Peace River (Rockland Ranch Series) (34 page)

             
Clinging to the very top of the fence, she saw the bull knock Judd down directly below her, and then circle back around to return and repeatedly smash him into the dirt with its head.  It was the most horrific thing she'd ever seen and heard, but she couldn’t make herself look away.  After what seemed an eternity the bull lifted its head, seemed to glare up at Isabel for a long, long moment, pawed arena dirt that flew up over its back, then trotted off further into the tunnel.  Moments later in the distance she heard a metal gate slam shut. 

             
The alley suddenly became breathlessly still and quiet.  Even the stock seemed to be waiting.  Isabel carefully stretched her feet down to a rail and glanced over her shoulder.  Four people lay in the alley, eerily still, and the other two clung to the top of the fence down the way.  She saw movement and realized Special Agent Keary was attempting to sit up.  From the corner of her eye she saw a man between her and Keary who she’d first thought dead or unconscious, silently extend his arm with a gun in his hand, taking careful aim at the wounded woman.  The agents on the fence couldn't see him from their angle. 

             
Isabel knew what she had to do and she didn't hesitate.  Her hand slipped into the pocket of her skirt.  She gripped her gun, pushed the safety aside, aimed and shot in an instant without even pulling her gun free of the fabric. 

A split second later
two other shots rang out.  There was a metallic ding and the echoing whine of a ricochet and the bucking stock began to plunge and rear in their pens.  The gunman she had shot at didn’t react and terror shot through her as she realized he would now turn the gun on her. 

When he slowly
lowered the gun and slumped further to the side, she started to cry.  She was suddenly overcome with weeping and she could feel herself shaking.  The storm of emotion was so uncontrollable she couldn’t even climb down.  She tried to wipe at her eyes with her shoulder while still clinging to the top of the fence as people poured into the alley.       

             
Slade and Rossen arrived first.  Right behind them were the rest of the Rocklands and Dante, and what seemed like thousands of FBI and law enforcement, followed by a pick-up man looking for Slade. 

             
Slade ran straight to Isabel while Rossen came more warily.  When Slade approached her, Isabel struggled to control her emotions, feeling like her entire universe was going to shatter.  She was completely overwrought, but she knew Slade was needed back in the arena and didn’t want him to feel guilty for having to leave her. 

He tried
to help her down from the fence but she couldn’t make her hands let go.  Finally, he softly said, “It’s all over.  Everything is okay.” He pried her fingers loose, lifted her to the ground, and turned her back to the lifeless body of Judd to envelope her in a hug.

A
fter a long moment, against her hair he asked, “Are you hurt?”  She shook her head where it was buried in his chest and they simply stood like that until the pick-up man approached.

             
He sat on his horse, looking all around in amazement.  Finally, he said, “Marsh, they’re waiting for you in the arena.  Ya’ll gotta get back in there, man.”

             
Slade turned to him without letting go of Isabel and said, “I’m needed here.  I’m sorry, they’ll have to do it without me.”

             
Isabel pulled back from him and silently shook her head.  Mustering all her self-control, she lifted her chin and firmly said, “No, we’ll all go.  We can’t miss this.” 

             
The pick-up man stepped down.  “Take the horse, Marsh.  Hustle!”  Slade looked down into her eyes and she did her best to smile at him and nudge him away.  With one last squeeze, Slade legged onto the horse and galloped back up the tunnel again, scattering agents and cops. 

             
Isabel turned to go back, wondering if her legs would carry her.  Although the first trip down this lane had felt like miles, it was actually only a couple hundred feet back into the arena.  Rossen and Dante and the others fell into step beside her, which was good because she needed their strength to walk. 

             
As they passed him, Gray tried to stop them, saying, “We’ll need to ask you some questions before you go.” 

             
Rossen made a sound of disgust and took her elbow, ushering her past the agent, and said with disdain, “You’ve got it all on surveillance.”  He waved at the video cameras.  “You almost got her killed!  You’ve got that on tape too.”  Gray opened his mouth to speak and then shut it again, as to a man the Rockland men and Dante all moved to surround her and they headed back inside.  Her determination to handle this kicked in and she tried to focus only on Slade and what he'd just accomplished.

             
Isabel’s breath caught in her throat as they reached the arena.  The lights were all down except the spotlight that followed Slade and the horse as he galloped the perimeter.  All the work and risk and danger, all the miles and strains and injuries had come to fruition, and he had indeed reached his goal.  He was now the World Champion All-Around Cowboy.  The announcer was giving some background on him and some of the achievements and sacrifices he'd made this year in his quest for the title.  The story of his life-threatening wreck brought it back in an instant, but at this moment it all felt worth it.  As he finished his ride to thunderous applause, Isabel’s eyes filled again.  This time they were happy tears. 

             
He turned the horse into the center of the arena, took off his hat to wave it at the crowd, then putting it back on, he rode out of the spotlight for good and back down into the tunnel. 

             
The announcer made some final remarks, effectively ending the National Finals Rodeo for another year, and the lights started to come back on.  Loud, rocking country music began to play and people started climbing the stairs to leave the arena as if nothing was amiss.  Everything was so normal it was bizarre.

 
              The relief in the tension was such a let down it was almost numbing and Isabel began to shake again.  She leaned against a nearby gate post and gave in to the emotional maelstrom and the tears that had only been made more poignant by the tender feelings from Slade’s award.

 
Slade returned the horse and thanked the pick-up man.  Then he came back and with all the after rodeo crush going on around them, he took Isabel in his arms and just held her, smoothing her hair gently and whispering comfort and hope to her—telling her how proud he was of her and about what a great future they were going to have—how he would keep her and their children safe for the rest of forever.

