The Girl with the Golden Spurs (28 page)

As planned, cowboys in jeans and white shirts and black Stetsons sat astride quarter horses that were lined up on either side of the sidewalk from the parking lot all the way to
the party. Lizzy glanced at them to see if Cole was among them.

He wasn’t.

Joanne wore a long black dress and was playing her role as the ranch’s mistress to the hilt. She flew about, seeming to be everywhere at once, greeting first one person and then another. When Joanne saw Vanilla, she made her way graciously through the well-dressed throng to greet Lizzy. Delighted, Vanilla squealed to be taken into her grandmother’s waiting arms.

Cole was standing at the bar talking to a pretty, predatory-looking, young redhead wearing a low-cut gown. Even though she wasn’t Suz, Lizzy quickly looked the other way.

Without Vanilla to care for, Lizzy mingled freely with the guests and tried to stay as far from Cole as possible. But any time she accidentally caught a glimpse of him, he was surrounded by beautiful women.

Sam found a drink for her. Her throat felt parched, but she set it down. Hawk and Walker brought her a plate of appetizers from the buffet table. Not that she could make herself eat either.

She was as popular with the men as Cole seemed to be with the women. Not that she wanted to be. She wanted Cole. Only Cole.

But her doubts and nagging questions had driven him away. She
had
to believe in him.

Everybody wanted to talk to her about the ranch, about her father and about all the bad publicity that had been in the Texas newspapers and on television, which, of course, was the last thing she wanted to discuss.

“Was Caesar murdered?”

“What about Electra Scott? What’s the connection there? Were they lovers?”

“Who’s next? I’d be careful if I were you, sweetie!”

Lizzy was polite, if evasive. When the men asked her to dance, she demurred. Despite all the attention from men, she felt bereft because Cole ignored her.

When Aunt Nanette arrived on the arm of a cowboy as young as her sons, Sam and Bobby Joe, and began to make a spectacle of herself on the dance floor, the men stalked abruptly into the house. Aunt Nanette, who was slim, looked far younger in her white leather pants and clingy silk shirt than her age.

Uncle B.B. and Aunt Mona glided up to Lizzy.

“They keep getting younger and younger,” Uncle B.B. said, his eyes on his sister.

“Sam and Bobby Joe should be used to it by now,” Aunt Mona said. “Still, no wonder Sam lived with Caesar and Joanne all those years. Sam’s always seemed sort of lost…like he didn’t belong anywhere. And as for Bobby Joe, he can’t seem to find himself.”

Aunt Nanette rubbed against her lover on the dance floor and Lizzy blushed. “Sam was like my own brother.”

“You shouldn’t be trying to run the ranching operation, Lizzy,” Uncle B.B. muttered, his tone so grim it almost sounded threatening.

“I’ll step down just as soon as I can,” she said.

When still another man asked to Lizzy to dance, she smiled and almost accepted just to escape Uncle B.B. and Aunt Mona, but a deep baritone behind her rocked her senses.

“She’s with me.”

She turned questioningly to Cole. “Am I?”

Uncle B.B. scowled at them both. Then a dark look passed between Aunt Mona and him as they moved away to circulate.

“Well, you damn sure didn’t look like you wanted to be with
him
, or your aunt and uncle,” Cole said in his sexy,

Texas drawl as he led her away. “I always was a sucker for a damsel in distress.”

“Which is how we met,” she said, feeling shy.

“Do you want to dance? I think we’d better. Your new suitor is scowling at us.”

She smiled, nodding. “I guess we have to. But there’s no way we can compete with Aunt Nanette.”

Then Lizzy was in Cole’s arms, being whirled about on the dance floor. There were other couples besides her aunt and her new lover, and yet to Lizzy it seemed as if they were the only two people in the world.

Her doubts had receded in importance. Nothing mattered except being with Cole. Not having him around for the past few days had made her know for sure how desperately she wanted to be with him forever.

He was the only man she’d ever loved. No matter what had gone wrong before. No matter the risk, she had no choice but to take a chance on him. He couldn’t be the killer. She couldn’t have loved him if he was. She couldn’t stand her life without him.

Now that she knew for certain that she couldn’t live without him, she couldn’t wait to tell him she wanted to marry him.

“Cole, could we go somewhere to talk?”

He looked uncertain and yet her shining eyes must have communicated what was in her heart because a new eagerness lit his dark face. “Sure.”

He took her hand and squeezed it before bringing it to his lips.

