The Outsider Series: The Complete Omnibus Collection

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

By the time Jed pulled in, it was late afternoon. He slammed the door and strode into his house. Diana was eating a ham and cheese sandwich, and sipping the coffee she’d been denied earlier, while sitting on the board that served as her front step. She still felt as if a storm had tossed her around, and her muscles had no starch in them. She’d finally stopped trembling, but she was still worried that the sheriff would pull in at anytime. She’d changed out of her earlier jeans, which were still damp from her stroll through the forest. Andy had scared the hell out of her and this time there was no doubt about it—she’d screwed up and had somehow lost focus of why she was here. And if there was one thing Diana was good at it was staying focused.

Diana finished her sandwich and started towards the house to rinse her cup out. Jed yanked the door open and jumped down. His face was heavily shadowed from not shaving.

“Jed, what did the sheriff say?”

He gazed at her with a hardness that she couldn’t read. Maybe Andy had spoken with him and told him she’d come over and he was going to call the sheriff on her. Jed had a way of hiding everything from someone when he wanted to. She’d seen the best lawyers out there mask everything right before they yanked the rug right out from under her, but they had nothing on Jed. And that terrified her.

“He’s on his way out.” He must have seen the way Diana flinched because he stepped closer, gazing at her in a way as if trying to figure her out. The fact was, Diana was flat-out scared that Andy had called the sheriff and told him he’d caught her trespassing, maybe even adding that she was going to steal a horse. She knew she was being paranoid, but with Andy Friessen there was wisdom in being prepared.

Diana grabbed Jed’s shirt when she heard a car pull in. She felt her insides jump when she saw the sheriff slip out of the patrol car, tall and solid and very young for a sheriff, with baby blue eyes and short blond hair beneath his hat. She blushed furiously when Jed stared at her, but what he did next surprised the hell out of her: he wrapped his arm around her shoulder, tucking her close to him. She went with it, feeling his support and wanting it.

“Sheriff, thanks for coming.” Jed motioned toward the corral. The sheriff paused and glanced at Diana, his tanned face hard as stone and just as unreadable.

“Ma’am.” He nodded, and Diana hoped she was successful at putting up a calm face, because she was trembling inside, worried just having him here.

Jed squeezed her shoulders, and when she glanced up, she realized she wasn’t hiding it from him. She followed Jed as he showed the sheriff the tracks and where the horses were.

“And you two saw nothing, heard nothing?”

“No, nothing. I woke Diana after I discovered they were gone. Been looking for them, but seen no sign of them.”

Diana realized he had given the sheriff the impression she was sleeping with him, and not in the cabin beside the house. Instead of saying otherwise, she recognized Jed had done it for a reason. With her not inside with him, the sheriff could easily say she’d been part of letting the horses go, waste a lot of time shifting the blame on Diana instead of looking for the horses and who had really taken them.

“Well, all I can do, Jed, is put word out. Look around. You been having trouble with anyone lately? Any threats that could give me an idea where to start?”

“Yeah, you can start with my uncle Todd and cousin Andy,” Jed answered with a hint of sarcasm.

That got the sheriff’s attention, as his eyes widened, staring at Jed in a way that was all cop. “Now why would I want to do that?”

“Because they’ve been trying to make things real difficult for Diana. I paid my family a visit and gave them a warning that if they didn’t back off, it’d become my fight and my war. I don’t take kindly to someone I care about being harassed,” Jed said, looking at the sheriff.

The sheriff took another look at Diana and nodded.

“If you can give me a description or even a photo of those two horses, I’ll go pay a visit to Todd and Andy, check out their stables.”

“In my office in the barn, I have photos.…”

“Jed,” she interrupted, “I already went to their stable this morning after you left. I thought Andy was responsible.”

Jed stared at her with those hard, unreadable eyes, but then he grabbed her arms as if realizing something else, and his face darkened. “Why would you do a foolish thing like that? Wait, you walked in there and they let you?”

Diana glanced sheepishly at the ground, her face warming. She knew the sheriff was watching and listening to every word. “No, I cut through the forest. I went in the barn and looked at all of the stalls. The horses weren’t there, Jed,” she said smoothly, and Jed watched her, knowing there was more.

“And? Come on, Diana. I know there’s more that you’re not saying.” Jed gave her an irritated glance.

“Andy caught me.” She said nothing else, but the way Jed’s cheek twitched let her know he had a few other things to say. For her benefit, he glanced back at the sheriff and held his tongue. But the sheriff didn’t.

“Diana, that was a stupid thing to do, and if Todd or Andy wanted to press charges against you for trespassing, they’d be well within their rights,” the sheriff said, laying into her.

“I’m sure he won’t, and the horses aren’t there. But I’m not convinced they aren’t responsible. They could be hidden anywhere, and you know as well as I, Sheriff, that if Andy or Todd ordered someone in this county to take them, it would be done, and you won’t find them.”

“Well, that doesn’t give us many leads.” The sheriff closed his notebook and issued Diana a stern warning before following Jed into the barn: “Diana, if you want to stay in this county, then I wouldn’t start provoking Andy and Todd Friessen. Stay away from them. And stay off their property.”