“If you're going into the mountains, you're not going alone.”

Jerrod turned then, sending heat and sparks sizzling through her. One of his powerful arms wrapped around her and pressed her to his chest.

Allison looked directly at his black-as-night eyes. Somewhere in those depths she could have sworn she saw hot burning coals.

“Damn,” he whispered … just before he kissed her.

The weakening in her grew as he deepened the kiss. Beyond any shadow of a doubt she knew she'd never felt this degree of longing for any man.

All she wanted was to enjoy this new experience of feeling utterly safe, utterly cherished, by a man who looked like a lethal weapon.

“Tell me I shouldn't have done that,” he murmured.

“I can't,” she answered on a mere breath of air.

“Oh, hell,” he said. “I'm in trouble now.”

Deadly Hunter

Rachel Lee

www.millsandboon.co.uk

RACHEL LEE was hooked on writing by the age of twelve and practiced her craft as she moved from place to place all over the United States. This New York Times bestselling author now resides in Florida and has the joy of writing full-time.

MILLS & BOON

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Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Excerpt

Prologue

Cleaning guns had always soothed him. The smell of the oil, the focus required to disassemble and reassemble small parts, the rubbing motions as he worked the oil into them.

He had them all out tonight, a collection of a dozen different weapons, everything from small pistols to his semiautomatic AR-15 and AK-47. Running his rags and oil over them focused him on his new mission.

It was a good feeling to have a target again. A very good feeling. There was no longer any reason to contain his rage, no longer any reason to hold back. He’d be in and out, and the remains of the target would be carried away by woodland animals, leaving no trace.

Then he could carry on with life again. Only then.

Chapter 1

Darkness fell early on cold winter nights in Conard County, Wyoming. Allison pulled into her driveway, feeling the weight of the frigid night air even inside the warmth of her SUV. She sat for a bit, reluctant to get out, to once again feel the sting of icy air in her nostrils and lungs.

It was a silly reaction. After all, she’d grown up around here, the winters rarely held any surprises, and the cold was the least of them. But for the moment she decided to enjoy the blast of heat from her car vents before dashing up to her door and stepping into a house that would be even colder than the car.

She believed in conservation and saving energy. During the days when she was at work, her computerized thermostat turned the temperature down to sixty. Right now it would be pushing the house toward sixty-eight, but wouldn’t have quite made it yet, given how cold it was today. Later, at bedtime, it would turn down again until morning.

Which meant she wore a lot of fleece indoors, and thick mohair socks, and even had a heavy blanket to wrap herself in for sitting around and reading in the evenings. Plus, the house itself, being older, managed to remain drafty no matter what she did with weather stripping and insulation.

She needed new double-paned windows, but those were far beyond her budget right now. Instead, she had to settle on insulated curtains, and while they helped, they didn’t quite stop the drafts.

And this was ridiculous, she told herself. Burning gas with her car needlessly just to avoid going inside and wrapping herself in layers of warm clothing. Wasteful. Bad for the environment.

Nearly giggling at herself, she flipped off the ignition and sat listening to the engine tick as it cooled down. Man, it wasn’t like this was Antarctica or anything, and the trip to her front door wasn’t that far. What had gotten into her?

Just as she reached for the door handle, a truck pulled into the driveway next door, not six feet away from her. Her new neighbor, a man she had barely glimpsed in the two weeks since he’d moved in, apparently kept so much to himself that the only gossip about him so far was that he kept to himself.

A strange thing around here.

Well, she thought, this was her opportunity to at least say hi. Climbing out quickly, watching her breath blow frosty clouds in the muted light from his truck and a streetlamp three houses down, she looked up and waited.

For a minute she wondered if he was waiting inside his truck to avoid her. Cold began to snake its way into the neck of her jacket, and she moved her purse strap so she could pull up her hood.

At last he climbed out. Tall. Lean, even in his layers of winter clothing. He glanced her way just briefly, and she almost caught her breath as she saw the narrow scar that slashed his cheek. He had just started to move toward his own door when she called out.

“Howdy,” she said cheerfully. “About time we met. Welcome to town, neighbor. I’m Allison McMann.”

He froze, still mostly turned away from her. The hesitation was perceptible, and she began to wonder if he was going to say anything at all.

“Hi,” he said shortly, then trekked toward his door without another word.

Okay, Allison thought. Have it your way. Turning, she hurried up her steps, slipping on ice she thought she’d gotten rid of. Then, like some crazy cartoon, she cartwheeled backward. All of a sudden she was lying on her back, staring up at the starry night sky, her laptop case and backpack in the snow, her purse wrapped across her chest.

“Well, dang,” she said to the stars. She never did this. That would teach her to hurry.

“Are you okay?”

Just as unexpectedly as she had fallen, Mr. Inscrutable was squatting beside her, looking down at her. Even in the lousy light she could see chiseled features and dark eyes. He had bone structure an actor would kill for.

“I think I’m fine,” she said. “Well, except for my pride. Despite evidence to the contrary, I almost never fall.”

“So you’re a mountain goat?”

Was that humor? She looked at his face but found it as unreadable as everything else about him.

“Not exactly.” She started to push herself up, but his hand on her shoulder stayed her.

“Take it slowly. You can’t always tell, and it sounded to me like you hit pretty hard on the pavement.”

“Yeah. Pavement I salted just last night so I wouldn’t slip and fall. Go figure.”

“Must have missed a spot.”

She pushed up again and was grateful that this time he didn’t try to stop her. In fact, he didn’t offer unnecessary assistance, either. He just remained there, watching.

When she was sitting upright, she wiggled her shoulders and untangled her purse. “I’m okay,” she repeated.

“No wooziness?”

“Not a bit.”

“Okay, then.” He stood, grabbed her hands without asking and pulled her to her feet. He dropped her gloved hands as fast as he had seized them, and stepped back. He watched her almost clinically for a few seconds, nodded to himself then bent and retrieved her laptop and backpack.

“There you go,” he said, passing them to her. Before she could thank him, he was trotting toward his door again, as if he couldn’t get away from her fast enough.

“Thank you,” she called after him. She didn’t even get a grunt in return.

Realizing she was getting colder by the second, she headed for her own door, more cautiously this time. No more pratfalls, she warned herself. Especially not in front of that guy. He seemed almost as cold as the winter night.

Thanks to her longer-than-intended sojourn outside, the house didn’t feel quite as cold as usual. Checking the thermostat, she saw the temperature had already reached sixty-six. Stripping her outerwear and hanging it on pegs by the door, she headed to her bedroom in the back for what she thought of as her “grungies,” old, comfortable sweats and socks and a sweater if necessary. She’d warm up making her dinner, then settle in with grading the latest chemistry test.

In the kitchen, she flipped on the small TV to listen to the weather while she cooked. This cold wave was extreme for this early in the winter, arriving more than a month sooner than usual. Tomorrow she had fieldwork to do and figured unless something happened overnight, she would have to dig out the snowmobile suit she kept for the coldest days of the year. She never went snowmobiling, but the one-piece suit had other uses, including protection from the wind.

This damn job was going to be tough enough as it was. A rancher had recently lost two cows to a deadly toxin, one that had been outlawed years ago and had the ability to spread far and fast with little control. The state had asked her to take some soil and water samples to try to identify the affected areas. Given the toxicity of the chemical identified in the dead cows, this was going to be dangerous.

Still, it had to be done, and she’d just have to be careful, wearing protective gloves and booties over her winter gear. All of which was going to make collecting the samples awkward, but there it was. This compound had to be tracked and the source cleaned up as swiftly as possible. The spring thaw would only make things worse.

With these thoughts running in her mind, she broiled a chicken breast and tossed a small salad. Inevitably, though, her mind returned to the stranger next door. He’d been quick to help when she had fallen, but was otherwise utterly unfriendly. She hadn’t even learned his name.

His face suggested he might be a hunk, but the scar on his cheek looked as if he’d been slashed with a knife. He might also be bad news. He could be hiding out from the law for all she knew, although with a face as memorable as that, he wouldn’t be able to hide for long.

The lights had been turned on next door two weeks ago, so she assumed that was when he moved in. In all that time, tonight was the first glimpse she’d had of him, although his truck seemed to be gone an awful lot, so he was doing something with his days.

But given this town’s penchant for gossip, people had been amazingly quiet about this guy. They noted he’d moved in, but nobody knew a thing about him. If he had a job somewhere, someone would have mentioned it.

He was well out of the norm in a number of ways, and it made her curious as hell. None of her business, of course, but it was impossible not to think of the lines she’d heard in so many horrible news stories: He kept to himself. He was a loner.

She giggled at the direction her imagination had taken and poured coffee to take into her home office with her while she graded those tests.

Despite all the technological advances, giving an in-class test meant that she had to pore over chicken scratchings. In a couple of hours, she would feel nearly blind and probably have a splitting headache. Such was the price of teaching Chemistry I and II at a community college. A small price overall, she decided, as she picked up the first test.

She liked her job. And she had to stop wondering about the stranger next door.

