скачать книгу бесплатно
“If these guys have a problem, what does that have to do with us?” Sloan asked.
“Callahan is Callahan. The fight is the same.” The chief gestured one last time at the clan gathered in a circle. “Get to know each other well. A single stick can be broken, but a bundle not so easily.”
“I’ve heard that before,” Sloan said. “Any further intel would be appreciated.”
“Your home is here,” the chief said. “Keep the ring of stone and fire in your hearts. Across the canyons, a few miles as the eagles flies, lies danger.”
“If we’re supposed to be a bundle,” Jonas said, “I assume they’re staying with us at Rancho Diablo? They’re welcome to, of course, though we can take care of ourselves.”
“For now they stay here.” The chief squatted next to the fire, waved a hand over it. “You have nineteen children, six wives and two elderly people on the ranch, Jonas. It is best to have your cousins remain in this place so they can keep a lookout.”
“I’d watch calling Aunt Fiona and Uncle Burke elderly,” Jonas replied. “Chief, we can establish our own lookouts.” He glanced across the fire at his new kin.
Sloan knew exactly how Jonas felt. “Why again is this our problem?”
“Brother takes care of brother.” The chief let that sink in for a moment. “Remember that only blood matters. Stay together and yet separate. There is strength in all of you, but even a chain can be broken if the weakest link is not reinforced,” the chief said, rising. “Here the past and the future become one. What comes now will change you all.”
He disappeared, and the fire dimmed. Hoofbeats echoed eerily in the darkness.
Sloan had little patience for open-ended missions with little purpose, and slackers who couldn’t take care of themselves. He appointed himself troubleshooter, deciding to go ahead and shoot this trouble in the head before it took over their lives. “I take it you’re in some kind of jam, cousins,” he said. “Not really sure we can help you.”
“I’m Jonas Callahan. And as far as I knew when I woke up this morning, the only jam in my world was on my toast. We thought we were doing just fine until you showed up.”
Sloan took the hand stretched out to him, giving it a brief shake. “Sloan. These are my brothers and sister. Falcon, Galen, Jace, Dante, Tighe and Ashlyn.”
Ashlyn’s diminutive size caught Jonas’s attention. He glanced at Sloan.
“She’s not the weak link,” Sloan said drily. “Trust me on that. Five feet two of meanness if you cross her.”
“Good,” Jonas said. “No offense, Ashlyn.”
“Not a problem,” she said.
Jonas looked at Sloan. “These are my brothers. Creed, Pete, Sam, Rafe and Judah.”
“Seven of us, six of you?” Sloan asked.
“Guess your father was more prolific,” Jonas said.
“Or he was determined to have a girl,” Ashlyn said, her tone sweet.
Jonas eyed Sloan. “We’ll head on now.”
He nodded. Sloan glanced around at the rest of the Callahans on the opposite side of the fire. There was definitely a strong resemblance, but they didn’t feel like family.
Yet they were supposed to fight for a common cause, against something dangerous that affected all of them.
Sloan didn’t get it. Frankly, if the seven of them had been brought in to help these six, he wasn’t all that interested.
His family could stand on their own.
Too bad if theirs couldn’t.
Chapter Two
Kendall Phillips looked down at the sleeping man, unsure how to wake him. He slept like he was dead, which he probably should be, considering he’d spent the night on the ground at Rancho Diablo. In the not-quite-dawn light, she saw that the fire had gone out, perhaps hours ago.
The next thing Kendall knew, she was flat on her backside in the dust. “Ow!” Her fanny smarted—and now this guest of Jonas’s was on her very bad side. “Let go of me, you gorilla!”
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” he demanded.
She noted he didn’t release her, and she squelched the great desire to pull off one of her high-heeled Manolo Blahniks and pierce him with it. “I’m Kendall Phillips. I was sent with coffee and to bring you in to meet the family while it’s still dark. Let go of my ankle!”
She slapped his hand, but he didn’t seem to mind. He slowly released her, his fingers lingering against her skin—as if he wasn’t used to feeling anything soft.
Chills ran up her legs.
“Sorry,” he said. “Not used to a chuck wagon showing up to greet me, nor a female.”
Kendall stood, turning to look at her white Chanel skirt, which now bore a target-size dirt mark on it, very visible despite the dimness still covering the ranch. “Apology not accepted. I was trying to wake you gently, you...” She sized the man up as he stood. “You do look like a Callahan.”
