Lone Star Winter Read Free

“And if it’s the last thing I ever do, I’ll see him pay for it.”
    â€œI had…no idea,” she faltered. She winced at the look on his face. “I’m very sorry, Mr. Parks. I knew about the fire, but…” She averted her eyes to the dark landscape outside. “They told me that Walt only said two words before he died. He said, ‘Get Lopez.’ They will, you know,” she added harshly. “They’ll get him, no matter what it takes.”
    He glanced at her and smiled in spite of himself. “You’re not quite the retiring miss that you seem to be, are you, Mrs. Monroe?”
    â€œI’m pregnant,” she told him flatly. “It makes me ill-tempered.”
    He slowed to make a turn. “Did you want a child so soon after your marriage?” he asked, knowing as everyone locally did that she’d only married two months ago.
    â€œI love children,” she said, smiling self-consciously. “I guess it’s not the ‘in’ thing right now, but I’ve never had dreams of corporate leadership. I like the pace oflife here in Jacobsville. Everybody knows everybody. There’s precious little crime usually. I can trace my family back three generations here. My parents and my grandparents are buried in the town cemetery. I loved being a housewife, taking care of Walt and cooking and all the domestic things women aren’t supposed to enjoy anymore.” She glanced at him with a wicked little smile. “I was even a virgin when I married. When I rebel, I go the whole way!”
    He chuckled. It was the first time in years that he’d felt like laughing. “You renegade.”
    â€œIt runs in my family,” she laughed. “Where are you from?”
    He shifted uncomfortably. “Texas.”
    â€œBut you lived in Wyoming,” she pointed out.
    â€œBecause I thought it was the one place Lopez wouldn’t bother me. What a fool I was,” he added quietly. “If I’d come here in the first place, it might never have happened.”
    â€œOur police are good, but…”
    He glanced at her. “Don’t you know what I am? What I was?” he amended. “Eb Scott’s whole career was in the Houston papers just after he sent two of Lopez’s best men to prison for attempted murder. They mentioned that several of his old comrades live in Jacobsville now.”
    â€œI read the papers,” she confessed. “But they didn’t mention names, you know.”
    â€œDidn’t they?” He maneuvered a turn at a stop sign. “Eb must have called in a marker, then.”
    She turned slightly toward him. “What were you?”
    He didn’t even glance at her. “If the papers didn’t mention it, I won’t.”
    â€œWere you one of those old comrades?” she persisted.
    He hesitated, but only for a moment. She wasn’t a gossip. There was no good reason for not telling her. “Yes,” he said bluntly. “I was a mercenary. A professional soldier for hire to the highest bidder,” he added bitterly.
    â€œBut with principles, right?” she persisted. “I mean, you didn’t hire out to Lopez and help him run drugs.”
    â€œCertainly not!”
    â€œI didn’t think so.” She leaned back against her seat, weary. “It must take a lot of courage to do that sort of work. I suppose it takes a certain kind of man, as well. But why did you do it when you had a wife and child?”
    He hated that damned question. He hated the answer, too.
    â€œWell?”
    She wasn’t going to quit until he told her. His hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Because I refused to give it up, and she got pregnant deliberately to get even with me.” He didn’t stop to think about the odd way he’d worded that, but Lisa noticed and wondered at it. “I cur tailed my work, but I helped get the goods on Lopez be fore I