Wyoming Tough

Chapter ELEVEN




“YOU CAN’T BELIEVE THEM!” Gelly exclaimed, almost hysterically. “She’s rich, so she can accuse me of things and I can’t defend myself!”

He glanced at Gelly in the seat of the corporate jet beside him. “Weren’t you just on the other end of that argument?”

She glowered at him. “She stole the egg. I know she did. You saw it in her bag!”

“I did, didn’t I?” He was still kicking himself mentally for believing Morie guilty in the first place.

“I did not plant it there. I swear!”

“They’ve hired a private detective. So have my brothers. The same detective—how’s that for a coincidence?” he murmured.

She shifted in her seat. This was getting too close for comfort. She couldn’t endure a thorough background check. “I’ll sue for invasion of privacy!”

“Gelly, the detective is investigating the theft of a priceless jeweled egg,” he reminded her. “How does that involve your privacy?”

She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry.” She forced a smile. “I wasn’t thinking clearly. I’m very upset. Her father is obnoxious!”

“He loves her. He’s very protective. I’d be that way about my own kids.”

She snuggled up to him. “Wouldn’t you like to have a family? I would. We could get married right away.”

“We could. But we aren’t going to.”

“But you like me, don’t you?”

He looked down into eyes like cash registers, as cold as ice, and realized that he’d never seen Gelly as she really was until now. It had taken a near tragedy to open his eyes to her real nature.

“You really want to be rich, don’t you?”

She gaped at him. “Who doesn’t?”

“There are things more important than money.”

She laughed coldly. “Of course there are, if you’ve got it.”

“I want to hear more about that friend of yours, Cardman,” he said suddenly.

She looked around restlessly. “He’s just someone I know. He’s down on his luck.”

“Would it be because of the lawsuits?”

She cleared her throat. “I think I’ll try to have a little nap,” she said with a practiced smile. “I’ve had a very upsetting evening. You don’t mind?”

“I don’t mind.”

She curled up in her seat and pillowed her head on her arm. Mallory got up and went to sit in the front seat, where he had access to a laptop. He opened it and started doing some digging of his own.



WHEN HE GOT HOME, his brothers were both in the living room, having coffee and watching the news before bedtime.

They stared at him curiously. “You’re back early,” Tank said. “I thought the plan was to fly back in tomorrow.”

“There was an unexpected surprise.”

They both raised eyebrows.

Mallory stuck both hands in the pockets of his dress slacks and glared at them. “Kingston Brannt has a daughter.”

“Oh?” Cane mused with a wicked smile.

“Does he, now?” Tank added. “And you noticed her?”

“It was hard not to,” Mallory snapped. “She worked for us for several weeks.”

There were shocked faces all around.

“Morie?” Cane asked. “She’s the daughter of that Brannt?”

“Told you the name wasn’t a coincidence, didn’t I?” Tank mused. “She had quality and breeding.”

“What the hell was she doing working for wages?” Cane wanted to know.

“She got tired of men wanting to marry her for her money,” Mallory said tersely.

“I can understand that,” Tank agreed.

“So she found a man who was loaded and now she’s engaged to him,” Mallory continued in a dull tone. “He’s a pretty boy. His father’s in the Fortune 500. No gold digging there. And her father likes him.”

It was the emphasis on the last word that caught their attention.

“King doesn’t like you, I’m assuming,” Cane mused.

“Fat chance. I accused his daughter of theft and fired her,” Mallory said heavily. He took off his jacket, loosened his tie and dropped down into his recliner. “I must have been blind, to think she’d steal from us.”

“You had Gelly helping you think it,” Cane said sourly.

“Gelly was half-hysterical when we left,” Mallory confided. “Morie’s father hired a private detective.” He glanced at Cane. “The same one you hired, Dane Lassiter. When he mentioned that, Gelly almost fainted. And there’s something else. That friend of hers, Cardman, who wanted to buy our scrubland, he’s in the oil business. He does the fracturing process with injection wells to extract oil. He’s being sued in several states for sloppy work that resulted in groundwater contamination.”

“I seem to recall that you were in favor of selling him that land,” Tank commented to Mallory.

“Go ahead, rub it in. I’ve been a complete idiot,” Mallory grumbled. “No need to feel shy about commenting.”

“Anybody can be fooled by a woman,” Cane said sourly.

“Except me,” Tank said with a grin.