* * *

Little more than thirty feet away, the stranger next door stood in his unlit back room and stared out an uncurtained window. Agitation crawled across his nerve endings, and he faced that fact that not even six months had been enough to ease the constant pressure and stress he lived with. It was as if his mind and body had simply forgotten how to relax.

He’d moved here for the wide-open spaces and the clear sight lines. A strange way to pick a town. Well, that and the fact that he knew Seth Hardin a bit and Hardin had always spoken well of this place. But he hadn’t even let Hardin know he was here, although he heard the guy was currently on station with his fiancée somewhere out there. No point in introducing himself to Hardin’s family hereabouts. He might not stay long.

He might not be able to stay long. Questions about his past simply couldn’t be answered. His whole adult life was stamped “classified,” and it was hard to talk around those things without inadvertently giving something away.

He had his cover story, but it didn’t fit him somehow. He’d rather say nothing than lie needlessly, anyway. It was beginning to strike him that all he’d done was exchange one covert life for another. How did you build on that? He had six months of public history and a childhood. The rest was best forgotten.

Hell, maybe they should have filed him in the warehouse with all his mission debriefings.

The thought amused him, but not for long. Something about that encounter with his neighbor earlier had seemed to cast his current existence in high relief. Was he always going to live in the shadows?

It hadn’t been so bad when he’d shared those shadows with the other guys in his unit, but now he shared them with no one, cut off from friends who could no longer talk to him about what they were doing, and cut off from everyone else because he couldn’t say where he’d been or what he’d done.

He wasn’t feeling sorry for himself. He’d made his choices. But it sure got irritating at times. Even the most casual of conversations felt like a minefield. He’d probably get used to it, though. He’d gotten used to a lot worse.

So he had some decisions to make and some learning to do. First off, he could have handled that encounter with the woman—Allison—with a minimum of common courtesy. Damn, it wasn’t as if his name was classified. Would it have been so hard to say, “Nice to meet you. I’m Jerrod”?

Except that it might have been taken as an invitation to get to know him better. So he’d been rude. Not even helping her up after she’d slipped could make up for his cold response to her friendly greeting.

Time to learn to get through those simple courtesies without keeping his guard so high that he failed at the smallest aspects of daily life.

It wasn’t as if he didn’t know how. During his service, there had been plenty of opportunities to practice the social graces, at least to a minimal extent. Certainly the academy had drilled them into him. But then covert operations had kind of drilled them out.

Still, it was no excuse. What was going on inside him? No longer in uniform, he was feeling like some kind of sham. Because at heart he was still a long way from being a civilian.

He sighed and pressed his forehead to the icy window glass. When his career came to a close, thanks to shrapnel lodged near his spine, he hadn’t dreamed that he’d feel so much like a stranger in a strange land. Or that he’d be so ill prepared for a so-called normal life.

His old normal was no longer normal, and he needed to get his act together. Traipsing around the countryside all day, every day, might ease the need for action, at least a little, but it wasn’t moving him forward in any useful way.

He had a lot of years ahead of him, and he needed to do something worthwhile with them. If worse came to worse, he supposed he could return the call from the CIA, but did he really want a covert future where his ability to act would be hemmed in by pretending to be a diplomat? Was he even certain that he would do any good? At least what he’d been doing for the military—well, damn near all of it—had sure as hell seemed necessary.

The CIA was a whole different can of worms, one he wasn’t sure he wanted to open. At least in his former capacity, he hadn’t usually needed to lie and gain the trust of people who shouldn’t trust him at all.

There it was again, that whole lie-and-trust issue. Kind of late, he thought almost bitterly, to be developing moral qualms.

Or maybe not too late. Not too late to want to do something productive rather than destructive. The only question was what would satisfy him. What did he feel equipped to do that didn’t involve sniper rifles and C-4?

Maybe he just needed to take it in small steps. One little thing at a time.

He glanced at his watch and saw it was only eight o’clock, still early, although the winter had made it dark as pitch out there.

Maybe he could rectify one small rudeness. Just a small step, but a right step.

One foot in front of the other. That had gotten him through more than he cared to remember. One step at a time.

* * *

The ringing of her rather sickly sounding doorbell startled Allison. Her friends seldom dropped by unannounced and solicitors were rare on cold winter nights.

She dropped her red pen, tossed her reading glasses on the stack of papers and walked to the front door, rubbing her neck as she went. It hadn’t taken long for the first seeds of eyestrain to start making themselves felt from her forehead to the back of her neck. She wondered at the tension, then decided she was probably more worried about tomorrow than she wanted to admit, even to herself. Tracking down a poison so dangerous that many countries had declared it a chemical-warfare weapon would be no picnic, no matter how carefully she collected her samples. One slip might be her last. Unfortunately, she was the only one available with sufficient expertise to do this. Her fault for taking training with a decontamination team while she had been in graduate school. Curiosity had led her to this point.

She opened her door and felt her heart skip a nervous beat, even as her jaw dropped. She didn’t know what she had expected, but certainly not the enigmatic guy from next door who had barely answered her earlier greeting. Up close like this, she saw that while he was lean, he was also larger than she had thought, and both the porch and hall lights cast his harshly angled face in high relief.

For the first time, she realized he looked dangerous. But as the wind whipped snow into her door, stinging her face, she knew she couldn’t stand at the door like this for long. He might be wearing a parka, but she sure wasn’t. Should she let him in?

“I wanted to apologize,” he said gruffly.

She blinked as snow crystals melted on her face and made a quick decision, possibly a stupid one, but time would tell.

“Come in,” she said. “I’ll freeze standing here.”

He hesitated, as if he considered his purpose here completed, but then gave a slight nod. She stepped back, letting him in and closing the door against the frigid night and blowing snow.

She wiped her sleeve across her face to get rid of the wet, then caught sight of herself in the hall mirror. Her grungies. A great first impression. But as she raised her gaze again, she met eyes that looked about as black as a starless night, and just about as cold. A little shiver passed through her.

“Coffee?” she asked.

Again he hesitated. “Sure. But I only wanted a minute of your time, not to disrupt your evening.”

“Anything that takes me away from grading papers is welcome.” She didn’t know whether she was being brave or brainless, but manners were deeply ingrained.

She almost waved him into the living room, then changed her mind midmotion. Living rooms were too comfortable. They invited people to stay. She wasn’t at all sure that would be a good thing, so she led him into the kitchen. Coffee tasted the same at a table.

Behind her she heard him unzip his parka, but when she turned around as she reached the coffeepot, she found he hadn’t removed his jacket. He pulled out one of the chairs at the round oak table and sat on its very edge. A man poised to get the hell out...or to move quickly.

“How do you like your coffee?” she asked.

“Black as hell and hot as Hades.”

She blinked. “Okay. I’m not sure it’s that hot, though.”

He closed his eyes for just an instant. “Sorry. I’ve been living too long among guys. I guess I could have phrased that more politely.”

“It’s okay.” She quickly filled two mugs, getting a fresh one for herself rather than trotting back to her office. She sat on the opposite side of the table from him, as far away as she could get. Unsure about this visit, she, too, sat on the edge of her seat.

“So why should you apologize?” she asked.

“Let me start at the beginning. Hi, I’m Jerrod Marquette. Nice to meet you. Sorry I was rude when you said hello earlier.”

“Nice to meet you, too,” she said, although she wasn’t absolutely certain about that yet. “Allison McMann. Or did I tell you that?”

“You told me, which makes it even ruder that I didn’t respond.”

Since he seemed to be making an effort, she sought for a way to make one herself. “Well, maybe you weren’t too happy to be greeted, but you were sure fast to the rescue when I fell. Thanks for the concern.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “It was nothing.”

“But it would be something for someone who isn’t too keen on meeting the neighbors.”

He looked away from her, his gaze growing distant. “Training. Instinct. All of it.”

“All of it? Which all?”

He lifted his mug, drinking several sips, saying nothing for so long she wondered if he would say another word.

But then he surprised her. “Military training,” he said finally. “Nothing I want to talk about, even if I could. But...” His gaze came back to her. “You know, it’s a devil of a time trying to become a civilian again. Sounds crazy, I know.”

“I didn’t say that.” And a picture was beginning to form in her mind. She wondered how far from the truth it was.

“Regardless, you wouldn’t think I’d have lost the common courtesies. It’s just that...”

Again he trailed off. She decided not to press him, but to let him say what he chose and avoid what he chose.

He sighed and drained his mug. “Too many years of secrecy. Invisibility. Being in a new place brings back habits. I can’t explain more than that.”

“I think I get it. At least some of it.”

“Nobody who doesn’t do it really gets it. But that’s the way we want it.”

“What do you mean?”

“We do what we do so civilians can remain innocent.”

It was as if he sucked the wind from her between one breath and the next. She felt an unexpected piercing pain for what must have been required of him to make a statement like that. Before she could think of a word to say, he was starting to rise, preparing to leave.

She felt a desperate urge to not let him go, though she didn’t know why. Yes, he was attractive, but what she was feeling right now touched her in a much deeper way. She needed to do something. Say something. Give him the very welcome he seemed to want to avoid. But how?

“Have some more coffee,” she said quickly.

“I shouldn’t. You were grading papers.”

Man, he didn’t miss a thing.

