Читать книгу Hot Target - Elle James - Страница 10
ОглавлениеCaveman shook his head as he stared down at the strange woman. “Shoot you? I don’t even know you,” he muttered. He glanced around, searching for others in the area. She had to have a reason to think he was there to kill her.
He ran his gaze over her body, searching for wounds. Other than the bump on her forehead, she appeared to be okay, despite being tossed by her horse.
The animal had recovered his footing and taken off toward the highway.
Caveman would have the sheriff come out and retrieve the horse. For now, the woman needed to be taken to the hospital. He ran back to his truck for his cell phone, knowing the chances it would work out there were slim to none. But he had to try. He checked. No service.
How the heck was he supposed to call for an airlift? Then he remembered where he was. The foothills of the Beartooth Mountains. He didn’t have the radio communications he was used to, or the helicopter support to bring injured teammates out of a bad situation.
With no other choice, he threw open the truck’s rear door, returned to the woman, scooped her up in his arms and carried her to his truck. Carefully laying her on the backseat, he buckled a seat belt around her hips and stared down at her. Just to make certain she was still alive, he checked for a pulse.
Still beating. Good.
She had straight, sandy-blond hair, clear, makeup-free skin and appeared to be somewhere between twenty-five and thirty years old. The spill she’d taken from her horse could have caused a head, neck or back injury. If they weren’t in the mountains, where bears, wolves and other animals could find her, he would have left her lying still until a medic could bring a backboard, to avoid further injury. But out in the open, with wolves and grizzlies a real threat, Caveman couldn’t leave the woman.
He shut the door and climbed into the driver’s seat. The man he was supposed to meet out there would have to wait. This woman needed immediate medical attention.
As soon as he got closer to the little town of Grizzly Pass, he checked his phone for service. He had enough to get a call through to Kevin Garner. “Caveman here. I have an injured woman in the backseat of my truck. I’m taking her to the local clinic. You’ll have to send someone else out to meet with Mr. Khalig. I don’t know when I’ll get back out there.”
“Who’ve you got?” Kevin asked.
“I don’t know. She was thrown from the horse she was riding. She hasn’t been conscious long enough to tell me her life history, much less her name.”
“Grace,” a gravelly voice said from the backseat.
Caveman glanced over his shoulder.
“My name’s Grace Saunders.” The woman he’d settled on the backseat pushed to a sitting position and pressed a hand to the back of her head. “Who are you? Where am I?”
“I take it she’s awake?” Kevin said into Caveman’s ear.
“Roger.” He shot a glance at the rearview mirror, into the soft gray eyes of the woman he’d rescued. “Gotta go, Kevin. Will update you as soon as I know anything.”
“I’ll see if I can find someone I can send out to check on Mr. Khalig,” Kevin said.
His gaze moving from the road ahead to the reflection of the woman behind him, Caveman focused on Kevin’s words. “I found a truck and trailer where his office staff said it would be, but the man himself wasn’t anywhere nearby.”
“I suspect that truck and trailer either belong to the dead man or the man who was doing the shooting,” the woman in the backseat said.
“Dead man?” Caveman removed his foot from the accelerator. “What dead man? What shooting?”
“I’ll tell you when we get to town. Right now my head hurts.” She touched the lump on her forehead and winced. “Where are we going?”
He didn’t demand to know what she was talking about, knowing the woman needed medical attention after her fall. “To the clinic in Grizzly Pass.” He’d get the full story once she had been checked out.
“I don’t need to go to the clinic.” She leaned over the back of the seat and touched his shoulder. “Take me to the sheriff’s office.”
Caveman frowned. “Lady, you need to see a doctor. You were out cold.”
“My name is Grace, and I know what I need. And that’s to see the sheriff. Now.”
He glanced at her face in the mirror. “Okay, but if you pass out, I’m taking you to the clinic. No argument.”
“Deal.” She nodded toward the road ahead. “You’d better slow down or you’ll miss the turn.”
Caveman slammed on his brakes in time to pull into the parking lot.
Grace braced her hands on the backs of the seats and swayed with the vehicle as it made the sharp turn. “I was okay, until you nearly gave me whiplash.” She didn’t wait for him to come to a complete stop before she pushed open her door and dropped down from the truck, crumpling to the ground.
Out of the truck and around the front, Caveman bent to help, sliding his hands beneath her thighs. “We’re going to the clinic.”
She pushed him away. “I don’t need to be carried. I can stand on my own.”
“As you have so clearly demonstrated.” He drew in a breath and let it out slowly. “Fine. At least let me help you stand upright.” He slipped an arm around her waist and lifted her to her feet.
When she was standing on her own, she nodded. “I’ve got it now.”
