The Littlest Cowboy (5 page)

A single nod.

“Are you sure?”

Her eyes finally came back to his. “I just came from identifying my sister’s body, you murdering slug. You’re damned right I’m sure.”

Wes stiffened, closed his eyes, shook his head. Elliot snorted, coming forward to stand at Garrett’s other side. “Lady, you don’t know my brother at all if you think he could hurt a woman.”

His words had no impact on her. She merely lifted her chin and continued staring at Garrett. “I came for my nephew. Give him to me and I’ll leave.”

“Well, now, I’m real sorry, ma’am, but I can’t do that.”

“I’ll kill you myself before I’ll let you keep him.” And Garrett believed she meant every word of it.

“You’ll have to go through me,” Wes told her, his eyes going cold. Wes’s eyes, when they went cold like that, could make a rattler tremble. Two black marbles without a hint of feeling. “And going through me won’t be an easy job, lady.”

“Damn straight it won’t,” Elliot agreed. “And when you finish with Wes, you’ll have to get by me.”

“And then me,’’ Jessi said.

Nothing fazed the woman. She didn’t even blink. “If that’s the way you want it.” She faced Garrett again. “Let go of me, Brand. I’ll leave, but when I come back it will be with the law.”

“No need to leave for that, ma’am. I happen to
be
the law. ‘Round here, leastwise.”

For the first time, he saw fear tinge her eyes. She glanced down at his arms, imprisoning her, and it seemed to Garrett she was suddenly afraid of him. He eased his hold on her that very second. Let her go completely, and even stepped back away from her. It stunned him, that fear. Made him feel kind of queasy. He didn’t like scaring people. Especially women or kids. Though he usually tried to be less intimidating because of his size, he knew only too well it wasn’t always enough. Hell, nothing made Garrett more miserable than people being afraid of him.

Especially her.

She was very small, he realized. Smaller than Jessi, even. She’d been through some kind of hell tonight, and he figured she was probably telling the truth about having just identified her sister’s body in EI Paso. She certainly
looked
like someone who’d just lost a sister. And if she truly thought him responsible…well, hell, he’d have been just as angry in her shoes.

She didn’t lash out at him again. Only stood there, looking like she’d fall down in a few more minutes. Looking like the stress was tearing her nerves right to shreds.

Garrett turned around and took little Ethan from Jessi’s arms, though she protested. Ethan chirped and grinned and blew spit bubbles. He latched onto one of Garrett’s fingers and held tight. Garrett turned back to the woman, who stood near the front door. “Come on into the parlor,” he said to her, and he tried harder than he ever had to make his deep voice sound soft and gentle. “Sit down and hold your nephew for a while. We’ll talk this out.”

She blinked, licked her lips. “I just want to take him and go.”

“I understand that. But you have to understand my position here. I’m the sheriff, ma’am. A woman left her child in my care. I can’t just hand him over to the first stranger who comes along and claims him, now can I?”

She eyed him so skeptically he squirmed inside.

“I’ll check out your story,” he went on. It was more than her smallness that made her seem as fragile as bone china right now. And he felt big and awkward beside her. “If you are who you say you are, and Ethan really is your nephew, I’ll let you take him. But, ma’am, even if I were sure right this minute, I wouldn’t let you out of here now. You’re in no shape to be driving tonight. Especially not with a baby in the car.”

He had her there. She knew it. He saw the concession in her eyes. “I’m not leaving here without him.”

“Then you’re gonna have to stay a spell.” She looked at the baby he held and she put her arms out. Little Ethan looked back at her and smiled. Her white hands trembled as she took a step forward. Then she dropped like a sack of potatoes right at Garrett’s feet. Garrett pushed little Ethan into the nearest set of arms, which turned out to be Wes’s, and bent down to scoop the woman up off the floor. As he turned to carry her through the house and upstairs, he noticed that she smelled like violets.

C
helsea awoke to hot sunlight burning over her eyelids and face, cool, crisp sheets against her skin, and the smell of coffee. Good, strong coffee.