“Consider it my excuse not to go to bed with a pounding headache.”

For the first time, the very first time, the stone of his face cracked just a bit. One corner of his mouth tipped up. “You’ll still have to get the headache eventually.”

“Sunday will be soon enough.”

She was relieved when he walked over to the pot and poured himself more coffee. He returned to the table and sat. “I should ask about you.”

“Sure. I’m an open book.” Only as she saw his face darken a shade did she realize how that had sounded. She spoke swiftly to cover the faux pas. “Nothing really interesting, no secrets, no jaunts to exotic and dangerous places. I grew up here, went to college and came back here to teach at the community college. Chemistry.”

This time he settled back into the chair, looking less likely to take flight. Although she got the feeling he didn’t quite uncoil. She wondered if he even knew how.

“Do you like it?”

“Mostly,” she said.

“But not grading papers.”

“It’s the lousy chicken scratches. I think computers have killed the fine art of handwriting.”

“So why not let them use computers?”

“Because computers give them access to information. Every exam would essentially be an open-book test then. I do it sometimes, but other times I want to know what they really understand.”

He nodded briefly, then drank more coffee. “Great coffee, by the way.”

“Thank you. But not hot as Hades.”

Again that faint flicker of a smile. “Not quite. But hot enough.”

A silence fell, but it didn’t feel as tense. Still, she decided to fill it. “The big thing in my life right now is the state has hired me to find out how far a toxin has spread. A few weeks ago, a rancher lost two cows, and tests show it was a horrible poison.”

“What kind?”

“The kind that is outlawed because it’s so dangerous. Well, it was until the USDA allowed it to be used in a few states for coyote control. But to give you an idea what I’m dealing with here, a number of countries have labeled it a chemical-warfare weapon. And the way it spreads is incredible. It doesn’t just stop where it’s applied, which is scaring the ranchers and hunters.”

For the first time she realized how intimidating it could be to have this man’s full attention. Those black eyes had looked at her before and seemed attentive enough, but now they lasered in on her. They made her think of his comment about black as hell. She had to fight an urge to pull back, knowing that he would see it and not willing to make him feel like a pariah without reason. At the same time, she felt an unexpected and unwanted tingle of sexual arousal. Dang it.

“Tell me about it,” he said. “What exactly is it? How does it spread?”

“Its name wouldn’t mean much to you or to most people who don’t raise livestock. It’s applied to bait to kill animals that eat carrion. Unfortunately, that doesn’t just mean coyotes. Well, it’s bad enough if it stops there, but it doesn’t. The contaminated animal can take hours or days to die, wandering away from the bait. It becomes toxic itself, so wherever it dies, it can contaminate the ground and water, and if anything eats it, it’ll die, too.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah. So they found the bait—at least, they think it was the bait—and only two cows have died so far. They think the cows must have licked some snowmelt or eaten some contaminated grass that was under the snow. Regardless, once the toxin was identified, we had to get into high gear because we can’t be sure what appeared to be the bait wasn’t simply an animal that had eaten the original bait. The spread could be big and getting bigger.”

“So what do you do?”

“Take soil and water samples to try to figure out the impacted area. At the very least to let the ranchers know whether their grazing land and water is safe, but also to try to home in on the dangerous areas.”

“Does it break down? Disperse?”

“Everything does, but you wouldn’t believe how little of this stuff it would take to kill a grown man. In theory, it’s supposed to be used only in livestock collars. So, for example, if a coyote bites a collared ewe on the neck, it’ll get a fatal dose of poison. But there’s enough poison in that one collar to kill six grown men or twenty-five children. If collars get lost or punctured, the poison gets into the environment. And by the way, if a collar is discarded, it’s supposed to be buried at least three feet deep in the ground.”

He nodded. “Okay. But if it’s lost...”

“Yeah, if it’s lost, the poison can leech into the environment. And even if it doesn’t get lost... Well, I painted the picture of what happens when an animal gets poisoned. It wanders away, dies an agonizing death and something else eats it. And there isn’t any known antidote.”

“That could be bad.”

“It is bad. It’s the cascade effect that makes it so awful. If it killed just once, no big deal. But it doesn’t. So until the poison dissipates to safe levels—and even sublethal levels can cause brain damage and so on—you’ve got a big-time problem that’s spreading randomly.”

“I can’t think of a worse scenario. Do you think you can trace it back to its origin?”

“Probably not. I wish I could. If someone wasn’t using it in an authorized collar, then they’re breaking the law in a lot of ways. Law enforcement is looking into that part, but without any success so far. But I’m sure I won’t get that far, and it’s not what I’m out there to do, anyway. I’m just supposed to take samples for the state to identify any areas that present a threat. I hope I don’t find a single one. Maybe it’s all dissipated now. Maybe it was an isolated incident. I hope to God it was.”

“Helluva problem.”

“Yeah.” She propped her chin on her palm and sighed. “If the weather settles down, I start tomorrow. Slowly circling out from where the dead animals were found. With any luck I’ll be able to tell at least one rancher his grazing land is safe.”

“But others?”

“That’s the question. Was that bait the primary kill? Or have other animals died and spread the poison? I guess I’ll find out.”

“Why is this stuff even still in use?”

“Because it works.” She straightened and threw out her arms. “They use it in Australia, New Zealand and Tasmania. To get rid of rodents and other vermin. They’ve had some unexpected consequences, but they got the dose calibrated to do the job without killing too many other things, like the birds. The problem is these collars aren’t low dose. And someone using it illegally would probably overuse it. People have a hard time grasping just how little of this poison is needed.”

“That seems to be a common human failing,” he remarked. Then he rose, went to the sink and rinsed out his mug.

“Thanks for the coffee. See you around.”

She stood to walk him to the door, but he moved fast and by the time she got to her small foyer, there was nothing left of him but the blast of cold that had entered when he opened the door to leave.

“That was fast,” she said to the empty house. She wondered what was riding his tail.

“Military,” she murmured to herself. That probably explained a whole lot more than she could even imagine. But at least he had tried to be polite. She gave him marks for that.

It probably hadn’t been easy for him, either, judging by his initial response to her greeting.

A glance at the clock told her it was still early. Back to grading papers. It was only as she sat at her desk with fresh coffee that she realized something.

That man had gotten her motor running for the first time in years. For all he was a cipher, he’d still kicked her hormones into overdrive and she didn’t know why. Like she needed that? In fact, it was the last thing on earth she wanted from any man.

She squirmed a little in her chair as her most feminine parts insisted on reminding her that she was a woman with very real desires. They happened. It only mattered what she did because of them.

Right. With any luck, the chicken scratchings on the stack of papers in front of her would drive him right from her mind. And her rebellious body.

Chapter 2

Usually, walking and jogging over rough countryside for hours on end made Jerrod sleep well. That night he didn’t sleep well at all, and he wasn’t sure why.

His thoughts kept straying to that pretty brunette next door, her soft sherry-brown eyes, her bright smile, her nicely curved body. She may have thought her assets were hidden beneath those baggy sweats, but whether she knew it or not, those loose clothes enhanced her appeal. It was almost like playing peek-a-boo to watch her move. There was something to be said for not flaunting it.

Was a woman getting to him? It wasn’t as if he’d been doing without sex for very long. Sex came easy to a man like him, especially when he’d still been in uniform. He also knew that he could do without it for long periods. He wasn’t a kid anymore.

He’d been attracted to Allison. No question of that, but maybe what was troubling him was that he’d been attracted to her in other ways than sexually. Something in her personality engaged him, even though they’d had only the briefest of conversations.

He didn’t need that now, not when he was a long way from settled in himself.

If his life was a ledger, he wouldn’t have known whether he was more in the red or the black. How would he? He seldom knew the real purpose behind much of what had been asked of him. He had been given mission briefings; sometimes he knew he was after terrorists, other times he just had to go on faith that his country needed this thing done.

That left him suspended somewhere between heaven and hell, he supposed. In purgatory. Regardless, things came back to haunt him—everyone got haunted to some degree—and they’d flash through his mind. If nothing else, memories goaded him to find a different way to leave the world a better place. Problem was, he hadn’t found that way yet.

Maybe that was because he felt like he’d been through an emotional blender. He hadn’t expected such an abrupt end to his career, although he was no fool and had known it was possible. If he’d expected anything, it was that he’d come home in a bag or box. He’d been wounded before and had recovered. So, idiotic or not, he hadn’t exactly planned for an abrupt shift into civilian life. Truthfully, he admitted to himself, in his job neither he nor anyone else looked that far down the road. It was dangerous. You had to live for the mission and then for the next mission, and keep your focus tight.

Then, boom, every parameter of your life changed. You went from fitting perfectly into a machine to fitting nowhere at all.

Interesting, really. A different kind of challenge, one he hadn’t been up to so far.

But he supposed it was hard to go from a tight focus, where damn near every moment had been directed, to one where nothing was directed. It was like going from narrow tunnel vision to full vision. It was certainly a different way of existing.

He dozed occasionally, but sleep was fitful, more as if he was in a dangerous situation than completely safe in a house in a nice little town. It was okay, though. He’d learned to get a whole lot out of catnaps, just as he’d learned to take one whenever he got the opportunity.

