Why did he not see it?
*
Jayce
Watching the twowomen laughing and chatting gave Jayce cold chills.
In hindsight, Tilly might not have been the best choice to use as a buffer.He hadn’t expected them to like each other.They were so very different.The quick looks they darted at him made his ears burn and his heart palpitate.Women talked.What if Malika told Tilly he’d kissed her?
He was considering the potential ramifications of their blossoming alliance when he spotted Adam walking alongside the creek, headed toward him.
Adam was just the man Jayce wanted to see.He was eager to share his opinion on the placement of the bear fences he’d offered to help erect but hadn’t been consulted about.The tingling in his fingers had stopped but his toes were taking longer to recover.His arm muscles still ached from the spasms.
Adam climbed the short gravel slope and cut through the grass to where Jayce was sitting.His knees popped as he dropped his scrawny butt on the ground and lifted the corner of the cloth covering the picnic basket to check out the contents.
His eyes lit up.“Grady’s chocolate cake.Guess maybe I’ll join you for lunch.”
“If you want some of that cake, you’ve got to work for it,” Jayce said, still annoyed about the fence.“Why not help the ladies pick berries?There’s plenty on the far side of the bushes.You should start there.”
Adam broke off a blade of grass and smoothed it straight with his fingers.“Probably not a good idea to go crawling around in any berry bushes this summer.Benny told me to hide the fences as best I could, and that’s the best I could do.”
“That information would have proved helpful earlier.What if I’d had a weak heart?”
“You’re young.It’s not the first time you’ve grabbed hold of an electric fence.”
Of course not.Any ranch kid over the age of five had laid pennies on an electric fence to see what would happen.The adventurous ones held hands to see how many kids the current could run through.Short answer—a lot.
But ranch kids got smarter around ten or twelve.They didn’t grab and hang on to an electric fence the way he just had.He’d thought he was tugging on a piece of fishing line that someone had tossed and forgotten, and he was trying to pull it out of the bushes to dispose of it properly.
“Cow fences are about half the voltage of bear fences,” Jayce said.
Adam changed the subject.“I was talking to Mavis.She told me about our guest’s career ambitions.”
The bear fence wasn’t nearly as jarring as Malika and her desire to school men in the art of attracting women.
Adam would be with him on this.
“I don’t know what’s the matter with women these days,” Jayce complained.“Why do they want to play prostitutes and women with ruined reputations?What’s wrong with being a schoolteacher?Or a shopkeeper?”
“Soiled doves were savvy businesswomen.They knew their market, and they made money off men.A number of those ladies invested in other businesses, too, and became rich in their own right, so I can see the appeal.”Adam’s thoughtful gaze bored into him.“But I was referring to pie-making.That’s what the berries are for, aren’t they?Pie-making seems respectable enough.What are you talking about?”
Back away.Slowly.
“Just thinking out loud,” he said.
Silence clicked for a few erratic heartbeats.
“I’ve got something else for you to think about,” Adam said, letting it drop.“The client coming at the end of August wants to rob a bank.He’ll lead a gang of outlaws, and one of them is going to betray him.Mavis says you get to be the outlaw with the heart of gold who turns do-gooder, then has a shootout with our guest during the getaway outside the bank.Grady’s already started a draft of the script.”
Immediately, Jayce was suspicious.Guests usually liked to play the do-gooder.
“Which one of us dies?”
Adam patted his shoulder.“Sorry, do-gooder.You aren’t going to pull through.”
Didn’t that figure.
“We’re going to need nitroglycerin,” Adam said thoughtfully.“But back to the soiled doves… you’re in charge of the sheik’s little sister because he trusts you around her, but I’ve seen the way she looks at you, and she’s up to no good.Do you honestly believe that Tilly’s going to be a steadying influence on her?”
