She thought she heard a helicopter, but paid little attention to the sound. She took another mare from Mike just outside the door and headed to the corral with her as he disappeared back into the barn.
Four. Four now. Eight to go.
Rafe came out later with a stallion, and she paused a moment after he handed her the lead rope. “Rafe, your lungs can’t take all that smoke—” He was coughing violently.
He grabbed a cloth from her and turned back to the opening nearly hidden by thick smoke. “Get him out of here, Maggie!”
Swearing unsteadily, she quickly led the stallion down the lane to one of the other barns and released him into a paddock. She had just started back down the lane at a run when a shout reached her and she half turned in automatic response.
“Where’s Rafe?”
In spite of her fear and anxiety Maggie was a woman—and no woman made of anything other than stone could have failed to react as she reacted. It was past dawn now, and she could see the stranger’s face clearly. It was a face utterly beautiful in its masculine perfection, a heart-stopping, mind-boggling face—and her mind boggled. For an eternal instant she could only stare at him in astonishment. He had thick, wavy black hair and clear blue eyes, and not even his grimly set expression could detract from his beauty.
“Where’s Rafe?” he repeated impatiently, either uncaring or accustomed to mindless stares from women.
Maggie came to herself with a start. “In the barn,” she answered, heading back down the lane quickly with the stranger racing beside her. She didn’t know who he was and didn’t particularly care once the shock of him had worn off. Her entire attention was focused on the raging inferno that was a death trap for men and horses.
They reached the door just as Rafe handed over another mare to waiting hands. His face was white beneath the soot and grime, his eyes red-rimmed and watering, and he was coughing so hard, he could barely stand.
The stranger with Maggie grabbed the cloth from Rafe’s hand and snapped at her, “Keep him out here!”
“How the hell am I supposed to do that?” she snapped right back. “He’s bigger than I am!”
“I’ll knock him down,” the stranger growled, “and you can sit on him!”
But he plunged toward the barn with no more than a glare toward Rafe.
“York!” Rafe would have dived right back into the barn, but Maggie put both hands against his chest and shoved him away as the stranger disappeared through the door.
“Rafe, you can’t go back in there!”
“Neither can York, dammit!”
Maggie knew who the stranger was now, and a detached part of her mind thought what a wonderful way she’d chosen to meet Rafe’s brother. First she’d stared at him like a moron, then she’d yelled at him. Wonderful.
She forced Rafe to back away, aided by the fact that he was coughing too hard to struggle very much. “York can take care of himself,” she said. “And if you go back in there, he’ll have to carry you out!” She glanced across the lane at the corral, quickly counting. Eight horses were now safe; four to go. She thought she saw someone moving within the corral, but assumed one of the hands was simply remaining there to soothe the terrified horses, and dismissed the matter from her mind.
The sun was rising, adding its orange glow to the hellish scene surrounding barn four. The flaming barn was still silhouetted against the sky, and ominous groaning and cracking sounds now came from within. Maggie could see the men still battling with hoses, and there were other men working to smother the sparks jumping from the building and onto the dry patches of grass nearby.
Horses were still screaming in fright, and those in barns three and five were close enough to be panicked by the smoke and the fury of sound all around them.
Maggie counted again. Three to go.
York emerged with a mare, and someone else pushed past him to vanish into the smoking hell. He paused, coughing, then directed a quick question at Rafe.
“Burke here?”
Rafe gestured toward the other end of the barn, where another tall, dark-haired man was helping battle the fire. “Got here a few minutes ago. York, stay the hell out of there!” He grabbed his brother’s arm.
“There are a couple more horses—”
“And at least three of my people are in there getting them out,” Rafe interrupted roughly, pulling his brother away from the burning barn.
Maggie was dimly aware that time had somehow slowed, aware that less than an hour had passed since the alarm had awakened them so violently. In spite of the hurried movements around her, she had the eerie sensation of dragging time. Even her heart seemed to be pounding in an altered, slower rhythm.
