Guarding Gaby Read online

  For the first time since the tumult that had greeted her arrival, she registered the absence of her phone. In New York, it was her most constant accessory, seldom turned off. Her existence was contained in it, her calendar, all her contacts and what passed for her social life. She was hardly ever at home, if the hovel she inhabited could be termed as such.

  Truth was, Gaby had no home now. She lived for her job; that’s what a modern American woman did. What was required to succeed in the most exciting, ambitious city in the world.

  What her father could never understand.

  For a second, she could hear the bustle of Manhattan, the whoosh of bus air brakes, the roar of the trains below. Cab horns blaring. Sirens. The city was an unceasing roar, an omnipresent wall of noise that she’d thought at first would drive her mad, however much she’d longed for it.

  Nowadays she scarcely noticed.

  But here…the deep silence was a living thing, so complete that a single car’s engine drew notice. A bird’s lilt. If Manhattan was a sky roiling with thunderclouds and lightning, West Texas was night so dark and clear you could almost hear the stars hum.

  The dog whined, and Gaby snapped back into the present.

  The grocery list lay beneath a hand gone slack, so relaxed she had become in the stillness.

  List. Right. She rubbed between her eyes with her middle finger.

  Flour. Dog food.

  She glanced at the animal sitting so quietly and holding her in his steady gaze. “What brand do you like, boy?”

  He cocked his head, and she could imagine his snort. As thin as he was, being picky about food was a ridiculous notion.

  Nearly as absurd as acquiring a dependent when she couldn’t wait to get away. A commitment to him would only slow her down. Perhaps, however, when she returned to New York, she’d start looking at apartments that allowed pets.

  That idea had her glancing toward her new tenant, now occupied in sniffing his way around the kitchen. “What do you think, pal? Want to become a big city dog?”

  He walked to the screened back door, looked out and whimpered.

  “I guess not.” She stood behind him, her gaze drawn to the endless vista. “With all this to roam, why would you accept spending every day in a small apartment?”

  Why do you? asked a voice she couldn’t identify.

  With a jolt, she realized how far away New York seemed, and the thought had her spinning from the door in panic.

  The dog whined again.

  “Just a minute,” she muttered, rummaging a little desperately through her purse. “Got it,” she crowed.

  She powered up her cell and retraced her steps, then opened the screen door. The dog bounded outside. Gaby followed but paid no attention to his path, too intent on waiting for the signal strength indicator to appear.

  “Damn.” One bar, please. Just one little—

  She circled in a slow spin, alert for any improvement. Come on, come on—

  “Yes!” Jubilantly, she hit her speed dial, mentally calculating the time difference, sure that Beth, the early riser, would already be in the office—

  “You have reached the offices of Bijou magazine. Our hours are—”

  What? Where were—

  Then it hit her. This was Sunday morning. Even the most driven staff members wouldn’t be in; even she, who practically lived at the office, went there seldom on Sundays and then, not until afternoon.

  She dialed her boss’s extension. Listened to the message like a lifeline to the real world.

  Her boss’s voice was real. Gaby’s life there was real. She would return; she wouldn’t get swallowed up by Chamizal. The past had no power to harm her now.

  But when the beep sounded, what she wanted to say was absurdly emotional, nothing like the Gaby everyone knew. She had developed cunning and armor a young, lovesick girl had never imagined needing.

  But right now, the words poised to spill from her throat were nothing like the woman she’d become.

  So she settled for “Hi, it’s Gaby. Just checking in. I’ll—” Be on the next plane, she wanted to say.

  But even more, she yearned to rid herself of this place and its ghosts for once and for all, and that would require a few days to clear up her father’s estate, however pitiful it was. “The funeral is over, but there are details to finalize.” A hitch in her voice had her biting her lip. She cleared her throat and resumed speaking as the Gaby she’d become, crisp and efficient. “I’ll get on it first thing tomorrow and let you know in a day or two when I’ll be back.”

