Covert Cowboy Read online

  Chapter Two

  With a frown Conrad Burke looked around the massive and rustic great room of the Royal Flush Ranch. It had been three months and two weeks since his encounter with Marilyn Langworthy, he reflected, although encounter came nowhere close to describing the conflagration that had consumed the two of them that night in her office. Three months and two weeks of burying himself in his work, of drinking too much, of falling asleep, drunk or sober, with the memory of her haunting his dreams.

  He’d promised himself he wouldn’t return to Colorado, but when his old friend Wiley Longbottom had come to him yesterday with a request to meet with a certain Colleen Wellesley here at her ranch, located a couple of hours outside Denver, even the fact that Wiley had refused to reveal what the meeting was about and who Wellesley was hadn’t given him pause. He’d caught a red-eye flight out of Louis Armstrong Airport, touched down in Denver, and the first damn thing he’d done after renting a vehicle had been to head for the city’s lively and upscale LoDo district. He’d parked near the corner of Blake Street and 33rd, within sight of the converted-to-lofts warehouse where he knew Marilyn lived, and had sat behind the wheel of his car all afternoon hoping to catch a glimpse of her. Only when the early November dusk had begun to fall had he left the city, taking I-285 until it hooked up with Highway 9 near Fairplay, just north of the Royal Flush.

  Although apparently the house itself had been a bordello in the wild old days, to his mild surprise he’d realized when he’d arrived that the Flush was definitely a working ranch. He was willing to accept that as an excuse for the Wellesley woman’s absence so far, Con told himself, walking over to the antique portrait hanging above the gilded mirror running the length of the heavily varnished and well-stocked pine bar.

  He gazed without interest at the rest of the decor, an obvious holdover from those same wild days when this room’s red velvet furnishings and saloon fittings had probably been the last word in decadent luxury for woman-hungry cowboys. Ranch duties or not, if Wiley hadn’t been there, he would have driven back to the airport, Con thought with growing impatience. And this time he wouldn’t have indulged in a foolish and futile side-trip to Marilyn Langworthy’s neighborhood.

  It had ended as he’d known it would. After the third time they’d made love she’d fallen asleep in his arms on the sofa, the cashmere throw they’d been lying on pulled lightly over her hips, her head tucked into the hollow of his neck. He hadn’t slept himself, but had spent the few hours before dawn just drinking in the sight of her and breathing in her scent.

  During those hours he’d hoped against hope he was wrong. As soon as she’d opened her eyes, hope had died.

  Of course she regretted it. What she did with you went against everything she ever thought she was. The only way she could live with herself when she realized she’d made love with a stranger—made love with a stranger and liked it, for God’s sake—would have been to wall herself up again behind the ice that’s protected her all her life. Even before she told you to get out you knew that. Even before she started crying you knew.

  So it had ended with her hating herself and hating him, he thought. And if he had it all to do over again, for the life of him he didn’t see how he could have acted differently.

  She’d needed someone to love her for a few hours. What she would never realize was that with him she hadn’t had to ask.

  “Ray called through to the horse barn and didn’t get an answer.” Balancing a thick china plate heaped high with a Dagwood-size sandwich and a huge dill pickle, Wiley Longbottom walked into the room. He made a beeline for the bar and set his precarious burden onto its scarred surface. “Melody insisted on fixing me a little snack, as she calls it. Not that I need it,” he said, giving his stomach a rueful pat.

  “The Castillos are the ranch’s housekeeper and caretaker,” he went on. His next words were spoken around a mouthful of roast beef. “Ray said he’d try the foreman’s quarters, find out if Dex knows where the devil Colleen’s disappeared to.”

  “So while we’re waiting for her to grace us with her presence why don’t you fill me in on a couple of details?” Con suggested, shooting his old friend a sharp look. “Like what the hell am I doing here in the first place? You know I don’t like the cold, Wiley, so you must have had one hell of a good reason for dragging me away from New Awlins and into the snow belt at this time of year. You’ve got mustard on your tie,” he added in irritation.

