Angel Creek Read online

  LOOK FOR THESE HEART-POUNDING

  NOVELS OF ROMANTIC SUSPENSE

  FROM BESTSELUNG AUTHOR

  LINDA HOWARD

  She’s hunting for a mate—and there’s

  no more playing it safe.

  OPEN SEASON

  Handsome, rich, sexy, deadly. . . .

  MR. PERFECT

  . . . and don’t miss

  A LADY OF THE WEST

  ALL THE QUEEN’S MEN

  KILL AND TELL

  NOW YOU SEE HER

  SON OF THE MORNING

  SHADES OF TWILIGHT

  AFTER THE NIGHT

  DREAM MAN

  HEART OF FIRE

  THE TOUCH OF FIRE

  All available from Pocket Books

  “[ANGEL CREEK IS] FILLED WITH COMPELLING

  CHARACTERS, SENSUOUS ROMANCE, AND

  LOADS OF ACTION.”

  —AFFAIRE DE COEUR

  PRAISE FOR THE SENSATIONAL NOVELS OF

  NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR

  LINDA HOWARD

  KILL AND TELL

  “Linda Howard meshes hot sex, emotional impact, and gripping tension in this perfect example of what romantic suspense ought to be.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  OPEN SEASON

  “A perfect mystery for a late summer weekend. It’s part romance with a dollop of suspense.”

  —The Globe & Mail (Toronto)

  MR. PERFECT

  “A frolicsome mystery . . . Jaine Bright lives up to her name: she’s as bright—and explosive—as a firecracker.”

  —People

  ALL THE QUEEN’S MEN

  “A high-suspense romance. . . . Howard’s trademark darkly sensual style and intense, layered plot will delight her fans.”

  —Booklist

  NOW YOU SEE HER

  “Steamy romance morphs into murder mystery. . . .”

  —People

  “An eerie, passionate, and thrilling tale. . . .”

  —Romantic Times

  Books by Linda Howard

  A Lady of the West

  Angel Creek

  The Touch of Fire

  Heart of Fire

  Dream Man

  After the Night

  Shades of Twilight

  Son of the Morning

  Kill and Tell

  Now You See Her

  All the Queen’s Men

  Mr. Perfect

  Strangers in the Night

  Open Season

  Dream Man

  Published by Pocket Books

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  An Original Publication of POCKET BOOKS

  A Pocket Star Book published by

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 1991 by Linda Howington

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  ISBN 13: 978-0-671-01976-1

  eISBN 13: 978-1-4391-3943-1

  ISBN 10: 0-671-01976-7

  First Pocket Books printing November 1991

  20 19

  POCKET STAR BOOKS and colophon are registered

  trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Cover design by Jae Song

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  ANGEL

  CREEK

  1

  LUCAS COCHRAN HAD BEEN BACK IN TOWN FOR ALMOST a month, but it still amazed him how much the little town of Prosper had lived up to its name. It would never be anything more than a small town, but it was neat and bustling. A man could tell a lot about a place just by looking at the people on the streets, and by that standard Prosper was quiet, steady, and—well—prosperous. A boomtown might be more exciting than a town like Prosper, and people could make a lot of money in such places, but mining towns tended to die as soon as the ore played out.

  Prosper, on the other hand, had started out as a single building serving triple duty as general store, bar, and livery for the few settlers around. Lucas could remember when the site Prosper now occupied had been nothing but bare ground and the only white men for miles had been on the Double C. The gold rush in 1858 had changed all that, bringing thousands of men into the Colorado mountains in search of instant wealth; no gold had been found around Prosper, but a few people had seen the land and stayed, starting small ranches. More people had meant a larger demand for goods. The lone general store/bar/livery soon had another building standing beside it, and the tiny settlement that would one day become Prosper, Colorado, was born.

  Lucas had seen a lot of boom towns, not just in Colorado, and they were all very similar in their frenzied pace, as muddy streets swarmed with miners and those looking to separate the miners from their gold: gamblers, saloon owners, whores, and claim-jumpers. He was glad that Prosper hadn’t been blessed—or cursed, depending on your point of view—by either gold or silver. Being what it was, it would still be there when most of the boomtowns were nothing but weathered skeletons.

  It was a sturdy little town, a good place to raise a family, as evidenced by the three hundred and twenty-eight souls who lived there. All of the businesses were located on the long center street, around which nine streets of residences had arranged themselves. Most of the houses were small and simple, but some of the people, like banker Wilson Millican, had already possessed money before settling in Prosper. Their houses wouldn’t have looked out of place in Denver or even in the larger cities back East.

  Prosper had only one saloon and no whorehouses, though it was well known among the men in town (and the women, although the men didn’t know it) that the two saloon girls would take care of any extra itches they happened to have, for a price. There was a church on the north end of town, and a school for the youngsters. Prosper had a bank, two hotels, three restaurants (counting the two in the hotels), a general store, two livery stables, a dry goods store, a barber shop, a cobbler, a blacksmith, and even a hat shop for the ladies. The stage came through once a week.

