The Christmas Target
Charlotte Douglas
FOR JESSICA,The note was accompanied by a single red rose on a white satin pillow. For Miami businesswoman Jessica Landon, the gesture was anything but romantic. She'd been in snowy Montana less than a day, and already she'd become the target of a rifle-toting Santa, then run off the road and left for dead. Her protection through the holidays was sexy-as-sin cowboy cop Ross McGarrett–a man with a tragic past and a motherless young daughter….FROM YOUR SECRET SANTARoss liked city women and warm, tumbled beds. And Jessica fit him and his bed to a tee. With Christmas approaching, Ross dared to believe in love again–but could he keep Jessica safe through the silent and deadly night…?
“I need you to stay.
“I mean, I want you to stay,” Ross corrected.
Jessica lifted her feathery brows over questioning eyes, but said nothing,
“Let me explain.”
“I’m listening.”
“We have a situation here—”
“We?”
“I have a situation. At least, the sheriff’s department does.”
“Yesterday’s shooting?” Jessica asked.
He nodded. “We don’t know what we’re facing. There’s the possibility what’s happened to you is totally unrelated to other incidents in Swenson County.”
“So if I leave tonight, I’m no longer your problem,” she reasoned.
“I can’t let you do that.”
Her eyes widened with a hint of anger. “You can’t stop me.”
“Actually, that’s not completely true.”
“What are you going to do?” she insisted hotly. “Arrest me?”
“If I have to,” he answered easily.
Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,
Take a very well-deserved break from Thanksgiving preparations and rejuvenate yourself with Harlequin Intrigue’s tempting offerings this month!
To start off the festivities, Harper Allen brings you Covert Cowboy—the next riveting installment of COLORADO CONFIDENTIAL. Watch the sparks fly when a Native American secret agent teams up with the headstrong mother of his unborn child to catch a slippery criminal. Looking to live on the edge? Then enter the dark and somber HEARTSKEEP estate—with caution!—when Dani Sinclair brings you The Second Sister—the next book in her gothic trilogy.
The thrills don’t stop there! His Mysterious Ways pairs a ruthless mercenary with a secretive seductress as they ward off evil forces. Don’t miss this new series in Amanda Stevens’s extraordinary QUANTUM MEN books. Join Mallory Kane for an action-packed story about a heroine who must turn to a tough-hearted FBI operative when she’s targeted by a stalker in Bodyguard/Husband.
A homecoming unveils a deadly conspiracy in Unmarked Man by Darlene Scalera—the latest offering in our new theme promotion BACHELORS AT LARGE. And finally this month, ’tis the season for some spine-tingling suspense in The Christmas Target by Charlotte Douglas when a sexy cowboy cop must ride to the rescue as a twisted Santa sets his sights on a beautiful businesswoman.
So gather your loved ones all around and warm up by the fire with some steamy romantic suspense!
Enjoy,
Denise O’Sullivan
Senior Editor
Harlequin Intrigue
The Christmas Target
Charlotte Douglas
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The major passions of Charlotte Douglas’s life are her husband—her high school sweetheart to whom she’s been married for over three decades—and writing compelling stories. A national bestselling author, she enjoys filling her books with love of home and family, special places and happy endings. With their two cairn terriers, she and her husband live most of the year on Florida’s central west coast, but spend the warmer months at their North Carolina mountaintop retreat.
No matter what time of year, readers can reach her at charlottedouglas1@juno.com, where she’s always delighted to hear from them.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Ross McGarrett—Heir to the Shooting Star Ranch and sheriff of Swenson County, Ross is plagued by unsolved crimes…and determined to keep beautiful Jessica safe.
Jessica Landon—Assigned to the Shooting Star as financial consultant, she’s stalked by an unknown assailant.
Fiona McGarrett—Ross’s grandmother has secrets of her own.
Courtney McGarrett—Ross’s two-year-old daughter.
Chang Soo—Longtime chef at the Shooting Star Ranch.
Harry Chandler—Ross’s friend and county judge.
Jack Randall—Ross’s former father-in-law and neighbor with a boundary dispute. Is he as dangerous as he seems?
Carson Kingsley—He owns ranch adjacent to the Shooting Star.
Dixon Traxler—A client from Jessica’s past who threatened her. Is he still a threat?
Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Epilogue
Prologue
The man kicked back in the deep leather chair in front of the fireplace, propped his aching feet on the ottoman and rubbed the twinge in his shoulder. He was getting older.
But not too old to complete his mission.
Besides, he assured himself, he didn’t need brawn, only brains, to carry out his plans. Plus a ton of patience.
He had the brains. And he was a very patient man. He wouldn’t rush things. First, he’d toy with his victims. He wanted them looking over their shoulders, flinching at shadows, suspicious of every little noise, fearful of every stranger, wondering what the hell was happening to them and knowing they couldn’t do a damn thing about it. If they died suddenly, without fear, he’d miss half the fun.
Most of all, he wanted them to suffer for the trouble they’d caused. Only then would he remove them permanently from the face of the earth so they couldn’t create any more.
Satisfied that his cause was right and just, he picked up the glass from the table beside his chair, swirled the ice in the amber liquid and downed the rest of his drink. He could afford time to relax. Everything was in place. All was ready.
Death would only have to cool his heels a little longer before claiming his own.
Chapter One
Santa with a shotgun?
Jessica Landon peered through the frost-rimmed glass door at the plump, red-suited figure in line at the teller window. None of the other customers paid any attention either to his costume or his weapon. Did everyone in Montana carry a gun?
Welcome to the Wild West.
The thought made her grimace. With a sigh of resignation, she tugged open the door at the First Bank of Swenson, fought the opposing force of the blustery December north wind and hurried into the lobby. Cold numbed her fingers in too-thin gloves, wet snow sifted down her neck beneath the stylish collar of her lightweight cashmere coat and icy slush soaked her feet, exposed to the elements by elegant but now-ruined high-heeled shoes. She wasn’t accustomed to dressing for winter weather and, obviously, hadn’t got it right.
Welcome heat greeted her, but not the familiar moist, tropical atmosphere of her native Miami. The dry, fusty air of a central system, apparently operating at its maximum potential, seared her lungs and dried her skin. Longing for the humid warmth of Florida sunshine, she crossed the lobby toward a desk marked Information, where a bank employee was conferring with an elderly lady.
“Excuse me,” Jessica said, and shot a smile of apology at the older woman.
“Can I help you?” the bank employee asked.
“I’m here to see John Hayes,” Jessica said.
“If you’ll have a seat,” the employee answered in a pleasant but distracted tone, “he’ll be with you shortly.”
Jessica settled in a chair a few feet away, unbuttoned her coat and refrained from fanning her cheeks in the unnatural heat. Ever since her boss, Max Rinehart, had escorted her aboard her flight at Miami International, she’d been either too hot or too cold.
Thinking of Max, probably sunning himself and sipping a tall, cool drink beside the free-form swimming pool of his Biscayne Bay home at this very minute, she uttered a silent curse.
He’d given her no choice in accepting this assignment. “You’re the best consultant I’ve got,” he’d insisted, “and our client demanded the best.”
“You’re the best, Max. You should be flying to Montana in the dead of winter, not me.”
Max had grinned, flashing his amiable puppy-dog look that hid a savvy business mind. Brilliant sunlight streaming through the glass wall of his twelfthstory office glinted off his bald head, the wristband of his Rolex and the fourteen-carat gold buttons of his navy-blue blazer, tailor-made for his dumpling body.
“You know I can’t go,” he explained with an apologetic look. “The Christmas holidays are approaching. All the grandchildren and their pals from college will be descending on me.”
