Melissa Cutler - Cowboy Justice

“You need to make things right with her, and this is not the way to go about it.”

Vaughn scrubbed a hand over his chin. “Don’t start with me, K. I’ve already told you, there’s no way to make things right with her. We’re over. Done. There’s nothing keeping me from doing my job with this case. And that job is sticking it to the Meyer family like no one else has had the balls to do.”

“I admit that your vendetta against Wallace Meyer is justified, but it’s still not worth giving up on Rachel.”

“Oh, my God, you’re dense. There’s nothing to give up on. Back in December, when Amy and Rachel’s mom was dying, I let you talk me into being there for Rachel. I stood in that hospital hallway with you for hours, waiting to be there for her. When she came out of her mom’s room and saw me, do you remember what she said? She said, ‘Go away, Vaughn.’” It still made his insides reel to remember the way she’d looked while saying that to him. Like he was nothing but dirt on her shoes. “Giving it any more of a try would be pathetic.”

“Fighting for the person you love is never pathetic.”

“Who ever said I loved her?”

Kellan let out an incredulous snicker. “Please. It’s written all over your face every time her name comes up.”

“There’s a huge difference between lusting after a woman and being in love with her.”

“Trust me, I know.”

The sun was broiling Vaughn where he stood. The shade from the brim of his hat wasn’t doing him a lick of good. He unbuttoned his cuffs. “I am not in love with Rachel Sorentino, and I don’t need you to help me get in touch with my feelings or some pansy crap like that.” He rolled the sleeves to his elbows. “A year ago, you would’ve never butted into my personal life like this. Now that you’re getting married, you think you’re some kind of relationship god.”

“Look, I don’t pretend to understand what you and Rachel see in each other, but I do know that you should not be working her case. Let your deputies take care of it.” He pointed toward the hospital. “Go back up to her room. Sit by her side and take care of her like I know you want to.”

“I’m going to build a case against the men who shot her and make them pay for what they did. That’s how I’m going to take care of her.”

“Like I said, you’ve done some stupid things, but this takes the cake.”

Vaughn shook his head. “That’s really nice of you. Thanks for being such a great friend, asshole.”

Grinning, Kellan clapped him on the back. “Think of how much easier it’ll be for you both at my wedding if you two work things out, with you both being in the wedding party.”

Man alive. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He bent forward and rested his forehead on the top of his car, cursing under his breath. How was he supposed to be in the same room with Rachel that long? It was liable to kill him. And that wasn’t even taking into account the inevitable rehearsal dinner and other wedding-related festivities. He cursed again, louder.

“Yeah, you’re over her, all right. Any fool could see that,” Kellan said. “I’d better get going. Amy and Jenna are waiting in my truck for me to take them home.”

After Kellan left, Vaughn glanced at the hospital’s third-floor windows. Rachel was behind one of them. He was doing the right thing, staying on the case. Their relationship had been poisoned from the get-go, and nothing he could do or say could fix it. He tossed his hat on the passenger seat and slid behind the wheel.

He fired up his laptop and scrolled through the photographs backward, beginning with the last one Rachel took. In it, four men were in motion, either walking or running away from a rusty red pick-up truck. Each one’s expression of malice had been permanently captured by the camera. He made notes of his observations and jotted questions the picture brought to mind on the pad of paper he kept on the passenger seat.

Twenty photographs and three pages of notes later, he hit the scroll button and a stunning image of a mesa at either sunrise or sunset filled the scene. The image awed him, soothing his stress from the day. To get the shot, she must’ve stood at the base of the mesa and photographed upward, capturing only the silhouette of its steep edge, which extended like a dancer’s leg toward the ground. Half of a crimson sun crested above what would’ve been the dancer’s upper thigh.

Vaughn stared for a long time, his breath gradually slowing, his peripheral vision fading. He felt himself drifting into the world of the image, just as the crimson sun lost itself in the swell of the ridge. The photograph was sensual, worshipful of nature’s beauty. Perfection.

Man, she was a gifted artist. He knew she enjoyed photography as a hobby, but he’d had no idea what that actually meant, having never seen her pictures before.

One click brought forth the next photograph. This one was of a coyote and its two babies, peeking their heads out of a darkened den carved into the red earth. He couldn’t help but smile at the hope the image evoked. With each click, a new wonder was revealed to him. Images both small and expansive, every one of them taken on Sorentino land, he guessed. But the real treasure wasn’t the discovery of the land’s beauty, but the glimpse it afforded him into Rachel—the self she’d never revealed to him. The side of her he’d regret forever not getting to know when he’d had the chance so many months ago.

Suppressing the longing and frustration that realization brought with it, he clicked again. When the picture loaded, he let loose a volley of curses. He was looking at himself.

In the image, he was standing in front of Rachel’s house, leaning against his off-duty truck, looking at something or someone off-camera and smiling as though he’d heard a joke.

He’d only been on her property a couple times in the last year, the most recent being when he’d stopped by to have a word with Kellan about the annual start-up of their fantasy baseball league. Kellan spent a lot of time at the Sorentino property since he and Amy had gotten together, and every now and then, Vaughn had no choice but to bite the bullet and venture into Rachel’s territory.

Each time he made the turn onto their dirt road, he felt strung as tight as a wire, wondering if he’d catch a glimpse of her as she moved about her day’s work. He never had, but every time, he wondered if she didn’t see him coming and made herself scarce. Guess that wasn’t always the case. At least this once, she’d been watching him.

