Rider on Fire & When You Call My Name: Rider on Fire / When You Call My Name. Sharon Sala

as she paused beneath a large oak.

      “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But all I can remember was constantly disappointing him. I was gone so much and he wanted more from the relationship than I was ever able to give.”

      “He wanted to marry you?” Adam asked.

      “Something like that,” Sonora said, then her voice broke. “And now he’s dead…he’s dead because of me. I told him my life was too complicated for commitments, but he wouldn’t listen.” She choked on a sob and then covered her face with her hands. “Oh. God, Adam, Garcia beat him to death. I can’t get that out of my head.”

      Adam put his arms around her. Sonora stiffened. Accepting sympathy was as difficult for her to deal with as accepting advice. But he didn’t turn her loose and she didn’t pull away, and slowly, slowly, she began to relax. When that happened, the wall of her emotions crumbled. Before she knew it, she was sobbing.

      “Yes, pretty lady…cry for your friend…and for yourself. Cry it all out,” Adam whispered.

      And she did.

      * * *

      A day passed, and then another, until an entire week had come and gone since Sonora’s arrival. As per her father’s wishes, she’d checked in every day with Mynton, just so she would stay up-to-date on the investigations. She’d called the Phoenix detective as she’d been asked to do but had been unable to give him any information he didn’t already have.

      She knew that after a possible sighting of Garcia in Amarillo, Wills and the task force had left Flagstaff to check it out, and upon arrival had gotten a positive ID. Problem was, by the time all of that had been confirmed, Garcia was long gone—destination unknown.

      * * *

      As for Miguel Garcia, it had taken big money and calling in some favors from an old friend of his father before he’d finally gotten some help. Now four of the drug cartel’s finest were combing the highways and the states bordering Texas and Oklahoma, trying to get a fix on the whereabouts of the missing DEA agent. Miguel had let it be known that it was worth a half million dollars to him to find Sonora Jordan.

      While the men were searching, Garcia was forced to lay low. He now knew he had agents on his tail. He’d been assured by Emilio Rojas, the man who’d been his father’s right hand, that not only did the DEA have agents on his trail, but they knew the make, model and tag number of the car he was driving. Once the significance of this news sank in, he felt sick. The only way that could have happened was if he’d been betrayed.

      Time and time again, he went over a mental list of people who’d helped get him across the border. There were any number who could have tipped off the DEA, but he kept remembering the man at the airport outside of Houston who’d brought him a car and money and then so abruptly disappeared.

      It stood to reason that this man could be the one who betrayed him. But then he would skip to the fact that Jorge Diaz had set everything up. Diaz was entirely responsible for successfully getting Miguel out of Mexico. He would have had access to the same information.

      To go there in his mind, Miguel had to accept that Diaz would betray him, and he couldn’t believe it, even though he had been unable to contact Diaz for days.

      To be on the safe side, he’d sold his car at a used car dealer in Oklahoma City, bought a four-year-old Jeep from a different car lot, driven thirty minutes east on I-40 to Shawnee, Oklahoma and had the Jeep painted black.

      Before he left town, he’d stolen a Native American license plate from a member of the Muscogee Nation while the car was parked outside the Firelake Casino south of Shawnee. He’d driven off with no one the wiser, traveling as far as Tulsa, Oklahoma before going to ground.

      There, he’d begun the business of disguising his appearance. He’d shaved his head and mustache, bought himself some Western-style clothes, including a pair of ostrich skin boots and a big black hat. By the time he added a large silver belt buckle to his wardrobe, his own mother would not have recognized him.

      Feeling fairly safe about getting back out in the world, he thought about resuming his own search for Sonora, but decided to err on the side of caution. If his men didn’t find her within the week, he was going to go back to Phoenix. Sonora Jordan couldn’t stay gone forever, and he was a patient man.

      * * *

      Adam had not been to Franklin’s house or seen Sonora since the morning she’d received the news of her old friend’s death. He relived their last moments together in his dreams—holding her close against his body—feeling the thrust of her breasts against his chest as she cried for another man. But in his dreams, her tears somehow turned to passion. They would lie down together beneath the sheltering limbs of the old oak. There would be whispers and promises and an ache so deep that it took Adam’s breath away. What was driving him crazy was that he kept waking up before they could make love. He was sick and tired of cold showers and aches that wouldn’t go away.

      She and Franklin didn’t have a lot of time to play catch-up, and he didn’t want to intrude. But he wasn’t a fool. He also didn’t want to lose the small foothold he’d gained with her by staying gone too long. She was a stranger in every way that it mattered, and yet there was a part of him that knew he couldn’t bear to let her go. He didn’t know how much time she would give herself to stay on the mountain, but he wanted his share of it. The way he looked at it, he’d given them a week. His streak of generosity was over.

      * * *

      Franklin was having a bad day and, after breakfast, had gone back to bed. Sonora had quickly learned that on these days, the best thing she could do for him was give him space and quiet. So when he went back to his room, she took his fishing pole and straw hat and headed for the pond at the back of the property.

      She caught a few grasshoppers on the way and put them in a jar to use for bait just like Franklin had shown her. The wide brim on his old hat shaded her face while the sun had its way with the rest of her body. Even though it was hot, she knew she wouldn’t burn. By the time she got to the pond, her T-shirt was stuck to the sweat on her back and she had some kind of weird-looking burrs in her socks. Still, she was happier than she could ever remember being.

      On the second day of her arrival, Franklin had saddled up two of his horses and they’d ridden from one corner of the property to the other until she knew where Blue Cat land began and ended. It had given her a sense of identity that she’d never known.

      So, today, as she baited her hook, she had the satisfaction of knowing that she was standing on Blue Cat land—about to fish in a Blue Cat pond.

      She wrinkled her nose and asked an apology of the poor grasshopper that was still kicking on the hook as she tossed it in the water. The red-and-white bobber bounced a few times within the spreading ripples. After that, it was a case of sit and wait.

      For Sonora, it was like living out a dream. As a child, she used to imagine the innocence of a life like this, with people who loved her sitting beside her. There would be a picnic and laughter and playing barefoot in the water. It wouldn’t matter if anyone caught fish because they were together.

      The sun was hot. Sonora’s eyelids were drooping. The bobber was riding high in the still water like an empty ship, and she couldn’t bring herself to care that she wasn’t getting any nibbles.

      Something tickled her arm. She brushed at it without looking. Then something tickled the back of her neck. She brushed at it as absently as she had her arm.

      “If I was a bad guy, you’d be in trouble.”

      Sonora choked on a squeak and fell backward. For a second, the sun was in her eyes, and then a tall shadow fell across her face and she could see.

      It was Adam.

      “Darn you,” she muttered as she sat up, then yanked the pole from the water and flung it on the ground. “You scared me.”

      “Sorry,” he said, but he was smiling as he sat down beside her.

      “No,