Dark Secret (10 page)

Most of the ranches were further down the mountain, several thousand feet down from the Chevez ranch. Clinton Daniels’s property bordered Colby’s to the south, but only Sean Everett’s twenty thousand acres stretched beyond Colby’s property, with the state land behind him. Everett had wrangled with the state over most of the land, buying up the rest from small-time ranchers. Like Colby, he seemed to prefer the mountains, leading a fairly self-sufficient existence. His fleet of vehicles, not to mention the small Piper and helicopter, made her green with envy.

The Everett hands who lived in the ranch’s comfortable cabins with their families stayed mainly to themselves although she knew all of them by name and could call a few of them friends. They seemed to work hard. Everett’s ranch had definitely prospered, his cattle remaining fat even through the harsh winters. Some of his hands, most of whom had never worked on a ranch until Sean had given them a home, were becoming interested in rodeo competition.

Colby smiled to herself as she gathered up Domino’s reins. She spent a great deal of her time doing business with men, earning her reputation as a reliable and shrewd rancher with an exceptional talent with horses. It had given her a quiet confidence in herself, a joy of life. She was one of those lucky people who accepted her way of life and simply lived it to the best of her ability.

She swung easily into the saddle, liking the familiar creak of leather. Pulling her hat to a better angle to shade her eyes from the sun’s rising rays, she turned her mount toward the
farthest corner of her property. The fence had been sagging for some time and, unlike Colby, the cattle favored this rugged, remote area. Perhaps Pete had come here to repair the fence. She rubbed her eyes several times. The sun wasn’t high, yet her eyes felt sore, unduly sensitive to the light.

As Domino picked his way carefully over the loose rocks, his hooves the only sound in the utter stillness, Colby alternated between anxiously scanning the ground for tracks and scowling nervously up at the jutting remorseless mountains. The unrelenting steep rock guarded the series of dark, forbidding caves winding into the very bowels of the mountain. She disliked this section of property intensely, avoiding it with every excuse possible. There was a sense of evil, a dark somber dread as if the land were alive, waiting patiently, relentlessly to reclaim her. She was never able to approach it without her heart rate doubling, her stomach churning, and a terrible sense of foreboding overtaking her, a leftover bogey from her childhood. She would never forget being trapped in the old abandoned mine shaft, a primitive affair, a hundred years old with rotting timbers. It had all come crashing down, smothering her nine-year-old cries, nearly suffocating her. She had been buried alive, trapped in the damp rotting earth for eleven hours and twenty-two minutes. It had been an eternity. Even with her special gifts, she had not been strong enough to move the mounds of earth and rock by herself. She had waited alone and frightened in the terrible darkness for her stepfather to rescue her.

Something had moved in the dark bowels of the caves, something not human. She had seen red flames in glowing eyes and smelled dead flesh. The thing had taunted her, its voice gravelly, skin stretched taut across its skull. She had seen jagged teeth stained with blood and long, razor-sharp talons for fingernails. Her parents had sworn to her over and over, when she woke screaming in the night, that it had been her imagination. Colby still had a difficult time believing she could have conjured up the hideous creature.

Armando Chevez had closed up the mines and she hadn’t gone exploring there, feeling the place was like a giant spider web waiting for her return. It was only after Armando had
been paralyzed in the plane crash that Colby had gone back to declare the mines unsafe and totally off-limits to Paul and Ginny. She refused to allow Paul to patrol this section of fence line, doing it herself or letting Pete take the job.

The fence was on the ground, strands of barbwire wrapped around a fallen post. She could see a leather glove caught in the wire. She dismounted quickly and hurried over to the glove. The three ranches joined together at this point. Everett’s property climbed steeply behind hers, erupting into dense, thick forest running wild. Daniels’s property off to her south gradually sloped into gentle, grassy hills. He had dotted the area with a series of small shacks and old machinery. His dump, she thought a little wryly, a nice eyesore to add to the ambience of the place.

She carefully worked the glove free of the barbwire and held it up to examine it. The sound of a rock dropping abruptly spun her around just as Domino threw his head up, ears forward, snorting. Colby stepped closer to her horse, smoothly drawing her rifle from its scabbard. She turned, her heart in her throat. Several yards away a man was standing, holding his horse, as startled as she was.

