Lawless. Diana Palmer

“But they seem all right. I had the boys herd them into the pasture down from the barn, just in case.”

      “Who left the gate open?” she wanted to know.

      “None of my men,” Nick assured her, his dark eyes flashing in his lean, rugged face. “I rode up to Hob Downey’s place and talked to him. He spends his life in that rocking chair on the front porch most of the year. I figured he might have seen who cut the wire.”

      “Did he?” she prodded.

      “He said there was a strange pickup truck down there early this morning, one with homemade sides, like a cattle truck would have,” Nick told her. “An older truck, black with a red stripe. Two men got out and one acted like he was fixing the fence, then Hob went out on his porch and yelled at them. They hesitated, but a sheriff’s patrol car came up the road and they jumped in the truck and went away real fast. It was a small opening, just wide enough to get a cow through, and not visible except up close.”

      She moved closer to the horse, worried and thoughtful. “I want you to call Duke Wright and ask him if he’s got a black truck with a red stripe, and ask who was driving it this morning.”

      Nick leaned over the pommel, meeting her eyes. “You’ve got some idea who it is,” he said.

      She nodded. “But I’m not mentioning names, and what I know, I’m keeping to myself. Get down from there.”

      He lifted both eyebrows. “Why?”

      “I don’t want to have to go to the barn to saddle Mick,” she admitted. “The film crew’s down there. They make me nervous.”

      Nick swung down gracefully. “Where are you going?”

      “Just out to see how that fence was cut,” she told him.

      “I already told you...”

      “You don’t understand,” she said, moving closer. “The fence where the bull died had been cut, too, remember? I never mentioned it to Judd, and we fixed it, but I noticed how it was cut. No two people do the same thing exactly alike. I can tell if it was Maude or Judd who opened a cola can, just by the way they leave the tab. I know what the first wire cuts looked like.”

      “I’ve got to find Denny. He picked up some new salt licks. We’ll take those out when we fix the fence.”

      “Good enough.” She swung gracefully into the saddle and patted the gelding’s red neck gently, smiling. “I’ll take good care of Tobe, okay?”

      He shrugged. “I never doubted it. Want me and Denny to get the truck and follow you over there?”

      She shook her head. “I’m no daisy.” She noted the rifle that protruded from the long scabbard beside the saddle horn. “Mind if I take this along?” she added.

      “Not at all. I’d feel better if you did. Remember the safety’s on. Is Judd down there?” he asked abruptly, nodding toward the barn.

      “Yes, so you’d better go straight to the equipment shed. What he doesn’t know won’t get me dressed down.”

      He started to argue, but she was already trotting away.

      She didn’t really need to look at the cuts to guess that Jack Clark had been around, making mischief. He might have just wanted to let the cows out, or he might have planned to steal some. But she wanted to get away from Judd and the others. If she were lucky, they’d be long gone by the time she got back. Besides, it wouldn’t hurt to make sure her theory was correct. If she could get any sort of evidence to give Cash, he could take care of Jack Clark for her.

      She remembered the look in Judd’s black eyes when he’d helped Tippy Moore down from the SUV, and the way he’d let her lead him away after insulting Christabel. He hadn’t even seemed to notice that she’d been insulted, either. Her heart ached. Just as she’d dreaded, the model’s arrival marked a turning point in her life. She wished she could turn the clock back. Nothing was ever going to be the same again.