Son of a Gun Read online

  She shed her clothes slowly. Only after she was naked did she look up and see the noose a few yards away, dangling from the branch of an oak tree. He’d torture her and then he’d hang her.

  Damien would find her like that.

  Caudillo always won.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Damien was dismounting when his cell phone rang. He started to ignore it, but then saw the call was from Carson Stile.

  “I guess you’re calling to tell me that Caudillo is dead,” Damien said in lieu of a greeting.

  “No, I’m calling to tell you he’s in the Dallas area near your ranch.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “He used his ATM card to withdraw cash at that same hardware store where you talked me into buying those ridiculous spurs.”

  Damien tossed the phone and raced into the house.

  “What’s the rush?” Carolina asked when he crashed into her.

  “Where’s Emma?”

  “She took Belle outside. What’s wrong?”

  “Outside where?”

  “In the back. The last time I saw her she was walking toward that old tire swing.”

  “Where are Tague and Durk?”

  “They left in Tague’s pickup truck.”

  “Stay in the house and lock the doors. And call Tague and Durk and tell them to get home on the double. I think Caudillo is heading this way.”

  “I thought it was over,” Carolina cried. “I thought he was dead.”

  Damien didn’t even think about stopping to explain. He grabbed the pistol that he’d kept handy last night and ran to find Emma.

  Instead he found blood. Drops of it beneath the swing like crimson raindrops in the dirt. Oh, God, don’t let him be too late. If he’d let something happen to Emma…

  Dread and adrenaline pushed him on, slowly, quietly, moving from tree to tree so he wouldn’t be seen.

  And then he spotted Emma through the trees. She was naked, her hands and feet bound, her neck in a noose. Her feet were still on the ground, but the loose end of the rope was in Caudillo’s hand. One yank and her neck would break.

  Belle was lying on the grass, eyes closed, not moving. Sick terror ground in Damien’s gut.

  “If you kill me, Damien will track you to the ends of the world and make you pay.”

  “Do you honestly think I’m afraid of a cowboy?”

  Damien had never killed a man before, yet he relished the idea of putting a bullet in Caudillo’s head.

  And the way he saw it, Caudillo gave him no other choice. One yank of the rope and Emma was dead, and he had no doubt that if Caudillo saw him, he’d make sure Emma’s neck was broken.

  Damien would have one shot. He’d have to make it count. He fit his finger around the trigger, held steady and pulled.

  * * *

  EMMA HEARD THE BLAST OF gunfire and thought for a second it was the crack of death. Belle’s screams jerked her back to reality.

  Caudillo lay on the ground in a pool of blood.

  Damien rushed over, took the noose from her neck and pulled her into his arms. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”

  “No, he was just getting warmed up. It’s the mental game he loved.” She began to shake. “Is he dead?”

  “He’s dead. Even Caudillo can’t live with his brain splattered across Bent Pine grass.”

  He yanked off his shirt and wrapped it around her. “I have never been that afraid in all my life. I don’t ever want to be that afraid again.”

  “Apparently neither does Belle.” She hurried over to pick up the screaming baby. Belle hushed almost immediately. She handed the baby off to Damien while she slipped back into her jeans.

  He put his arm around Emma and pulled her back into the shelter of his embrace.

  “I’m crazy in love with you, Emma. I don’t know how I fell so hard and so fast, but I’m there.”

  “I feel the same, Damien. I think I loved you since you found me in the snow. Like your dad and mother, we were meant to be.”

  “Does that mean you’ll marry me?”

  “In a heartbeat.”

  Emma looked up as Tague and Durk came running through the trees.

  “What the hell is going on? Mother yelled at me to get home fast and then I hear— Whoa.” Durk stopped and stared at the body.

  “Is that who I think it is?”

  “That’s the monster,” Emma said. “He wasn’t dead, but he is now. Your brother just saved my life.”

  “What happened?”

  “I’ll fill you in later,” Damien told him. “Right now, call the sheriff. Tell him we have another self-defense killing at the Bent Pine Ranch.”

  “I’ll call Delaney, too,” Durk said. “He’s going to have a devil of a time getting his head around this.”

  “Are you and Belle both okay?” Tague asked.

  “Better than okay. We’re alive,” Emma said.

  She fit Belle against her right shoulder as Damien wrapped an arm about her waist.

  “Let’s go home, cowboy.” Home to stay.

  Carolina was right. A woman should always choose love.

  * * * * *

  ISBN: 9781459226319

  Copyright © 2012 by Jo Ann Vest

  All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen