Page 38 of River Legacy (Powder River #5)

V ictoria surfaced with a start to find herself bound and her mouth covered with duct tape in the pas senger seat of a vehicle racing down a highway.

Her gaze flew to the driver. Claude, she thought with a groan as everything came back.

Ryder! She thought her heart would burst at the thought that Claude had killed him.

“Are you demented?” she tried to yell, but it came out a muffled groan behind the duct tape covering her mouth. “My father will have you thrown in prison.” Again her words were more like muffled groans.

Claude let out a curse, reached over and ripped the tape from her mouth.

She let out a cry of pain and saw him grin.

She hadn’t been afraid until that moment when he’d struck Ryder and taken her captive and she’d awakened bound and gagged.

She’d always thought Claude was harmless.

Now she saw that he wanted her to suffer.

She felt a moment of regret for the way she’d treated him and said as much.

He laughed. “Easy for you to say now.”

“Was Ryder all right when we left the ranch?” she asked, terrified of what he might say since he could have gone back and finished the job before they left.

Claude shrugged. “I didn’t check.”

She rode for a few moments in silence as she tried to assure herself that Ryder was strong.

He would be all right. He had to be. Her heart lunged in her chest at the thought that he might die.

She’d never felt about anyone the way she did Ryder.

It had happened so quickly, yet she knew this was the first time she’d been in love, and the last. She’d always laughed about her friends wanting to find their so-called soul mates.

Whatever, she used to think. But in her heart, she knew that was exactly what Ryder was.

He was her soul mate, and she his. It was funny how Montana had played a part in it, she thought.

This place she thought she wouldn’t like had seduced her.

Ryder’s love for this land and ranching had in turn drawn her even closer to him as if her fate was always going to lead her here.

Ryder had to be all right. Claude couldn’t have killed him. If her hands had been free, she would have attacked him. “Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“To the airport. We’re flying back to Dallas.”

She studied him for a moment. “Did my father tell you to do this?”

“Your father doesn’t tell me what to do anymore.”

Still trying to assess what was going on here, she asked, “Did he fire you?”

Claude let out a bark of a laugh. “He just isn’t calling the shots anymore. I am.”

Victoria really doubted that, unless her father was dead. “Where is Wen?”

“Last I saw him he was going to get a geologist to inspect his new property...” He glanced over at her. “Stafford Ranch. Before he begins drilling.”

That sounded like her father. “Does he know that we’re flying back to Dallas?”

He nodded. “I called him as I drove out of Powder Crossing. Sent him a photo of you all tied up and unconscious. Told him I’d meet him at the airport because he’s coming with us.”

She stared at him. Earlier she’d been afraid because Claude had seemed so different.

Clearly, he’d reached the end of his patience with her—and her father.

But if he thought this was going to work, he’d completely gone off the rails.

“My father won’t just show up at the airport, and he certainly isn’t going to fly to Dallas with us unless he’s ready to do so,” Victoria said as he drove.

“He’ll tell his pilot not to fly us at all.

You’re going to get to the airport and only be disappointed. ”

“I’ve been disappointed from the moment I met you and signed that contract to work for your father. He dangled you in front of me like a prize if I went to work for him. What a fool I was.” He shook his head angrily. “I will fly home in the company jet because you’re going with me no matter what.”

Victoria sighed, shaking her head. “Do you really not know how far my father will go? He won’t do what you want. But he will make you pay.”

“He will when he realizes that I not only have you and that, unless he comes to the airport and agrees to leave with us, I will kill you.”

She couldn’t help being skeptical. “I don’t think you’re a killer, Claude.”

He shot her a look, then he pulled the gun from his pocket. “I wouldn’t bet on that, princess.”

“You overestimate his love for me. He loves money and power a hundred times over what he feels for me. He was trying to marry me off to you. Think about it. Does that sound like a man who loves his daughter?”

“Insult me again and I’ll put the duct tape back on your mouth,” Claude said through gritted teeth as he pocketed the gun. “I know what I’m doing. He’ll show up. Your blood on his hands would be bad for business.”

They were almost to Billings when he pulled off in a wide spot.

She watched him get out and make three calls.

She couldn’t imagine who he was calling.