The idea thrilled him. He shouldn’t have allowed it to, but it did nevertheless. Eagerly, he clicked to the next photograph, but she was back to nature images. He did a rapid search of the rest of the pictures, but that single shot of him was the only non-nature shot in the entire fifty-image set before the pictures of the vandals.

He toggled back to it. It wasn’t artistically rendered in the least. Almost out of focus and off-centered, like she’d snapped it in haste. He wondered if she ever looked at it, and if she did, what she saw in the picture—and in him. Wasn’t like he’d ever done right by her to deserve the attention.

He’d never be able to fix the mistakes he’d made with Rachel, but now he had the opportunity to step up. It wasn’t as much as she deserved, but he’d do everything in his power to keep her safe from Meyer and his network of bullies. He’d protect her the only way he could—with his badge.

He closed the folder of her camera images and opened Binderman’s crime scene photographs. The graffitied boulder was the first picture. He studied it, but couldn’t get his mind off the photo Rachel had taken of him. All of a sudden, his stomach dropped as the awful possibility occurred to him that Binderman and who-knows-how-many of his deputies had seen the photograph too. Maybe they hadn’t taken the time to flip through her nature images, but then again, maybe they had.

Fingers unsteady, he pulled the picture up again and considered deleting it. He didn’t want anyone to know about him and Rachel. He didn’t want to explain why he was working a possible assault case involving his former lover. He moved the pointer over the image. If he erased this copy, then he’d have to delete it from her camera too, along with the copy on Binderman’s laptop.

What a mess that would turn into, especially if he got caught. In fact, what the hell was he thinking? The truth floored him. He’d considered—seriously, honestly considered—tampering with evidence. What was wrong with him?

The peal of his cell phone ringing made him jump. With his heart racing and perspiration blooming on his forehead, he slammed the laptop closed and fished the phone out of his pocket. It was Stratis.

“Cooper here. What’s happening?”

“Wallace Jr. is being moved to a suite on the second floor. His parents are demanding access, along with their lawyer.”

“I’m on my way. Who’s the lawyer? Anyone we know?” He unplugged the laptop to bring with him. He wanted to watch the look on Junior’s face when he saw the photograph of him and his friends toting AR-15 rifles.

“Billy Tsai.”

Didn’t surprise Vaughn that Meyer had sprung for one of the premier defense attorneys in the state. Vaughn had given expert testimony in court against several of Tsai’s clients over the years. The man was a shark in the courtroom, but Angela Spencer, the Quay County district attorney, was no minnow either. She could more than hold her own against Tsai and the Meyers.

Vaughn dropped his hat on his head, locked the car, and strode through the parking lot. “Go ahead and let the Meyers see their son, as long as you’re in the room too. Maybe Junior will blab to his parents before Tsai has a chance to convince him he’s better off staying quiet.”

He’d press Junior for information until either Tsai or Wallace Sr. shut the conversation down, then he’d stand first watch on Junior’s twenty-four-hour guard until Kirby or Molina were available to relieve him. After that, he’d take on the job of guarding Rachel’s door. Unadvisable, considering he’d probably spend the whole night torturing himself by watching her sleep. He wished he were stronger than to do that, but he knew, unequivocally, he was not.

It seemed that the harder he fought against her hold on him, the worse her grip around his heart got. Striding through the parking lot, then the lobby, he thought again about the secret picture she’d taken of him, and couldn’t help but wonder if that feeling was mutual.

Rachel’s assessment of her suite being like a jail cell didn’t change the next day. That is, it didn’t change until she’d waited hours for the nurses to organize her paperwork and find a doctor to sign off on her release papers. By then, she’d concluded it would’ve been easier to get released from prison than checked out of a hospital.

Adding to her anxiousness to get home was her commitment to avoiding any more surprise run-ins with Vaughn. He’d made a brief, awkward appearance in the doorway that morning while a nurse was removing her IV. His eyes were tired, his expression gravely serious, and his uniform wrinkled, giving the impression he’d never made it home to change or sleep the night before. Even still, the mere sight of him sent her insides haywire. Then she’d jumped at the sting of pain as the nurse pulled the needle free of her arm, and her hospital gown slipped off her shoulder. She’d scrambled to cover herself, and when she’d looked up again, he was gone.

Amy drove her home and prattled the whole hour drive. Rachel was happy to let her talk, especially since she didn’t seem overly concerned with whether Rachel was paying the least bit of attention to what she said, which gave Rachel plenty of opportunity to let her mind wander.

It was past lunchtime when Amy made the turn off the highway and under the wooden heritage farm inn sign that marked the road to their sprawling ranch house. A smaller sign on a fence post declared:inn closed june through august. local dish restaurant open year-round. friday and saturday for dinner, sunday for brunch.

Rachel rolled the window down and angled her face into the wind, inhaling her favorite scent in the world—her land. She could close her eyes and know the month by the way the alfalfa smelled, raw in its newness or crisp and ready for harvest, or by the bloom of cholla bushes. Even dirt smelled different in winter than summer, the scorched earth of August turning pungent with moisture by November as rain-and snowstorms swept through the high desert.

When Amy’s conversation topic came around to the farm’s safety, Rachel sat up a little straighter and tuned in.