  The entire town was there only because the Cochran family had carved the big Double C spread out of nothing, fighting the Comanche and Arapaho, paying for the land with Cochran blood. Lucas had been the first Cochran born there, and now he was the only one left; he had buried his two brothers and his mother back during the Indian wars, and his father had died the month before. Other ranchers had moved in, but the Cochrans had been the first, and had bought the security the town now enjoyed with Cochran lives. Everyone who had been in town for long knew that Prosper’s backbone wasn’t the long center street, but the line of graves in the family burial plot on the Double C.

  Lucas’s bootheels thudded on the sidewalk as he walked toward the general store. A cold wind had s
prung up that had the smell of snow on it, and he looked at the sky. Low gray clouds were building over the mountains, signaling yet another delay to spring. Warmer weather should arrive any day, but those low clouds said not quite yet. He passed a woman with her shawl pulled tight around her shoulders and tipped his hat to her. “Looks like more snow, Mrs. Padgett.”

  Beatrice Padgett gave him a friendly smile. “It does that, Mr. Cochran.”

  He entered the general store and nodded to Mr. Winches, the proprietor. Winches had done right well in the ten years Lucas had been gone, enough to hire himself a clerk who took care of most of the stocking. “Hosea,” Lucas said by way of greeting.

  “How do, Lucas? It’s turning a mite cold out there, ain’t it?”

  “It’ll snow by morning. The snowpacks can use it, but I’m ready for spring myself.”

  “Ain’t we all? You need anything in particular?”

  “Just some gun oil.”

  “Down the left, toward the back.”

  “Thanks.”

  Lucas went down the aisle Hosea had indicated, almost bumping into a farm woman who was fingering the harnesses. He muttered an absentminded apology and continued without more than a glance. Farming was hard on a woman, making her look old before her time. Besides, he had just spotted a familiar blond head over by the sacks of flour, and a sense of satisfaction filled him. Olivia Millican was just the type he would want when he got around to getting married: well-bred, with a pleasant disposition, and pretty enough for him to look forward to bedding her for the rest of his life. He had plans for the Double C, and the ruthless ambition to put those plans into effect.

  There were two other young women standing with Olivia, so he didn’t approach, just contented himself with a tip of his hat when her eyes strayed his way. To her credit she didn’t giggle, though the two with her did. Instead she gave him a grave nod of acknowledgment, and if the color in her cheeks heightened a bit, it just made her prettier.

  He paid for the gun oil and left, not getting the door shut good behind him before a muffled flurry of squeals and giggles broke out, though again Olivia didn’t contribute.

  “He danced with you twice!”

  “What did he say?”

  “I was so excited when he asked me, I almost fainted dead away!”

  “Does he dance well? I swear I had butterflies in my stomach just at the thought of having his arm around my waist! It’s just as well he didn’t ask me, because I’d have made a fool of myself, but at the same time I admit I was powerfully jealous of you, Olivia.”

  Dee Swann glanced at the knot of three young women, two of whom were taking turns gabbing without allowing Olivia a chance to answer. Olivia was blushing a little but nevertheless maintaining her composure. They stood off to the side in the general store and were making an effort to keep their voices down, but their excitement had caught Dee’s attention. It took only a moment of eavesdropping to discern that the gossip was, as usual, about some man, in this case Lucas Cochran. She continued to listen as she selected a new bridle. The stiff leather straps slipped through her fingers as she searched for the one that was most pliable.

  “He was very gentlemanly,” Olivia said in an even tone. The banker’s daughter was seldom ruffled. Dee looked up again with amusement sparkling in her eyes at Olivia’s unwavering good manners, and their gazes met across the aisles in silent communication. Olivia understood Dee’s mirth as plainly as if she had laughed aloud, just as she understood why Dee not only didn’t join them but preferred that Olivia not even acknowledge her presence beyond a polite nod. Dee jealously guarded her privacy, and Olivia respected her old friend enough not to try to include her in a discussion that wouldn’t interest her and might actually irritate her.

  Even as small as Prosper was, there was a definite social structure. Dee wouldn’t normally have been welcome in the circles in which Olivia moved, and she had long ago made certain her friend understood she didn’t want to be made an exception to the rule. Dee was totally disinterested in such socializing. Her penchant for privacy was so strong that though everyone knew they were acquainted, since they had attended the local school together, only the two of them knew how close their friendship really was. Dee never visited Olivia; it was always Olivia who rode out, alone, to Dee’s small cabin, but it was an arrangement that suited both of them. Not only was Dee’s privacy protected, but Olivia in turn felt a certain freedom, a sense of relief in knowing herself unobserved and unjudged at least for a few hours by anyone other than Dee, who was the least judgmental person Olivia had ever met. Only with Dee could she truly be herself. This wasn’t to say that she was in reality anything less than a lady, but merely that she enjoyed being able to say whatever she thought. In their shared glance was Olivia’s promise to ride out soon and tell Dee all that had happened since they had last seen each other, which had been over a month ago due to the late winter weather.

