“Since you obviously aren’t Nate Beaumont, who the hell are you?”

If he didn’t know who she was, he couldn’t have tracked her here. Unwillingly, Nicola turned her head so that they were face-to-face. Their bodies were pressed together intimately. As if they were lovers. She was no longer afraid of the man who’d pinned her to the ground in self-defense. She was very much aware of him—no longer as an enemy, but as a man.

“I’m not going to hurt you. I might even be able to help.”

“Nicki Carson. Nicola, actually.” She listened to her own voice with a sense of disbelief. She had intended to stay silent. But somehow the thought of having assistance—from this stranger—was just too tempting.

Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,

This month Harlequin Intrigue has an enthralling array of breathtaking romantic suspense to make the most of those last lingering days of summer.

The wait is finally over! The next crop of undercover agents who belong to the newest branch of the top secret Confidential organization are about to embark on an unbelievable adventure. Award-winning reader favorite Gayle Wilson will rivet you with the launch book of this brand-new ten-story continuity series. COLORADO CONFIDENTIAL will begin in Harlequin Intrigue, break out into a special release anthology and finish in Harlequin Historicals. In Rocky Mountain Maverick, an undeniably sexy undercover agent infiltrates a powerful senator’s ranch and falls under the influence of an intoxicating impostor. Be there from the very beginning!

The adrenaline rush continues in The Butler’s Daughter by Joyce Sullivan, with the first book in her new miniseries, THE COLLINGWOOD HEIRS. A beautiful guardian has been entrusted with the care of a toddler-sized heir, but now they are running for their lives and she must place their safety in an enigmatic protector’s tantalizing hands! Ann Voss Peterson heats things up with Incriminating Passion when a targeted “witness” to a murder manages to inflame the heart of a by-the-book assistant D.A.

Finally rounding out the month is Semiautomatic Marriage by veteran author Leona Karr. Will the race to track down a killer culminate in a real trip down the aisle for an undercover husband and wife?

So pick up all four of these pulse-pounding stories and end the summer with a bang!

Sincerely,

Denise O’Sullivan

Harlequin Intrigue, Senior Editor

Rocky Mountain Maverick
Gayle Wilson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Five-time RITA® Award finalist and RITA® Award winner Gayle Wilson has written twenty-seven novels and two novellas for Harlequin/Silhouette. She has won more than forty awards and nominations for her work. Recent recognitions include a 2002 Daphne du Maurier Award for Romantic Suspense.

Gayle still lives in Alabama, where she was born, with her husband of thirty-three years. She loves to hear from readers. Write to her at P.O. Box 3277, Hueytown, AL 35023. Visit Gayle online at http://suspense.net/gayle-wilson.

The Confidential Code

I will protect my country and its citizens.

I will stand in the line of fire between innocents and criminals.

I will back up my fellow agents without questions.

I will trust my instincts.

And most of all…

I WILL KEEP MY MISSION AND MY IDENTITY STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Colleen Wellesley—Colleen’s first assignment as head of the newly organized Colorado Confidential is to find the kidnapped heir of the Langworthy empire. She soon discovers that the case she’s been given involves far more than a missing baby….

Nicola Carson—An intern in Senator Franklin Gettys’s Washington office, Nicki staged a disappearing act when she realized her life was in danger. Now, hiding in plain sight of her enemies, she tries to unravel the mystery behind why she became a target.

Michael Wellesley—Burned-out ex-CIA agent Michael Wellesley undertakes one last assignment as a favor for his sister and finds himself embroiled in a situation as perilous as any he’s ever faced.

Charlie Quarrels—Foreman of the mysterious Half Spur ranch. Is Quarrels an innocent dupe or the mastermind of a diabolical experiment?

Ralph Mapes—The old man knows more about what’s happening on the Half Spur than he should, but will he be willing to tell before it’s too late?

For Emily,

who is smart, independent, feisty

and a bit of a maverick.

One day you’ll make a great heroine

for your own hero—just not too soon, please!

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Epilogue

Prologue

It had happened several times in the past couple of weeks—an eerie, eyes-on-the-back-of-her-neck feeling. Often enough that whenever she was out in the city alone she had to resist the urge to keep glancing over her shoulder.

Nicola Carson couldn’t quite put her finger on when or why that nervousness had begun. All she knew was that at one time she hadn’t minded working late, even if the Senate Office Building was nearly deserted by the time she finished. Now she had to steel herself to face stepping out onto the nighttime streets of Washington, D.C.

And that’s ridiculous, she told herself, as she hurried down the steps, holding the collar of her coat closed against her throat with one gloved hand. There was a hint of snow in the December air, making her homesick for the crisp, cold air of the Colorado Rockies where she’d grown up.

Which is also ridiculous. She was living her dream, working as an intern in the office of one of the most powerful men in the capital, and all she could think about lately was a life she once couldn’t wait to leave behind.

Despite her pep talk, as she walked, heels clicking against the sidewalk with a quick, staccato rhythm, her uneasiness grew. Don’t look back. Don’t look back. She chanted the words in her mind, determined not to give in to this unreasonable paranoia.

She wouldn’t have been out this late if Senator Gettys hadn’t handed her a package as he was leaving and asked her to deliver it personally before she went home. She couldn’t imagine why the disk she’d just left at the senator’s campaign headquarters couldn’t have been couriered over tomorrow, but it wasn’t her place to ask those kinds of questions. It was her place to be as useful as possible.

Normally, she wouldn’t have had any problem with anything she was assigned to do. She had no illusions about her role in the grand scheme of things. For someone who had grown up on a farm, helping with every unglamorous chore required to keep it running, she had never felt that any task was beneath her dignity.

She was grateful to be here. Grateful to have been chosen for an internship out of all the other applicants. Grateful for the opportunity to live in the nation’s capital and participate in government at work.

Even as she repeated the litany, trying to bury her uneasiness in the enumeration of all the things she had to be thankful for, behind her—like an echo—came the sound of another set of footsteps. Her heart rate accelerated suddenly, and adrenaline pumped into her bloodstream in a gut-clenching rush.

The Metro entrance was half a block away. Surely, despite the cold, deserted streets around her, there would be someone there. At least there would be more light. Nothing ever seemed as frightening if you didn’t have to face it in the darkness.

She increased her pace. By the time she reached the escalator that descended to the Metro, she was almost running. And none of the strategies she had used before against this insane panic seemed to be working.

She wanted to get on the train. Out of the darkness and among others who were leaving their offices late and heading home.

Hand on the rail, she clattered down the moving metal stairs, her own descent making so much noise that she couldn’t possibly hear anything else. At the foot of the escalator, she turned and looked quickly toward the top.

There was nothing there. No one was following her. Maybe there had never been anyone behind her. No footsteps but her own, loud in the emptiness of the dark streets.

She took a breath in relief. Then, clutching her coat around her, she headed toward the platform.

She pressed her fare card against the red circle without really looking at it. Almost there. Almost to the train. People. Safety.

As she walked toward the track, the sound of her heels on the red, hexagonal tiles echoed and reechoed against the walls. This time she ignored the sound. After all, she knew there was no one behind her. And absolutely no cause for the sense of panic she had felt.

She breathed deeply, trying to calm the near hysteria that threatened. She could hear the train in the distance. Thankfully, despite the lateness of the hour and this less trafficked location, there were a few people waiting on the platform.

She was less than fifty feet from the track, the sound of the oncoming train was growing louder by the second. Her attention focused on the waiting passengers, all of whom were watching its approach, she caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye.

Before she could turn to identify its source, a hand fastened onto the long strands of hair that spilled over the back of her coat. The pressure was strong enough not only to jerk her head backward and stop her forward motion, but to physically pull her in its direction.

Because it took too long to realize what was happening, a gloved hand fastened over her mouth before she could release the scream crowding her throat. Not that it would have made any difference. The train came ever closer, filling the waffle-weave concrete tunnel with noise.

Eyes watering from the pain, she clawed at the fingers over her lips. The hand that had grabbed her hair released to snake around her body, the forearm settling under her breasts.

Driven by panic, she increased her efforts to break out of her attacker’s hold, futilely twisting and turning. She aimed a few kicks backward, but they never seemed to connect solidly with whoever was behind her.

There was no doubt in her mind it was a man. Not only was he stronger than she was, but given the angle at which he was holding her, he must top her own five foot ten inch height by a good two or three inches.

She knew by now that this wasn’t a robbery. The strap of her purse had slipped off her shoulder in those first desperate moments. The purse had fallen to the floor, items rolling from it to clatter out onto the tile. He had ignored it completely, meaning…

She stopped prying at his fingers and began battering at his face with her fists. She couldn’t see it, of course, and the blows, delivered above and behind her head, seemed to have as little effect as clawing at his hand had done.

Where the hell was security? The Metro was supposed to be safe, every area equipped with cameras to prevent attacks like this. Her eyes searched for the one that should cover this location. It was there, but for some reason, its lens was pointed away from the platform entry. By accident or design?