“That’s because I am.” He glanced around. “Do me a favor. Don’t tell my brothers and sister you made it to the fire without me taking you out.”
“I beg your pardon,” Kendall said, “but I can assure you that you and I will never be going out.”
“It’s okay. We had a bead on her all along,” a female voice said. Five large men and one much smaller woman appeared out of the darkness. Kendall thought it was amazing how silently they could move.
“You sleep like a bear in winter,” the petite blonde said to her brother, who looked embarrassed at her comment. “If she can sneak up on us in those shoes, you’re going to stink as a lookout. That’s got to change.”
“This is all very nice, but not my issue,” Kendall said. “Do you want coffee or not?” She put full-force attitude into her voice, letting these people know that she might have gotten dumped on her butt, but it wouldn’t happen again.
“Sure,” the blonde said. “You’re kind of fancy for a rancher, aren’t you?”
Kendall was about to let her have it—she hadn’t driven a military jeep out to the corner of nowhere to put up with this—but just then her twin brother, Xav, rode up on his big stallion, and the little blonde’s eyes went huge in her face.
“Everything all right, Kendall?” Xav asked.
She nodded. “We’re getting to know each other, all of us,” she said, her gaze on the man who’d spilled her on the ground. “It may take a while. We have different methods of saying hello.”
Sloan shrugged. “Where’s the coffee, Barbie?”
Kendall sucked in a breath. “Did you just call me Barbie?”
The big man looked at her curiously. “Is that a problem?”
His brothers shifted, and as slight streaks of dawn began slowly lighting the sky, she realized that all these people looked very Callahan—and a little dangerous.
Darn Jonas for saddling me with this mission.
“My name is Kendall Phillips,” she said. “This is my twin, Xavier. We help out at the Callahan ranches.”
“Not dressed like that, you don’t,” Sloan said. “Unless you’re the party planner.”
“That’s right,” Kendall said. “That’s what I am, the party planner.” She glared at him, not caring that he was disgustingly handsome even after sleeping on the ground all night. “You’re going to miss the party if you don’t all introduce yourselves, because I’m going to drive off in the only mode of vehicular transportation that can make it out here, with your stupid pot of coffee. And you won’t eat the hot bacon and eggs Fiona Callahan has waiting on the stove. You don’t really know what you’ll be missing,” she added. “I’ve done my job. The party planner’s jeep leaves in five seconds.”
“Sloan, Tighe, Dante, Falcon, Galen, Jace and Ashlyn,” Sloan said. “Since we need cover of darkness, we’d better get a move on.”
He had a nice voice. A little rough and gravelly, maybe, but she thought he’d be appealing if he relaxed.
He didn’t look as if he relaxed much. “Can’t they speak for themselves?” Kendall demanded.
“Kendall,” Xav said, laughing, still astride his horse, “cut them a break. They’re not aware of the game rules.”
“Yes, we are,” Ashlyn said to Xav. “We make the rules.”
“Great,” Kendall said. “Nothing but fun times ahead, I can tell.”
Sloan looked at her. “We appreciate you coming out here. We just weren’t expecting company.”
She nodded, backing off just a bit. “Let’s get you that coffee.”
He smiled, and the effect was devastatingly, hauntingly beautiful. As if he didn’t smile often, so when he did, the smile came from deep in his soul. Kendall caught her breath—and then remembered that when he’d held her ankle in his strong hand, capturing her, she was pretty certain his fingers had stroked her skin as he’d finally released her.
It had felt nice.
“Sorry about your skirt,” he told her. “I’d brush it off, but I think the dirt—”
“Don’t you dare,” Kendall said. The thought of him brushing her fanny with his big, rough hand alarmed her. It didn’t ring a long-forgotten bell of sexual desire at all. “I mean, thank you, it will be fine. Nothing the dry cleaners can’t handle.”
His dark eyes squinted at the corners, as if he might be trying to smile again but the action was just too rusty for the muscles to obey. He ran a hand through his messy dark hair, waiting for her to lead the way.
Kendall marched the procession to the jeep and the coffee, more than ready to hand the big man and his rowdy band off to Jonas.
Party planner, my foot. Barbie?
What an arrogant devil. Cute, though, I suppose.
If one likes their men rough and tough—and I don’t.
