LITMIR.BIZ

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she had no choice except to accept help. She couldn’t put Markie at risk.

      “It will be all right,” he assured her.

      “Nothing ever really is,” she mused. She smiled. “I’m glad you’re getting better.” She looked at her watch. “I have to go.”

      “I’ll have the pilot phone you tonight,” he told her. “Is Rourke staying?”

      She glowered at him. “Yes. He won’t leave and I’m not strong enough to pick him up and toss him out the door.”

      He smiled. “He’s the best at what he does. Don’t argue.”

      “Okay.”

      His eyes searched hers and held them. It was like a mild electric shock. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Joceline.” His deep voice was almost purring.

      She drew in a steadying breath. Her heart was turning cartwheels. “Okay.”

      He smiled. “Thanks for coming to see about me.”

      She shifted. “It’s in my job description. Take dictation, run down leads, keep a neat filing system online and come see the boss when some idiot shoots him.” She glanced at him. “But I don’t make coffee.”

      He just shook his head. But there was a light in his dark eyes that was puzzling. She thought about it all the way home.

       CHAPTER EIGHT

      THE PLANE WAS a small jet. Joceline was surprised at the luxury inside. The plane had a cabin that was more luxurious than the best hotel she’d ever seen. It had everything from thick blankets to wrap around Markie to beverage service, and even meals.

      “We try to make sure that our bosses have everything they need when we fly.” The steward chuckled.

      “It’s very nice of Mr. Blackhawk to let us fly up,” Joceline told him. “My car would never make it to Dallas, much less Oklahoma,” she added with a laugh.

      He laughed. “I know what you mean. Until I landed this job, I considered any vehicle with less than a hundred thousand miles on it as brand-new.”

      She leaned forward. “Mine just turned over on a hundred thousand. But it’s one of those little Japanese imports and in great mechanical shape. It should go for a few more miles.”

      “I agree. They’re great cars for people on budgets. Hey, sport,” he told Markie, “you ever seen the inside of a cockpit?”

      “No,” Markie replied from inside the blanket.

      “Want to?”

      He sat up. “You mean it?”

      “I do.”

      He pushed off the blanket. “Sure!”

      “Come on, then,” the steward said with a grin, and held out his hand.

      “It’s okay?” Markie asked his mother.

      “Certainly,” she assured him, smiling.

      He went with the steward and Joceline sat back in her seat, worrying again. So much turmoil in her life, in such a short time. She was sick with fear and she couldn’t let it show because it would upset Markie. She was afraid to be in the apartment, but even more afraid to go to the Blackhawk family ranch. She’d kept Markie separate from her work all his life, away from her boss and his family. It was awkward and difficult, this trip. But she comforted herself with the knowledge that it was only for a couple of days. Surely in that short length of time, nobody would pry.

      She closed her eyes. She hadn’t been sleeping well. She kept seeing Jon’s pale face and bloodstained lips the night they’d taken him to the hospital. He could have died without ever knowing …

      She bit down hard on that thought. He could never know. She’d made a hard decision and now she had to live with it. She closed her eyes and was suddenly asleep before she knew it.

      “MA’AM?”

      She heard the voice through a fog. She’d been riding an elephant and carrying a buffalo rifle, dressed in buckskins and a floppy hat yelling “Lay on, McDuff!” to someone in the distance.

      She opened her eyes and blurted out the dream, laughing.

      “Something you ate, maybe?” the steward asked with twinkling eyes.

      “Must have been something awful,” she agreed, sitting up straight. “An elephant of all things, and carrying a Sharps buffalo rifle, .50 caliber.” She shook her head. “I guess it was that first-person account of a fight Quanah Parker was in that I’ve been reading.”

      “The one they call the fight of Adobe Walls, where Comanches led by Quanah Parker, outnumbered them something like five-to-one, got into it with a handful of buffalo hunters armed with those rifles and they fought him off?”

      She grinned. “The very one. Quanah Parker was quite a guy.”

      The steward nodded. “His mother was white, a captive who was married to the chief of that particular Comanche tribe,” he added. “The whites traded for her and took her, forcibly, back home. She tried over and over to escape and go back, but she couldn’t. She just died.”

      She shook her head. “She loved her Comanche husband. And he never remarried. People are always trying to make other people do what they want,” she said with a quiet smile. “Nothing ever changes much.”

      “Never does. We’re about to land,” the steward said. “Your son went to sleep when he came back in here,” he added, nodding toward Markie, covered up in blankets and sound asleep.

      “We’ve had a fraught couple of days,” she said without elaborating. “I don’t think he’s slept much, and I certainly haven’t.”

      “The ranch is a nice place for sleeping,” the steward told her. “It’s out in the country. No city noises, no traffic sounds. Just cattle bellowing occasionally and dogs barking.”

      “They have dogs?” Markie asked suddenly, sitting up to throw off the blankets.

      “Oh, yes,” the steward told him with a smile. “They raise champion German shepherds.”

      “Oh, dear,” Joceline said. The animals had a bad reputation for being aggressive.

      The steward laughed. “I can almost tell what you’re thinking, but these babies wouldn’t hurt a fly—not unless someone in the family was attacked. You’ll see what I mean when we get there.”

      “I wish we could have a dog,” Markie said with a pointed look at his mother.

      “Just as soon as we buy that mansion in France, I’ll buy you one,” she told him with a straight face.

      “We’re gonna live in France?” the child exclaimed. “When?”

      Joceline sighed and explained the concept of sarcasm to him.

      A big Lincoln SUV met them at the small airstrip on the ranch. It was driven by a grizzled old cowboy with bright blue eyes and a big grin under his reddish-gold and gray whiskers.

      “Miss Perry? I’m Sloane Callum. I’m sort of the chauffeur and odd job man around here. Mr. Blackhawk sent me to fetch you and the boy.”

      “Nice to meet you,” she said, shaking hands and smiling.

      “So you’re that secretary we hear so much about!” he exclaimed as he loaded her small suitcase and Markie’s duffel bag into the vehicle.

      She didn’t correct him. In his day, administrative assistants were referred to as secretaries. She smiled. “I hope what you heard wasn’t too bad.”

      He made a face. “I hate making coffee, too,” he told her as he watched her strap Markie in the backseat. “Damned shame, that, sticking kids as far away from their parents as possible

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