Johanna Lindsey - Angel

Catherine’s surprise was evident. “That’s right, you worked on the Rocky Valley spread for a while, didn’t you? But what brings you this far south?”

Angel’s eyes met Cassie’s briefly before he answered, “Looking after your daughter as a favor to Lewis Pickens.”

Catherine glanced at Cassie. “But I thought—”

“Mr. Pickens couldn’t make it, Mama, so he sent Angel — and what can’t wait?”

The question was for Angel, and he abandoned his casual pose to reply, “You need to come with me.”

“Where?”

“Out to the barn.”

That wasn’t exactly what Cassie was expecting — or hoping — to hear. “What’s in the barn?”

“Some friends of yours, prepared to listen to you meddle one more time.”

Her eyes flared wide in understanding. “You didn’t! Both of them?”

“And then some.”

“Could you two maybe talk in plain English?” Catherine interjected at that point.

“Angel has managed to bring some MacKauleys and Catlins together under one roof so I can talk to them,” Cassie explained, and to Angel she added, “That is why you did it, isn’t it?”

“Figured I owed you that,” was all he said.

Cassie blushed and smiled at the same time — until another question occurred to her. “Did they come willingly?”

“I wasn’t going to waste my time asking.”

“Now just a minute,” Catherine demanded.

“Are you saying you brought these people here — at what? — gunpoint?”

Angel shrugged. “With this bunch, there wasn’t any other way, ma’am. You folks can come along or not, but Cassie has to come with me. And I reckon this is going to take some time, so don’t expect her back for a while.”

Charles finally spoke up. “You’re out of your head if you think I’m going to let you go off alone with my daughter, for whatever reason. Besides, I’ve got a thing or two to say to R. J. myself. Cassie, tell your mama there’s no need to wait up for us. She can make herself at home.”

“Cassie, tell your papa he’s out of his head if he thinks I’m staying behind,” Catherine retorted.

Cassie didn’t follow either order, but Angel issued a warning. “You enter that barn, folks, you’ll be playing by my rules. There won’t be no leaving until I say so. And I’ll take your gun, Mrs. Stuart. Mine is the only one that will be needed tonight.”

Catherine conceded that much, handing her weapon over, but she whispered in an aside to Cassie, “Just what does he think he owes you that he’s breaking the law for?”

“It’s personal, Mama.”

At which point silver eyes the same color as Cassie’s narrowed. “Am I going to have to shoot him before we leave here, baby?”

Cassie wished her mama weren’t serious, but she knew she was. “Please don’t go jumping to conclusions,” she told her. “I’ll explain everything once this is over.”

“It better be good, because I don’t think I like that young man.”

Cassie wished she still felt that way, too.

Angel handed Cassie a knife as soon as they entered the barn. With several lanterns burning, she saw at a glance why a knife was needed. The look she gave Angel was definitely full of reproach.

He merely shrugged indifferently, saying, “Did you really think they’d be sitting around chewing the fat, just waiting for you?”

“I suppose not, but this isn’t going to make them very open-minded.”

“They won’t be leaving until they are.”

“Do you expect me to shove common sense down their throats?”

He actually grinned at her. “I expect you’ll give it a good try.”

She grinned back, because she would. But first she had some neighbors to cut loose. Her mother helped, since Angel hadn’t taken her only weapon. She still had a hunting knife she wore strapped to her boot, and she used it to release the MacKauleys. Cassie went straight to Jenny.

“I’m sorry about this,” she told her friend as she cut through the rope on her wrists.

“What’s going on?” was the first thing Jenny asked as soon as she pulled the gag out of her mouth.

“Angel heard me make that wish the other day and decided to grant it for me.”

“It won’t work, Cassie.”

“Let’s hope you’re wrong. Do you want to do the honors?” Cassie nodded toward Dorothy.

“I’d better. She’s liable to come loose taking a swing at you.”

Dorothy wasn’t quite that enraged, but she was definitely put out at being there. Embarrassment had a great deal to do with that, however, since Angel had collected her right out of her bed. She was in her nightgown, her blond hair loose and flowing around her. She actually looked years younger, and to a woman like Dorothy, who was used to wielding complete authority, that put her at a disadvantage and she knew it. But there was another consequence she hadn’t even noticed yet. R. J. couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her.

