The Deputy Gets Her Man

Tyler walked over to a corner of the room and after plucking his cowboy hat from a hall tree, he levered the gray felt onto his head. “I have to go to town, so I won’t be here for lunch.”

Gib’s voice followed him as he strode to the door. “You know what people think of you, Ty. They think you’re trouble.”

Tyler’s jaw tightened. Yeah, he was trouble, he thought bitterly. All he’d ever done in his life was try to walk the straight and narrow, to do the right thing no matter what it cost. And it had cost him one hell of a lot.

“I don’t give a damn what people think,” Tyler muttered.

“Not here. But back in Texas …”

“Was a lifetime ago, Gib. That doesn’t matter.” He paused at the open doorway long enough to cast the cook a pointed look. “If you’re worried my reputation is going to get you in trouble, you don’t have to hang around and wait for the axe to fall. You going back to the Rocking P would give Dad one more reason to gloat.”

“Gloat, hell! Warren Pickens will never see this old man again. Dead or alive.” The older man shoved his hands into the soapy water and began to scrub a plate. “My home is here with you. Is that settled?”

This was the perfect time to tell Gib just how grateful he was for his unwavering loyalty, Tyler thought. But he’d never learned to actually form the sentiments in his heart into words. He’d always believed in letting his actions speak for his feelings. While his twin brother had been exactly the opposite. He’d had a gift of gab and affectionate phrases had rolled off his tongue like molasses off a hot biscuit. And they’d meant little more.

“It’s settled,” Tyler said, then moved to the older man and clasped his shoulder briefly. “I’ll be back by midafternoon.”

Minutes later, Tyler was driving through a section of road where flames had eaten grass and underbrush right up to the edge of the bar ditch. Slowing the truck, he stared with disgust at the soot-covered ground, the charred tree trunks. The person responsible needed to be choked to within an inch of his life, just to show him how the wildlife felt when they were being consumed with smoke and running for their lives.

But he wasn’t going to hold out much hope that the sheriff’s department would find the culprit. Unless they’d found plenty of worthwhile clues at the origin of the fire. And if that had been the case, Deputy Lightfoot hadn’t let on. No, she’d been wasting time with useless questions about his feelings toward the Cantrells.

Trying not to think about Rosalinda Lightfoot, he pressed down on the accelerator. After rounding a sharp bend in the road, he spotted a Chaparral truck parked at the edge of the narrow dirt path. Seeing Laramie Jones sitting beneath the steering wheel, Tyler pulled alongside the vehicle and stopped. As he rolled down his window, Laramie did the same.

“Out surveying the damage?” Tyler asked the dark-haired cowboy. Laramie had been the foreman of the huge neighboring ranch for far longer than Tyler had lived in New Mexico.

He shot Tyler a weary grin. “Could’ve been worse.”

“Amen to that. You lose any cattle?”

“No,” Laramie answered. “What about yourself?”

“One cow cut her leg, that’s all,” Tyler told him. “She must have spooked and bolted through the fence. Thankfully, most of the herd was up on a higher range last night.”

“That’s good,” Laramie replied.

Was the other man thinking how convenient that sounded? Tyler wondered. Was Laramie part of the group that considered him to be nothing but trouble? He didn’t want to think so. Laramie Jones was one of the few men who had befriended him since he’d moved here.

I don’t give a damn what people think.

Tyler’s outburst to Gib a few minutes ago hadn’t been completely true, he thought. He didn’t mind if people considered him cocky, or hot-tempered or a weird recluse. Those were trivial and sometimes even accurate descriptions of him. But the idea that anyone might consider him a criminal was another matter completely.

“A deputy is up at the ranch right now questioning my men.” Pulling off his dark aviator glasses, he looked directly at the foreman. “If any of them had anything to do with this, Laramie, I want them to be severely punished.”

“I have no doubts about that. A couple of deputies are at our place, too. Let’s hope they get to the bottom of this. And quick.”

Tyler released a heavy breath. “So how is Quint taking all this? Last night when we were moving cattle I didn’t see him around.”

“He’s angry and worried. That’s how he’s taking it. His wife, Maura, is pregnant and last night she was so upset over the fire that I convinced him to stay with her and let the rest of us men handle the cattle.”