The train arrived, filling the station with noise, and the fingers that had been fastened over her mouth began to move. So that he could put both hands around her throat? Or to allow him to take out a weapon?

A knife? Oh, my God, not a knife.

In the endless seconds she fought, her imagination conjured up every urban horror story she had ever heard, playing them in her head like a tape running on fast forward. In desperation, she bent her knees, lifting her feet off the ground and letting her full weight pull against his hold.

For a split second, as he tried to counteract that move, she would be out of his control. She knew that was all she would have. A split second to decide her own fate.

Everything seemed to happen at once, yet each movement, each breath, each heartbeat was etched with complete clarity on her brain. As she’d anticipated, his body began to shift in an attempt to maintain his balance. He tried to set her on her feet, but in order to do that, he had to bend forward, negating the advantage his height had given him.

Before he could straighten away, Nicola put her feet back on the ground and used the muscles in her thighs and buttocks, strengthened by years of horseback riding, to propel her body upward. The top of her head collided with the man’s chin, striking so hard that she heard his teeth snap together.

And hard enough that the air thinned and darkened around her. She fought to stay conscious as she staggered forward like a drunk.

Behind her she heard something metallic clatter against the tile. The knife she had thought he was reaching for?

Her purse lay directly in her path. She bent, scooping it up by the strap without slowing. Ahead of her the doors of the train car were beginning to close.

The same fear that had driven her to use her skull as a weapon drove her in a sprint toward them, determined that they wouldn’t close her out, leaving her trapped on a deserted subway platform with a madman.

She wedged her arm between the doors, forcing her shoulder through as the rubber-lined edges began to close against her body. She didn’t stop to consider whether or not she could pry them open enough to get in. There was no choice. This was life or death, and she didn’t want to die.

Dear God, she didn’t want to die.

Her body slid through the narrowing opening as the doors closed with a whoosh. Panting from exertion and terror, she leaned against them, trembling, her eyes squeezed tight against the threat of tears.

And then she opened them, knowing there was something she still had to do. She turned, looking through the window behind her as the train gathered speed.

The emptiness of the platform was broken only by shadows cast by the grill-encased lights above it. There was no sign of the man who had attacked her.

A man who had known exactly where to find her. A man who had had that information in time to push the security camera out of alignment.

And there was only one person who could have told him. They would try again, she realized. Unless…

She closed her mouth, aware for the first time that her breath was sawing in and out, loud enough to be audible over the noise of the train. The woman in the seat across the aisle was staring at her, eyes wide with shock.

Nicki bent her head, gathering control. She realized that she still held the strap of her purse in her hand. She lifted the soft, leather bag, fumbling inside it with her left hand until her fingers closed over the familiar shape of her bill-fold.

She didn’t have to go back to her apartment. Never again would she go back there. Or anywhere else he might expect her to be. She had everything she needed right here, she thought, her hand resting protectively over the wallet that contained her ticket to safety.

Her upbringing had taught her the value of money. She had saved as much as she could, carefully putting part of what she made into her savings account every month. All of it was accessible through any of the thousands of ATM machines in this city.

There was enough there. Enough to get her somewhere far away from here. Far enough to be safe.

Please, God, let somewhere be far enough for that.

Chapter One

I hope to hell Frost was right and home is the place where they have to take you in, Michael Wellesley thought as he pulled the SUV he’d bought in Denver into the circular drive. It wasn’t really that he had nowhere else to go, but the Royal Flush was home. It always would be.

He had realized that anew as he’d driven across the river, his stomach tightening in anticipation of his first glimpse of the house and the barn. Home.

Like a beaten dog, he was returning to his birthplace to lick his wounds. At least that’s what Colleen would think.

And what if she did? He had a right to be here, despite what his father had done.

He could now think about the provision in his dad’s will, the one that had given the family ranch to Colleen, without the bitterness and anger that had driven him away at eighteen. He still wondered, however, why his father had done something that seemed so grossly unfair.

Maybe to force him to make it on his own. To become a man. His own man. Or maybe, Michael had finally decided, because he had never told anyone, much less his father, how much he had loved this place. That had obviously been a mistake.

He shut off the ignition and opened the car door, easing down carefully from the high seat. As he’d expected, his knee had stiffened, both from the long flight and the hours he’d spent behind the wheel.

Right hand on the top of the door, left on the roof for support, he took an experimental step, testing it. Prepared for the pain, he managed to control his response to it except for a slight tightening of his lips and a nearly soundless inhalation.

It would have been smart to bring the cane, if only for the duration of the trip. Instead, he’d tossed it into one of the trash bins outside Reagan. Just as he’d metaphorically trashed everything else associated with the past eight years of his life.

Still holding on to the top of the door as he flexed the damaged knee, Michael allowed his gaze to scan the compound. The place looked prosperous and well kept. Both the barn and the house had been freshly painted. He had already noted that the grazing stock he passed on the way in from the highway were sleek and healthy. Maybe his father had known what he was doing after all.

Rejecting that thought, he stepped away from the door, slamming it behind him. Limping heavily, he walked around to the rear, opening the door there to drag out his duffel bag.

He’d stuffed every item of clothing from his wardrobe that might be appropriate for the ranch into it. And he’d been surprised by how little of that there was. The rest, with exception of a couple of suits hanging from a hook in the back seat, he’d given away.

He closed the hatch, the noise unnaturally loud in the drowsy afternoon heat. He’d half expected someone to come out by now to investigate the arrival of a strange car.

Of course, it was possible there was no one in the main house. There were always a hundred things that needed seeing to on a ranch this size, especially in the middle of summer.

He walked around the car and up the low steps, boot heels echoing across the wooden planks of the porch. Switching the duffel bag to his left hand, he raised his right to punch the bell.

Somewhere in the back of his mind the word “home” echoed. He changed the motion he’d begun, his fingers fastening around the knob instead. He opened the door, letting it swing inward to a cool dimness.

At the far end of the huge central room it revealed, the brass fittings on the old bar, a survivor from the days when the Royal Flush had been the fanciest bordello in Colorado, caught the late afternoon light. Michael’s eyes lifted automatically, searching for the portrait of his great-great-grandmother, which had always hung behind it.

Old Dora was still there. It seemed nothing about the Flush had changed. Of course, it never had.

He set the duffel bag down on the rich, heart pine floor and stood in the somnolent stillness, letting the memories close around him. As he did, he became aware of voices coming from behind the house. One was obviously male. And the other…

Colleen? If so, it might be easier for both of them if their first meeting took place outside. At least then she wouldn’t have to throw him out of the house.

His lips tilted at the image. At maybe five foot five to his six-three, she’d play hell trying. Of course, a challenge, even one of that proportion, had never discouraged his sister.

He realized he was anticipating seeing her again, just as he’d been looking forward to his first sight of the house from the moment he’d turned off Highway 9. Whatever bitterness he’d felt toward his father had never extended to Colleen. Or, if it had then, it certainly didn’t now.

In the nearly sixteen years since he’d been here, he’d been to hell and back. The only family he’d known in all that time had been the men who had fought and died beside him. Without that bond—

Deliberately he broke the thought. Today wasn’t about guilt or regret. Today was about homecoming. And the sooner he got this one over with, the better for everyone concerned.

“ALL I’M TELLING YOU—”

“And all I’m telling you is to handle it,” Colleen interrupted. “That’s what I pay you for, Dex.”

“Why don’t you just sell the damn place to someone who’ll appreciate it?”

“I appreciate it. That doesn’t mean I want to be in on every minor decision of its day-to-day operation.”

“What I’m asking you about isn’t minor, Colleen. And you damn well know it.”

“I also know you’ll make the right decision, with or without my advice. I’m not real sure why you’re so all-fired set on having it.”

Michael had already heard enough to identify the man his sister was arguing with as her foreman. And anger was apparent in each muscular inch of the man’s body. It was also apparent that those muscles were not the kind built in a gym, but through the hard, backbreaking work a ranch demanded.

Besides, he had the look of a cowboy, both in his tall, rangy build and sun-darkened skin. It was obvious that, boss-lady or not, Colleen did not intimidate him.

“You don’t deserve what you’ve got,” the foreman said, his voice no longer raised. It was quiet and somehow far more effective at expressing his disgust. He ran a hand through black hair that had a liberal sprinkling of gray. “Maybe because you had this place handed to you on a silver platter, you think it don’t require any work on your part to keep it.”

Colleen took a breath, her lips tight, visibly controlling her own temper. Although it had been a decade or more since he’d seen her, Michael had had no trouble recognizing his sister. She had the Wellesley coloring, of course. Dark brown hair and those strange blue-green eyes that a few women in his past had unfortunately referred to as turquoise.

Whatever color they were, it looked a whole hell of a lot better on Colleen. She was still a good-looking woman, despite the fact that she must be…

When he’d done the math, he realized with a sense of shock that his sister was forty-five. Nine years older than he, she had been only twenty-nine when he’d joined the military.

A lifetime ago. A lifetime he knew almost nothing about.