Slowly she relaxed when she recognized the foreman of Clinton Daniels’s ranch. “You do turn up in the oddest places, Tony,” she greeted, “thanks for taking ten years off my life.”

He continued toward her, his dark gaze touching the glove in her hand, then resting briefly on the rifle she held. “I didn’t expect to find you out here either. The fence has to be lying on the ground before
you’d
repair it.”

She mounted Domino smoothly, not liking to appear so small around Tony. She pushed back her hat, shrugging indifferently at the accusation. She had never liked Tony Harris. She had known him for years, long before Daniels had hired him. He had a mean streak in him. His reputation for brawling was legendary, almost as much as his notoriety with women. She had never understood his fatal charm, was appalled by the number of women who suffered physically, mentally, and emotionally, yet like moths to a flame always went back for more. He made her flesh crawl.

Colby tucked the glove into her belt and raised her eyebrow
at Tony. “You want to tell me what you’re doing on my property?” She made herself smile, although the way his eyes were running over her body made her all too aware of his isolation.

He grinned nastily. “Maybe I was looking for you. The ice princess. The little virgin sacrificing herself for the kiddies. We all want to know who will melt your heart.” He laughed loudly, the sound coarse in the stillness of the silent mountains.

“Not you, Tony,” she assured him coolly. “You’re way too wicked for my taste.”

“You mean I’m too much of a man,” he countered, swaggering a little as he crowded closer to her horse.

Colby raised an eyebrow at him. “I hear they’re looking for stand-up comedians at the Wayside Saloon. Why don’t you check it out?”

“I just might do that.” He was right in front of her, close enough for her to read the thoughts lurking behind his too handsome face. “I’ve always wanted to have you to myself, just for a couple of hours,” he said softly, as if thinking aloud. “You’re always sitting up on that pedestal; it’d be kind of nice to have you groveling at my feet.”

Colby laughed openly at him. “You have a vivid imagination, Tony. It’s a wonderful fantasy, but I’ll have to pass. I’ve got too much work to do. Which reminds me, just what are you doing on my property? Not looking for stray calves, are you?”

“Are you accusing me of something?” he snapped, instantly angry, taking another threatening step toward her.

Domino moved restlessly, not liking the man’s close proximity. Colby casually turned the horse sideways, resting the rifle naturally across her body, the barrel low, but unmistakably centered on Harris’s large frame.

“Hey, Tony, you drive those cattle back yet?” A voice bellowed the question from the rocks nearby.

Colby kept her eyes on Harris. She didn’t recognize the voice, but Harris looked triumphant, more malevolent than ever. “Sure did, but Miss Jansen isn’t nearly as grateful as she should be. Maybe she needs a lesson in how to treat a man properly.”

The second man, a total stranger, dark, with a day’s growth
of beard and shrewd assessing eyes, scrambled from the rocks and into her line of vision. His eyes were red-rimmed and streamed constantly. He shoved dark glasses on, but not before she saw his expression. Where Tony Harris annoyed her, this man frightened her. Harris was a bully; this man was truly evil. Daniels had himself a wonderful crew. Most likely they were stealing him blind. “So you were returning my cattle,” she said thoughtfully.

“That’s right, Colby, those little critters of yours just don’t want to stay put.” Tony took another step closer to Colby, watching her carefully with hot eyes.

“What the hell is taking so long?” Daniels strode up to the fallen fence, glaring at his foreman. “Get back to work, Harris. It shouldn’t have taken the two of you all this time to return a couple of steers. And you could have fixed the fence.” He dismissed the two men with a wave of his hand, ignoring Harris’s surly grumbling and the other man’s mocking insolence. “Sorry, Colby, it didn’t occur to me they wouldn’t fix the fence.” For the first time he seemed to notice the rifle. “They weren’t giving you any trouble, were they?”