And the sound she heard then, a peculiar echoing cra-aack, puzzled her momentarily. It came from behind them, she realized, from the corral, and there was something familiar about the sound.
“Down!” York snapped, then he was bending low and running toward the other end of the barn, where men were diving for the ground.
Rafe paused only to push Maggie to the ground with a hurried command to stay there before following his brother in a crouching run.
She knew, then, and astonishment washed over her. Who would be shooting at them? Good Lord! Something right out of the movies! It didn’t happen in real life, Maggie tried to tell herself—except that it was happening.
Whoever it was was shooting steadily, forcing everyone to take cover or at least lie flat on the ground, and two of the Delaney brothers were racing toward the third—who, Maggie realized in horror, was the gunman’s target. Her heart clenched in fear, then lurched sickeningly when one of the tall, dark-haired men stumbled and fell, and she was up in an instant to race forward.
Through the smoke and shimmering heat of the blazing barn, it was almost impossible to tell which brother had been shot, and Maggie was nearly crazy with the fear that it was Rafe. Someone had found a rifle in one of the trucks and was returning the fire, either deliberately or accidently shooting wide. Maggie hoped that it was the former, since there were horses in that corral, but she hardly wasted a thought on the question.
She found the three Delaneys sheltered from the gunfire behind a parked truck, and was jerked down by Rafe instantly.
“Dammit, Maggie, I told you to stay down!” He didn’t waste further breath raging at her, since he was somewhat occupied in tying a ragged bandage torn from his shirt around York’s upper left arm.
Maggie told her heart to quit pounding since all the brothers were reasonably safe. York’s wound seemed to be fairly minor. He was leaning against the truck while Rafe worked on his arm and seemed apparently more disgusted than hurt at his wound. He was also swearing steadily in a low voice and being admirably creative about it. She listened with a fascination born out of shock and near-hysteria. He hadn’t, she thought with respect, repeated himself once.
Realizing that the giggle in her throat was perfectly natural under the circumstances, Maggie nonetheless dragged her attention from York’s colorful curses and concentrated on Rafe’s savage voice.
“Will you take the damned threats seriously now?” he demanded of his eldest brother. “Hell, I wondered why the whole system was out of commission. Now we know!”
“Now we know.” Burke Delaney’s voice was level, his striking green eyes filled with icy anger as he glanced in the direction of the sniper.
Maggie studied this brother’s face with utter captivation, a very sane and logical part of her mind telling her that she’d better concentrate on something—anything—or else she’d fly into a million pieces.
Burke seemed as good a focus as any.
The oldest Delaney brother was a bit more rugged than the other two, a tough man with more than a hint of ruthlessness in his strong face. That might of course, Maggie decided fairly, be due to their present circumstances, but she didn’t think so.
Apart, any one of the brothers would have looked formidable. Together, they literally shouted a kind of raw strength and power that
was rare in these reasonably civilized times. Maggie was enchanted by them, her gaze moving from one to the other wonderingly. She no longer heard gunfire, and blinked in surprise when a hand waved suddenly in front of her face.
“Maggie?”
She looked at Rafe and smiled. “I’m fine,” she said brightly. She sat, perfectly calm, with her legs folded and her hands lying placidly in her lap, and wondered why he was looking at her so strangely.
Rafe seemed to be fighting a grin. “Are you?” He glanced at his brothers, both of whom were also gazing at Maggie. “Shamrock’s newest trainer, Maggie O’Riley,” he said.
Before he could offer to introduce the brothers, she nodded at them cheerfully. “And you’re the other two Delaneys. I yelled at York, and Burke’s the mean-looking one.” She blinked and rubbed her forehead fretfully. “I didn’t say that,” she murmured.
“She’s had a rough morning,” Rafe explained to his laughing brothers, chuckling himself.