“I work,” she said, her tone as intense as that of the man who’d made the accusation. “And damned hard, too. What I do makes it possible for this operation to survive no matter how the markets fluctuate. Just because I don’t want to be consulted about every little detail doesn’t give you the right to suggest I don’t appreciate the Flush.”

“Then act like it, damn it.”

“If you’re trying to convince her to do something,” Michael said, choosing that moment to reveal himself by stepping out of the shadows from where he’d been watching the confrontation, “I can tell you for a fact that you’ll fare better not cussing her. Gets her back up every time.”

With his first word, their heads had snapped toward him, almost in unison. Two pairs of eyes—one hostile and suspicious, the other slightly narrowed—focused on him.

“Who the hell are you?” the cowboy demanded.

“Michael.” Colleen breathed his name as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

Because he had been watching for her reaction—a matter of training as well as need—he had known the exact instant when she’d accepted her identification. What was in her eyes as she did eased tensions he hadn’t been aware he harbored.

“Hello, Colleen. It’s been a long time.”

She shook her head, her eyes welling with tears. She fought them, succeeding only because she was determined and because whatever his sister set her mind to, she accomplished. When she was again in control, she turned to the man with whom she’d been arguing.

“Dex, if you’ll excuse me. We can talk about this later, please. Right now I have some…unfinished business I need to take care of.”

“Something more important than the ranch?” Dex asked, his voice edged with bitterness.

Colleen turned to smile at Michael, ignoring the taunt. “Much more important,” she said softly.

The cowboy’s hazel eyes locked briefly with his. Michael inclined his head as if they had been introduced. A muscle in the other man’s jaw knotted, but he didn’t make any further objection. He slammed the battered Stetson he’d held in his right hand back on his head and stalked off.

Colleen didn’t even glance his way, her eyes examining Michael’s face as if she were trying to memorize it.

“I can’t believe you’re here.”

“I hope you don’t mind.”

“Mind? God, Michael, you have to know better than that.”

A little more of the tension seeped out of his body at the sincerity of her exclamation. She reinforced it by stepping forward and holding both her hands out to him. After a second’s hesitation, he put his into hers, using them to pull her against his body in an awkward embrace.

It didn’t remain awkward for long. Colleen leaned against him, her arms fastening around his waist in a fierce hug. Almost against his will, Michael found himself responding to that honest emotion.

After a moment she stepped away to look up into his eyes. Hers were once more suspiciously touched with moisture, but she was smiling.

“I wish I could tell you how wonderful you look, but, truth be told—”

“I look like hell,” he finished for her.

“Are you okay?”

The depth of concern in her voice was almost his undoing. He hated that emotion seemed so near the surface now, but the idiot shrink the agency had insisted he talk to had told him he could expect that. Maybe so, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

“I will be,” he said, forcing a smile. Her lips quickly answered it, but her eyes were still clouded. Slightly anxious. “I thought I might hang out here for a while. If I won’t be in the way.”

For one instant there was a flicker of something in the blue-green depths of her eyes. It was gone before he could even think about identifying what he’d seen. Her smile broadened immediately, and she leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek.

“Welcome home, little brother,” she said. “And when you’re all rested up, there are a couple of paint ponies that could use some schooling. Think you’re up to that?”

“I will be,” Michael promised, and for the first time in nearly six months, he began to believe that might be true.

“GUILTY OR NOT, Cal Demarco’s still a son of a bitch.”

Michael could hear the anger in Colleen’s voice despite the nearly ten years that had passed since the Internal Affairs Division of the Denver Police Department had cleared her former supervisor of the corruption charges she’d leveled against him.

“Unfortunately, they don’t put you away for that,” he said, “or jails would be a whole lot more crowded than they are now.”

The bourbon his sister had been pouring with a generous hand had finally eased the ever-present ache in his knee. It had also served to destroy any sense of strain his long absence might have caused between them.

“I could suggest a few other candidates.” She lifted her glass, resting it against her chin as she considered him. She was sitting on the couch opposite his, legs curled under her. “And now that I’ve caught you up on the sad, uninteresting story of my life, I think it’s time to hear what you’ve been up to.”

He hesitated, thinking about what he wanted to tell her, as well as what he couldn’t. Most of that was for security reasons, but some he just didn’t want to talk about.

“Suffice it to say that I’m retired.”

Her lips pursed, her eyes still on his face. “From the military.”

It hadn’t been phrased as a question, but he nodded, dropping his eyes to the amber liquid he was absently swirling in the bottom of his glass. He lifted it, anticipating the dark, smoky bite of his grandfather’s private stock.

“Except you left the Rangers more than eight years ago.”

His hand halted in midmotion as his eyes jumped up to meet hers.

“I’m just curious what you’ve been doing since,” she said. “Or is that privileged information?”

He didn’t answer, holding her gaze as silent seconds ticked by.

“You’re the only family I have left, Michael. It’s unlikely I wouldn’t try to find out where you were and what you were doing.”

What was unlikely, he thought, was that she could have.

“And did you?”

“That surprises you.”

“Considering.”

She smiled at him, seeming pleased she’d been able to shock him. “I know you worked for Jack Waigner up until December of last year. I don’t know where you’ve been for the last six months. You…dropped off my radar screen.”

Her eyes briefly touched on the knee she’d pointedly avoided asking him about, in spite of its obvious impairment.

“Hospital and then rehab,” he said. That, too, was probably obvious, given what she already knew.

“That’s why you retired?” This time her acknowledgment of the injury he’d suffered was more open, her eyes tracing along the long, blue-jean clad length of his leg, stretched out on the coffee table between them.

Was it? That wasn’t a question he’d allowed himself to think too much about.

“Partially.”

“I’ve thought about the timing of your disappearance. About what was going on then. Wondering if there was a connection.”

“And you think you’ve figured it out,” he said flatly, reading confidence in her tone.

“I asked some questions.”

“And got answers?” he asked, his voice deliberately quizzical.

He hadn’t quite been able to put together how, living here, his sister could know things no one outside the intelligence community should know. Nor had he figured out where her questions were headed. He’d be willing to bet, however, that this conversation wasn’t about familial concern. Nor was it the product of an idle curiosity.

“A few. Enough, I think. San Parrano maybe,” she suggested.

The words evoked memories he never wanted to think about again. He had worked hard on erasing the nightmare images from what had been a joint Special Forces/CIA counterterrorist mission. One that had gone very wrong very quickly.

“You were there, weren’t you?”

He nodded, then raised the glass and tossed down the last swallow of liquor. It burned a path along the back of his throat, despite the ache that had formed there.

“And you don’t want to talk about it.”

“I don’t want to think about it,” he said truthfully. He leaned forward, setting the empty glass down on the coffee table.

“I understand Waigner sent his best people.”

“Most of them died. Hardly a recommendation.”

“I don’t know. It’s good enough for me.”

The small smile was back, but he couldn’t quite read it. A little self-satisfied. Maybe even challenging. In response, he tilted his head, raising his brows in inquiry.

“I could use some help right now,” she said, “and since you’re here…”

Get up now, he told himself. Walk down the hall to your bedroom, thoughtfully located on the ground floor. Crawl into bed, pull the covers over your head, and pretend this conversation never happened.

“Help with what?” he said instead.

“An assignment.”

After she’d left the police department, Colleen had set up her own private investigation agency. She ran it from behind the scenes, and from what she’d told him earlier, it had become very successful.

This offer to join it was probably her way of getting him back on his feet, as misguided as the idea was. He’d been approached by other people with the same purpose during the last couple of months. His answer hadn’t been repeatable. He mitigated his response to his sister, however, because he truly believed she acted out of love.

“I’m no P.I., but thanks for the thought.”

“You think I’m patronizing you.”

He smiled rather than responding with what he thought.

“I really do need your help, Michael. I’m assuming your security clearances are all in order.”

“For what it’s worth.”

“A baby’s life,” she said softly. “What would that be worth to you?”

Chapter Two

Every time he thought he’d figured out where this was going, Colleen threw him a curve. He didn’t much like this last one. “Whose baby?”

“Samuel Langworthy’s grandson.”

Even as he’d asked the question, Michael had realized there was only one baby who’d occupied the headlines of the nation’s newspapers during the past two weeks. He’d read stories back in Virginia about the Langworthy kidnapping. The coverage here in Colorado had probably been ten times as intense, not only because of the political ramifications, but because it involved one of the founding families of the state.

The Langworthys were Colorado’s version of the Kennedys, and to most people here they were every bit as glamorous. Samuel, the patriarch, had served as governor. His run at the Senate had been interrupted by heart trouble, so his political dreams were being lived out by his son, Joshua.

A Harvard Law grad who had come home to work for the Department of Justice, Josh Langworthy was currently running for governor. There were also two Langworthy daughters, but Michael had been away from the state too long to remember their names.

“Langworthy hired you?”

“Not Langworthy,” Colleen said. “This is…something official.”

“Meaning what?”

He wondered for a moment if she’d maintained some connection to the Denver police. That wouldn’t explain, of course, how she had known so much about what he had been doing for the past eight years.