He’d also been taken from his bed and was in his long underwear, red in color, but that wouldn’t bother a man like R. J. It was getting caught so unawares that had him steaming, and the fact that he was without a weapon, while Angel stood in front of the closed barn door, arms crossed, looking relaxed and removed from what was going to happen, but with his Colt in plain view to say otherwise.

The only MacKauleys and Catlins not present were Buck and Richard, who’d both been inaccessible due to having bed companions whom Angel hadn’t wanted to involve. Frazer came loose laughing, and was in fact the first one to say anything.

“I gotta hand it to you, Miss Cassie. Things sure have been interestin‘ since you showed up this time.”

His humor, as usual, got her dander up. “It wasn’t my intention to entertain you, Frazer.”

“Guess you just can’t help it, huh?”

She ignored that. R. J. didn’t. “Close it up, Frazer,” his father ordered, and said to Cassie, with all the belligerence he was capable of, “What in hell’s tarnation are you up to this time, little girl?”

Catherine, just finishing slashing through Morgan’s bonds, looked up to say, “Watch your tone when you talk to my daughter, mister.”

“Your daughter? Well, don’t that beat all. You’re a mite late, lady, in showin‘ up to take your girl in hand. You damn well shoulda—”

R.J. didn’t get any further. “You’ll watch your tone when you talk to my wife and my daughter,” Charles said as he stepped up to R. J. and planted a fist in his mouth.

The larger man staggered back two steps, shook his head once, then eyed Cassie’s father with surprised reproach. “Now what’d you wanna go and do that for, Charley? I thought we were friends.”

“After what you did to my daughter? You’ll be lucky if I don’t tear you apart.”

“What’d I do except hurry along what she was plannin‘ anyway?”

Hearing that, Frazer fell back onto a bale of hay, giving in to silent laughter. Only Cassie noticed, but didn’t have time to spare him a look of disgust. She thought she’d talked her papa out of taking on R. J. Apparently not, and their fighting wasn’t what she’d wanted to accomplish here.

“Papa—”

He didn’t hear her because he said at the same time, “What she was planning doesn’t matter, R. J., and you damn well know it.”

R. J. held up a hand when Charles took another step in his direction. “Now, come on, Charley. I don’t want to have to hurt you.”

It was indicative of R. J.‘s confidence that he’d put it that way, and of Charles’s anger that he didn’t care. Charles raised his fist again, R. J. took a stance to block him, and Angel fired a shot into the roof above their heads.

A cloud of dust and wood splinters filtered down on the two men as they and everyone else turned toward the entrance. Angel was calmly slipping his gun back into its holster.

“I’m right sorry to spoil your fun,” he said in his slow drawl, “but if any violence is going to be committed here, it’ll come from me.” He looked directly at Charles to add, “If what MacKauley did was worth a fight, I’d have killed him already, so let it go, Mr. Stuart. For the time being, Cassie’s my responsibility, not yours, and all she wants is to say a few words to these folks.”

Charles lowered his fist and nodded grudgingly, though he gave R. J. a this-isn’t-finished look before he turned away. In the meantime, Catherine came up beside Cassie. “It appears something important didn’t get mentioned to me before I was invited to join this little party,” she said. “Would you mind telling me what your papa is so riled about, and why that hired gun thinks you’re his responsibility?”

“He’s my husband,” Cassie said in a whisper.

“He’s your what?” Catherine shrieked.

“Mama, please, this isn’t the time to explain.”

“Like hell it isn’t!”

“Mama, please!”

Catherine would have said more, a lot more, but Cassie’s expression stopped her. It wasn’t a pleading look she was getting, but one of stubborn determination that Catherine wasn’t used to seeing in her daughter. Cassie simply wasn’t going to discuss it now, no matter what Catherine said.

She wasn’t used to giving in, either, but in this case she did — for the moment. “All right, but as soon as you’re done here, we talk.”

“Fair enough,” Cassie replied, and turned to look at R. J. and Dorothy. She took a deep breath before she said to them, “I tried to apologize before, but I won’t again, because my intentions were good whether you think so or not. I thought a marriage between your two families would end the animosity you’ve been living with for so long. It should have — but you won’t let it, will you? And what’s ironic is you’ve both raised your children to hate and they don’t even know why. Why don’t you tell them why?”