  “That might be from lunch. I never was the dandy you are, with your boutonnieres and those extravagant vests.” The older man nodded with a grin at the yellow flower in Con’s lapel. Under bushy brows his gaze remained hooded. “As for my reasons for dragging you away, yeah, I’d say they’re justified, but I think it’s best if Colleen’s in on this discussion.”

  “Aren’t you playing your cards a little closer than you need to?” Con kept his voice even with an effort. “Dammit, Wiley, this is me. We go back a long way, to before you were appointed director of public safety and when I was just starting out in the Marshall Service. At least give me some background on the mysterious Colleen Wellesley I’m about to meet.”

  “I haven’t given her much on you,” the older man informed him with a sidelong glance. “All she knows is that in the past when I’ve run into a particularly thorny problem I’ve consulted with my ‘conscience’ to come up with a solution. She’s not aware said conscience is a reformed cardsharp who cooks up the best crawfish étouffée in the French Quarter, bar none.”

  Con grinned reluctantly. “I appreciate the cover even if it isn’t one I’d have chosen myself. And even though you’ve obviously decided it’s time to blow it,” he added, more soberly. “She can be trusted, Wiley?”

  “With your real identity, and a whole lot more.” His friend nodded and took another bite of his sandwich. “Wellesley started out as a cop on the Denver force and made detective in record time. She was a damn good one, too, until a bribery scandal derailed her career ten years ago.”

  “Nice knowin’ you, Longbottom.” Con pulled the gold watch that had been a legacy from his great-uncle Eustache out of his pocket. “If I break the speed limit all the way back to Denver I should be able to catch a flight home tonight.” His lips tightened. “You know how I feel about dirty cops, Wiley.”

  “The same way Colleen feels about them,” the other man replied testily. “She was the whistle-blower, Burke. Except she wasn’t believed, since the son of a bitch she blew the whistle on was a superior officer and the rot went a lot higher than even she’d suspected. She handed in her badge when she realized the corruption was just going to be covered up.”

  Slowly Con slipped the watch back into his waistcoat pocket. “That took guts, f’sure,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “So she bought this place and took up ranching?”

  “The Royal Flush was left to her when her father died,” Wiley corrected him. “She’s got a brother, Michael, but he’s just come back from time in the special forces and hasn’t been involved with the ranch. Colleen herself delegates most of the day-to-day responsibilities to Dexter Jones, her foreman. Until recently she’s concentrated her energies on running an operation in Denver called ICU, which is short for Investigations, Confidential & Undercover.”

  “You taught me a long time ago always to listen for what the other fellow was leaving out,” Con observed. “If she’s been operating a private investigation firm until recently, that means she’s currently doing something else, am I right?”

  “She works for us now,” Wiley said flatly. He popped the last bite of dill pickle into his mouth. “The Royal Flush is the headquarters of Colorado Confidential, and Colleen heads the operation. ICU is still operating, but it’s also a front for Confidential activity.”

  Con gave a low whistle. “F’true, Cap? So those cryptic e-mails you’ve been sending me asking my advice in a case one of the Confidential organizations was working on—they’ve been about Wellesley’s outfit? I knew about the setups in Chicago and Texas, but th
is is the first I’ve heard that Confidential had moved into Colorado.”

  “Don’t forget Montana,” the other man reminded him. “Yeah, it’s for true, Captain.” He grinned as he played back Con’s slang to him. “You know, Burke, you’re living proof that you can take the boy out of New Orleans but you can’t take the New Orleans out of the boy.”

  “And you’ll only get this boy outta dat sweet Crescent City under protest,” Con told him with an answering smile. “All kidding aside, Wiley, what’s any of this got to do with—”

  He stopped as if he’d been shot. Then he shook his head decisively. “It ain’t in the cards, old pal. Check with the Marshalls and see what my boss writes in his reports about me. ‘Does not play well with others,’ that’s what. No way am I interested in joining Wellesley’s merry band of undercover cowpokes, not even if our tardy hostess gets down on her knees and begs me to—”

  “I’m tardy because I’ve been in the birthing shed with Dex, saving the lives of a mare and a foal who decided to come out feetfirst.”