“Uh-huh. Prove it.” He let go of her for a brief moment.
Grace swayed and would have fallen if he’d let her. But he didn’t. Instead he wrapped his arm around her waist again and led her into the sheriff’s office.
With his help, she made it inside to the front desk.
The deputy on the other side glanced up with a slight frown, his gaze on Caveman. “May I help you?” His frown deepened as he looked toward the woman leaning on Caveman. “Grace?” He popped up from his desk. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, Johnny. Is Sheriff Scott in? I need to talk to him ASAP.”
“Yeah. I’ll get him.” He glanced from her to Caveman and back. “As long as you’re okay.”
Anger simmered beneath the surface. Caveman glanced at the man’s name tag. “Deputy Pierce, just get the damn sheriff. I’m not going to hurt her. If I was, I would have left her lying where her horse threw her.”
The deputy’s lips twitched. “Going.” He spun on his heels and hurried through a door and down a hallway. A moment later, he returned with an older man, dressed in a similar tan shirt and brown slacks. “Grace, Johnny said you were thrown by your horse.” He held out his hand. “Shouldn’t you be at the clinic?”
Grace took the proffered hand and shook her head. “I don’t need to see a doctor. I need you and your men to follow me back out to the trail I was on. Now.”
“Why? What’s wrong?” Sheriff Scott squeezed her hand between both of his. “The wolves in trouble?”
“It’s not the wolves I’m worried about right now.” She drew in a deep breath. “There was a man. Actually there were two men.” She stiffened in the curve of Caveman’s arm. “Hell, Sheriff, I witnessed a murder.” She let her hand drop to her side as she sagged against Caveman. “I saw it all happen...and I was too far away...to do anything to stop it.” She sniffed. “You have to get out there. Just in case he isn’t dead. It’ll get dark soon. The wolves will find him.”
“Is that why you were riding your horse like you were?” Caveman asked.
She nodded. “That, and someone was shooting at me. That’s why Bear threw me.” Her head came up and she stared at the sheriff. “I need to find Bear. He’s running around out there, probably scared out of his mind.”
Sheriff Scott touched her arm. “I’ll send someone out to look for him and bring him back to your place.” He glanced at Caveman. “And you are?”
“Max Decker. But my friends call me Caveman.”
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed. “And what do you have to do with all of this?”
Grace leaned back and stared up at the man she’d been leaning on. “Yeah, why were you out in the middle of nowhere?”
“I was sent to check on a Mr. Khalig, a pipeline inspector for Rocky Mountain Pipeline Inc. I was told he’d been receiving threats.”
“RJ Khalig?” the sheriff asked.
Caveman nodded. “That’s the one.”
“He’s been a regular at the Blue Moose Tavern since he arrived in town a couple weeks ago. He’s staying at Mama Jo’s Bed-and-Breakfast,” Sheriff Scott added.
Grace shook her head. “I’ll bet he’s the man I saw get shot. He appeared to be checking some device in a valley when the shooter took him down.”
“What exactly did you see?” Sheriff Scott asked.
“Yeah,” Caveman said. “I’d like to know, as well.”
* * *
GRACE’S INSIDES CLENCHED and her pulse sped up. “I was searching for one of the wolves we’d collared last spring. His transponder still works, but hasn’t moved in the past two days. Either he’s lost his collar, or he’s dead. I needed to know.” Grace took a breath and let it out, the horror of the scene she’d witnessed threatening to overwhelm her.
“I was coming up to the top of a hill, hoping to see the wolf pack in the valley below, so I tied my horse to a tree short of the crown of the ridge. When I climbed to the crest, I saw a vehicle on a hilltop on the other side of the valley. It was an all-terrain vehicle, a four-wheeler. I thought maybe the rider had fallen off or was hurt, so I looked for him and spotted him in the shade of a tree, lying in the prone position on the ground, and he was aiming a rifle at something in the valley.” She twisted her fingers. “My first thought was of the wolves. But when I glanced down into the valley, the wolf pack wasn’t there. A man was squatting near the ground, looking at a handheld device.
“When I realized what was about to happen, I yelled. But not soon enough. The shooter fired his shot at the same time. The man in the valley didn’t have a chance.” She met the sheriff’s gaze. “I couldn’t even go check on him because the shooter must have heard my shout. The next thing I knew, he was aiming his rifle at me.” She shivered. “I got on my horse and raced to the bottom of the mountain.”
“And he followed?”
She nodded. “He shot at me a couple of times. I thought I might have outrun him, but he caught up about the time I reached the truck and trailer Mr. Decker mentioned. He shot at me, hit the truck, my horse threw me and I woke up in the backseat of Mr. Decker’s truck.” She inhaled deeply and let it all out. “We have to go back to that valley. If there’s even a chance Mr. Khalig is alive, he won’t be by morning.”
