The Cowboy’s Hidden Agenda

“You okay?” Bronco said to Lauren as he eased away from her. When she nodded, he pulled himself to his feet and took off after Ron. Took him out with a flying tackle and a couple of the moves he’d learned in ranger school. Seconds later he was on his knees in a pool of blood, and Gil McCullough’s head was in his lap.

Gil was trying to speak to him. “Take it easy,” Bronco growled. “You’re gonna be okay. Just take it easy.”

“You…were like a son to me, Johnny.”

“I know,” Bronco whispered. “I know.” After a moment he put his hand over Gil McCullough’s eyes and gently closed them.

Lauren pulled herself slowly and painfully to a sitting position. She felt hollow. Cold. As if they belonged to someone else, she held up her scraped hands and stared at them, then gaped in surprise at the torn knees of her jeans. Her chin was throbbing-she touched it absently with a finger.

All around her people were running, shouting. People were reaching down to help her to her feet, asking questions. A short distance away she could see Bronco, crouched over Gil McCullough, who wasn’t moving. She called to him, shaking off the hands that were trying to help her. “Bronco-Johnny!”

Then at last he was there beside her, holding her by the arms, but not gently. His face was that of a stranger as he thrust her into the hands of a man in a dark suit with the words, “This is Rhett Brown’s daughter. Get her to him-now!”

With a startled exclamation, the man in the suit pulled a photograph out of his jacket pocket and stared at it, then at Lauren, then at the photo again. The next thing she knew she was surrounded by men in suits and she was being hurried along, hurried away from the scene faster even than she could walk. And no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t catch even one more glimpse of the man known as Johnny Bronco.

In a hotel room somewhere in Texas, Agent John Bracco was watching television. The evening news was on, with a recap of the convention that had just wrapped up in Dallas. The sound was turned low on the presidential candidate’s acceptance speech, and Bronco’s eyes were fixed on the people standing behind him on the podium. Rhett’s entire family were there, it looked like. His brother and sister and their spouses, his dark-haired wife, Dixie, and his two blond children-tall good-looking Ethan, tall beautiful Lauren, with a scrape on her chin.

He was staring at that scrape and his heart was knocking against his ribs when he heard a knocking at the door. The maid, he supposed, with the extra towels he’d asked for. Just to make sure, though, he looked through the peephole. He growled, “What the hell?” and yanked open the door. He caught a whiff of green apples as Lauren walked calmly past him and into the room.

He carefully closed the door. Then, for a minute or two he didn’t say anything. He was too busy fighting the joy that threatened to engulf him, and afraid his voice might squeak like a boy’s if he tried to speak. When he was sure he could do it calmly-but not looking at her, walking away from her, stalling for time-he said, “How did you find me?”

Her voice was soft and ironic, without a tremor. “I may not be the president’s daughter yet. But I am the daughter of the former attorney general. I have my resources.”

He gave his short dry huff of laughter. “I knew I shouldn’t have underestimated you.”

There was a moment of silence. When she spoke again it was in a whisper, and now her voice did tremble. “Why couldn’t you just have told me?”

He turned and looked at her then. Her eyes were brimming with tears and her chin was jutted out at a belligerent angle. The scrape on her chin made her expression seem unbearably poignant to him. He shrugged and said in a voice that was gravelly with guilt, “Ah, you know-thou shalt not blow thy cover.” Knowing it was a cop-out. Knowing it was nowhere near enough.

“I knew something about you wasn’t right.” She was suddenly fierce and angry. “I told you, remember? It just took me a while to figure out what it was.”

He’d always been more comfortable with her temper than her tears. Smiling, he said, “What gave me away?”

“You smelled good,” she said with a grudging sniff, and couldn’t resist smiling back-with triumph. “No booze.”

Bronco made a tsking sound with his tongue. “Never should have danced with you,” he murmured, reaching out a hand to touch her chin. And then his fingers just naturally curved on around her jaw to the back of her neck, under the wild-grass ripple of her hair.

“That’s my line,” she protested, resisting him. But only very briefly.

It was much later when she was finally able to pull herself away from him again. She didn’t want to-she’d come prepared to stay, unless, of course, he’d thrown her out the door. But she was back firmly rooted in reality now, and there were things she had to know.

“So what happens now?” she asked him, her heart trembling inside her. “Do you go back? Undercover?” And if you do, how will I ever live until you surface again?

He shook his head. His voice sounded dry as dust. “Can’t-not after my picture was splashed all over the evening news. Not with SOL, anyway.” He paused, then took a breath and said brusquely, “I’m sort of thinking about local law enforcement. Thought maybe it’s time I gave something back to my father’s people. My people.” He coughed. Made a small gesture with his hand, but didn’t touch her. “What about you? You ready to go back to being the good little girl?” His smile was crooked. “After all, you’re gonna be the president’s daughter.”

Her face hurt when she tried to smile. “I guess we’ll have to wait and see about that.” Then she shrugged and looked away. I won’t ask, she thought. I can’t ask. Some things were just impossible for a woman with an ounce of pride. “I don’t know,” she said dully. “Go back to being a lawyer, I guess. It’s what I know, what I’m good at.”

There was a long, long pause. Pulses pounded and hopes and fears sang in the air between them like the whine of locusts on a summer evening.

Then Bronco spoke softly, “Apaches need lawyers too.”

Lauren’s eyes snapped to his face, his fierce and beautiful warrior’s face. And in his glowing black eyes she saw it at last-the look of love and longing she’d hoped for, prayed for, risked so much for and come so far to find.

KATHLEEN CREIGHTON

has roots deep in the California soil, but has relocated to South Carolina. As a child, she enjoyed listening to old timers’ tales, and her fascination with the past only deepened as she grew older. Today, she says she is interested in everything-art, music, gardening, zoology, anthropology and history-but people are at the top of her list. She also has a lifelong passion for writing, and now combines her two loves in romance novels.

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