The smell, she discovered after blinking the sleep haze from her eyes, originated from the carafe that sat on the round table beside the bed. A pink cloth with lacy white edging covered the table and draped halfway to the floor, leaving only the bottom portion of the broad, carved, totem pole-like pedestal visible. Chelsea wanted to reach for that coffee. And for the plate of the steaming, fragrant, omelet-type concoction beside it. But she couldn’t summon the energy to move.

“Well, the beast lives,” a feminine voice announced.

Chelsea jerked her gaze to where the young woman she remembered from last night stood near the window. The curtains were as pink as the tablecloth. In fact, so were the sheets. Pale pink fabric with lilac blossoms lined the two overstuffed chairs in the room, and the wallpaper matched. It was very loud, very flowery and
very
pink. A white vanity with more filigree trim than substance stood in one corner. It was laden with pretty bottles and jars of every size, shape and color.

“Looks like the inside of Jeannie’s bottle, doesn’t it?” The woman let the curtains fall closed. “My brothers think all the frilly stuff makes up for being the only female in a houseful of men. I let them indulge me.”

She was young. Early twenties, Chelsea guessed. Her pixie-short hair gleamed a reddish brown like the coat of a deer. And those huge brown eyes of hers reinforced the image of a doe. She was taller than Chelsea, curvier, too.

“So, do I pass inspection, Your Majesty?”

Chelsea cleared her throat, trying to work up enough energy to put the spoiled brat in her place. All she managed was, “What do you want?”

“I don’t
want
anything, least of all to wait on some lunatic in my own house. I wouldn’t be in here at all if Garrett hadn’t insisted I stay with you until you came around. He said he was afraid you’d be
scared waking up in a strange place.
” She said the last bit in a whiny, mocking tone, and Chelsea wished she could slap her. “So I suggested my room. At least here I can keep an eye on you.”

“I wouldn’t be here if I had a choice about it.”

“You wouldn’t be here if I had a choice about it either, lady.”

Chelsea closed her eyes at the look of hostility in the pretty face.

“You might as well eat.” The girl pushed herself away from the wall she’d been leaning on and came to the bed to hand the tray of food to Chelsea.

“Thanks,” Chelsea said.

“Don’t thank me. I wouldn’t cook for you if you were starving. Garrett brought this up.”

Chelsea looked up from the plate of food on her lap to the glittering brown eyes. “Look, I don’t have a problem with you. It’s your brother—”

“You have a problem with one Brand, lady, you have a problem with all of them.”

“He might have killed my sister.” And why the hell was she suddenly qualifying her accusations with a “might have?” Last night, she’d been so sure. Chelsea sat up straighter, suddenly losing interest in the food. “You can’t expect me to just— “

“He didn’t even
know
your sister! And you don’t know Garrett. Of all my brothers, he’s the most gentle, the sweetest, the kindest, the—”

She broke off, turning away fast and blinking tears from her eyes. As if she didn’t want Chelsea to see her crying.

“Garrett wouldn’t hurt a fly. You can ask anyone who knows him. The boys in town, they have a joke. They call him the gentle giant.” She turned again, with one angry swipe at her eyes. “But
I’m
not gentle. And neither is Wes. And I’ll tell you right now, we’re not gonna stand by and let you hurt Garrett this way. You can’t go around accusing him of murder. You do and I’ll—”

“That’s enough, Jessi.”

The command was spoken softly, but in a voice so big it didn’t seem likely anyone would disobey. The man Chelsea had believed to be a cold-blooded killer stood in the doorway, looking at his little sister with a frown, but adoringly all the same.

“But, Garrett—”

“No buts. Go on, now. Wes needs your help in the barn. That new calf got himself tangled in some wire and cut his hind leg up. He needs tending.”

“Wes can handle a cut calf.”

“Wes isn’t the Brand one semester away from a degree in veterinary medicine, Jes. You are. Now get out there and see to the calf before he gets infected or something.”

The girl—Jessi—blinked twice, and seemed to forget all about Chelsea. With budding concern in her eyes, she yanked open a closet door and snatched out a brown leather satchel. Then she headed out of the room and Chelsea heard her feet taking the stairs at a trot a second later.

Garrett Brand came farther into the room, but he left the door open. He really
was
big. Not just tall, but as broad shouldered as a lumberjack. He had bodybuilder arms that bore the coppery kiss of the sun beneath a fine mist of dark hair. His eyes were as deeply brown as his sister’s. Soft eyes, bottomless and kind.

