Only 05 - Autumn Lover

breath. “One way or another, if it’s the last thing I do on this blessed earth.”
    A pink flush appeared on Elyssa’s cheeks. She suspected that Hunter wasn’t talking about cattle at all.
    “If anything changes,” she said in a remote voice, “please advise me at once.”
    “You’ll be the first to know. I guarantee it.”
    That was one promise Hunter was looking forward to keeping.
    But first he had to figure out a way to get Elyssa alone. He had to do it quickly, for his time on the Ladder S was running out. If Ab’s raiders didn’t attack soon, Hunter would have to go after them.
    Then he and Case would go back to the Spanish Bottoms. The sooner they got there, the sooner the last of the Culpeppers who had raided in Texas would be brought to justice.
     
    Standing just beneath the ridge overlooking Wind Gap, Hunter merged into the piñons and waited. All around him the night seethed with wind and the promise of rain.
    A lark’s call sifted between the piñon boughs. Hunter returned the call as softly as it had come to him.
    Case appeared in front of his brother.
    “You keep riding your men so hard, you’re going to lose them,” Case said quietly.
    “What does that mean?”
    “Even Morgan is tiptoeing around you, and God knows he is a tough son.”
    “How do you know what’s going on at the Ladder S?” Hunter retorted.
    “Same way I know what it’s like in the Culpepper camp,” Case said sardonically.
    “I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
    “Yeah. Her name is Sassy. What went wrong with you and that little gal of yours?”
    “She’s not mine,” Hunter said curtly.
    “The hell she isn’t. She’s yours whether you’ve ever had her or not.”
    Even in the uncertain moonlight, Case saw the change in Hunter’s expression.
    “So that’s the way of it,” Case said quietly. “Is she pregnant?”
    “It’s none of your damned business,” Hunter snarled.
    “The last time you said that to me, I was telling you what a common piece of trash Belinda was.”
    The frustration and anger in Hunter leaped without warning. He went after Case in an undisciplined rush. There was a short, sharp skirmish, but the advantage was all Case’s. He was in control of himself.
    Hunter wasn’t.
    Rather quickly Hunter found himself facedown on the ground, breathing hard, trying to buck Case off his back.
    “Give it up,” Case said, increasing the pressure on Hunter’s neck and arm. “You’re the one who taught me this hold. You can’t break it without breaking your own stubborn neck.”
    Hunter kept struggling.
    “Damn it!” Case said. “Stop acting like a green kid. You weren’t the first man Belinda fooled, or the last.”
    Abruptly, self-control returned to Hunter.
    “Let me up,” Hunter said through his teeth.
    “Not just yet,” Case said calmly. “First I want to know if I’m going to be an uncle any time soon.”
    Tension snaked through Hunter’s body again, but he made no effort to throw off Case.
    “I don’t know,” Hunter said.
    “Ask Sassy.”
    “I did.”
    “And?”
    “She told me to go to hell.”
    Case muttered an indistinct word. An instant later he released Hunter. Simultaneously Case stood up in a lithe rush.
    Warily he watched Hunter come to his feet. When Hunter showed no inclination to jump him again, Case let out a long breath.
    “Sorry,” Case said quietly. “I thought you were just being pigheaded about Sassy, the way you were when you wanted Belinda.”
    “And you told me she was a shallow little flirt.”
    “She was.”
    “I know. Now.” Hunter’s voice was both weary and bitter. “What a goddam shame it cost the lives of two fine children for me to find out what I had married.”
    “Their dying wasn’t your fault.”
    “That’s what I tell myself fifty times a day.”
    “Do you believe it?”
    “No.” Hunter hesitated, then said simply, “Thinking of them scared and hurting and crying for their daddy…It eats me alive.”
    “So you’re going to spend the rest of your life punishing yourself, is that it?”
    Hunter shrugged.
    “You think that will make it right?” Case asked.
    “I don’t know what I think. All I know is…” Hunter’s voice died.
    “I’ll tell you what I know,” Case said. “You come to a point like a bird dog whenever Sassy is in sight.”
    A hissing curse was Hunter’s only answer.
    “Why don’t you marry her?” Case asked calmly. “The world needs more decent people. The two of you would have good