From what Tyler understood, the baby was going to be Quint’s third child, coming after two young sons. In all honesty, Tyler had to admit he was envious of the man. At one time in his life he’d wanted children desperately. More than anything, he’d wanted to be a father and raise his children far from the stranglehold Warren Pickens had placed upon him. But DeeDee hadn’t wanted to be a mother. Hell, after less than a year of being married, she’d not even wanted to be his wife. She’d wanted to have fun and enjoy herself. And Tyler’s twin, Trent, had been more than eager and willing to show her a good time.

Now, nearly ten years later, Tyler fought to forget how he’d bent over backward to please his young but fickle wife. In the end, she’d not been worth his efforts and all his trying had made him look like an even bigger fool. Especially with his father continually taunting him with warnings that Trent was the man DeeDee really loved. And as it turned out, Warren’s stinging predictions had come true. In the end, DeeDee had divorced him and married Trent. Not only that, the two of them had moved in to the very house that Tyler had originally built for himself and his wife.

Hell, what was he doing thinking about DeeDee or Trent at a time like this? Tyler wondered, as he gave himself a mental shake. He didn’t give a damn about either one of them. They deserved each other.

Putting the truck into gear, he said, “Well, you and Quint have my number. If either of you need me for anything, just call.”

“Thanks.”

Tyler lifted a hand in farewell and put the truck into motion. A quarter of a mile down the road, his cell phone rang and seeing the caller was his foreman, he quickly answered. “Yeah, Sawyer?”

“Sorry to bother you, Ty. But you’d better get back here to the ranch. Quick.”

Tyler bit back a sigh of frustration. Sawyer was a competent man. He didn’t annoy Tyler with trivial problems, so clearly something had to be wrong. “What the hell has happened now?”

“It’s that deputy. Seems as though Santo didn’t take too kindly to some of her questions. He blew his stack and told her he’d taken feed sacks, a jug of kerosene and a cigarette lighter down to the property line and set the fire. Said he’d wanted to burn every damned Cantrell to a crisp! Now she’s about to haul him to jail!”

Muttering a curse under his breath, he promptly jammed on the brakes and wheeled the truck around in the middle of the road. “Stall her if you can! I’ll be right there.”

When Tyler reached the ranch yard he instantly spotted Santo standing at the front of the deputy’s vehicle with his hands cuffed behind his back. Sawyer and two other cowboys were standing several yards away, anxiously watching the scene unfold. Instead of worrying that his men might cross the line with the pretty deputy, Tyler realized he should’ve been more concerned about her taking advantage of his men.

After braking the truck to a jarring halt, Tyler leaped to the ground. He trotted over to where Deputy Lightfoot was speaking on a two-way radio affixed to the dashboard of her truck.

He waited until she leaned across the seat to hang the mike back on its holder before lashing out at her. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Slowly turning from the vehicle, she fastened a look of warning on him. “That should be clear to you. I’m taking your employee into custody.”

Tyler would be the first to turn over any man on this ranch if he was guilty. But the only thing Santo would set a match to was a candle when he said a prayer. “That’s stupid! Santo hasn’t done anything!”

Her lips pressed tightly together as her dark brown eyes leveled a pointed look at him and at that moment the odd thought of kissing her shot through his mind. What would it feel like to pry those lips of hers apart and feel the soft skin of her cheek pressed against his?

Her voice suddenly interrupted his wandering thoughts. “Mr. Pickens, I suggest you let the law do its job. Otherwise, you might find yourself in a pair of handcuffs.”

He didn’t know whether to burst out laughing or curse. “If you haul Santo to jail, you’ll be making a huge mistake.”

“Your man just confessed to the crime,” she retorted. “I’d be stupid not to arrest him.”

“You insulted him. He said all of that out of spite because he’s angry!”

Stepping forward, she wrapped a hand against the back of Tyler’s arm and urged him several feet away from the vehicle and out of the earshot of Santo and the other men. Tyler was acutely aware of the warm weight of her hand, the flowery scent wafting to his nostrils.

“Mr. Pickens,” she said lowly. “When I left your house less than an hour ago, you implied you had no qualms about me interrogating your men. Now here you are interfering. Maybe you should start explaining yourself.”