“Darlin’, I love you.” The warmth of his lips seeped inside her.

“I love you, too.” She hugged him.

“Let’s go.”

He was leading her toward the golf cart path that led to
the aviary and the greenhouse when suddenly there was an explosion directly in front of them from the direction of the barn.

Next came yelling, screaming and utter pandemonium. She clung to Cole. Above the trees, she saw white birds soaring and flames licking the inky, star-bright sky.

“It’s the horse barn!” Cole yelled. “And the aviary! Get back to the house. Stay close to your brothers.” Then he kissed her before taking off in a dead run for the barn and aviary.

O
range flames licked the inky night, streaking it with gold. White birds whirled overhead. Cole had disappeared inside the smoke-filled inferno that had been the barn and was unlocking the stalls to free any horses that weren’t being used for the celebration and might still be inside. As heat blasted her and ashes blew toward her, Lizzy was filled with panic that he might be overcome by smoke and never get out.

Suddenly there was an unearthly roar above the groaning and crackling of burning timbers. Then the entire south end of the barn shuddered and began to rip apart from the rest of the building.

Explosions rocked the barn. The fire must have reached the gas cans and mowers stored at one end. Sparks shot even higher into the air.

“Cole!”

A horse screamed and galloped out of the barn, racing past her.

Ringo.

But where was Cole?

“Cole?” She was crying his name and stumbling toward
the barn when the south end collapsed in upon itself, spewing sparks high into the air.

Dazed, Lizzy felt tears on her cheeks. When something began to vibrate against her waist, only vaguely did she realize it was her cell phone. When she picked it up, a disembodied voice said, “I’ve got Vanilla.”

Sirens screamed in the distance.

“Too late,” she whispered, not really knowing that she’d spoken out loud. Cole had to be dead. Nothing inside that barn could still be alive.

“Lizzy,” the caller repeated. “I’ve got Vanilla.”

Even as she felt cold and crazed with grief and fear, her pulse accelerated in alarm.

It isn’t Cole. The killer isn’t Cole. Cole isn’t a Mr. Hyde.
Cole is dead
.

Not that she felt any relief in that knowledge.

“Come alone, Lizzy, or I’ll kill her.”

Vanilla
. Lizzy’s throat went dry.
Vanilla was in danger
.

“Come where?” she screamed, feeling dead and hollow, backing into the shadows.

“If you tell anyone, if anybody else comes with you, I’ll set the camp house on fire just like I did the barn. I’ll kill Vanilla just like I killed your mother and your daddy and Cherry…and Cole.”

How did the monster already know about Cole?

“You know I will,” he said softly.

“Who is this?” she hissed.

“Come and see. If you’ve got the guts, little Lizzy.”

“Tell me who this is!”

The caller laughed.

“Tell me,” she begged.

More laughter. Then the line went dead.

“Lizzy!” Cole screamed.

One minute, she’d been there, at the edge of the brush talking on her cell phone. In the next, she’d vanished in the smoke.

Fire trucks whirred up and surrounded the barn. An ambulance braked, but its siren kept on screaming.

Cole felt strange, disoriented. White birds whirled above him. Black dots danced in front of his eyes. Suddenly he knew he must’ve lost time again. He’d gone in one set of doors, but he must’ve escaped out the back. He began moving toward the trees. He’d been standing so close to the fire, he was bathed in sweat and his hands were blistered.

But where the hell was Lizzy? It scared the hell out of him that he couldn’t find her. Had whoever set the fire done something to her?

Firemen rushed up to him, and he went wild, trying to push past them to find Lizzy, but they grabbed him and threw him on the ground. When he fought back, it took three of them to hold him down.

“It’s all right. You’re in shock,” one of them said.

A man in white stuck a needle in his arm. “Breathe deeply and you’ll be fine, sir. We’re going to take good care of you. Everything is going to be all right.”

“Let go of me! Let go! Let go! Lizzy—”

But Lizzy was gone.

Had he hurt her?

The black dots thickened in front of Cole’s eyes until they blinded him.

The last face he saw was Uncle B.B.’ s.

“We’ve got to save Lizzy,” Cole said. Then total darkness.

It’s Uncle B.B., he thought
.

Lizzy drew a swift breath as she parked on the road a quarter of a mile shy of the camp house. Then she tucked her loaded revolver into her waistband and got out, climbed a fence and snuck through brush country to the camp. Her black outfit concealed her. She was drenched in sweat and so terrified that whenever a leaf rustled, or a twig broke, or
a frog croaked, her heart leapt into her throat and she sank to a crouch. The gun felt heavy and alien against her spine, but the thought of Vanilla in mortal danger was enough to keep her going.

