“Want another one of those?” Gabe asked.
“Want? Yes. Can I hold it? No. I think my stomach shrank. Thanks for this one. I think I’ll go to sleep for a while.”
“I LIKE YOUR SISTER,” Gabe said as he and Sam walked down the hall.
“Me, too,” Sam said. “She’s one of a kind. Did I ever tell you that she was an FBI agent?”
Gabe nodded. “I think you told me when you explained about the Outlaw family’s tradition of being named after famous outlaws and all being in law enforcement. You’re Sam Bass Outlaw, and she’s Belle Starr Outlaw. And you have brothers Jesse James and Frank James.”
Sam nodded. “J.J. is the sheriff of Naconiche County, and Frank is a judge there.”
“And isn’t there another brother?”
“Cole Younger Outlaw. He was a homicide cop in Houston, but he teaches criminal justice these days. My brothers are all married now and have families.”
“Didn’t I remember that Belle was married, too?”
“She was,” Sam said. “She’s getting a divorce. The SOB she married turned out to be a louse.”
Gabe shouldn’t have been pleased about that, but for some reason, he was. Even ill and without the usual female paint, Belle Outlaw was a stunning woman. She was gutsy for sure, and she had a great sense of humor. Plus, he’d seen a side of her that he doubted she showed very often. Her vulnerability. She’d drawn out his protective streak and made him want to bundle her up and cradle her like a baby. In short, she fascinated him.
“How are we going to work getting your sister back to Texas?” Gabe asked. “And exactly where are we going to take her? Is she planning to stay with you?”
“Beats me,” Sam said. “I’ve been thinking about that some myself. I know you have a business to run, and you can’t hang around here forever. I suppose you can take off anytime now, and I’ll drive her back to Austin.”
“I’m not in any hurry. Matter of fact, didn’t you tell me that you have to go to an important training session next week?”
Sam nodded. “In Virginia. Since I have to be gone, and I’m in the middle of moving, I’m going to try to talk Belle into going home to Naconiche.”
“She doesn’t want to go?”
“Nope. I suspect that partly she’s concerned about my mother’s tendency to hover, but mostly I think she doesn’t want to talk about the mess with Matt.”
“The husband?”
“The soon to be ex-husband.”
“Maybe she could fly home with me and stay in Wimberley to recuperate while you’re gone. My sister will be there, and her clinic is right next to the house.”
“Her clinic?” Sam asked. “What kind of clinic?”
“She a vet. And my mother is there, too. She’s a little flaky, but she makes good chicken soup.”
“Your mother or your sister?”
Gabe laughed. “My mother makes good chicken soup—when she remembers to put the chicken in the pot. She’s an artist of sorts and a little flighty. She’s not a hoverer for sure—more of a soarer, I’d say.”
“Sounds…interesting.”
Gabe grinned. “You don’t know the half of it.”
“I’m willing to park Belle with you if she’s willing. I have to warn you though. Belle’s as stubborn as a mule.”
“So am I. Flora says it’s my most endearing trait.”
“Who’s Flora?”
“My mother. I have a cook and a housekeeper if Flora forgets the chicken. Also, I think having someone her own age around will be good for my sister. Most of her friends are animals. We have a menagerie at our place. Belle’s not allergic to animals, is she?”
“Lord, no. That’s Cole, my oldest brother. And only to cats. We all grew up with lots of critters. Give Belle a horse or a dog, and she’s happy as a pig in slop.”
Gabe laughed. “Then she’ll fit right in. Shall we go back and tell her our plans?”
Looking pained, Sam hesitated for a moment. “Let’s wait and surprise her later.”
Chapter Two
Belle wasn’t exactly sure how it had happened. She blamed all the antibiotics for turning her brain to mush. But here she sat in a helicopter headed for Texas with a man she barely knew, albeit a very attractive man. And a kind one. She had to admit the flight in the chopper was less daunting than a road trip. Even so, she’d slept off and on for a good part of the time they’d spent in the air.
Rousing from her doze, she looked around, trying to get her bearings. “How much farther?” she asked Gabe. Because of the noise, they had to use headphones and mikes to talk.
“We’ll be setting down in a few minutes. Are you tired?”
“Not so much tired as stiff. Are you sure that your family won’t mind having a surprise houseguest?”
“They won’t mind, and you’re not a surprise. I called ahead so Suki could shoo the chickens and pigs out of the guest room.”
Belle wasn’t quite sure if he was teasing or not. She knew very little about Gabe except that he was Sam’s friend and insurance agent. “Who’s Suki?”
“The housekeeper.”
“Is she Asian?”
“Some on her mother’s side, I think. She’s mostly a mixture like the rest of us. Suki’s barely over five feet tall, but she’s been ruling over the wild mob in our household for several years.”
“You have a wild mob?”
“It seems that way sometimes. You’ll soon have everybody straightened out.”
Belle chewed on that for a while. Sounded like a zoo at his place, and what she needed was peace and quiet. Growing up with four brothers was like living with a wild mob, too, and she often retreated to her hidey-holes to escape the madness. While she adored her brothers and enjoyed people, she also enjoyed solitude. Since she’d left home for college, she’d lived alone, except for an occasional roommate, until she’d married Matt.
“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever been to Wimberley. Exactly where is it in relation to Austin?”
“About forty or forty-five miles southwest. You were asleep when we buzzed the governor’s mansion a few minutes ago. Didn’t I hear Sam say that you’d gone to the University of Texas?”
“Only to law school. But except for occasional forays downtown to Sixth Street, I never ventured far from campus and my apartment. I pretty much kept my nose in my books.”
“A high achiever, huh?”
Belle chuckled. “You’ve got my number. I’ve always been competitive. But with four brothers, what can you expect? Hustling was how I kept up.”
Gabe smiled and turned his attention to piloting the chopper.
She saw a small town ahead, nestled among rolling hills and with a rocky river running through it. From her viewpoint, it looked like a picturesque village from a movie set.
“That’s home,” Gabe said, nodding toward a place at the edge of town.
She spotted their destination: a large stone house on a hill surrounded by a number of outbuildings. Horses grazed in a pasture, unfazed by the noise of the rotors, and she noticed several other animals as well, including what looked like a llama.
