chapter Fifteen
“I thought we were going to check out wedding gowns,” Xav said. “I know that’s what I want to do. Some guys want to watch football reruns, I just want to see my gal in a white dress.”
Ash laughed, and his heart seemed to fill up at the sight of her smile. “I’m going to take a peek at the one in the attic first.”
“You said Fiona told you it was ugly. Pretty sure you could wear a burlap sack and be gorgeous, but I think the kids might be a little disappointed in our wedding photos.” He pulled her into his arms. “Let’s skip the one upstairs, and go get you one with your name on it.”
She kissed him, and he thought he’d never felt so whole. “You rock my world,” he told Ash. “You’ve changed me for the better.”
“Xav.” She smiled up at him. “Only you would have stuck with me through this whole journey. Any other man would have run off screaming.”
“That’s right. I’m a badass.” He stole another kiss. “And later on, when it’s just you and me, and the babies are asleep—”
“For a whole ten minutes,” Ash teased.
“I’m going to let you give me some badass reward.”
“Aunt Fiona made a wicked pumpkin pie today—”
He swatted her fanny gently. “I’m looking for a different kind of sweet. Up the stairs with you. Make it fast, beautiful. I’m in the mood for a trip to the wedding shop. If you’re lucky, I may even splurge for one of those dainty little garter things.”
“That would be um, exciting.”
“Go.” He gave her a tiny push toward the stairs. “I’d be happy to go up there with you, but I sense I’m not invited.”
“No need for this. It’ll only take me a jif. Go talk to Fiona,” she said, her voice floating down from the attic.
He went and sat in the den dutifully. “Is it really ugly?”
Fiona laughed. “We’ll know in a minute.”
“How did this gown get up there?”
“I assumed you put it there.”
“You called a gown you thought I bought ugly?” He looked at Fiona. “Whose side are you on?”
“Ash’s,” Fiona said blithely. “Although I like you very well, too.”
He sighed. Stared at his children, who were all now lying on their soft pallet while Fiona wrapped more presents. His ear stretched toward the attic, waiting to hear any sound from Ash. “Sure is taking a long time.”
“You know how ladies are about these things.”
He supposed so. His sister, Kendall, certainly took her time when looking at fashions. He didn’t care what Ash wore, just so long as he got a ring on her finger, and an “I do” from her lips. “Why hasn’t Running Bear been by to see these babies?”
Fiona looked at him. “What makes you think he hasn’t?”
“Has he?”
“I don’t know,” Fiona said, and it felt to Xav like they were playing nowhere fast. Maybe by Fiona’s design.
“Need any help wrapping those?” he asked, deciding to make himself useful while his children played with their toes and looked at the tree lights.
“Oh, no. Men can’t wrap presents. They don’t pay attention to the details. Details are important.”
“I can diaper a baby in under five seconds. Pretty sure I can put a little paper around a box.”
She looked up at him, her round face pert with merriment. “Only a man would think that wrapping a gift is like a diaper. It’s the beauty of the wrapping that counts, it’s part of the gift, Xav. It’s not entirely utilitarian.”
“I guess so.” Just like the wedding gown Ash would eventually wear, he didn’t care so much about outside coverings. “Ash! You’re killing me down here!” he yelled toward the attic.
“Sorry!” she called.
Fiona giggled. “To think there was a day when we all thought you wouldn’t marry our girl.”
He scratched the back of his neck. “Yeah, well. Have no idea why you folks would even think that.”
“I was very surprised when you called in with the winning bid that night, you know,” Fiona said, her voice low, even though Ash was in the attic. “You wanted me to keep your secret, so I did, but it was the toughest one I ever kept!”
He was a little embarrassed about that. “I just didn’t want anybody else winning her. I didn’t want some schlub getting the wrong idea about Ash being available.”
“She was very available! But if you liked Ash so much, how come you didn’t ever ask her out?” Fiona shook her head. “Seems to me you move awfully slow, Xav Phillips, for a guy who’s proud of being ruled by rational thought and not emotions.”
He got down on the floor and grabbed a white box, the contents of which couldn’t be ascertained but which had the certain shape of a child’s toy, and began wrapping it. “I never asked Ash out because I thought she was just making time with me.”
Fiona blinked. “Making time?”
“I thought she came to see me when I was camping out in the canyons because she didn’t want anything more than that.”
“Are you insane?” Fiona demanded. “Why are men so ridiculously hard to decipher?” She wagged a finger at him. “You put yourself through this agony. You could have told her last year that you’d won her, and taken her out on a fancy date in Santa Fe. You wasted a year of wooing thanks to your pride.” She made a disgusted sound and snatched the package away from him. “While you’re doing a tolerable job, it’s not a thing of beauty.”