He’d be fine in the morning.

And maybe he’d go over and offer his assistance to Allison. Sampling for a poison that dangerous didn’t seem like something she should do alone.

Maybe it was time he reached out to someone. Just one person. It would be a big step out of the shadows that dogged him still.

* * *

Allison blinked in astonishment as she looked up from loading her sample case into the back of her car and saw Jerrod Marquette crunching through the snow toward her. A cup of coffee and suddenly he was no longer a loner? Uneasiness trickled through her.

She gave herself a mental shake, telling herself not to be ridiculous. If he’d moved in two days ago, she wouldn’t even question his approach. He was a guy with a shell, as she had seen last night, but he’d done not one untoward thing.

“Good morning,” he said as he reached her.

“It’s certainly a beautiful one. Cold, though.” Her breath was visible as she spoke, and she was grateful for her one-piece snowmobile suit. How much nicer if the weather hadn’t gone crazy or she could just let this ride until the unusual cold passed. But the toxin couldn’t wait.

“I was thinking how dangerous it might be for you to hunt this toxin all by yourself. Is someone going with you?”

She bridled. “I know what I’m doing.”

“I’m sure you do. But if something goes wrong... Do cell phones even work when you get out of town very far?”

“Intermittently,” she acknowledged. “Ranches are spread so far apart that it doesn’t seem worth the cost to put in a lot of towers. But the lines of sight are good until you get into the woods and mountains, so...intermittent.”

Reluctantly, however, she admitted he was making a good point. She’d been thinking in terms of wandering ranch land, shoveling away a little snow and drilling contained cores of about six inches of dirt. No big deal. But he was also right about being out there alone. Any accident could cause serious trouble if she had no way to call someone.

“I guess I need to get a radio,” she said finally. “To call the sheriff if I need help.”

“Good idea. Can you get one this morning?”

“I doubt it. I don’t know how long it will take, and while we’re standing here that toxin could be spreading.”

“Okay, then, how about I tag along? I’ll bring my own truck if you would be more comfortable, but if you twist an ankle or something, I can be there.”

She studied him, thinking he didn’t look quite so much like a devil in the bright morning light. But every bit as attractive, even bundled up as he was.

“Are you a born caretaker or something?” she asked.

“Not exactly. Or possibly. What I know is, I almost never went on a dangerous mission alone. The smallest team I ever went out with was three. The average was six.”

“Backup?”

“And rescue.”

“Dang,” she said. Mostly because he was right and she should have thought of it herself, persuaded one of her students to go along or something. No, she’d just been hot to trot to get those samples. “You know, I have to talk to the ranchers before I go out on their lands. They’ll know where I am.”

“Okay, then. Stay safe.” He turned and started to walk away. For the first time it occurred to her that he might need something to do himself. Everything about him seemed to be at loose ends, though she couldn’t exactly say why she sensed that.

“Jerrod, wait. I’d appreciate the company.”

He turned back, nodding shortly and giving her a small smile. “You’ve got it.”

But she made him take his own truck. She was not ready to get all cozy with this guy, no matter how much her hormones awoke when he was around. Even though her conscience did twinge when she considered the waste of gas and the pollution of unnecessarily taking two vehicles.

No, she thought as she backed out of the driveway, this was the wisest decision. If he got bored, he could leave. She wouldn’t feel pressured by him being stuck with her. And she’d have her own escape route if she needed it.

She wasn’t ready to trust yet. No way.

But thinking about Jerrod as she drove out to the Madison ranch where the initial incident had occurred, she wondered if she was being too distrusting. Yes, she had little to go on, and how could she be sure he really was ex-military? How could she be sure he hadn’t spoken a pack of lies to her?

But she’d met a few con men, and as a rule they were smooth, charming talkers. He hadn’t tried any smooth talk at all. Quite the contrary, he hadn’t done a damn thing to win her over. Instead, he had struck her as a box full of tightly locked secrets. Everything about him screamed, “Watch out!”

Hardly the way to put anyone’s fears to rest.

So she laughed off her doubts about him. Military vet, probably still struggling to make his way back to this life after one so very different. There were more than a few around this county. The adjustment to coming home always seemed far harder than the adjustment of arriving in a strange land. She’d even heard that from people who traveled for long periods of time.

She wondered if anyone had studied that adjustment issue. It seemed odd, but hadn’t she read that Peace Corps volunteers also had reentry problems? She seemed to remember she had.

By the time she reached Jake Madison’s place, she thought she had settled the issue, in her own mind, anyway. Until given some evidence that Jerrod wasn’t trustworthy, she’d let it lie.

The wind bit at her as soon as she stepped out of her vehicle. Jake knew she was coming and why, so she wasn’t at all surprised when he stepped out onto the porch, warmly dressed and ready to go.

“You sure picked a fine day for this,” he remarked.

“I didn’t pick it. It picked me.”

He grinned and started down the steps. “I’ve even got my horses in the barn. Are you sure you should be out?”

She spread her arms. “I came dressed.”

He glanced toward the truck. “Who’s your compadre?”

“My neighbor, Jerrod Marquette. He seems to think I shouldn’t be out doing this alone.”

“Well, you shouldn’t. But I didn’t intend to leave you alone. Nora will be thrilled that I can come back as soon as I show you the site. Then the two of you be sure to stop in for something hot to drink. You’re going to need it.”

She noted that Jerrod didn’t get out of his truck. Jake noticed, too, glancing that way again, but quickly turning to his own truck parked alongside the house. “I’ll lead the way. Damn winter came early, didn’t it? Ground is already frozen.”

“How are your stock doing?”

“Unhappy, but surviving. We’re spending an awful lot of time checking on them.”

A minute later, Jake pulled away from the house, leading the small convoy across his rangeland. They had to stop a few times while he opened gates to let them through, then waited while he closed them.

Jake had a decent-size ranch, but they could have gotten to the problem location faster on a galloping horse. They weren’t driving on a road, and Allison bounced up and down, her seat belt locking up frequently but preventing her head from hitting the roof of the car. Small mercies, she thought.

At last they came to what she would have guessed to be the farthest reach of his range, judging by the stream that still rippled and sparkled in the sunlight and the almost abrupt rise of the ground toward the mountains just beyond it.

An area was surrounded by yellow tape, and no cattle were in sight anywhere.

Jake climbed out and walked back to her as she exited her vehicle. Jerrod finally decided to emerge from his truck and she made introductions. The two men shook hands and exchanged measuring looks.

Jake got right to business. “Sheriff Dalton roped this off. It includes where we found the dead animal that might have been coyote bait, and the spot where my cows died and a considerable piece around it. For safety, I moved my stock to a different pasture.”

“Those pin flags? What are they?”

“The red one is where we found the bait. The yellow ones are where we found the cows. They didn’t get very far, but you could see where they convulsed and vomited before we got this fresh snow.”

“Damn,” Allison whispered.

“What?” Jerrod asked.

“I get that cows don’t move far very fast usually, but this toxin affects the nervous system and brain. Most animals when they’re exposed will run crazily, have seizures, try to bite at themselves. In short, I would have expected the cows to travel farther.”

Jake looked at her. “You think the toxin was that strong that it killed fast?”

“They had to be eight hundred or so pounds?”

“They’re Angus. They both tipped the scales close to a thousand.”

“Damn,” Allison murmured. “That was a lot of poison.”

“Did you get results from the state lab?”

“Only as to what kind of poison. They haven’t given me concentrations. I guess I need to call them Monday. I’m also wondering how they could have gotten so much of it. A little meltwater....” She trailed off, trying to imagine it. “Given what cows eat, this is weird.”

“Scary, too,” Jake said. “I’m still amazed my dogs didn’t get into the bait. They should have found it irresistible.”

“Given that the poison is odorless and tasteless, yes, they should have. Maybe the cows’ reactions were so fast they moved away.”

“They sure moved the rest of the herd away.” Jake shook his head. “Well, I’ll leave you to it. I’d like some answers, but I’m not expecting them overnight.”

He nodded to her and Jerrod, climbed back into his truck and drove toward the ranch house.

Allison stood looking at the roped-off area, feeling utterly creeped out.

“Maybe,” Jerrod said presently, “you should have a whole decon team out here.”

“It’s crossing my mind. I’m trying to think of all the ways that quantity of poison could have wound up here. A single bait? It seems a reach. Maybe someone was screwing around out here doing something they shouldn’t have been doing and spilled a bunch of the stuff. I told you how little it takes. But in terms of its effects on those cows, I’m thinking it was more than a teeny bit.”

“Yeah. Enough to kill five or six men?”

“Or maybe cows react differently. I need to talk to someone after I get done here. The thing is, that poison usually takes a couple of hours to start working. That makes it even stranger that the cows and the bait were found so close together. They should have wandered away before it hit, even if they were grazing normally.”

“Unless the supposed bait was still wandering itself when it got here.”

“Which opens up a whole other can of worms. Where had it been? Where did it find the toxin? How far had it come?” She shook her head. “I’m going to get my gear. Maybe you should stay outside this circle.”

He didn’t look as if that sat well with him, at least insofar as she could tell from his stony facade, but too bad. She had the gear to protect herself, and he didn’t.

