Can't Stop Believing (HARMONY) (26 page)

Cord waited for Salem to get around to the facts.

“Security talked to him but didn’t hold him. He said he’d gotten a letter firing him as of last week. It was on Boxed B stationery and included a thousand in cash if he’d go quietly. Joey said he went over, cleaned out his gear, and left. The security officer faxed me the letter if you want to see it.”

“Who signed the letter?”

Salem dug in a box and handed him the fax. “You did.”

Cord glared at the paper. “Not my—”

“I figured that. I asked to have the original sent, but it’s probably been handled so much there won’t be any fingerprints on it that can help with the investigation.”

“I understand.”

“Joey Mason didn’t question it. He claimed he never fit in on the ranch and was glad to leave. You said you hadn’t gotten around to meeting him.”

Cord didn’t argue. “I should have. I’d seen him from a distance several times.” If he hadn’t listened to Nevada’s rule, he would have ridden over to her barn and met Joey.

“We never had that cup of coffee,” Travis Salem finally said as he folded his glasses and slid them in the case clipped to his vest pocket. “Any chance you got time for it now?”

Cord wanted to say no, but he hoped somehow he could let go of some of the anger that had kept him breathing all the years he’d been locked up.

“I’ll be at the Blue Moon Diner as soon as I leave a message for Sheriff Matheson. If you want to talk, I’ve got time for one cup of coffee.”

Salem nodded and returned to boxing up papers.

Cord walked away. He headed straight for the dispatcher and asked if Alex would contact him as soon as she had a few free minutes. No emergency. He wasn’t sure what he could tell her. Cameron had stolen the photo album, and the letter to Joey still didn’t make enough to arrest Bryce.

Cord drove to the diner and parked out front. When he walked in, the breakfast rush was over, so the place looked deserted except for dirty tables. He took a seat in the first clean booth and ordered a cup of coffee. If the ranger wasn’t there before he finished, there would be no next time.

Cord’s cup was half empty when Travis Salem entered. Even though he’d put on a stomach the size of a basketball, Salem looked so much smaller than he had that night at the lake. That night he’d had a rifle in one hand and a flashlight in the other. That night Cord had been more kid than man.

“Thanks for waiting,” the ranger said as he slid in and motioned to the waitress that he’d have a cup.

Cord was silent. He had nothing he wanted, or needed, to say.

Salem took a few deep breaths. “I’ve been needing to say something to you for a long time. It took me a while to figure everything out. I was madder than hell at you for years. When I finally got up the nerve to talk, I drove out to the prison and they said you’d been released. After that, I guessed I’d be the last person you wanted to see.”

Cord held the coffee cup so tightly he was surprised the mug didn’t shatter in his hands.

Salem thanked the waitress for his coffee and waited until she walked away. “I lost ninety percent of the sight in my left eye that night. I thought my life was over. All I’d ever wanted to be was a deputy sheriff, and you ended that dream.”

Cord stared at the man, not knowing whether to feel guilty or angry. Did he think he was the only one who lost something that night?

“I sat at home recovering and feeling sorry for myself for months. One day, out of the blue, your parents showed up at my door. I figured they were going to beg me to help get you out early, but all they wanted to do was give me your college fund. Said they’d had an argument with you over going to college, and that was probably why you were drinking that night.”

Cord didn’t breathe. Memories poured like liquid lead over him. His parents not listening to him, the argument, the feeling that they didn’t care what he wanted.

The ranger continued, “I took the money and, more out of anger than want, I decided to go back to school and use every dime of it. Four years of school and two eye surgeries later, I walked out with a master’s degree and enough sight in my left eye to pass the test to try out for the Texas Rangers. They saw me as a hero, injured in the line of duty. I got a job I never would have worked my way up to on my own. It’s more business and paperwork. Not the fun of being out there fighting crime, but I’ve settled into it and surprisingly I’m good at it.”

“You got a point to this?” Cord asked. “I’m almost finished with my coffee.”

“Yeah.” Salem stared at his cup, still untouched. “One of the first things I did after becoming a ranger was go back and look at the file we had on you. I listened to the tape of your testimony and heard something I hadn’t heard before. You sounded scared. I ran what you said over and over in my mind. I remember walking into the camp of drunks and kids high on who knows what. It was dark and the smell of fireworks reminded me of the army when I was nineteen and deployed straight into hell. That same kind of terror filled my mind that night at the lake. I must have been yelling as I headed toward you.”

“What are you saying?”