“What better reason to get out of town?” Jessica asked in a dry tone, but she knew how much Max doted on his grandchildren and that he wouldn’t miss spending their vacation time with them.
He spread his hands as if to accent his helplessness in the situation. “With their grandmother dead, God rest her soul, they need someone here to keep them in check.”
“So you’re sending me to the boonies while you ride herd on the party animals? Thanks a bunch.”
“Jessikins—” He rose from his desk and came to her, encircling her in a fatherly hug. “You’ve never made a secret of the fact that you hate Christmas and everything about it. I’m doing you a favor, giving you a challenging assignment to take your mind off your least favorite time of year.”
She couldn’t argue with him about disliking the holidays. From the time she was six until she was eighteen, she had spent every Christmas vacation alone in the cold impersonal dormitory of the New England boarding school where her parents had shunted her after their nasty divorce. As a result, she’d hated the Yuletide season and cold weather ever since.
“You’re all heart,” she said grumpily, but in spite of her irritation at the impending job, she could never stay angry with lovable Max. With her parents remarried—her mother was on her fourth husband, her father, his third wife—and flitting from one European playground to the next, Max was the closest thing to family she had. She returned his hug and offered him a teasing challenge. “I could forget Christmas even better during a few weeks on the beach at St. Thomas.”
“You bring back your report by January sixth, and I’ll give you the rest of the month in the islands as a bonus,” he had promised.
Remembering, she sighed and considered removing her coat in the bank’s heat. January couldn’t arrive fast enough—if she didn’t either freeze or cook to death before then.
The information officer launched into an explanation of social security direct deposit for the fragile old lady. Jessica shifted in her chair and glanced around the lobby. Except for the heavy clothing that bundled the customers against Montana’s bitterly cold climate, the bank, with its contemporary decor in fashionable neutral tones and its jungle of potted tropical plants, could have been in Miami.
Seven customers, including the gun-toting Santa, waited in two teller lines. At a table near the entrance, a tall, rugged cowboy stood with his back to her, filling out what looked like a deposit slip. His attire, including a suede, sheepskin-lined jacket, a battered Stetson pushed back off his forehead, butt-hugging jeans and tooled leather boots, would definitely draw a few stares in Miami. Unlike the Santa, however, the cowboy didn’t appear to be carrying a gun.
Jessica pulled her gaze from his long, lanky legs. Since the cowboy was apparently unarmed, maybe the West wasn’t as wild as she’d imagined. Its famous mystique was undoubtedly a myth. Take the cowboy, for instance. As seductively attractive as he appeared from behind, he was probably missing teeth, reeked of horse sweat and cow hides and had breath as foul as her mood right now.
Her temper was rising because she didn’t like waiting. She kept herself on a regimented schedule and could never understand why others didn’t do the same. Efficiency was good for business.
She glanced toward the door of a private office across the lobby where a brass plaque read, John F. Hayes. Hayes was the bank manager Max had told her to contact, but the employee at the information desk hadn’t informed him Jessica was waiting. She decided to take matters into her own hands and knock on Hayes’s door.
Ignoring the cowboy’s attractive denim-clad tush, Jessica conducted a mental review of Max’s instructions as she pushed to her soggy feet and crossed the room toward Hayes’s office. Her ability to concentrate on work to the exclusion of all else—that and her MBA from the Wharton School of Business—contributed to her success as a top-notch financial consultant and troubleshooter. Oblivious to everything but her assignment, she ran through a mental list of the questions she’d prepared for John Hayes.
Suddenly a bone-jarring jolt struck her and yanked her off her feet.
She yelped in surprise as strong arms surrounded her and jerked her against a chest as solid as case-hardened steel. The concurrent deafening blast of a shotgun and the cascading crash of the bank’s front window drowned her cry. She struggled against the grip of the cowboy she’d noted earlier—until she spotted the Santa from the teller line, pointing the double barrels of his shotgun directly at her.
“I said nobody move,” he shouted with an angry growl. “Don’t you understand English?”
Jessica had been so deep in thought, she’d heard nothing the Santa had said until now. She froze in the cowboy’s embrace—except for a quick flick of her eyes that took in the rest of the now-silent lobby. The customers stood ashen-faced, hands raised, with the panicked expressions of wild nocturnal animals caught in a sudden beam of light.
The snarling Santa hadn’t been waiting in line for a legitimate transaction. His fluffy white beard and bushy eyebrows were a disguise. Beady yellow-brown eyes, like those of a cobra prepared to strike, glared at her. Jessica shivered as his cold stare bored into her. He’d shot out the window without hesitation and looked ready—even eager—to shoot again. The man was either totally reckless or out of his mind.
Or both.
Jessica swallowed hard against the terror rising in her throat and prayed silently that no one would try to be a hero. The crazed Saint Nicholas looked capable of blowing them all away without a qualm.
Behind the counter, a terrified young female teller was stuffing packets of bills into a bag as fast as her shaking hands would allow. Even under duress, Jessica’s efficient and encyclopedic brain fed her information, reminding her that bank tellers were trained to hand over their money without resistance—and to insert a stack of bills with a dye pack that would explode once the robbers left the bank. She recalled that small-town banks were considered soft targets for thieves, with buildings that were less secure and escape routes that were more accessible and less likely to be heavily patrolled by law enforcement.
For an instant, Jessica, locked in the iron grasp of the cowboy’s arms, wondered if the man who held her was the robber’s accomplice and had grabbed her as a hostage. Then she noted the path the shotgun pellets had taken to the outside window and realized with a shock that the cowboy had probably saved her life. Lost in her mental review of her upcoming interview, she hadn’t heard the robber’s first warning to remain still, and he’d opened fire on her. Only the swift intervention of her rescuer, who had jerked her out of the buckshot’s path, had saved her from being blasted to kingdom come, just like the bank’s front window.
Her knees buckled at the could-have-been, and if the cowboy hadn’t held her, she would have collapsed onto the desert-toned carpet.
“Steady.” His low voice, rich and smooth as cubano espresso, filled her left ear. “Stay calm.”
“Shut up,” the pseudo-Santa yelled, “or I’ll shoot you both.”
Jessica dragged in a deep breath of the chilly air pouring through the shattered window, and with it, the tantalizing fragrance of leather, saddle soap, open spaces and the unmistakable provocative male scent emanating from her rescuer. He had molded his body against her back and buttocks with an intimacy usually reserved for lovers, and his heat seeped through the triple layers of her coat, suit and lingerie. His contact reassured and, at the same time, flustered her, but she didn’t have long to dwell on the contradiction.
“Hurry up!” the robber screamed at the young teller. At the strain in his voice and the knowledge that he’d already shot to kill once, Jessica shuddered. Everyone in the room faced imminent danger.
The distraught teller shoved the last of the bills into the bag and flung it atop the counter.
The biting north wind carried the wail of an approaching siren through the demolished window. Someone must have triggered the silent alarm, Jessica thought. Hearing the siren, Santa grabbed the money-filled sack and swung it over his shoulder.
And laying his finger aside of his nose… Jessica choked back a hysterical giggle as the line from the traditional Christmas poem popped into her head.
With no chimney for his escape, Santa backed toward the front of the lobby. Swinging his shotgun in an arc that covered every person in the room, he warned, “You follow me, you’re dead meat.”
He lifted a dirty black boot over the low sill, stepped out onto the shards of glass that covered the sidewalk and disappeared at a trot down the practically deserted main street of Swenson.
Jessica sagged in relief against the stranger who held her, and chaos erupted in the lobby with everyone talking at once. A sheriff’s car, blue emergency lights flashing, sped past the window in the direction the robber had taken.
The cowboy who’d rescued her grabbed her shoulders and swiveled her to face him. He was so tall, she found herself confronting the broad expanse of his chest.
