The Cowboy's Son

Dylan motioned toward his truck and unlocked the doors. “I can walk,” Collena assured him.

“I don’t doubt that, but this will be warmer.”

But not faster. She could actually walk across the pasture quicker than taking the roads around the ranch to get to her car, but Dylan wasn’t sure how steady she was on her feet. She’d eaten a few bites in his office, but she was still pale and seemed unsteady.

And it irritated him that he was even remotely concerned about that.

This woman could cost him everything.

He wanted to hate her.

What he didn’t want was to believe that she was telling the truth. Because if she was, if someone had truly stolen her baby and left her for dead, then she’d been through hell, something that Dylan totally understood.

“I suppose Adam can walk?” she asked.

He groaned. He didn’t want to talk about Adam, not to her, but it’d be petty to withhold such simple information. Still, he considered it before he finally mumbled, “Yes.”

“And he can talk?”

He bit back another groan. “He can say a few things.”

Collena nodded. “Thank you. I know that wasn’t easy.” She watched as he drove out of the wrought iron gates that fronted the ranch. “I came today, hoping I’d get a glimpse of him through one of the windows. I really hadn’t planned on intruding on your Thanksgiving day.”

What could he say to that? That she’d gone about it the wrong way? Well, they both knew there was no right way to do this. If she’d come to his door with this bombshell on any day, holiday or not, he wouldn’t have let her in.

He made the turn on the dirt and gravel road that snaked against the fenced portion of his property. The snow had already dusted the surface, making it hard for him to see where the road ended and deep ditches began.

Because the silence was thick and uncomfortable, Dylan decided to push her for more information. “Tell me about the father of your child,” he said.

Collena took black leather gloves from her pocket and put them back on. She also took a deep breath. “Sean Reese was a lawyer. We’d been engaged nearly a year when I got pregnant.”

A year. That wasn’t a casual relationship. “You planned a family?”

She shook her head. “No. I was on the pill, hadn’t missed taking any, so the pregnancy wasn’t planned. When I came home from work the day after I told him, he was gone. He’d moved out and left me a typed letter saying he didn’t want to be a father and that he was breaking up with me.” She paused. “That’s the kind of man he was.”

“And he’s really dead?” Dylan managed to ask through his suddenly tight jaw. Because he didn’t want a guy like that in Adam’s life.

“Yes. About six months after he moved out, one of his drug-dealing clients murdered him when he received a guilty verdict that obviously didn’t please him.”

Dylan hated to feel relieved, but he was. It was bad enough having one birth parent in the picture. If Collena was indeed a real birth parent. It was hard to doubt it though, especially when he looked at her mouth.

That was Adam’s mouth.

Heart shaped. And capable of expressing a huge range of emotions.

So, if Collena Drake was truly Adam’s birth mother, then the question was—what was he going to do about it?

He didn’t get a chance to come up with any possibilities because Collena spoke before he had time to think.

“There’s something else you should know about Sean Reese,” Collena said. Her voice was practically a whisper now, and she looked down at her gloved hands. “I hadn’t planned on telling you this soon, but you’ll probably find out when you press your P.I. for a deeper background check on me.”

Which he would do, especially after an opening like that. “There really is someone from Brighton after you?” he asked.

“No. Not Brighton. The problem is Sean’s father, Curtis Reese. He’s been looking for Adam, too.”

Well, that sounded ominous, and Dylan didn’t like where this conversation was going.

“Curtis Reese is very wealthy,” Collena continued. “And Sean was his only child. He loved him, and he was obsessive about it. Once he learned that I was pregnant with Sean’s child, he became consumed with his unborn grandchild, as well.”

Dylan quickly came to a conclusion, but he hoped he was wrong. “Are you saying that this Curtis Reese will try to get custody of Adam?”

“He’ll try,” Collena confirmed. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but since the adoption was illegal, you don’t stand much of a chance of keeping Adam.”

His jaw tightened even more. “That’s debatable.”

“It’s true. There are things in my past that Curtis Reese will try to use to challenge my own custody. Nothing criminal,” she quickly added.

Dylan would have questioned exactly what those things were if he hadn’t seen the smoke ahead. Collena obviously saw it, too; she pointed in that direction.

“That’s where I left my car,” she said.

With the snow and the wind, it wasn’t a day to burn brush. Besides, he’d given all the hands the day off. Dylan took the last turn, dreading what he would see.

There, off to the side of the narrow dirt road sat a dark blue compact car, engulfed in flames.

Chapter Four

Collena saw the fire and smoke.

She felt the instant slam of adrenaline, and she reached for her gun, which wasn’t there. Because Dylan still had it in his pocket.

Dylan reacted, too. He caught on to her shoulder and shoved her down onto the leather seat. Hard. Then, he drew his own weapon, threw his truck into Reverse and sped backward to put some distance between them and her burning vehicle.

It was a good decision. With the flames already eating through the interior, the car could explode.

“Do you see anyone?” she asked, trying to get up. But he merely used his muscled body to keep her in place. Protecting her.

More than likely, it was an automatic response, something he would do for anyone who happened to be in danger. And there was no doubt in Collena’s mind that this was a dangerous situation.

Someone had set fire to her car.

And that someone could still be around to do even more damage to them.

“No, I don’t,” Dylan relayed to her. He pulled his phone and her gun from his pocket and handed both items to her. “Call nine-one-one and ask for the fire department.”

Surprised, she blinked. “Not the sheriff?”

“Dispatch would only send Jonah back out.”