The Angel and the Outlaw

A woman armed with a gun was dangerous enough. A crying woman was even worse.

Go, Cooper told himself. Turn around now. Let her do what she wants. You don’t need this complication. You’re not her keeper.

She took her finger from the trigger to wipe the back of her hand over her eyes. A shudder shook her body. Cooper would bet it wasn’t due solely to the weather.

The figure framed in the French doors drained his glass.

The woman fitted her eye back to the scope. It wasn’t easy. She was sobbing continuously now. Her hands were trembling. The gun barrel wavered.

Aw, hell. What if she missed? Cooper pulled his hands from the pockets of his raincoat, preparing to lunge for her.

Before he could move, she dropped the gun on the ground and pushed to her knees. Her shoulders jerked with a sob. She slammed her fists into the mud. “Damn you!” she cried.

A dog barked from somewhere on the far side of the house. It was answered by a second bark from the direction of the front gates. Cooper glanced around. Terrific. Someone must have set loose the Dobermans.

“I’m sorry.” The woman punched the ground again, then sat back on her heels and buried her face in her hands. Her head brushed a branch of the lilac as she rocked back and forth. More blossoms fell on her shoulders and stuck to her wet hair. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

The barking grew nearer. Cooper strode forward to snatch the rifle. “Yeah. Too bad you didn’t save us both a lot of trouble and figure that out sooner.”

The woman staggered to her feet. She spun to face him.

She was taller than she’d appeared when she’d been lying down. The top of her head was at a level with his nose. Her soaked clothes clung to long legs and a slender body. Her hair hung across her face in limp, muddy strands. In the dim light that shone through the shrubbery from the house, her features were nothing more than blurred suggestions of planes and shadows, impossible to identify.

Yet Cooper already had a good idea of who she had to be. Plenty of people might want to put a bullet into Oliver Sproule, but only one person would want it this badly.

She held up her palms. Her hands were still shaking. Her gaze darted to the gun.

Cooper emptied the bullets from the magazine, worked the bolt to eject the cartridge that was in the chamber and slipped the rounds into his coat pocket. He slung the strap of the rifle over his shoulder and grabbed her wrist. “Come on. We have to get out of here.”

She pulled at his grip. Behind her straggling hair, her eyes were wide, her gaze not completely rational. She shook her head, spattering water droplets and petals.

Through the mud that slicked her arm, Cooper could feel her pulse fluttering against his fingers. Her breath was coming out in shallow puffs. He suspected she was on the verge of breaking down, but there was no time to coax her gently. If he couldn’t bluff her into moving, he’d have to carry her. But that might make her scream and jeopardize them both. “Suit yourself.” He leaned forward, bringing his face to hers. “If you feel like taking your chances with the dogs and Sproule’s guards, go ahead, but I’m not sticking around to watch you bleed.”

A healthy dose of alarm flickered over her face. Whether it was the sound of the barking or his harsh words that finally got through to her didn’t matter. She shivered, glancing past him.

He let go of her wrist and backed toward the place where he’d scaled the fence. “My truck’s over there. I’ll give you three seconds and then I’m gone.”

She wavered for two seconds, then took a halting step toward him. “Am I…” Her teeth chattered. “Am I under arrest?”

If the circumstances had been different, he might have enjoyed the irony of that. Imagine him, Cooper Webb, being mistaken for a cop. “Seeing as how you’re gunning for Oliver Sproule, sweetheart, the cops are the least of your worries.”

Hayley opened her eyes with a start. Had she fallen asleep? It seemed incredible. She hadn’t been able to sleep for days, not since the jury had gone out.

She lifted her head. She was lying on a couch in a room she didn’t recognize. The only illumination came from a gooseneck lamp that sat on an oak desk a few steps away from the couch. On one corner of the desk rested a pair of large cowboy boots, the leather worn to the point of broken-in comfort. Hayley pushed up on one elbow, moving her gaze from the boots to the man who wore them.

