Cassie Miles - Colorado Abduction

“No more sweets for you, Elvis.”

He whinnied in protest.

She tugged a forelock of his black mane. “If you get any fatter, you won’t fit into your white jumpsuit.”

As she watched Nicole head out, Carolyn shivered. She should have grabbed a jacket before she came out, but the weather was pleasant enough—probably in the mid-fifties—and her blood still boiled with anger. She had a bad feeling about Nicole riding alone. It didn’t seem safe. Not if there was an arsonist on the loose. A few minutes later, a man wearing a jacket with the Longbridge Security patch rode from the barn to follow her.

She turned her attention to Elvis. The horse listened while she talked about her worries about the ranch, about Dylan and Nicole. They’d always seemed like the perfect couple. If they couldn’t make it, what hope did Carolyn have of finding a mate? She was thirty-three with no special man to warm her bed. Her last date had been a disaster and…

A noise distracted her. A snap that ricocheted across the valley. A rifle shot?

Carolyn peered across the field. The bodyguard and Nicole were nowhere in sight.

The grizzled ranch foreman, Lucas Mann, came around the corner of the barn, moving faster than his usual bowlegged saunter. “Carolyn, did you hear that?”

“Hush.” She listened hard. A volley of shots echoed from far away, like pebbles being dropped in a metal bucket. Sound traveled great distances in the thin mountain air and she couldn’t tell where the gunfire was coming from. “Lucas, give me your gun.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Lucas handed over his sidearm. Though he looked like an old-time cowboy, the weapon he carried in his belt holster was a brand-new Glock nine millimeter.

Carolyn tucked the gun into the waistband of her skirt. “We need to find Nicole and make sure she’s okay. She was headed southwest toward the creek. I want you to saddle up. Bring one of those security guards.”

“What the hell are you fixing to do?”

“Take care of business.” If someone had fired on Nicole, she needed backup. And she needed it now.

In her high-heeled boots, Carolyn climbed the corral fence, tore the slit on her wool skirt and slung her leg over Elvis’s bare back. As soon as Lucas unlatched the corral gate, she rode through. Digging her heels into Elvis’s flanks, she took off across the field.

Riding without a saddle wasn’t easy, especially not with the horse’s bristly coat snagging her panty hose and an automatic pistol digging into her side. She wouldn’t have attempted this ride with any other mount, but Elvis’s gait was as familiar as her own jogging style. Her body adjusted instinctively to the rhythm of his gait. In her teens, she and Elvis had won dozens of trophies and blue ribbons for calf roping and barrel racing in local rodeos.

She clung to his mane and directed him with pressure from her knees and verbal commands. The chilly December wind sharpened her tension as she rode toward the area where the valley merged into rocky hillsides covered with forests of ponderosa pine.

She hadn’t heard any other shots. If there had been a gunfight, it was over. The damage was done.

What if Nicole and the bodyguard were shot and bleeding? Can’t think about that now. She needed to stay focused. That’s what I do best—hard-driving, straightforward action.

Through the dusky gloom, she spotted a horseman coming out of the trees at a slow walk. The bodyguard. He slumped over his horse’s neck. As his horse came to a stop, he slipped from the saddle to the ground.

She dismounted and ran toward the injured man. His shirt and denim jacket were covered in blood, his face twisted in pain. She sank to her knees beside him and pushed his jacket aside. If she could figure out where he’d been shot, she could apply pressure and slow the bleeding.

“Nicole.” His voice was faint. “Couldn’t save her.”

Talking was too much of an effort. He needed to calm down and slow the pumping of his heart. But Carolyn had to ask, “Was she shot?”

“No.” His eyelids closed. “They took her.”

She tore open the buttons on his shirt, exposing a raw, gaping hole in his upper chest. Carolyn took off her suit jacket, wadded the fabric in a ball and pressed against the wound. Blood also stained the sleeve of his jacket and his leg. She had to get him to a hospital.

His hand gripped hers. He forced his eyes open and stared with fierce intensity. “Nicole tried to fight. Two men. One of them hit her. She fell. Didn’t move.”

Carolyn choked back a helpless sob. Oh, God. How could this happen?

“The other guy…” The bodyguard coughed. His fingers tightened. “He stood guard. He got off a shot. Before I could get close enough to…”

“You did the best you could.”

“I fell off my horse. Couldn’t move. Just lay there.” It must have taken a fierce effort for him to mount up. Even now, he struggled to sit. “Saw their faces. I can ID them.”

“Settle down.” Though she respected his courage, this man wasn’t going anywhere. “Help is on the way.”

She glanced over her shoulder. What was taking so long? Lucas should have been here by now.

The bodyguard lay back. His chest heaved. Yet he forced himself to speak. “They said Dylan would pay. He’d pay a lot. To get his wife back.”

“Are you telling me Nicole was kidnapped?”

“That’s right. Kidnapped.”

His eyes closed and his body went limp. He was still breathing. But just barely.

Her arms ached from putting pressure on his wound. The jacket she pressed against his chest was already soaked in blood. His chances for survival decreased with every minute.

“Don’t die.” Tears slid down her cheeks. “Please. Please, don’t die.”

She heard the sound of hoofbeats approaching and dashed away her tears. If the men found her crying, they wouldn’t listen to a word she said. And Carolyn needed to take charge, needed to be strong. Her brother was going to be crazy and illogical—dangerously irrational.

The bodyguard she’d met on the veranda joined her on the ground beside the injured man. “I’ll take it from here, ma’am. I’m a medic.”

“He’s unconscious.”

“You did the right thing,” he said, “putting pressure on the wound. Don’t worry. We’ll get him to the hospital.”

She stood and stepped out of the way, relieved that the wounded bodyguard would be cared for by someone who knew what he was doing. Turning on the heel of her boot, she faced four other men on horseback. All of them had rifles. They looked like a posse from the Old West.

Lucas swung down from his horse and came toward her. “You’ve got blood all over. Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay.”

“Where’s Nicole?”

Her lips pinched together. If she told them Nicole had been kidnapped, they’d take off to rescue her. They were cowboys, experienced hunters who were capable of following the track of a jackrabbit across miles of mountain terrain. If they located the kidnappers, there’d be a shoot-out.

The paramedic called out. “I need the first-aid kit in my saddlebag. Somebody call an ambulance.”

“You heard him,” Carolyn said. “The first thing is to get this man to a hospital. He’s lost a lot of blood.”

While the other cowboys followed instructions from the paramedic, she saw her brother racing toward them, leaning low over the mane of his horse, riding like the demons of hell were on his tail. He pulled up and dismounted in a single move, hit the ground running and yanked her into a hug. “Thank God, you’re all right.”

“I’m fine.” She could feel the tension in his body. Every muscle was clenched. Dylan wasn’t going to like what she had to say, but there was no way to get around it.