  The crisp explanation came from the slim, fortyish brunette entering the room. Walking past them to the business side of the bar, she pulled a bottle of scotch from the array in front of the antique mirror and produced a cut-glass tumbler from under the counter. Pouring a hefty shot of the amber liquor, she set the bottle down and favored Con with a piercing look.

  “As for the getting on my knees and begging part, I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you. The members of my merry band—” her gaze frosted over even further as she quoted him “—are all solid team players. By your own admission it’s obvious you wouldn’t fit in. Can I get you men a drink?”

  She raised the tumbler to her lips. Con studied her through narrowed eyes as she took a healthy swallow of her scotch.

  Beneath the ranch-woman exterior of jeans and chambray shirt, Colleen Wellesley was still all cop. It showed in the spit-and-polish neatness of her attire, the no-nonsense short cut of her hair—her damp hair, he noted, realizing that she’d taken time to clean up before she’d joined them.

  But a change of clothes and a few minutes under a hot shower hadn’t been enough to obliterate all evidence of what she was trying to conceal, he thought. Her lips were still slightly swollen. Although her gaze had been sharp when she’d directed it at him, as she set her glass down on the bar he caught an unguarded flash of warmth in her eyes.

  Colleen Wellesley probably had been helping her foreman deliver a foal, Con decided. But their maternity ward duties had been completed a little earlier than she was admitting.

  “Bourbon, if you’ve got it.” From his waistcoat pocket he extracted a silver dollar, its surface smooth from long handling. Idly he passed it under his index finger and over his middle one, then let it slip under his ring finger. The worn silver gleamed and disappeared as he lazily passed it back and forth in his hand. “He must be quite a man, cher’.”

  Her head jerked up and a drop or two of the bourbon she was pouring splashed onto the bar. “I’m sorry?”

  Con ignored the warning in her tone. “Your foreman,” he elaborated. He picked up his bourbon and looked blandly at her over the rim of his glass. “He must be good at what he does to have saved your mare’s life and delivered her foal safely. Breech births can be tricky, or so I hear.”

  Dark eyes held his a moment longer. “Very tricky,” Colleen said finally. “And I don’t like tricky, Mr. Burke. I presume you’re Wiley’s fabled ‘conscience’?”

  “Conrad Burke, Colleen Wellesley.” Wiley had been watching them during their exchange. “Why don’t the two of you start all over again, and this time let’s keep it civil. There’s a child’s life at stake here, people.”

  “I hadn’t forgotten that, Longbottom,” Colleen snapped, but before she could continue Con broke in.

  “A child’s life?” he demanded sharply. “Like when you’ve asked my advice about cases in the past, Wiley, your e-mails on this one just dealt with details. You never gave me the whole picture. What child?”

  “Schyler Langworthy.” Wellesley barely glanced at him. “He’s the six-month-old son of Holly Langworthy, and in this state the name Langworthy carries a lot of weight. By election day I guess we’ll see just how much weight, since Holly’s brother’s running for governor against the incumbent, Todd Houghton.” She exhaled tightly. “Sky was kidnapped almost four months ago. Colorado Confidential took on the case a few weeks later, when the police and the feds ran out of leads.”

  She drained her scotch. “But that’s not your problem, Burke. You and I agree you’re not team material, so don’t worry about it.”

  Take the pain away…

  He’d known the Langworthy baby was still missing, and his private opinion had been that Sky had been snatched by someone desperate for a child of their own. There’d never been a ransom demand. So for three months he’d tried to shut out the memory of the agony in Marilyn’s voice when she’d spoken of her kidnapped nephew, since unless and until the U.S. Marshalls were called in on the matter his hands were tied.

  That was still the case, Con thought heavily. As the oldest federal law enforcement agency in America, the mandate of the Marshalls was primarily centered on federal fugitives, money-laundering prosecutions and the witness protection program. They cooperated with other levels of law enforcement, but only when specifically requested to.

  He frowned. Knowing all that, why had Wiley sent for him?

  “It’s got everything to do with you, Con.”

  Wiley had shaken his head at Colleen’s earlier offer of a drink. Now he hesitated, and pulled the bottle of scotch toward him.

