Nothing Sweeter (Sweet on a Cowboy) (10 page)

Max snorted. “His boyfriend will probably have a fit about it.”

She studied his face, gauging his mood. “Would you mind a piece of well-meaning advice?”

His expression was hopeful, but there was reserve in his dark eyes. “Bill Cosby says, ‘A word to the wise ain’t necessary—it’s the stupid ones that need the advice.’ ” He dropped her hand and heaved a sigh. “All right. Hit me with it.”

“Do you love your brother, Max?”

“What do you mean? Who told you I don’t?”

“Then why do you make those little offhand remarks about him?”

He shifted on the bale, and his eyes skittered away. “We always pick on each other. It’s just how we are.”

“But it isn’t loving if it hurts.” She smiled to soften her words. “Can’t you see on his face that those jabs hit home?”

Max’s face got red. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

Instead, he looked out the window at the view of the meadows and the foothills beyond them. Slowly, the taut muscles in his jaw relaxed. Still, he said nothing.

Bree sat in the quiet with him, waiting.

“I don’t know how to deal with it—his gayness—if that’s even a word. It’s one thing to know about it when he’s in Boston, but now that he’s back, it’s impossible to ignore. I can’t help but imagine him and his boyfriend…” He flushed even redder.

“But, Max, it’s like your Cheyenne blood. He can’t change it.”

He got to his feet and looked down on her. “Save the lecture. I know the facts. It’s living with them that I’m not so good with.” He stepped to the door and leaned a forearm against the edge, staring out. “I’ve never known how to handle that part of him. It’s like someone telling you to get used to someone walking around with no skin. You know you shouldn’t stare, but it’s so foreign to you, you can’t help it.” His words came out tortured in spite of the fact that his face showed no emotion. “I don’t want to react that way. I know it hurts when I tease him about it. I think I do it to try to find a way around the elephant between us.” He ran a hand through his damp hair, leaving tracks. “I don’t know how to get past it.”

She stood, walked to him, and ran the backs of her fingers down his cheek. “You just love him, Max. That and time will make it better.”

“Your mouth to God’s ears,” he whispered, and he turned to look out the doorway again, shutting her out.

13

T
hursday evening, when Max met Wyatt at the head of the stairs, they both stopped short and looked each other over. Max wore tan dress pants, Wyatt’s were blue, but they both had on white, collared dress shirts. Wyatt raised an eyebrow.

Max shrugged. “Hey, it’s a business meeting.” They started down the stairs. “I sure hope Bree can cook. I could eat two-day-old roadkill right about now.”

“In that case, it really doesn’t matter how well she cooks, does it?” They turned into the front hall, boots loud on the wood floor. They jostled at the door to the kitchen, both trying to get through first. They burst in to find the table in the nook bare, pans bubbling on the stove.

Wyatt shrugged. The swinging door between the kitchen and the formal dining room opened, and Bree swept in.

Wow, Max thought, what a difference a day made. Their stable hand had morphed into a businesswoman, and by the look, one to be reckoned with. Her hair was up in a fancy French twist, and she wore an ivory silk blouse
and a camel pencil skirt. She was all business. His fingers itched to mess her up a little.

Wyatt looked down. “Nice shoes.”

“Thanks. They’re last year’s Jimmy Choo’s, but I love them.”

Jimmy chews?
Max looked down. He didn’t know about shoes, but he sure could recognize a great pair of legs in silk.

“Dinner will be served in the formal dining room, gentlemen.” When she smiled, Max glimpsed his Bree under the makeup. Well, not
his
Bree.
Not yet anyway
. Before he had time to herd that stray thought, Wyatt stepped in front of him and bowed, offering her his arm.

“May I escort you,
jeune fille
?”

Max was left to follow.

The dining room appeared a combination of board room and high-class restaurant. The lace-covered table was perfectly set with what he recognized as Wyatt’s mother’s china and sterling silver. A flip chart on a stand took up one corner, and a pad and pen lay next to each place setting. Wildflowers spilled from the silver-plate centerpiece, and the sunset tinted the room in amber.