“Well, she did yell at me,” York said gravely. “And Burke does look mean. It must be the light or something, but he definitely looks mean.”
Seemingly amused, Burke said dryly, “I’ve been called worse.”
“Haven’t we all?” York sighed, then winced as he apparently disturbed his wounded arm. “Hell. Has that bastard stopped shooting?”
Rafe peered cautiously around the truck’s bumper. “From the looks of it, yes. I can see Tom over by the corral, and a couple of others. The sniper must have run for the river.”
“There’s no way we’ll catch him now,” Burke said decisively, then added in a hard voice, “but he won’t get away for good.”
Maggie watched, still suspended in that peculiar fascination, while Rafe got up, and he and Burke helped York to his feet.
“Come on, brother,” he said. “Let’s get you to the vet.”
“The what?”
“Sorry. Only doctor on the place, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, great! That’s two I owe you, little brother,” York said meaningfully.
“Two? What do you—” Rafe broke off abruptly, looking as if he wished he’d kept his mouth shut.
“Kathleen,” York said in a very gentle voice.
It was Rafe’s turn to wince. “Why don’t we talk about that later,” he suggested.
“We will,” York said, amiable now. “I want the use of both arms when we talk about that.”
“Don’t quarrel, kids,” Burke said. “We still have a burning barn to deal with.”
Maggie rose to her feet, watching the two unhurt brothers flanking the wounded one as they walked over to where Dr. Woods was treating a few minor injuries from the back of his well-equipped pickup truck. She frowned a little, counting carefully in her mind, but not quite certain what she was counting. Except that the number she came up with was eleven, and that was wrong somehow. Then Russell appeared at her side, gasping for breath, his grimy face exhausted.
“Maggie…we tried…but he knocked Lisa down…and I had to get her out of there….The loft’s about to go….”
Icy fear and horror yanked Maggie back from the edge of hysteria, and she stared at him. “My God,” she whispered. “Twelve. It should have been twelve!” And she raced toward the flaming pyre that still held a horse trapped.
“Maggie!”
Rafe heard the shout and turned instantly, his eyes finding her running form silhouetted against the burning barn. And then he saw Russell’s ashen face, and heard him shout words that stopped his heart.
“Rafe, she’s going in after Warlock!”
With a harsh sound Rafe broke the sudden grip of Burke’s hand and whirled back to the barn. He could see that the loft was already caving in, beams falling with groaning crashes inside, and he knew with a horrible certainty that Maggie would never make it out of there alive.
He ran.
Chapter 8
Rafe nearly hit his brother when Burke stopped him just short of the ragged opening in the barn door, and probably would have except that he found his arms suddenly tangled in the soaking weight of a horse blanket. He realized without thought that someone had managed to get some of the tack and equipment out, and that Burke had hurriedly wet down one of the blankets. Two blankets, he thought dimly as he saw his brother drape one around his own shoulders.
“Keep it over your head,” Burke ordered tersely. “And for God’s sake watch out for falling beams!”
A part of Rafe’s mind told him that Burke had no business going into the burning barn, but he didn’t waste time arguing when he knew he’d lose. Pulling the dripping blanket around him, he lurched through the opening—and into Purgatory.
This end of the barn had already partially caved in, the stables completely in flames and nothing overhead except the burning skeleton of the roof. The smoke was a red-lit, living thing, swirling with currents caused by the flames. It was hellishly thick and brought instant agony to already tortured eyes and lungs.
Rafe picked his way through the rubble of burning debris cluttering the hall, heading for the far end near the training ring where Warlock was stabled. He heard a beam collapse to his right with a grinding roar and felt the added heat it caused. He couldn’t see even a foot in front of him, and nearly ran full force into a stumbling, smoke-blinded Maggie leading a blindfolded black stallion.
Another beam crashed to the ground just behind the horse as Rafe grabbed Maggie and swiftly enclosed her within his rapidly drying blanket. He swore in hoarse gasps when he felt the coughs racking her slender body.