“I’ll take my men and check it out.”
Grace touched his arm. “I’m going with you. It’ll take less time for you to find him if I show you the exact location.”
“You need to see a doctor,” the sheriff said. “As you said, I don’t have time to wait for that.” He glanced at Caveman. “Do you want me to have one of my deputies take you to the clinic?”
Grace’s lips firmed into a straight line. “I’m not going to a clinic. I’m going back to check on that man. I won’t rest until I know what happened to him. If you won’t take me, I’ll get on my own four-wheeler and go up there. You’re going to need all-terrain vehicles, anyway. Your truck won’t make it up those trails.”
The sheriff nodded toward his deputy. “Load up the trailer with the two four-wheelers. We’re going into the mountains.” He faced Grace. “And we’re taking her with us.”
“I’ll meet you out at Khalig’s truck in fifteen minutes. It’ll take me that long to get to my place, grab my four-wheeler and get back to the location.” She faced Caveman. “Do you mind dropping me off at my house? It’s at the end of Main Street.”
“I’m going with you,” Caveman said.
“You’re under no obligation to,” she pointed out.
“No, but when you find an unconscious woman in the wilderness, you tend to invest in her well-being.” His eyes narrowed. He could be as stubborn as she was. “I’m going.”
“Do you have a four-wheeler?”
“No, but I know someone who probably does.” Given the mission of Task Force Safe Haven, Kevin Garner had to have the equipment he needed to navigate the rocky hills and trails. If not horses, he had to have four-wheelers.
“I’m not waiting for you,” Grace warned.
“You’re not leaving without me,” he countered.
“Is that a command?” She raised her brows. “I’ll have you know, I’ll do whatever the hell I please.”
Caveman sighed. “It’s a suggestion. Face it, if your shooter is still out there, you’ll need protection.”
“The sheriff and deputy will provide any protection I might need.”
“They will be busy processing a crime scene.”
“Then, I can take care of myself,” Grace said. “I’ve been going out in these mountains alone for nearly a decade. I don’t need a man to follow me, or protect me.”
The sheriff laid a hand on her arm. “Grace, he’s right. We’ll be busy processing a crime scene. Once you get us there, we won’t have time to keep an eye on you.”
“I can keep an eye on myself,” she said. “I’m the one person most interested in my own well-being.”
Caveman pressed a finger to her lips. “You’re an independent woman. I get that. But before now, you probably have never had someone shooting at you. I have.” He took her hand. “Even in the worst battlefield scenarios, I rely on my battle buddies to have my back. Let me get your back.”
For a moment, she stared at his hand holding hers. Then she glanced up into his gaze. “Fine. But if you can’t keep up, I’ll leave you behind.”
He nodded. “Deal.”
* * *
SHE GAVE THE truck and trailer’s location to the sheriff and the deputy. Because she didn’t want to slow them down from getting out to the site, she was forced to accept a ride from the man who’d picked her up off the ground and carried her around like she was little more than a child.
A shiver slipped through her at the thought of Caveman touching her body in places that hadn’t been touched by a man in too long. And he’d found her unconscious. Had she been in the city, anything could have happened to her. In the mountains, with a shooter after her, she hated to think what would have happened had Caveman not come along when he had.
If the killer hadn’t finished her off, the wolves, a bear, a mountain lion could have done it for him. Much as she hated to admit it, she was glad the stranger had come along and tucked her into the backseat of his truck.
“We’ll meet you in fifteen minutes,” Grace said to the sheriff.
He tipped his cowboy hat. “Roger.” Then he was all business back on the telephone before Grace made it to the door.
Once outside, Grace strode toward Caveman’s truck, now fully in control of the muscles in her legs. She didn’t need to lean on anyone. Nor did she need help getting up into the truck.
Caveman beat her to the truck and opened the passenger door.
She frowned at the gesture, seeing it as a challenge to her ability to take care of herself.
“Just so you don’t think I’m being chauvinistic, I always open doors for women. My mother drilled that into my head at a very young age. It’s a hard habit to break, and I have no intention of doing that now. It’s just being polite.”
Grace slid into the seat and gave a low-key grunt. “You don’t have to make a big deal out of it,” she said through clenched teeth.
Caveman rounded the front of the truck, his broad shoulders and trim waist evidence of a man who took pride in fitness. She’d bet there wasn’t an ounce of fat on his body, yet he didn’t strut to show off his physique. The man had purpose in his stride, and it wasn’t the purpose of looking good, though he’d accomplished that in spades. And he was polite, which made Grace feel churlish and unappreciative of all he’d done for her.
