Desperado: Deep in the Heart, Book 2 (15 page)

“I was only kidding about tossing you out the window—”

She started to scream again. Cody held his hands up. “Okay! Okay!” Lord, what a mouth this tiny woman had on her!

Watching her closely as he edged toward the window, he eyed the courtyard. There was no one out there, and plenty of soft grass for him to land on. Cursing Stormy and how she’d managed to turn the tables on him again—and knowing very well he was getting what he deserved for his smart-alecky attitude when he should have been tender and sensitive—he went out onto the ledge, hanging by his hands to drop the few feet to the ground.

“We’ll need a stuntman for the movie,” she called after him. “Maybe you should audition!” As if it were a wedding bouquet, she tossed his cowboy hat out of the window.

He snatched it from the air, then stalked off. How could a lady so petite, so vixenish, have had him groaning with desire just a half hour ago?

Now he was back to the beginning, wanting to wrap his hands around her little white throat.

He had the funny feeling that would get him no place but back into her bed—which was where he really wanted to go. He just couldn’t allow it to happen again. The woman was draining all the common sense out of him. If he wasn’t careful, he’d end up cockeyed and irrational, just like her.

Mary watched her uncle leave the Stagecoach courtyard, dusting off his jeans as he strode away. Stunned, she realized he came from the vicinity of Stormy’s window. Suspicion and hurt bloomed in her mind. Going upstairs, she knocked on Stormy’s door.

Stormy opened the door, her expression odd and guilty.

“I came by earlier,” Mary said.

“I must not have heard you knock.”

Mary looked at Stormy’s nervous eyes and flushed face. Her heart sank. Stormy wasn’t just her friend. She was also Uncle Cody’s friend. She suspected Stormy was important to Uncle Cody in a way Mary never could be, if he was jumping out of windows.

She lowered her eyes, thinking that maybe she couldn’t even trust Stormy.

“Do you want to sit down for a while, Mary, and watch TV?”

She shook her head. “No, thanks. I think I’ll walk back to the hair salon and wait for Uncle Cody like I was supposed to in the first place. I knew he had an errand to run, and I—I wanted to come by and show you my hair.”

“It looks nice,” Stormy said, “I can’t tell any difference.”

“That’s what Hera said. She worked at it awful hard. Said if my Mom says yes, she’ll put a Maple rinse on it like yours.”

“Oh, Mary. I’ve got Maple on my hair just so it won’t be the color of one of your uncle’s red cows. It makes the color one I can live with. If I had hair like yours, I would never put dye on it.”

Mary gazed at her. Stormy’s hair was the color of a deep-heated jewel. It made her glamorous. Obviously, Uncle thought so, too, despite him always saying her hair was purple. Mary backed away from the door, seeing the rumpled sheets on the bed. A nail lay on the floor, the kind she’d seen Uncle use to nail fences and gates with, and barn doors. Stormy wouldn’t have a nail like that. Uncle had been here, and Stormy didn’t want her to know.

“I’ll talk to you later,” she said slowly. “I gotta go.”

“Okay.”

Stormy nodded as if she understood, but suddenly Mary wondered if the woman had ever understood anything, or just pretended to like her because of Uncle. Sadly, she went down the hall and outside.

But she didn’t feel like going back to Hera’s to wait for her uncle. Instead, she headed for the bus station.

Chapter Ten

Stormy made a calling out of being a happy person. She had to. Otherwise, with the way she’d grown up, she would have spent way too much time being depressed and withdrawn. A lot like Mary.

Right now Stormy couldn’t hang on to the happy mission. She hadn’t expected a proclamation of love from Cody, but it hurt that he had been so apparently repulsed by her virginity. More men than she cared to think about had wanted to get her into bed. No man had been right for her.

So she had waited to feel something special before sharing herself. Her parents might have believed in free love, but she did not. No, she had not wanted Cody to be grateful for the fact that there had been no man before him. But she had hoped he would think their lovemaking was more than just a spare few moments in the sheets. It was worse that he expected her to be easy, or to be “Hollywood”, whatever the heck that meant, and had been disappointed when he’d discovered she wasn’t. Hypocrite.