  She ended the call. Clutched the cell to her breast and stared toward the horizon, but what she was seeing was Forty-second Street, midtown Manhattan. The view from the corner office windows that might someday be hers.

  A nicker from the barn snapped her reverie. The dog sat in front of her, tongue lolling.

  Did it really matter whether she saw Paco or not? Ramon could care for him until she found him a good home. Ditto the dog at her feet. Did she honestly have to take any more steps into the quicksand of her past by facing the animal who was the last, living reminder of her father?

  Gut it up, Gaby. Nothing in Chamizal can match what you tangle with every day in New York.

  But Paco wasn’t the only memory lying in wait in the barn, nor was Papa. She and Eli had met there in secret on nights when the weather was too bad to rendezvous in the open.

  Just his name rattled her.

  He hated your dad for coming between you.

  How could Chad know that? She’d never seen Eli again after her father had locked her in her room and forbidden her to see him. Eli had disappeared that same night.

  Eli had never been a creature of hate with her. Prickly with the world, yes. Troubled and solitary and a little like the dog before her, rail thin and hungry far beyond any need for food.

  He’ll be charged with your father’s murder.

  Where are you, Eli? To believe him guilty of her father’s murder or his mother’s death would mean that he’d changed drastically from the boy she’d known. Loved.

  But you’ve changed. She had. A lot. Maybe Eli…

  She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. She had a life to return to; she couldn’t get involved with his.

  And her father was dead. However it had happened, he was gone. What did it matter why? It was too late to seek his forgiveness, to make peace between them, to tell him how much she—

  Loved him. Oh, Papa…

  Gaby resisted the urge to sink to the ground, enervated by her grief, by all the loose ends whipping around in the gale force winds of her past, snapping and tearing at her hair and scratching her face. There was no peace to be found here, and if she lingered, she would be sucked back into everything she had fought so hard to escape.

  She eyed the back door and longed to go inside, pack her one suitcase and get the hell out of Dodge.

  But first, she needed transportation, had to find the truck keys. And however badly she wished to flee, there was an animal in the barn who was undoubtedly hungry. She could at least turn him out into the pasture where he could graze on his own and obtain water from the stock tank until Ramon made it over to care for him.

  Like a prisoner facing execution, she headed for the barn.

  Once inside the cool, dim interior, Gaby paused to let her eyes adjust. At the far end, sunlight beckoned.

  Nothing had changed. But everything had.

  A hundred scenes played out in her head: Papa beaming as she took the reins for her first, breath-stealing ride alone on Honey. Papa had rescued the mare from old man Rodriguez’s heavy hand, bartering two precious calves from his herd for his horse-mad daughter, despite the reality that only a working horse was practical on a struggling ranch.

  But it had been her first birthday without her mother, and a milestone one, at that. Thirteen and left with no female relatives, only a father reeling from his own grief and scarcely managing to survive dealing with her first menstrual period just one month earlie
r.

  Celia Navarro would have made a pretty cake and concocted a party with appropriate flourishes; Frank Navarro was out of his depth in the female domain. He had left Gabriela’s rearing to her mother; he would take the lead with a son—but instead of sons, Celia had miscarriages. She kept trying until her body was weakened. An ordinary flu turned into pneumonia, and she was gone.

  Taking the heart of their home with her.

  A welcoming whicker from the far end of the barn dragged Gaby back to the present.

  “Hey, boy.” She found her way to the stall. Paco stuck his head over the rail, and automatically, she began to pet him, scanning his form for signs of neglect.

  When she didn’t see them, she unlatched the door and stepped inside. “Are you hungry? I’ll grab a bucket and—”

  She frowned. His feed bucket was nearly full, and the water in his trough was free of debris. She walked around him and noted the shine to his coat. Picked up a hoof and saw that it was well-maintained. “Ramon’s been here already, has he?” As she stroked the horse, he nudged his big head into her side. She couldn’t help smiling. “I’m glad he’s caring for you, but I guess you’re still lonely, huh?” She rested her forehead against his withers.