“What’s the matter with you?” Anger tainted the rich smoothness of his voice. “Are you deaf? Or just suicidal?”
Before she could reply, he turned from her and shouted across the lobby, “Nobody move or touch anything until I give the okay.”
Still stinging from his rebuke, Jessica felt a flush of embarrassment mixed with irritation rising to her cheeks. Prepared to explain her behavior, she lifted her gaze from the open collar of his denim shirt to the man’s face. Her excuse died on her lips, and her knees threatened to go weak again.
The cowboy mystique was alive and well in Swenson, Montana.
Gazing down from a lofty height of well over six foot four with a body as big and sturdy as a Humvee and eyes as deep brown as the mineral-stained waters of the Everglades, the intriguing man took her breath away. His face was too rugged to call handsome with its square jaw and high cheekbones, but attractive enough to make her pulse stutter. At the corners of his eyes and mouth, fine laugh lines crinkled skin as warm and golden as South Beach sands, and his wide, appealing mouth and strong chin had a determined set.
What was the matter with her?
She was gawking at her rescuer like a moonstruck teenager, expecting to hear the opening strains from The Magnificent Seven any second. Her close brush with death had addled her brain.
Hands that felt strong enough to snap her in two shook her gently, and his eyes filled with alarm. “Hell’s bells, lady, don’t faint on me.”
His plea broke the spell, and she shook off his grasp. “I’ve never fainted in my life,” she insisted with righteous indignation.
“There’s always a first time.”
Before she could protest further, he scooped her into his arms.
“Put me down. I’m perfectly capable of walking.”
“No, you’re not. And you’re in no position to be giving orders.”
Surprise took her breath away, stifling any more protests. He carried her across the lobby into Hayes’s empty office and deposited her on a sofa.
“I’m okay—” She struggled to rise, but he pushed her back onto the sofa with a firm hand.
“Stay put.” His tone left no room for argument. He pivoted on his heel and headed toward the lobby.
“Wait!”
He turned at her call, and she was struck again by the man’s magnetic charm. Accustomed to addressing conference rooms filled with international captains of industry, Jessica found herself suddenly tongue-tied in front of one incredibly attractive cowboy.
His wide mouth lifted in a slow, bone-melting grin, and amusement lit his eyes at her extended silence. “Well?”
“I… Thank you. You saved my life.”
“Just doing my job.” With a look that made her stomach flip-flop, he touched his fingers to the brim of his hat and stepped out the door.
Jessica propped herself on her elbows and watched him stride into the lobby, where the other customers and tellers had gathered. As her heartbeat returned to normal after revving at the stranger’s sexy smile, her previous irritation at her current assignment rose to new heights. She hadn’t been in Montana more than a few hours, and already she’d been shot at and man-handled. Max would have to cough up more than three weeks in St. Thomas to compensate for this.
She struggled upright, swung her feet to the floor and started to stand, but her knees wouldn’t cooperate. More shaken by her close brush with death than she cared to admit, she collapsed onto the sofa with a soft grunt.
She was where she’d intended to be, in John Hayes’s office. She might as well wait.
ROSS MCGARRETT left the woman in John Hayes’s office and returned to the lobby. He was a man slow to anger, but at this moment he felt like Mount St. Helens ready to blow. The robber had not only come within a hairbreadth of killing a young woman, he had stolen hardworking people’s money and scared a sweet old lady half to death.
Holding his temper in check, Ross waded into the midst of the frightened group in the bank’s lobby and strode straight to the information desk where Miss Minnie Perkins was trembling like a leaf in a gale-force wind.
With the bank filled with people, he’d decided against using the gun in the holster at the small of his back to confront the fake Santa. Better to let the robber get away than to have someone killed. His decision, he realized, had been the right one when the man proved so trigger-happy. Ross’s next instinct had been to follow the robber into the street. Then Josh Greenlea, the deputy on duty, had roared by in hot pursuit in his cruiser. With Josh on the felon’s tail, Ross had decided to remain with the rattled customers and secure the crime scene until the technicians arrived.
Kneeling on one knee by the information desk, Ross grasped the old woman’s cold hands. “You okay, Miss Minnie?”
All the color had drained from her weathered face. “I need my pills.”
Ross opened her oversize handbag and dug out the bottle of nitroglycerin from among the jumble of wadded Kleenex and grocery coupons. He popped the cap and dumped one pill into her shaking hand, then thought better of that and gripped it between his fingers. “Open wide and lift your tongue.”
Like a baby bird, Minnie did as he asked, and he tucked the pill beneath her tongue. “Want someone to drive you to the hospital?”
She shook her head. “I’ll be fine now.”
Renewed anger at the robber surged through Ross. If he lived to be a thousand, he’d never understand people who felt that laws didn’t apply to them. As a young boy, Ross had been taught by his grandfather that law was the glue that held society together, and Ross’s reverence for the law had eventually led to his election as sheriff of Swenson County. He took his sworn duty seriously.
And he took the breaking of the law within the county’s borders personally.
Especially personal had been the murder of his wife, Kathy, last year….
With an effort, he shoved aside that pain and the unsolved mystery. One crime at a time, he reminded himself and moved swiftly through the lobby, speaking to each witness, consoling the distraught customers and easing them away from any possible forensic evidence.
The entire time, however, he found himself glancing into John Hayes’s office, unable to keep his eyes off the beautiful stranger who’d come so close to perishing from the shotgun’s blast. The floral fragrance of her shampoo, something tropical and exotic, still clung where his chin had brushed her sleek auburn hair when he’d yanked her from harm’s way. Her provocative scent stirred feelings he didn’t have time to deal with now.
Concentrating on the business at hand, he realized the attractive woman in Hayes’s office had been one of two strangers in the bank that morning. The robber had been the other. His shot at her could have been a ploy intended to terrorize the others into submission. The probability that this petite and elegant woman was Santa’s accomplice was a stretch, but Ross had to check out every angle.
“Everybody stay put till the Crime Scene Unit arrives,” he warned the others after a call to dispatch, who assured him the CSU was en route.
Then he returned to Hayes’s office.
At his approach, the woman leaped to her feet, all five foot three of her. She had seemed such a tiny submissive thing in his arms, but now she appeared ready to take on a wild grizzly five times her size. Her stylishly short coat and skirt revealed long, slender legs, and as he’d held her, he had registered the pleasant fact that she was deliciously rounded in all the right places. Her spunk as well as her appearance impressed him. No, spunk suggested too much heat. In spite of having come within inches of losing her life, the woman appeared cool and composed. Glacial was a better term.
“I’m Sheriff—”
“Where’s John Hayes?” she asked abruptly.
Ross shrugged. “Probably taking a late lunch, but he’ll be back soon if he’s heard the news. Mind if I ask what you’re doing here?”
She cocked her head and observed him with defiant blue eyes, dark and deep as a mountain lake. “You said ‘sheriff.’ Am I under arrest?”
“Should you be?”
“I may be crazy for coming here and for not hearing the robber’s warning,” she said in a rueful tone, “but I haven’t done anything illegal.”
“I’ll need your name and address.”
She slid the tiny strap of a fine leather handbag off her shoulder, snapped open the gold clasp and removed a business card. “Everything you need to know is right there.”
With interest, he scanned the card, printed on heavy, expensive stock. She was Jessica Landon with Rinehart and Associates, Financial Consultants, out of Miami. The card appeared authentic, but anyone with a computer and the right paper could print one. “You’re a long way from home.”
Comprehension appeared to dawn suddenly in her eyes. “You don’t think I had anything to do with—”
“Sheriff.” John Hayes, the bank’s manager, stepped into the office.
“You expecting this lady?” Ross asked. “Ms. Landon from Miami?”