  “My ulcers are going to play me hell for this,” he muttered as he poured himself a shot and swallowed it neat. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “But then, my ulcers have been giving me hell lately anyway. Ever since Helio DeMarco’s name cropped up in this investigation,” he added, his suddenly grim gaze fixing on Con.

  “Helio DeMarco?”

  Con felt as if the blood in his veins had suddenly turned to ice. He heard something strike the floor, and looking down, he saw the silver dollar had slipped through his fingers. With a swift movement he bent to pick it up, grateful for the chance to avert his face.

  “You know of him?” Colleen’s tone was still barbed. His own was flat as he answered her.

  “You could say that. A year ago in New Orleans a protected witness in a case the Marshalls were building against DeMarco on money-laundering charges was killed by him. Then DeMarco contacted Roland Charpentier, one of our agents, and said he wanted to cut a deal.”

  “But instead the Marshalls obviously let him get away, since he’s surfaced here in Colorado,” the ex-cop said disgustedly. “Was Charpentier on the take?”

  “Colleen—” Wiley began warningly, but Con didn’t let him finish.

  “No, cher’, Roland wasn’t on the take,” he drawled. He met her eyes. “I’d have known if he was. Charpentier’s my best friend—in fact, I visited him earlier today, just before I caught my flight to Denver.”

  Her gaze wavered. “I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions,” she muttered. “So how did the Marshalls lose Helio, or Lio, as he now calls himself?”

  Instead of answering her question, Con asked one of his own. “Everyone’s heard about the Mardi Gras celebrations in New Orleans, but do you know what our other big day is, cher’?”

  Annoyance reappeared on her features. “The name’s Wellesley, Burke. And no, I don’t know. I also don’t care.”

  “You should,” he informed her. “Because there’s a kind of poetic justice involved you might appreciate. Our other big observance is November the first. Today,” he added softly. “The Day of the Dead, when we visit the graves of our loved ones and remember how much they meant to us.”

  He glanced down at the yellow flower in his lapel. “The custom is to lay chrysanthemums by the headstone and have a little chat with the deceased.” He shrugged. “Some families even bring a p
icnic lunch, make a day of it. I didn’t have time to do that so I just laid my flowers down and made the same vow I always do.”

  “Charpentier’s dead, isn’t he?” Belated comprehension filled Colleen’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Burke, I didn’t know. What’s the vow you make?”

  “That I’m going to take down the bastard who killed him. That I’m going to take down Helio DeMarco.”

  Con flipped the silver dollar into the air. It flashed upward and then tumbled down again, throwing off glints of light before he one-handedly caught it. Slapping his palm and the coin in it flat against the pine bar, he looked at her.

  “Call it,” he said tonelessly.

  She raised an eyebrow. “Heads.”

  He lifted his hand. “Tails. I’ll work with Colorado Confidential, cher’, but on my own terms. No boss, no partners, no rules.”

  “No deal,” Colleen riposted. She turned to Wiley. “For God’s sake, Longbottom, this is the maverick you’re considering to head the New Or—”

  “I think you should take him up on his offer.” Con heard a hint of steel in the DPS director’s normally mild tones. “If Burke says he’ll deliver Helio to Colorado Confidential he will. Right now that’s all that matters—especially since this whole thing could blow up in our faces if it’s not taken care of quickly.”

  “How’s that?” Con frowned at his friend, but Colleen answered him before Wiley could speak.

  “We think one of the Langworthys has gone over to the other side,” she said coldly. “There was always a possibility Sky’s kidnappers had help from a member of the family, and with what we’ve found out about Helio’s involvement, that now seems to be a certainty. A former intern of a certain Senator Franklin Gettys, Nicola Carson, came close to being killed by a DeMarco hit man when she discovered a link between the senator, the mobster and a mysterious chemical mist that was being tested on sheep at Gettys’s ranch, the Half Spur. Fibers found in Sky’s crib after his abduction came from the type of sheep on the Half Spur. And Gettys’s ex-wife, Helen Kouros, gave us information she copied on a disk from the Half Spur’s computer that backs up our belief that some kind of bio-weapons research is being done there.”