Salem straightened, and Cord knew no apology would be coming. He didn’t expect one. He didn’t want one. What good would it do now?

The ranger’s voice hardened slightly. “I found a note in the file. Apparently, a teenage girl had come forward, to one of the other deputies, after I was sent to the hospital and you were arrested. She claimed I came at them with a bright light and in charge mode like I was ready for a fight. No one knew who I was. They didn’t even know it was the cops. She said she thought I either stepped on your leg or kicked you, and you came up swinging wildly.”

Cord froze. Exactly the story he’d told. The story no one believed.

Salem shrugged. “The deputy who took the statement told her to come by the station the next morning, but she never did. When they checked on her, her father swore she’d never been out of the house that night. Since she was a minor, her statement was dropped.”

“Why tell me now?” It was too late to change anything. “I don’t care who she was or what she said. She didn’t help when it counted.”

“Oh, I figured you knew who she was.” Salem raised his eyebrow in surprise. “You married her.”

Cord didn’t remember saying good-bye to the ranger. He sat in the diner for an hour in the dungeon of his thoughts.

When he drove back to the ranch, he went straight to the bunkhouse, gathered up equipment, and headed for the south pasture.

At sundown, he was still working as hard as he could, pounding in fence posts across the uneven ground when Galem found him.

“Putting in a hard day, aren’t you, Boss?” the cook shouted, without getting out of his pickup.

“Shouldn’t you and Ora Mae be gone to the lake?” Cord stopped long enough to wipe the sweat off his face with a shirt he’d ruined hours ago.

“We decided to stay here this weekend. Ora Mae says she don’t think she can eat another bite of fish or one more hush puppy for a while. I took her into town for Mexican food, and when we got back I noticed your truck was still gone. If I hadn’t seen your headlights shining out here, I never would have found you.”

Cord pulled the next fence post from his truck.

“You plan on stringing barbed wire in the glow of your headlights?”

“I might.” Cord didn’t want to talk any more than he wanted to think. “You want to help?”

“Nope.” Galem shoved his hat back. “You want to talk about what’s bothering you?”

“Nope,” Cord answered.

Galem took the hint and shifted into gear. “Well, I’ll see you back at headquarters. I’m guessing if your battery don’t run down, you’ll be finished about dawn. Anything you want me to tell Little Miss?”

“Nope.”

Galem pulled his hat back down almost to his eyebrows. “Well, nice talking to you.”

Cord didn’t stop to wave as the cook drove off.

S
EVERAL
HOURS
LATER
C
ORD
DIDN
’
T
HAVE
TO
LOOK
UP
TO
know his wife’s Jeep was flying across the land at twice the speed she should be driving. He could hear her coming, and dread filled him to the core.

He watched her as she shot out of her seat without turning off the engine or the lights. She headed right toward him. Storming, he thought, there was no doubt.

“Cord, what do you think you’re doing out here in the middle of the night? The wire is dangerous enough to pull from post to post in daylight.”

“There’s work to be done,” he said, without stopping the pounding. “That’s what you married me for, isn’t it? To work your ranch. Don’t worry, you don’t have to come out to sleep with me, because I don’t plan on sleeping. In fact, I’m thinking I might just work until I drop dead. Then you could be a widow for a change.”

She stormed around in and out of the beams of light like a moth. He guessed she had to be pretty confused right now. The last time she saw him, he’d kissed her good-bye so deeply she’d tried to tug him back to bed. She didn’t know about the pictures or the trouble she might be in or that someone was setting fires in the back pastures hoping to burn the entire ranch down. She didn’t know what Salem had told him. She didn’t know that he knew she hadn’t bothered to even try to keep him out of prison. Her silence had ruined his life just as Salem’s lies had.

His whole body and mind were being drawn and quartered into pieces. Six years he’d sat in prison because not one person had come forward to back up his story. Of course the jury took the deputy’s side. Cord had known there were others around the campfire, but he’d figured they all ran. Nevada must have stayed long enough to see what happened to him. She even talked to the other deputy, but she hadn’t said a word when he needed someone to back him up.

She marched back to her Jeep and pulled out something, then marched back. “Galem said you ruined your shirt. I brought you another one. At least take the time to put it on.”

“You spend too much time worrying about what I wear. Don’t you have anything better to do?” He twisted the wire around, nicking his hand for the tenth time. Cord barely noticed. “What difference does it make anyway?”

She waited for him to take the shirt. He could hear her pouting like she always did when things weren’t going her way.

