Amish Country Undercover

“And?”

“And I wouldn’t still be here if you weren’t my thief.”

Jack felt Grace stiffen under his touch. She was burned, but he knew her response had less to do with his ministrations and more to do with his accusation. He took the next foot and examined it. “This one looks better than the other. You must stomp heavier with your right foot. Ever thought of taking up square dancing?” He tried to lighten the mood, but his attempt at a joke fell flat. He wrapped the foot in the cool cloth and pressed gently. “Sorry, I forgot the Amish don’t dance. But we do sing.”

“We?”

Jack winced at his slip. “Old news. I grew up in a community in Colorado. I left eight years ago, when I was eighteen. End of story.”

“That hardly sounds like the end of that story.”

Jack shrugged and locked his gaze on Grace’s wide eyes. So inquisitive for the Amish, but then, Grace was unique all around. She was a fighter, and that in itself was as unlike the Amish as could be.

Jack recollected his first glimpse of her in the barn, her pitchfork held high. He had to bite down on the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling. She might think he was trying to make light of the situation again, and this really was no time to laugh about anything. Not when he was going to have to arrest her.

“You have stolen goods on your property, or at least one of them,” he said, bringing the subject back to her. “You’ve told me your story, but it doesn’t explain how you ended up with a thoroughbred, instead of the standardbred you purchased.”

“Th-thoroughbred?” She swallowed hard as her eyes filled with shock. Or most likely feigned shock. “H-how?” Her voice cracked.

Jack bit back a smile. Even if she was faking it he found the sight of her bewilderment endearing. He could almost believe she was innocent in all this. Almost. “That’s what I’ve been asking you to explain. How did you switch the horse today without the stable hands not noticing?”

Grace reached for the papers with the identification codes. As she silently read them her eyes grew wide in shock. “These are thoroughbred numbers. I can’t believe this. I didn’t even look at the identifications. I’ve just been concerned with showing the bishop I could handle the job.” She glanced toward the door and moved to stand up.

“Whoa,” Jack said, keeping her down with a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll need to clear the woods before you go anywhere tonight.”

“I have to protect that horse until I can get him back to the stables. Do you have any idea what a thoroughbred is worth? They are purebred.”

“I’ve done my research, yes.”

Her face blanched further. “I’ve already lost two horses to the thief. What if...” Her eyes searched his with growing fear. Shaking her head, she said, “I can’t replace them or pay for them.”

“I gathered that,” he said.

“You don’t understand.” Panic made her hands shake as she reached for his, still holding her foot. “I could go to jail.”

Jack nodded. “That’s what I’ve been saying, ya.” He cringed at his unconscious slip into the old language. One night with this woman, and his past was already breaching the borders of his new life. He looked to see if Grace had caught his dialect, but she was facing her father.

Benjamin slumped back against the wall, watching them talk with a look of confusion on his face. “Oh, Daed. What should I do?” she implored him.

Benjamin squinted in response. If he had an answer, he wasn’t sharing it with his daughter.

For the first time since Jack met Grace tonight, he saw tears well up in her eyes. Not even when she was being shot at did she cry. But in this moment, with her father unreachable, he could see how much Grace relied on him.

With Benjamin inaccessible, she was left to take care of everything alone. Left to run the business as perfectly as possible, so the elders wouldn’t take her job away from her.

Signing on with a horse theft ring wouldn’t be the way she would go, not if she wants to show how well she can handle the job.

The thought bounced around in Jack’s head—and disrupted his plan.

The plan was to bring in his horse thief, no matter what.

But what if I’m wrong?

The idea seemed ludicrous. He was never wrong. He always had a way of sizing a person up and knowing if he had his man...or woman, as the case may be. That talent traced all the way back to Colorado, when someone had pinned a crime on him. He’d figured out who was behind the scheme and had called him out—even if he’d had to stand alone to do it.

But that was another story.

After that day, Jack had vowed he would always seek justice, and he wouldn’t stop until he had the right criminal behind bars. Up until this point he hadn’t been wrong when he’d brought a perpetrator in.

