The Deputy's Lost and Found (4 page)

The sheriff was a true family man and nothing made him happier than his wife and children. Brady could only wonder if he’d ever want to be that settled, that focused on one certain woman. So far he’d not found one that could hold his interest for more than a month, much less forever. Where women were concerned, Brady’s mother accused him of being a selfish alpha male who expected too much from a lady. But Brady would hardly classify himself in those terms. He’d rather think of himself as smart and practical. And he was smart enough to know that he wasn’t ready or willing to turn his life over to a woman. For that to happen, he’d have to be head over heels in love. And so far, that malady had never struck Brady.

Shaking the sheriff’s hand heartily, Brady expressed his congratulations. “Wow! This must have been a pleasant surprise for the whole family! You must be walking on a cloud right about now!”

The sheriff chuckled. “The whole Murdock clan has kept the phone lines hot with the news. And me, well, I’m not even complaining about having to cook breakfast for me and the boys for the past week. Penny can’t stand the smell of food early in the mornings. She won’t even let me make coffee. And speaking of coffee—” he glanced over his shoulder to a corner where the coffeemaker was located “—has anyone made a pot yet?”

“Yeah. Me. I’ll get us both a cup,” Brady told him. “I need to talk with you.”

“Fine. Bring it on to my office,” he said. “I want to see if Dottie has left any notes on my desk.”

Moments later, carrying two cups steaming with coffee,
Brady entered the sheriff’s office and took a seat in front of the other man’s desk.

“So,” Ethan said as he sipped from the cup and rifled through the scraps of paper scattered in front of him, “you have something personal on your mind? Or business?”

Feeling sheepish and not really knowing why, Brady cleared his throat. “A little of both, I suppose. It’s about the Jane Doe case. She’s getting released from the hospital today. And I…plan on taking her out to the ranch.”

Ethan’s head shot up. “The Diamond D—?”

“That’s right. Do you have any problems with that?”

The sheriff rubbed a finger along his jaw. “Well, I don’t think there’s any law against it. But I…wouldn’t advise it, Brady. The county has places for people like her. They’ll look out for her until we get this thing straightened out.”

Frowning with disapproval, Brady leaned forward. “Sure. In that women’s shelter down in Ruidoso. That wouldn’t be good.”

“Why not?”

Brady slowly sipped his coffee while he tried to gather all the legitimate excuses he could think of. “Well, it’s right next to the mission for people with addiction problems.”

“She won’t have to mingle with those people.”

Drawing in a deep breath, Brady tried again. “The women’s shelter is small and they rarely have enough room to spare. Lass wouldn’t have any privacy and she’d have to wear whatever she could find out of the charity box.”

Ethan picked up another note and scanned the brief contents. “I could think of worse things.”

Brady’s jaw tightened. “She doesn’t come from that sort of background, Ethan. She doesn’t belong there.”

The sheriff shot him a wry look, before he carefully sipped his coffee. “None of the other women belong there,
either, Brady. Bad circumstances put them there. Just like the Jane—” He suddenly paused, his eyes narrowing on Brady’s face. “Did I hear you call her ‘Lass’? Has she remembered her name?”

Brady couldn’t stop a wave of red heat from crawling up his neck and onto his face. “No. Unless her condition changed overnight.” He made a dismissive gesture with his hand. “I gave her the name. We had to have something to call her.”

“Yeah,” Ethan said dryly, “guess the name Jane wouldn’t work for that.”

Knowing the other man could see right through him, Brady tossed up his hands in surrender. “Okay. Okay. So I’m a sucker for a stray. What can I say?”

Ethan settled back in his chair and Brady could feel the full weight of the other man’s attention.

“Like I said, there’s no law against you taking Lass or Jane or whatever the hell she’s calling herself, home with you,” the sheriff said, “but you could be asking for a whole heap of trouble. This thing with her smells fishy to me. And the stink could rub off on you or your family. Are you prepared for that?”

Unease prickled down Brady’s backbone. He’d been a law officer long enough to know that Ethan was right. Lass could mean trouble. Yet his job was to serve and protect. And right now he couldn’t think of anyone who needed his services more than Lass.

“All the more reason to have her in a safe, secluded place. Where I can keep watch on her.”

Ethan studied him for long, thoughtful moments, then shook his head. “All right, Brady. I’m not going to buck you on this. Just remember not to let your personal feelings get in the way of the case.”