It suddenly dawned on Tyler that if their roles were reversed, he wouldn’t be showing the calm patience that she was projecting at the moment. The insight was enough to dissolve his anger and make him even more aware of her touch and the deep, dark depth of her eyes.

“Okay, I’m guilty of interfering. I’m sorry. But in this case I think you need to know what’s going on here.”

Dropping her hand away from his arm, she rested her hands on her hips. “Hmm. Well, exactly what is going on here?”

“Santo couldn’t have started the fire. Yesterday I sent him over to Roswell to pick up a horse. He didn’t return until late in the evening and when the fire started, Santo and I were both down at the stables dealing with the new horse.” He inclined his head to a point beyond her shoulder, where a long barn with a wide roof protecting the whole length of the building, which stabled more than two dozen horses. “We’d barely gotten the horse unloaded and into its stall when we started to smell smoke.”

She stared back at him as she weighed the sincerity of his words. Then, finally, she inclined her head toward Santo. “I’ll talk to him again. You come with me. But don’t say a word. Understand?”

“Santo will hear a few choice words from me,” he assured her. “But that will be later.”

Seeming to accept his promise, she motioned for him to join her and they quickly returned to where his chief wrangler stood passively waiting for the deputy to haul him away.

A man in his sixties, Santo had worked for Tyler for eight years and since his wife had died several months ago, he’d moved into the bunkhouse and lived on the ranch full-time. Tyler understood the man was going through a tough emotional patch. Otherwise, he would have fired him for pulling such a stunt with Deputy Lightfoot.

She said to Santo, “I think you’d better tell me your story again, Mr. Garza. It’s not adding up to your boss’s account of your activities yesterday.”

Remorseful now, the man looked at her, then Tyler. “Okay. I was gone to Roswell. I didn’t set no fire,” he mumbled.

Her eyes rolled with utter frustration. “You stated that you wanted to burn every Cantrell to a crisp. If you didn’t set the fire, what was that about?”

“I added that for good measure,” the wrangler explained. “Miss Deputy, don’t you know when someone is feeding you a line of bullsh—uh—manure?”

She shot Tyler an exasperated look. “Evidently your man doesn’t understand he can get into deep trouble by lying to a law official. I could take him in, you know. For giving false statements, impeding an investigation and—”

“But you won’t,” Tyler interrupted. “Because you and I both know that Sheriff Hamilton doesn’t have time to deal with this sort of nonsense.”

“Neither do I,” she snapped.

Turning to Santo, she gave him a stern upbraiding before finally releasing him from the handcuffs. The horse wrangler didn’t press his luck by hanging around or tossing any more sarcastic jabs at the deputy, especially in front of his boss. Instead, he quickly headed in the direction of the stables with the other three ranch hands close behind him.

Lifting his hat from his head, Tyler raked a hand through his thick hair and heaved out a weary breath. This morning was hardly going as planned. “I’m sorry about this, Deputy Lightfoot. Santo is—well, he’s an independent cuss. He sometimes has the idea that rules are for other people to follow, not him. Believe me, I’ll get the message over to him.”

“That might be a good idea. Before he gets himself into a serious situation.”

She walked around the truck to where the driver’s door still stood ajar. Within the cab, he could hear the dispatcher relaying information to another officer and Tyler suddenly wondered if Deputy Lightfoot had already alerted the sheriff that she was making an arrest regarding the fire. He hoped not. It would hardly shed a positive light on her ability to judge people and the situation.

Whether she makes a fool of herself or not is hardly your business, Tyler. If she takes a fall for mishandling the investigation, it’s not your worry.

Even though the pestering voice in his head was giving him good advice, he pushed the annoying noise aside. For some reason he didn’t understand, he wanted this woman to succeed. And not just because it would be to his advantage to have the arsonist found and punished. No, this was a personal feeling. Something he’d been short on for a long, long while.

“Are you finished interviewing the men?” he asked.

“For now.” She climbed into the truck, shut the door, then looked out at him through the open window.

Amazed by the crazy pull she had on him, he couldn’t stop himself from stepping closer to the truck door. “I’d like to thank you again, Deputy Lightfoot, for being so understanding about Santo. His wife died a few months ago and he’s been struggling to get back to normal. If not for that, I would fire him. As it is—”

“Forget it,” she cut in briskly. Then, turning her focus back inside the truck, she started the engine.