John nodded. “We have an appointment.” He turned to Jessica. “Sorry, but I’ll have to postpone our meeting. Have you had lunch?”
The woman looked ready to protest the delay, then seemed to think better of it. “Is there a restaurant nearby?”
Ross nodded toward the opposite side of the street. “The café has great coffee. Good pies, too.”
“I’m free to go?”
Ross nodded again, irrationally wishing for an excuse to keep her around until his sense of duty kicked in.
“Come back in an hour,” John suggested with a glance at Ross. “I imagine the sheriff will be through by then.”
“That should do it,” Ross agreed, hoping the CSU would arrive promptly.
Jessica Landon straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin and strode out of the office and the bank as coolly as if someone almost killed her every day.
TWO HOURS LATER, Jessica sat in the booth at the front of the café watching the controlled pandemonium at the bank across the street. Except for three rugged cowboy types, their weathered faces making their ages impossible to guess, one at the booth beside hers, the others at the counter, the restaurant was empty.
During her vigil, she’d watched the arrival of the Crime Scene Unit van, the departure of the customers, the removal of the glass from the front walk and the covering of the window with plywood. Throughout all the activity, the tall, handsome sheriff had been a constant presence, supervising, observing, instructing, and obviously completely in charge.
What struck Jessica most about the man, besides his distinctive good looks, was his apparent calm throughout the chaos. Nothing seemed to rattle him as he moved smoothly from task to task, person to person. He took the term laid-back to a whole new level. She could understand why the people of Swenson had elected him. He was without a doubt a good man to have around in a crisis. She just hoped he handled things quickly so she could meet with Hayes and get out of Dodge—or Swenson, as the case may be.
“Change your mind, hon?” The waitress with a name tag identifying her as Madge reappeared at her elbow, shoved the mint she’d been sucking into the pouch of her cheek and refilled Jessica’s cup. “Want to order now?”
Jessica had been nursing several mugs of decaf while she waited for Hayes to become available, obviously longer than he’d anticipated. At first, her close call had robbed her of her appetite, but she hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and at three in the afternoon, hunger made her empty stomach ache.
“I’ll try some pie. The sheriff recommended it.”
The middle-aged waitress grinned and winked, exposing a lid caked with blue eye shadow. “You a friend of the sheriff?”
“We met at the bank.” How else could Jessica describe her intimate encounter with the man who had saved her life and set her senses tingling?
Madge made a clucking sound with her tongue. “What a hunk. He can park his boots under my bunk any day.”
The bedroom image made Jessica flush with heat in the already stuffy room, but she wasn’t about to discuss one stranger’s attributes with another. “What kind of pie do you have?”
Madge rattled off an impressive list, and Jessica selected chocolate cream. In moments, the waitress placed a huge wedge of pie topped with several inches of meringue in front of her and nodded toward the window. “Looks like they caught the crook.”
Another cruiser had pulled up with a man in the back seat, apparently handcuffed, judging from his posture. The Santa suit was gone, but even from across the street, Jessica could recognize those cold, deadly eyes. The sheriff climbed into the passenger seat of the car, the deputy drove away and the Crime Scene Unit van followed.
Within minutes, an Open sign appeared on the bank’s front door. Deserting her hardly touched pie, Jessica grabbed her coat, paid her bill and headed across the street.
ANOTHER HOUR LATER, Jessica left the bank in an even fouler mood than when she’d first arrived. In spite of what Max had hinted, she’d hoped this assignment would be quick, a day or two at most auditing accounts, perusing records and then writing up her assessment of the ranch’s viability in the dubious comfort of her spartan hotel room.
Max and Hayes had made other plans.
All the paperwork she needed to complete her assignment was in the office of the Shooting Star Ranch, thirty-five miles outside of town. And Hayes had insisted that the trustees wanted a thorough inspection of the ranch, acreage, stock and buildings.
“The family’s invited you to be their guest while you work,” Hayes had said. “That way you won’t have that long commute back and forth to the hotel and restaurants every day. The less you’re on the road this time of year, the better. Driving can be treacherous.”
“Then I should see you in a few days,” Jessica said.
Hayes looked surprised. “Oh, I doubt that. You should take your time, observe for yourself the assets of the ranch and how it works. Plus you have over a decade’s worth of accounts to evaluate. The trust insists on a complete evaluation of the property’s productivity. Only when the trustees are satisfied that all is as it should be will ownership be transferred.”
“Rinehart and Associates are never anything but thorough,” Jessica said, wishing in this instance it wasn’t so. She’d never been so homesick for Miami.
“Of course,” Hayes said soothingly. “That’s why the trustees selected you.”
Climbing into her rental car with wet snowflakes plastering her cheeks, Jessica wished the trustees had picked another firm. She faced a thirty-five-mile drive in unfamiliar territory in increasing snow. Blessing the fact that her vehicle had snow tires, she pulled away from the curb, eased down the main street and took the turn Hayes had instructed.
Thirty-five miles south on this road; hang a right at the Shooting Star gate. Seemed simple enough.
Within minutes she was in deserted countryside where snow drifted against fences and turned rocky outcroppings and buttes into gigantic gnomes hovering in the cold. Working at maximum, the wipers barely kept the windshield clear enough for her to see the road ahead of her. The defroster on the rear window was minimally efficient. As much as she disliked the thought of being a houseguest among strangers, Jessica had to admit that not having to drive this far at least twice a day in this weather would be a relief. Not a single car had passed her coming from the opposite direction. The only vehicle she’d seen on the road was far behind her, headlights glaring and gaining fast. She guessed most of the natives had better sense than to risk driving in these conditions and cursed her own impatience. If she’d waited until morning, the snow might have ended.
The car behind her was closing in on her bumper. Only a fool would drive so recklessly on these icy roads, she thought. The dark pickup loomed large in her rearview mirror.
The truck swerved into the other lane, pulled alongside as if to pass, then slowed, keeping pace with her speed. She wondered if the driver was trying to signal her with some sort of message or warning, but she couldn’t see through the dark-tinted glass of the pickup’s passenger window.
She slowed so he could pass, but the truck beside her slowed, too.
Without warning and catching her totally off guard, the other vehicle lurched to the right and slammed into the side of her much smaller sedan.
Jessica fought the wheel to keep her car on the pavement. Luck, not skill, kept it from spinning into a skid, and she sighed with relief as she regained control.
The truck, however, remained alongside her. With what seemed like predetermined intent, it smashed into the side of her car again.
In horrified disbelief, Jessica felt the sedan leave the road, airborne. With a sickening crunch of glass and metal, it plowed into a snowbank.
The world turned briefly white when her airbag deployed, and her body slammed painfully against the restraints of her seat belt.
Everything went black.
Chapter Two
Jessica, head throbbing, muscles stiff with cold, slowly regained consciousness. Moving gingerly, she tested her arms and legs. Nothing felt broken. She ran cold-numbed fingers over her body. No sign of bleeding or other injury. She was only bruised.
And freezing to death.
To her great relief, she discovered her door would open, and she climbed from the car. The sight that greeted her drove all further relief from her thoughts. The sedan had soared across a ditch and crashed into a wall of earth on the other side. Even if the car was drivable, she’d need a tow truck to extract it from its current resting place.
She scanned the area, searching, with mixed emotions, for the vehicle that had hit her. She needed someone to save her from the cold, but the driver of the pickup definitely hadn’t had her welfare in mind. She should be glad he hadn’t returned to finish her off. Maybe he figured she’d perished in the crash, and if she hadn’t, the cold would kill her.
She didn’t want to believe someone had run her off the road on purpose, but the person who caused the accident hadn’t stopped to assist. A glance at her watch indicated at least fifteen minutes had passed since the collision. Her assailant was long gone.
