Cowboy Justice
Patricia Rosemoor
His body was the beautiful, smoothly sculpted work of a driven man
Letter to Reader
Title Page
Dedication
CAST OF CHARACTERS
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
Epilogue
Copyright
His body was the beautiful, smoothly sculpted work of a driven man
A grin pulled at Cash’s mouth, but didn’t reach his eyes. He tugged at the towel around his waist and freed it, first rubbing at his stomach and then at his chest.
Reine was speechless. Was that his aim? To silence her? To drive her away?
“What is it you expect me to do, Reine?” Cash finally asked, casually holding the towel between them. “Rant and rail at the gods?” His brow furrowed. “Or pay the ransom?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what I expected from you—”
“Then why did you come?”
“Because I figured, despite everything you might still care, just a little.”
“About Gray?” he asked. “Or you?”
He dropped the towel....
Dear Reader,
A hero or heroine without any faults would make pretty dull reading since the most gripping conflicts come, not from outside forces, but from within.
The Seven Deadly Sins—Pride, Sloth, Lust, Greed, Anger, Envy and Gluttony—exemplify the most hurtful behavior, human failings that can keep us locked in self-absorption and self-doubt. They can keep us from finding real happiness within ourselves...or with that one special person whom we all deserve....
As a writer, I love nothing more than throwing my heroes and heroines to the precipice of danger, to make ordinary people fight the worst villains and win. For me, it’s a celebration of the human spirit, the discovery of untapped strengths that I am certain we all possess if only we can find the courage to reach deep inside ourselves.
For SEVEN SINS, I’ve chosen to raise the stakes, to push my heroes and heroines to the emotional edge at the same time they are fighting for their very existence. In the midst of mortal danger, they must wrestle with equally destructive inner demons and take back their lives...and in doing so, be rewarded with a love for all time.
Let me know how you enjoy their stories at P.O. Box 578279, Chicago, IL 60657-8297.
Cowboy Justice
Patricia Rosemoor
TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON
AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG
STOCKHOLM • ATHENE • TOKYO • MILAN • MADRID
PRAGUE • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND
To Linda,
For the one that I missed.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Cash Abreu—He reluctantly put his quest for wealth on hold to rescue his brother.
Reine Kendrick—She tried to keep her relationship with Cash strictly about saving Gray.
Gray Matlock—His kidnappers demanded an exorbitant ransom.
Jasper Matlock—The sins of the father were being visited on his son.
Luna Abreu—What was Cash’s mother hiding?
Nemesio Escobar—Could Cash’s uncle want the ransom money—and revenge—bad enough to see Gray die?
Evan Bixler—He’d already tried to get his hands on Matlock Construction.
Sam Valdez—He believed the Matlock’s river property was stolen from his family.
Selena Cullen—Matlock had financially ruined her son, who then committed suicide.
Prologue
“So, we’ve arrived at the midpoint of our collaboration,” Zoe Declue told her writing partner as he took the chair upholstered in nubby cream with ivory-satin stripes. The seating area near the windows would be more comfortable, but more than ever, she was feeling the need to keep her desk between them. “Sin number four.”
Pride, Sloth, Lust, Avarice, Envy, Wrath, Gluttony—the humanistic ramifications of the Seven Deadly Sins in individual lives had absorbed her since she’d taken her first psych course. As a research psychologist, she’d spent years gathering as much information on the subject as she could.
And her position here at Haven, a privately funded mental-health foundation, gave her the opportunity to turn that knowledge into a useful tool for the lay person—with help from one very talented writer.
From his charcoal slacks and buttoned-up-to-the-throat silk shirt to his glowering visage, Alex Gotham presented the only dark spot in her office, which was a study in the same pale neutral colors that she preferred for herself.
Shifting under his stare, she asked, “Is something wrong?”
“‘Midpoint’...” he echoed. “You’re keeping score.”
“I’m tracking our progress.”
Zoe eyed the growing manuscript on her desk—the first three chapters of their proposed self-help book that would deal with the Seven Deadly Sins. Now that they were starting work on number four, they were approaching the halfway mark—quite a thrilling accomplishment, as far as she was concerned.
Alex didn’t look equally thrilled when he said, “You’re anxious for it to be over.”
She met his dark gaze. “Aren’t you?”
“I wouldn’t put it that way. Sounds like you’ll be glad to be rid of me.”
“Oh...I didn’t mean to be insensitive....”
Zoe let her words trail off as she noted a twitch around his lips and realized that Alex was baiting her again, an increasingly frequent occurrence. Warmth crept through her and she tried covering it by hooking her blunt chin-length hair behind an ear and sorting through a pile of folders, although “Avarice” was already on top.
It had taken her some time to realize that Alex often said things merely to get a reaction out of her. She wasn’t used to working with someone she had such difficulty reading. In the beginning, she’d assessed Alex as uptight, and seeming to need to prove something—to himself, or to the world.
