скачать книгу бесплатно
His mouth twitched and his gaze made another arrogant sweep over her. “What makes you think I’m interested in feeling saintly?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” She waved her hand airily. “Something about you suggests you might be able to use a few brownie points in heaven. I’ll bet you don’t rack up too many of them during your normal day, do you?”
For all his antipathy toward getting involved, he had to admit she was waging a pretty good fight here. “I try to avoid them,” he said dryly, but he didn’t pull away and urge the horse back onto the road as he should have. In fact, he was forgetting about his desire to move on for the moment.
“Obviously,” she taunted good-naturedly. “But this time, you see, you’re trapped.”
His head went back and he let out a short laugh. “The hell I am.”
She shrugged grandly. “Well, that’s right where I’m afraid you’re headed if you don’t get a few good works under your belt. So you see, I’m trying to do you a favor.” She gestured with a toss of her head, all supreme confidence. “Come on down and help.”
He met her eyes and stared for a long moment. He wasn’t about to change his overall opinion of her, but he had to admit there was more in her than he’d been giving her credit for. And he also knew they had come to a point where it would be churlish of him to continue refusing to help her. How had he let this happen? He was usually the one manipulating things. This time, she was going to win. Smiling ruefully to himself, he swung down off the horse.
“What do you want carried?” he asked her without rancor.
She breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn’t been about to let him know how shaky her confidence had become in the past few minutes. Looking at him now, so tall, so thickly muscular, wearing faded jeans and a plaid shirt augmented by a leather vest, she knew he was all male and decidedly insolent. And here she was, ordering him around.
And here he was, giving in. My my. She allowed herself a quick feeling of satisfaction.
“This easel,” she told him, gesturing toward it. “I can actually carry the rest myself.”
He nodded, glancing at her face. To her credit, she didn’t gloat, but took his acquiescence as a matter of course and went on with things. “That won’t be a problem,” he said.
She was still weighing possibilities, her hands on her hips, her head to the side. “Maybe you could just prop it up on your horse.” She frowned at the large beast doubtfully.
Mitch patted his neck. “This big fella is skittish as it is. If I start piling wood on him, he’s liable to take it as a very bad sign.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “You’re probably right. Well, if you just took one side and I took the other…”
Without waiting for the rest of her musing, he lifted the easel without effort and hoisted it onto his wide shoulder. “Top of that hill?” he asked, nodding toward the area.
“Yes,” she said, hastily gathering her other things. “Thank you so much.”
But he was already striding toward the spot and she had to run to catch up by the time he reached it. He set the easel in place and was going to take her bundle of papers from her, but as she transferred the items, a small stack of drawings fell out and sailed haphazardly to the ground. Picking one of them up, he stopped, startled, staring at the cowboy face she’d drawn. Slowly he turned and stared at her, feeling like a man walking on quicksand.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked her softly, waving the picture at her. “That’s me.”
She glanced at it, not surprised at all. “Oh. Is it? Yes, I guess it is. I was just sketching some of the cowboys a week or so ago. I didn’t remember that you were one of them.”
He stared at her with steely eyes for a long moment, then handed the sketch back to her. “Don’t do it again,” he warned, his voice low but ominous.
She looked up at him, somewhat startled by his tone. “Why not?”
Yes, why not? He could hardly explain that he was an undercover agent, could he? That he didn’t want his cover blown. “It’s an invasion of privacy,” he said, evading the real issue. That made her laugh.
“Oh, come on. I was just sketching character studies. As far as I was concerned, you were just an ordinary cowboy, no more, no less. It was nothing personal.”
He didn’t relent, and actually, he had to admit, seeing the picture of himself had been downright disconcerting. It gave him an eerie feeling, as though something were going on here that he didn’t understand. And he hated not feeling in the know.
“Still,” he said, looking at her narrowly, “you reached out and took a piece of me and I didn’t even know it. Some Indian tribes used to think you captured someone’s soul when you had a picture of them.”
She waved that theory away dismissively. “That was photography.”
He shrugged. “Same difference.” His forefinger jabbed at the picture. “That’s me, and anyone looking at it is going to know it’s me.”
And that was just the problem. She was damn good, but he wasn’t about to tell her so. Opening the sketchbook he was holding, he riffled through others that were just as welldone.
“You see,” she said, watching him, “they’re just character studies. I mean, I don’t think of you as you, whoever that may be. I think of you as Joe Cowboy.”
He nodded, studying her work. “Sort of a generic brand,” he said softly.
“Exactly.”
Looking up, he pinned her with a sharp gaze as he snapped the book shut. “Sure, I understand that,” he said calmly. “That’s kind of the way I think of you.”