“Get her out of here!” Burke shouted. “I’ll bring the horse.” He had to yank the lead rope from Maggie’s fierce grip, but the trembling horse followed him as obediently as he’d followed the woman.
They were barely out into the sunlight when there was an ungodly roar behind them, and the entire roof caved in.
—
Maggie didn’t know how much time had passed before she became aware of a masklike something over her face and felt the blessed relief of pure oxygen filling her aching lungs. She realized vaguely that the firemen had arrived, too late for the barn but not too late to offer aid.
Breathing happily, she heard voices.
“The next time you start to slug me, brother, I’ll knock you flat on your pride.”
That, she decided thoughtfully, was Burke. Then she heard York’s voice.
“I don’t know, Burke. I’ll bet Old Shamus himself never looked half so wild when he was fighting Apaches. Rafe might have knocked all your ‘science’ right down your throat.”
“No way,” Burke responded firmly.
Then she heard Rafe’s voice, more hoarse than normal but cheerful for all of that.
“I’ll plead temporary insanity—and can we please drop it? I didn’t hit anybody, after all.”
“You nearly hit the fireman when he took her away from you,” Burke said in a musing voice. “York had to sit on you.”
“He did not!” Rafe said indignantly. “He just shoved me and I tripped!”
Maggie, listening to this somewhat puzzling dialogue, suddenly remembered something and sat up with a cry of fear. She pushed the mask off her face, finding herself the focus of a great deal of attention. There were people sprawled all around her on the ground suffering from smoke inhalation, burns, and exhaustion, while firemen moved about and around the still-burning barn.
“Warlock?” she gasped.
“Oh, he’s fine.” Rafe was staring at her, something she’d never seen before in his eyes. Something dangerous. “You, however, are in imminent danger of being strangled.”
Rather hastily reclaiming her mask, Maggie breathed methodically and stared at him over the plastic rim. It would be safer, she decided, to remain a pathetic victim of the fire a while longer.
Except that Rafe obviously wasn’t buying it.
“Just as soon as I recover from this godawful morning,” he told her politely, ignoring the interested eavesdroppers all around them, “you and I are going to have a lo
ng talk, Maggie.”
“That should be interesting,” York murmured.
Rafe gave him a look. “You aren’t invited.”
Maggie felt giggles overtaking her, and tried desperately to restrain them. There was nothing, of course, funny about the aftermath of a cruel fire. It was just that the three overpowering Delaney men were gazing at her and their faces were all grimed with smoke and York looked peculiar with one sleeve of his khaki shirt ripped away and a bandage around his upper arm and all of them seemed in a ridiculously comical mood or maybe it was her mood that was ridiculous….
Trying to think of something else, she pulled the mask aside to direct a question at Rafe. “Did anyone report the—”
“I think we should all go get cleaned up,” he interrupted her briskly, getting to his feet. He lifted a superior brow at York as that brother rose as well. “And since Shamrock boasts several bathrooms, no one will have to stand in line or draw straws for the shower.”
“I hate a braggart, don’t you?” York asked the eldest brother.
“Insufferable,” Burke agreed solemnly.
Maggie was still wondering where she’d lost track of the conversation when Rafe bent down and calmly picked her up. She handed the oxygen mask to a fireman who was fighting a grin, then stared at Rafe. “I can walk,” she told him, feeling honor-bound to protest.
“I doubt that.”
She didn’t really absorb his comment, being too busy in frowning over his shoulder. “Someone should clean up the mess,” she said, outraged by the smoldering clutter behind him.
All three men turned to stare at the ruin of barn four. Then they looked at each other. Then they looked at Maggie.
“Well,” she murmured, feeling that her comment had been somehow inappropriate.
Rafe sighed and started up the lane toward the house, carrying his burden with no appearance of strain. “I have never,” he said, directing the comment to both his brothers impartially, “seen her quite like this.”