“ICU has been recruited.”

Investigations, Confidential & Undercover was Colleen’s agency, which she’d started after she left the police force. Who might have “recruited” a private investigation firm and to do what was another question.

One he refused to ask. She seemed to want to tell this in her own way. He had plenty of time to listen.

“You probably don’t remember Dad’s friend, Mitch Forbes.”

“From Texas?”

Colleen nodded and leaned forward to refill his glass. When she had, she held it out to him across the table. As he reached for it, she said, “He asked me to organize a branch of the investigative arm of the Department of Public Safety here in Colorado, just as he’s done in Texas. Something called Colorado Confidential.”

“I’m not sure I follow. To investigate what?”

“Threats to the public safety,” she said, as if that explained everything. “On a local level, of course.”

“And the Langworthy baby’s kidnapping qualifies as a threat to public safety?” He didn’t bother to mask his skepticism.

“Someone in DPS thinks so.”

“And that’s good enough for you?”

“Did you question Jack Waigner when he sent you to San Parrano?”

“I should have.”

She smiled, recognizing the gallows humor for what it was.

“I don’t question my orders either. I try to carry them out to the best of my ability. And frankly, you’d be a real asset right now in helping me accomplish that.”

“I think that would be a matter of opinion.”

“Yes, it is. Mine. All I’m asking is that you sit in on a meeting. Offer suggestions. Criticisms. Maybe undertake a little legwork.” Again her eyes touched on his knee. “Whatever you feel up to.”

If there was anything more likely to get him to agree than that note of unctuous concern in his sister’s voice, he couldn’t imagine what it would be.

“Anybody ever tell you that you don’t play fair?” he said, letting her know that he recognized what she was doing.

“I play to win,” she said. “And I make no apologies for it.”

“EVERYONE, this is my brother, Michael. I’ve asked him to join us today to offer suggestions and observations.” As she talked, Colleen’s eyes touched on the face of each of the three people gathered around the table.

During last night’s tour, she had shown Michael the renovations she’d made that allowed Colorado Confidential to function efficiently from the ranch. The room where they were meeting today, its entrance cleverly hidden behind a wine rack, had once been the basement storage area. Beyond this room, behind another disguised entrance, a second room contained state-of-the-art surveillance equipment, which, he admitted, nearly rivaled that of the CIA.

“And in case you’re wondering,” she went on, “his security clearances are higher than mine.”

There was a nearly imperceptible change in the atmosphere. A relaxation, perhaps, now that his presence had been explained. And a curiosity that was expressed to varying degrees in the three pairs of eyes, all of which had settled on him. Evaluating.

He was more than willing to play the role of consultant, but he had no interest in getting involved in any fieldwork. As slow as he was right now, he’d be a hazard to the rest of the team.

“I didn’t know you had a brother.” The comment sounded vaguely sympathetic, perhaps because it came from the only female member of the group.

“Fiona Clark,” Colleen said, introducing the woman who’d spoken. “Ex-FBI. From Chicago.”

“It’s nice to meet you.” Small, blond and delicate, Clark didn’t look or sound like anyone’s idea of an FBI agent, which had undoubtedly been to her advantage.

“Shawn Jameson. Arson investigator, currently employed at the Royal Flush. From…?”

“Around,” Jameson said. His blue eyes mocked the relevance of Colleen’s question.

Without seeming the least bit embarrassed by his lack of response, she turned to the last of the three operatives at the table.

“And this is Night Walker. Former bounty hunter and private security specialist. Night works with the horse-breeding operation here on the ranch. Among other things.”

Both the name and the long, raven’s-wing black hair indicated Walker’s heritage. As far as Michael was concerned, the fact that Colleen had hired him to handle her beloved horses said all he needed to know about the man’s character.

“I’m sure most of you know about the Langworthy kidnapping. With the media coverage, it would be pretty hard not to. Colorado Confidential has been asked to conduct its own investigation, since the official one seems to be going nowhere. And, more importantly, since there are some aspects of the case that set off alarm bells in Washington.”

“Can you tell us what those are?” Shawn asked.

“They haven’t told me,” Colleen admitted. “Just that, like other things we’ve handled for the Department of Public Safety in the last six months, there’s more to this abduction than meets the eye. We’ll be working closely with the head of the Colorado DPS, Wiley Longbottom, on a need-to-know basis. We’ve been told enough to determine some initial avenues of investigation. That’s our first order of business. To decide who does what.”

A little more democratic than what Michael was accustomed to, but no one seemed to find it strange that they were being let in on the decision making.

“As you know, Schyler Langworthy, three months old, was taken from his crib in the Langworthy’s home in Denver on the night of the Fourth of July. It happened while the family was attending a campaign rally for Josh Langworthy, who is currently a candidate for governor.”

“I think we all know the history on this,” Fiona Clark offered, obviously in an attempt to cut short the background.

“I wasn’t sure that Michael did,” Colleen explained.

Again, three pairs of eyes focused on him. Since his sister had covered most of this with him last night, Michael believed she had some other agenda for this rehash of things they all knew. He was willing to serve as her excuse.

“Samuel Langworthy thinks Governor Houghton and Senator Gettys are somehow involved, maybe in hopes that the kidnapping will distract Josh from the campaign. I’m not sure that belief is based on anything other than the political bad blood that exists between the three. Considering the seriousness of the accusation, however, Houghton and Gettys have been questioned. Discretely questioned, given their positions. The governor suggested that the kidnapping is a desperate move on the part of the Langworthy clan to gain a sympathy vote for Josh’s flagging campaign.”

“I thought he was ahead in the polls,” Shawn said.

“Not according to the opposition’s private polls. Who knows where the race really stands? However, according to our sources, Langworthy—that’s Samuel, not Josh—also hasn’t been completely forthcoming with the authorities. The agents who questioned him felt he might know more about his grandson’s disappearance than he told them. Given who he is, they couldn’t act on their feelings, of course.”

“Meaning no bright lights and rubber hoses for the head of the Colorado’s Centennial Family,” Fiona suggested lightly.

“Meaning Langworthy is still a very powerful and respected name in this state. Whatever investigation of the family we undertake must also be discreet. Very discreet.”

Michael’s gaze had been drawn to Night Walker, maybe because he was the only one who hadn’t offered an opinion or a suggestion. However, there seemed to be some spark of animation in those dark eyes now that hadn’t been there when the former bounty hunter had been introduced.

“That’s why I thought Night might be the ideal candidate to conduct that part of the operation.”

There was no reaction to Colleen’s words in Walker’s impassive features.

“You once worked at the house,” Colleen continued, as if his lack of response had been expected. “I think the baby’s mother, Holly Langworthy, bears watching. If the Langworthys are involved, it’s possible she may lead us to the baby. After all, her stake in this is higher than anyone else’s. Except for the baby’s father, of course. And no one seems to know who he is.”

There was some nuance of inflection in the last that Michael couldn’t decode. Whatever it was, it had the desired effect. Night Walker nodded his agreement, a single up and down motion of his head.

“Good,” Colleen said, glancing down at the sheet of paper on the desk in front of her. “Fiona, that leaves Houghton and Gettys for you. Gettys’s ex-wife might be a way to hone in on whatever shady dealings the senator’s involved in.”

“You think there are some?” Fiona asked. “Shady dealings, I mean.”

“They’ve been rumored for years.”

“Nobody at that level of politics is ever completely clean,” Shawn Jameson said. “So where does that leave me? There doesn’t seem to be another side in this nasty little war.”

“Well, I do need someone to check out a sheep farm that Gettys owns part of, but actually, I was hoping—”

“A sheep farm?” Fiona broke in. “You just lost me, Colleen. How does a sheep farm play into this?”

“Maybe you should have let me finish the intro,” Colleen said, smiling to indicate her comment wasn’t intended as a rebuke. “One of the strangest aspects of the kidnapping was the trace evidence recovered from the baby’s room.”

“Don’t tell me,” Shawn said, controlling an upward quirk at the corners of his mouth.

Colleen ignored him, again referring to her notes. “Fibers identified as Merino wool were found on the bedding, along with particles of eggshell and dirt.” She looked up, eyes again scanning the faces of the people at the table. “The dirt, by the way, came from the southern part of the state.”

“Egg shells and wool?” Fiona’s question probably expressed what they were all feeling.

Colleen lifted her hands, palms upward. “All I can tell you is what the technicians found. And that Senator Gettys does own part of a sheep ranch somewhere in the mountains around Granby. It’s a stretch, but enough of a coincidence that it seems worth checking out. Maybe just by having someone work there for a few weeks to see if there’s anything remotely suspicious going on. The problem is…I have a couple of other leads DPS is working up. I had hoped to keep you here,” she said to Shawn, “until something comes through on those.”

No one said anything, although it must be obvious to them, as it was to him, what Colleen was hinting for. And she could hint until the cows came home, Michael decided. He wasn’t getting back into covert operations. Especially not on some damn sheep farm. The assignment was obviously make-work, designed to give him something useful to do—something not too challenging, of course—and they both knew it.