Could he be wrong about Grace?

Jack studied her crestfallen face as she searched her father’s confused gaze. Jack wasn’t ready to give in and admit to being wrong about her. Too much evidence was stacked against her. She’d had the stolen horse in her barn...and now in his trailer.

But maybe...

Jack pressed his lips together in annoyance. He typically liked a good joke, but not when the joke was on him. He could imagine his supervisor, Nic Harrington, laughing hysterically if Jack brought in an Amish woman who was completely innocent. Nic would never let him live it down.

Before Jack could slap cuffs on anyone, he would need to be 100 percent sure he had the right person.

But first, he had to catch the gunman in the trees.

Jack winced as he stood up to go. He’d hidden from Grace the fact that the gunman had clipped him. Something that the man would pay dearly for.

“I’ll tell you what you’re going to do,” he responded, when Grace’s question to her father went unanswered. He opened the door. “You’re going to prove your innocence.”

“How will I do that?” she asked, clearly bewildered as she looked up at him from the floor.

“I’m going with you to Autumn Woods.”

Her eyes widened once again. “But what will I say when I’m asked why I’m with an Englisher?”

“You won’t be.” At her confusion, he said, “I’m going to need some of your daed’s clothes.”

“You’re going to pretend to be Amish? I don’t like this at all.”

“Ya, me neither. But believe me, this is going to hurt me so much more than it will hurt you.”

Just then the sound of a vehicle starting up outside alerted Jack to the present danger. How? He felt for his keys in his pocket.

“That’s your truck. With my horse!” Grace shouted. She jumped to her feet, then crumpled back to the floor in obvious pain, clearly not going anywhere.

Jack withdrew the keys from his pocket, needing to get outside. But instead of reaching for the doorknob, he stepped forward to help Grace. Instantly, she waved him away, struggling to speak through the pain. Then she forced out the only word he needed to hear.

“Go!”

FOUR

Grace released the pent-up breath she’d been holding since Jack left, slamming the door behind him. She stretched out her throbbing feet and winced from her burns. Her days of walking barr fees were over much earlier in the season than normal. Autumn was only beginning, and she should have had a few more weeks of warm weather to walk the farm with no shoes.

Two gunshots echoed through the night, reminding her of the danger just outside her front door. Both she and her daed jolted in their places on the floor. Her lack of shoes was the least of her worries when there was a gunman on the loose.

“Are we under attack?” Grace’s father laid his forehead on her shoulder. His voice had never sounded so fearful. The whole scenario was unfathomable for their simple Amish lifestyle, never mind for someone whose mind couldn’t comprehend normal, everyday things.

As Grace rubbed his cheek, she looked up at the closed door. The FBI agent had just left through it, hoping to catch the thief stealing his truck and trailer—and her horse. Would she hear another gunshot? Or had the thief just found his mark?

“I wish I could say no, Daed, but I’m not sure what’s going on. It appears someone is using me to steal horses from Autumn Woods, and the FBI believe I’m involved.” Grace wasn’t sure how much of that her father understood, if anything. She didn’t understand it herself. “What do I do? I could be in a lot of trouble.”

“We mustn’t fight,” he said solemnly, and lifted his head. “No fechde.”

Grace frowned at his appropriate reply. It was not what she wanted to hear. His Amish gentleness stayed true, even when he could lose his daughter to prison. He didn’t understand what was at stake. But he was still right. There could be no fighting.

“I know,” she replied, and swallowed a growing lump of resentment. With the possibility of going to jail, Grace wondered how far God would ask her to go.

She thought of Joseph in the Old Testament, wrongly accused of a crime that had put him in jail for years. As horrifying as it was for him, Joseph had to go there to save many lives. God needed him there. God’s will was done. “Gött’s will be done to me, as well,” she said under her breath. Her gaze dropped to her folded hands in her lap. A prayer formed in her heart, and she spoke it quietly as her eyes drifted closed. She sought protection for herself and her father in whatever place they were called to go from here.