The fact that the condom they’d used had held together at all was astonishing. Barely any lettering had been on the foil. That cowboy had spent a few years keeping that packet warm as it stayed hidden in the wallet in his jeans back pocket. Cody wasn’t any more into easy sex than she was. How dared he act as if she should be an experienced woman?

He’d said he regretted making love with her. Maybe she should regret it, too. After all, it hadn’t made anything better between them. Their business relationship would undoubtedly suffer because of what they’d done.

Mary was suffering, too. Stormy had seen it in her face. Maybe the teenager didn’t know exactly that Stormy and Cody had made love, but something was wrong. She’d seen Mary’s nervous glance toward the unmade bed.

Everything had gone awry. Clammy fingers of sadness gripped her. She fought for the positive side of the matter, the silver lining in the cloud, but she couldn’t quite get there. All she felt was lost. Alone.

But although she knew she should feel regretful about their lovemaking, she didn’t.

“You can be proud of yourself,” Cody said, heaving himself into a chair in Sloan’s office. “Between you and the two old codgers, you finally got me to do something I didn’t want to do.”

“Hm.” Sloan steepled his fingers. “Go to church?”

“Don’t start.” Cody sent him a grim frown. “The movie will be on my ranch. Hopefully so far away I won’t even know it’s there.”

“Really?” Sloan perked up considerably. “The rough way you were treating the movie scout, I’d heard she was taking her business to Shiloh.”

“Well, you could have only heard that from Curvy and Pick. They’ve been thinking up schemes, Mary’s been after me… I tell you, it’s been hell. Even Annie’s thrown herself in with Stormy’s lot.”

“Well, that’s great news for Desperado!” Sloan jumped to his feet. “We can use this publicity for next summer’s tourist flyers. Even a billboard, so that everybody who’s passing us by to get to San Antonio and the beach resorts will want to stop here!” He rubbed his hands with glee.

The disgruntled expression on Cody’s face made him quit. “What’s the problem?” He slid back into his chair.

“Nothing.”

“Then what’s your chin dripping into your coffee mug for?”

“It’s not.” Cody gave him a wave-off.

“Is it the scout? I heard you two don’t hit it off too good.”

“No, it’s not the scout.” For once, the gossips were wrong. He and Stormy hit it off way too good. “It
is
the scout. But I don’t know what’s bugging me about her.”

“Maybe it’s doing a deal with a woman.” At Cody’s derisive snort, Sloan said, “You know how it is around here. It’s usually men doing the talking, the dealing. We slap each other on the back and shake hands, and we’re happy. With a woman, it’s different all the way around.”

Yeah. He hadn’t slapped Stormy on the back. He’d slept with her.
Jumping Jehosaphat.
“Sloan, I gotta get going.” He rose to his feet, and his cellular phone rang. “Excuse me,” he said to the sheriff. “Hello?”

“Cody? It’s Annie.”

“Hey, Annie.” Talk about a woman having trouble doing business. After her husband had died, nobody’d wanted to do business with her. She was a woman, and a widow, and she’d all but lost her farm that drought-stricken summer. Zach had pretty much been her lifeline.

“Have you seen Mary?” Her voice held a small note of worry. “Your mom said you took her into town.”

“I dropped her off at the beauty salon. When I went to pick her up, they said she’d walked over to a friend’s house. I’ll yell at her for that in due time. I’m waiting for her to call me, because she knows I’m bringing her over to your place.”

“Oh. Why was she at the beauty parlor?”

“Uh—” Cody realized there was no reason not to tell her, except that she was probably going to be mad at her daughter, and maybe him. “She dyed her hair orange. I took her to Hera’s to get it fixed.”

Cody pointed at Sloan as he laughed out loud. Annie giggled, too.

“What’s so funny?” he demanded. “I didn’t think it was
funny
at all.”

“I did that when I was a girl. I wanted so badly to be a platinum blonde.”

“A platinum blonde?” Cody couldn’t believe his ears.

“Oh, great,” Sloan groaned.