The strained silence built until Jameson broke it, his eyes considering Michael. “If you want someone to hire on as a hand, maybe I should do it.”

Michael knew exactly what had prompted that offer. The son of a bitch thought he wasn’t up to working on a ranch. After all, Colleen’s three hotshots had already been seated at the table when he’d limped into the room.

“You know a cowboy worth his keep who hasn’t had a couple of broken bones?” he asked.

It was the first time he’d spoken, and no one seemed particularly eager to answer his question. Fiona’s eyes fell to examine her hands, which were clasped together on top of the table.

Michael Wellesley couldn’t remember the last time anyone had doubted his competence. With more than a dozen years of combined special ops and intel experience, some of it in places these three probably couldn’t find on a map even if they’d heard of them, he wasn’t about to let someone start now.

He might be beat up and battered, both mentally and physically, but the day he couldn’t ride a horse or mend fence or herd some frigging sheep well enough to earn his keep, he’d quit. Not until. And that decision, when it came, sure as hell wasn’t going to be made by someone else.

“If you’re worried about Michael being able—”

“I’ll do it,” he said, his voice overriding his sister’s attempted defense of his abilities.

It wasn’t that he didn’t know he’d been played. Or didn’t understand that this was exactly what she’d been hoping for. And he did see the irony in his leaping into something he’d sworn he would never be involved in again.

Hell, he needed a success. Something to go right so that the long years of service to his country wouldn’t end with that fiasco in San Parrano.

Besides, how hard could checking out a sheep farm be? It would do him good to work a few weeks in the open. He could use the time to get back into shape. To work on getting his head screwed back on straight. After all, it wasn’t as if something really dangerous was likely to come up during Colleen’s “therapy” assignment. Not likely at all.

Chapter Three

“This way each of the hands gets his own place,” Charlie Quarrels said, as he unlocked the door of the small trailer to which he’d driven Michael. “Privacy. Folks these days seem to prefer that rather than all bedding down in a bunkhouse.”

Despite the fact that he had the skills required for this job, Michael had been surprised at how quickly he’d been hired. The questions Quarrels had asked during his interview had been cursory. Michael’s answers had been accepted at face value.

Now officially an employee, he was being given the grand tour of the Half Spur. Not that there was anything remotely grand about what he’d seen so far.

Employees lived in trailers that were scattered around the outer perimeter of the central compound. Judging by the interior of this one, he decided after he followed the foreman up the high step and then inside, none of them were living in luxury. Heated by propane and lighted by an outside generator, the small metal caravans would be freezing in winter and like ovens in a summer like this.

He’d been given the trailer farthest from the complex where the offices and shearing pens were located because, Quarrels had explained, Michael had his own transportation. Not the SUV, of course. He’d left that at the Royal Flush and purchased the most disreputable looking pickup he could find to make the journey north.

“Meals are down at the main cabin,” the foreman went on. “Six, noon and six.”

He assumed the main cabin referred to the building where his interview had been conducted. Michael had gotten the impression that some of the workers, including the foreman, lived on the premises. Everybody else got one of the trailers.

“I’ll introduce you to the rest of ’em during supper. We’re shorthanded right now, so there ain’t all that many names to remember.”

“Thanks,” Michael said, swinging his duffel bag onto the narrow bed.

Little more than a cot, it didn’t look as if it would be long enough to accommodate his height. Ever since he’d entered the trailer, he’d felt as if he needed to duck his head to avoid bumping the low ceiling. When this was over, Colleen was going to owe him big time.

“You can ride back down with me,” Quarrels offered. “Ain’t no need to start ’til morning. We’ll be taking blood samples then.”

“Blood samples?”

“This ain’t just a sheep ranch. It’s a government research facility.”

Each syllable in the last two words had been enunciated separately, as if Quarrels had had to practice until he got the phrase right. Michael didn’t ask what they were researching. He doubted the normal hired hand would give a damn, so that was the attitude he needed to adopt.

He’d had a lot of experience adapting to whatever role he was playing. Someone who couldn’t bury himself completely in a situation wasn’t going to survive undercover work.

To him, that had always been one of its biggest draws—the tension created by the dichotomy of disappearing into a persona while maintaining the necessary vigilance about who you really were and why you were there. It created a constant adrenaline rush. Or as near to one as he had believed he could get.

“You ready?”

Michael turned to nod, but Quarrels hadn’t waited for his answer. He was already going down the steps that led to the ground. Michael followed to find him standing at the bottom of them, watching his descent with interest.

“Horse or a bull?” Quarrels asked, obviously referring to his knee.

“Something like that,” Michael said shortly, limping around the dusty pickup to climb in on the passenger side.

“The cold up here in the winter plays hell with broke bones.” Quarrels started the truck, again seeming to expect no answer.

“How many hands on the place?” Michael asked.

“Two permanent. Bunk in the cabin.”

“Permanent?” Michael asked, wondering how the foreman made the classification.

“Been here more ’an a couple of years. Don’t many stay that long. Too isolated. No bright lights.”

No lights at all, Michael thought, remembering Quarrels’ explanation about the generator’s limited hours of operation.

As they talked, the pickup rattled over the dirt road that led back down to the main cabin, which appeared to be the center of the ranching operation. The speed at which it was driven made no concession to the potholed roughness of the track.

“Five temps, including you,” Quarrels continued after a contemplative silence. “Ain’t but a couple of them been here more ’an six months. Pays all right for what little you gotta do, but the place itself gets to people.”

Yet it would have been difficult to find a more beautiful location. The magnificent Rockies loomed in the background. Abundant water from the spring runoff guaranteed the lush richness of the pastures. So far, Michael realized, he hadn’t seen a single sheep.

Quarrels roared around the last curve with a shower of gravel, pulling the truck into the yard outside the main cabin. A man stood in its open doorway. His eyes, narrowed against the smoke wafting upward from the cigarette he held cupped in his hand, followed the two of them as they got out of the pickup and walked across the expanse of worn, patchy grass.

“Sal Johnson,” Quarrels said, indicating the man in the door with a forward motion of his head. “This here’s McAdams. What’d you say your first name was?”

“Mac’ll do,” Michael said, nodding to the cowboy with the cigarette.

Small and wiry, Johnson looked like dozens of other hands he’d known growing up. Skin burned to a wrinkled mahogany by a combination of wind and sun. Eyes perpetually squinted against its glare, even when it wasn’t in the sky. Body stripped of every ounce of fat by the work he did.

“Pleased to meet’cha.” Johnson threw the stub of his cigarette into the yard and stepped back, making room for them to come by him.

The central room of the cabin was the office, dominated by a battered old desk piled high with circulars and paperwork. Quarrels led the way through it, entering the hallway to the living quarters. There were three bedrooms off the hall, two on one side and one on the other, Quarrels pointed out as they passed the closed doorways.

The dining room at the end of the passage held one long table. The bar behind it was topped by a service window to the kitchen.

There a heavyset man, cigarette dangling from his lips, stirred something in a metal pot. He made no acknowledgment of their presence, despite the sound their boots made on the wooden floor.

“Still early,” Quarrels said, heading for the seat at the end of the table.

Rank hath its privilege, Michael thought, amused by that assumption of power. He hesitated a moment, wondering if the other places were also spoken for.

“You can sit anywhere,” the foreman advised, ending that speculation.

Michael deliberately chose a seat in the middle of the far side of the table, knowing, even as he did so, that most people would probably have sat down on the nearer side. He wanted to watch the rest of the hands assemble, however. To have a chance to observe them before they were aware they’d been joined by a newcomer.

Johnson, the one who’d been standing in the doorway when they arrived, entered the dining hall almost as soon as Michael sat down, followed closely by an older cowboy. That man extended his hand across the table before he took his seat.

“Ralph Mapes.”

“McAdams,” Michael said. “Call me Mac.”

A metal bell tolled somewhere outside, interrupting the brief conversation.

“Warning bell,” Quarrels said. “Means you got three minutes before cook serves it up.”

Michael nodded. Johnson took a saltine out of the narrow basket in the middle of the table, chewing it with serious concentration. Nobody else said anything. After a minute or so a group of four entered almost at the same time, settling rapidly into the remaining places at the table.

None of them introduced themselves as Mapes had done. And none of them paid him any overt attention. There were a couple of sidelong glances, eyes skating quickly away if they made contact with his.

The last person to enter was a lanky kid who looked as if he couldn’t be more than eighteen or nineteen. By the time he got to the table, the only available chair was next to Michael. The boy slipped into it almost furtively, as if he expected someone to object.

His arrival seemed to be the signal. The cook, cigarette still between his lips, appeared, holding the metal pan by its handle. He set it down on the edge of the table and began ladling chili con carne from it into the bowls stacked in front of Quarrels.

As each was filled, it was passed along the table. A couple of the hands had picked up their spoons, holding them while they awaited their portion. Everyone began eating as soon as he was served.

Passing each serving to the kid beside him gave Michael an opportunity to observe him. His hands, visible as they took the bowls, bore silent witness to the work he did.