That startled her. She turned slowly, keeping her face bland. “Oh, really?”
“Sure.” His eyes narrowed. “You’re the generic rich girl.”
Her eyes widened and she laughed. “Hardly.”
Straightening, he handed her back her sketchbook. “Didn’t your father buy out the place so you could have it to yourself for a month?”
She opened her mouth to protest, but after all, what could she say? He was pretty near the mark. “You don’t know the first thing about it,” she said simply.
He shrugged, his hard face unemotional. “All I know is, they booted all the other guests out so you wouldn’t be disturbed. And you have two bodyguards. Now what kind of message do you think all that is sending?”
She stared at him for a moment, then turned and began to straighten the easel, preparing it for work. “My father used to say, if you want to send a message, call the telegraph people,” she murmured as she aligned the paper guides.
He knew he deserved that, and he almost smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he told her instead. “Now, if you’ve finished with me, boss-lady, I’ll get back to work.”
She turned her green gaze on him and shook her head in wonder. “You’ve got your nerve, mister,” she said. “It’s pretty obvious you’ve never been briefed in customer relations.” She tilted her head to the side, studying him. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll turn you in? That you might lose your job?”
He shifted his weight from one leg to the other, ready to make his escape. “Miss Kingston,” he drawled, “there are things in this life I am afraid of. Losing this crummy job isn’t one of them.” He started to turn away, but said back over his shoulder, “And neither are you.”
“Then what are you afraid of?” she called after him. “I’d be interested in knowing.”
He paused, still looking back. “I’m more afraid of losing my self-respect than I am of losing this job,” he told her seriously.
She laughed softly. “What is your name, cowboy?”
He hesitated. “Mitch Harper,” he said at last, rather grudgingly. “Happy sketching, Miss Kingston.”
She smiled. “Happy branding, Mitch Harper. Be kind to those little dogies.”
For a moment he stood there looking at her, like an animal poised just before flight. The picture she made with her wild blond hair and the blue sky behind her made him want to stand and stare for a long, long time. But he controlled the impulse and moved on. That was what cowboys always did, wasn’t it? They moved on, moseyed on out of there. But he knew this little encounter had changed things. She wouldn’t ignore him the next time they met. The dynamics had changed. For some inexplicable reason, he began to whistle as he made his way back to where his horse was tied.
Hailey watched him go and shook her head. Then she turned to her easel and began to sketch rapidly, first the rough outline of a man, then the details, and before Mitch had disappeared from sight, she had a new picture of him. Standing back to examine it, she smiled. Then she tore off the sheet and quickly began drawing him from another angle, forgetting all about the landscape work she’d planned to do. Was she interested in his form because of something in him that had inspired her? Or was she merely happy to do something he’d expressly ordered her not to attempt? She wasn’t sure. Maybe a little of both. Whatever motivated her, she worked for hours, and when she was done, she had ten pictures of the man, and it made her smile to think of presenting them all to him, neatly tied in a satin bow.
“Later,” she promised herself as she packed up her charcoals and pencils. Right now, she had to begin preparing for the dance she was going to attend tonight.
Tonight. Ah, tonight. Maybe a little romance. Maybe… maybe just one.
Folding the easel and putting it under a bush for future use, she walked happily back through the grass. All in all, this had been one of the least boring days since she’d arrived, and with the evening ahead of her, it promised to keep right on going that way.
Mitch left the confines of the bunkhouse and wandered out under the stars. He could hear the raucous poker game going on behind him. Ordinarily he liked to join in. But tonight he was restless. Instead of heading toward the edge of the driveway, where he could look out over the valley in the moonlight, he turned toward the house. The place was lit up as though it were full of guests, as it usually was at this time of year. But there was only Hailey Kingston. Hailey and her bodyguards and a house full of help. It seemed like a waste.
He knew only sketchy details of the case. Her father was involved in a trial in San Francisco. As he understood it, the man had gangland ties that the district attorney’s office had been suspicious of for some time, and now he was paying for his misdeeds. Just what they were, Mitch wasn’t sure.
“He probably didn’t pay his taxes,” he muttered to himself as he sauntered along. That was the one crime the government could never forgive or overlook. At any rate, there was a lot of missing money involved, as well as some documents. The D. A. thought Hailey might have an idea where those things were hidden. And Mitch was here to see if she would inadvertently give a clue as to where they might be.
He’d had cases like this before, but they weren’t his favorite. He preferred going after the bad guys directly, not through some woman. Unless the woman herself was a bad guy, of course. Now those cases could be a lot of fun.
But this case wasn’t exactly topping the charts in the fun department. It was assignments like these that made him wonder why he’d ever gotten into this business, why he didn’t get out and go start up his own business somewhere.