Brady grinned with relief. “I’m not going to stop until
I solve it. In fact, that’s why I’m here so early this morning. I was trying to go through the system, see if she might match any new missing person’s case.”

“What about her fingerprints? Have you already run them?”

Nodding, Brady said, “Did that yesterday. No match there. But then she would’ve had to have been in the military, the government or arrested to find them in our database.”

“What about medical progress?” Ethan asked. “Hank tells me that your sister has taken her case. What is Bridget’s medical opinion?”

“That time will heal her. But she can only guess as to how much time.”

“Hmm. Let’s hope her recovery is speedy. In the meantime, the woman has to be connected to someone. Boyfriend. Husband. Family. Someone who cares enough to start a search for her.”

Someone who cares.
Ethan’s words jerked Brady back to the everyday reality of his job. Of course there were people out there who cared about Lass, he thought. A woman who looked like her most likely had a special man in her life. And it was Brady’s job to see that she got safely back to that man’s arms.

S
hortly after lunch that same day, Lass’s paper work for her release from the hospital was completed and Brady picked her up in a black pickup truck with a sheriff’s department seal emblazoned on the doors.

The day was warm and bright and as he drove slowly along a mountain highway, Lass felt her spirits lift. It felt wonderful to be out of the confines of the hospital and even more wonderful to know that she wasn’t going to be deposited in a charity ward, where she’d be pushed aside and her plight ignored for those persons with more serious problems.

Turning her gaze away from the passenger window, she glanced over to the man behind the wheel. Brady Donovan was not just a regular deputy, she decided. He was a tall, sexy angel who had rescued her from possible death. If she’d lain on the side of the road throughout the night, she could have succumbed to exposure to the elements or wild
animals, particularly black bears. Now he’d come to her rescue again and she wasn’t quite sure why.

“You’re sure that your family won’t mind me staying at their home for a few days?” she asked.

“It’s my home, too,” he reminded her. “And stop worrying. I spoke to my parents this morning. They’re glad to help.”

Lass sighed. Most of last night and this morning, as she’d struggled to remember anything about her life up until a day ago, she’d felt totally disconnected, as though she’d been defeated by something or someone, even before she’d received the whack on her head.

“They must be very generous people to allow a stranger into their home.” Bending her head, she squeezed her eyes shut as tears threatened to fall. “It would be impossible to express my gratitude to them—to you.”

“Forget it, Lass. My family has plenty to give. And they like helping others. They’re that sort of people.”

Raising her head, she glanced his way. Now in the bright light of day, she was getting an even clearer image of the man and she had to admit that the sight of him was a bit breathtaking. Did that mean that she’d not been accustomed to having a sexy man like him for company? If her memory were working normally, would he still look just as special? Something told her that he would and that she’d never encountered a man like him before.

His tawny-colored hair was shaggier than she’d first noticed and subtly streaked with shades of amber, copper and gold, a perfect foil for his dark green eyes. But the rich colors were only a part of what made his looks so striking, she realized. It was his bigger-than-life presence, the personality that simmered behind his twinkling gaze and enigmatic smile.

“Well, I won’t forget this kindness you and your family are showing me. I’ll repay you somehow. I promise.”

A corner of his mouth lifted in a wry grin. “We don’t expect that, Lass. Giving doesn’t mean much if you give only to get something in return. That’s what my mom always taught me.”

Her heart heavy, she gazed out at the desert mountains. They were dotted with twisted juniper, scrubby pinyon pine and clumps of sage. To her right, at the bottom of the mountains, the highway shared part of the valley floor with a river. The Hondo, Brady had called it earlier, was lined with tall poplars, willows and evergreens, while in between the meandering ribbon of water and the roadway, green meadows were covered with grasses and wildflowers. Pretty as the scenery was, nothing about it seemed familiar to her fuddled brain.

“I wonder if I have a mother,” she murmured. “I wonder what mine might have taught me.”

He was silent for a moment and then the two-way radio on the dashboard began to crackle yet again as a busy dispatcher issued information to an officer on call. By the time the female voice had finished, Lass figured Brady’s thoughts had moved on to things other than her miserable plight.

He surprised her by picking up the conversation exactly where Lass had left off. “You’re a young woman, Lass. I’m betting you have a mother somewhere. She’s probably hunting for you right this moment, and so is…your father.”