The knuckles were scuffed and reddened. Grime was embedded in the creases and around the rims of ragged nails. The plaid shirt he wore looked too large, with the ends of the cuffs resting low on the back of his hands.

The boy kept his eyes downcast, focused on the contents of the dishes he accepted. He never once looked up at the stranger beside him. Although the bowls were brimming with hot chili, there was something about his studied disinterest that seemed peculiar. Especially in a kid.

Almost all that was visible of him was a droop of long, mouse-colored hair, which hung down over his eyes and ears, and the rounded curve of a cheek. As Michael watched, a slow flood of color moved under the tanned skin, revealing that the boy knew he was being observed.

Based on what he saw, Michael revised his original estimate of the kid’s age downward a couple of years. Runaway? he wondered.

This would certainly be the ideal hiding place for someone who was determined not to be found. And it was always possible it wasn’t the kid’s parents that he was hiding from. Men dodging warrants frequently joined that itinerate brotherhood who followed seasonal work across the West.

Quarrels hadn’t inquired too closely into his credentials this afternoon. Based on Michael’s previous experience with ranch hands, there were probably at least a couple seated at this table who couldn’t afford any scrutiny from law enforcement. Running fingerprints from this bunch might prove to be an interesting exercise.

Despite his conviction that Colleen had sent him out here as some kind of occupational therapy, he realized that he was beginning to take this assignment seriously. Hardly surprising, since “seriously” had always been the only way he knew how to operate.

He turned to pass the last bowl to the boy. Only when he had did he realize the kid was already bent low over his serving of chili, spooning it into his mouth with a rapidity that spoke of real hunger.

As Michael held out the bowl, the kid turned to look at it before he finally raised his eyes to Michael’s face. The deep, clear blue of a summer sky, they locked on his for maybe two seconds before they were returned to the serious business of eating.

The force of their impact, however, had been like an electric shock. Michael continued to hold out the bowl long after that contact was broken, trying to understand what had just happened.

When he placed the chili on the table in front of him, he was grateful for the excuse it gave to lower his head. As he did, he tried to reconstruct what he had seen in the kid’s eyes.

Maybe it had been the directness of that stare, or the surprise of the color against the wind-burned skin. He felt as if some unspoken connection had been made. Or at least attempted.

“McAdams here’s the new man,” Quarrels said, speaking around a mouthful. “Starts tomorrow. Beaumont, you show him what to do.”

Only Mapes looked up. The others continued to shovel chili into their mouths. Michael wondered which of them was Beaumont, and how much help he could expect with the blood samples they were going to be taking.

Across the table, Sal Johnson pushed back his chair. He picked up his empty bowl and utensils and carried them toward the kitchen. He didn’t return with seconds as Michael had anticipated. Instead, after he’d deposited his dishes, he crossed the dining hall to disappear down the hall.

The ritual was repeated, as one by one the men returned their dishes to the kitchen and left. The kid was maybe the third or fourth to depart. Eventually only Charlie Quarrels and Ralph Mapes remained.

“I do something wrong?” Michael asked.

Mapes looked up to grin at him even as he scraped the last bite of chili out of his bowl.

It was Quarrels who answered. “They ain’t big talkers.”

“Glad to know it wasn’t me.”

“You need any help tomorrow, you ask. Nate’s the best with the needle. He’ll show you what to do.”

“Nate?”

“Nate Beaumont. The one sitting beside you.”

“The kid?”

“Says he’s twenty,” Mapes said. “Believe that and I got me a bridge I wanna talk to you about.”

“Runaway?”

“I ain’t never asked him,” the foreman said. The tone was obviously intended to discourage further discussion of the subject.

Across the table Mapes raised his brows, looking directly at Michael. A warning, or an expression of sympathy?

“Breakfast at six. We start in to work at six-thirty.” Quarrels pushed back his chair, almost drowning out the last of those instructions.

Mapes got up, too, trailing him across to the kitchen and then out through the door to the hall. Neither spoke to Michael again.

Left behind in the empty dining room, he put his spoon down, giving up all pretense of eating. He had been immersed in dozens of alien cultures during his years of service, first in the military and then with the agency. This one would rival any of them for strangeness.

He had known taciturn men before, but these barely acknowledged one another’s existence. If this was the extent of their social interaction, it was no wonder the turnover was high.

He couldn’t blame anyone who chose to leave this place. He’d been here less than four hours and he was already aware that the atmosphere was decidedly strange. And that business about the ranch being a research facility was just odd enough to make him decide that even if what was going on here had nothing to do with the Langworthy kidnapping, it was something he intended to understand before he left.

Young Nate Beaumont seemed the ideal place to start.

Chapter Four

It was not yet noon, and Michael already knew a lot about the kid he’d been assigned to partner with. Due to his years on the Royal Flush, he had worked with a lot of ranch hands. There were those who grew to hate the creatures they tended, their small cruelties deliberate. More common were the ones who no longer saw the animals as anything other than commodities, the reason they had a job. Something to protect because that’s what they were paid to do.

Working in the morning’s dusty confusion of sheep and dogs, it would have been easy to pick up on those attitudes. Nate Beaumont manifested neither. He was quick and efficient in taking the blood samples, but he was also careful not to unduly frighten or hurt any of the ewes or lambs they handled.

What they were doing was hot, backbreaking work. Michael had discarded his denim jacket by ten o’clock. The kid was still wearing his long-sleeved shirt, a near twin to the one he’d worn yesterday. Beneath it was a waffle-weave thermal underwear top, its three-button neckline visible at the open throat of the plaid. And despite the growing intensity of the sun, he showed no inclination to shed his outer garment as most of the other men had already done.

“What do they do with them?” Michael asked.

The kid didn’t raise his head, slipping the needle into the vein in the ewe’s neck, which he’d expertly located beneath the close-crimped fleece.

“The blood samples, I mean,” Michael prodded.

“Don’t know.”

“You never asked?”

The answer was a negative motion that set the bowl-cut brown hair swinging. Nate withdrew the needle, and Michael reached for the yellow plastic tag on the sheep’s ear.

He was holding her around the head, as the shearers did. She didn’t seem to even realize she’d been stuck.

“Because you don’t give a damn?”

“Because it’s none of my business.”

There had been no direct eye contact between them as there had at dinner last night. It hadn’t been necessary. The routine they’d worked out, virtually without discussion, ran like clockwork.

Michael dragged the sheep to the table, where Beaumont drew the blood. When that was done, Michael read aloud the number from the animal’s tag, and the kid wrote it on an adhesive label, which he then pressed around the vial. He had rarely looked up in the long hours they’d worked together.

“And you aren’t even curious?” Michael prodded.

“No.”

It had been like this all morning. Nate spoke only when asked a direct question and then in the fewest possible words, his voice so low Michael strained to catch the words above the constant noise of the pens.

“You’re supposed to be teaching him how to do that,” Charlie Quarrels yelled from outside the fence. “You two change places.”

Michael glanced up to find the foreman leaning on the top rail, watching them. Nate didn’t look at Quarrels, but he laid the syringe, which he’d already made ready, back on the table. Without a word, he walked around to where Michael was holding one of the spring lambs.

A small, straw-colored female, she was anxiously watching as her mother was being forced through the exit shoot by Sal Johnson. The lamb voiced her displeasure at that maternal desertion loud and clear.

The adult sheep seemed accustomed to the procedure, but the lambs were a different story. That was part of the reason Michael dreaded having to use this one as a guinea pig for his untested methodology. Conscious that Quarrels was still watching, Michael gave the lamb over to Nate’s more than competent hands and walked around to the front of the table.

He picked up the needle, and as the boy held the lamb in position, he bent over it, searching for the vein in its neck, as he’d watched Nate do a hundred times. The problem was it was less visible on the lambs than on the adults.

He did the best he could, sliding the needle in under the skin. Thankfully, the syringe began to fill with blood. The lamb bleated soulfully, but that seemed more a result of loneliness than pain.

When the vial was full, Michael slid the needle out and straightened. He had begun to turn toward the table to complete the procedure by labeling the vial. Nate’s head was still bent, his left hand holding the small, curly lamb while his right found the tag.

A glitter of silver-gilt where the boy’s lank hair fell forward at the crown caught Michael’s eye. Obviously new growth, it was less than an eighth of an inch long. That line of demarcation between the pale, champagne-blond at the scalp and the muddy brown color of the rest of his hair could only be seen from this angle.

Nate called out the number and then released the lamb, sending her scampering after her mother. Michael pretended to be occupied with the labeling as he considered the implications of what he’d just seen.

It wouldn’t be all that unusual for a boy this age to dye his hair. The more likely scenario, however, would be to go in the other direction. To change the color from a dull brown to that shimmering blond.

The more he thought about it, the more he realized that the opposite transformation made no sense, unless what he’d suspected last night was true. The kid was on the run.

And for some reason, the mystery of who Nate Beaumont might be hiding from and, more importantly, why was far more intriguing than what would become of the hundreds of vials they had filled this morning with sheep’s blood.