* * *
THEY FILED SILENTLY into their cousin’s house, somewhat awed by their surroundings. Their grandfather had said Rancho Diablo was five thousand acres, but it felt bigger. A couple of small oil derricks worked in the distance. The house was Tudor, almost British in style, supposedly Jeremiah Callahan’s dream house. Sloan couldn’t think of his family as having anything in common with these Callahans. He was pretty certain none of his family had ever been in anything like this joint. There were seven chimneys, for Pete’s sake. It was like a ghostly castle rising up off the New Mexico landscape, banked by dark spools of canyons.
A small, gray-haired woman stood at the door to greet them. She wore green rubber boots appropriate for walking in mud or to the barns and a pink apron with red hearts fashioned into the fabric. The apron looked as if it might have been made by small hands in a school project. Sloan thought it had probably been made by one of the many children he’d been warned were here, a veritable army all their own.
But on this cold early morning the ranch was silent except for workers he could see in the distance.
“Come in,” the woman said. “I’m your aunt Fiona. Welcome to Rancho Diablo.”
Sloan and his siblings went into a grand foyer in which a massive iron chandelier hung overhead. He glanced at the others, who shrugged at him.
“It’s not home,” Ashlyn said, “but it’s not bad, either.”
“Follow me,” Fiona said cheerfully. “I’m sure you’re cold and hungry. The chief says I can only keep you here an hour before you must depart.” They trailed after her into a large kitchen where the fragrance of eggs and coffee and toast permeated the room. Sloan’s stomach rumbled to get at the food.
He glanced at Kendall. Now that they were in a well-lit room, he realized the dirt mark on her skirt was huge. That spot was never coming out without professional assistance. Of course, the spot only made him realize what a really nice fanny she was packing.
“I have to admit that the chief pulled a shocker on me. Still, we’re always delighted to have family about. Rancho Diablo is a family place.” Fiona looked around the room with a smile. “In the future, Kendall will be your liaison. Anything you need, you let her know. Grab a plate and tell me your name as you fill up,” the older woman said. “This is dine and dash, I’m afraid. We’re just lucky it’s the darkest part of the year. It gives you a little more time.”
Sloan’s gaze went to Kendall’s. She raised a shoulder as if to say, “You blew your shot with me, dude. Don’t look my way.”
His brothers and sister wasted no time taking their plates and introducing themselves to Fiona and her husband, Burke, as they went by in the line. Sloan went over to talk to Kendall, hoping to make amends.
“Let me pay for cleaning the skirt.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Stubborn.”
“You should talk.” She gestured toward the food. “One thing you’ll learn about being around this branch of the Callahan family tree—if you’re hungry, you’d best get to the front of the line. The men in this group eat. Last one in line gets a short stack.”
He grinned. “I’m not used to eating a lot.”
Her gaze floated down his body. “You’re thin,” she agreed. “All the same, this is the only food you’ll get for a while.”
“It’s fine. There’s always something to eat.”
“Not unless you like snake.” She grabbed a plate, handing it to him. “I don’t eat snake, so I’m going to eat your share if you don’t get a move on.”
He didn’t have to be told twice. He let Fiona fill his plate, murmured his thanks and seated himself at the long table with everyone else.
“This is very nice of you,” Ashlyn said. “Thank you, Fiona.”
“I don’t understand,” she replied, “why you can’t just stay on this ranch.” She studied the group. “Jonas! Why can’t they stay here? Why is the chief complicating things? If we need protection, shouldn’t they be here? We certainly have the room,” Fiona muttered. “It’s twenty-nine degrees outside, for heaven’s sake, well below freezing.”
Jonas pulled up a chair near his aunt, shrugged at his cousins. “If I had a dime for every time someone tried to figure out the chief, I’d be a wealthy man.”
Fiona sniffed. “You are a wealthy man, don’t be an ass. Now,” she said, staring straight at Sloan, “wouldn’t you rather stay here than out in the cold?”
He gulped his coffee. “Ma’am, I’m just following orders.”
Fiona frowned. “Good soldier.”
Kendall met his gaze, blinking. A good soldier probably wouldn’t keep staring at the pretty ranch employee.
“It’s okay,” Ashlyn said hurriedly. “We’re used to surviving in remote locations. We wouldn’t feel right staying here. It’s not our assignment.”
“Assignment!” Fiona glanced around the table. “You’re family! Burke’s never going to rest knowing you’re all out there sleeping on the hard ground. He’s going to think he needs to join you.”