“I’d rather buy your dinner,” he said, unable to stop the rush of words from tumbling out of him. “Just to show my gratitude.”

That jerked her head around, and Tyler could see shock arching her black brows and widening her dark brown eyes.

“Sorry. It’s against department policy to accept gratuities,” she said stiffly.

“Okay. Is it against department policy for deputies to eat dinner?”

A grimace tightened her lips. “No. We do get to eat from time to time.”

“Then would it be a crime for someone to sit down at your table and eat at the same time you were eating?”

She stared at him. “No. But you paying for it would be.”

He grinned and was totally amazed at the spurt of excitement skittering along his veins.

“Well, Deputy Lightfoot, you know how things sometimes go at busy restaurants. Meal tickets get mixed up. One diner’s order might get added to someone else’s. It’s all just innocent confusion.”

He could see the corners of her mouth twitch, making it clear that she was trying her best not to smile. The idea pleased him far more than it should have.

“You know, Mr. Pickens, right now you’re proving to me that you’d make a perfect criminal.”

He chuckled. “Perfect, huh? I’ll take that as a compliment.”

She let out an exasperated breath; then, after a few moments of mulling over the idea, she said, “All right. It just so happens that tonight I’ll be having a meal at the Blue Mesa. If you just so happen to stop by about eight o’clock, I’ll be sitting there in a booth.”

“Eight o’clock!” he exclaimed. “That late?”

“I’m working a split shift today. Some of us don’t get to hang up our spurs after the sun goes down, Mr. Pickens.”

Casting her a suggestive smile, he said, “Sometimes I wear mine all night, Rosalinda.”

“Deputy Lightfoot to you, Mr. Pickens.”

Before he could make a reply to that, the window slid upward and he could do nothing more but watch as she reversed the truck away from the barn, then drove away.

The dust of her vehicle had barely dissipated with the wind when a voice sounded directly behind him.

“What the hell was that?”

Turning, Tyler saw that Gib had walked up behind him. Apparently, the cook had noticed something going on here at the ranch yard and had walked down to check things out for himself.

“That was the deputy leaving,” Tyler told him.

“I’m not talking about the deputy. I meant you laughing. What was that all about? I can’t see anything amusing about part of the ranch going up in smoke and the law snooping all over the place.”

It was about him flirting and actually getting a charge out of the whole exchange between himself and the sexy deputy, Tyler could have told him. But Gib didn’t need to know that; especially since it had been a momentary thing. He didn’t want the older man worrying that he was going to get himself involved in another painful position with a woman. Because that was the last thing Tyler would ever do again.

“Oh. I’m just feeling good, I guess.”

Frowning, Gib said, “You sure as hell weren’t feeling good when you left to go to town a while ago.”

“That was before I saw parts of the burn in daylight. Made me realize how lucky I was to only lose one hay meadow and no cows.”

Gib thoughtfully stroked a thumb and forefinger against his chin. “That’s so. But she—that deputy—was about to haul Santo off to jail. I thought you’d be upset with her.”

“No need for that. She came around to my way of thinking.”

Gib studied him for another moment and then, with a puzzled shake of his head, replied, “I’m going to the house.”

The cook had taken only a few strides in the direction of the sprawling hacienda when Tyler called out to him. “Don’t bother making supper for me tonight. I’ll be eating in Ruidoso.”

Halting in his tracks, Gib glanced over his shoulder. “You’ll be eating supper in Ruidoso, too? Why?”

“I’ve got a date. That’s why.”

Turning, Tyler walked to his truck to leave the flabbergasted cook staring after him.

Chapter Three

“Rosa, you look so pretty tonight!” Loretta, a longtime Blue Mesa waitress, stepped back from the booth and gave Rosalinda a full-length inspection. “I can’t ever remember seeing you in a skirt. Must be something special going on.”

Loretta’s remark brought a sting of heat to Rosalinda’s face. She’d donned the turquoise tank top and white tiered skirt because it was a warm summer evening. Not because there was anything special about tonight, other than the idea that Tyler Pickens might walk through the door and sit across from her.