I can do this. I can do this. I’m Caesar’s daughter. And
Electra’s, too. I’ve got my gun. I’m scared, but I’m strong
.

When she finally reached the camp house, all the lights were blazing. For a long moment she stayed in the brush and watched the house, wondering what to do. Then she heard Vanilla’s music box start playing softly in the same unit where she and Cole had made love such a short time ago.

Keeping well inside the brush line, she crept closer to the camp house. Through a window she could see that a baby bed had been set up, and a blanket had been thrown over it. The blanket was tented as if a child stood there.

“Vanilla!”

When Lizzy raced onto the veranda and then inside the room, the door, as if caught by the wind, slammed behind her. When she ripped the blanket off the crib, the last thing she saw before the lights went out was a stick of wood on the pillow instead of Vanilla.

The baby wasn’t in the crib.

“Vanilla!” she screamed as an explosion shook the building.

She sank to the floor in the suffocating darkness. Holding her breath, she crawled to the door and waited.

Where was Vanilla? She had to get out. She had to find her, and yet she was afraid of what she’d find on the other side of the door.

When the doorknob rattled she wanted to scream but then covered her mouth with her hand. Someone was out there in that blackness. Her mother’s killer? Her father’s? She felt crazed with grief and fear.

Again she saw Star’s carcass on the flatbed truck. Again she saw the barn roof collapse and knew Cole was inside.

In the absolute stillness that followed, she raised her pistol and took aim.

“Don’t shoot,” a voice said.

“Who?” Her hand holding the gun shook uncontrollably.

When the door slammed open and struck the gun, she accidentally pulled the trigger.

She heard a burst of fiendish laughter.

Then a tall, broad-shouldered figure toppled toward her, and the lights came back on.

His arms outstretched, Cole lay in a pool of blood at her feet.

“Cole.” Horrified, she knelt beside him. “
It was you. All
the time it was you
.”

Surprised she felt no revulsion toward him, she touched his thick black hair. “I—I can’t believe it was you.” It made sense, of course. He’d hated them. All he’d ever wanted was revenge. He’d probably blacked out again. But she didn’t believe it, not really.

“Lizzy, are you all right?”

She looked up as Sam entered the room and ran toward her.

She felt exhausted and defeated. It was wonderful to have someone to lean on. “Sam? Thank God, you’re here. I shot him. I shot Cole!” Hot tears burned her eyes. “Cole couldn’t have done it! He couldn’t have!”

“Uncle B.B. sent me. I saw your car and Cole’s truck in the brush. Vanilla’s in Cole’s truck asleep. She sure as hell looks zonked. He must have drugged her. Lizzy, what’s going on? I got a call on my cell phone and was told to come here or else. There’s a fire at the end of the camp house.”

She stared at Cole, too stunned to move.

“I—I don’t feel too well. I’m very tired, Sam. Just call the sheriff. And an ambulance. And the firemen. Then we’ve got to get Vanilla and make sure she’s all right.”

When Sam went out to make the calls, Cole’s dark head
stirred. His hands smeared blood across the threshold as he fought to lift himself.

“Don’t move,” she whispered. “Or…or I’ll…”

He was so weak he couldn’t lift his head and it was agony to watch him struggle. Their eyes met, and she began to tremble all over when she saw his concern and fear—
for her
. He was bleeding. She had to stop the blood, she thought. She had to save him.

“Run,” he managed in a thready whisper. “S-Sam… Run!” He closed his eyes.

“Sam?”

A second or two of beating silence passed before he managed in hoarse voice. “Not me. Not me—
Sam
.”

And then she knew
.

“Let him go. Put the gun down.” Sam’s disembodied voice came out of the darkness before she saw him. “Don’t forget I’ve got Vanilla. She’s safe and sound for the moment, but not for long. She’ll die if you don’t do exactly what I say.” Sam stepped over the threshold into the lit room.

Feeling desperate, she stared helplessly at Cole’s black head. “But he’ll bleed…”

“So?” Sam laughed.

“Why, Sam?”

“Why? Why the hell couldn’t Caesar have flown with

Cole that day instead of Mia? If they’d gone down together, the board would have chosen me for sure.”

“You don’t know that.”

“If you’d only resigned… You had no business…” His voice changed. “Just put the gun down.”