“Have a seat. I’ll be right back with the salads.” She disappeared through the door to the kitchen.

“Wow, that’s some groom you hired, Wyatt,” Max said, pulling out a chair. “Doesn’t mean she can cook, though.” He chuckled.

“You’re such an ingrate, Max.” Wyatt took a seat, but they both jumped up again to help when Bree came back through the door, arms laden with salad dishes. When her arms were empty, she reached for the sideboard to retrieve an open bottle of red wine.

She grinned at Max’s long face. “I know you’d rather
have a beer, but push the envelope a little, dude. This is a 2006 Sonoma Coast Failla Pinot Noir, one of the best reds around.” She poured them each a half glass, crossed the room to the flip chart, and tossed back the cover to the first page of marching numbers in neat rows. “Here’s the plan.”

Max tasted the wine, managing not to wrinkle his nose as he put it down. “I figured it out. You were Madoff’s personal accountant, weren’t you?”

Back to him, she froze, arm half raised. The marker in her hand shook.

It was quiet enough to hear the clock in the kitchen ticking. She lowered her arm, then turned. “No. I—”

“All right, Max, that’s enough.” Wyatt threw his napkin on the table and stood. “I’m not going to let you bully a lady anymore. You were brought up better than that. You either trust Bree enough to go into business with her, or you don’t. And if you’ve let her cook this big dinner with the intent of turning her down, you and I are going to step outside.” Shoulders squared, hands fisted, he loomed over Max. “You’ll kick my ass, but then you’ll have to feel bad about that, too.” Wyatt’s soft, reddened cheeks and pursed lips made him look like a sulky five-year-old, but Max wasn’t about to tell him that. Besides, Wyatt was right.

“I apologize for my lack of manners, Bree.”

Her face went still like she was waiting for a “But.”

“I would much rather go into this venture with all my questions answered, but I guess you have a right to your privacy.” He looked up at Wyatt. “Sit down, John Wayne.”

Wyatt sat.

“I do have one requirement. It’s a deal breaker for me.” Max wiped his lips on the linen napkin. “High Heather
is not part of the deal. We can have a partnership, or a corporation, or whatever, but the land stays in Jameson hands.”

Bree turned back to the chart and circled points as she made them. “I have no problem with that, Max. It makes the startup more even. I’ll contribute my three head of bucking stock, which will bring in working capital. You throw in your breeding stock. We’ll all contribute whatever money we can spare for hauling expenses and to fund a trainer, who we’re going to need, at least in the beginning.”

They discussed the budget over a roast that had been marinated in something wonderfully spicy, mashed potatoes with rich brown gravy, and flaky biscuits that melted on the tongue. An hour later, they sat drinking coffee, the table strewn with crumpled paper and pages of notes. Max sat back and unhooked the massive silver belt buckle that dug in his gut. He’d even tasted the after-dinner cordial. A sissy drink, but one that packed a surprising punch.

Bree said, “I’ll handle getting the articles of incorporation drawn up and filed with the state. There’s only one more thing to agree on.” She tossed her napkin on the table and stood. “What are we going to call this venture? It should be catchy. Something that relates to what we do, but something that people will remember.”

Max spoke up. “High Heather Bucking Bulls.”

She walked to the easel and turned to a white page. “I thought more along the lines of using our initials.” She wrote, W-A-M. “Wyatt, Aubrey, and Max.” She drew a flourish beneath it. “As in Wham! Get it?”

“What’s wrong with High Heather?” Max grumbled.

“High Heather’s not part of the deal, remember?”

“Well, yours is just dumb. It sounds like a name a girl would think up.”

“You’re just mad because your name comes last. We could change it to M-A-W, but that is
really
stupid. If you’d get your ego out of it—”

“Oh, now, that’s total bull.” Max glared across the table at her.

“No, it’s fact.” Chin stuck out, she glared back.