Ash walked into the room wearing a white dress, a sheer sleeveless column with lace at the hemline. His breath caught. “That’ll do,” Xav said. “That’ll do just fine.”
“I can’t get it off,” Ash said.
“Is the zipper stuck?”
“No.”
He looked at Ash, got up to examine the zipper. “It’s a pretty dress.”
Ash looked over her shoulder. “Can you unzip it?”
He’d get anything off his bride-to-be she wanted. “Can’t be responsible for my actions if I do,” he teased, but she stood very still without saying a word.
He got down to the business of undoing the dress, making certain he didn’t forget himself and start kissing her neck the way he wanted.
The dress didn’t seem to want to cooperate. The zipper way stuck.
“Fiona? Can you help me with this? I don’t appear to have the hang of this wedding gown.” Xav stepped back.
Fiona walked over, unzipped the gown. “Probably like your gift-wrapping skills. Just a teensy bit lacking.” She moved the zipper down without hesitation. “There you go, niece.”
“Thank goodness! I was beginning to think I was stuck in the stupid thing.” Ash tore back up the stairs to take it off.
Shaking his head, Xav sat on the floor again, took another package to wrap, and this time, Fiona didn’t take it away from him. “Feisty gown.”
“You’re very impatient,” Fiona observed.
“We’ve already agreed on that.”
“Sometimes it’s good to be patient with things you don’t understand.”
He winked at her. “I’m learning that all the time. No worries that I’ll fail that particular lesson.” He chose a silvery foil with Santas on it and began cutting the paper. “How many gifts are we wrapping?”
“Tonight, twenty. I do a little wrapping every day. That way I get finished by Christmas Eve.”
“Twenty!” He added up Callahans and Callahan cousins in his mind. If Fiona and Burke gave one gift each to each Callahan child, they could be wrapping gifts until kingdom come. “I never thought about what a huge job Christmas is around here.”
“You’d better start thinking about it. Have you bought your own gifts?”
He looked at his children. “I meant to take Ash shopping, but I haven’t gotten around to it.”
“In the future, you’ll spend your Christmas Eves putting toys and bicycles together late into the wee hours.” Fiona sounded pleased about that. “I recommend organization.”
“Yeah. Sure.” He glanced over his shoulder as Ash rejoined them. “That one was a dud?”
“That gown and I did not get along.” Ash flopped down on the sofa. “I swear I think it was fighting with me.”
Fiona looked at her. “Let me get you a cup of cocoa.”
She got up and left the room.
“So, you and I are off to the wedding shop, then?” Xav finished the present he was wrapping and looked at it with pride. “Not too bad.”
“Xav,” Ash whispered, “Fiona’s acting strange.”
“How can you tell?” He looked around to see if Fiona was returning. “Isn’t she always a little eccentric?”
Ash shook her head, and he wished he could hold his hot, sexy momma and let her know that he was going to take care of her. Nothing bad was going to happen ever again.
“That gown was weird.” Ash said. “I hated it the moment I put it on.”
He would have thought trying on a wedding gown would be a happy experience, even if it wasn’t “the one.” “We’ll find something you like.”
“That gown didn’t want me to take it off.”
“It’s okay, Ash. You’re free now.”
She stared at him, her navy eyes huge.
“What?”
“I’m free now,” she murmured.
He got next to her, pulled her into his lap. “See those darling babies right there?”
“Yes.”
He loved her delicate giggle. “They’re your freedom. Whatever you do for the rest of your life, you’re going to have four little things that want to kiss you and suck up to you and make you ugly clay pottery pieces that you’re going to think are the prettiest things anyone ever gave you.”
Ash smiled. “I hadn’t thought of that, but you’re right.”
“And that’s freedom, babe. They make you smile, and that sets your soul free.”
She put her arms around his neck, kissed him so sweetly he felt his toes warm in his boots. “Only you understand me.”
“That’s right. You just remember that when you get cold feet on Christmas Eve, right about the time the deacon asks you if you’re going to obey me, love only me and wash my socks for the rest of your life.”
She giggled again. “I don’t think that’s what marriage is about, exactly.”
“You’re right, of course. I left out the cooking and making-my-lunch-every-day parts.”
“You’re leaving something else important out.” She whispered something sexy in his ear that brought him right out of the teasing mood and into something far more serious.
“Keep suggesting things like that, and I promise not to forget again,” he said huskily, wishing he had his sexy girl naked right this moment.
“Here’s cocoa for all,” Fiona trilled, holding a tray in front of her that she set on the coffee table. There were three cups of cocoa, and some cookies on a plate.
