was the problem with Rourke. He thought he owned Blaze, had ever since junior high. What a fool. Anyone with a pocketful of money could have Blaze—at least until the cash ran out.
Forrest rolled a cigarette, lit it and glanced at his watch before tossing the match to the floorboard. In that instant between light and darkness, he looked out and thought he saw someone silhouetted against the storm.
He stared into the darkness, unnerved until lightning lit the horizon and he could see that there was nothing out there but clumps of silver sage and sun-golden grasses bent to the breeze.
Just the booze playing tricks on him. He crushed out the last of his cigarette, wishing now he’d just gone home. Leaning back, he pulled his cowboy hat down over his face and closed his eyes. He was tired and sore and already feeling a little hungover. This had been a bad idea, but if she’d ever get here…
The night air felt good coming in through his open window. He half listened for the sound of the vehicle coming up the creek road, half dozed.
He’d dropped off into a deep, alcohol-drenched sleep when he was startled awake. At first all he heard was the whine of a vehicle engine coming up the road and the low rumble of thunder. Lightning flickered across the horizon, then died, leaving the night even darker.
But as he listened, he realized that wasn’t what had awakened him.
He sat up a little, trying to place the sound. Then he heard it again. The soft scrape of boot leather brushing against sagebrush.
He sat up straight, pushed back his hat and, rubbing his hand over his face to wake up, stared out his open side window into the blackness.
The air seemed to change around him an instant before he saw the barrel of the pistol. Just a glint of blued steel appearing out of the night right next to him and the open window.
He stared at the gun, more than a little startled to realize that he really wasn’t alone, probably hadn’t been for most of the time he’d been sitting there.
He frowned, uncomprehending. In the distance, the sound of the vehicle coming up the road grew closer and closer.
For just a split second, the gun, the gloved hand holding it and the face of the person were illuminated in a flash of lightning. Just long enough for Forrest Danvers to face his killer.
“No!” The deafening boom of the gunshot drowned out his cry. He felt the burning heat as the lead entered his chest. The second shot exploded from the barrel of the gun. He barely noticed it. In the flare of the gunshot, he studied the killer’s face, wanting to hang on to every familiar feature until they met again in hell.
Chapter One
Eleven years later
A storm blew in the day Rourke McCall got out of prison.
At the Longhorn Café, Cassidy Miller brushed back an errant strand of hair from her face and tried to pretend it was just another day as she picked up the coffeepot and headed for the table in the corner now full of ranch hands from the VanHorn spread.
On the way, she made the mistake of looking out the window. The sky outside had turned dark and ominous, dust devils swirled in the street, the first drops of rain pelted the front window and streaked the glass.
Past the rain and dust, someone else was also staring out at the storm—and her. Blaze Logan stood at the window of the Antelope Development Corporation. Their eyes met across Main Street and Cassidy felt a chill rattle through her.
“I’ll take a little more of that coffee, Cass,” called Dub Morgan, the VanHorn Ranch foreman, from the table she’d been heading toward.
Cassidy dragged her gaze away from the window and Blaze, not realizing that she’d stopped walking, and took the pot of coffee over to the tableful of cowboys. But as she filled their coffee cups and joked and smiled, her mind was miles away in Deer Lodge, Montana, where Rourke McCall, the wildest of the McCall boys, would be walking out the gate of the Montana State Prison this morning.
None of her patrons had mentioned it, but everyone in town knew. That was one reason the café was packed this morning and she’d had to call in an extra waitress.
Everyone was wondering if Rourke would come back to town and make good on the threat he’d made against her eleven years ago.
As he was being dragged out of the courtroom in handcuffs, he had called back to Cassidy, “I know you framed me. I’m going to get out and, when I do, I’ll be back for you.”
The judge had given him twenty-five years but Rourke was walking out a free man after only eleven. For most of those years, Rourke had worked the prison’s cattle ranch. Ironic since he’d hated working the family ranch and done everything possible to avoid it in all the years Cassidy had known him.
Good behavior, the warden had told the parole board. “Rourke McCall is a changed man. A reformed man. He is no longer a threat to society.”
No, he was only a threat to Cassidy Miller—no matter what he told the parole board or the warden.
“You okay, honey?” Ellie whispered, slowing as she passed Cassidy with an armload of plates headed for the VanHorn Ranch table.
Cassie nodded and glanced outside again, trying to imagine what it would be like seeing Rourke after all these years. Maybe he really was a changed man. Maybe he was reformed. Maybe he’d forgotten his threat against her.
But even as she thought it, she knew better. Rourke McCall might have fooled the prison officials but he couldn’t fool her.
The bell dinged indicating that an order was up. She moved toward the kitchen, determined to keep up a good front. She didn’t want anyone to know she’d been dreading this day for eleven years. Or the real reason why.
ACROSS THE STREET, Blaze Logan stood at the window watching the crowd at the Longhorn Café and smiling to herself. How appropriate that one hell of a thunderstorm would hit town just before Rourke McCall did.
She could sense the change in the air, smell the rain and expectation, hear the hush that had fallen over Antelope Flats, Montana. She loved nothing better than a good knock-down-drag-out fight. She’d had that and more the night Forrest Danvers was murdered and she was ready for the hell Rourke was going to cause when he got back.
As she caught another glimpse of Cassidy Miller through the café window across the street, her smile broadened. Cassidy. The good girl and a thorn in Blaze’s side since they were kids. Her cousin Cassidy had always been the perfect one. She now owned her own business, was president of the chamber of commerce, helped with every damned fund-raiser in town. No one ever had a bad word to say about her.
“Why can’t you be more like Cassidy,” her father had said from as far back as Blaze could remember.
She and Cassidy competed against each other in regional rodeos and Cassidy always won, and Blaze always threw a fit when she lost.
“You could learn something about being a good sport from your cousin,” her father would say.
But Blaze knew she should have won, had to win, was expected to win because her great-grandmother had been a trick rider with a Wild West show.