Grace opened her eyes and lifted her gaze to the window the agent had been standing by earlier. The curtain billowed out in the slight breeze. Then Grace heard the truck’s engine shut down. Someone was out there.

Was it the agent? Or the thief?

Rising up on her knees, Grace crawled over to the window, careful to keep her skirt under her, protecting her from the broken glass. As she reached the window, she noticed a stain on her white curtains. Smudges of dirt, she thought.

But when she touched the fabric, a bit of the substance came off on her fingers. She studied her fingertips, then looked at the floor in front of her, finding little droplets of a dark liquid.

Grace dabbed her pointer finger in one and knew in an instant what it was.

“He’s bleeding,” she whispered, as the possibility became real.

Agent Kaufman was injured. But how?

It didn’t matter.

“Daed, he’s hurt!” Grace spoke louder, crawling back to her father. She pushed herself up on her feet, then cried out, crumpling back to the floor in pain.

Carefully moving to stand on the edges of her feet, Grace found her balance and caught her breath. “Daed, I have to go outside. The agent is bleeding.”

Grace remembered the grunt the lawman had given when he was carrying her. Had he been shot and never said a thing?

She glanced to the floor where he had placed her and taken care of her burned feet. He had lowered her father so gently, as well, all the while hurt and bleeding from his own wound?

The idea bewildered her. It was a gesture of charity even in the midst of pain. And now he was out there searching for the gunman.

Or bleeding out.

Grace felt at an impasse. Should she go out to look for him and help him? Or stay inside and risk him never returning?

Whatever she chose would put them in danger. But if she stayed inside, she would invite the danger in.

Grace’s eyes filled with tears at her father’s feebleness. Whatever she did, she had to make sure he was safe. That’s all that mattered.

“Daed, I’m going to go out for a while. I’ll be back real soon,” she said, in the most normal voice she could muster.

Benjamin squinted up at her and she knew he wasn’t placing her. She figured it was just as well. In a sad way, his brain was protecting him through this ordeal. When this nightmare was over, hopefully he wouldn’t remember a single gunshot.

Though Agent Kaufman would.

Grace limped over to the closet and found a pair of her father’s boots. She bound wet rags around her feet and gingerly slipped them into the boots. A careful test proved she could endure walking in them. At the door, she reached for a lantern to take with her, but thought better of it. A flame would only draw attention. Still, going out empty-handed seemed just as dangerous.

An idea flickered in her mind, one that seemed so wrong.

A glance in the direction of the closet, with its door still opened wide, showed her the long box with the shotgun was still there. She’d never fired it but had seen her daed load it enough times to understand the mechanics involved.

She looked his way, and it was as though her father could read her thoughts. His head tilted, and his green eyes sought hers for an excuse valid enough to go against the Amish way of no violence.

She had none.

With quiet acceptance, she opened the door and walked out into the dark of night empty-handed. She couldn’t use a weapon to help the agent, but Grace didn’t think there were any rules about creating a diversion.

She looked to the barn and the trailer. The thoroughbred kicked up a fuss against the steel sides. Grace headed toward the horses and thought that she just might have the perfect weapon, or weapons.

Three to be exact.

As soon as Jack left Grace’s house, he shot his truck’s tire to stop the thief from riding out with the vehicle and trailer. With a flat tire, the pickup couldn’t go anywhere, but by the time Jack made it there the driver’s side door was open and the cab was empty. The man had run off.

Jack scanned the tree line, knowing he would have to go in if he was going to catch this guy. The horse thief wasn’t leaving without the thoroughbred, and Jack wasn’t leaving without his thief—or thieves, if Grace Miller was really part of the operation. Although that was appearing to be not the case, he wouldn’t rule it out yet, especially since he’d witnessed her taking the horse at the track.

Jack reached under the dashboard and pulled apart the twisted strands that had hotwired the vehicle. With the engine killed and his gun up, he headed toward the base of the cliff for a game of cat and mouse in the woods.

