A slight smile curving his mouth, Cal shut the door.

Teague couldn’t believe his luck. Sometimes the sunshine just poured down on a man, now didn’t it? That bastard Creed had driven straight to Trail Stop, of all places.

They weren’t likely to have a better opportunity than this. The hour wasn’t as late as he’d like, but most people in Trail Stop were middle-aged, at least, with a few old geezers, so it wasn’t as if they were hitting the singles bars every night and staying out until the wee hours. There were a few younger people, like the Nightingale woman, and one couple looked about the same age as her, but that was about it. He’d bet every inhabitant was at home, snug as a bug. Come to think of it, he ions betting on that—betting the success of this plan on what he knew from observing people and his skill in reading them.

“Hurry up,” he whispered into the two-way.

“I’m hurrying,” Billy whispered in return. He was tinder the bridge, putting detonators into the packages of explosives they’d stolen from a construction site some months before. Teague believed in being prepared; you just never knew when you might need to blow something to hell and back. Billy had to move carefully because the slabs of rock under the bridge were wet with spray, and slippery; one false step and he was in the swiftly moving creek, being swept toward that murderous river.

Slowly Billy made his way out from under the bridge, carefully unrolling the reel of wire in his hand. Teague could have gone with wireless detonators, but in his experience they weren’t as reliable—not to mention they could be accidentally set off by a signal from someone else. Not good. Playing out the wire in this terrain took time, time during which Creed might leave, but like almost everything else in life, using wire was a judgment call and Teague had made it.

His nephew Blake was set up at the nearest firing position, infrared scope attached to his hunting rifle. As soon as Billy had turned over the wire to Teague, he would get into position at the next firing position over.

Troy, his cousin, was up the nearest utility pole with his insulated cutters, waiting for league’s signal. Because Trail Stop was so small and so isolated, the power company and the phone company shared the poles. Troy would cut the power line first, then the phone line—and then Teague would blow the bridge.

Creed hesitated on Neenah’s porch, his fist raised to pound on her door. He was so wound up that instead of driving he’d walked to her house, which was about a hundred yards from the feed store with another house tucked between them, but the hundred yards had done nothing to ratchet down the tension coiling in him.

Only the knowledge that he would scare her half to death if he started beating on her door staved his hand. Hell, she’d probably heard him stomp across the porch with all the lightness and grace of Paul Bunyan and had run out the back door in fear for her life. He grimaced. What in hell was wrong with him? He’d spent a lifetime, two lifetimes, moving soundlessly behind enemy lines and across this damn mountain range: now all of a sudden he was stomping?

He knew what was wrong. It was the sudden, gut-wrenching knowledge that Neenah could easily have died on Wednesday—and not only was there nothing he could have done to save her, she would have died without knowing how he felt. He’d have lived the rest of his life knowing he hadn’t taken the chance and now it was too late. All the excuses he’d given himself over the years—very good excuses—suddenly seemed pretty lame. Call was right. He was a candy-ass coward.

Creed had felt fear before; every good soldier had. He’d been in situations so tense he’d given up hope of ever relaxing his sphincter again—but he’d never before been frozen into inaction.

He tried to bolster his nerve. What was the worst that could happen? Neenah could reject him, that was all.

And just the thought of that was enough to curdle his blood and make him want to run. She could reject him. She could look at him and say “No, thanks” as if she were turning down nothing more important than a stick of chewing gum. At least if he never asked, he’d never have to face the sure knowledge that she didn’t want him.

But what if she did? What if she would say yes, if only he dared ask?

Shit. Piss. Fuck. He sucked in a deep breath and knocked—gently.

A moment of silence stretched out so long he fought a deep surge of despair. Her lights were on; why wasn’t she answering the door? Maybe she’d peeked out a window while he’d been dithering there and seen who it was, and didn’t want to talk to him. Hell, why should she? He was nothing to her; he’d made damn sure of that, by giving her a wide berth for years. He’d never said anything to her other than a few pleasantries whenever he was in the feed store, which wasn’t that often.

What the hell. He knocked again.

“Just a minute,” came a faint call, and he heard the sound of approaching footsteps.

A couple of feet from the door she hesitated, and said, “Who is it?”

That was probably the first time she’d asked who it was before opening the door, at least here in Trail Slop, he thought grimly, and he hated that her sense of security had been shattered.

“Joshua Creed.”

“My goodness,” he heard her mutter to herself; then the lock clicked and she opened the door.

She’d been getting ready for bed. She wore a white nightgown and a long blue robe that she’d belted snugly around the waist. He’d never seen her wear her silvery brown hair any way except pulled back from her face and held with a scarf, which struck him as very old-fashioned, or pinned up in a knot. It was loose now, straight and sleek, falling around her face and over her shoulders.

“Is something wrong?” she asked anxiously, stepping aside so he could enter. She closed the door behind him.

“I just heard about what happened Wednesday,” he said, his tone a little rough, and he watched all expression fade right out of her face. She lowered her eyelids, closing herself off; his heart pinched as he realized Cal was right, she wasn’t handling the incident well and had no one to turn to. She’d been alone a long time, he thought, which was strange because everyone in Trail Stop thought of her as a friend. She’d been here when he’d retired from the Corps, changing little over the years. To his knowledge, she didn’t date at all. She ran the feed store, occasionally she would visit with a friend, and at night she came home alone. That was it. That was her life.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his deep voice coming out in little more than a rumble. Before he could stop himself, he reached out, gently brushing her hair back from her right temple so the dark bruise there was fully revealed.

She quivered, and he thought she might jerk back, but she didn’t. “I’m fine,” she said automatically, as if she’d already provided the same answer many times over.

“Are you?”

“Yes, of course.”

He moved closer, his hand touching her back. “Why don’t we sit down,” he suggested, urging her toward the sofa.

Two lamps were all that lit her cozy living room, so he wasn’t certain, but he thought her color warmed. “I’m sorry, I should have—” She broke off and would have veered toward a chair; with a subtle shift of his body he prevented that, steering her back toward the sofa. She sat down on the middle cushion, hard, as if her legs had suddenly gone out from under her.

Creed sat beside her, close enough that his thigh would touch hers if he shifted just a bit. He didn’t, remembering suddenly that she’d been a nun.

Did that mean she was a virgin? He broke out in a sweat, because he didn’t know. Not that he would be having sex with her tonight or anything like that, but—had any man ever touched her? Had she ever dated at all, as a teenager? If she was completely inexperienced, he didn’t want to do anything to scare her, but how in hell was he supposed to find out?