Love Under Two Wildcatters (16 page)

“What the hell happened out there, Mike?”

“Damned if I know.” Murphy took a moment to adjust himself in the bed.

Colt had to stifle his urge to help. Murph winced, so movement did hurt, but the man sighed when he obviously found the right position.

“I showed up at the rig right at seven a.m.” He continued with his report. “Did the walk around, you know, before the other men arrived—same as we always do. Then I headed into the trailer, thinking to put on a pot of coffee. Next thing I know, I’m lying on the ground outside, halfway to the rig, with pieces of the trailer burning all around me.”

Colt shuddered as he envisioned the scene. He recalled the glimpse he’d had of the trailer in the aftermath of the explosion when they’d stopped at the site the day before. There’d been very little left of the metal building. Dr. Scott hadn’t been kidding when he said Mike Murphy was a very lucky man.

Colt chose his words carefully. He knew enough about investigations to understand he shouldn’t give away too much, not to Mike, not before he spoke to the investigators. “So nothing looked out of the ordinary to you at all?”

“Not one damn thing, Colt. I’ve been running it through my head, trying to see if I can recall anything unusual, anything suspicious. Trying to figure it all out. But you know me. If I’d thought anything had been off, I’d have taken precautions. I know I didn’t smell any gas or anything. Seemed to me the damn trailer went up shortly after I turned on that coffeemaker. If there’d been a gas leak, though, the alarm should have been ringing. Besides, I’d have smelled
something
.”

“It wasn’t a gas leak, but that’s all I know for certain at the moment. Likely, once you get moved, those investigators will be on you like peanut butter on jelly.”

“I’ll tell them everything I know, of course, but that sure as hell isn’t much.”

“It’ll be enough,” Colt assured him. “So how are you feeling? Really?”

Mike made a point of looking toward the door, likely to make sure Nancy wasn’t close by or on the verge of returning. “I feel like hell. Like I was rode hard and put away wet.”

“You need or want anything, you tell Nancy, she’ll see you get it.”

“You don’t need to go fussing over me,” Mike grumbled.

This time, Colt saw the embarrassment and didn’t care. He leaned forward. “You listen to me, old man. You belong to me. To me and Ryder. And if we want to fuss over you, we fucking well will, so just deal with it.” The wave of emotion swamped him, taking him by surprise. “Jesus Christ, Mike. We could have lost you. God damn it all to hell, we could have lost you.”

“Hey. No cussing. There’re ladies in the next room. And don’t you go getting all teary-eyed, either, boy. I’m not planning on leaving this earth anytime soon. Besides, I have to wait till you boys get yourselves hitched. I figure I’m due being able to bounce some grandbabies on my knee.”

It was the closest Mike had ever come to saying out loud that they were a family. Michael Murphy had never once voiced what could only be called the more tender sentiments. He’d never once told them he loved them, but he’d
loved
them every day since the day he’d caught them trying to steal food and brought them to his home.

Colt swallowed to get his emotions under control. Then he said, “Yeah, well, as it happens, Ryder and I have met someone.”

Murph never even blinked at Colt’s announcement that they had met some
one
. It just proved to Colt—as if he’d needed any—that the man who’d taken them in and become their father, in every way that mattered, knew his sons.

“Is that a fact? Maybe I ought to give this woman a talking to, let her in on a few secrets on how to handle the two of you.”

“I’ve got news for you, old man. She seems able to handle the two of us just fine.”

Mike laughed, then groaned with the twinge of pain the laughter caused him. He looked down at his leg, encased in bandages and suspended in a sling. He shook his head, but didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. Colt knew the man was pissed at the inconvenience of having a busted leg, more than anything else.

“They get me into a regular room, the two of you bring her on by. I want to meet the woman that can take on the two of you. She sounds like she’d be a woman worth knowing.”

Colt laughed. “We’ll do that.”

Chapter 13

It looked like a war zone.

What had once been a trailer had been reduced to a piece of jagged metal, lewdly opened as if an oversize can opener had torn into it. Debris littered the ground, and Susan shivered, imagining what it must have been like to be in the midst of it all.

In the middle of the field the derrick stood, dark, tall and eerily idle.

Susan insisted on accompanying the men to the drill site. When they both looked as if they might start spouting “reasons” for her to stay behind at the hotel, she pointed out that, with them at her side and all the investigators on the scene, the drill site was likely the safest place in all of San Angelo for her to be.

When they’d arrived the day before, they’d only stopped off there long enough to find out where their friend, Murphy, had been taken. She’d only gotten a quick glimpse of the devastation. Of course, they’d tuned in to the television news last night, as well. So Susan thought she understood what they’d be seeing in the light of day.

She’d been wrong. Now that she’d listened to some of the stories about Mike Murphy, and about Colt and Ryder’s growing up years, the horror of what had happened yesterday morning was that much more real to her.

The entire site had been roped off with yellow police tape. Little markers numbered each piece of debris, still resting on the ground where the blast had strewn them.

A larger marker noted the spot where Mr. Murphy had lain, unconscious. There, the ground had a darker stain, which Susan surmised was blood. Looking down at that stain, Colt went stonily silent while Ryder cursed low and long, finishing with a very ragged, “Jesus Christ, Colt.”

“Yeah, I know. Fucking miracle he’s alive, let alone not seriously hurt.”