Deceptively so.

“We ought to talk,” he said in that slow, easy way of his. He moved slowly, too, as if giving her time to object with every step he took. When she didn’t, he eased his big frame into one of Jessi’s pink-and-lilac chairs, and Chelsea wondered if she were about to witness a scene from
Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
Nope, the fragile-looking chair legs held.

It was only when those deep brown eyes moved slowly down her sheet-draped body and then darkened that Chelsea became suddenly, acutely interested in what the hell she was wearing. She lifted the sheet, peeked down and gasped.

“I’m naked under here,” she blurted, mainly because she was so surprised.

Garrett shifted in the chair, his face reddening all the way to his ears. “Well, I asked Jessi to get you out of your clothes last night. I mean…you were pretty well soaked from the rain and all, and…”

She scowled at him when he ran out of words.

“You want me to leave so you can get dressed?”

“In what? I don’t see any of my things in here.”

“Well, you must have luggage in your car, right? I can have Elliot go out and—”

“Just say what you have to say and get it over with, will you?”

He nodded fast, keeping his eyes carefully lowered, though whenever they did come up, they focused on certain strategic bits of the sheet and she wondered how much he could see through it.

“All right,” he said. “For starters, ma’am, I’m not sure what—” he frowned, meeting her eyes “—what’s your name?”

“My name?”

“I can’t talk to you without even knowing your name. It feels too odd.”

She closed her eyes, sighed. “Chelsea Brennan.”

His lips curled upward just slightly at the corners. “I like it.”

“I’m so glad it meets with your approval,” she snapped, then saw a wounded look come and go in his eyes and almost regretted her words.

“I didn’t hurt your sister, Chelsea Brennan,” he said, and there was so much sincerity in his deep, steady voice that it made her wonder. “But I’d like to help you find out who did…if you’ll let me.”

Nothing he could have said would have shocked her more. Denials, she expected. Threats, even. But an offer of help? What was this? A trick?

“Why would you want to help me? You don’t even know me.”

“That’s true, I don’t. But I know Ethan.” He licked his lips as if he were nervous or something, dipped his head.

“It might sound foolish to you, Chelsea, but I made that little fella a promise. I told him I’d make things right for him again, and that’s what I intend to do.”

She studied him, scanning the little worry lines—or were they laugh lines?—at the corners of his brown eyes. Telling herself that just because his appearance and demeanor were so damned gentle and approachable didn’t mean that’s the way he truly was. Inside. Where it counted.

Hell, her father hadn’t looked like the monster he was, either.

“Why should I believe you? How do I know this isn’t just an act? That you aren’t just lying to throw me off track?”

“Why
shouldn’t
you believe me?”

“You want me to list the reasons?”

He nodded, watching her with those soft eyes of his,

“Fine. I will, then. A year ago, my sister, Michele, got herself pregnant by the lowlife she’d been dating. She didn’t tell me his name, but I saw him once from a distance. He was big…like you. And he wore a hat—” she pointed at the black hat he’d perched on the arm of the chair “—like that.”

He glanced down at his hat with a frown, then picked it up. His lips pursed in thought as he turned the brim slowly in his big hands and ran his fingers around the edge and then through the dip in the hat’s center in what seemed uncomfortably like a caress. “Most of the men in Texas wear hats like this one,” he replied, calm and quiet. “And I imagine a lot of them are big.’’

He stroked the black felt over and over. Chelsea’s stomach tightened and twisted, and she jerked her gaze away from those slow-moving hands.

“A week ago, Michele called me. She told me she had a son, Ethan, and she asked me to come down here right away to see him.” Chelsea clenched her jaw, closing her eyes before rushing on. “If only I had, she might still be alive. But I knew I couldn’t take time off work on such short notice. I promised to fly down in a couple of weeks, but…”

“There was no way you could have known,” he said.

But she should have known. There’d been something in Michele’s voice, something she should have picked up on. But she hadn’t. Not until it had been too late. She’d live with that for the rest of her life.

“Then, yesterday, I got a call from the Texas Rangers, telling me they had a body they wanted me to look at.”

“And it was her,” Garrett finished softly.