Nobody said anything. It wasn’t true. He used to have a fail-safe radar when it came to women. In fact, he’d been the first to suspect that Gelly wasn’t what she seemed to be. But his own track record was blemished since his last failed romance.

“What about Morie?” Cane asked.

“What about her?” Mallory returned belligerently.

“Don’t try to fool us…we’re your family,” Tank replied. “It was obvious that you felt something for her, even if you were fighting it tooth and nail.”

Mallory’s dark eyes grew narrow. “Maybe I did. But I’m not marrying into any family that belongs to King Brannt!”

“Ooooh,” Tank murmured drily. “Venomous.”

“Absolutely,” Cane agreed.

“He’s bullheaded, uncompromising, acid-tongued, confrontational, bad-tempered and he has the parlor manners of a rabid moose!”

“So you liked him, then,” Cane replied, nodding and smiling.

“I’ve never seen a rabid moose,” Tank commented.

“I’ll fly you to Texas. You can see for yourself,” Mallory muttered.

“To give the man credit, it would be offensive to have his only daughter charged with theft. And from what I’ve heard, nobody has a temper the equal of King Brannt’s.”

“I gather that you didn’t get to meet Cort at the party?” Cane mused.

Mallory frowned. “Who’s Cort?”

“Her older brother. If you think King’s got a temper, you ain’t seen nothing yet,” Cane drawled. “A cattleman made a nasty remark about his conservation practices that he didn’t like and he put the man through an antique screen in a restaurant. Police came, arrests were made. Cort just laughed. The cattleman was selling supposedly purebred cattle with bloodlines that were, shall we say, not of the purest. Cort exposed him at the hearing. The charges were dropped, very quickly, and the cattleman did a disappearing act. I hear they’re still looking for him.”

“Any cattleman worth his salt can spot a good bull by conformation alone,” Tank scoffed.

“Yes, well, the cattleman was selling his stock to a newcomer from back east who’d just bought a ranch and was buying bulls for his new herd,” he replied. “He was furious when he found out what he’d lost.”

“God help us,” Tank exclaimed. “So the perp skipped and left his pigeon holding the bag. Tragic.”

“Perp? You still talk like a lawman,” Cane remarked.

Tank shrugged. It was painful to remember how he’d been shot up during the border incident. But it was getting easier to live with.

“Sorry,” Cane said gently. “I wasn’t trying to bring back bad memories. I forget sometimes.”

Tank smiled. “Me, too. No problem.”

Mallory was listening, but not commenting. He was seeing Morie in her beautiful gown, her black hair upswept, her creamy shoulders on view. He was seeing that handsome yahoo holding her waist and feeling the anger rise in him at the sight. She’d been his, if he’d wanted her. He’d kissed her, held her, touched her. She was innocent. Was she still? Or had she gone rushing into that playboy’s bed, full of grief and anguish at Mallory’s rejection and distrust?

“Damned pretty boy,” Mallory muttered to himself.

“Excuse me?” Cane replied.

“Morie’s fiancé,” he said coldly.

“I’m sure that she only likes him because he’s handsome,” Tank said with a wry glance at his brother.

“You can talk,” Mallory said irritably. “Both of you got the looks in the family. I favor our grandfather, God help me. He looked like his face caught fire and somebody put it out with an ax.”

They both practically rolled on the floor laughing.

“Well, we’re still stuck with lawsuits drifting in,” Mallory said heavily. “Brannt’s going to sue us for defamation of character.”

“He won’t,” Cane replied easily. “Morie won’t let him. She’s got a heart.”

“A big one,” Tank agreed. “She’s as innocent as Joe Bascomb.”

Cane was silent. Mallory stared at him pointedly. “You’re loyal to your friends. It’s one of your finest traits. But Joe beat his father’s mule senseless and almost killed it. Have you forgotten that?”

“Joe said it was his dad,” Tank replied tautly.

“There were witnesses, Tank,” Mallory said gently. “His mother was taken to the emergency room around the same time with a fractured arm. The talk was that she tried to stop Joe from beating the mule and he hit her with the tire iron.”

“She said she fell,” Tank replied doggedly.

“You don’t want to hear these things, but you already know that Joe got out of the army on a mental,” Cane reminded him. “He attacked two men in his barracks for making fun of him because he couldn’t spell. Put one of them in the hospital.”

“That might all be true, but he could still be innocent of deliberately causing the death of the man who was beating Laura Teasley.”

