Bodyguard Under the Mistletoe. Cassie Miles

jump right out of the car to help. Are you feeling a little pain?”

      “I’m fine.”

      That wasn’t entirely true. He’d taken three bullets, and the left side of his body was hurting. His upper left thigh had been shot clean through. His left arm was nicked. The worst damage had been in his upper chest near the shoulder where the bullet burrowed deep through muscle and flesh, requiring surgery to remove it. He wore a sling to keep his left arm and shoulder immobilized.

      He’d signed half a dozen forms releasing the Delta hospital and the doctors from liability if he croaked because of his insistence on leaving before they recommended.

      “You lost a lot of blood,” Wentworth said.

      “Just flesh wounds. No bones broken. No internal organs harmed.”

      “When you were in surgery,” Wentworth said, “the doc thought he lost you. You were dead for four minutes.”

      “I remember.”

      Jesse hadn’t experienced his death as a white light. Instead, he saw himself as a youth on the reservation where he went to visit his grandparents. His mom—a blue-eyed woman of Irish descent—always encouraged him to stay in touch with his deceased father’s Navajo heritage.

      In his vision, he climbed up a crude wood ladder from the ceremonial kiva. His chest heaved as he inhaled a breath redolent with the richness of the earth and the scent of burning sage. His black hair hung past his shoulders, much longer than he wore it now.

      Across the plain, he saw his grandfather, a white-haired shaman wearing a turquoise belt and holding an eagle feather.

      His grandfather beckoned. But Jesse’s feet were rooted to the soil. He couldn’t go. Not yet. There was still something he needed to do on this earth.

      “You remember dying?” Wentworth asked.

      “Something like that.” He adjusted the sling to fit more comfortably around the bandage and dressing near his shoulder. If his grandfather had still been alive, the old man would have given him herbs to use for healing. “Tell me what happened to Nicole.”

      “How much do you remember?”

      Jesse thought back to the morning before she was grabbed. Her husband, Dylan, had hired Longbridge Security for surveillance and protection. There had been several incidents of sabotage on his ranch, including a fire that burned down one of the stables.

      Jesse and three of his men, including Wentworth, had only been on the job a few hours when Nicole stormed out of the ranch house. Though she’d been warned not to take off by herself, she saddled up and rode across the field into the pine trees near a creek. Jesse followed on horseback.

      He’d gotten close enough to see the two men who abducted her. He’d heard them say, “Dylan will pay a lot of money to get her back.” And then…disaster.

      If he’d moved faster, if his horse hadn’t stepped on a twig, if he’d had a clean shot, he could have protected Nicole. Instead, he’d been shot.

      “I remember getting back on my horse. But I didn’t make it far before I fell out of the saddle. I talked to a woman.”

      “Carolyn Carlisle,” Wentworth said. “Dylan’s sister.”

      “Then I went unconscious. Tell me what happened next.”

      “The first thing? I saved your sorry ass.”

      “And I thank you for that.”

      “Wasn’t easy,” Wentworth said. “I slowed the bleeding, threw you in the back of a truck. One of the ranch hands—a kid named MacKenzie—drove like a NASCAR racer to get you to the hospital. Might have been the best triage I ever did as a paramedic.”

      “Is this your way of asking for a raise?”

      Finally, Wentworth laughed. The level of tension between them dropped. “I guess you’ve done okay by me.”

      “That’s good because I’m not sure who’s going to hire Longbridge Security after word gets out that I let our client get kidnapped. What happened next?”

      “The FBI was called in. There was a ransom demand for a million bucks. The FBI tracked down the kidnappers—a bunch of survivalists who were also smuggling. Case closed. Right?”

      “Was it?”

      “Hell, no.”

      Jesse shifted uncomfortably in his seat. With his right hand, he felt in his jacket pocket for the amber vial of prescription painkillers. “Go on.”

      “They couldn’t find Nicole. Last night, she called her husband, met with him and told him that she wasn’t coming home. She wants a divorce.”

      Jesse wasn’t sure he understood. “I thought you said the kidnappers were arrested.”

      “Two are still at large.”

      “And the ransom?”

      “Gone.”

      The Carlisle ranch house came into view in the distance. The property was bordered by a white slat fence. A gently curving road led to a big, two-story, whitewashed house with a veranda that stretched all the way across the front. Pine-covered foothills framed the area. Hard to believe so much turmoil had taken place in such an idyllic setting.

      The drumbeat inside Jesse’s head started up again. A low, hollow throb. “What else do you know?”

      “That’s about it,” Wentworth said. “I haven’t been to the ranch house. The client instructed me to stay at the hospital. To protect you. You’re the only eyewitness, and it seemed likely that the kidnappers might want you out of the way.”

      Jesse hadn’t seen their faces well. They were wearing cowboy hats that shadowed their features. When he closed his eyes to get a mental picture, his pain intensified. He opened a vial of painkillers, tapped one out and gulped it down.

      He didn’t know what he’d say to Dylan. The word sorry sprang to mind. Sorry I messed up and let Nicole get kidnapped. Sorry you lost a million-dollar ransom. Sorry your wife left you.

      He winced. All of a sudden, leaving the hospital seemed like a really bad idea. He wasn’t ready for a confrontation. “Don’t go through the gate. Take a left.”

      Wentworth followed his instruction. “Are we headed any place in particular?”

      “I need a few minutes to think before I face Dylan.”

      It went without saying that Jesse wouldn’t quit this job until it had reached a conclusion that satisfied both him and his client. Even if Dylan was ready to take his wife at her word, Jesse wanted confirmation from Nicole.

      He turned his head and looked out the window. On the other side of a barbed-wire fence was a field of winter wheat. Still green. Even in December. “Slow down.”

      “What are you looking for?”

      “Not sure.”

      He was hoping for clarity—a flash of insight that would point him in the right direction. In the skies above the field, a hawk circled. His grandfather would have called the bird an omen, a sign that Jesse should be like the hawk. He should be the hunter. Find Nicole. Find the money.

      Wentworth stepped on the brake.

      A woman was running toward the SUV. Her green jacket matched the low grasses growing in the field. Her long brown braid flipped back and forth behind her.

      She yanked open the passenger door. She was thin, delicate. Her cheeks flushed with the effort of running. Her gray eyes shone with a feverish light that made him want to look deeper.

      “Your logo.” She gasped. “You’re Longbridge Security.”

      “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “I’m Jesse Longbridge.”

      “I