He was sitting behind the desk in a green leather chair, his legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. His hands cradled a white porcelain mug that he balanced on his flat stomach just above his belt buckle. His chest was broad, straining the fabric of a black T-shirt. Raven-black hair curled past his ears and brushed the sides of his neck. Although the light from the desk lamp left the top half of his face in shadow, Hayley recognized the lines around his mouth and the way his beard stubble darkened the cleft in his chin.

It was the man who had found her at Sproule’s. The one who had appeared like a wraith from the storm, his long dark raincoat whipping against his calves, his shoulders squared against the wind, his features slick with rain and hard as stone. The stranger who had seen her reach the absolute rock-bottom point of her life.

Her pulse gave a painful thump. She remembered now. He’d taken her to a black pickup truck in the shadows outside the fence. She had been shivering so he’d draped his coat over her and turned up the heater. As incredible as it seemed, she must have fallen asleep.

She swung her legs off the couch and sat up. A plaid blanket fell from her shoulders to bunch in her lap. The man must have replaced his coat with this blanket when he’d brought her in from his truck, but she couldn’t remember walking in. He must have carried her.

It was humiliating to know she’d been so out of it that she’d been helpless and at the mercy of a complete stranger. But it was nothing compared to what he had witnessed…

Good God, had she really tried to kill Oliver Sproule?

She dipped her head, peering through her hair at the mud that smeared her fingers. On some level, she knew she should be horrified by what she’d almost done.

On another, more primitive level, she was ashamed that she had failed.

She drew the blanket aside. Her jeans were stiff with mud but almost dry. So was her blouse. She must have been here a while.

The man behind the desk lifted the mug to his mouth and took a leisurely swallow. The name of a heavy metal band, Metallica, was emblazoned in silver lightning bolts on the front of his T-shirt. He tilted his head toward the gray file cabinet behind him. A coffeemaker sat on top of it. “There’s plenty of coffee left if you want some. You look as if you could use it.”

His voice was a quiet rumble. His words were mild, yet they carried the same undertone of steel she’d heard him use the last time he’d spoken.

Hayley brushed at the mud on her legs. She didn’t want to consider how bad she looked.

But she had almost killed a man tonight. What was a bit of mud compared to the horror of that? How much lower could she sink? How much uglier could she be?

She shoved her hair off her face so she could take a more careful survey of her surroundings. There was a window behind the desk but the blind that covered it was shut tight and blocked the view outside. There was a closed door to her left. Was it locked? She wasn’t handcuffed or restrained. Would the man chase her if she made a break for it?

This room appeared to be an office, yet it wasn’t like any she’d seen in the Latchford police station. Wait, she remembered he had said something about cops being the least of her worries. She wasn’t under arrest. “Where…” She cleared her throat.

“Where’s your rifle?” he asked before she could continue. “It’s locked in the storage room along with the bullets.”

“I meant where are we?”

He drained his mug, pulled his feet from the desk and stood. The room suddenly seemed smaller. He was a tall man, his body lean, his movements projecting a careless sexuality. He took a second mug from the top of the filing cabinet and filled it with coffee. “We’re at the Long Shot.”

She knew the place. The Long Shot was a bar at the northern edge of the Latchford, Illinois, city limits. The parking lot was usually packed with pickup trucks or cars such as Mustangs and Camaros with tinted windows and oversized tires. Hayley had driven past it many times but had never been inside before. “You’re not a cop,” she said.

One corner of his mouth twisted upward. “Nope. I’m a bartender, but it’s after hours so all I can offer you is coffee. Wouldn’t want to break any laws.”

“Why did you bring me here?”

“Didn’t want to argue with the Sproule guards or the Dobermans.”

“I guess I should thank you for getting me off the estate.”

“Yeah, you should.”

“Thank you.”

“No problem.” He hooked his chair with one foot, rolled it toward the couch and sat down in front of her. He held out the mug. There was a tattoo of an attacking eagle on his forearm. Its faded blue talons seemed to flex with the shift of his muscles. “You look as if you’re feeling better.”

She braced her hands on her knees and rocked forward. “Yes. I’ll call a cab and—”