F
or the longest time he just held her and kissed her.  They’d made it.  They’d survived Judd and the mob and the bulls and the injuries and literally everything that had come at them, but they’d made it.  Slade was the World Champion All-Around Cowboy, and Isabel was at long last free to move on with her life.  They both were.  And the rest of their life would be all the more sweet because of what they’d been through.  They’d made it.

Finally,
as the sweet, sad strains of “This is Where the Cowboy Rides Away” came on over the PA system, Slade tenderly kissed her temple one last time, and spoke with his cheek against her silvery-gold hair, “Come on, Isabel.  Let’s go home.”

Epilogue 

              Ninety days later, Ebony Wind had been back at home at Wind Dance Farms for more than two months and the Thoroughbred breeding season was winding down just as it always did in late March.  Isabel still missed Eli, Dante and the others in California, but she knew in her heart that Wyoming was where she wanted to be.  Other than a visit every few weeks and a lot of phone calls, she'd left the farm in Eli and Dante's capable hands.  She still owned half the farm, but no longer needed or wanted to be in on the daily management of it.  Dante was engaged, and she gave him her grandfather's house as a wedding present. 

As the last snow was melting from the wildflower beds and the
wind off the Peace River held the tangy scent of sage, Slade and Isabel Marsh sat in their home office watching a video conference call with the FBI.  Special Agent Gray had invited them to sit in as he reported on the closing details with his staff.

             
He admitted to Isabel that until she had mentioned the bearded agent to him the second to last night, they hadn't realized it was Judd and he added, "To be honest, we didn't think he was smart enough to pull off what he did by himself.  He surprised us all, obviously."   

             
The final night of the rodeo they had apprehended nine men including the elusive Tony Delvechio, both at the rodeo and in a simultaneous raid of another home they had had under surveillance there in Las Vegas.  Two of the criminals had died of injuries sustained from the bull and horses that night.  The rest had either been tried and successfully convicted, had plea bargained to lesser charges, or were bottlenecked in the system awaiting trial with overwhelming evidence against them. 

             
Judd had died without making provisions for his estate, so his house had reverted back to Isabel as his daughter.  It was slated for demolition because it held such bad memories that Isabel never wanted to see it again. 

             
The only agent who had suffered more than minor injuries had been Keary. She’d broken her pelvis and gotten a concussion when the bull had hit her and thrown her with its head.  She was mostly better and wanted to come back to work.  She swore she wasn’t working near any more bulls, so Gray threatened to assign her to a drug case on a crab boat in the Bering Sea with only his bland smile to prove he was kidding. 

             
In conclusion Gray commented, “The weirdest thing about this case is that in the tunnel when Keary was coming around after being tossed by the bull, the surveillance cameras show one of Tony’s thugs attempting to shoot her.  He was stopped by multiple shots from three different people.  He actually would have eventually died of injuries from the bull, but in his autopsy they found a fresh gunshot wound from a .25 caliber bullet.  The coroner swears it happened at the same time, but none of my agents or any of the perpetrators carried a gun that small.  We’ve watched the tapes over and over and have never figured out where that shot came from, but have reason to believe it was the shot that saved her life.  We finally just marked the file ‘shooter unknown,’ and shelved it.  It’s the only loose end of this whole case.” 

             
As the video conference call concluded, Slade and Isabel sat for a pensive few moments remembering that fateful night.  They talked solemnly for several more minutes, then Slade excused himself and went into their bedroom.  Following a few minutes later, Isabel found him in her closet looking in the little black case she kept on the top shelf. 

             
When she realized what he was doing, she turned to him and searched his eyes, afraid of what she would see there.  There was no sign of the disgust or repulsion she feared.  Instead, his voice was gentle when he asked sadly, “Why didn’t you tell me?” 

             
She looked down and admitted, “I’m not even sure how to feel about it.  I certainly didn’t want anyone else to know.” 

He put the p
istol away and pulled her close and whispered, “He said you saved her life.  That’s a good thing.”

             
She looked up into his eyes.  “I shot a person, Slade.  I never dreamed I’d have to do something like that.  The only way I’ve been able to deal with it is that I knew at the time I had to stop him.”  She inhaled a shaky breath and hid her face against his chest. 

             
He wondered aloud, “Are you going to tell Gray?” 

             
She shook her head and answered without looking up, “I didn’t intend to.  Would it help anything, or just ruin my reputation and cost the tax payers a lot of money?”

             
He tipped her head up to kiss her.  “You make a good point.  I still wish you would have told me.  That’s quite a burden to carry alone.  I wish you would have felt you could trust me.” 

             
“I trust you completely.  You know that.  I just didn’t want you to think differently of me.”  She gave him a tenuous sad smile. “Do you?”

             
He shook his head.  “I respect you more than ever.”  Then he gave her a small grin.  “And I am never going to mess with you.”  He put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close as they walked out of the room. 

             
She stopped him at the door to ask, “He knew, didn’t he?”

              After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded.  “Yeah, he knew.” 

The End

About the author

             
Jaclyn M. Hawkes grew up in Utah with 6 sisters, 4 brothers and any number of pets.  (It was never boring!)  She got a bachelor’s degree, had a career and traveled extensively before settling down to her life’s work of being the mother of four magnificent and sometimes challenging children.  She loves shellfish, the out of doors, the youth and hearing her children laugh.  She and her fine husband, their family, and their sometimes very large pets, now live in a mountain valley in northern Utah, where it smells like heaven and kids still move sprinkler pipe.