“Yes. I turned my hair green, though. Did Hera fix it?” Annie asked.

“I’m sure. I haven’t seen Mary yet. I’m sitting in Sloan’s office shooting the breeze.”

“Okay. Well, I want her to come home soon. I’ve got some good news for her.” Annie paused, pleased. “Stormy called and told me that you’re going to let them do the movie shoot over at your place.”

“Yeah.” He was in no way enthusiastic about it.

“I hope you’ve checked into all the details,” she said, her voice teasing. “Particularly about the explosion they’re planning to set off.”

Well, hell. An explosion or two on the farthest end of his twenty-five hundred acres wasn’t going to hurt anything, especially if he had time to move his steers to the opposite end.

“Mary doesn’t know she’s going to get to stay with Stormy for a few days. Don’t tell her, okay? I want to surprise her.”

He couldn’t see what was so dang exciting about staying with Stormy. Instantly, he thought of a few things he’d like to do if he could stay with Stormy for a few days. “I won’t say a word,” he promised irritably.

“Well, bring her home as soon as you two hook up, okay? Tell Sloan hi.” Annie hung up.

Cody turned the phone off and laid it on the desk. “Annie says she hopes you end up with a platinum blonde one day.”

“She did not,” Sloan said, chuckling. “She knows women and the law do not get along.”

“You’re just plain not interested in getting tied down.” Cody crossed his arms. “That’d be the same for you as roasting in hell. Well, I’m wishing a platinum blonde on you.”

Sloan laughed as if there were no tomorrow. “I think misery wants company! You want me to be as bent out of shape as you are! You’ve fallen for that crazy scout, haven’t you?”

“No.” Cody’s denial was flat.

The sheriff slammed his palm against the desk as he roared with laughter. “Stormy Nixon. Stormy Nixon! That little bitty woman’s roped her a big ol’ cigar-store Indian. Ha!”

Sloan’s mirth dug at Cody’s pride. He got to his feet and pointed one meaningful finger at the sheriff. “A platinum blonde. Who can’t cook and who thinks a church is just for getting married.”

“Uh-uh, friend. This is misery you have to suffer all by yourself.” Sloan wiped his eyes. “Your phone, Cody. Don’t forget your phone. It gets expensive using quarters to call women.”

Glaring, Cody stepped back in the room. In the space he left in front of the door, Curvy and Pick came in.

“Figured sumpin’ more had to be going on in here than on the bench,” Curvy said. “It’s too hot for folks to be out right now.” He squinted at Cody. “Saw your niece at the bus station. She going on a trip?”

“What?”
Fear shot into Cody’s stomach like a thrown rock.

“I said, we saw Mary go into the bus station. Is she—?”

“Damn it!” Cody hurried out the door.

“Hang on, I’ll go with you,” Sloan said, jumping up to follow. “You boys answer the phone,” he called back to Curvy and Pick.

The two elderly men looked at each other. Curvy slid into Sloan’s seat. Pick took the one Cody had vacated.

“I told ya,” Pick stated.

“You did.” Curvy nodded agreeably.

“That bus pulled out already,” Pick said.

“Yep. Don’t matter. Cody and Sloan’ll run it down.” He rummaged around in the sheriff’s desk. “Look at the size of this hunting knife,” he murmured. Out of curiosity, he picked at the bottom drawer lock, which he’d never seen open. “It sure is a heavy knife. Wonder who he confiscated it from—well, would you look at that?” The lock popped and he slid the drawer open easily. “I always thought picking drawer locks was something they did in movies to make you scared of what might pop out.” Curvy reached into the bottom drawer and felt around. “Nothing in here. Wait a minute.”

His fingers grasped cold metal. He held up a picture frame. “Would you look at that?” he asked Pick, though he didn’t have to because Pick was craning to see.

It was a wedding photo of a young Sloan and a woman. They were both smiling as if they’d found paradise. He didn’t have the grim lines of worry on his face that he carried now, and she was a delightfully perky blonde with straight teeth and breasts that caught Curvy’s attention. “Didn’t know Sloan was a breast man.”

“Reckon I didn’t, either.”