He stuck the wire cutters in his back pocket and reached out for the denim shirt. In the lights he could see her face and hated himself for making her so unhappy. She’d grown up on a ranch. She knew he was putting himself in danger to be out here alone after dark. She’d probably worried for hours before finally coming out.

“You got a gun with you? There are wild hogs on this back land.”

“No. It’s been my experience that people are far more likely to hurt me than wild animals.”

She walked halfway back to the Jeep, then turned to face him. “I hate it when you’re like this, Cord, all closed off and cold.”

He almost said he hated it when she wasn’t honest. She played him and he didn’t even know the rules.

Hell, he hated them both. What kind of game were they playing anyway? If she wouldn’t stand up for him, why would she marry him?

Suddenly, he remembered one detail about the night at the lake. One fact he’d stored back in his whiskey-washed head drifted forward. Cord remembered the cop who’d cuffed him and shoved him down in Salem’s blood and his own vomit. When he jerked him up to frisk him, he had ripped Cord’s shirt. By the time they made it to the office it had fallen completely off.

Cord forced his anger to settle. Before he said a word, he saw panic flash in her eyes. She was afraid of him. He’d never hurt her, never raised his hand to her. But her blue eyes couldn’t hide the fear as she stared at him. She thought she was watching a wild animal. Maybe she thought he’d snap and hurt her like all the folks in town seemed to think he might. After all, he was an ex-con.

Slowly, he took the shirt and pulled it over tired shoulders. “Thanks.” His voice sounded hoarse even to him. “You were there at the lake ten years ago, weren’t you, Nevada? You saw the cop tear off my shirt, because he was certain that I had a weapon. That’s why you buy all those shirts. You’re trying to replace that one from ten years ago.”

She didn’t answer.

“I talked to Salem this morning. He told me a girl told the officer left at the scene about what happened, but she wouldn’t testify. The next day, her father swore she wasn’t there.” Cord let out a long breath and felt his muscles relax. “It was his word against a cop who’d seen her in the dark, and nobody thought to question your daddy’s word; after all, he was a big rancher.”

Nevada crumpled, disappearing from the lights of his truck and her Jeep. For a moment it was as if she just vanished.

Cord stepped toward where she’d been. On the third step, his leg bumped against her. He knelt, feeling her shoulders as she crouched, curled into a ball. His grip was rough as he pulled her up, needing to see her face. Her body was stiff in his grip, as if she were preparing for a blow.

Her tears cracked the wall of anger he’d been building inside all day. He circled her with his arms and pulled her close. All the times when she’d talked to him. All the nights she’d rattled on about nothing and suddenly his wife couldn’t say a word.

“We’re going to talk about this,” he finally whispered as his hands stroked up and down her back. “It’s not going to stand between us anymore. We’re going to get it all out, right now.”

He felt her nod against his shoulder. Before all the wrong words came between them and the fragile peace they’d known was forever broken, he kissed her one last time. Her lips were salty with tears, but she kissed him back. He felt her lip tremble and her hand rest hesitantly over his heart, but she gave him what he needed, one last kiss.

When he finally pulled away, he lifted her and walked to the bed of the pickup. It was dark there, but maybe what they had to say needed to be said in the shadows. After all, that was where it had happened.

He set her down and rested his hands on either side of her knees. “Tell me the truth. I’ve got a right to know. Did you marry me out of guilt? Was it some kind of sick joke?”

She gulped back a sob, and he understood.

“Before you start, let’s get one thing straight. I’m not going to hurt you, Babe. No matter what you tell me, I swear, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not going to leave you either. No matter what is said here, I go back with you and we finish what we’ve started. We make it to the first frost. We make the ranch pay.”

She nodded, but he couldn’t be sure she believed him. He fought the urge to touch her, but he knew if he did, they’d never work this out. The attraction between them was the only thing he knew was real.

She wrapped her arms around her sides, making the shadow of her seem smaller. “I saw what happened that July Fourth. I tried to tell the cop writing down names of who was there, but I could tell he wasn’t buying my story even if he did write it in his notes. He kept asking if I was with you and would I lie just to help you.”

Cord waited, giving her all the time she needed.

“When I got home, my dad exploded. He slapped me so hard my ears rang. He said everyone already hated the Britains, and if I got mixed up in your problem it would only be worse. He threatened all kinds of things if I spoke up again and convinced me that they wouldn’t take my statement anyway. All the time he was talking, he was jerking me around, slapping me just to make sure I got the point of every word he said.