Jack held his weapon in his right hand. His other palm was pressed tightly against his left side, where a bullet had clipped him during his run with Grace. “Thank you, God,” he muttered under his breath. The gash burned like crazy, but could have been so much worse than a missing chunk of skin. It still could be dangerous if he didn’t stop the bleeding, of course. Judging by the feel of the wound, the gunman had nothing bigger than a .22. Most likely why he’d missed his mark from out in the woods.

Jack pulled his hand away, only to find fresh blood on it. Well, maybe it wasn’t a complete miss. But at least the bullet didn’t get Grace. At least she was still locked up safely in her home. Jack would play hide-and-seek with this gunman all night if it meant keeping him away from Grace and Benjamin.

Jack pressed his hand over his side again and tilted an ear to his right. The sounds of leaves rustling in the breeze mingled with a few far-off crickets. Then he heard what he was waiting for.

The snap of a twig.

The gunman was off to his right, just as Jack had predicted. Moving stealthily, he followed the other sounds the thief made, and soon realized the guy wasn’t very smart. So far, he had moved in the same right, right, left pattern. Jack figured it was so he could find his way out of the forest. But that also meant he could be tracked.

And just like that, Jack became the stalker with the upper hand.

He readied his gun as he took silent steps to his right. At ten feet, he turned left to keep to the gunman’s right. Jack picked up his pace to outmatch his target’s. He took one more turn, this time left, and came face-to-face with a shadowed figure in the dark, his eyes wild at being caught.

“Who are you?” Jack asked into the night, his trigger finger ready to pull. He stepped closer and noticed a bandana covered half the man’s face.

Or more like a boy’s.

Jack huffed in disbelief. “They’re hiring them younger and younger these days. How old are you? Seventeen?”

“None of your business. I’m here for the horse, but you have inconvenienced me.”

Jack laughed aloud. “That’s a big word for such a little guy. That’s a good one.” He laughed again.

The gunman’s eyes narrowed with anger. “How would you like another bullet in you?”

Jack’s laughter stopped cold. “I let you take a shot at me once. It won’t happen again.”

The boy lifted his gun straight at Jack’s head. Jack wasn’t about to give him another chance to fire.

He jerked to the right as his left hand reached for the gun and pushed it away. The weapon blasted, but the boy gripped it firmly as they grappled together.

The sound of a horse running interrupted them. Then Jack heard the thud of several horses’ hooves on the hard ground.

“There’s more than one,” he said aloud.

“The horses!” the boy yelled frantically. “The horses are loose!” He took off in the direction of one of the running animals, then veered to go after another. “Which one is it?”

Jack could see the boy knew what was at stake if he didn’t return with the thoroughbred.

His life.

“Tell me who you work for, and I can help you,” Jack said. He hadn’t moved from his spot, just turned to watch the boy grow more and more frustrated.

“She did this!” the boy wildly yelled. “I knew she would be trouble. I knew it wouldn’t be that easy.”

“You think the Amish woman did this?” Jack asked, biting back an amused laugh at the idea. Then he gave the remark some thought. The boy had to be right. Only Grace could have released the horses and caused the confusion.

But that wasn’t all she’d managed to do.

“That little Amish woman not only freed the horses, but she managed to disarm you,” he said with a smirk.

The boy looked down at his hands, now empty. He lifted confused eyes and saw two guns now in Jack’s possession. The boy’s own gun was now aimed at him.

“So tell me who you are,” Jack ordered.

The boy’s eyes flitted from side to side before resting on Jack. Slowly, he peered through angry eyes. “I’ve got all night. How long do you have before you bleed out?” He lifted his head in defiance.

Jack recognized that smug expression. He’d been just a little bit older when he had given that same look to his family and walked away forever. Only Jack had gone into law enforcement. This kid wouldn’t make it out of his teens if he stayed on a track of crime much longer.

“You’re a dead man,” Jack said. “You know that, right? And it won’t be me pulling the trigger that does you in.”

“That only means I’ve got nothing to lose.”

Jack shook his head. “You’ve got everything to lose. You’re just too blind to see it right now. Let me help you.”