Colby faced him across the fallen fence. Smooth. Charming. A shark. Clinton Daniels had deliberately used her stepfather’s terrible accident for his own gain. The hospital bills were piling up and Colby had taken out a loan using the family ranch as collateral, the terms nearly impossible to meet. A blur of movement caught her eye. Up on the ridge one of Everett’s somber, silent workers stood beside Juan Chevez, surveying the scene below. The worker lifted a hand at her, still watching from his vantage point.

Colby burst out laughing. “It’s a regular convention out here. I thought I was all alone, but we’ve got enough people out here to have a party.”

Daniels was scowling up at the two silent men. “I don’t think it’s so funny, Colby. There’s something strange about Everett’s hands. Every last one of them is an ex-con. It makes me nervous to know they sit up there watching everything we do.”

“They just want to be left alone.”

“It isn’t safe for you riding around alone out here.” Daniels cast another fierce glance up at the two men. “And
those foreigners are a strange bunch too. I think they’re up to something.”

Colby gathered up the reins as Domino sidestepped nervously. “Thanks for returning my cattle, Clinton. I’m sorry about the fence. I’ll get some materials out here as soon as possible and we won’t have the problem anymore.”

“You might want to hold off a couple of months, save yourself time and expense,” he told her suavely.

Colby’s chin went up. “You don’t have to worry, I’ll have your money for you.”

“Colby”—he shook his head, clucking his tongue at her—“I understand you went to the bank and they turned you down. How do you expect . . .”

“They turned me down because of you, Daniels. Don’t think I don’t know that. And it’s none of your business how I come up with the money. You’ll get it.”

He reached out and caught her reins, preventing her from moving. “You’re being stubborn, Colby. Let the Chevezes take the kids away. Marry me. You’ll still have your ranch, it will all work out. You shouldn’t be running yourself into the ground. Look at you, you’re pale and tired. You have dark circles under your eyes. And you’ve lost weight. Let me take care of you.”

She backed Domino away from Daniels. “No one is taking my brother and sister anywhere. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.” Abruptly she turned the horse, urging him back over the rocks as she thrust the rifle into the scabbard. Automatically her eyes were on the ground, picking up signs, noting Tony Harris’s mount needed a new shoe on his left rear foot. It took a few minutes before she realized she hadn’t seen any fresh cattle tracks accompanying Tony’s mount.

One last time she looked up at the high, craggy peaks, feeling the familiar curling in the pit of her stomach. She was already running behind time on her chores. As she started back toward the ranch, she caught sight of a vulture circling lazily in the sky. She watched its path, turning Domino so she could pick her way through the larger boulders along the steep cliffs. As she rounded a particularly steep rock face, she saw more of the large birds. They were gathered together near the base of one of the cliffs.

At once she felt a terrible dread, her body stiffening. Domino began to dance nervously, Colby’s body language communicating instantly to the animal. She bit at her lower lip, made a long sweep, scanning the area to ensure this time she really was alone.

Colby approached on foot, not trusting Domino’s reaction with the birds and the odor. She kept her rifle with her, but used her handgun, firing into the air to frighten off the vultures and to alert the Everett riders she needed their help.

She circled the area, careful not to disturb anything, looking for tracks to tell her what had happened. She knew before she ever reached the body that it was Pete. He had been dead for days. It looked as if he had been on the ledge up above and had slipped and fallen. The back of his head must have hit the small boulder near where he lay. There was blood on the rock and plenty of it staining the shirt across his shoulders.

Colby saw the broken pieces of a whiskey bottle scattered around. She closed her eyes, suddenly tired, her throat choking on unshed tears. For a brief moment she rested her hand on Pete’s arm. Immediately she snatched it away, backing away from the body, looking around her, very, very afraid.

She felt it, the instant she touched him: she knew it had been no accident, knew Pete had been murdered. She didn’t know who or why, only that someone had killed him. The aftermath of violence was still haunting the ground, the rocks, especially the body. Colby examined the area carefully, wanting to read the messages the earth might give her, yet she didn’t want to disturb the crime scene.

She moved away from the body, back to Domino, and buried her face against the animal. For once he remained steady, unmoving, as if he knew he was consoling her with his presence.

Colby?
Her name shimmered in her mind. Warmth seeped into the coldness of her body.
Pequena, I feel your pain. I cannot come to you. Share it with me. Let me help you.