“I know,” Cane said. “But there’s a pattern of violent behavior going back a long way. It came out at the trial. Besides that, Laura testified that Joe already had a grudge against the victim for a blacksmithing job he did and wasn’t paid for.”

“We were talking about the Brannts,” Tank said, changing the subject abruptly. “And we still have the problem of who took that egg.”

“The only people who had access to this room were Mavie—and we know she didn’t do it—and us. And Gelly,” Cane added quietly.

“That’s not quite true, is it, Tank?” Mallory asked suddenly, and with a pointed stare.

Tank glared at him. “Joe was only in here once, just before he was arrested,” he said.

“Tank, he came on the place without even being noticed when he approached Morie at the line cabin,” Mallory reminded him. “He’s a woodsman. He can get into and out of anything. He’s a locksmith, in addition to being a blacksmith. He can open locks.”

“Isn’t it enough that he’s being accused of a murder he didn’t commit? Do we have to start accusing him of theft, as well?” Tank exclaimed, exasperated. He got up. “I’m going to bed. Arguing gets us nowhere.”

“Me, too,” Cane agreed. He got to his feet. “Dane Lassiter has one of his best detectives up here poking around. He’ll dig up something. I’m sure of it.”

“Most of it will probably concern Gelly, I’m afraid,” Tank said with a worried look at Mallory. “I hope you aren’t more involved with her than you seem to be.”

“I’m not,” Mallory said heavily. “She was just somebody to take around places.”

“You’d better hope she doesn’t come up with a better accusation than the ones she made against Morie and our former cowhand,” Cane told him.

“Like what?” Mallory asked, stunned.

“Maybe she’ll turn up pregnant,” Cane said.

Mallory’s dark eyes twinkled. “Not by me,” he said. “I’m not that careless.”

“She could lie.”

“Bloodwork would exonerate me,” Mallory said easily. “I was never intimate with her in the first place.”

“Good thing,” Tank said.

“Yes,” Cane agreed.

Mallory didn’t mention that there had been a close call once, just once, after Morie left and he was depressed enough to need comforting. But he hadn’t crossed the line with Gelly. So even if she made the charge, he’d be able to refute it. He did worry, though, that she might try to trap him. She wanted money and now she was desperate. He wondered if she might have taken that priceless egg. She did have the opportunity and the motive. It would have to wait for the private detective to iron it out, he supposed.

He went up to bed, his mind still full of Morie’s real identity and the picture that he’d carry forever in his heart, of her in that white gown, looking as elegant as a princess and quite at home among the wealthiest cattlemen in the world.



A FEW DAYS LATER, AT ALL, dark man with long black hair and pale gray eyes, wearing a suit, knocked at the front door.

Mavie let him in and called Mallory, who was the only brother in the house at the moment.

“Ty Harding.” The man introduced himself and shook hands with Mallory. “I work for Dane Lassiter, out of Houston.”

“Come in,” Mallory invited. “Mavie, coffee?”

“Coming right up,” she said, casting a last, smiling glance at the handsome newcomer. Not only was he handsome, he had the physique of a movie star, tall and muscular without being overtly so.

Harding sat down across from Mallory. “I’ve finished the investigation.”

“Then you know who took the egg?” Mallory asked at once.

He nodded grimly. “It was sold to a fence in Denver through a third party for ten thousand dollars.”

Mallory gaped at him. “It’s worth ten times that!”

“Yes, we know. The fence has been arrested and the egg was confiscated from its new owner. He’s pretty upset. He paid a quarter of a million for it. Luckily, the fence hadn’t had time to distribute more than a third of the money.”

Mallory was relieved. “That piece of art was our grandmother’s,” he explained. “It really is priceless, but it has a sentimental value, as well. Who stole it?”

Harding hesitated. Mavie came in with steaming cups of black coffee in mugs on a silver tray. There was pound cake, too. She put it down, grinning at the newcomer. She didn’t smile much. Mallory was amused at her friendliness to the visitor. “Hope you like cake,” she said. “It was made fresh yesterday.”

“I love it. Thank you.”

“Cream? Sugar?” she offered.

Harding shook his head and chuckled, showing perfect white teeth. “I got used to drinking it black years ago. It’s hard to find condiments in some of the places I’ve worked.”

“Thank you, Mavie,” Mallory said pointedly.

She glanced at him, cleared her throat, excused herself and left.