But he wasn’t going to change, and he knew why. He hadn’t needed therapy to get to the bottom of his own motivations. It was clear as a bell to him. He knew it had to do with his background, with his father’s failures and his own experience of being raised as a rescuer, always pulling his family back from the brink of disaster. He just couldn’t stand to see the bad guys win. He had to make sure they met their just deserts. That was also the impetus that made him side with the underdog every time. Growing up, he’d been down so far, normal life looked like a climb up a heavenly stairway to him. He wanted to make sure that didn’t happen to good people if he could help it.
He glanced up at Hailey’s bedroom window as he neared the house. The light was on, but as he watched, the window went dark. She was already going to bed, it seemed. He’d heard from one of the dinner servers he’d struck up a casual relationship with that she’d gone to her room early with a bad headache. So that, it appeared, was that, at least for this evening.
He smiled when he thought about their encounter that afternoon. He had to admit, she had spirit. And the funny thing was, he had a feeling she was just as bored with this extended vacation in the country as he was.
“So do us both a favor and go home already,” he advised the darkened window. But he didn’t think she would take his advice.
Standing hidden in the shadow of the trees, he watched as Jen came out of the house by the back door and turned to call to someone else. Another of the staff joined her, a woman he hadn’t noticed before. She was pretty, with a fluid walk that turned his head. He whistled below his breath. How had he overlooked this one? That was something he was going to have to rectify.
But right now, he had other things on his mind and he hardly paid attention as the two women got into a small economy car and began to maneuver out of the tricky parking place. He could see through a side window that the two cops were playing cards in the game room. This might be an opportunity to gather more information. He looked back toward the parking area and saw that Jen and her fellow worker were driving off down the road. Starting toward the house, he mused over whether he would question the butler or strike up a conversation with the boy who did the dishes.
For just a moment, he thought about the night he’d climbed the brick chimney to gain access to Hailey’s bedroom while she was down eating dinner. He wasn’t supposed to do things like that—not officially, at any rate. But you could find out things by looking through the possessions of people under surveillance that you couldn’t find out any other way, and he’d been getting antsy. What he’d seen had surprised him. She had lots of quality clothing, but nothing fancy, no fur coats, no diamonds. Expensive things, the sort that were made to last, but not to be showy. Good, basic clothing. If he hadn’t known better, he would have thought she was a woman of uncommon class. And she certainly had the body to wear anything and make it look good. But it was also obvious she came from money.
“Of course,” he whispered to himself. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t be watching her, now would I?”
He’d almost reached the back porch when something visceral struck him and he spun, staring at the cloud of dust behind Jen’s car as her taillights disappeared around the bend. The picture Jen’s companion had made replayed itself in his brain. Short, dark hair, a staff uniform…
“And the longest damn legs this side of the Great Divide,” he muttered savagely. It had been Hailey Kingston, hadn’t it? Hailey in disguise and running away from her bodyguards. What was the matter with him? How could he have missed such an obvious ploy?
“Damn it,” he snarled to himself, starting toward his truck at a run. “Get your mind straight and do your job!”
The dust had settled by the time he reached the main road and he had to make a choice. Right or left? He thought he remembered that Jen lived in the foothills, so he turned toward them and was rewarded in a few moments by the sight of her taillights ahead. Slowing, he followed until they turned into a small community and pulled up in front of an apartment building. Driving on past, he parked half a block away and waited, engine and lights turned off. His instincts told him it would only be a few moments before they would be out again, and once more he was right. They’d shed their uniforms and were dressed in bright skirts and big sleeves.
“What are they doing, going square dancing?” he asked himself as he eased his car out behind theirs again.
Sure enough, Jen drove up in front of a long, low building about two miles from her apartment. Mustang Café, the sign said. Music poured out the door. Mitch watched as Jen and the woman he was now sure was Hailey got out of the car and hurried toward the entrance. Heaving a sigh, he tilted his head back and asked himself just how much square dancing music he could stand. Not much. And there didn’t really seem much point to it, anyway. He might as well head for home. She wasn’t going to be doing anything relevant here.
He’d already pulled the car onto the highway when he saw a familiar face in a car going the other way. It took a minute to register the identity of the man, but as he watched him turn into the dance club, it came back to him. Pauly McVern. That was who it was. He ran a small private detective agency out of Palm Springs, catering mostly to strip club owners and gambling interests. What the hell was he doing here?
So much for a quick ride home. Mitch heaved another sigh as he turned the truck and headed back for the parking lot. If Pauly was sniffing around, he’d better go in and see if he could figure out what was up. There was just no way to avoid it.