Five minutes later she had disposable decon boots pulled up to her knees and big rubber gloves over her hands that reached up to her elbows even over her snowsuit. Then she picked up her sample case, corer and a shovel and headed for the circle.

Given what she had just learned, this was no longer looking like such an easy job. If the quantity of toxin was truly large, it could be all over by now. Some would have broken down, but she wondered how well. She had no idea how it reacted to the cold. She understood that fungi in the dirt would break it down, but how active were they near the surface now that it was so cold? Either way, she needed to be extremely cautious that she didn’t carry the toxin out of this area in any way.

So many variables right now that could make everything worse.

She ducked under the tape, then reached back for her supplies. It was going to be a long morning.

* * *

Jerrod watched her work, pacing around the outer edge of the delimited area. He figured he could help her if he had the protective gear, and he decided to ask her if she had any spares, and if he could help in some way. He got her concerns about exposure, but it was a lot of work for one person, he thought as he watched her use the snow shovel to clear away the snow, then twist her manual coring tool into the ground, pulling up samples that were at least six inches long. She strained occasionally as she met a particularly hard piece of ground, but as the hours passed she piled her small core samples, carefully labeled according to some grid system, into her case just outside the ring.

And everywhere she drilled, she added a blue pin flag.

Eventually, the place was fluttering with flags. She made her way back to the edge of the tape. “Can you get one of the big trash bags out of the back of my car? I need to ditch my rubber gloves and boots.”

He brought her the bag, watching the caution she exercised in removing the boots and gloves and stuffing them into the bag he held open. “Please seal it,” she said.

So she was worried she might have picked up contaminants. Great. He looked around again, wondering if it had ever crossed her mind to consider that someone might get upset if he or she thought Allison could track the toxin back to its origins. Then he remembered she had said that would probably be impossible. Given the way this crap spread, he supposed she was right. It all depended on whether the guy who’d done this understood that.

“What now?” he asked as he stood holding the tied-off bag and she bent to pick up her gear.

“I’m going to take a few samples outside the perimeter, then I want to go downstream and take some water samples.”

He looked at her, thinking that even after all that labor she was looking cold. “You should have brought a thermos of coffee. You’re chilled.”

“Rule one when dealing with toxic substances. Don’t eat or drink.”

“Bad enough you have to breathe, huh?”

She surprised him with a laugh. “Maybe. But I think the snowfall took care of that.”

He felt his lips twitch, wanting to join her laughter. The feeling surprised him. “Well, I’ve been standing here, too. I’d hate to spread it. What’s the likelihood I’m carrying some of this stuff right now?”

“Low. You’re uphill.” She waved her arm. “Just a couple more samples farther out, then we’ll drive along the stream.”

Her competence made him feel comfortable. He liked being around people who knew what they were doing, always had. The fact that he was the tyro here didn’t bother him. He was learning.

And even in that snowmobile suit she looked tempting enough to eat.

He watched her study the terrain, keeping his mouth shut, refusing to insult her by speaking. He was a capable judge of terrain himself, extremely capable, but she didn’t seem to need his help at all.

The back of his neck prickled. Moving slowly, he turned to scan the area. Someone was watching them, someone he couldn’t see. He knew it as sure as he was standing there.

But who? A hunter? Someone who wanted to keep an eye on Allison’s activities?

But then the feeling faded. Probably just a hunter, he told himself. Although given that everyone by now had probably heard of the poison, he was surprised that anyone would want to hunt in the area.

“Have they warned hunters?” he asked.

“You bet,” she answered, then marched away toward the stream’s edge where she took a few more ground samples. Then they were off, bucking alongside the stream.

It struck Jerrod that while he was of no real use, this was still the most useful day he’d spent in a while.

“Damn, man,” he said aloud, “you’ve got to get your act together soon.”

* * *

The daylight was fading by the time they got back to town. Allison had driven farther along the stream than he’d expected, and stopped frequently to take samples from the bank and the water. By the time she was done, the back of her vehicle was loaded with samples and she’d used quite a few pairs of gloves. He guessed the next time she went, if she did, she wouldn’t have any trouble giving him some protective gear so he could help. She also skipped stopping back at the ranch house for a hot drink. It was getting late.

“Want me to help you unload?” he asked when they had parked. He crossed the small space between their two driveways easily this time.

“Nothing leaves my car until the state comes for it. Why don’t you come in for some coffee? And I think I have some lasagna I can heat for the two of us.”

It would have been smart to say no, but instead, a different word popped out. “Thanks.”

Being with her all day had been easy. No reason to think another hour or so wouldn’t be just as easy. Nothing about her was pushy or intrusive.

He paused once again and scanned the street. That made twice today he’d felt watched. The uneasiness began to creep along his nerves again, a feeling he usually only had on missions, but a feeling that had too often been his companion since he’d returned to civilian life. Like some kind of training he couldn’t shake.

But the street was quiet and growing dark, and this was a safe little town in the middle of nowhere. It was as if his brain was trying to take him back to places he no longer needed to go. Not at all. Or as if he couldn’t let go of an adrenaline addiction.

Yeah, that was probably all it was. Imagining things because he was used to a whole different kind of life, one full of threats. Years of training he couldn’t quite shake.

He blew a disgusted breath and followed Allison into her house. This adjustment thing was too much. Ridiculous.

Hell, he’d even lost his sense of humor, although he supposed the kind of black humor he and his team had often indulged in probably wouldn’t fly well with civilians. But he clearly remembered it, remembered how often they had found reasons to kid around. It was a great way to break tension.

He hadn’t laughed since he’d wound up in the hospital the last time. Man, he needed to shake himself up good. Rattle his head until it settled into this new world.

Inside, he found Allison in the kitchen. Evidently she was still cold because she hadn’t even unzipped her suit yet. He needed to get one of those for himself, if the past few days were any indication of what he could expect here. A parka and jeans weren’t making it.

Assuming he stayed here, of course. He wasn’t even sure about that yet.

“Grab a chair,” she said cheerfully. “I may thaw by tomorrow.”

“And here I am looking at that snowmobile suit of yours with envy.”

“I can see why,” she answered, running her eyes over him. He didn’t miss the appreciative glimmer in them as he ditched his parka. Despite everything, he’d kept himself in fighting trim. His shoulders weren’t quite as broad since he hadn’t weight trained in a while, but all the walking and running, along with calisthenics, had at least kept his belly flat and the rest of him lean enough.

He held her gaze for just an instant, long enough to feel the sizzle himself, and wondered how it was that a woman bundled up almost like a polar bear could get to him like this.

The coffeemaker started brewing. “I’ll be right back,” she said. “I want to change.”

Back into her sweats, he supposed. He could understand why. Even after the cold they’d endured all day, he could tell she didn’t keep her house that warm.

Five minutes later she was back, this time wearing a sweat suit that looked relatively new, a gold one that emphasized the unusual color of her eyes. Peeking out beneath the sweats were fuzzy booties in an astonishing hot pink. He blinked.

“No fashion sense, I know,” she remarked. She waggled a foot at him. “But they’re warm. Very warm.”

That was when he smiled, genuinely smiled, for the first time in a long, long time. “I like them. I wouldn’t advise them if you don’t want to be noticed, though.”

A peal of laughter escaped her. “We need to get something straight.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m a flaky professor. And I like the flaky part. As well as the professor part.”

“Nothing wrong with being flaky.”

The coffee finished as she popped a frozen lasagna in the oven. It looked homemade, and the thought made him instantly hungry. She brought two mugs of coffee over to the table and joined him.

“There are some things I’m not flaky about,” she said, continuing the conversation. “Like my work. There I have to be very precise. No flakiness allowed.”

“So it bursts out other ways?”

Her eyes smiled at him over the rim of her cup. “Obviously.”

“What happens now with those samples?” he asked. “Do you test them?”

She shook her head. “The state lab is sending someone down to pick them up. I don’t know where they go from there. Could be Washington, for all I know. I just don’t have the facilities in my lab to test for something like this. It’s a community college with limited equipment.”

“Given what you told me about this toxin, can I say I’m glad to hear that?”

“I’m not real keen on working with it myself.”

“But you still collected the samples.”

She waved a hand. “It wasn’t the biggest of risks. I’ll need to collect some more, though, attack a bigger area. We don’t know where that bait came from. If it was a poisoned animal, there could be trouble elsewhere, like up in the mountains.”

“You’d need more than one person to search up there.”

“Well, I can circumscribe an area, guessing how far the bait animal could have traveled. Or how far something that ate some of it might have gone. That’s a good starting point. I’ll check for other carcasses, take a few samples as I go. Then we’ll see. By the time I do that, I should have some information back from the lab. This is going to be a priority. Those samples will get tested as soon as they reach the right person.”

He nodded.

She sighed and put her chin in her hand. “It’s going to be tough, though. We’re going to be relying a lot on hunters to report anything unusual.” She closed her eyes a moment. “Enough of that,” she said, snapping them open again. “If I think too hard about it I’ll feel overwhelmed.”

“But you’re fairly certain you won’t be able to source it?”