Lass’s heart winced with a doubt she couldn’t understand. Why did she have this notion that her parents might not be hunting for her? Wasn’t that what normal parents did when their child went missing? Only if they were normal, she mentally pointed out, and God only knew if hers were alive, much less normal.

“I can only hope,” she replied, then forcing her mind to move on, she asked, “Does this area have a name? I’ve noticed we’ve passed a few homesteads.”

“It’s called the Hondo Valley. People around here raise cattle and horses and lots of fruit in the summer. Does that ring a bell?”

She bit back a sigh. “Not really.”

“Well, if you’re not from around here, it probably wouldn’t. And I’m positive you don’t live anywhere close.”

“How could you know that?”

His chuckle was warm and husky and filled Lass with unexpected pleasure.

“’Cause I know all the pretty women in Lincoln County. And believe me when I say I would know your name.”

Forty minutes from the time they drove away from Sierra General, Brady steered the truck off the highway and onto a graveled dirt road lined with a white board fence and towering Lombardy poplars. Along the way, the land opened up to wide meadows with tall dense grass.

When Lass spotted the first mares and foals grazing along the roadside, she squealed with delight.

“Oh! How perfectly lovely!” Leaning forward, she gazed raptly at the horses and, as she took in their grace and beauty, emotion suddenly overwhelmed her to the point that she had to swallow before she could say another word. “Could we…stop for just a minute, Brady? For a closer look?”

“Sure. We’re not in a hurry.”

He pulled the truck to the side of the road and after carefully helping her to the ground, wrapped his hand firmly around hers, then led her to a spot where the fence was shaded by one of the poplars.

“This is part of the Diamond D’s brood stock,” he explained as they looked out over the meadow dotted with mares and babies at their sides. “And I’ll admit without a speck of modesty that we have some of the finest horses in the southwest.”

“Mmm. I wouldn’t argue with that,” she said as she deliberately fixed her gaze on the horses and tried to ignore the fact that he was still hanging on to her hand. But that was impossible to do when the tangle of their fingers was sending all sorts of hot currents pulsing through her, sensations that she was certain she’d never felt before. Something this strong couldn’t be forgotten, she decided.

“You must like horses,” he observed. “Maybe you have one of your own somewhere.”

She could feel his glance sliding over her and like a magnet it drew her eyes back to his rugged face. Drawing in a deep breath, she replied, “It doesn’t make sense but I know…without even thinking about it, that I love these beautiful animals. Strange, isn’t it?” she murmured with despair. “I don’t know if I have a job, or home or…anything. Yet I feel this affinity to horses.”

“We’re going to find answers for you, Lass. I promise. And Brady Donovan never makes a promise he can’t keep.”

Glancing up at him, she gave him a shaky smile and tried not to notice the gentle gleam in his green eyes. As far as she was concerned, Brady Donovan didn’t need to carry a firearm. His smile was lethal enough to stop a woman dead in her tracks.

Her heart kicked into a faint flutter, making her words little more than a husky whisper when she said, “I’m going to hold you to that, Deputy.”

Carefully extricating her hand from his, she moved a
step forward and leaned against the white fence. The afternoon was warm and a southwesterly breeze ruffled her black hair against her shoulders. The wind carried the scent of pine and juniper and though pleasant, the smells seemed unusual to her. But not nearly so much as the strong reaction she was having to Brady Donovan.

“It’s very beautiful here,” she went on nervously. “Have you always lived here in this valley?”

“Always,” he answered. “All of us six children were born here. My paternal grandparents came from Ireland and settled for a while in Kentucky. That’s where my father was born before they moved out here and built the ranch in 1968.”

“Are your grandparents still living?”

“My grandmother Kate lives with us. She’s eighty-four now and still going strong. My grandfather Arthur died of a stroke nine years ago. He was quite a bit older than Kate. And mean as hell when his temper was riled. But he was a wonderful man.”

It was easy to pick up the fondness in Brady Donovan’s voice and Lass didn’t have to ask whether he was close to his family. Obviously they were a close-knit bunch. And that notion could only make her wonder about herself. Did she have sisters, brothers or both? Was she carrying a family in her heart? One her mind had forgotten?

She was straining to remember the slightest image from her past when a bay mare and brown colt ambled near. Gripping the top rail of the fence, Lass was once again struck with an overload of emotions.

“Oh, what a perfect little filly! She’s all brown. Not a speck of white on her!”