Sometimes she still got glimpses of that man below the more easygoing surface that had emerged. Certain that this was the real Alex, she had to wonder what, exactly, had happened to make him go underground for nearly two years.
Knowing that her own writing was too erudite for a broad audience, Zoe had sought him out after reading Lost Youth, his critically acclaimed glimpse into the world of runaway teens. For a while, his book had given him celebrity... and then he’d disappeared from the public eye. Literally. Still, she’d wanted to enlist his talent and so had made it her business to find him. It had never occurred to her that they would become more than collaborators. But lately, she’d recognized a stronger bond being formed between them.
Friendship? she wondered, a bit uneasily.
And what would be wrong with that? Her entire humanistic theory of the seven sins had to do with isolation—that of an individual being guilty of a crime against his- or herself, and therefore preventing himself or herself from forming a true bond with society, not to mention from establishing personal relationships.
Not having such a relationship of her own—currently, she was too busy to see anyone socially—Zoe quickly turned away from that last thought.
“Avarice,” she began, opening the folder she’d separated from the pile. “The willingness to climb over others to get to the top... Loving the idea of possessing more than the possessions themselves... Making possessions of people.”
Like the other chapters, this one would focus o
n an individual who’d found a second chance at life after having conquered one of the emotion-based sins. Thank heaven for her cooperative colleagues across the country and their generous patients who had given written permission for their stories to be used. These individuals would remain anonymous as agreed upon, but they, too, could take reward in knowing that they would help so many other people with similar problems.
“Greed. A tough one,” Alex said. “Hard to forgive, especially the ‘treating people like possessions’ part. You actually found a story you think readers can identify with?”
“I hope so. Given his circumstances, Cash Abreu’s affinity for greed was understandable if not justifiable.”
“How so?”
“He was the son of the laundress and foreman on the Matlock spread in New Mexico. Jasper Matlock treated him abusively—”
“He beat the kid?”
“No. At least, not until the day Matlock drove him from the ranch and told him never to return.”
“And did he?”
Zoe nodded. “Cash came back for his father’s funeral. That’s how the whole thing started. And this is how it almost ended.”
She handed Alex a newspaper clipping with the headline: Land Magnate’s Only Son Disappears....
Chapter One
Wednesday
The soft glow of sunset hovered over the Chimayo Valley as Grayson Matlock loped his mustang along the eroded barranca in search of a stray calf. A hawk wheeled along the spinelike ridge that seemed incandescent, reminding him of adobe when lit by the burning coals of a kiva fireplace.
He brought his mount to a stop, stood in his stirrups and checked the badlands that bordered the verdant valley like long, rugged arms.
Where was that little bugger?
The calf was a naughty one, always wandering away from his mama’s side to explore. Gray had nicknamed him Wanderlust, a capricious holdover from the days of his childhood when he’d refused to think about what would happen to the cattle raised on the Matlock Ranch.
His daddy had always reminded him, though, had always told him he was too soft—if not in body, then in heart. Jasper Matlock had maintained that a man shouldn’t get involved with an animal who might someday be staring up at him from his dinner plate.
But Gray had anyway, and he’d tried not to think of the fate of the creatures he’d befriended.
He urged his mount on, toward a nearby box canyon, the site of an old, abandoned chile mill.
The years hadn’t changed him. Nor had his taking over the running of the ranch. Hired hands and neighbors alike might chuckle over what they considered his soft attitude—a man could have a worse reputation, Gray knew—but while the herd was in his care, he considered its hooved members more than commodities. And while he couldn’t know each and every one of them, a few cows or calves with personality always caught his attention.
Like Wanderlust.
Entering the canyon along a barely wet streambed, Gray frowned. Considering the calf had been out of sight of the rest of the herd for a while now, this was far, even for the most curious of creatures.
And Wanderlust was such a little guy....
Instincts kicking in, Gray felt his suspicions rise along with the walls around him. Maybe the calf hadn’t wandered off at all... or at least, not this far on his own.
Gray’s sudden shock of uncertainty transmitted to his mount, for the mustang started dancing.
Gray ran a hand along the ragged mane. “It’s all right, son,” he murmured.
But Gray couldn’t settle down inside. Nor could he turn back before he’d finished checking out the canyon.
They came out of nowhere. Two of them. Armed. Rifles aimed straight at him.
They were wearing hoods beneath their hats, as if covering their faces would hide their identities when one of them hadn’t even bothered to switch from his usual mount. Gray might not be able to identify every head of cattle in the area, but he was familiar with most of the horses.
When had they taken to rustling? he wondered. “You boys on your way to a masquerade party?” he asked in as conversational a tone as he could manage.
“Yep,” one of them drawled, raising his rifle to his shoulder. “And you’re the damned guest of honor.”