“Nice lady,” Harding commented as he sipped coffee. He closed his eyes. “Colombian,” he decided. “My favorite.”

Mallory’s eyes widened. “You can tell the origin of the blend?”

“It’s a hobby.” His eyes twinkled with secret amusement.

Mallory didn’t comment. “Now. Who took the egg?”

Harding had another sip of coffee and put the cup down. “A threesome, I’m afraid.”

“What threesome?” Mallory’s mind was working overtime as he searched for suspects.

“A local woman, Gelly Bruner, took the egg. She had a key to your cabinet, which was made for her by an escaped convict, Joe Bascomb, who needed money to avoid being captured. There was a third man involved, peripherally, a man named Bates. It seems he helped Ms. Bruner by planting evidence.”

Mallory’s face was thunderous. “Bates works for me! He said he saw Morie Brannt holding the egg in the bunkhouse.”

“I believe he also helped plant evidence on another cowboy who worked here, a man named Harry Rogers, who’s retained counsel and plans to sue for false arrest.”

“Great,” Mallory said. “I guess we’ll keep our lawyers busy.”

“Rogers does have a case, but it’s the sheriff who arrested him that he’s suing, and also Ms. Bruner. He isn’t suing you. He said you were set up, just as he was.”

Mallory was touched. “In that case he can have his job back with a raise, if he wants it, and I’ll pay for his attorney.”

“You’d have to talk to him about that. Your cowboy Bob Bates has been arrested, however, and charged with aiding and abetting theft.”

“I’m just astonished,” Mallory said heavily. “I did suspect Gelly, but I had no idea Bates was that involved.”

“He had feelings for her and he’s very young,” Harding replied. “He’s sick at heart about what he did. She told him it was a prank. He didn’t find out different until Ms. Brannt was fired, and then he was afraid to come forward.”

“It doesn’t excuse theft,” Mallory said. “Not at all.”

“He’s a first offender,” Harding said. “I’m almost certain that he’ll get probation. Ms. Bruner is, however, in a different situation. She has a record.”

“For what?” Mallory asked, stunned.

“Theft. This isn’t her first walk around the justice system. She’s never been convicted, but she’s been charged twice in the theft of priceless antiques from private homes. I’m afraid she’s not going to have an easy time. Her signature was on the receipt for proceeds from the sale of the stolen egg, and Bates is turning state’s evidence against her in return for first-offender status. He can put her in the house with a duplicate key at the time of the theft. It seems that Bascomb also made her a copy of your house key.”

“Oh, good God,” Mallory exclaimed.

“So it might be a good idea for you to check your other valuables and see if any are missing or have been replaced with copies,” the detective suggested.

“I’ll do that today,” Mallory agreed. “That’s a lot of good detective work for such a short time.”

Harding shrugged. “I love my job. I used to be a cop, but I got tired of the hours, so I quit Houston P.D. and went to work for Dane Lassiter.” He grinned. “He’s some boss, let me tell you.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“There’s a rumor going around that Joe Bascomb didn’t get his cut of the money and he’s out for revenge,” Harding added. “If I were you, I’d put on extra patrols out here and watch where I went. He’s really desperate now. They’ve brought in other law-enforcement personnel to go into the woods after him, including some trackers and some K-9 units.”

“I’ll make sure we’re all armed,” Mallory told him. “And thanks.”

Harding smiled. “My pleasure.”



MALLORY TOLD HIS BROTHERS what Harding had related, and they went around the house looking for other missing objects. To their shock, they found at least two priceless ceramic vases missing and one irreplaceable solid gold miniature goblet, not to mention an entire silver service that was kept apart from the others in a special cabinet. It was almost never unlocked and the brothers paid it little attention, because it was in an out-of-the-way place in the house.

Mallory called the sheriff’s department and an officer took down the descriptions of the missing items and their value. He promised to have their investigator get in touch with the appropriate authorities in Denver and search for them. Mallory didn’t expect them to be found. But there was always a chance, even if it was a small one.

Gelly had called him collect from the detention center, crying and begging for help. “I’m innocent,” she wailed. “I’m being set up! It’s a lie!”

“Gelly, you had duplicate keys that Bascomb made for you,” he added. “The prosecutor has an eyewitness who saw you sell the jeweled egg to a dealer in Las Vegas. What do you expect me to do?”

“You have to help me!” she exclaimed. “I’ll tell them I’m pregnant! I’ll call the newspapers!”