The storm was intensifying, and if she didn’t get help soon, she’d die from hypothermia. She tried her cell phone, but Hayes had already warned her it would be unreliable in this part of the country where relay towers were scarce. She was disappointed but not surprised when she couldn’t receive roaming service.
Recalling vaguely hearing or reading something about staying with the car if stranded in a snow-storm—whoever would have thought a Miami resident would need that bit of info?—she started to climb back into the vehicle.
And smelled gasoline.
The tank must have ruptured. The ominous liquid was dripping from beneath the chassis and puddling in the ditch. Afraid to risk the danger of remaining in a potential fireball, she figured she should at least attempt to retrieve her luggage. Donning extra layers of clothing—even clothing woefully unsuitable for southeastern Montana’s cruel winter climate—might be her only chance for survival.
The car had landed at an angle, and she had to struggle to drag her luggage from the trunk that rested shoulder-high. She carried her bag to the side of the road and hoped someone would pass and give her a lift.
If they could see her in the blowing snow.
Her head pounded, her bruised knees and shoulders ached, and she swore that Max was going to owe her big-time.
If she lived to collect.
She was on her knees, rummaging through her open case for additional clothing, when the howling wind carried the sound of an engine, approaching from the direction of town. Grabbing a red silk dress, Jessica raced to the center of the road and brandished the garment like a flag.
The car appeared suddenly out of the driving snow, almost on top of her. Jessica dived for the side of the road. The driver slammed on brakes, going into a skid that would have landed the SUV next to her car in the ditch without some first-class maneuvers on the part of the driver.
Jessica pushed to her feet and brushed snow from her ruined stockings.
The SUV’s door opened. A massive man exited the car and descended on her like a charging bull.
“Hell’s bells, lady! You got a death wish?” It was the sheriff from Swenson. Even hopping mad, he was the sweetest sight she’d ever seen. “You could have been hit, standing in the middle of the road like that!”
“I’ve already been hit,” Jessica said hotly. “And if I hadn’t been in the middle of the road, you wouldn’t have seen me, and I would have frozen to death in this godforsaken wilderness.”
She doubted he understood a word she’d said, since her teeth were chattering so hard, her speech was almost incomprehensible.
He must have comprehended enough, though, because his anger seemed to leave him, like the air from a deflating balloon. “Are you hurt?”
“Luckily,” she managed to utter through her chattering teeth, “not as badly as my car.”
She nodded toward the ditch, and the sheriff followed her gaze.
“Aw, sh—” He bit off the curse, then turned and loped back to his car. He returned seconds later with a blanket, and without giving Jessica time to react, he’d wrapped her tightly, lifted her in his arms and settled her on the front seat of the deliciously warm SUV, his official car from the looks of the radio and shotgun mounted on the dash.
Before she could say a word, he returned to the roadside and made a quick inspection of the wrecked sedan. After gathering her luggage from the shoulder, he placed it in the back of the SUV and climbed into the driver’s seat.
She opened her mouth to speak, but he grabbed the microphone off the dash and depressed a button. “I need a tow truck on Highway 7, eighteen miles south of town. Car’s in a ditch. Tell Pete he can wait till the storm passes. I’ve picked up the driver.”
“Ten-four,” a no-nonsense female voice replied. “Need medical assistance?”
“Negative.” The sheriff gave a call number, signed off and replaced the microphone on the dash.
Warmth from the heater was slowly thawing Jessica, and either the bump on her head or the welcomed heat was making her drowsy. She seemed to be floating, a state she’d experienced only once before, when she’d drunk too much champagne at Max’s New Year’s Eve party last January. In such a blissful state, she found maintaining a good head of steam over her situation difficult.
And ignoring the attributes of the man next to her impossible.
She’d sworn off men, she reminded herself, except as the occasional dinner date, although Max never gave up playing matchmaker, hoping she’d find the right man and settle down to raise a family. Having witnessed the chaos and heartbreak that emotional entanglements had created in her parents’ lives, she wanted none of it. Her life was full enough as it was. She had her fantastic job, her South Beach condo, her friends. She didn’t need love or anything slightly resembling it. She’d avoided infatuations as fiercely as she avoided accounting errors. She’d never had a broken heart, never shed a tear over a man, never sat by the phone for a call that never came….
Never intended to.
“Now—” The sheriff, who appeared even more attractive at close range than he had in the bank, turned to her. “Want me to take you back to the hotel?”
Even in its groggy state, her mind somehow continued to function. If she went back to town, she’d have to rent another car, drive the same treacherous roads and arrive hours, if not an entire day, later than she’d planned. And she had no intention of remaining in Montana a day longer than she had to. She hated the dinky little town, the monotony of the landscape, and, most of all, the intolerably frigid weather.
To plead her case, she lifted her lips in what she hoped was an alluring smile. “I don’t suppose you could take me to the Shooting Star Ranch?”
He started the engine and put the car into gear. “Sure you don’t want to have a doctor check you out? You must have been shaken up pretty bad.”
“Nothing a few aspirin won’t cure.”
He gave her a quick head-to-toe glance as if to assure himself. “Then the Shooting Star Ranch it is.” He pulled onto the highway and drove slowly through the swirling snow as confidently as if he knew the route blindfolded. “You’re not used to driving in these conditions.”
She resented his implication that the accident had been her fault, and that irritable feeling helped squelch any danger of succumbing to his aw-shucks Western charm. “I was doing fine until someone sideswiped me and knocked me off the road.”
“They didn’t stop?”
She could hear the anger in his voice and was glad it wasn’t directed at her. “If they did, I was unconscious. No one was around when I came to.”
“Get a license-plate number?”
She shook her head and winced at the pain the movement caused. “All I saw was a dark-colored pickup with tinted windows.”
He stifled another curse. “You’ve just described ninety percent of the vehicles in this county.” Flicking her a glance that seemed to pierce straight through her, he asked, “You sure you were hit? I can’t believe no one stopped to help, especially in this weather. People here are friendlier than that.”
“Have the garage check the car’s driver’s-side panels.” She didn’t like his suggesting that she’d lied, and the frost in her voice matched the temperature outside. “The damage has to be there. Whoever it was, hit me hard. Twice.”
This time he seemed to accept her account. “I’ll ask for a paint sample from the damaged area. See if I can track the truck down.”
“Isn’t that a lot of trouble for a fender bender?” His thoroughness impressed her.
“Hit-and-run’s bad enough.” His scowl emphasized the rugged contours of his face. “If you’d frozen to death back there, it would also have been manslaughter. At least.”
“At least?”
“If someone ran you off the road on purpose and you’d died from the accident or the cold, it would have been homicide.”
She shook her head, unable to comprehend the notion that the wreck had been intended. The movement was not a smart reaction, with her head and body still painfully sore. “Do all sheriffs think like you?”
“How’s that?”
“Paranoid. I’ve only been in town a few hours. Who would want to run me off the road, much less murder me?”
“Ever heard of road rage?” His expression was dead serious, and she couldn’t decide if he was better looking when he smiled or was solemn. “The perpetrators seldom know their victims.”
“I didn’t have time to do anything to make him mad. This guy came out of nowhere.”
“Anyone else you’ve ticked off since you came to town?”
“Nobody but the shotgun Santa.” Her eyes widened at a sudden thought. “You haven’t released him, have you?”
“No way.”
“Has he robbed other banks?”
The sheriff’s tanned forehead wrinkled in a frown. “The guy has no record. Holds a respectable job in Grange County north of us. He isn’t on drugs. In fact, he doesn’t fit the profile of a bank robber at all. And whatever his motive, he’s not talking.”
