Читать книгу Bounty Hunter's Woman - Linda Turner - Страница 8

Moving gingerly, the incision from her surgery twinging in protest, Priscilla Wyatt stepped through the front door of her London flat and found herself blinking back tears. Over the course of the last week and a half, while she was in the hospital recovering from injuries incurred in a car accident and the emergency surgery that had saved her life, she’d begun to wonder if she was ever going to sleep in her own bed again. When her doctor had finally told her she was being released, she hadn’t known whether she wanted to laugh or cry.

Watching her as the last of her strength gave out and she sank down onto the couch, her brother, Buck, frowned in concern. “I don’t know what the doctor was thinking, releasing you so soon after your surgery. Look at you. You’re as weak as a kitten.”

“I just need to rest for a few minutes, and I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, right,” he retorted, scowling. “In case you’ve forgotten, you had a hell of an accident. You could have been killed—”

Hovering at the door, his wife, Rainey, frowned warningly. “She’s aware of that, Buck. You don’t have to keep reminding her.”

“Apparently, I do,” he growled. “She’d still be in the hospital if she hadn’t pressured the doctor to release her.”

“I can recover better here,” Priscilla replied. “No one gets any rest in the hospital. You know that.”

“What I know is that you had major surgery. You lost your spleen, dammit. This is serious, Cilla. You’ve got no business being here by yourself.”

“Why don’t you come home with me and Buck?” Rainey suggested. “Let us take care of you.”

“Oh, no!” she said quickly. “The ranch isn’t home. This is. London is.”

Buck could understand her feelings. When Hilda Wyatt, a distant American relative from the States, had left the Broken Arrow Ranch in Colorado to him and his sisters, the place had felt nothing like home even though it had been in the Wyatt family for nearly a hundred fifty years. That was before the ranch came under attack, however. The first time he picked up a gun to defend the Broken Arrow, the land of his ancestors became his.

Not that he and his sisters could claim it outright just yet, he reminded himself. Hilda had wanted the ranch to go to the last of the Wyatts, but she’d still left it to them with strings. One of them had to be at the ranch at all times for the period of one year. If there was no Wyatt at the ranch for two nights in a row during that year, they lost the Broken Arrow and it went to an unnamed heir. No one, however, knew who the unnamed heir was. His or her name was in a sealed envelope that would only be opened in the event that the English branch of the Wyatts was disqualified.

And it was that clause in the will that had caused countless problems for him and his sisters, Buck thought in disgust. Once the terms of the will became common knowledge, everyone in Willow Bend seemed to think they were the unnamed heir and all they had to do to inherit the ranch was drive Buck and his sisters away.

The attacks began almost immediately and had been going on for months, always coming from a different direction. And they hadn’t stopped at the property lines of the ranch…which was why he and Rainey were in London.

“You’re not safe here,” he told Priscilla flatly. “Your accident wasn’t an accident.”

“We don’t know that for sure,” she argued. “Just because someone ran a stop sign—”

“All the witnesses said the driver could have easily avoided the accident,” he cut in. “He didn’t. We can’t prove it, but my gut tells me the jackass was hired by someone in Colorado to hurt you and draw the rest of us away from the ranch. If that’s the case, this is only the beginning. Whoever hired the man who hit you will try again.”

When she shivered, hugging herself, he said huskily, “I’m not trying to scare you, Sis. But we’re all worried sick about you. You’re here alone, and you’re so weak you can’t possibly protect yourself if someone decides to come after you. If you’d just come home with me and Rainey until you’re stronger, I promise I won’t say a word to stop you when you’re ready to come back here to London. I’ll even help you pack.”

If her stomach hadn’t been in knots at the thought of someone stalking her, trying to hurt her, she would have laughed. “Yeah, right. The second I even bring up the subject of going back to London, I’m going to get grief from the entire family, and you know it.”

Not bothering to deny it, he only grinned. “And your point is?”

“You’re terrible.” She laughed…and gave in. “Okay, I’ll go. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. I will go home as soon as I’m feeling better.”

“We’ll talk about it then.” He chuckled and strode over to the phone to call the airline and book their tickets.