“Go ahead,” he said easily.

“I mean it!”

“So do I,” he replied. “You’d have to prove it. We both know it’s impossible.”

“Well, I know that. But I can lie,” she shot back. “I know how to lie and make people believe me!”

“You sure do,” he agreed coldly. “You got Morie fired with your lies. Not to mention Harry Rogers, who worked for us and was fired for stealing a drill that he didn’t even take.”

“That silly girl,” Gelly muttered. “I made up all sorts of stories about her, and you believed every one of them!”

“Yes. I did,” he replied grimly.

“Maybe I can’t have you, but you’ll never have her, now!” she exclaimed. “I can’t imagine that she’d really want you. You’re as ugly as an old boot!”

His pride ached at the charge. “Maybe,” he replied coldly. “But I’m rich.”

“Humph!”

“Goodbye, Gelly.”

He hung up and removed the cartridge that had the conversation on it. Even though he hadn’t informed her that she was being recorded, this would serve as evidence that he wasn’t responsible for any pregnancy she might claim in the future. He dropped it in the drawer of the telephone table, replaced it with a new one and then blocked the number she’d called from—the detention center—so that she couldn’t reach him again. Her words stung. He knew he had nothing in the looks department. He turned and went out to work. But his mind wasn’t at all on what he was doing. Which was a shame.



MORIE WAS WALKING AROUND the barn with her father and brother. She hadn’t said two words all morning.

Cort was tall like their father, with jet-black hair and eyes. He was drop-dead gorgeous, Morie thought, even if he was her brother. Now he glanced at her with narrowed eyes. “Don’t be thinking about that damned Wyoming coyote,” he said hotly. “He’s not worth a single thought.”

“Amen,” King Brannt muttered.

“Neither of you know a thing about him,” Morie replied without looking up. “He has good qualities. He was taken in by Gelly Bruner.”

“His brothers weren’t,” King replied.

“Love blinds men,” Morie said with more pain than she realized. “Mallory is in love with Gelly.”

Both men looked down at her.

King, undemonstrative to a fault, nevertheless put his arm around his daughter and hugged her close. “Daryl will make you a good husband,” he told her firmly.

She smiled. “I know.”

“If she doesn’t love him, he won’t,” Cort cut in bluntly.

King glared at his son. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I am on your side. But she’s my sister and I love her,” the younger man added. “It’s not a good idea to jump into a new relationship when you haven’t resolved the old one.”

“I never had a relationship with that awful cattleman,” Morie muttered.

King let her go and searched her face. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” she said firmly.

King raised an eyebrow. “He was looking at you the way I look at a juicy steak when your mother’s been feeding me chicken for a week.”

Morie’s heart jumped. “He was?”

King shrugged. “He stood up to me, too.”

“I thought you didn’t like him.” Morie faltered.

“I heard from the private detective,” he continued. “It seems Ms. Bruner is in jail awaiting trial on theft by taking, along with one of the Kirks’ cowboys. That escaped criminal they’re looking for is on the list, too, but they still can’t find him.”

“It was on the news this morning,” Cort said. “They’ve sent in tracking dogs.”

“I feel sorry for Tank,” Morie said. “Joe Bascomb was his friend.”

“Tank?” Cort asked, blinking.

“He killed one overseas and his men gave him the nickname,” Morie volunteered.

Cort sighed. “I guess it’s better than Tub.”

Tub was what they called one of their cowboys, who was thin as a rail and the best wrangler they’d ever had. Nobody knew how he’d come by the nickname.

“They said that Bascomb had told a family member that he had a score to settle before he was caught, and that they wouldn’t take him alive.”

Morie felt cold chills run down her arms. It was an odd sort of apprehension, as if she knew something terrible was about to happen and that she had no way of stopping it.

“I feel odd,” she murmured.

“Odd, how?” her father asked.

Before she could answer, Shelby came into the barn, looking like a fashion plate even in jeans and a T-shirt. She was frowning.

“What’s wrong, honey?” King asked, sensitive to her moods. He caught her by her arms, gently, smiling down at her. “Can I help?”

She shook her head and looked at Morie with sorrow. “It’s about that cattleman you worked for, Mallory Kirk.”

Morie’s heart stopped, skipped and ran away. “What about him?”

“That escaped criminal kidnapped him on his own ranch. He says he’s going to kill him… Morie!”

Morie didn’t hear her. She’d fainted dead away.