Wyatt jumped in. “That’s brilliant!” They both blinked at him. “Total Bull. That’s the name.” He tipped his chin to Bree. “It’s catchy.” Then at Max. “It’s manly.”

“I like it.” Bree beamed.

“I can live with it,” Max grumbled.

Wyatt dusted his palms together. “Now, wasn’t that easy?”

Bree tossed a dish towel over her shoulder and stood. “I’m glad that’s settled. I’ll get dessert to celebrate.”

“Oh good,” Max said. “What are we having?” He took a sip of coffee.

She smiled sweetly. “Orgasm pie.”

Max choked. He slapped a hand over his mouth and scooted his chair back.

Bree tossed him the dish towel. “You’d better not ruin Tia’s company tablecloth. She’ll wear your guts for garters, cowboy.” She turned on her heel and sashayed out the door.

Max caught his breath and laughed. “I don’t know if this venture is going to make money, but it sure won’t be boring.”

In moments, Bree was back with a gooey plateful of chocolate heaven.
Those legs, a businesswoman’s brain, and she cooks, too.
Max couldn’t help but stare.

When Bree poured another cordial, Max raised his glass. “Beauty is worse than wine. It intoxicates both the holder and the beholder.” He tossed back the contents of the tiny prissy glass. “Aldous Huxley.”

Bree flushed prettily.

Wyatt beamed. “There may be hope for your black soul yet, brother.”

Max lowered the chair back on four legs. “Stick around, little brother. I may teach you a thing or two.”

Bree held up a hand. “You’d best quit while you’re ahead, Max.”

The next morning, saddled ponies milled in the corral and cowboys lounged against the fence awaiting orders when Max and Wyatt walked up.

“Mornin’, boss.”

“Mornin’, Armando, men.” Max shot a glance at Wyatt, then began. “The Heather is taking a lead change. You all know the beef market is in the toilet. We’ve seen ranches around Steamboat failing, one by one.

“That’s not happening to the Heather if we can help it.” He slid his hands into his back pockets. “We—well, Bree—came up with the idea of raising bucking bulls. Wyatt and I have put a lot of decidin’ into it, and it just might work. Bree has two more bulls on the way, but we’re gonna need more.

“So today I need you to go up to the west pasture and bring down the bulls. Even the one and two-year-olds that didn’t go to market.”

Wyatt shifted next to him and mumbled out of the side of his mouth, “And the cows.”

Max turned and stared him down.

“And the
cows
,” Wyatt spread his arms and shrugged. “You know what Bree said. We’ve got to find out which ones will buck.”

Max looked skyward.
Lord, I know you’re testing me, but can’t you leave me just a bit of dignity?
He’d been a bull rider in high school. No self-respecting cowboy on the planet would be caught dead riding a cow. It just wasn’t seemly. He sighed and turned to face the men. “And the cows.”

“Have any of you ever ridden a bull?” Wyatt asked.

Armando leaned forward to look down the line of raised hands. “Pedro, mechanical bulls in a bar do not count.” The cowboys laughed and elbowed the youngest hand.

Max said, “We’re gonna have our own buckin’ contest, just like the PBR. Any man that can go eight seconds gets an extra day off and a little cash to take to town.”

14

A
week later, Bree hesitated in the aisle of Walmart, eyes on a skein of hot-pink eyelash yarn. Tia wouldn’t find a taker for that on the Heather. She’d have to knit something for herself.

Bree put two skeins in her basket and walked to the checkout line. Families crowded the aisles. Kids darted around their parents’ shopping carts like hummingbirds around a feeder. She relaxed, leaning her forearms on the cart. Today was the first day that a crowd hadn’t made her feel jumpy.

Wyatt walked up and dumped an armload of jeans, work shirts, and socks in the cart. “I ran into my high school English teacher in the underwear aisle! You have to love small towns.”

“This place is a zoo. Are they giving away free beer?”

