TRACE PACED THE LENGTH of his bedroom and back again. It seemed to take forever for the couple that had commandeered the house to finally call it a night and head up to Eric’s room.
Correction, not Eric’s room. His older brother had claimed their parents’ master bedroom down the hall. A room the two brothers had silently agreed never to sleep in.
As if it wasn’t enough for Eric to take over the ranch, he’d also staked a claim on the house.
Trace hadn’t gone down for dinner. Instead, he’d taken a shower in the main bathroom off the hall, forgetting to bring a clean change of clothes with him, he was so distracted. Hell, it wasn’t his fault that when he opened the door wearing nothing but a small towel, Sara was out there.
Of course, he could have apologized and then backed into the bathroom. Or even gone to his room.
Instead, he’d leaned against the doorjamb and allowed the towel to drop to the floor.
He grimaced and ran both of his hands over his hair, even now not knowing what he’d been thinking. He supposed at the time he’d figured it was a good idea that the female addition to the household get used to the idea of sharing the place with two males.
Then he’d looked at her belly, where his niece grew inside, and felt instantly guilty for having done something so juvenile.
Evidently, Sara hadn’t shared the incident with his brother. Because Trace had little doubt that Eric would have hunted his ass down and instigated that fight they were both spoiling for.
Why she wouldn’t tell surprised Trace. After all, he had humiliated her. And Eric was there to protect her.
Then again, maybe she understood how Eric might react, and had said nothing in an effort to keep the peace.
Trace supposed he owed her the same consideration. Especially since he hadn’t exactly gone out of his way to make her feel welcome.
Tomorrow, he told himself. Tomorrow he’d get up and try to make amends. After all, it wasn’t her fault his brother was such an overbearing jackass.
Five minutes after he heard the door to the master bedroom finally close, he exited his own room. He hadn’t eaten, but that was low on his priority list just now. What was more important was having that talk with Jo.
He went quietly down the stairs…and ran straight into Eric, who had apparently forgotten something.
The two of them faced off in the half-cleared living room…
THE MATERIAL WAS SOAKED with something. Jo detected a chemical scent. She held her breath as she continued to dig for her pocketknife, freeing the weapon. She opened it and took a blind swing at her assailant, who moved behind her at the same time she brought her boot heel down on his instep.
Both blows hit their intended target, giving her the opening she needed to step out of his grasp and struggle to remove the hood. Unfortunately, he appeared to have tied it off, and she couldn’t find a way to open it. Still holding her breath, she instead looked for a way to tear it open, something—anything—to allow her fresh air.
She was aware of barking. Scout. He must have heard the ruckus and was trying to alert the other cowboys and gain access to the stables at the same time. She heard him scratching at the door.
Her assailant regained his footing and grabbed for her again. Relying on tactics that had been drilled into her head during combat training, she fought him off.
Until she was forced to draw a breath.
The world instantly faded to gray and then black, and she collapsed to the stable floor.
“I’M EXPECTED SOMEWHERE,” Trace told his brother, and began to circle around him to gain access to the door. “You’re not going anywhere until you talk to me.” Trace stared at him. “There you go again, trying to act like a parent rather than a brother. Get the hell out of my way, Eric. Or I’ll make you.”
The sound of Scout’s sharp barks distracted them both at the same time. They continued staring at each other, but no longer with the same animosity.
“Get the shotgun out of the cabinet,” Trace told Eric as he grabbed a Smith & Wesson from the drawer of a side table and ran for the door.
When you were raised on a ranch, you were trained to know what each dog bark meant. There were the playful barks when someone played fetch. The “I’ve got a squirrel in my sights” bark. And even an “I’m not happy to be out here on this cold night” bark.
This was none of those. This was a “let me at him” bark, meaning someone was on the grounds who didn’t belong there.
Trace’s thoughts ran straight to Carter Southard. He’d been released from the county lockup the morning before. But had he gone back to Dallas as everyone assumed? Or had he stuck around, had another bout with booze, and come back to finish the job he’d started the other night?
Trace’s blood boiled through his veins as he ran full out for the stables.
Scout spotted him and redoubled his alert, probably hungry for some intruder flesh now that Trace was going to give him a shot at it. Trace pulled open the door and Scout led the way in.
“What is it, boy?” he said. “Show me.”
Scout ran first right, then left. Then stopped in front of the stall left empty by the mare they’d lost two days ago. He began scratching at the bottom of the door.