“Later,” Ash whispered in his ear, and Xav felt better as she hopped out of his lap.
Later.
* * *
ASH COULDN’T PUT her finger on what was bothering her. She had so many thoughts pushing through her mind, almost scrambling her brains. Trying on the dress had really unnerved her. It felt hot and scratchy, ugly and somehow evil. When she tried to take it off, it was as though she was lost in it, with it clawing at her, trying to keep her a prisoner in its white folds.
Which was her imagination run wildly amok. Ash looked out the kitchen window at the white-covered landscape, brightened by the pale moon. Icicles hung from the barn roofs, where the stalls would be filled with horses covered in their blankets. She shivered, wrapped a wool shawl around her more tightly. The babies were down for the first round of sleep, which would last maybe four hours.
She was too keyed up to sleep.
Xav was out helping her brothers secure the barns and putting away the animals. Fiona and Burke had gone to bed.
She lit a vanilla-scented soy candle in the kitchen and perched on a barstool. Closing her eyes, she thought about her visit with Grandfather.
She’d learned so much—but there was so much more to learn.
A frown wrinkled her brow. Everything in the house was askew; it felt as if time was dancing around her, upsetting everything in what should have been a peaceful house. She couldn’t get her thoughts to calm.
Fiona had seemed so giddy tonight. Otherworldly. And that business of her taking Skye downstairs to show her the silver treasure had been odd. Why had the Callahans buried the treasure down there, anyway? It was too easy to find.
Especially with all the digging his cartel mercenaries were very good at—witness the maze of tunnels.
Xav said he thought Wolf was operating on his own now. She wasn’t sure why he would have been abandoned by the cartel—unless they’d decided they no longer needed him.
If they no longer needed him, then they thought they could take over Rancho Diablo without his help.
It also might mean the cartel had information on where Jeremiah and Molly, and Carlos and Julia were. Since their only reason for working with Wolf in the first place was to find the Callahans, then had they somehow achieved their goal? And let him go. She shivered, startled by the idea that perhaps the cartel had somehow found the Callahans.
Was that why Wolf had been so quiet lately? He had no connection any longer to the cartel. But if they weren’t working with him, wouldn’t they just kill him off?
Perhaps Xav had misread the situation. The thought calmed her a little, pushed back some of the panic threatening to take her over. Xav was only postulating that Wolf was operating on his own. It was a hunch; it might not mean a thing.
Maybe it was best to meet the enemy head-on.
Tomorrow, she would.
* * *
ASH SLEPT IN XAV’S ARMS, secure in the peace that came with being held by her man. In just a few days, she’d be his wife. The knowledge gave her a sense of comfort she’d longed for all her life.
She drifted, thinking about her parents and how much she’d missed knowing them. Her children would always know her; she was determined to turn the tide of the past.
A gasp pushed out of her as she had a vision of Wolf’s face, evil and taunting. A loner now, he was more desperate than ever to achieve the goal. No longer backed up by the cartel, and no longer useful to them, the chance to take over Rancho Diablo fired his desperation.
He would do whatever it took to force them out. He believed he alone deserved the land, felt cut out by his father, whom he hated. A spirit of revenge swirled inside him, guiding him.
Her grandfather came to her in the vision, instructing her to lure Wolf to Loco Diablo. She awakened in a sweat, her heart racing.
“Babe, what’s going on?”
“Nothing. Go back to sleep.”
“I can’t.” Xav wrapped an arm around her, dragging her next to him. “My better half’s had a bad dream. I can feel your heart banging like a drum. The only solution for that is for me to make love to you.”
She relaxed under his kisses, his hands skillfully easing away her fear. Her breath returned, her stomach unclenched as he charmed her terror away.
“It’s going to be okay, babe,” Xav murmured. “I’m never going to let anything happen to you. You’re safe.”
She wanted to tell him so badly about the vision she’d had. Not a dream; a true vision. It had been clear as a bell, full of color and sound, like watching a movie. There was so much she didn’t understand, still couldn’t understand. The magic wedding dress was gone, its magic destroyed. There was another dress in its place, but it was all wrong. She reached deep inside her soul, trying to find the source of her unease, yet only her mother’s and father’s faces came to her from the photo she’d seen in Fiona’s room. They’d been one big happy family—a long time ago.
But Xav held her and made love to her, and it was as if calm water rushed over, making her forget everything for just a while. Yet the vision haunted her, despite Xav’s love. The babies were the future of Rancho Diablo, as were all the Callahan children.
She knew what she had to do.