“Not likely. Now, if the bait were wearing a tag or collar...” She shrugged.

“Would someone have that kind of a grudge against Jake Madison?”

“Wow,” she murmured. “That’s scary to contemplate. It’s possible, though. He’s the chief of police, such as it is, and his fiancée’s dad is angry with him, I hear, but to do something like this?” She shook her head a little. “Is this how you think?”

He pulled back. Tendrils of ice filled him inside. Before he could say anything, however, she spoke quickly.

“I’m sorry. That didn’t sound like what I meant. You have to understand you’re talking to a small-town girl here. We almost never have things go to that extreme. But you’re right, it’s possible. I need to think about it.”

He relaxed again, muscle by muscle, and tried to do his part to smooth it over. Here he was enjoying a woman’s company for the first time in forever, and he’d stuck his foot in it.

But it was still possible. Like it or not, this could have been a directed attack. And if that was the case, Allison could be inserting herself in the middle of something that could be deadly.

He needed to gather intel, but how the hell was he supposed to do that? Nobody in this town was likely to share much with him. He was a stranger and a total unknown.

But he remembered that sense of being watched, both out on the rangeland, and then here on her street. He trusted that feeling. It had never yet failed him, and had probably saved his life more than once. He’d be a fool to dismiss it.

Allison might be wading into deeper trouble than she had any idea. He came from a world where such things were possible. She did not. Yet just being aware of such a possibility might make all the difference.

She sort of changed the subject then, as if she wasn’t ready to deal with what he had suggested.

“So,” she said, a twinkle in those sherry-brown eyes, “how miserable were you standing out there in the cold while I took the samples?”

“I’ve endured worse. But next time it would be nice if you’d let me help.”

“That might be arranged.”

“Good. I hate feeling useless.”

She studied him, and after a minute he started wondering what she was seeing, other than that knife slash across his cheek. He liked to think he was impenetrable unless he chose otherwise, but he had the uneasy feeling that she might be able to see right into him.

“You’re young,” she said suddenly.

“Young?” The idea didn’t fit his self-image at all.

“Agewise,” she explained. “Not experiencewise. I can already tell you’ve probably had a lifetime of experiences I’ll never know or even understand. No, I was just thinking you look maybe thirty?”

“Thirty-three.”

She nodded. “So you didn’t want to stay in the military until retirement?”

“It wasn’t a choice. Medical separation.”

She drew a breath. “Wounded?”

“Yeah.” No details. The last thing he wanted was sympathy. In life you made your choices and lived with the consequences. He’d made his.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “And that probably sounds empty. But I am. I hope you’re okay.”

“Okay enough.”

She frowned faintly. He wondered if she had any idea just how revealing her face was. He enjoyed the chase of expressions across it. “I suppose I can’t ask what that means?”

“I’m walking and talking. That’s okay.”

She gave a little nod. “Fair enough. And you can’t talk about any of it?”

“Not much. Most of my life is classified now.”

“Well, that’ll make getting to know you an adventure.”

He laughed. He had to, because of the way she rolled her eyes.

“I can’t play truth or dare with you,” he said presently. “But I can tell you a few things.”

“I’m all ears,” she said drily.

“I graduated from Annapolis. I took some training at Quantico, and then some other places.”

She perked a little. “Do you happen to know Seth Hardin?”

“I’ve met him a few times. Briefly.”

“Aha!”

“What?”

“That explains why you wound up in the middle of nowhere. I was wondering. Okay. I won’t bug you about the rest. I heard Seth say once that most of his life was redacted.”

Another laugh escaped him. “That about covers it.” He wondered if she realized that her eyes were devouring him and awakening a hunger in him. Probably not. He doubted she had any notion of how easy she was to read.

“SEAL?”

He shook his head. “I can’t tell you.”

Her eyes widened a bit. “You mean there are units nobody ever hears about?”

“I can’t tell you that, either.”

“I think you just did. Okay, I won’t bug you, promise. Even if I die of curiosity. But if you’re thinking of hanging around here for a while, you need to meet Seth’s family. His father and a couple of his sisters would be just about the only entrée you need around here.”

An entrée? That snagged his attention. An entrée meant intelligence, and he still wanted a better sense of what Allison might be getting into.

“Okay,” he said. “Should I just go over and introduce myself?”

“You could, but Marge might overwhelm you. She mothers everybody.” She paused. “I’ll find a way for you to meet his dad. Tomorrow. He used to be a Green Beret, so I guess he’ll understand what redacted means better than I ever could. He used to be the sheriff here and knows everybody.”

Exactly the man he wanted to meet, Jerrod thought. Handed to him out of the blue. Funny how those things worked sometimes.

The aroma of the lasagna was beginning to fill the kitchen now, and his stomach rumbled loudly as if it couldn’t wait.

Allison laughed. “Twenty more minutes. Sorry.”

“I’ll survive.” He was pretty sure of that. He’d been surviving for a long time.

Chapter 3

Allison awoke Monday morning after the worst night ever. Well, maybe the flu had been worse, but last night had been something else. How many times had she wakened from barely remembered dreams that had left her aching with desire? Heck, she hadn’t even done that in high school.

Jerrod Marquette was certainly getting to her, and doing it in ways she didn’t want. The man had materialized out of nowhere, couldn’t talk much about himself and gave her the distinct feeling that he might evaporate at any moment.

He certainly wasn’t planted here, and to her way of thinking that was as big a problem as the secrecy imposed on him. She’d lost everyone in her life who had mattered to her, except some girlfriends, and she didn’t want to risk any more. Jerrod struck her as a huge risk.

He certainly was as zipped up as anyone she’d ever met. Maybe more so. Seth Hardin came across as an ordinary guy, easy to talk to, with a sense of humor that sometimes bordered on the wicked. Nor was Seth the only other former special-ops guy in the county. Nate Tate, the former sheriff and Green Beret, seemed to attract them. Or at least if they wanted to hang around, he helped make it possible.

When she thought about it, she almost laughed and spewed her toothpaste. This county probably had more guys with a background in special ops per capita than any place other than a military base.

She rinsed the toothbrush, decided last night’s shower could carry over because the house was so cold this morning and climbed into her warmest clothes for work.

“Climate change,” she muttered as she looked at her thermostat to ensure it had readjusted itself for the day.

She called Nate as she climbed into her frozen car and tried not to hop up and down on the seat from the cold. Sheesh. At least her cell phone was warm as she put it to her ear, waiting for the engine to warm up before she started driving.

“Nate Tate,” the familiar gravelly voice answered.

“Hi, Nate, it’s Allison McMann. I have a rescue mission for you.”

“Yeah?” He sounded interested. “And how are you doing? Collecting those samples?”

“I’ve got a bunch in my trunk, but I think I’m going to need to branch out to be safe.”

“Probably.” He sighed. “Damn fool thing to do. There are better ways to protect stock.”

“Nobody can afford cowboys and herders anymore.”

“So I hear. But they got paid squat even in my youth. Just about enough to tie one on when they came in from the range. So what’s this rescue mission?”

“I have a new neighbor.”

“I heard.”

There was nothing Nate didn’t hear, so she wasn’t surprised. “He seems okay. One of your kind of guys.”

“Meaning?”

“He said most of his life was classified.”

“Ah. And you want?”

“It’d be nice if he met someone besides me. Someone who gets where he’s coming from. He seemed interested when I mentioned you.”

“I’ll introduce myself, then. He at home now?”

“His truck’s in the driveway. I’m getting ready to go teach a bunch of bored students about the Avogadro constant.”

Nate ripped out a laugh. “You’re over my head already. Okay, I’ll drop on over.”

“One warning,” she added before she disconnected. “He’s the most buttoned-up guy I’ve ever met. Thanks, Nate.”

She shoved the phone back in her pocket and felt some warmth coming out of the heater vents at last. Time to go to work.

Definitely time to put Jerrod out of her mind and settle down her crazy hormones. Man, if she had to get the hots for someone suddenly, why couldn’t it have been one of her fellow teachers? Not some guy who wouldn’t or couldn’t talk about himself, a guy who would actually think of things like someone pulling this stunt with a deadly toxin because they had a grudge against Jake Madison.

That was so far outside her world it astonished her, and it was also a world she didn’t want to enter. Not even tangentially.

Oh, God, had she actually told him he could help collect samples next time she went out? She ought to be barring the barn door before the horse escaped, ought to be avoiding a situation with trouble written all over it in neon capital letters. One broken heart was enough for a lifetime.

Maybe she could just forget. Kind of space it, and just go off by herself on her next collection. Distance seemed like a great choice right now, the more, the better.

After debating whether to take the samples into her lab, she left them in the back of her locked car unless the state wanted her to do something different. She pulled out her cell again as she hurried toward the science building, calling her contact with the state.

“I’ll just come down and collect them from you today,” Dan Digby said. “Much safer than you handling them repeatedly.”

“They’re in the back of my car. Let me know when you get close.”

“Will do.”

Well, that solved one problem, but considering the rapidity with which she seemed to be accumulating new ones, she wasn’t sure that was such a great thing.

When she got to her classroom the first words she heard was a young man saying, “Global warming is a crock. Look at how cold it is right now!”

