Kylie Brant - In Sight Of The Enemy

“I didn’t ask.”

He nodded, but his mind was already grappling with a host of other questions. Suddenly a decision that had seemed so easy only minutes ago became fraught with complication, although their situation was hardly an uncommon one. Children grew up all the time with split families.

He’d just never considered it for his child.

Dodging the bleakness that accompanied that thought, he said with more certainty than he was feeling, “We’ll work it out. When’s your due date?”

“April fourth.”

“You should be cutting way back on your work around here.” Concern flickered when he saw the mutinous look on her face. “Cass, you’ll have to take things easy, especially this winter.”

“Dr. Godden says I can continue doing what I’m doing as long as I feel up to it.”

He opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again. Of course, that was standard medical advice for a woman with a low-risk pregnancy. But this was different. This was Cass. And the baby in question was his. It was oddly disconcerting to discover how easily science could be set aside when emotion was involved. He made a mental note to talk privately to Hawk about curtailing Cassie’s activities around the ranch. Despite her slight stature, she worked as hard as any hand on the place. Common sense demanded that she exercise some restraint during the course of the pregnancy.

A sudden thought struck him. “Were you uncertain about the due date originally?”

He noticed the caution creeping into her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“Well, they usually don’t order an ultrasound in the first trimester unless there’s a reason for it. And you said your health is fine, so…”

“Yes, it was for the due date.” It may have been his imagination but her response seemed rushed. “Like I told you, the baby is fine.”

The phone rang then, and Cassie rose, not without a feeling of relief. She’d like to delay any discussion of the tests she’d undergone, and the reason for them, for as long as possible. Shane was very much a man of science. A discussion of her symptoms would only worry him, and he wouldn’t put a lot of stock into the recipe for the tea Hawk had found for her.

As the phone sounded again, she quickened her step. Wild horses couldn’t convince her to tell him about the brief flashes into the immediate future she’d been experiencing. She’d learned too late that he wasn’t a man to accept anything that couldn’t be proved and witnessed with his own eyes.

A moment after answering the phone she heard her brother’s voice on the line and a delighted smile broke out. “You’re not checking up on me, are you? Because I can assure you, Jim makes a pretty effective watchdog.”

“Cassie, thank God.” The urgency in his voice had the smile fading from her lips. “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you. I don’t know how much time we have. You’re in danger. Is Jim there? The other hands?” She heard him swear, the impatience in his epithet familiar. “Damn. I suppose they’ve all gone home for the day.”

She frowned. “Hawk, what’s wrong?” A shiver raced down her spine, and the room seemed suddenly chilled.

“You need to get off the ranch. Now. Go to town and stay with…I don’t know, any of your friends. Sheila maybe, if Rafe will be there. Just go somewhere safe and don’t return until I get to town. It’s going to take me a day or so. I haven’t been able to get a flight yet. If I don’t find something soon, I’ll start driving.”

It was unusual to hear her taciturn brother string two sentences together at once. So this litany of terse orders didn’t get her back up. It filled her with foreboding.

“You’re going to have to be a bit more specific, Hawk. What’s going on? What kind of danger are you talking about?” She glanced up as Shane moved to her side. At his quizzical look, she shrugged. She couldn’t tell him what was going on when she didn’t understand herself.

Rather than snapping at her, as was his custom when she refused to fall in with his plans, he spoke faster. “Someone is coming for you. I don’t know who will appear, but stay away from anyone you don’t know, just to be safe. I can’t give you details now. Just get out of there, Cassie, as quickly as possible.”

“There was a couple here about an hour ago,” she said acerbically. “They wanted to look at the horses we have listed on the sale bill. Irritating, certainly, but hardly cause for alarm.” Annoyance had replaced trepidation. It wasn’t like him to be so dramatic, but he’d been overprotective ever since he’d learned of her pregnancy, and the weird spells that had accompanied it.

“Who were they?” His voice was sharp. “What’d they look like?”

After Cassie described the strangers, she heard her brother’s voice, sounding muffled, as though he were talking to someone next to him. “Sheridan’s found her. She’s already been there.”

“Sheridan?” The shiver was back, an electric current down her back. “They introduced themselves as Billings.” Even as she completed the sentence she knew the couple had lied. There had been something about them from the first that had made her wary. She’d explained away the feeling as a side effect of the mental flash she’d had that had preceded their arrival. Cassie swallowed around a throat that had gone suddenly dry. Aware of the man standing beside her, listening intently, she said, “Hawk, I knew they were coming. Just like I knew about Baby.”

Her brother was silent as he digested the information. She’d called him on his cell a couple days ago, after she’d had one of those strange mental flashes. In this one she’d seen her brother’s beloved dog, Baby, lying on the ground, blood pouring from its flank. Her brother hadn’t been available to answer her call. But when they’d spoken later she’d learned her brother had been involved in a fight for his life, and his pet had been injured by a bullet meant for him.

“This is related to what you found out about our mother, isn’t it? What haven’t you told me about that? Why would people have tried to stop you from discovering the truth about her death?” She felt, rather than saw, Shane’s reaction to her words.

“I’ll tell you everything later,” Hawk promised, a hint of desperation sounding in his voice. “But I think the woman who showed up at your door is Dr. Janet Sheridan. She’s a chemist, and the man she works for will stop at nothing to get you, Cassie. She’ll try to inject you with a drug they’ve designed. You can’t let her near you.”

The ground seemed to shift beneath her. There were, she thought numbly, more pieces than ever missing from the story her brother had yet to tell her about his adventures in the last few weeks. “Who is he?” she demanded. “How would he know about me?”

“That doesn’t matter now. If the woman at your door was Sheridan, and from your description, it sure sounds like it, she’s picked up some hired muscle to help her. I don’t know why she left before kidnapping you, but you can’t wait for her to come back.”

“I know why.” Cassie took a deep breath, forced herself to think rapidly. “Shane was coming up the drive. When they saw the car, they left, saying they’d be back tomorrow.” After their initial insistence on seeing the horses, she’d thought it odd that they’d left in such a hurry. But when she’d discovered who was in the vehicle that had sent them on their way, all thoughts of the couple had abruptly faded.

“Farhold’s there?” Hawk’s voice was sharp. “Let me talk to him.”

She hesitated, torn. Her brother had made no bones about his feelings about Shane when he and Cassie had broken up. But the decision was taken out of her hands, along with the phone.