Lone Star Winter: The Winter Soldier. Diana Palmer

for the first time. Nobody tells you that people scream when they get shot. On television they just grunt or groan and hold the part that’s been shot.” He shook his head. “It’s a lot more…vivid…in real life.”

      “Were you afraid, the first time?”

      “I was afraid every time,” he corrected with a level stare. “Only a fool pretends he isn’t. You learn to face the fear and deal with it, just like everyone else does.”

      “It’s difficult, isn’t it?”

      “Difficult to watch people die, yes,” he told her. “Difficult to live with what you do, too. I remember a young boy in Africa who was fighting the rebels. He carried a carbine in his hands and ammunition belts that probably weighed more than he did, strapped around his chest. His name was Juba.” He smiled as he worked. “He had a passion for chocolate bars. We always had a few in our packs, just a taste of something sweet to remind us of civilization. One day, Juba ran ahead of us into a building the rebels had just evacuated. We hadn’t swept it for traps and he wouldn’t stop when we tried to warn him. He broke a trip wire right in the doorway and blew himself up.” His hand hesitated on the knife as he spread mayonnaise on the bread. His eyes were solemn and quiet. “He didn’t die right away,” he added grimly. “We gave him morphine from one of our medical kits. Then I sat under a silk cotton tree with him in my arms and talked to him until he died.” His eyes fell back to his task. “He was eleven years old.”

      She winced. “That’s very young to be fighting a war.”

      “He’d already lost his parents and two sisters in the cross fire,” he recalled. “He was alone in the world, except for us. We’d thrown in with the government forces. They were overwhelmed by the rebels and advertised for mercenaries. My unit went in. I started with thirty men and came back with three.” He passed her a plate with a sandwich on it and started making two more for himself. “The rebels took over the capital and formed a government of their own. It stood for two months be fore outside troops joined forces with the overthrown government, moved in and took back possession of their country. Before they did, ten thousand people were shot or blown up in the streets.”

      “I’m sure I wouldn’t make a good soldier, even if Harley thinks he would,” she remarked somberly.

      “I wanted to make enough money to retire while I was still a young man,” he mused. “I planned to come back home, buy a ranch, get married and settle down.” He finished his own sandwiches and took a sip of his iced tea. “It almost worked. But along the way, I helped a government agency get hard evidence on that drug lord Lopez,” he said, searching her eyes. “As I mentioned a while back, he had my house in Wyoming set on fire. The hitch was, my son was supposed to be rescued before the incendiary device was placed. Lopez’s henchman didn’t think one kid more or less would matter.” He traced an invisible pattern on his coffee mug. “The only consolation I had was that Lopez had the assassin eliminated for that slipup. He doesn’t kill children.”

      “I’m so sorry,” she murmured, watching him.

      “So am I. But all the regrets in the world won’t bring back that little boy.”

      His face was harder than rock. She sketched it with her eyes. “You can help me take care of my little boy.”

      He glanced at her. “What makes you think it’s a little boy?”

      “Wishful thinking, I guess. I love baseball and soccer and working around the ranch. I know girls can do those things, too, but I’d love a son.”

      “You’d love whatever you get,” he chided.

      “Yes. I would.” She grimaced.

      “What’s the matter.”

      “I don’t know.” She laughed nervously. “I have these mild cramps sometimes. I read a book about being pregnant, and it said some women have fleeting cramps during early pregnancy.”

      He scowled. “That doesn’t sound good.”

      She picked up her sandwich. “Maybe it’s just nerves. It’s been a rough few weeks.”

      “Sure it has. But if those cramps get any worse, you go see a doctor.”

      “I will.”

      After lunch, he took her out to the huge, airy barn to see Puppy Dog, who was comfortably contained in a huge stall with a drain in the concrete floor, and fresh wheat straw making a comfortable place for him to sleep.

      “Hello, Puppy Dog,” she said, going into the stall to pet the frisky, enormous puppy. “Did you miss me?” She glanced past him at the clean containers of dog food and water, and the dog toys liberally scattered along the wall. “Maybe not, considering all the toys.”

      “Dogs need something to play with. Keeps them active and healthy. I got half a dozen for Bob, too.”

      “Bob?”

      He motioned to her. She gave Puppy Dog a last hug and went out of the stall. He whined for a minute and then went back to pick up a ball he liked.

      In the stall next door was a huge white-and-tan collie with an intelligent face and soft brown eyes. There were still traces of malnutrition in the coat, but Bob was beginning to shape up into a beautiful animal.

      “He’s a doll,” she said, smiling at him.

      “She’s a doll.”

      She hesitated. Turned. Raised her eyebrows.

      “She’s a doll,” he repeated.

      “Bob is not a female name…”

      “If a boy can be named Sue, a girl dog can be named Bob.”

      “You listen to too many Johnny Cash songs,” she accused with a chuckle.

      “He’s great, isn’t he?” he asked. “‘A Boy Named Sue’ was great, but I loved everything he ever recorded.”

      “I have two of his albums myself,” she confessed.

      He grinned. “I knew you had good taste.”

      She liked the way his eyes twinkled when he smiled. He was something of a curiosity around town, because he had a reputation for being a hard case and unsociable. But here, on his home ground, he was relaxed, pleasant, even amusing. She wondered how many people ever got to see this side of him. Probably not many.

      “What happened to that man who broke into my house?” she asked abruptly.

      “Sheriff’s got him locked up,” he told her. “We left the crowbar right where it dropped. The man wasn’t even wearing gloves. There are enough fingerprints on it to convict him. He’ll make bond, of course, and then he’ll go home.”

      “Home?”

      He turned toward her. “A man wearing an Armani suit drove up here a few days ago and introduced him self as my new neighbor. There’s a honey packing ware house on my border. But it’s not honey they’re distributing, if you understand what I mean.”

      She stilled. “Drugs?”

      “Raw cocaine,” he replied. “Or, rather, cocaine paste. At least, that’s what we suspect they’re stockpiling in that warehouse.”

      “Here, in Jacobsville?” she gasped.

      “Right here,” he said.

      “Then tell the sheriff and let him send some men out to arrest the owners!”

      “They won’t find cocaine if they do,” he said carelessly. “In fact, I’d bet my boots that they’ll phone in a tip about themselves just to draw the law out there to check around. And while they’re checking, all the honey in the jars will be real honey, and even a drug-sniffing dog won’t find a trace of cocaine. Having searched the place once and found nothing, local law enforcement will logically hesitate before they go back out there a second time. At least, not without