Oh, boy, she thought. Here we go. She dumped her laptop case and backpack on the table beside the podium and simply waited as the students settled. Quiet came quickly enough.

“Who’s heard of the Little Ice Age?” she asked casually.

A couple of hands rose tentatively, but nearly forty other students remained still.

“All right, let me do this quickly. It’s more interesting than Avogadro’s constant.”

Laughs. They were attentive now.

“The Little Ice Age started in the Middle Ages and didn’t fully end until late in the nineteenth century, just a little over a hundred years ago. I’m sure you’ve seen paintings of people from that era. Didn’t you ever wonder why Henry VIII was always painted wearing so many clothes? Or how people could wear the kinds of heavy clothing they did back then?”

Now she really had their attention. “Well, it was because it was cold. It was so cold that summers were short. People couldn’t grow the kinds of crops they once had. They were starving. It helped set them up for things like the Black Plague because the rats came into town for food.”

“Wow,” a couple of voices said.

“But we need to get to Avogadro, a very brilliant man, so I’ll just keep this short. During the early stages of the Little Ice Age, when the climate was starting to change, the weather went through wild swings for about two hundred years. They’d get a couple of really cold years, a couple of warm years, back and forth like a pendulum. Give that some thought. But only after you think about Avogadro.”

It seemed almost cruel to get on with her lecture, because she’d excited their interest and they wanted more. She kept a lid on it until after class. When students clustered around wanting to know more, she suggested they hit the computers and look it up.

“Do your own research,” she said, smiling. “Don’t take my word for it.”

It was kind of amusing, though, to realize she’d sparked the interest of quite a few of them, and of course it had not one darn thing to do with chemistry.

* * *

Jerrod was surprised at the knock on his door. He’d been here two weeks and not one person had knocked. Well, he might have missed some friendly overtures because he’d been so busy spending his days out in the countryside.

He went to answer it and saw a tall man with steel-gray hair and a weathered face. The man smiled and held out his hand. “Nate Tate. Allison called me this morning and suggested I stop by and introduce myself.”

“Jerrod Marquette. You must be the former sheriff?”

“That’s me.”

“I didn’t expect to meet you so soon.” He stepped back and waved the man inside. Tate looked around and Jerrod knew exactly what he saw: minimal signs of habitation, not even a chair to sit on.

“I’ve got coffee,” he offered.

“I never pass on a cup,” Tate answered.

The kitchen wasn’t any better. If anyone lived here, the only sign was the hot pot of coffee on the stove.

“Roughing it?” Tate asked.

“Still haven’t decided what I want to do.”

“That can be a big decision sometimes. I was lucky. I made the decision before I went to ’Nam, and she was still waiting for me when I got back.”

“That makes you a lucky man.”

“I guess you weren’t so lucky.”

“Lucky enough, just not that way.”

With no place to sit, Tate leaned back against the counter with his coffee. “Thick enough to stand a spoon in,” he remarked after he took a sip. “So what brought you to these parts?”

“Your son, I believe. Seth Hardin. I met him a few times and he always had great things to say about this place.”

“I should’ve figured my boy would be part of it.” Nate Tate smiled. “He’s liked it here since the first time he set foot in the county.”

Which opened the door to some questions, but Jerrod didn’t ask. He’d just met the guy. “I was out with Allison yesterday while she collected samples from the Madison ranch. It sounds bad.”

Tate’s face darkened. “Damn bad. I still don’t get why the Department of Agriculture is allowing the stuff to be used again in some states. I get that it’s in livestock collars. I get that coyotes can be a problem. I also get that this stuff is so dangerous it shouldn’t be permitted. Those collars get punctured. They get lost. And yeah, the poison deteriorates eventually, but how far will it spread before it does? Boggles my mind to think that killing one coyote might result in some bear dying, or some wolf, or poisoned water....” He shook his head.

“Why do they put so much poison in the collars? Allison said it’s enough to kill six grown men. Coyotes aren’t that big.”

“Sure kill,” Tate said. “One nip, a little on a canine tooth, and the coyote will bite the dust. From that perspective, and only that perspective, does it make sense.”

Jerrod nodded, taking a gulp of coffee. Hot and bitter, it slid down his welcoming throat. “Nobody’s worried it might kill their animals?”

“Some aren’t, apparently. Most of the time a grazing animal wouldn’t be affected, and since the coyote runs away he’s not likely to poison anything else until he gets sick and dies. Then you get a case like Madison’s.” Tate shook his head again.

“Would anybody do that deliberately to Madison? Have a grudge that big?”

Tate’s eyes narrowed, even as his lips stretched in a humorless smile. “Anything’s possible. Thing is, though, around here you might have a grudge, but you don’t mess with a man’s stock. That’s a killing offense in these parts.”

“Really?” Apparently some of the Wild West still survived out here.

“You get caught at it, somebody might take the law into their own hands. We have some rustling problems from time to time, and no jury around here would convict a rancher who shot a rustler. Or someone caught poisoning a rancher’s land or stock. No, you got a problem with someone, you’d best take it up with them directly.”

“So it was probably some kind of accident.”

“Probably. A bad one, though. If we ever found out where it came from, somebody would be paying for two Angus cows and maybe a little more, besides. I sure wish we could find out where it started.”

“Allison doesn’t think that’s likely.”

Tate sighed. “Mebbe not. Likely not. What little I know about that toxin gives me a real bad feeling, and the way it spreads makes it almost impossible to trace.” He cocked a brow at Jerrod. “So you went out with her on Saturday? You keeping an eye on her?”

“I thought she shouldn’t be out there alone. In case.”

“There’re a lot of in cases out there. Especially when the snow covers things. From prairie-dog holes on up. I don’t think cell phones work any too good out at the Madison place.”

“I didn’t think so. Which brings me around to something else.”

Tate nodded. “She ought to have a radio. I’ll stop by the office and talk to Gage Dalton. He’s the new sheriff.” Tate suddenly laughed. “Been a while since I retired, but he’s probably always going to be the new sheriff. Anyway, I’ll have a word with him. Chances are Allison won’t get around to it.”

He turned and dumped the dregs of his coffee into the sink. “I’ll think on what you said about a grudge. Don’t want to dismiss any possibility. In the meantime, you keep an eye on that young woman. I reckon you’re good at that.”

“It’s not exactly something I’ve done before, but I get the basics.”

Tate’s gaze measured him. “Reckon you do,” he said finally. “Who were you with?”

“Can’t say.”

“Like that, is it?” The former sheriff let it drop. “You need anything, give me a shout. And if you get to feeling sociable, I got a wife who loves nothing better than a guest for dinner.”

When Tate walked out, Jerrod was left holding his card. He stared at it, figuring he had just found an ally who could help with intel.

So Tate didn’t think it was likely someone had a score to settle with Madison. That was good to know, but it opened up some questions, like who and why? Just an accident?

It had been a long time since Jerrod had given much credence to accidents. Just like he wasn’t ready to give credence to the idea that they’d never be able to find the person who was responsible for the poison. It might be difficult, but not necessarily impossible. And what if the person responsible for the release had something to hide? Say, some illicit stock of the poison that wasn’t in collars at all. That would fit better with the idea of those cows ingesting some. In which case, somebody could have a whole lot of reasons for stopping Allison.

Remembering the way he’d felt watched out there, then later here on the street, he couldn’t dismiss the possibility out of hand.

Of course, it was always possible that he was trying to act on training that had no place here in his new life. Maybe he wanted to believe this because it gave him a purpose again.

If so, he might be worse off than he thought.

Grabbing his jacket, he decided to head over to the college and see if he could find Allison. Just a friendly gesture, an offer to take her out for lunch. It seemed the least he could do after that wonderful lasagna the other night.

Or maybe it was because his whole body was humming like a homing beacon, dragging him toward her.

He snorted, but didn’t fight it. She was interested in him, too, and she was a grown woman who could make her own decisions.

Whether he’d be good for her didn’t even enter into it. That was her decision.

Besides, he’d all but promised to keep an eye on her.

* * *

Allison stood looking at the back of her sporty SUV with dismay. Somebody had tried to smash the tailgate window. Trying to get at the samples? But why?

They hadn’t broken in, though. The car was still locked, the window was crazed with cracks and dented in at one place, but nobody had gotten in. So why?

It would be easy enough to take a swing at her car in the faculty lot. Even now, as lunch hour approached, there wasn’t another soul around. There rarely was except in the early morning or late afternoon. Unlike the student parking lot, this one was seldom busy.

Well, if they’d wanted the samples, it wouldn’t have taken much more work to get at them. Why would anyone want them, anyway? They might be dangerous, and it wasn’t as if she couldn’t just go out to collect some more.

Swearing softly, she pulled out her phone to call campus security. Dan Digby was going to be here shortly, and he’d be thrilled to find out that his trip had been lengthened by this. She probably wouldn’t even be allowed to open her car until someone had gone over it.

Not that the campus had much of a security force. There’d likely be another delay as they called the sheriff. She sighed this time. Just lovely.

She shivered a little in the cold. She really hadn’t dressed for standing out here long, but she didn’t feel she could step inside a building. What if someone saw this as an opportunity to get into her car and look for money or something? They might get exposed to that toxin.