“Hee-haw and howdy,” he muttered. “Here we come.”
Three (#ulink_39513b58-918f-59c9-aa7b-61719b522605)
Hailey stepped inside the Western dance club and looked from one side to the other. Energy washed over her in a wave that was almost physical—the noise, the laughter, the music, the smoke, the color of the lights, the heat from a lot of people in a very small space. For just a moment, she hesitated in the doorway. She’d been bored, she’d been climbing the walls, and she’d wanted so badly to get away from those two bumpkin bodyguards and go out and do something. But was this really what she’d had in mind?
Not exactly. But what did she want, anyway? What had she come here for? This was a dance club where people got together to have fun, or to pick up a quick date, or to find the man of their dreams. She wasn’t expecting the last two. All she’d bargained for was the first. Fun. That was it. So here she was in a silly black wig, looking for fun.
“Come on,” Jen was saying impatiently, gesturing for her to come along into the lively room. “I’ll show you around this place. It’s so neat.”
Neat, was it? Hailey hid a smile as she followed her friend. The difference in their ages was a stark reality at times. Jen’s eyes were wide with the excitement of being here, and Hailey was wondering why she’d come. She’d been to places like this before—maybe too often.
“The bar is around that way,” Jen said, pointing out a long area where cocktail waitresses in tiny cowgirl outfits held trays high above the crowd. “The restaurant is in through that doorway, and then, out here in back…” She led Hailey through an opening into a courtyard where an arbor of tangled red roses circled a wishing well. “Lovers’ walk,” she said, gazing with wistful admiration at the romantic setting, lights muted, roses blooming around a shimmering wishing well. “Isn’t it adorable?”
“I suppose so,” Hailey said doubtfully. “If you go in for that sort of thing.”
“Oh, you.” Jen scoffed at her playfully. “You put on this big old front, but if the right guy came along, you’d give him a tumble, just like any of us. Wouldn’t you?”
Hailey smiled at her. She wanted to say no, because that was what the answer was, but she hated to be so cynical when Jen was so full of joyful wonder. “Sure,” she said instead. “You’re probably right.”
“Of course I am.” It was evident Jen couldn’t conceive of a woman who didn’t need a man in her life. “Well, I doubt if you’re going to find your kind of male in this place. It’s full of cowboys and guys like that. But you can have some fun.”
Hailey nodded brightly. “That’s what I came for.”
“Good.” Her face grew more serious. “Just remember, if we see anyone from the ranch, we have to leave right away. Okay? We can’t risk them recognizing us.”
Hailey frowned. They hadn’t really explored the possibility of being found out before. “Jen, what would happen if we get caught? To you, I mean.”
The younger woman shrugged. “I’d probably get fired.” Reaching out, she grabbed Hailey’s hand as she saw the horrified expression spreading across her face. “Oh, don’t worry. Please don’t. Don’t even think about it. We’re here to have fun.”
Hailey had questioned her own judgment in coming here from the beginning, and now she was absolutely disgusted with herself. Why hadn’t she thought this thing through and realized the jeopardy she was putting Jen in? “You’re the generic rich girl,” her unhelpful cowboy had accused her that very afternoon, and she’d denied it. But here she was, acting as though that were exactly the case.
“Jen, let’s get out of here right now,” she said earnestly. “I hadn’t realized-”
“Are you kidding?” Jen pulled back and turned toward the music. “Not on your life. I’m going to dance! Come on.”
Hailey shook her head ruefully. “You go ahead,” she said. “I’ll be along in a few minutes.”
“Okay,” Jen responded happily. “But if I get lucky right away, you’ll find me on the dance floor.”
“Okay.” She watched Jen hurry toward the crowd and sighed. Well, here she was, having fun. Funny. It didn’t feel very different from being bored.
“You’re just a spoiled rich girl,” she chided herself, thinking of the cowboy again. “Never satisfied.” And for just a moment, she had to wonder if the man wasn’t right.
Mitch pulled the truck into a parking place and got out. Pauly was already out of sight. Striding quickly, he found his way inside the roadhouse. The room was a kaleidoscope of lights and sound. The music provided the beat, the dancers provided the swirling skirts and stomping boots. The place was packed and everyone seemed to be having a real good time.
Pushing his Stetson down as low as he could without blocking off vision altogether, he scanned the room for Pauly and found him lingering in the fringes, glancing at something in his hand.
That was all the information Mitch needed to make a quick diagnosis of the situation. Pauly was very possibly looking for Hailey. And the last thing Mitch wanted was for the sleazy detective to find her.
At least he was using a photograph for identification. That meant he’d never seen her face-to-face. It also meant he might not recognize her in the disguise. But he didn’t like to count on luck.