Brady smiled fondly at the curious filly drawing near to them. “My sister Dallas calls her Brownie. Of course,
that’s not her real name. Dad makes sure all of the horses’ names go back to their dams and sires. But we usually give them nicknames.”

Brownie stuck her nose toward Lass’s hand and as she touched the filly’s velvety nose, tears blurred her eyes, then fell like watery diamonds onto her cheeks.

Seeing them, Brady softly exclaimed, “Why, Lass! You’re crying!”

Instantly, her face blushing with embarrassment, Lass dashed away the emotional tears. “I’m okay,” she said with a sniff. “Just feeling a bit…sentimental.”

Bending her head, she wiped at the moisture that continued in spite of her effort to gather herself together. Oh, God, what was wrong with her? she wondered. Why would a brown filly with big, sweet eyes reduce her to tears? She was losing it!

Without warning, his arm came around her shoulder and its steadying strength allowed her to lift her head and look at him. The concern on his face touched her, made her long to lay her cheek upon his broad chest and weep until she was too weak to be frightened by the past or worried about the future.

“Have you remembered something, Lass? Is it something about the horses?”

With a brief shake of her head, she forced herself to turn her gaze back on the filly. At the most, the baby horse was probably six months old and would no doubt be weaned in the near future. Her body was long, her tall legs gangly. She was bred for speed and in a couple of years those legs would stretch into a gallop so fast they would appear as little more than a blur.

How did she instinctively know all these things? How did she know about a horse’s conformation? Without even
thinking she could point out the animal’s cannon bone, or hock or withers or any other body part.

“I…don’t know, Brady. Something about the horses…When I look at them—especially this brown filly—I feel happy and sad all at the same time. It doesn’t make sense. But somehow I’m certain that I know how to ride and ride well.”

“Well, that’s good news,” he said with gentle humor. “That means you’re going to fit right in with my family. And while you’re here on the ranch you can ride to your heart’s content.”

She nodded and he squeezed her shoulders.

“We’d better get on to the house,” he suggested. “I don’t want you to overdo on your first day out of the hospital.”

Embarrassed that she’d gotten so inexplicably weepy, she straightened her spine and gave him a grateful, albeit wobbly, smile.

“Thank you, Brady, for stopping and letting me have a few minutes with the horses,” she said softly. “And for…everything you’re doing for me.”

Without warning, his hand lifted to her face and her heart jumped into a rapid thud as his forefinger slowly, gently traced the line of her cheekbone.

“I don’t want you to keep thanking me, Lass. I have my own selfish reasons for giving you a temporary home.”

Instead of the wild race it had been on, her heart geared itself to a near stop.

“Oh.” She unconsciously moistened her lips. “Um…what reasons are you talking about? Making your job easier?”

A lopsided smile twisted his lips. “My job actually has little to do with inviting you to the Diamond D. I like your company. It’s that plain and simple. And I guess you could call me a naughty boy for taking advantage of your homeless situation.”

She’d not expected anything like this to come from the deputy’s mouth and for a moment she was too stunned to make any sort of reply. “Well,” she finally whispered, then cleared her throat and tried again, “I have to admire your honesty.”

Chuckling lowly, he squeezed her shoulder. “Sorry, Lass. I’m not very good at being subtle, I guess. But don’t worry, I promise not to take any more advantages. Unless you…invite me to,” he added with a sinful little grin.

Feeling flattered and naive all at once, she drew in a deep breath. “Brady, I—”

Keep everything light, Lass. This lawman is just enjoying a little flirtation with you. That’s all.

After her long pause, he prompted, “You what?”

Plastering a playful smile on her face, she said, “I was just going to say that you probably won’t enjoy my company for long. Without a memory, I’m pretty boring.”

His eyes softened. Or did she just imagine the elusive change in the green depths?

“Let me be the judge of that,” he said, then before she could possibly decide how to respond, he turned her toward the waiting truck. “Right now, we’d better get back on the road.”

They traveled two more miles before Brady finally stopped the truck in front of a massive two-story house built of native rock and trimmed with rough cedar. Arched windows adorned the front and overlooked a deep green lawn shaded by tall pines.

A brick walkway led to a small portico covering the front entrance. At the double wooden doors fitted with brass, Brady didn’t bother knocking. He opened one and gestured for her to precede him over the threshold and into a long foyer filled with potted plants and lined with a selection of wooden, straight-backed chairs.

Instantly Lass caught the scent of lemon wax and the distant sound of piano music.