Lone Star Winter: The Winter Soldier

“Micah’s taking the guy over to the sheriff,” he said. “He suddenly doesn’t speak English, of course, and his friend lit a shuck while he was breaking into the house. We won’t be able to prove a thing beyond the obvious.”

“He’ll be out on bond by tomorrow afternoon and out of the country an hour later,” Ebenezer added.

Cy’s expression was homicidal before he turned his glittery green eyes on Lisa. “You can’t stay here a day longer,” he said flatly. “Lopez doesn’t make the same mistake twice. You’ve been put on notice. The next time, there won’t be a near miss.”

She ground her teeth together. “This is my ranch. I haven’t sold it to you yet, and I’m staying here,” she said furiously. “I’m not going to let some sleazy drug king pin force me into hiding out like a scared kid!”

“Commendable courage,” Cy remarked with a stoic expression. He reached into his belt and pulled out something dark. “Here.”

He tossed her his automatic. She caught it and then dropped it with a gasp of pure horror.

“You’d better pick it up and learn to shoot straight and under fire,” he said coldly. “You’d better learn to shoot to kill while you’re at it. Because that—” he indicated the gun “—is the only way you’ll survive if you insist on staying here alone. We were almost too late tonight. Next time, we might not be so lucky.”

She glared at him, but she didn’t argue. “I hate guns.”

“Good God, so do I,” Cy told her. “But when you get in a war, you don’t throw potatoes at the enemy.”

“Then what do I do?” she asked Cy.

Cy told her. “Go pack a bag. You’re leaving.”

“Leaving for where?” she demanded, standing up with both hands on her hips. “I told you already, I’ve got no family, no close friends, and no place to go to!”

“Yes, you have. The Expedition’s outside. I’ll send Harley over in the morning to pick up your VW and bring it over, too.”

Her dark eyes widened. It didn’t help much, her glasses were upstairs on the bedside table and all she could see of Cy was a blur. “I can’t go home with you. I’ve only been widowed a short time!”

“I’ve only been widowed three years,” he reminded her. “So what?”

“I can stay with Callie Kirby!”

“Callie’s apartment isn’t big enough for Callie, much less Callie and you,” he said. “I’ve got three bedrooms. You can even have a bathroom of your own.”

She didn’t want to give in. But the memory of someone trying to break in the house scared her. She knew that she couldn’t shoot an intruder. That left her few options.

“When you make up your mind, I’ll be in the truck,” Cy told her.

He actually walked out the door. Eb followed him with an amused grin that he didn’t let Lisa see.

Lisa glared after him, hesitant and bristling with hurt pride. But in the end, she went upstairs, changed into jeans and a shirt and packed a small bag. Ten minutes later, he opened the door of the utility vehicle so that she could climb in with her tote bag.

“If Harley so much as grins, I’ll kick him in the shins,” she said after she’d fumbled her seat belt together.

“So will I,” Cy promised her.

She glanced at him from the warm folds of her flannel-lined denim jacket. “Would you have shot that man?”

“If there hadn’t been another way to stop him, yes.”

“I couldn’t shoot anybody,” she said.

“I know. That’s why you have to stay with me until we get Lopez.” He glanced at her. “It won’t be so bad. I can cook.”

“So can I.”

“Good. Fair division of labor.” He glanced at her with a faint smile. “When the baby comes, we’ll take turns getting up for his meals.”

She felt a warm glow wash over her. She smiled, too. “Oh, I wouldn’t want to sleep if he was hungry,” she mused dreamily. “I’d get up, too.”

He remembered his wife complaining bitterly about lost sleep, making formula, giving bottles. She hated everything to do with the baby, and couldn’t begin to understand his affection for the tiny little boy, who wasn’t even…

He closed his mind to the anguish that memory fostered, and concentrated on his driving instead.

Apparently Cy’s men were asleep in the bunkhouse, because the ranch house was quiet when they arrived. He helped Lisa out of the vehicle and carried her suitcase into the house.

“You’ll probably like this room. It faces the rose garden,” he added with a smile.

She looked around at the simple, old-fashioned room with its canopied double bed and gauzy white curtains and white furniture. “It’s very pretty,” she murmured.

“The house belonged to an elderly woman, who was the last living member of her family,” he said. “She had to go into a nursing home. I learned the history of the house from her. It belonged to her father, who was one of the better known Texas Rangers. She raised two kids and three grandkids here. One of her grandsons was a congressman, and another worked for the U.S. Secret Service. She was very proud of them.”

“Is she living in Jacobsville?”

He nodded. “I go to visit her every other week. You might like to go along occasionally. She’s a walking history of Texas.”

“I’d like that.” She was studying him with open curiosity. He looked so different in that stark black outfit that she wondered if she would even have recognized him if she’d seen him on the street. Her husband had been in law enforcement, but even he hadn’t looked as dangerous as Cy Parks in commando gear.

He lifted an eyebrow.

“Sorry,” she murmured with a shy smile. “You look different, that’s all.”

“Think of it as a covert ops business suit,” he mused. “The object is to blend in with the night.”

“Oh, you did that very neatly,” she agreed.

He chuckled. “Get some sleep. There won’t be anybody to bother you here, and you can sleep as late as you like.”

She grimaced. “What about Puppy Dog?”

“What?”

“Puppy Dog,” she said. “He’s all shut up on the back porch…”

“I’ll fetch him at daybreak,” he said. “But if he eats one of my chickens, he’s dog bone stew. Got that?”

“You’ve got chickens?”

“Five,” he said. “Rhode Island Reds. I like fresh eggs.”