When he slid into the driver’s seat beside her, she stared straight ahead, her lips twisting into a wry smile. “Thank you for helping me when I was unconscious. And thank you for giving me a ride to my house.” She glanced across at him. “And thank you for opening my door for me. It’s nice to know chivalry isn’t dead.”
His lips twitched. “You’re welcome.” Twisting the key in the ignition, he shot a glance toward her. “Where to?”
She gave him the directions to her little cottage sitting on an acre of land on the edge of town. She hoped Bear had found his way home after his earlier scare. The town of Grizzly Pass was situated in a valley between hills that led up into the mountains. Grace had ridden out that morning from the little barn behind her house.
As she neared the white clapboard cottage with the wide front porch and antique blue shutters, she leaned forward, trying to see around the house to the barn. Was that a tail swishing near the back gate?
Caveman pulled into the driveway.
Before he could shift into Park, she was out of the truck and hurrying around to the back of the house.
Her protector switched off the engine and hurried after her. “Hey, wait up,” he called out.
Grace ignored him, bent and slipped through the fence rails and ran toward the back gate next to the barn, her heart soaring.
Bear stood at the gate, tossing his head and dancing back on his hooves.
She opened the gate and held it wide.
Bear slipped through and turned to nuzzle her hand.
Grace reached into her jeans pocket and pulled out the piece of carrot she’d planned on giving Bear as a treat at the end of the day. She held it out in the palm of her hand.
Bear’s big, velvety lips took the carrot and he crunched it between his teeth, nodding his head in approval.
Wrapping her arms around his neck, Grace hugged the horse, relieved he wasn’t hurt by the bullet or by wandering around the countryside and crossing highways. “Hey, big boy. Glad you made it home without me.” She held on to his bridle and leaned her forehead against his. “I bet you’re hungry and thirsty.”
Bear tossed his head and whinnied.
With a laugh, Grace straightened and walked toward the barn. Bear followed.
Inside, she opened the stall door. Bear trotted in.
She removed Bear’s bridle and was surprised to find Caveman beside her loosening the leather strap holding the girth around the horse’s middle. “I can take care of that,” she assured him.
“I know my way around horses,” he said, and pulled the saddle from Bear’s back. “Tack room?”
“At the back of the barn. I can handle the rest. I just want to get him situated before we leave.”
“No problem.” He took the saddle and carried it to the tack room. Caveman reappeared outside the stall. “I’ll be right back.”
“I’m leaving as soon as I’m done here.”
“Understood.” He took off at a jog out of the barn.
With her self-appointed protector gone, Grace suddenly had a feeling of being exposed. Shrugging off the insecurity, she went to work, giving the horse food and water, and then closed the stall.
From another stall, she rolled her four-wheeler out into the open. She hadn’t ridden it in a month and the last time she had, it had been slow to start. She’d had to charge the battery and probably needed to buy a new one, but she didn’t have time now. She’d promised to meet the sheriff in fifteen minutes. Already five had passed.
The next five minutes, she did everything she knew to start the vehicle and it refused.
Just when she was about to give up and call the sheriff, a small engine’s roar sounded outside the barn.
She walked out and shook her head.
Caveman sat on a newer-model ATV. “Ready?”
“Where did you get that?”
“My boss dropped it off.” He checked the instruments, revved the throttle and looked up. “I thought you’d be gone by now.”
“I can’t get mine to start, and we’re supposed to be there in five minutes.”
“Let me take a look.” He killed the engine and entered the barn.
Okay, so she wasn’t that knowledgeable about mechanics. She knew Wally, who had a small-engine repair shop in his barn. He fixed anything she had issues with. That didn’t mean she couldn’t take care of herself.
“Your battery is dead.” Caveman glanced around. “You got another handy?”
She shook her head. “No. Fresh out.”
“Got a helmet?”
She nodded. “Yeah, but I won’t need it if I can’t get my ATV started.”
He spun and headed for the barn door. “You can ride on the back of mine,” he called out over his shoulder.
Grace’s heart fluttered at the thought riding behind Caveman, holding him around the waist to keep from falling off. “No, thanks. Those trails are dangerous.” She suspected the danger was more in how her pulse quickened around the man than the possibility of plunging over the edge of a drop-off.
“I grew up riding horses and four-wheelers on rugged mountain trails. I won’t let you fall off a cliff.” He held up a hand. “Promise.”
She frowned. But she knew she only had a few minutes to get to the meeting location and relented, sighing. “Okay. I guess I’ll put my life in your hands.” She followed him out of the barn and closed the door behind her. “Although I don’t know why I should trust you. I don’t even know you.”