Thursday
“I WANT THAT LAND,” Cash Abreu growled into the receiver, aggravated by another failed attempt. He leaned back in his chair, put his feet up on the mesquite desk and noted the scrape across the toe of one of his handmade boots. His temper rising, he snarled, “I thought we had a deal.”
“I’m holding up my end of the bargain. But for now, it’s a no go.”
“You can be a no go, as well.”
“That’d be your decision, Abreu. Hey, as long as I get my money ... one way or the other....”
Cash heard the threat in the other man’s tone, but managed to hold his anger in check. He needed allies if he was going to succeed in his promise to Jasper Matlock—even allies he had to pay.
Finally too close to his goal to take a stumble, he said, “The deal stands as made.”
“I figured it might.”
“We’ll get another chance at him,” Cash promised, already figuring out how best to proceed. “And soon.”
He hung up and set his feet on the floor. The scraped boot glared up at him. Now he’d have to get a duplicate pair made. Not that he didn’t have a couple of dozen others to choose from, and not that he’d give a second thought to the cost. But these were his favorites and they were broken in exactly the way he liked them.
“Are you busy?” came a soft voice from behind.
“Never too busy for you, Mom,” Cash said as he swiveled toward her.
Luna Abreu stood in the doorway of his home office. While small in stature and compact, as were most women of Pueblo-Hispanic descent, she filled the room with her presence and her exotic beauty. He knew she still had the power to draw a man to her with a glance of her sparkling dark eyes, because he’d seen it happen more than once. Her face was unlined, ageless, the silver wings threading through her coiled black hair the only suggestion that she’d left her fiftieth birthday behind.
Cash rose, stooping to envelop her in a big hug. “I thought you were taking the day off.”
His mother never had to lift a finger again as far as he was concerned. He’d had enough money to support her in style for nearly a decade now, but she refused to be useless. She ran his home for him with the help of Gloria—a young “maid-in-training”—and an elderly groundsman who moved so slowly that no one else would employ him. But Ignacio was a case in point, his mother had insisted when she’d hired the man, saying he would go off somewhere and die if he didn’t feel useful.
Thank God Cash hadn’t inherited her sentimentality.
“I planned on doing some shopping in Chimayo,” she said. “Some new weavings...” Her fingers grasped at his sleeves so he couldn’t move away from her. “But in town, I heard—Well, i-it’s just a rumor—still. I wanted to tell you myself....”
His mother’s sudden case of nerves unsettled Cash. He stiffened.
“Tell me what?”
“Something terrible may have happened.” She looked up at him, her gaze sober. “It’s Gray. Word is...he’s disappeared.”
“MY GOD, WHY DOESN’T IT ring?”
“Get a hold of yourself, woman!” Jasper Matlock snapped, even as he paced the length of the huge living room too fancy for his taste. He’d be damned if he’d take his boots off in his own home, no matter the color or cost of the carpet. “Stop imagining the worst!”
Swollen-eyed and red-nosed, Marlene sat on the shadowy side of the room, staring at the telephone. She’d spent half the night and the whole morning weeping and they didn’t even know a thing yet.
He himself had been alarmed, of course, when his son’s horse had come back riderless the night before. The men he’d sent to scout the area hadn’t seen anything in the dark. More had ridden out at dawn, had even picked up and followed the mus
tang’s tracks to the riverbed where they’d lost them. They’d kept looking anyhow.
Had found nothing.
A fresh search party with an experienced tracker had been out there since noon, but in his gut, Jasper feared they’d find more of the same—who knew how far they’d followed the river?
Better that than a body, an evil voice inside his head whispered.
Gray, dead... His worst fear.
What could have happened? How could he have up and disappeared without a trace?
A thought struck him....
Cash!
But the seething flow of his mind was interrupted by a tense, “I think we should call the sheriff.”
He jerked to a stop and glared at his wife’s niece, as usual all prim and proper, heavy blond hair coiled at the base of her neck, lace-edged blouse buttoned up to her chin. At the first sniff of trouble, Reine Kendrick had come running to stick her nose where it didn’t belong. Also as usual.
“Mind your own business, girl. I don’t know what you’re doing here anyhow. Don’t you have some troubled teenagers to ride herd on?”
“Not today. Gray is my business,” Reine said firmly. “And Aunt Marlene needs me.”
She placed a hand on his wife’s shoulder and gave him one of those defiant looks that had always irritated the hell out of him from the day they’d taken her in.
“If I’d known how much trouble you were gonna be—”
“You would have left me to the nuns. Yes, I know,” Reine said quietly, though she was unable to cover a bitterness that hadn’t always been there. “You’ve reminded me often enough.”
And well he should have.
Jasper’s troubles had all started with his wife’s niece, he reminded himself. Not that he hated the girl. In the best of times, he’d almost thought of Reine as the daughter Marlene couldn’t give him. But this wasn’t anywhere close to a good day. And his memory was long, his nature unforgiving. If not for his trying to protect her...