A crunch of leaves to Jack’s left alerted them to the presence of someone else. Jack expected to see a horse trotting in, but at the silhouette of an Amish woman, he knew it was Grace. His weakening state held him back a fraction of a second too long. Just the time the boy needed to reach down to his ankle, then spring into a run at Grace. He wrapped an arm around her neck just as Jack leaped toward them.

Grace shrieked and flailed. Quickly, her body stilled, and she whimpered.

Jack rushed the last few steps until he realized the boy had a knife to her throat. It must have been strapped to his ankle, Jack thought distractedly, while his brain raced to figure out his next move.

He raised his hands in surrender. “I’m not going to shoot you. I only want to help you get away from these people before it’s too late for you.” He set the guns at his feet to show his words rang true.

But he readied himself to spring in and take the boy down.

“You forgot one thing,” the youth said, keeping Grace’s back pressed tightly against him. “I don’t want to get away. I was going places. And this is so much bigger than a few horses.”

Grace struggled to get free and cried out again when her assailant twisted her arm. She was yelling as Jack took another slow step forward. He was nearly there when he saw her lift her right foot and jam it down hard on the boy’s instep. He noticed she wore large boots now just as the boy hollered out in pain, and she did the same.

The young thief let go of her, and she fell to the ground. Boots forgotten, Jack took the opportunity to run at the boy, but just as he was about to make contact, his opponent turned and ran into the dark.

Jack started to go after him, but knew that in his current state he’d never catch up. Still, he had to try.

Then he heard Grace crying behind him.

Jack stopped where he stood, torn in two directions.

But he couldn’t leave Grace sobbing.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, retracing his steps to her. “Did he cut you? Or is it your foot? I saw you stomp on him. With your burns that took some guts.”

Grace lifted her face to him. Fear shone in her widened eyes. “I fought back,” she whispered in despair.

Jack grabbed his side with a grunt as he knelt to face her. He frowned at seeing her agony, both physical and emotional, then sighed and helped her to her feet. Automatically, they leaned together for support. “I know you think you fought back, Grace, but actually, you saved his life. For at least tonight. I was going to have to take him down.”

“But he’s only a boy.”

“It was either you or him, and trust me, it wouldn’t have been you.”

Her face lifted to his. So close, he could feel her soft breath on his chin. He studied her bewildered expression and knew before she said a word what she would have had him do. He knew the Amish way of turning the other cheek. “In my line of business, I do my best to avoid bloodshed, but if there must be some, I aim for the one who’s holding the weapon, not for the innocent bystander caught in the fray.”

“Like yourself?” she asked, her gaze locked on his. “I know you were shot. I found your blood in my home.”

Jack didn’t deny it. With a shrug, he said, “I’ll live. It’s just a graze.”

“We still need to tend to the wound. It could become infected.” The angle of her chin told him she wouldn’t take no for an answer.

“I thought Amish women were supposed to be passive,” he grumbled.

“I’ll take that as the pain talking.”

Jack bit back a grin. She was different from the Amish women he’d grown up with. Maybe she would have stuck up for him when he was younger, even when his family hadn’t.

No, probably not.

He let the wishful thinking go and said, “First we need to round up the horses. They’re my first priority.”

“Not me anymore? Does this mean you believe I’m innocent now?” Hope brightened her eyes.

Jack paused before answering. The image of Grace tying the stolen horse to her buggy was fixed in his mind. “It’s not my job to determine your innocence.”

“But—”

“Let’s go. Our shooter could return at any second with backup.” He took her elbow to guide her out of the woods.

“But do you still think I’m guilty?” she asked as they moved gingerly through the trees. If her feet were paining her, she didn’t mention it. He’d give her points for that.

But he still avoided her question. “Tomorrow, you’re taking me to the track, and you’re going to show me what you do there. Cooperate with me, and I might put in a good word to my supervisor.”

They left the woods, but before they descended the hill toward the house, Grace clicked her tongue, and two horses came stomping up behind them. They approached her and stood by, panting and nickering, and nosing her outstretched hand.