The hand that held the revolver hung limply against her side. Slowly she knelt, intending to do exactly what he said.

It was over. She was no kick-ass heroine after all. No brave audacious cowgirl like Mia. No daughter Caesar could
be proud of, either. She was a joke. Cole would die because of her. She’d even suspected Aunt Mona—for buying bullets. All hunters bought bullets. She’d shot the good guy, who also happened to be the man she loved.

Her face crumpled. Just as she felt herself surrendering to total despair and her fingers relaxing on the gun, she glanced up desperately, straight into the painted eyes of her father’s portrait. Someone had replaced the immense painting above the fireplace, so that he could stare coldly down at her in this moment of supreme stupidity. He looked as arrogant and superior as he had in real life—and as demanding.

“I’m sorry, Daddy,” she murmured. “I wanted you to be proud of me.” She turned to Sam. “You killed all of those people.”

“I did it for the ranch,” Sam said. “I want to run the ranch. I don’t want to answer to anybody other than the board. I did it for the same reasons your father killed his brother. Down here whoever runs the Golden Spurs is like a king. I tried so hard to make Caesar proud of me. Just like you did. But I was only his nephew, and he wanted one of his children to be his heir. I tried so hard to show him…. Then Cole married Mia, and started to outshine me.”

“Daddy didn’t murder anybody. He loved Uncle Jack. He’s not sneaky like you. He was brave and bold. You’re a coward. A real coward. Maybe he saw through you, Sam!”

“Lizzy, put the gun down or I’ll blow your brains out.”

She stared at Cole again, who lay sprawled before her. Slowly she lifted her gaze to her father’s portrait again. For the first time in her life she
felt
his profound belief in her. It was almost as if he were here with her.

“It’s up to you,” Caesar seemed to say. “Everybody’s depending on you. You can do it, Lizzy.”

She thought of her mother.

And then it happened.

One minute she was weak and scared and utterly lacking in self-confidence. Her shoulders were sagging, and she was lowering the gun to the floor about to do as Sam said.

And then the wind gusted, the door banged and her father seemed to speak to her again, “Give it all you’ve got, girl! He’s gonna kill you sure as shootin’. Cole will die sure enough. You have nothing to lose, girl!”

Her grip tightened on the loathsome gun. Without thinking she whirled, thrust it upward and fired twice.

Boom! Boom!
The gunshots sounded like explosions.

Sam staggered backward, clutching the bullet wound in his chest. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“I didn’t.” It was as if someone else had done it. As if Daddy’s spirit had leapt out of that canvas and taken charge of her and pulled the trigger for her.

Lizzy fell to her knees. Dropping the gun, almost shoving it away, she gently touched Cole’s face. His brow felt cold. So cold. Like ice. Maybe he was already dead.

She’d shot him. She’d killed him. She would never touch another gun as long as she lived. Never!

“No! Don’t die!” she screamed. “I’ll marry you! I love you! Just don’t die!”

Grabbing her cell phone, she dialed 9-1-1. Then she rushed to the bedroom and found blankets to cover both men with. She had to find a way to stop the bleeding.

If Cole lived, would he ever forgive her for believing him capable of murder?

And where was Vanilla?

Lizzy pressed against his wounds with the blanket and held him while she waited.

“Duck! Puppy!” Vanilla made monkey sounds along with real words. Joanne bounced her and pointed at the television set in the ICU waiting room in an effort to amuse her.

Lizzy glanced at her watch. “You two can go. I don’t need a baby-sitter.”

“Not until it’s time for you to go in to see him,” Joanne said. “He’s going to be fine, you know.”

Lizzy was so frantic and guilt-stricken over Cole that she hadn’t left the hospital other than to shower and change for the five days he’d been here. Friends and family came to stay with her and to tell her to take care of herself, that she had to keep herself going for Cole.

She barely noticed them coming and going. The few moments when she was allowed inside the ICU to speak with Cole, he lay as still as her father had, except Cole’s eyes were closed. He didn’t react, not even when she said his name and told him who she was. He simply lay there, the only sounds in his room were those of his machines.

According to his doctors, who constantly reassured her, Cole was in a light coma. Even though his doctors were very optimistic, Lizzy was still terrified that he was going to die. Or if he didn’t die, she was terrified he’d never forgive her. When she was with him, she stroked him, talked to him, held his hand, prayed for his love and forgiveness and begged him to stay in this world because she loved him so much.