  “Me, too,” she whispered.

  Then the tears she’d been fighting off would be stifled no longer.

  Paco stood still while she cried. Her father was everywhere, but nowhere more than with this companion he had loved. Paco had been a working horse when she left, a fine, strong animal capable of herding cattle and bracing to pull a stump from the ground, of enduring hot summer days and bearing a calf over his hindquarters.

  But Gaby had always suspected that even if Paco had not been as hard a worker as the man who owned him, her father still would have moved heaven and earth to keep him, hay-burner though any horse was.

  Now Paco was old, and his master was dead. Gaby grieved for how his life would change when, inevitably, she would have to send him away.

  Paco nudged her again, and blew softly across her arm as if entreating her to play.

  Gaby scraped at her wet cheeks and stepped back. “How long since you’ve had a good run, boy?” She glanced down at the slim, tailored slacks she’d donned. Perfect for city streets but all wrong here.

  But if she weren’t mistaken, nothing in her room had been changed. A pair of her old jeans might still be in the drawers.

  For the second time that morning, a beast brought her the grace of a smile. “You wait right here. I’ll be back.”

  Eli couldn’t sleep, despite his exhaustion. The cave was cool and quiet, but he was newly aware of just how long it had been since he’d slept in a real bed. Had a meal at a table. Moved around in the light without wondering who might spot him.

  Not for the first time, he considered walking away. He had no real stake here; whatever small connection he’d had with Chamizal had ended nine years ago, with his mother’s death.

  With Gaby’s abandonment.

  Damn it. He shoved away the sleeping bag, rose to his feet. Stalked to the cave mouth and stared across the expanse of dun and gray-green. The need to wrap up his half-assed investigation gnawed at his gut, the desire to be anywhere but Chamizal stronger yet. If only Gaby—

  There the problem lay. Gaby was here, like it or not, and as long as she was, he was bound to stay. No one knew about his oath but a dead man; he could leave with no one the wiser. Things would proceed as they had for years. No one but him cared.

  But there was the rub. He had cared very much once, and he had made a promise.

  To a man who had been murdered.

  He could go back to his life as a roving blogger, filing his daily dispatches under his pseudonym—Max Sager at The Hot Spot Journal—from the far reaches of the planet. He could continue the criss-cross from Bangladesh to Antartica, Siberia to Morocco and stay out of the country indefinitely, as he had before Frank Navarro’s message had reached him. There was nothing to tie him to the fire that killed Frank.

  The truth had stopped no one nine years ago, however. The cloud of suspicion would not disperse until he came up with proof.

  He would depart again but not yet, and when he left this time, it would be on his own terms. Gaby’s presence was a complication, but surely she would go back to New York very soon. Until she did, he was going to watch out for her, but once she left, he was free to resolve things in his own time. He could hide out here forever; he’d learned well when he was very young.

  Resolve, however, did nothing to still restlessness. Gaby was too near and unaware of her danger. If she stayed only a day or two more, she would be all right. No one would harm her if she simply sold out.

  Movement in the distance caught his attention. He squinted to make out the figure on horseback. When he realized who it was, first he swore. Then he smiled.

  Then he simply watched in wonder as a stranger metamorphosed into a sight he hadn’t witnessed in years.

  Damn you, Gaby. Please. Go away.

  I don’t want to remember that girl anymore.

  Gaby had walked Paco first. He was not a young horse, and he’d been in the stall for at least a few days, she imagined. She was a runner and understood the value of stretches and warming up muscles.

  She caught an eagerness in him, a touch of impatience, so she moved him to a trot. When he still strained at the bit, she let him out into full gallop. Across the acres, they flew, and Gaby found herself smiling.

  When a form appeared off Paco’s left flank, recognizing it as the dog required a second.

  Then she began laughing for sheer joy.