“Maybe the coming holidays affected his reasoning. Not everybody’s crazy about Christmas,” Jessica said with more intensity than she’d intended. The knock on her head had made her talkative. She rarely felt so at ease with strangers. “Maybe he was… What do the psychologists call it? Acting out?”
“We’re still running a check on him. All we know for certain is that he wasn’t the one who ran you off the road. Anybody else who might be out to get you?”
Jessica could think of dozens, business executives whose get-rich-quick-at-someone-else’s-expense schemes she’d thwarted with her investigations. But none of them was within a thousand miles of Montana.
Unless…
“I haven’t met the people at Shooting Star Ranch yet,” she said. “Don’t know if someone there has something to hide, something they’re afraid my audit might unearth.”
The sheriff coughed harshly, as if something had caught suddenly in his throat. Once he was able to speak again, he gave her a megawatt smile that warmed her more than the superefficient car heater. “Guess you won’t know that until you meet them and do your homework.”
He seemed remarkably unconcerned.
“Do you know them?” Jessica asked. “You don’t think they’re a threat to me?”
His expression sobered, but mischief twinkled in his brown eyes. “I’ll give you my number, so you can call if you feel threatened.”
Being around the sheriff was making her paranoid, expecting criminals around every corner, she thought, when probably she’d simply been the victim of ugly but common road rage. “Maybe the guy who hit me was drunk, and I was merely in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Maybe.” He slowed the car, turned off the highway and stopped in front of a rustic timber arch, where the words Shooting Star Ranch and the emblem of a star with lines trailing behind it like a comet’s tail had been burned into the sign above the driveway. “We’re here.”
Jessica peered through the snow. “Where’s the house?”
The sheriff started the car again. “Five miles up this road.”
“Five miles! That’s a heck of a driveway.”
“Short by Montana standards, but don’t worry. I’ll deposit you safely at the front door.”
They continued up the driveway with snow-covered open fields on either side. After several minutes, dark shadows loomed in front of them. As they approached, Jessica could make out tall, leafless trees in front of a huge, three-story Victorian house, complete with symmetrical Queen Anne turrets flanking spacious porches.
“This is the main house,” the sheriff announced.
“It’s not what I expected.”
“Not every ranch looks like the Ponderosa,” he said with a wry grin.
When the sheriff brought the SUV to a halt, Jessica could see the Shooting Star emblem carved into the corbels and cornices of the gingerbread trim.
“It lives up to its name.” She turned to the sheriff and offered her hand. “I don’t know how to thank you. You’ve saved my life. Twice now.”
He gripped her hand firmly in the calloused warmth of his own. “All in a day’s work. We serve and protect.”
“And provide delivery service.” She kept her voice light and retracted her hand, unwilling to admit how much she’d enjoyed the contact, how much she liked him. Her attraction to him wouldn’t be a problem, however, since she’d never see him again. “I’ll just hop out and get my luggage. No need to inconvenience you more than I already have.”
He killed the engine and opened his door. “I’ll get your bag.”
Jessica climbed out quickly and met him at the back of the SUV. “It isn’t heavy. I can manage. You need to get back to work.”
“No problem. I’m through for the day.”
She reached for the luggage, unwilling to obligate herself more to a man she found entirely too appealing. “Then you should be headed home.”
He took the case from her. “I am home.”
She stopped short. “What?”
He grinned and gestured toward the front door. “I’m Ross McGarrett. My family owns Shooting Star Ranch. Welcome, Ms. Landon.”
ROSS COULDN’T HELP GRINNING even wider at Jessica Landon’s look of surprise. He’d had a hard enough time keeping from laughing earlier when she’d suggested that someone at the ranch might be out to get her. More likely she’d want to kill him when she saw the state of the ranch’s books. Nothing illegal or sinister. Just absolute, unfettered chaos. He hated paperwork worse than criminals.
Before he could say more, however, the front door swung open, and the light from the hall outlined a tall, regal figure peering into the darkness and swirling snow. “Ross, is that you?”
Beside him, Jessica’s mouth dropped open, but she snapped it shut quickly when she caught him watching her. He didn’t blame her for the reaction. His grandmother had that effect on people. Meeting her was like meeting the queen. Fiona had grown up in Manhattan, attended the best Eastern finishing schools, traveled throughout Europe and the Far East, and inherited a small fortune before she’d married his grandfather and moved to the West. After all these years in the wilds of Montana, the polished cosmopolitan aura still clung to her, from her elegant sense of style and her cultured voice and accent to her stately posture and expression, all attributes that camouflaged a heart as immense as the Big Sky State.
“It’s me, Fiona,” he called to his grandmother, “and I have Ms. Landon with me.” Taking Jessica’s elbow with one hand, her bag with the other, he helped her up the broad icy steps into the house.
“Welcome, Ms. Landon,” Fiona said. “We’ve been expecting you. I’m glad you’re both here safe and sound, Ross. There’s a blizzard coming.”
Jessica looked surprised and cocked her head toward the door. “What we came through wasn’t a blizzard?”
Fiona shook her head. “The weather’s mild now compared to a real storm.”
Jessica shook off her surprise and became the professional, competent woman he’d first noticed in the bank. “Then it’s good I’m here so I can begin work right away.”
Ross had to give her credit. She’d been caught in the middle of a bank holdup, shot at, and run off the road, all in one day, yet none of her troubles seemed to have daunted her. The woman was either an incurable workaholic or had nerves of steel. Or both.
Jessica’s small stature and fragile beauty were deceiving. When Fiona had told him she’d engaged a top financial consultant from Miami, Ross had expected an Ivy League male with a button-down collar, expensive suit, a sharp mind and an eagle eye for details. The lovely Jessica had been a pleasing surprise.
On the one hand.
On the other, bad enough having another man chastise Ross for his sloppy bookkeeping. He could only imagine the disdain the superefficient Ms. Landon would have for his records.
And on another hand—
“No need to start work tonight,” Fiona was saying graciously. “Come into the living room. We’ll have a glass of wine before dinner.”
“Maybe Ms. Landon would like to see her room and settle in first,” Ross suggested, catching sight of Jessica’s ruined stockings. “She’s had a rough day.”
“Of course,” his grandmother replied. “The guest suite’s ready. Will you take her bag?”
Jessica reached for her luggage. “I can manage—”
“Nonsense,” Fiona said in that tone of hers that squelched any argument. “Ross doesn’t mind.”
Ross hefted the suitcase, which, judging from its weight, couldn’t possibly hold enough clothing for December on the Montana prairie. Then again, Jessica probably expected to spend the entire time indoors with her very pretty head buried in his accounts.
“Your room’s upstairs,” he said. “I’m right be hind you.”
Jessica started up the stairs and Ross followed, unable to keep his eyes off the sculpted curve of her calves, the slender turn of her ankles, the subtle swing of her shapely behind. For such a small package, she certainly packed a wallop. She mesmerized him more than any woman ever had. Which was unfortunate. The last thing he needed now was a distraction from his job.
“This is it.” He indicated a doorway on the right, halfway down the hall, waited for her to enter, and followed inside with her bag.
Jessica gazed around the room, her eyes alight with approval. “It’s beautiful.”
Seeing the room through her eyes, as if for the first time, Ross agreed. A fire burned cheerfully in the fireplace with comfortable chairs grouped in front of it. Piles of pillows edged with lace were heaped at the head of the four-poster mahogany bed. “Fiona uses all her favorite antiques in here. I hope you’ll be comfortable.”
“Do you always call your grandmother Fiona?” Jessica asked.
Ross nodded. “She never liked to be called grandma. Said it made her feel old and dowdy.”
“She’s definitely neither,” Jessica noted. “She’s an impressive woman.”