As she’d done in the hospital the day before, Susan stood between them, a hand on each of their backs, soothing them in the only way she could in public.

They didn’t take long to settle. Susan could almost feel the change of emotion in them, could sense the rage that began to grow in place of the horror and the fear.

“Someone did this to us, to him. They’re going to pay.” Colt’s words held the fervency of a vow.

“Damn straight,” Ryder agreed.

As one, her men looked up, looked around, and Susan felt sorry for whichever investigator the two of them cornered. They wanted answers, and they wanted them
now
.

It wasn’t investigators their gazes found, however. There, not fifty feet away from them, standing just off to the side and apparently having a conference between them, stood three of Susan’s four brothers.

She registered the exact instant that Josh and Alex saw her with Colt and Ryder. The shock that briefly flashed in their eyes confirmed something she’d suspected from the moment she finally remembered those hazy hours after her other brothers’ wedding reception.

As natural as breathing, Colt and Ryder took one of her hands each. She kept the smirk off her face when her younger brothers’ eyes widened at the sight. Matthew, who had no idea there was any subtext happening around him, nodded as they approached.

“Colt, Ryder. How’s your friend doing?” he asked.

“Better, thanks,” Colt said. “They’ll be moving him out of Intensive Care this afternoon. He’ll be off his feet for a few weeks, but he’s going to make a full recovery.”

“That’s good news. I was just going to update Josh and Alex on what the investigators have shared with me so far.” Matthew stepped back, making the circle they all stood in larger.

“Susie, what are you doing here?” Alex’s gaze went from one of her hands to the other. She could tell he was really surprised to see her there.

“I was just going to ask you and Josh the same thing. Don’t you two have an oil company to run? Deals to broker? Lives to orchestrate and direct, like some kind of deity from on high?”

No one said anything for a long moment. Matthew’s gaze tracked from Susan to her men. He furrowed his brow, then turned to look at his younger brothers.

“Okay, what did you two clowns do this time?” he asked.

“Do?” Josh looked at Matthew with as innocent an expression as Susan had ever seen him wear. She wasn’t fooled, of course, and from the expression on Matthew’s face, he wasn’t fooled, either.

“What makes you think we did anything?” Alex asked.

“A lifetime of being your older brother,” Matthew said.

“I was just surprised to see Susan here, is all,” Alex said. “I mean, I know how anxious she was to get that ranch up and running…and all.” His voice petered out, and then he cleared his throat.

Matthew put his hands on his hips as he studied the pair.

Susan kept silent. She’d played a version of this game off and on for most her life. Josh and Alex liked to think they were the “fixers” of the family. Most of the time, their idea of what needed to be fixed wasn’t necessarily shared by anyone else.

Matthew turned to look at her. “Suse? Care to enlighten me?”

How much did she dare reveal? Part of this story certainly didn’t portray her in a very good light. Then she shrugged. What would be the point? “Not particularly.”

“Darlin’? Is something going on Colt and I should be aware of?” Ryder’s velvet-over-steel voice caused shivers all over her body. She wondered if he could just talk her to an orgasm. Maybe on the phone? She’d have to test the theory.

While she wasn’t necessarily all that interested in satisfying Matthew’s curiosity, neither would she deny either of her men an answer when they wanted one. “It all turned out perfectly between the three of us. But I guess you should know that my brothers sent you to me believing that if they gave me what I
thought
I wanted, I would realize the error of my ways and want it no more.”

“I think you’re going to have to explain that in detail later, when we’re alone,” Colt said. He gave her brothers a good hard look as he said that, and Susan was gratified to see neither Josh nor Alex could look him in the eye. She also agreed with his sentiment. Some things, after all, should remain private.

Matthew closed his eyes and groaned, obviously getting it. “The two of you better get a clue, or you’re
never
going to find a woman willing to take you on. Or, if you do find her, you’ll have one hell of a time keeping her.”

Josh and Alex proved themselves at least marginally trainable, in Susan’s opinion, when they had the good sense to look sheepish and say nothing in their own defense.

Susan decided to bring the conversation back on track. “What have the investigators learned so far, Matthew?”

Matthew
tsked
, shaking his head at his brothers, and then turned his attention back to Susan and the wildcatters. “They finished combing the site, and as you can see, they’ve marked and numbered each piece of debris. They’re working on a computer simulation of the blast, based on the location of these pieces, so they can come up, definitively, with an analysis of the type of explosive used, and how much was involved. They don’t have everything yet, but they do have a few things. And one of the things they did find was a blasting cap.”

“It didn’t get destroyed in the explosion?” Ryder asked.

Matthew shook his head. “No, this was an
extra
blasting cap. Asshole must have dropped it when he left the site after rigging the bomb to go off in the trailer.”

“So not only an asshole, but a sloppy one,” Colt said.

“Why is that important?” Susan didn’t understand why her men seemed pleased with this development.

“Because,” Matthew answered, “all blasting caps have serial numbers and are registered with the federal government.”

“But that means they’ll be able to find him. The person who did this!”

“Well, it’s a giant step in the right direction,” Colt agreed.

“The caps and explosives have likely been stolen,” Matthew said, “which is almost always the case. But it will give the authorities a place to start.”

When Matthew looked as if he was trying to hold back a chuckle, Ryder said, “What?”