* * *
AFTER XAV LEFT HER in the early morning, she dressed in dark jeans, a dark shirt and a black jacket with a sheepskin vest beneath. She went to find Fiona in her usual location, stirring up eggs, bacon and pancakes in the kitchen. It all smelled heavenly, but she had little appetite.
“You’re up early,” Fiona said with a smile.
“I was thinking I might go out for a bit, if you and Burke wouldn’t mind keeping an eye on the children.”
“We’d love to!” Fiona beamed. “Just like the old days. We don’t get many chances to have them to ourselves.”
“You’re sure you don’t mind? I feel terribly—”
“Ashlyn Callahan, don’t you say another word!” Fiona’s face was serene in spite of the reprimand. “We live and breathe to hold those babies. We would do it more often, but we’re trying not to be overbearing family members while you and Xav are working on bonding with those angels! And with each other, I might add,” Fiona said with a wink. “He sure seemed in a good mood this morning.”
Xav’s happiness made her smile. “Aunt, about that gown I tried on the other day.”
“Don’t dwell on it, niece.”
She shook her head. “It was a magic wedding dress, too. But it felt all wrong. Evil, even. Like it was trying to trap me.”
Fiona nodded. “It was a dress with bad magic. You know that there are tests in life, Ash. If you’d worn it, if you’d just been content to get married just for the sake of marriage, you’d have settled for any old gown. The bad wedding dress was a test to sway you from your true path in life. Who knows how your destiny might have changed if you’d fallen for its lure?”
Ash stared at Fiona. “Who put it there?”
“The same spirits that drive your uncle Wolf, of course. We’re not the only ones who fight for good. Supernatural forces are always at work, trying to help us, but thwarted just the same by their battles with evil. Angels fight with bad angels, good wars with bad—evil is always going to try to win. Magic can’t stop that. What’s important is that you discerned wisely. You didn’t know it, but you set your course for the good and didn’t allow yourself to be tempted by an easier path.”
“I’ll burn that dress later.”
Fiona shook her head. “You can’t destroy it. Only a strong woman who refuses to be set aside from her destiny destroys the gown’s evil charm. It goes to haunt another poor bride, who may not make the same choices. Life is about choices, and we are all governed by our choices.”
Ash tried to smile, thinking she wouldn’t want her daughters to experience that, nor her sons’ brides. But by the time her children were ready to be married, maybe they’d just go to the wedding shop in town and choose something new for themselves.
In the meantime, she would raise her children to be warriors, as she and her brothers had been raised. “Thank you for everything, Fiona. I’ll be back soon.”
She went out in the cold, bracing herself against the wind. With any luck, Xav wouldn’t discover her leaving and try to stop her. He had that tendency to be protective.
She loved that about him.
But today, he couldn’t protect her, so she hadn’t told him, though she felt guilty about it.
In the paddock was the silver mare Wolf had trapped when Jace and Sawyer had released the Diablos from the underground cave. “Hello, beautiful girl,” Ash murmured, and the mare looked at her calmly.
“I remember you can run very fast. Something tells me you’re here for me. So if you don’t mind taking this adventure with me, kindred spirit, we’ll see what today has in store for us.”
The mare tossed her head as if in agreement, accepted the saddle and bridle with no complaint. If anything, she seemed eager to be off and running.
Ash slipped into the saddle and left the paddock, making her getaway before any of her brothers or Xav might see her. They would ask a thousand questions and try to change her mind.
She rode toward the canyons until she got to the Sister Wind Ranch, also known as Loco Diablo, aware that Wolf had shot at Xav when he’d come out here. But only the silence of predawn greeted her.
A flash of light drew her eyes, and she followed it. To her surprise—and suspicion—a gate had been left open, perhaps by a federal agent or someone else. She asked the beautiful mare to stay close by and, drawing her gun, went down into the opening, astonished by the size of the tunnel she found.
It led to another, then another reinforced tunnel, an underground city of concrete and steel. She passed an oven of sorts, an antiquated type of bake oven used for rudimentary cooking. Ventilation pipes appeared at different intervals, denoting the potential for subterranean life.
She pulled out a flashlight to supplement the glow from crude gas sconces. Chambers split off into different directions, and an occasional wheeled cart or three-wheeler indicated transport deeper into the tunnels, destined for Rancho Diablo.
Ash burned with fury as she took in the stronghold fortified under their lands. Wolf knew all this was here, and if he had been cut loose, as Xav suspected, then he would know he had to strike before the cartel did, in order to claim what he wanted first.
But if the cartel could destroy and take over Rancho Diablo, there was no reason for them to cut Wolf in on the spoils.
“Hang on there, little lady,” a deep voice said behind her, and Ash whirled with a gasp, ready to strike.