  The wind whipped hair she should have tied back, if she’d been thinking, but thinking was the last thing she wanted to do just now. Her thigh muscles burned with the unaccustomed exertion, her eyes teared from the wind—

  But none of that mattered. She was free, at that instant, unencumbered by the past or the future for a few precious moments, and her spirits expanded to meet the endless blue sky above.

  They raced, she and Paco, as though borne on the wings of morning, and in that span of time, he was not an old horse soon to be abandoned and she was not a woman with tenuous ties to a painful past.

  They flew as if one being, and Gaby glimpsed a vision that promised she would get past this and put West Texas behind her forever. If that shutter-snap left her feeling bereft, she put it off to the occasion.

  She was meant for much more than this desolate country could ever deliver. Her life brimmed with challenging work and fascinating people and untold heights to scale.

  But those considerations were for later. Right now, she and Paco would run. “You okay, boy?”

  He seemed to catch her intent and lengthened his stride even more.

  Delight bubbled from her throat again.

  She made quite a picture, Eli mused, dark hair streaming behind her, lithe body arrayed over the horse’s back. Gaby’s profile had never been girlish, too bold and dramatic to fall easily into the category of cute.

  Cute she was not, nor even conventionally pretty. Arresting, yes. All woman and stop-your-heart beautiful now.

  After a long, noisy bout of slurping, the dog returned to his side, still panting.

  “Wear you out, boy?” Eli bent and scratched behind the dog’s ears. “Go on and eat.” He gestured toward the rear of the cave where the animal slept not far from his cot.

  The dog remained.

  “Already fed you, did she?” Eli spoke without removing his gaze from the figure receding into the distance. “Shouldn’t be surprised,” he murmured. “She always had a big heart.”

  Then, farther out, Eli spotted another figure moving northward in a track that would cross Gaby’s path at the boundary that divided Navarro property from Anderson.

  When recognition struck, he swore beneath his breath.

  Stay away from her, he commanded silently. Eli might have no desire to claim her, but he’d see his enemy in hell before he’d let him do it.

  The f
ence line hove into sight, and with it a mounted figure. Gaby pulled gently but steadily on the reins.

  The cheer from the ride remained on her features. “Good morning, Chad.”

  “You are a sight for sore eyes, Gabriela.”

  The admiration in his expression only added to her pleasure. “Why, thank you, neighbor.” Her lashes fluttered with her best Southern belle imitation.

  Chad grinned. “It’s good to see you smiling.”

  She wanted to cling to the optimism, not descend into mourning again. She wasn’t naïve enough to think she wouldn’t still be forced to contend with it.

  But not just yet.

  “It’s a welcome sensation.”

  “Had coffee yet? Or breakfast? Maria would love to cook for you. She’s already asked me when the niña will be by to visit.”

  “Maria’s still there?” Chad’s father’s housekeeper had been with them since Chad was in grade school and his parents divorced. His restless, beautiful mother had left him with his dad and gone on to seek a more exciting life than that of a rancher.

  He tipped his Stetson back and nodded. “She’ll outlive me, I feel certain. She’s always complaining because I don’t settle down and give her grandbabies to spoil. I’ve tried to retire her, but she refuses to go. Says I can’t do without her. Would waste away without her cooking.” He patted a flat belly. “Maria never heard of low-carb cooking. I grab salads for lunch, but the pounds are always lurking.”

  Seen from a purely feminine perspective, he was an undeniably handsome man in his prime. “You’re managing fine, as far as I can tell.”

  His eyebrows waggled. “That mean you’ll come home with me?”

  She started to ask For what? but resisted the temptation of images swirling in her head. Chad had been a good kisser, as she recalled. He might very well be a good lover, too. He’d given plenty of signs already that he was willing.

  She thought about how long it had been since she’d last enjoyed a good bout of sweaty sex. Too long, she realized. She’d been caught up in the battle to succeed and channeled all her energies into that.

  She cocked her head. “I might. But only for breakfast,” she stipulated. Then relented a bit. “For now, anyway.” If he were onboard with the notion of simple physical release, they could perhaps come to an arrangement.