Ever since she’d driven from the Pine Ridge Ranch this morning, she’d been asking herself exactly what she was doing. Cozying up to the enemy or simply wanting to be a woman again? No matter which way she answered, it would be wrong. Outside of an official interview, she had no business conversing in any form or fashion with Tyler Pickens. And why would she want to? He wasn’t the most charming or sociable guy she’d met in the past few years, though he was probably the sexiest. He was also a mystery. One that she wanted to unravel.

“Nothing special, Loretta. I do wear skirts and dresses, you just always happen to see me whenever I’m working.”

The young woman with a long red ponytail pulled out her order pad. “That’s for sure. You’re always working. Especially at this time of night.”

“I worked overtime last night investigating the fire out on the Chaparral Ranch. So I got off early this evening.”

Loretta tapped the end of her pencil against her chin. “Oh, yeah, I heard about the fire. Have you caught the person who set it?”

She gave the waitress a sidelong glance. “How did you know that someone set it? It could’ve been a wildfire.”

Loretta chuckled. “Rosa, you know how word gets around. Lawmen are in here for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Besides, if it had been a simple wildfire you wouldn’t have been working overtime.”

“You’re a smart girl,” Rosalinda said wryly. “What are you doing wasting away here in this restaurant?”

A furtive look came over the waitress’s face. “Waiting for a man to walk through that door and sweep me off my aching feet.”

She might as well keep waiting, Rosalinda could’ve told her. Gallant knights didn’t ride up to restaurants and save damsels in distress. A few years ago Rosalinda had worked as a waitress, too, at the Brown Bear Cantina, a dingy little diner down on the Mescalero Apache Reservation. During that time she’d fallen in love with a regular customer, but her feelings had all been one-sided. Johnny Chino had loved someone else and was now happily married to the woman. Thankfully, he’d never really guessed her flirting meant anything serious. Otherwise, it would be awkward working as his fellow deputy now.

“Good luck,” Rosalinda told her.

A customer at another table called out to Loretta and she said to Rosalinda, “I’d better go check on that table. I’ll get your coffee on the way back.”

The waitress swished away from the corner booth and because she was nervous, Rosalinda picked up the menu that Loretta had left behind. The Blue Mesa wasn’t a fancy place. But the simple, home-cooked food was so good that patrons ignored the scruffy seating and worn tile. The old establishment had been a focal point on Mechem Drive for more than five decades, and during all those years the city police and county law officers had used it as a gathering place.

Moments later, Loretta returned with her coffee and as Rosalinda stirred a huge dollop of half-and-half into the cup, she heard the bell over the front door jingle.

Glancing up, her heart immediately gave a hard jerk as she watched Tyler Pickens emerge from a small entryway at the front of the room. Except for replacing the cream-colored shirt with a pale blue one, he was wearing the same cowboy gear he’d worn this morning. And like it had this morning, the sight of him struck her hard.

He paused at the entryway long enough to allow his gaze to sweep the room. When it finally landed on her, he acknowledged the recognition by a faint incline of his head, then quickly made his way through the busy eating place until he reached the far back wall where she was sitting.

“Hello, Mr. Pickens,” she greeted him.

“What a surprise to find you here, Ms. Lightfoot.” The wry slant to his lips made the glint in his eye seem even more suggestive. “Quite a coincidence, isn’t it?”

Because she didn’t know whether to groan or laugh, she ended up doing neither. And since she was off duty at the moment, it hardly seemed appropriate to remind him once again that she was Deputy Lightfoot to him, not a Miss or Ms.

She said, “Ridiculous is more like it.”

He took a seat on the opposite side of the table and eased off his gray hat. As he placed the headgear next to him on the bench seat, her gaze traveled over his black hair. It was thick with a slight wave bending the ends. Her mother would say the man needed a haircut. The wayward strands curving around his ears and onto the back of his neck gave him a reckless, bad-boy look. Add that to the day-old growth of beard shadowing his jaws and chin and the image was downright lethal, she decided.

He looked across the table at her. “Why? Because you told me where you’d be? Or because I’m here?”

“Both.”

“You’re out of uniform,” he stated the obvious as his gaze swept over her. “I got the impression you’d be stopping by here on your work break.”