  Having made her selection, Dee took the bridle and her other purchases up to the counter where Hosea Winches waited. He painstakingly tallied her selections on the ledger page that bore her name at the top, then subtracted the total from the amount of credit remaining from the year before. There was only a small amount left, she saw, reading the figures upside down, but it would last her until her crops came in this summer.

  Mr. Winches turned the ledger around for her to double-check his arithemetic. While she ran a finger down his columns he eyed the group of young women still standing at the back of the store. Bursts of stifled laughter, high-pitched with excitement, made him snort. “Sounds like a fox got in the chicken house, what with all that squawking,” he mumbled.

  Dee nodded her satisfaction with his totals and turned the ledger back to its original position, then gathered up her purchases. “Thank you, Mr. Winches.”

  He shook his head absently. “Be thankful you’re more levelheaded than some,” he said. “You’d think they ain’t never seen a man before.”

  Dee looked back at the others, then at Mr. Winches again, and they both shrugged their shoulders. So what if Lucas Cochran was back in town after a ten-year absence? It didn’t mean anything to either of them.

  She had recognized Cochran when he had bumped her in the store aisle, of course, but she hadn’t spoken because recognizing someone wasn’t the same as knowing him, and she doubted that he had recognized her. After all, he had left Prosper shortly after her folks had settled in the area. She had been a fourteen-year-old schoolgirl, while he had been eight years older, a grown man. They had never even met. She knew his face, but she didn’t know the man or much about him.

  Dee made it a practice to mind her own business and expected others to do the same, but even so she had been aware of what was going on at the Double C. It was the biggest ranch in the area, so everyone paid some attention. Ellery Cochran, Lucas’s father, had died a few weeks before. Dee hadn’t known the man personally, only enough to put a name to his face whenever their paths crossed in town. She hadn’t thought anything unusual of his passing; death was common, and he’d died peacefully, which was about as much as a body could ask for.

  The matter was of only mild interest to her, on the level of hearing that a neighbor had a new baby. She had never had any dealings with Ellery, so she didn’t expect to have any with his son. She had already forgotten about the Cochrans by the time she stepped out into the icy wind. She tugged her father’s old coat more snugly around her and jammed his too-big hat down around her ears, ducking her head to keep the wind off her face as she walked hurriedly to the wagon and climbed up onto the plank seat.

  It began snowing late that afternoon, but the swirling of the silent white flakes was one of her favorite sights and filled her with contentment, rather than restlessness at yet another delay of spring. Dee loved the changing seasons, each with its own magic and beauty, and she lived close enough to the land to become immersed in the inexorable rhythm of nature. Her animals were snug in the barn, her chores finished for the day, and she was safe in the
cabin with a brisk fire snapping cheerfully, warming her on the outside, while a cup of coffee warmed her on the inside. She had nothing more pressing to do than sit with her feet stretched toward the fire and read one of the precious few books she had obtained over the winter. Winter was her time of rest; she was too busy during the other three seasons to have either the time or the energy for much reading.

  But the book soon dropped to her lap, and she leaned her head against the high back of the rocking chair, her eyes focused inward as she planned her garden. The corn had done so well last year that it might be a good thing to plant more of it. Corn was never a waste; what the townspeople didn’t buy, she could always use as feed for the horse. But extra corn would mean that she would have to cut back on some other vegetable, and she couldn’t decide if that would be wise. By careful planning and experimentation she knew to the square yard how much she could tend, and tend well, by herself. She didn’t intend to expand at the expense of the quality of her vegetables. Nor did she want to hire a young boy to help her. It was selfish of her, perhaps, but the greatest pleasure she got from her garden, other than the primitive satisfaction of making things grow, was her complete independence. She stood alone and reveled in it.

  At first it had frightened her when she had found herself, at the age of eighteen, totally alone in life. When Dee was sixteen, only a couple of years after they had settled in the narrow, fertile valley just outside Prosper, Colorado, her mother, a schoolteacher, had died, leaving her daughter a legacy of books, an appreciation of the benefits of hard work, and a level head. Barely two more years had passed before her father, George Swann, had managed to get himself kicked in the head by a mule, and he died in his bed the next day without regaining consciousness.

  The silence, the emptiness had haunted her. Her solitude, her vulnerability had frightened her. A woman alone was a woman without protection. Dee had dug her father’s grave herself and buried him, not wanting anyone to know she was all alone on the homestead. When she had to go into Prosper for supplies she turned aside friendly queries about her father, saying only that he couldn’t leave the ranch just then, and she comforted her conscience with the knowledge that she hadn’t lied, even if she hadn’t told the exact truth.