Roxanne Rustand - Duty To Protect

“Looks to me like you’ve got a few hundred other vehicles to check,” the cowboy shot back, his voice laced with derision. “And you’d better get moving—I see at least three with headlights on that are gonna be leaving anytime.”

“If she stowed away in your rig, you’d better be ready to watch your back, cowboy,” the man growled, his voice so close to the trailer that Emma’s heart skipped a beat. “I thought I saw something moving over here. I’m only trying to save you trouble.”

Emma heard a pause, then a series of four drop-down feed doors along the side of the trailer squealed open and slammed shut, one by one.

“There. Are you satisfied?”

“No. She’s got to be here somewhere.” A set of footsteps crunched in the snow as the voice moved away.

Someone else—likely the cowboy—headed forward to the pickup. A truck door opened, then closed.

Emma crawled forward into a dim pool of light coming through the foot-square window in the dressing room door and felt through her purse, then ran her fingertips along the seams. Underneath the zipper, she found it—a small, silver disk.

All of her careful efforts had been for nothing, because she’d had a tracking device planted on her all along.

Sickened, she waited until all was silent, and then she stood and surreptitiously slid the window open to throw the device over a bank of snow.

It might not be the only device they’d planted, but finding it was a start.

She would stay hidden in here, but she’d have the rifle in her hands and ready if the wrong person opened that door. And once she was far enough away from here, then she would slip away the first chance she had.

From outside she heard the familiar whoosh of the Greyhound as it rolled back toward the highway, paused, and lumbered away. Now the pickup engine roared to life. An overhead light in the dressing room compartment came on, and through a sliver of space in the back wall, she could see the lights were on in the interior of the horse compartment, as well.

A vibration shook through the trailer, and suddenly it was moving. Unfolding more of the blankets to create a warm nest, she tucked one around herself to guard against the chilled air.

It was cold in here. She had no idea where she was headed, or if she could trust the cowboy at the wheel. But if she’d stayed at the truck stop, she might have been found, and she had no illusions about where that would’ve led. At least now, she had at least a little more time to live.

She started to pray.

Jake Kincaid turned up the truck radio and scanned through the stations. Every frequency coming in loud and clear was focused on one thing: blizzard warnings—the last thing he wanted to deal with after three days on the road.

He flicked a glance in the side mirrors and saw only a wall of white billowing up behind his rig. Now and then another vehicle seemed to come out of nowhere, its headlights suddenly slicing through the heavy snowfall. Ahead, he could only see a couple dozen yards of snow-covered asphalt. Western Nebraska and the eastern edge of Colorado were being hit hard, but the worst of it had passed Denver. If he could just make it to the metropolitan area tonight, he’d be home free.

The Early Spring Color Breed Bonanza Sale was tomorrow, and the two horses in back were consigned. He’d been glad to have a load to help pay for the westward trip home, after hauling one of his champion roping geldings to its buyer in Illinois, but now the weather was giving him second thoughts.

The truck bucked through a drift and the trailer jerked and swayed. Between the narrow, high snowdrifts blowing across the highway like ribs on a skeleton, glare ice now stretched as far ahead as he could see, and the number of cars and trucks in the ditches on either side of the freeway was increasing with every mile. Sensing his tension, the golden lab on the seat next to him uncurled herself to sit upright.

He stroked her soft coat. “Looks like we’d better take this next rest stop, Maisie.”

She whined and licked his cheek, thumping her tail against the upholstery.

He felt the vehicle lose traction, start to slide sideways, then the tires caught and straightened out. He slowed to a crawl, put on his flashers and eased off on the next ramp. The rest stop was already packed with semis and passenger cars, but at the end of the parking area he found one last double-long spot for a truck and trailer to pull in at an angle.

Maisie hopped out as soon as he opened the door and went to do her business in front of the bumper, then followed close at his heels when he went back to check on the horses. He’d just started to open the back gate of the trailer when the dog burst into a ferocious round of barking.

“Quiet,” he shouted over the keening wind.

She barked even louder, her attention riveted on the dressing room door at the front of the trailer. If she wanted her dog food that bad, she must think she was really starving. “Okay, okay.”

He reached down to ruffle her coat, then went to the backseat of the truck for a bottle of water and her two bowls. She growled when he reached for the door of the dressing room.

“What, did we pick up a mouse at the last barn?” He unlocked the door and reached inside to flip on the lights, which had gone out when he turned off the truck ignition, and scanned the insides, hoping it wasn’t something larger than a mouse. The last thing he needed was to find that a barn cat had hitched a ride away from that last horse farm. Especially if it was a favorite of the trainer’s children.

But it wasn’t a barn cat staring at him from the far corner with wide hazel eyes, tousled auburn hair peeking from beneath a knitted hat, and pale skin turning blue with cold. It was a woman huddled in a pile of horse blankets, her teeth chattering and hands trembling.

And she had his rifle pointed straight at his chest.

TWO

Jake took a slow step back and raised his hands, palms up, as he assessed the situation.

The woman staring back at him appeared slender, late-twenties. Caucasian. Probably not more than a hundred-twenty pounds. Delicate bone structure and pretty in an upscale way. In other words, the last person he’d ever expect to find in his horse trailer in a pile of pungent horse blankets, in the middle of nowhere…during a blizzard.

She looked more like the type to be heading to Starbucks, rather than a woman who might be on the run from murder charges, but his ten years in law enforcement had taught him more than he’d ever wanted to know about how looks could be deceiving.

After his ex-wife proved it all over again, he’d become one very jaded man.

“Tell me you’re not the woman that guy was looking for back in Ogallala,” he said on a long sigh. “I really don’t have time for this.”

She raised the rifle, ready to sight her target—his chest—and gave him the answer he wanted. “I’m not.”

A gust of wind-driven snow slammed against him and swirled into the dressing room of the trailer. “Let me rephrase that. Who are you, and why are you in my trailer?”

She was clearly cold, exhausted and desperate, her wild tangle of hair and the intensity in her eyes suggesting that she just might pull the trigger if he pushed her too far.

She visibly shivered, and the barrel of his rifle wobbled. “I…I hid in here when you stopped last.”

“In Sterling?” Not likely. He’d padlocked the dressing room door back in Ogallala. She couldn’t have gained access after that.

Apparently she realized her error. “I…I must’ve fallen asleep. I don’t remember Sterling.”

“Why don’t you come on out of there and we can talk about it.”

She shook her head.

“You look cold and my dog and I are standing out in a blizzard. My pickup is warmer.” When she didn’t respond, he shrugged. “I’ll tell you what. If you want to thaw, come to my truck. If not, this door is open and you can skedaddle. Far as I’m concerned, this just isn’t worth dying over.”