He placed Jessica’s bag on an eighteenth-century blanket chest at the foot of the bed. “Bathroom’s through the door on the left. Closet’s on the right. Join us downstairs when you’re ready.”
“Thank you. I won’t be long.” Looking only slightly dazed, especially in light of all she’d been through, Jessica closed the door behind him when he left.
Ross hurried down the stairs and found Fiona in the living room in her favorite chair by the fire.
“Where’s Courtney?” he asked.
“She’s asleep,” Fiona said. “I fed her early. She was completely tired out.”
Ross gazed at his grandmother with concern. “I wish you’d let me hire someone to look after her. I’m afraid she’s too much for you.”
“The day a two-year-old is too much,” Fiona said with a grimace, “you’ll have to hire someone to look after me.”
He’d had this argument and lost many times before, so he went on to the subject weighing most heavily on his mind.
“You didn’t tell me Rinehart and Associates were sending a woman,” he said in an accusing tone, one he’d seldom used with his grandmother.
“Jessica Landon is the best at what she does, according to Max Rinehart,” Fiona replied easily, apparently unperturbed by his disapproval. She reached for the novel on the table beside her chair, her usual signal that the current discussion was closed.
“It’s not her accounting skills that concern me.” He paused, reluctant to report bad news. “It’s happening again.”
Her hand froze in midair at the grimness in his tone, and the color left her face. “You’re certain?”
Ross shrugged. “Not a hundred percent, but a man would be better able to take care of himself.”
Fiona closed her eyes as if gathering strength, then opened them again. “Another accident?”
“She was run off the road. Said a pickup slammed into her car twice and kept going. Didn’t sound like an accident. And she’d have frozen to death if I hadn’t come along.”
“You have to tell her. Warn her.”
Ross nodded. “But not tonight. She’s been through enough already today. And she’s perfectly safe here.”
Fiona compressed her lips and shook her head. “When is this going to stop?”
Ross sank into the seat across from her, weariness seeping through his bones. “Not until I catch the killer.”
Chapter Three
Jessica surveyed the pleasant room with relief. She’d had visions of sleeping in the rustic equivalent of a bunkhouse, but the McGarrett guest room would rival any suite in Miami’s finest luxury hotels. In addition to an arrangement of pale pink roses and stargazer lilies in a cut-crystal vase, a silver bowl filled with fruit, a box of Godiva chocolates and three books from the latest bestseller list topped the table between two inviting overstuffed chairs centered in front of the fireplace.
Judging from the expensive antique furnishings and the lavish appointments in the room, the McGarretts weren’t hurting for money, Jessica thought. Then she recalled how deceiving appearances could be. Many people who’d lost every cent often continued to put up a good front. Only time and the careful scrutiny of the ranch’s books would reveal the true status of the McGarrett finances.
She longed for a hot bath to soothe her bruises but was unwilling to keep her formidable hostess waiting. Wishing fleetingly for warm wool socks, Jessica changed her stockings, stripped off her sodden clothes and dressed in a navy-blue skirt, white silk blouse and a camel-colored cashmere cardigan. She slipped her feet into low-heeled shoes, which were blessedly dry.
A few minutes later, she joined Fiona and Ross in the living room downstairs. Fiona set aside the book she’d been reading and glanced up with a smile of greeting that reached to her brilliant green eyes.
The woman could have been a fashion model, even at her age, Jessica thought, with her magnificent white hair arranged in Gibson girl fashion that matched the period of her house. Fiona’s fine bone structure, easy grace and sense of style, even in casual clothes, would fit perfectly on any couturier’s runway in Paris or Rome.
Ross pushed to his feet from the opposite chair. The big man would have overpowered an average-size room, but not this expansive space with its ten-foot ceilings. Jessica was struck again by his attractiveness. Not the cultured beauty of his grandmother, but a raw, earthy appeal that set her senses tingling. His expression, like Fiona’s, was welcoming, but with a hint of reserve. Jessica wondered how the sheriff felt about having a stranger living in his house, scrutinizing his finances and making the ultimate recommendation on whether the Shooting Star would be his.
“Bring us a glass of wine, please, Ross.” Fiona gestured Jessica to sit in the chair across from hers.
Ross looked at Jessica. “What would you like?”
“Whatever Mrs. McGarrett’s having will be fine.”
“Call me Fiona,” the older woman said. “And tell me all about Max. How is he?”
“You know Max?” Jessica didn’t know why she felt surprised. Her amiable boss seemed to be acquainted with half the population of the United States.
Fiona smiled, and the expression softened the majestic planes of her face. “We grew up near each other in New York. Our families were friends.”
Ross handed Jessica a glass of white wine, and his big hand brushed hers. With dismay, she realized she not only hadn’t seen the last of the too-charming sheriff, but she was going to be living in the same house with him. For days on end.
Concentrate on business, she ordered herself, and Ross McGarrett won’t be a problem.
She returned her attention to Fiona, but remained aware of Ross, pouring himself a whiskey over ice at the antique sideboard that served as a bar.
“Max is well,” she told her hostess, “and looking forward to his grandchildren coming home for the holidays.”
“You understand your assignment here?” Fiona asked.
“Max explained everything,” Jessica said.
Ross sank onto a sofa nearby, stretched his long legs in front of him and sipped his whiskey. Although he seemed nonchalant, Jessica could tell he was taking in every word of their conversation. She struggled to concentrate on what Fiona was saying.
“Please indulge me,” Fiona said, “and let me restate what I want you to do.”
“You?” Jessica asked in surprise. “I’ve been hired by the trustees.”
“I am the trustee,” Fiona said.
“There’s only one?” Jessica asked.
Fiona dipped her head in her regal fashion. “Since my husband died ten years ago.”
“I see,” Jessica said, even though she thought the entire arrangement odd.
“I’m sure you find the circumstances of the trust…unusual,” Fiona stated, as if reading her mind.
Jessica glanced at Ross, who was studying the ice in his glass, before returning her gaze to Fiona. “It’s not my job to assess the legal contract, only to fulfill the financial obligations of it.”
Fiona nodded in approval. “Ross’s great-great-grandfather set up a trust to make certain the ranch remained intact and in the family. Every McGarrett’s done the same since. When the current owner dies, the heir goes through a period of…I guess you could call it apprenticeship for ten years. After that time, if he’s proved himself capable of operating the ranch to its maximum capacity, the trustees award him ownership.”
“And if he hasn’t?” Jessica asked.
“The ranch is owned and operated by the trust,” Ross said, “until the next generation of McGarretts has a chance to prove themselves.”
The next generation, Jessica thought with a start. She hadn’t considered that the handsome sheriff was probably married. With children. Relief surged through her. She was uninterested in men, and she was even less interested in married men. If a wife and kiddies were present, Jessica wouldn’t have to worry about Ross’s charm and could concentrate on her work without distraction.
“The trust is a formality,” Ross continued. “There’s never been a McGarrett who didn’t inherit.”
A worried frown scudded across Fiona’s strong features, but she quickly regained her composure. His grandmother’s fleeting expression made Jessica wonder if Ross was in danger of breaking that record. Jessica would be the one who determined if he was operating the ranch to its maximum efficiency and whether he should assume ownership.
She took a deep breath and forced her aching muscles to relax. If Ross’s management of the Shooting Star didn’t meet standards, she’d be the bearer of the bad news. The prospect wasn’t pleasant, even though she’d handled such situations before, but disappointing the appealing man who’d twice saved her life wasn’t something she liked to contemplate.
Fiona gazed at Ross with concern clouding her green eyes. He didn’t meet his grandmother’s gaze, and the knuckles of his hand were white where he gripped his glass.
