Page 4 of My Cowboy Salvation
I nod, not wanting to think about my treasured cello I had to leave behind. When I left that morning, I needed to appear like I was just heading off to my morning class—not like I was about to run. That meant I could only take what I could fit into this backpack.
“All right then.” He walks to the truck and opens the passenger side for me.
As I climb in, I feel his gaze on me, and it thrills as much as worries me that he’ll demand answers I don’t know if I’m ready to share. We drive in silence, giving me the opportunity to study the quaint store fronts and street corners all decorated with bright fall decor that’s only rivaled in color by the autumn leaves still clinging to the mountain range beyond. Yep. Definitely like a movie.
“Parker tells me you’re in a bit of trouble,” Logan says, barely taking his eyes from the road to glance at me. “He couldn’t say much more, other than you needed a place to stay for a few days and maybe some advice.”
Probably because I hadn’t told Parker much. Couldn’t risk him doing something brave but foolhardy that would only cause him harm. Simon is an important person. A lawyer and partner in a big law firm downtown with friends at the DA’s office, the mayor’s office, and the police department. He would crush Parker if he so much as made the slightest accusation against him, just as he did me.
“Yeah,” I say. “I have to work a few things out. I shouldn’t need to stay with you more than a day or two.” Just enough time to plan my next stop and come up with a way to make some money to live on.
He’s silent, and I know he wants to ask more questions but is trying to give me some space. As we move outside the heart of town, the houses become farther apart, separated by pastures, forested hills and valleys, as well as tracts of farmland. After a few minutes, we pull up in front of a beautiful two-story home built of logs, large gray stones, and glass that’s built far back from the road with a few trees between the road and the front door for added privacy.
When I heard Parker’s dad had moved to Montana, I had images of him living in some small rustic mountain cabin or maybe an old ranch house. I never in a million years would have imagined a place as beautiful or large as this.
Logan parks in the driveway and, as I follow him up the walkway and onto the porch where he stops to enter a code into the front entrance, I can’t help but feel a sense of awkwardness being in this man’s presence. After my break-up with his son, he has every reason to hate me, and yet instead he’s opening his home up to me. I’m a bit surprised that after all this time and everything that Simon’s put me through, my body still reacts so viscerally at being in such proximity to Logan’s. Clearly I need therapy.
He opens the door and steps aside. Cathedral style ceilings soar above the large front room that, along with the large windows, give the space plenty of light. Despite its size, the room still feels cozy and inviting, filled with a couple of recliners, an L-shaped couch facing a massive television mounted on the wall, and a stone-faced fireplace that extends up to the second floor. Beyond the couch, I see the opening of the kitchen, but it’s the open stairway to the right Logan directs me to that brings us to the second floor.
We walk down the hall, passing two doors before he stops at the one on the far end and pushes it open. “I thought you might like this room. It gets lots of morning light, but if you prefer something a little shadier, there’s the other guest room at the top of the steps.”
I walk inside the Spartan room with a queen-sized bed, a tall dresser, and a chair set up by a window. Nothing fancy, but more than enough for my needs. More importantly, it’s a space that feels, for the first time in a long time… safe.
“This room is great. Thank you.” I stare up at his rugged face with the familiar scar just above his right brow and into those inquisitive blue eyes that stare fiercely back at me. The warm tingling feelings zapping through my body right now are more than just gratitude for his help. Which is ridiculous, considering there are far more important things to be thinking about than what it would be like to have this man kiss me. Things like survival.
All the same, it feels like the seconds are ticking by, and the blueness of his eyes are warm with a heat of their own as he stares back at me. That’s probably the lack of sleep talking—and wishful thinking.
“Well, you unpack. Make yourself comfortable.” He takes an abrupt step back. “I was going to run out for some burgers. Can I get you something?”
Food. Other than a Snickers bar and a Dr. Pepper, I haven’t eaten anything in the past twenty hours. “A burger would be great.”
I fumble in my back pocket for some cash that he ignores when I offer it to him. “I got this. I should be back in about twenty minutes.”
He turns around, and a few seconds later, I hear the front door shut. I breathe in deep and close my eyes, savoring the quiet of the house and the sanctuary it’s offering me, even if temporarily.
Best of all, there’s no way Simon can trace me here. Not yet.
And I need to keep it that way.
Chapter 3
Logan
It’s nearlyten the next morning before I hear stirring upstairs that tells me my guest is awake.
Last night, when I returned with a bag of burgers and a determination to get to the bottom of those marks on Dylan’s neck, I found her sound asleep on the bed, fully dressed and lying on top of the covers. She barely stirred when I grabbed a blanket and settled it over her, before I took a moment to study the faint marks on her neck.
Rage that someone would do this to her—to anyone—rolls over me as I imagine how hard he must have squeezed her neck to leave those marks, how scared she would have been as she struggled to take a breath. My protective instinct kicks in for this young, beautiful, and talented woman who, like many before, trusted the wrong man.
When Parker called me the other day to ask for a favor, I knew immediately that whatever he asked, I would give him. Thanks to more than fourteen years of service as an Army Ranger where I spent most of that time thousands of miles from him, I was absent for most of his life. By the time I left the Army and returned to LA, Parker was a teenager, used to living his life without me. His mom had gotten fed up being alone for most of our marriage and divorced me when Parker was eight—not that I could blame her. Pamela was the rock in Parker’s life, and I was grateful to her for that. And with Parker all grown up and a recent graduate from UCLA, I’m even less needed.
Probably why, when the opportunity to work as the chief of police in Castle Falls opened up a couple years ago, I leaped at the chance. I was done with LA and needed a new focus on my life. But no matter where I am, I will always be there for my son, as I’ve told him many times, which is why I found this house where I hope one day he’ll come up and stay for a visit. So when my son called me out of the blue a few days ago and asked me for a favor, I only said, “Shoot.”
“It’s Dylan. Dylan Harper, my old girlfriend. You remember her, right?” he asked.
Dylan Harper. Of course I remembered her. She had been a pretty, sweet-spirited young girl with a way of making my son laugh that made me both grateful and jealous. Although I probably only met her a half dozen times while they dated—no surprise seeing as how he spent most of his time at his mom’s and the occasional weekend with me—there was something about her quiet poise, a sort of grace, that struck me even then.
She broke my son’s heart once they went off to college, but I appreciated her wisdom, seeing as how they were so young and going in different directions. I have a strong suspicion, however, that my son still carries a torch for her.