She hoped her father didn’t take the bait.

He knew Claude. She also knew her father.

He’d call Claude’s bluff, and this time, he might be making a mistake that could get them all killed.

But as she watched Claude finish the last call, she saw that he was smiling as he headed back toward the SUV. What scared her was that he seemed... desperate, and way too sure of himself. She feared that she and her father had pushed the man too far.

“Any luck?” she asked as he slid behind the wheel and started the engine to pull back on the road.

He smiled over at her, and for a minute she didn’t think he would answer. His smile was almost more frightening than his snarl. “You, your father and I are flying to Dallas this evening. The pilot is making the arrangements as we speak.”

Claude was too happy. She had a bad thought. “My father’s pilot?”

“He won’t be flying with us. Maybe you hadn’t heard, but your father fired his bodyguards.

I assume you knew that they were both former pilots Wen hired as backups should his pilot be indisposed in some way.

JJ Gibson is flying us. Your father used to make me call them with their orders for the week, so I had their phone numbers.

JJ was still in Billings and happy to have a ride home. ”

She shook her head. “Claude, this can’t end well. You have to know that my father will—”

“Bury me. I know, he’s told me that numerous times.

It’s up to him what he decides to do, but he’d be smart to put a million dollars in my offshore account before we land in Dallas.

Otherwise...” His gaze held hers for a few seconds, long enough that she could see how much he hated her.

She couldn’t even blame him. “Otherwise, he’ll never see his princess again.

” He reached over and turned up the music, giving her a headache.

There was no way her father would give Claude a million dollars.

As she watched him attempting to sing along with the rock music, she had a bad feeling that this wasn’t even about the money.

This was about vengeance. It was why her father was rich and not behind bars.

He’d never let emotion cost him any money.

S heriff Stuart Layton had just walked into his office when he got the call.

“I think something has happened to CJ,” Charlotte Stafford told him. “I’m worried about my son. ”

“The son you didn’t want me to arrest for stealing your ranch,” Stuart said.

“That is hearsay,” she said indignantly.

“I saw him yesterday out at Treyton McKenna’s place,” the sheriff said. “I did as you asked, not taking either him or Treyton in for questioning. I only confiscated Treyton’s .22 rifle to check against the slug taken out of your son Brand’s shoulder. The ballistics didn’t match.”

“I doubted he would use his own rifle,” she said. “I have a bad feeling that CJ is still out there.”

That catch in her throat caught his attention, as well as her words. “A bad feeling.” He swore. He’d known when she’d contacted him that she was up to something. “I have no idea what’s going on, but I don’t like it, Mrs. Stafford.”

“Don’t Mrs. Stafford me, Stuart. I’ve known you since you were knee-high to a badger. I’m worried. Will you drive out and check or not?”

He sighed, worried about what he was going to find. “I’ll head out there now and call you if I find him.”

“Thank you, Stuart.” Her voice broke again before she could hang up.

Swearing, he headed for the door. Stuart drove toward Treyton’s place in the badlands outside of Powder Crossing, admitting he had a chip on his shoulder when it came to CJ Stafford and Treyton McKenna.

While Stuart had been raised by his father, the local sheriff, lived in a small house in town and had a mother who’d run away, CJ and Treyton were spoiled-rotten ranch kids.

Both had never wanted for anything as the eldest in their ranch families.

CJ even more than Treyton had no respect for the law.

Worse, they’d never had any respect for him.

After he’d taken over his father’s job as sheriff, he’d had to deal with both of them.

Arresting CJ and putting him behind bars had been a highlight.

Unfortunately, and without surprise, his mother had gotten him out, and trouble had soon followed—just as he’d known it would.

As he turned down the dirt road leading back into Treyton’s property, he found himself slowing to pull out his shotgun.

He had no idea what he was walking into, but his instincts told him it was going to be bad.

As far as he knew the two hadn’t started up their meth lab and human-trafficking business again, but one never knew with these two, he thought as he topped the hill.

The first thing he saw was CJ’s SUV parked where it had been before.

The sound of his patrol vehicle’s engine approaching sent a flock of carrion birds scattering across the barren yard like a scene from a scary movie.

That was when he saw what was on the ground.