“EVERY ANIMAL in the herd is sampled,” Michael said into his satellite phone. “They bring a part of the flock down from the high pasture on a rotating basis, draw blood and then return them.”

“And no one knows what’s done with the samples that are collected?” Colleen asked.

“If they do, they aren’t saying,” Michael said. “Given the lack of communication among the hands, that’s not surprising. I’ve never seen a stranger conglomeration. Could you run some prints if I sent them to you?”

“We have access to the national database. You have some reason—”

“Just covering the bases.” It was probably a long shot, especially where the kid was concerned, but worth a try. “Before we get into fingerprints, how about running a name for me. See what you come up with.”

He heard a rustle of paper on her end, thankful for the clarity of the sophisticated satellite phone’s transmission. It was the same one he’d used during his last year with the agency. He had taped the phone inside the heater when he’d left to go down to the cabin for breakfast this morning. As far as he could tell, it hadn’t been discovered. Actually, he had found no evidence that anyone had been inside the trailer during his absence, something he hadn’t taken for granted.

It would be a pain remembering to take the phone out of its hiding place and charge it during the few hours the generator ran in the evenings, but it was a necessity. This was the only way he had of communicating with the outside world. And the longer he was here, the more detached he felt from it.

“Okay, shoot,” Colleen said.

“Nate Beaumont,” he said, spelling the last name. “Since that’s probably not his real name, consider anything close. Same initials, for example. I doubt you’ll find anything criminal. I’d be more interested in missing persons. Lost or abducted kids. Runaways. Maybe sixteen or seventeen. Blue-eyed blonde. Five-ten or -eleven.”

“You think he’s involved in something on the ranch?”

“I think he’s hiding out here. I’m curious to know why.”

“Okay,” she said again, but he could hear skepticism in her voice.

He didn’t blame her. Even he couldn’t put his finger on what bothered him about the kid. It was like having someone’s name on the tip of your tongue and still not being able to figure out who they were.

“Everything all right there?” she asked, the note of sisterly anxiety clear, even across the distance.

“Meaning am I all right?”

There was a beat of silence. “Are you?”

“I smell like sheep. A lot of sheep. Other than that I can’t complain. You did intend for this to be boring, didn’t you?”

Another pause.

“Is it?” At least her voice had lightened, losing that tinge of concern he hated.

“I’ll let you know after I’ve been here a few more days. By the way, don’t call me even if you find something on the kid. Let me make the contact. It’s probably safer.”

Without giving her time to respond, he punched the off button with his thumb then laid the phone on the floor beside the bunk. He swung his bare legs up onto the mattress, grimacing as the left one protested. He leaned back against the limp pillow, his hands behind his head, fingers interlocked as he waited for the pain pills he’d taken after his shower to kick in.

There was nothing unusual about a ranch participating in research. Sometimes the money from a study was all that kept a small operation afloat.

Most ranches operated on a pretty narrow profit margin. Judging by the shoddy accommodations and the quality of the four meals he’d been served so far, this was one of them.

He couldn’t see how a run-down sheep operation could have any connection with the Langworthy kidnapping, despite Senator Gettys having a share in the place and the strange atmosphere. And frankly, he was too exhausted to do any serious thinking about the question tonight. At least tomorrow wouldn’t be as hard physically.

He and Beaumont had been instructed to move the sheep they’d taken samples from today back up to higher pastures. It had been a while since he’d straddled a horse, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you forgot. Thankfully it would involve the use of a different set of muscles from those that ached so badly now despite the long, semi-hot shower he’d just taken.

Maybe away from the others, Nate would be more forthcoming. If there were something shady going on here, he’d stake his reputation the kid wasn’t involved in it.

And if he were wrong, then by trying to pick Nate’s brain about what he had seen during the months he’d worked here, Michael would be staking a whole lot more than that.

NICOLA CARSON leaned forward, letting the weak, tepid stream of water run over the back of her neck and bowed head. There wasn’t much she wouldn’t give to be able to take a really good shower. The kind she used to take for granted. Strong spray. Gallons of hot water. Lots of steam.

Actually, there was something she wouldn’t give. Which was why she was living here on the Half Spur in the first place.

Living. Despite the primitive conditions and the fact that she hadn’t seen her mother in more than eight months, she wasn’t ready to risk her life in order to leave.

Most of the time she’d felt safe here. The exception to that feeling of security was when someone new entered the picture. Someone like McAdams.

She reminded herself that she had had this same sense of impending doom every time a hand signed on. It had gradually faded as each was assimilated into the strange world in which she now existed.

Of course, none of the others had seemed as interested in that world as Mac did. His questions today had made her increasingly uncomfortable.

He was different from the drifters and misfits Quarrels normally hired. She had decided early on those choices were deliberate, which made his hiring of McAdams even more peculiar.

She turned, letting the water run down between her breasts. Unconsciously, she cupped her palms under them, turning from side to side to let the spray wash play over her chest.

It was only at times like these, in the privacy of the tiny shower inside her trailer, that she could afford to acknowledge her femininity. The rest of the day she tried to merge totally into the role she was playing. A role that had so far kept her alive.

That was the other thing that bothered her about McAdams. The way he made her feel. Like a woman—and that was something she couldn’t afford.

Maybe it was because he was undeniably attractive. Exactly the kind of man she had always been drawn to.

Or maybe, after months of being virtually ignored by everyone around her, it was the way he looked at her. Really looked. As if he were trying to see through her.

She opened her eyes at the thought, staring at the plastic laminate in front of her as the words echoed in her brain.

As if he were trying to see through her.

That’s exactly what he did. He watched her. He questioned her. He studied her. As if he were trying to figure out who and what she was.

Hand trembling, she reached out and shut off the flow of water. She forced her eyes to focus on her fingers, which were still gripping the knob. Assessing them.

Short, broken nails. Sunburned skin that always looked a little grimy. A few half-healed nicks and scrapes.

There was absolutely nothing feminine about them. Nothing to give her away.

And she had always had a deep voice for a woman. Everyone commented on it. A whiskey voice, her grandmother had called it. That huskiness was one of the things that had made her think she might be able to pull this off. And in the six months she’d lived here, no one had seemed to think twice about its timbre.

Her size, too, was in her favor. She was tall and thin enough to appear boyish, especially in the kind of shapeless garments she wore.

She hadn’t been able to do anything to disguise her features, other than keep her head down. She had done that today, her gaze focused on the task at hand. Last night, however…

Looking at him had been a mistake. She’d known it as soon as their eyes had made contact, but by then it had been too late to do anything about it.

Too late. Too late.

She doubled up her fists and slammed them against the wall of the shower. Closing her eyes, she leaned forward, laying her forehead against her clenched hands.

After several frozen seconds, she opened them, stretching her fingers flat against the stall. Then she pushed away from it, standing straight and tall. Fighting for control.

That kind of thinking was nothing but sheer, mindless paranoia. McAdams was a new hand. That’s all he was. There had been a dozen before him, and when he was gone, a dozen others would follow.

She couldn’t allow herself to become suspicious. That wariness would make her self-conscious. Inclined to say or do something stupid when he was around. She needed to go on acting exactly as she had been before he’d shown up here.

Just another drifter, she told herself, determined not to let that smothering sense of terror that had followed the attack at the Metro station take control of her again. He’s just a man. Just like all the others on the ranch.

Except he wasn’t.

The image of strange, blue-green eyes that seemed to see through her was suddenly in her head. Hands that moved with a completely masculine grace. Corded forearms, tanned and covered with a fuzz of gold. Far lighter than the hair that curled against the collar of his shirt. Maybe that was just a trick of the sunlight—

A trick of the sunlight.

The thought was terrifying. She reached out and grabbed the frayed, graying towel off the bar. She wrapped it around her body, sarong-style, and stepped hurriedly out of the enclosure.

The mirror over the sink was clouded with age and moisture. Almost afraid of what she might see in it, she fumbled for the hand towel on the rack and after a second’s hesitation, used it to wipe off the surface.

Then she leaned closer, lifting her bangs with her right hand. Along the scalp was a narrow line of blond. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d put the dye on, but obviously it had been too long ago.

She dropped the bangs, parting the hair on the top of her head with shaking fingers. Turning to catch the light from the bare bulb above the sink. Even in this dimness, the new growth was clearly visible, several shades lighter than the rest.

And she must have ducked her head a hundred times today. Hiding her face. Concealing, or so she thought, the one thing that might give her away. The one thing that might make him question. Wonder. Think about her at all.

And tomorrow she would be alone with him all day. Away from the safety of the pens and the public areas and other people. She could feel that mindless apprehension growing, tightening her chest and making it hard to breathe.

Drifter. He’s just a drifter. She fought against her panic, repeating the words like a litany. Determined to force their reality into her brain. He isn’t here because of you. You are no more to him than Quarrels or any of the others.

Long into the night, eyes open and staring in the darkness, she made herself say them over and over, trying desperately to believe that they might be true.