“If my mother hadn’t stepped in, I think he might have beat me senseless that night.” She stared at her fingers twisted together in her lap. “My brother Barrett was there. He just stood watching and smiling, like it was about time someone taught me a lesson. I knew that night I was nothing to my dad, and my brother would never come to my rescue. I wanted to help you, but I couldn’t fight them all, and I didn’t believe a drunk minor’s statement would be of much help.”

Cord knew she was probably right. He waited for the rest.

Finally, she said, “For years, even after you got out, Barrett teased me that you were going to come over and kill me some night. He said if you weren’t a bad guy when you went to prison, you would be when you got out. He had me afraid to drive down the road past your farm.”

“How do you know I’m not?”

“I didn’t, but that day you worked on the Jeep, I was at the end of my rope. Another year of poor management and I would lose the ranch. My ex had been promising to come back. When my father was dying and Barrett was packing to make his break, Bryce grew tired of all the problems and took off, thinking that I’d be begging for his help in a few months. He didn’t take my calls or answer my mail. By the time he found out about the divorce it was almost final. He couldn’t stop it, but he swore I’d come back to him begging for his help one day. Even after the divorce was final, he whispered that when I begged him to take me back, I’d have to come on his terms.”

“So you married me before Bryce could get to you?”

“No. I needed your name to prove I’d moved on. I don’t know, maybe I was tired of fighting him alone. I thought he’d back away if you were in the picture. I told Bryce that if he stepped foot on my land I’d shoot him, and I meant it. I married you because . . .” She hesitated, then put her hand on his arm. “When I saw how you took care of the Jeep that day and how no one gave you any credit for doing it, I wanted to make you the man you would have been if you hadn’t gone to prison. The man you should have become.”

Cord pulled back. He hadn’t expected her to say something like that.

“I saw it in you, Cord, and I was right. You were a good man, broken and hollow, forced into a hard life. I thought I was helping, but I’m not sure if I haven’t brought you more trouble than you had before.”

He didn’t touch her when he whispered, “Don’t you know? You brought me to life.” He couldn’t lie to her, couldn’t play any games.

He brushed his fingers over her hair. “I told you once that I’d forgive you anything, but this, it’s nothing to forgive. I fell into hell, but you were going through it too.”

“You don’t hate me?”

“How could I hate someone I love so much? Somehow you crawled into my heart, and I’d have to cut the thing out of my body to stop caring.”

He lifted her up and swung her into the light.

She smiled, seeing him open for the first time. All at once she was crying and laughing at the same time.

As he lowered her in front of him, a shot rang out in the night.

Cord reacted on instinct, taking her with him to the ground between the two sets of headlights.

Another shot. Then another as Cord pulled her deeper into the darkness.

“Follow me,” he whispered. “Stay away from the light.”

He heard one of the bullets kick up dirt. Another hit a rock three feet away. Whoever was firing was guessing. They were too far from town or the ranch to make it on foot, and it was unlikely anyone on the ranch would hear the shots. Their only chance was to make it to the Jeep.

He pulled her close, trying to shield her as much as he could with his body. “Move toward the Jeep and slip into the driver’s side,” he whispered. Another shot rang out. The shooter was spraying the area between the two lights, hoping to hit something.

Silently, he pulled the wire cutters from his back pocket and tossed them toward his pickup.

They hit the roof and rattled off onto the hood.

Three rapid-fire shots shattered the night air. All hit the truck. One smacked a light. Another broke the windshield.

Cord ran for the Jeep, hoping Nevada had made it before him.

When he climbed in the open window, he heard her shift and gun the engine. Like a rocket the little Jeep went backward for a quarter mile, then spun around and flew toward the main road.

He heard a few more shots, but he guessed they were out of range by the time whoever was shooting at them figured out what was happening.

“Where?” Nevada yelled.

“Straight to town. If we head to the ranch house, we might be followed.” As she drove faster than he thought the old Jeep could possibly go, he dialed Galem and told him what had happened.

“Stay inside until light. Tell anyone at the bunkhouse to do the same. I don’t want him picking anyone off. Call all the guys and tell them not to come in tomorrow until I send the order. We have to know it’s safe before we step out.”

Cord listened, then hung up. “Galem thinks the shooter might have followed you out to me. He said he passed a car on the county road that looked abandoned. When you went past, the shooter could have left his lights off and followed you. This Jeep makes so much noise neither of us would have heard another car.”

“But he would have to know this ranch very well to know where I turned off the road onto the land. There’s only a ten-foot hole in the fence.”

Cord thought of the pictures. “He does know the ranch well.”