Trace led with his gun, holding the pistol out in front of him and cocking it for good measure. He heard no sounds other than excited whinnies from the horses and the shuffle of hooves as they moved to and fro. He hesitated outside the stall in question before reaching for the latch. The safety pin was off, so he pulled the handle.
And immediately spotted Jo sprawled on the floor, unconscious. She was wearing some sort of dark hood, her shirt and jeans partially open.
“Sweet Jesus,” Eric said from behind him.
“Check around! He’s still got to be here somewhere,” Trace ordered.
His brother instantly did as asked, disappearing down the aisle.
Trace stuck the gun in the back of his waistband and lifted her motionless form to a sitting position. It took a few moments, but he figured how to remove what looked like a standard pillowcase tied off with rope.
His stomach tightened. The rapist.
“Jo, can you hear me?” he asked, detecting the strong medicinal scent as he tossed the case into the aisle. “Come on, baby, wake up. Talk to me.”
He checked to make sure she was still breathing, and then smoothed strands of hair that had escaped her braid back from her face. He was virtually shaking all over. With fear that she might not be okay. With rage enough to kill whoever had done this to her.
Eric reappeared at the door with a subdued Scout. “Whoever it was is gone.”
Trace glanced up at him.
“She going to be okay?”
Jo coughed, a wretched sound that racked her entire body. Trace held her up straighter and rubbed her back.
“Hey,” he said when she looked up at him with damp blue eyes. “Are you okay?”
She started to talk, then went into another fit of coughing, nodding her head instead.
Trace helped her to her feet and led her out into the aisle. Milford, Jackson, Vern and the stable manager all came rushing into the barn.
Trace handed Jo off to Eric. “Have Sara look after her, will you? And call the doc.”
He stalked toward the door.
“Where are you going?” Eric asked.
“Just take care of her for me.”
JO SAT AT THE kitchen table of the main house, downing milk to counteract what she strongly suspected was chloroform. The doctor was on his way, and Trace had left her to do God only knew what, while Eric hovered like a dark sentinel, watching her closely.
“I’ve…” She started coughing again. “I’ve got to get ahold of Trace.”
“He didn’t take his cell phone,” Eric said.
“Then I’ve got to get to the sheriff’s. Can I borrow your truck keys?”
The woman named Sara handed her a couple more tissues from the box she held. Jo’s eyes kept drifting to her rounded stomach, but her foggy mind wasn’t sure why.
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” the woman said.
Eric agreed. “Trace is a grown man. He knows what he’s doing.”
Jo shook her head several times. “No, he doesn’t. He’s going after a man I don’t think had a thing to do with this.”
Sara and Eric shared a look.
Eric stepped to a box that hung on the back wall near the door, and opened it, taking out a set of keys. “Where do you think he’s heading?”
Jo shook her head again. “I’m not going to tell you unless you agree to let me go with you.”
“But the doctor—” Sara began.
“Will…still be here when we get back.” She downed the rest of the milk, picked up the water bottle that was on the table, and then led the way through the back door to where all the house vehicles were parked. She climbed into the passenger’s side of the truck while Eric took the wheel.
“The Town and Country Motel in Hansen,” she managed to tell him between coughs.
“SON OF A BITCH—it sounds like we’ve got our guy,” Sheriff Brody said as he drove to the Town and Country. Beside him, Trace sat checking his handgun. “You’re taking this mighty personal, aren’t you, son?”
Trace stared at him. “I don’t like it when people who aren’t welcome come onto my property.”
“You and every Texan out there.” Brody ran the siren and radioed for one of his deputies to meet them at the motel. “Give me the lowdown again.”
“She was out cold in one of the horse stalls with a pillowcase tied around her head. What more do you want to know?”
“Did it look like she’d been…messed with?”
“Messed with how, Sheriff? You mean raped?”
“That would about sum it up.”
Trace could barely speak through his tight throat as he remembered the way her shirt had been ripped open, her jeans unfastened. “I think I got there just in time.”
“And how can you be so sure it’s this guy Southard?” the sheriff asked.
“Are you telling me it was somebody else?”
They pulled into the parking lot of the motel, and Trace was out of the car before it drew to a full stop. He went to the office, got the number of Southard’s room and then stalked to unit 5 and kicked at the door. It took three tries, but finally the door swung inward and he burst into the room, his gun out in front of him.
Southard didn’t appear to be there.
Then the bathroom door opened and the man in question stared at him as he toweled off his face, apparently just having cleaned up.
Trace squeezed off a shot, the sound ringing in his ears.