Chapter Five

They were halfway back to the ranch when Michael pulled up his gelding. He dismounted and then stooped, despite the protesting muscles in his back and thighs, to run his hands gently over the horse’s left front fetlock. The two border collies that had come with them trotted over, ears pricked, and stood near him.

“Something wrong?”

Nate Beaumont had reined in a little farther back on the trail, behind Michael. Eyes narrowed, he watched Michael from under the wide brim of a battered straw hat.

“Seems a little lame.” As he offered the explanation, Michael lifted the gelding’s foot, pretending to examine the frog. “Got a pick?” he asked without looking up.

After a slight hesitation, Nate urged the mare forward, bringing her alongside the gelding. Michael put out his hand, palm upward, to receive the equestrian knife he was offered. As he unfolded the hoof pick from the multi-bladed instrument, he slanted a sideways look at the boy.

“Picked up a stone?” Nate asked.

“I don’t think it’s been there long enough to do any damage. He’s only been favoring it a minute or two.”

He bent over the gelding’s foot, his body shielding it from the boy’s view, and pretended to pry out the nonexistent obstruction. After a moment, he dropped the leg then ran a soothing hand over his mount’s neck. He turned to face Nate, folding the pick back into the knife before he held it up to him.

“I need to get one of these. You never know when a knife might come in handy. Especially out here.”

For a long moment Beaumont didn’t move. In contrast to their customary avoidance, the sapphire eyes locked on Michael’s face. He would have sworn that what he saw in them was raw fear.

“Your knife,” he prodded, moving it up and down to draw Nate’s attention. “Thanks for the loan.”

The boy swallowed, the movement strong enough to be visible down the column of his throat before it disappeared into the high collar of the thermal undershirt he wore. Michael’s eyes had followed the motion, and he felt again that nagging sensation that there was something important about what he’d just seen. Something he was missing and shouldn’t be.

Before he could figure it out, Nate’s hand closed over the knife, removing it from his grasp. “You probably should at that. They’re useful for all kinds of things.”

Maybe he thought it was strange Michael didn’t have a knife. After all, most cowboys carried them. He had when he’d worked on the Royal Flush.

His equipment requirements in the days since then had been very different. He had considered bringing the Glock up here, but the thought of acquiring a folding knife had never crossed his mind.

“How about a breather?” he suggested. “Give him a chance to figure out he’s not crippled.” Because he could see the resolution to refuse building in the kid’s eyes, he added, “I could stand one, too. Stretch my leg.”

Nate had never mentioned his limp. No one but Quarrels had commented on it. And although the knee had been stiff and painful this morning from the stooping he’d done yesterday, it hadn’t kept him from climbing on board the gelding. There was no way he would have let it, no matter how sore it had been.

Today’s assignment, however, hadn’t quite worked out as Michael had hoped. There had been no opportunity to ask Beaumont any questions. And maybe that had been deliberate on Nate’s part.

Going up to the high pasture, they had ridden on opposite sides of the flock, letting the Half Spur’s collies do the actual herding. During the ride back down, Nate had kept his distance, hanging behind Michael on the trail, letting the dogs run between.

That’s why Michael had come up with the story about the gelding’s lameness. And now he needed a reason to prolong this brief time alone with the boy. As he’d expected, the veiled reference to his disability worked like a charm.

Nate eased down off the mare, saddle creaking in the stillness of the mountain air. Once Michael saw he’d succeeded in getting Nate to dismount, he pretended to ignore the kid. He walked the gelding slowly around the small clearing as if assessing the injury, the dogs following behind him. As part of the act, he didn’t bother to try to hide his own aching muscles.

When he’d completed the circle and was returning to the starting point, he realized Nate had been watching the performance. Watching him, rather than the horse.

“You smoke?” he asked.

A lot of kids that age did, and it would provide another reason to prolong the break. Nate shook his head, his gaze now pointedly considering the trail down to the compound.

“Something bothering you?”

The kid turned, his eyes widened slightly. “What does that mean?”

“I’m just curious why you’re so damn skittish.”

“Skittish?”

“You keep to yourself. You keep your head down. You don’t talk. In my experience that means a man’s afraid of something or he’s hiding something. I just wondered which it was in your case.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about finding a good place to hide and then laying low. Trying to keep yourself off somebody’s radar screen,” Michael said, realizing that he had unconsciously repeated Colleen’s words about him. “I’ve done that a few times in my life.”

Nate shook his head. “I like working here. I like the country. The isolation.”

“So your family knows where you are.”

“I don’t have family. Not everybody does.”

“No family. No friends. No past.”

And no denial. The regard from those blue eyes was steady. Whatever fear Michael thought he’d seen in them before had been conquered or controlled.

“You about ready to head out?” the kid asked. “If we’re not back by six, there won’t be anything to eat until breakfast tomorrow.”

Since it was midafternoon, his excuse for leaving wasn’t terribly convincing. Given a chance to be on their own and without supervision, most cowboys would find a way to keep from going back before suppertime. It was almost expected.

“What’s the rush? Quarrels will just find something else for us to do. Relax.”

Nate’s lips flattened, but he didn’t argue. He led the mare over to an outcropping of rock and sat down. His mount began nibbling at the few patches of rough grass growing nearby. He signaled to the dogs and they lay down in a shady spot.

Michael made a pretense of walking the gelding for a few more minutes before he limped over to join Nate. Instead of sitting down beside him and taking a chance of scaring the kid off, he put his left foot up on the rock, resting his weight on his sound right leg. The position relieved some of the stress on the damaged knee.

“So how long you been here?”

“About six months.” The kid was ostensibly watching the two horses, which had begun ranging farther afield in search of more promising grazing.

“And the others? How long for them?”

“Less.” The admission was reluctantly made. “Nobody stays long.”

“Except you.”

“I told you. I like it here.”

Despite the determined front the kid was putting up, Michael’s conviction that he was on the run was still strong. There wasn’t much point in trying to push past this kind of stonewalling, however.

Maybe after he’d been here a while and earned Nate’s trust, the boy would be willing to confide in him. Until then, all he could do was keep an eye on Beaumont and at the same time do the job he’d been sent here for. Maybe if he couldn’t get Nate to talk about himself, he could get him to talk about the Half Spur.

“You like this place despite the weirdness?”

Nate turned his head, looking directly at him. His eyes were carefully blank.

“Those blood samples, for example,” Michael went on. “Nobody knows what they’re for or where they’re sent. You don’t think that’s weird? And Quarrels? Don’t tell me you don’t think there’s plenty strange about him.” No answer. By this time, of course, he wasn’t expecting one. “It makes me wonder what’s really going on here. And since you’ve been here a while…”

He let the sentence trail encouragingly. There was no response.

“Suit yourself,” he said after the silence stretched long and empty.

He pushed off the rock he’d been propped against, intending to admit defeat by going to round up the horses. As he put his left foot on the ground, the damaged knee buckled unexpectedly, throwing him off balance. He put out his hand, grabbing for something solid to keep from falling.

His reaching fingers encountered Nate Beaumont’s shoulder, closing over it like a lifeline. With its support, he managed to right himself. As soon as he had, he loosened his grip on the kid.

Nate jumped to his feet, assuming a fighter’s crouch directly in front of him. In his right hand he held the equestrian knife he’d lent Michael minutes before, its short blade exposed.

Given the speed with which it had appeared, Michael realized belatedly that the boy must have already had the knife out. His hand had rested on the rock near his leg, the blade obviously hidden alongside it. Open and ready.

Michael straightened, leaning away from the weapon. He held up his hands, shoulder high, their palms toward the kid in a classically submissive posture.

“Whoa,” he said softly. “Take it easy.”

The boy’s eyes were feral, his entire body tensed and waiting. “Stay the hell away from me,” he said, his voice as menacing as the knife he held.

“Look, whatever you’re thinking—”

Michael had made the mistake of lowering his hands as he talked. The knife moved, threatening his gut.

“What I think is that you ask too many questions.”

“I thought I could help,” Michael said, his tone quiet and reasoned.

“I don’t need your help. Or your concern.”

“Okay. Whatever you say. Just put the knife down.”

“So we can talk?”

The tone of that mocking question was cynical and distrustful. And more bitter than the situation seemed to warrant.

Maybe he had pushed too hard, Michael acknowledged, but pulling a knife seemed an overreaction that needed some explanation.

“We don’t have to talk. Not if you don’t want to.”

“How’d you find me?”

Confused, Michael shook his head, keeping his eyes on the blade. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about how handy you thought a knife would be. How you ought to get one.”

Again Michael shook his head. “You’ve lost me. First of all, I didn’t find you, because I wasn’t looking for you. And what I said about the knife? That was just making conversation. It didn’t mean a thing.”

Nate laughed, the sound abrupt, lacking any hint of amusement. The blade didn’t waver. Although he was holding the knife properly—blade up, handle down—there was something about his stance that spoke of desperation rather than intimidation.

“Just like before, I guess.”

“Kid, I don’t know what happened to you, or who did what, but I didn’t come here looking for you. I’ve never had any contact with you before yesterday.”

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