“It’s like this every Saturday,” Wyatt said, unloading the cart onto the conveyor. “It’s like the old town square—as much a place to socialize as a marketplace.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Bree caught a flash of
gold on blue serge. She stiffened and whipped her head forward.

Behind her, two policemen stood in line.

Sweat gathered under her arms.

Taking her items from the basket, she tried to ignore the men’s heavy presence at her back. Her fingers fumbled, and she dropped several metal knitting needles. They tinkled as they hit the floor and rolled. Bree bent, but the cop was quicker. He squatted and retrieved them, reaching under the candy display for the last one.

“Thank you.” She accepted the needles with a shaking hand and stood.

She felt the hot laser of professional scrutiny slide over her body. “Are you all right, miss?”

She ducked her head and looked away, to hide the scar. “Fine. Thanks.” She spun back to Wyatt’s raised eyebrow. She knew she was behaving oddly, but her sluggish brain couldn’t conjure normal.

Dammit, Bree, settle down. You don’t have “convict” stamped on your forehead.

Her palsied fingers slipped off the closure on her wallet. Wyatt pulled the cart through and then stepped between her and the cops. His solid presence and steady touch at her elbow calmed her enough to pay the cashier.

Finally, she was free to go. She forced her feet to a sedate pace to the parking lot.

“Bree, what’s wrong?”

She sped up, leaving Wyatt’s question behind. At the car, she juggled the keys, almost dropping them. When she got the door open, she tossed the bag on the floorboard and relaxed the frozen tendons in her knees enough to sink into
the seat. She jammed the key in the ignition and waited for Wyatt.

There is no reason to get riled up. It’s not like you’re wanted for something.
But the rush of adrenaline negated logic. Her heart raced and blood pounded in her ears.

“Bree, you’re obviously upset. Why don’t you let me drive?” She jumped at Wyatt’s voice, her butt actually leaving the seat. He stood, hand on her door, frowning.

She put up a palm, as much to halt argument as to hide from his worried gaze. “Please. Wyatt. Just get in.”

He didn’t look convinced, but complied.

When he was in, seat belt fastened, she wheeled out of the parking space and sped to the exit.

“Bree, talk to me.”

“Give me a minute here, will you? Traffic is nuts.” What was she going to tell him, that she had a phobia for cops? Thoughts scurried through her brain like panicked mice.

At the main street, she signaled left and pulled out. A horn blared. She whipped her head to the right. A truck bore down on them too fast. Its tires locked and squealed, laying rubber.

“Shit!” Wyatt flinched back.

She floored it. The engine roared and the Jeep sprang into traffic, the rear fishtailing as the tires found purchase.

Oh my God.
She’d totally misjudged the oncoming truck’s speed. Blood throbbed in her head, louder than the engine whine. Keeping the accelerator buried, she shot a look in the rearview mirror, expecting blue strobe lights. All she saw was the truck she’d cut off, retreating behind them.

“Take the first turnoff you come to.” Wyatt’s voice squeaked like a stepped-on mouse. He pried his fingers from the dash.

“I’m okay, Wyatt. I just—”

“I think I need to unload my pants.”

Seeing his clenched jaw, she decided not to argue.

On the outskirts of town, she took a right onto a narrow dirt farm road. She drove several hundred yards, pulled over, and shut down the engine.

Wyatt let out a long breath.

The wind hissed through the curtain of oats on either side of the road. Cawing crows argued on the barbed-wire fence, voicing their displeasure at the disturbance. The sounds leached into Bree’s mind, smoothing her roiled thoughts. Her shoulders had dropped below her earlobes when Wyatt spoke.

“I know who you are.”

In her core, a gut bomb of acid exploded. She wanted to see his expression, but her neck muscles wouldn’t obey. She saw only her fingers, thin claws, whitening on the steering wheel.

“I have a friend. He manages the IT department for the State of Massachusetts.”

Massachusetts? That couldn’t—

“He has access to the DMV records.”

I’ve never even been that far Eas—

“For the entire country.”