In spite of the McGarretts’ hospitality and obvious efforts to put Jessica at ease, she could sense a tension in the room, an underlying current of things unsaid, fears unstated, and she wondered at their source.
“Will the storm be a problem?” Jessica thought the vicious weather might be the cause of her hosts’ unspoken anxiety.
“The cattle have weathered bigger storms than what’s forecast,” Ross said, apparently unconcerned over his herd. “The worst should blow over during the night.”
The blast of wind against the side of the house rattled the windows, making Jessica believe the worst had already arrived. Not that the wind frightened her. She’d ridden out hurricanes in Miami. What concerned her was being stranded with strangers, no matter how hospitable they appeared.
“And we have a generator if we lose power,” Fiona assured her. “You mustn’t be alarmed.”
Jessica drank her wine. If the weather didn’t have them on edge, what did? Her instincts were flashing on yellow alert, cues that in the past had cautioned her to look beyond the financial statistics when evaluating a situation. Something was troubling the McGarretts. Only time would tell whether their anxiety was related to Jessica’s assignment or something altogether different.
“Have you worked for Max long?” Fiona asked.
“Since I finished graduate school,” Jessica said, “eight years ago.”
“Then you must be only a few years younger than Ross,” the older woman observed.
“Now, Fiona,” Ross cautioned gently, his deep voice seductively edged with a cowboy twang. “You know better than to mention a woman’s age.”
“Nonsense,” Fiona said. “I’ll be seventy-nine in March and proud of it. Why should anyone be ashamed of living long and well?”
Jessica hastened to change the subject. “I’d like to begin work as soon as possible.”
“Of course,” Fiona answered. “But not until after dinner. No one can work on an empty stomach.”
“I can work while I eat,” Jessica suggested. “Just a sandwich and some coffee on a tray—”
“Nonsense,” Fiona repeated with an indignant frown. “You’re our guest. Dinner will be ready in a few minutes. You can begin when we’ve finished.”
Ross glanced at Jessica over the rim of his glass with a sympathetic smile and an it-won’t-help-to-argue look.
At the same time, an elderly man with Far Eastern features and wearing a white chef’s jacket appeared in the doorway.
“Dinner is served, Mrs. McGarrett,” he announced in a heavily accented voice, then disappeared down the hallway toward what Jessica assumed was the kitchen.
Jessica set her wineglass aside and stood when Fiona did. If the woman insisted on treating her like a guest rather than an employee, Jessica didn’t know how she would get any work done. She wanted to finish her assignment and go home. Back to the warmth and familiarity of Miami.
And away from the alluring charm of Sheriff Ross McGarrett before she broke her own rules about emotional involvement.
FROM HIS PLACE at the foot of the mahogany dining table, Ross studied his grandmother, seated at the head of the table, and tried to assess her motives. Fiona’s gracious hospitality was usually tinged with a subtle aloofness, but she’d dropped her customary reserve around Jessica. Maybe her warmth toward their guest was the result of sympathy for Jessica’s harrowing experiences. Or simply an extension of her friendship with Max Rinehart, her childhood friend. Whatever the reason, his grandmother was treating Jessica as if she were practically a member of the family.
Ross hadn’t become successful as a sheriff without learning to read people well, however, and he couldn’t help feeling something else besides sympathy or old friendship was going on behind his grandmother’s bright green eyes. Fiona was up to something, and not knowing what she was scheming made him uneasy. When Fiona set her mind to something, the rest of the world—and Ross in particular—had better watch out.
“My compliments to your chef. The sirloin tips are extraordinary.” Jessica, seated between Ross and Fiona, was the epitome of politeness, but Ross could sense undercurrents in her, too. Remarkably self-possessed, even after a day that would have driven a strong man to some serious drinking, she couldn’t quite hide her impatience to be about her work.
Maybe she had a family at home in Miami and she was anxious to return to them for the holidays. She wasn’t wearing an engagement or wedding ring, but that fact meant nothing in today’s business world. It seemed improbable such a gorgeous creature didn’t have a husband or a lover eager for her return.
Jessica Landon was definitely a contradiction in terms. A strong personality resided in that tiny, fragile form. She’d handled being shot at, then sideswiped and stranded in near-zero temperatures without hysterics. With her sun-streaked auburn hair, startling blue eyes and honey-golden tan, she was a living work of art. With a mind, evidently, judging from her competency in her profession, as efficient and analytical as any computer. Her strictly business manner was certainly at odds with the emotions she generated in Ross. With a blink of surprise, he found himself remembering how she’d felt in his arms and wondering whether he’d enjoy kissing her.
He squelched that thought instantly. Just being in the McGarrett employ was dangerous enough for Jessica. Ross didn’t want to endanger her further by having anyone believe he had feelings for her. Which he didn’t, he assured himself. He hardly knew the woman.
But he’d sure like to know her better.
“The storm should pass by morning,” Fiona was saying, “and crews will have the roads cleared by the next day. Saturday’s Ross’s day off, so he can show you the ranch.”
Alarm flashed across Jessica’s heart-shaped face, and Ross took pity on her. “Not on horseback,” he assured her. “We’ll take the SUV. It has four-wheel drive.”
“I can ride if you’d rather,” she said.
“Didn’t know folks went in for horses in Miami,” Ross commented, unable to hide his surprise.
“I learned at boarding school,” Jessica said. “If I seemed reluctant, it isn’t about riding. It’s about taking time away from my work.”
“Nonsense,” Fiona insisted. “Seeing the ranch and how it operates is part of your job. And Ross will be happy to show off the Shooting Star.”
“You must be anxious to get home for the holidays,” Ross said.
Jessica patted her mouth delicately with the fine linen napkin. “Not really.”
His statement hadn’t prompted any revelations so he tried again, this time taking a more blunt approach. “Is your family in Miami?”
“My mother and father both live in Europe,” Jessica said, adding with a small grimace, “although, not together.”
“I think,” Fiona commented with a wicked gleam in her eyes, “what my grandson wants to know is if you’re married.”
Ross choked on a bite of sirloin and coughed to clear his throat.
Jessica, cool as a mountain spring, turned her blue-eyed gaze on him and waited for his spasm to pass.
“Is my marital status relevant to my assignment?” she asked with seeming innocence.
“It’s the law officer in me.” Ross hoped his excuse would cover his grandmother’s bluntness. “Makes me curious about people.”
Jessica’s eyes twinkled and a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth, resurrecting Ross’s thoughts of kissing her. “I don’t have a rap sheet, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I should say not,” Fiona said heatedly. “Max Rinehart wouldn’t stand for it.”
Turning from Ross to Fiona, Jessica launched into an anecdote about Max teaching his oldest grandson to windsurf. Ross was so entranced by the lilting cadence of her voice, he didn’t realize until long after she’d concluded her story that she’d effectively sidestepped both his and his grandmother’s inquiries.
Jessica was a paradox. And a puzzle. He’d never met a woman who so willingly passed up an opportunity to talk about herself. He considered her reticence a challenge, one he was ready to meet.
“We’ll need the name and number of your next of kin,” Ross told her. “Just in case of an emergency while you’re staying with us.”
“An emergency?” She smiled so sweetly, he knew without a doubt she was toying with him. “You mean like being shot at by bank robbers or run off the road and left to freeze to death? How many more emergencies can I expect?”
“We really live a very quiet life here,” Fiona said quickly. “The emergency number is just routine.”
“You can always contact Max.” Jessica had smoothly avoided once again revealing any personal information.
Just as Ross was beginning to wonder if she had something to hide, she spoke again. “Forgive me. I don’t mean to appear rude, but I always make a point of separating my professional and personal life. Your hospitality is gracious and appreciated, but I have to remain impersonal and objective to do my job appropriately.”
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