Security didn’t keep her waiting long. Well, of course not. They generally had little to do on this small campus. Ben Herbert climbed out of the car, took one look at her and the window and said, “Climb in my passenger seat before you freeze. I called the sheriff.”

“I thought you would. Has there been a rash of this?” she asked hopefully. It would be so nice to feel this wasn’t directed at her.

“No,” he answered bluntly. “Probably some stupid kid who did it on a dare, though. You wouldn’t believe how much craziness happens on a dare. Maybe even fraternity hazing of some kind.”

She liked that idea. She slid into his car, which was still running and blasting welcome heat. Even though she was wearing lined gloves, she held them out to the heater vent. Too much cold, too much snow. If this was the harbinger of the kind of winter it was going to be, everyone was going to wind up wishing they lived in igloos. At least the heating costs would go down.

A sheriff’s car pulled up just minutes later. It was followed by a police car, this one piloted by the chief, Jake Madison. The deputy turned out to be Sarah Ironheart. Allison was almost amused by the fact that her broken window had drawn so much attention. That a broken car window could be such a big deal gave her some idea how little happened around here. Although on the same day they found the dead cows, they’d had that killer from Minneapolis show up and try to take out Jake’s fiancée, Nora.

Crap, maybe things weren’t as quiet around here as everyone liked to pretend, now that she thought about it.

She opened the door and leaned out of the car. “Don’t touch anything inside the back of my car. I’ve got soil samples, water samples and a bag full of possibly contaminated gear in there.”

Jake looked at her. “From Saturday?”

“Yeah. Dan Digby, from the state, should be here any minute to pick it up.”

“He might have to wait a few,” Sarah said. Holding a camera, she started taking pictures.

“I’m sure it’s just a prank,” Ben Herbert said. “We get all kinds of pranks here.”

“Pretty expensive prank,” Jake remarked. He looked at Sarah. “You want to dust or you want me to?”

She shrugged. “I’m voting baseball bat and not one fingerprint.”

“You’re probably right.”

Which meant, Allison thought, they’d never figure out who did it. Oh, well.

Just then they were joined by Jerrod Marquette. Allison heard his step and turned to see who it was. She felt startled that he’d followed her here, but was glad to see him, more so because she hadn’t even caught a glimpse of him yesterday. Of course, she had told him she would be grading papers on Sunday, so apparently he was respectful of her time. Nice.

“Hi,” he said. He clearly had already taken in the scene. “I came to buy you lunch. Looks like that’ll have to wait. What happened?”

“Baseball bat? Nobody knows. They didn’t try to get into the car, though.”

“Lucky for them if that stuff in there is toxic.”

“I just warned everyone.”

He squatted down beside her. “I’m sorry this happened.”

“Me, too. But at least they didn’t break the windshield completely. I can probably tape it and wait until the auto repair shop gets a new one in.”

“Probably.”

She glanced at him and realized his gaze was fixed on her. Immediately, her insides sparked in response. Boy, she was getting it bad. Not good.

“Why don’t you scoot in and close the door so you can keep warm,” he suggested quietly.

“I’m waiting for Dan Digby from the state.”

“Do you know him?” He barely waited for her nod. “Then you’ll recognize him as soon as he gets out of his car.”

He had a point. “But what about you?”

“I’m fine. I ran over here. It warmed me up nicely. If I get cold, I’ll run around the parking lot.”

So she pulled her legs in and let him close the door for her. Then he went over and shook hands with Jake Madison, and was clearly introduced to Sarah and Ben. She wondered briefly if they’d be suspicious of him because he was a newcomer, but body language belied that. Finally impatient because she couldn’t hear what was going on, she climbed back out into the cold.

They were beginning to collect a small crowd of gawking students as Jake dutifully covered the back end of her car with black fingerprint dust. She figured the students wouldn’t be here long. The wind seemed to be growing more bitter by the second.

“Well?” she asked as she approached the knot of cops.

Jake looked at her with amusement. “You want a complete forensic analysis in ten minutes?”

“No, but a short one would do.”

“Blunt object. And Ben’s probably right about it being a bad prank, or some kind of hazing. Unless you gave someone a failing grade recently?”

He was serious, she realized. “Not recently. Whether they like the subject or not, no one is taking chemistry who doesn’t need it for a reason. Almost everyone works hard. It’s been a couple of semesters since I last failed someone.”

Jake nodded and looked at Sarah. “It doesn’t look angry.”

She agreed. “Angry would have involved more than one heavy swing. I’d expect your entire tailgate and maybe other parts of the car to be involved.”

“Unless,” said Jerrod, “they got scared away by something.”

Allison looked at him. “What’s that mean?”

“Probably nothing at all.”

But Jake and Sarah didn’t take it that way. “That’s a possibility. It happened since you got here this morning, right?”

“Some time in the past three hours.”

Just then a car pulled into the lot. It bore the state emblem on the side and parked close before Dan Digby climbed out. A balding, slightly portly man of about fifty, he quickly pulled on a fur hat and looked around. “What the hell?”

“Vandalism,” Ben Herbert said, stepping forward. He’d been quick enough to call the police, but apparently he wasn’t going to relinquish all authority here. Allison felt a flutter of amusement run through her, despite her anger about her rear window. Watching men could sometimes be downright amusing.

Dan ignored Ben and came hurrying over. “Are you all right, Allison?”

“Of course. I wasn’t here when it happened. And it really does look like somebody’s bad idea of a prank.”

“Hazing,” Ben said knowingly.

Digby glanced at him and nodded. “Just so long as everyone’s okay. But I suppose my samples are in there.”

“Yes, they are,” Allison answered. “You’d suggested that. Are you in a hurry?”

He flashed a surprisingly charming smile. “Only to get out of this cold.”

“It’ll only be a few more minutes,” Jake told him. “We’re almost done. Why don’t you keep warm in your vehicle?”

“Because this is more interesting,” Digby answered frankly. He pulled down the earflaps on his hat, then snapped the strap under his chin.

“Allison?” Sarah said. “Walk around your car and make sure nothing else appears damaged.”

She did as asked, but didn’t see one ding or scratch that she didn’t recognize.

Jake shook his head. “Protocol says we should dust the entire car in case someone tried to enter it, especially the driver’s side. But who’d be out here without gloves?”

“Skip it,” Allison said. “Only a lunatic would pull his gloves off to try a car door latch. Not today. Can we get Dan’s samples now?”

“Before we all freeze to death?” Sarah said with a humorous smile. “I think we’re done. No prints. Of course, the cold isn’t helping with that, either.”

“I guess I’m going to find out if duct tape sticks at this temperature,” Allison remarked as she opened the tailgate. Five minutes later, Dan Digby drove away with the samples, leaving her fresh core tubes to use, as well as additional sets of gloves and booties. The parking lot emptied out and she turned toward Jerrod, who was now bouncing from foot to foot to stay warm.

“I’m rescuing you,” she said. “Climb in. At least you’ll be out of the wind.”

It was picking up again, as if the air wanted to snatch the last heat it could from them.

In the driver’s seat, turning the engine over, she realized that she could hear the wind whistling inside the cab of her car now. Apparently some of those cracks had gone all the way through even though it was safety glass. Hell, she hoped the damn thing didn’t fall out.

Given that the last temperature she had seen said it was about eighteen degrees out, she let the engine warm up again. “Guess I’m going to have to plug in tonight,” she remarked.

“Plug in?” Jerrod asked.

“Engine block heater. I can tell you’ve never had a vehicle in a climate as cold as this.”

“Not usually. Once I was inserted, I hoofed it.”

That told her a lot, she supposed, or maybe nothing at all. “Back in the old days, when it got really cold, people would drain the oil from their cars and bring it inside, then put it back in the car in the morning. The block heater is a lot more convenient, but you can use an electric blanket under the hood, too.”

“Things I never thought about.”

The engine was starting to put out some heat, so she figured it was warm enough to drive. “It’s kind of you to want to take me to lunch.”

“Well, given a choice of eating alone or eating with you...” Then he laughed. She looked at him, wondering how to take that and then saw the heat in his gaze. Instantly, she blushed. He wanted her. Wow. Too bad he didn’t have any idea what he might be getting into. She dragged her gaze from him, telling her body to shut up. She knew this could lead nowhere good. Maybe she should have refused the lunch, but the rudeness... She sighed and gave in. No way could she insult him by refusing his invitation. She was going to have to find another kind of armor. Trying to sound businesslike, she asked, “Where did you want to have lunch? It’s not like we have an abundance of choices.”

“The diner downtown is pretty good.”

“Sure, if you can take Maude.”

He chuckled quietly. “She doesn’t bug me.”

“She’d be disappointed to hear that.”

The whistling from her back window worsened as she drove. She hoped it wasn’t an omen. She hoped she was right, that no one would have a reason to come after her just for taking soil samples. That no one was stupid enough to think she could find out who had done this thing.

She hoped the uneasiness that Jerrod had inadvertently wedged into her life with his comment about grudges was unnecessary.

She hoped life wasn’t about to change for the worse in a big way.

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