In her narrow field of vision, her fingers loosened and then disappeared as her hands thumped into her lap. Fingerprints smeared the steering wheel, and a thin layer of dust covered the dash. Funny, she’d never noticed that.

“You changed your name on your driver’s license. But the Jeep’s plates are registered to Aubrey Madison. Once I had the name, Google did the rest.”

The wind died. The crows fell silent. The world seemed
to stop as her mind snapped a picture. No doubt it would be added to the nightmarish film that ran through her head before sleep most nights.

When had she let down her guard? Somewhere in the comfortable routine of days, denial slipped in unnoticed. Now she was going to pay. What had she been thinking? She’d known she was different. An albatross hiding in a flock of sparrows.

Idiot.

Nothing to do now but drive home, pack, tuck tail, and run.

“Talk to me, Bree.”

Home?
When had the Heather become home? Thoughts blew through her head, but she was too discouraged to chase them down. It didn’t matter when, anyway. Shame bloomed in her chest. Her heart pumped billows of it, coursing through her body. It burned.

“Trust me, Wyatt, you don’t want to know.”

“Yeah, I do.”

If his voice had been demanding, torture wouldn’t have pulled it out of her. But it wasn’t. It was soft and cool like butter on a burn.

“I know what old secrets can do, Bree. You bury them in the back of your mind and try to forget. Yet they sit there, like a nugget of radioactive plutonium. Poison leaks into everything.” He rubbed his forehead like it hurt. “Until it takes you over. It becomes the sum total of what you are, until you forget you were ever anything more. You
are
the secret. You need to tell someone. I’m here. Talk.”

She dropped her head to the steering wheel.

She was so damn tired. Tired of running like a manic hamster on an exercise wheel. Tired of not sleeping in a
futile effort to keep the memories at bay. Maybe if she just let the damn things come, she’d get some peace. Besides, now that the cat was out, she had nothing to lose. For the first time since her release, unconsidered words fell from her mouth.

The Feds had played hardball. She’d told them to investigate Vic, but he’d covered his tracks well. He’d gone to ground, leaving the eBay account untouched since her arrest. All roads led back to her. Feds traced the money to an offshore bank account in Mexico, but without the number and password, they couldn’t get to it. Aubrey wanted to help them, but she didn’t know the number. The account wasn’t hers.

Intimating that she’d change her mind soon, the agents left. Not an hour later, a guard came to her cell, ordering her to collect her things as he unlocked the door. They were moving her into the general population. No more single-cell, solitary exercise time, or meals alone.

Arms full, her too long orange prison pants slapping with every step, he led her through locked doors to another wing of the jail. A cacophony of catcalls rained on her as she strode the gauntlet between the rows of cells.

“Fresh meat!”

“Oohh, isn’t she a pretty one?”

“I see you later,
puta
!”

They wouldn’t
really
leave her here, would they?

They did. She was locked in a ten-by-ten cell with three women who terrified her with their prison tats, tough talk, and hard eyes. Bree took the only open bunk on top and tried not to cower.

On the call with her attorney the next day, Aubrey was frantic when he promised to look into it. Look into it?
This wasn’t a research project, for chrissake. It was her life! In hindsight, maybe a jail wall hadn’t been the best place to look for an attorney, but she’d paid him a huge retainer and didn’t have money for a better one.

Before she hung up, Aubrey asked him what
La eMe
was. Her cellmates spoke mostly Spanish to each other, but this word came up several times, and it sounded important.

His hesitation told her she wasn’t going to like the translation.

The Mexican Mafia.

He rushed on to placate her with assurances that he was busy preparing for the trial. He said there was no way the jury would convict her on the meager amount of evidence the Feds had. All she had to do was hold tight, be safe, and stay out of trouble.

She’d wrapped her heart in that flimsy blanket of hope and hung up.

The prisoners were allowed out twice each day, once for showers, once to “exercise” in the yard, a hard-packed dirt square surrounded by guards and razor wire. Day after day, Aubrey kept to herself, trying to perfect her dismal attempt at invisibility. Her thoughts ran in an endless, useless loop, never coming any closer to a solution.

Her cellmates didn’t address her directly, using English only when they wanted her to overhear. Aubrey wished they’d left her ignorant. She learned that the smallest of them, Lupia, a pretty Latina with a tattoo of an eagle and a snake in a flaming circle over crossed knives, was the girlfriend of one of the Mafia’s top lieutenants.

They called Aubrey
carne ratón
—mouse meat.

One night, a week into her personal hell, Lupia’s whisper cut into Aubrey’s feverish thoughts. She said Aubrey
would be getting a conjugal visit from her “boyfriend” soon. He would give her drugs. She was to stash them in her
almeja
and bring them to Lupia.

Maybe it was the darkness that emboldened Aubrey. Or maybe she was losing hope.

She just said no.

Her cellmates laughed. She didn’t need to worry about being caught. Her boyfriend would be a gringo, and the guards would never suspect a
princesa
like her. Aubrey should thank Lupia; she’d even get laid!

Aubrey bit her tongue until the iron taste of blood filled her mouth. Giving in to hysteria wouldn’t get her anywhere with the guards, and the scent of fear would only frenzy the pack. Aubrey knew if she were caught with drugs, any chance she had of walking out of this hellhole would vanish.

Turned out, she’d been naive to think things couldn’t get worse.

Two days later, Aubrey was showering with seven women she didn’t know when Lupia’s soldiers came. As she turned to rinse soap from her face, she was grabbed from behind and wrestled to the floor.

Her head cracked on rough cement, leaving her dazed for precious seconds as water pelted her face. Her hair was caught in a viselike grip as a brown face filled her vision, features contorted with hate, waving what looked like a toothbrush in her face. Light glinted off a wicked shard at the tip. Panic surged, but fear immobilized her.

The girl’s wet hair hung in a curtain, cutting off Aubrey’s peripheral vision. “You can let go,” she’d growled. “She won’t scream. Will you,
ratón
?”

The weight on her limbs lifted. Aubrey felt a prick at
her throat and jerked. A sticky warmth trickled down her neck. She was going to die on this filthy cement floor.

Screw that!
Fueled by desperation and the adrenaline held inside since she’d been dumped in this shithole, Aubrey clubbed the girl’s temple with her fist. She collapsed, unconscious, on Aubrey’s chest, but before she could scrabble from under, the others were on her.

A dark-skinned, pockmarked girl straddled her chest. “You wanna play,
puta
?” She spit in Aubrey’s face. “You don’t even know the game.” She cocked her head. “I tell you what, white girl. I give you a necklace to remember me by.” A laser of molten pain burned an arc down Aubrey’s throat.

The artery pumped straight up: a geyser of crimson, spraying them all. Aubrey screamed in pain and horror, blinded by blood. She heard scrabbling and then they were gone. Aubrey slapped her hands to her throat, frantically trying to hold the gaping skin together and stop the heat of blood sheeting down her neck.

She was alone, with the sound of water drumming on the floor, the coppery smell of blood, and the chill of shock and cold cement seeping into her bones.

Bree lifted her head from the steering wheel to stare through the windshield. “I woke up in the prison infirmary. What passed for a doctor there told me the artery had only been nicked, that I was lucky to be alive. I was on the fence about that. My attorney assured me that I’d be returned to a solitary cell, and even if I were convicted, the judge would grant leniency due to the ‘incident.’ ” As if the words were emptying her, her voice diminished to a breathy whisper.

“I got four years, to be served in a Federal penitentiary. Club Fed may not have been up to Martha Stewart’s standards, but it looked like heaven to me.”

She reached to trace the scar, surprised to find it wet. When Wyatt handed her a tissue, she glanced in the rearview mirror. Her face was mottled, and a red weal stood out on her forehead where it had rested on the steering wheel.

“Feel better?”

She ran a gut check as she dried her face and blew her nose. “Maybe.” Both her body and mind quieted, calm after the storm.