A Little Time in Texas by Joan Johnston Read Free Book Online

shifted his flashlight to expose another opening in the rock “—that’s the other tunnel I mentioned to you.”
    Angel hadn’t noticed the sound of running water before, but it was clear to her now. “Do you have any suggestions how we do this?”
    “I go first. You follow me. I decide whether we keep going or turn back.”
    “All right. Let’s go.”
    Dallas hadn’t expected her to agree so readily, but he was glad she hadn’t argued. He had enough bad feelings about doing this. He didn’t like the idea of heading into the dark in ankle-deep water with nothing more than a couple of flashlights to show the way.
    The water was cold, but it stayed shallow for the first half hour. There was a slight current, but hardly enough to cause a ripple. Angel was nervous; the flashlights didn’t provide quite enough light to make her comfortable in the dark. She eased her fear by talking, asking Dallas questions.
    “Why did you become a Texas Ranger?”
    “The men in my family have been lawmen for generations.”
    “What if you’d wanted to do something else?”
    “I didn’t.”
    “What happened to your mother?”
    “She just up and left one day.”
    “How awful for you. How old were you when it happened?”
    “Seventeen.”
    “Why did she leave?”
    “Don’t you ever get tired of asking questions?” Dallas asked in exasperation.
    “No. Why did she leave?”
    “You’d have to ask her that.”
    “Belinda and I were just kids, babies almost, when we ended up in an orphanage and—”
    “Who’s Belinda?”
    “Belinda is—” Angel swallowed hard “—she was my sister.”
    Dallas stopped and turned back to shine his flashlight on Angel’s face. Her features looked grim in the stark light. “I thought you said you didn’t have any family.”
    “I don’t. Belinda’s dead. She was shot.”
    “Shot!”
    “There was a bank robbery in San Antonio a week ago. She happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Angel tried shrugging away the tremendous anger she felt at the injustice of it all. For Belinda to have survived everything they had lived through during the war, only to be killed in a bank robbery, seemed a cruel fate.
    “Does her death have anything to do with why you were on your way to San Antonio?” Dallas asked.
    “What if it does?”
    “Her funeral?”
    “Too late for that.”
    “What then?” Dallas asked.
    “It’s none of your business.”
    Dallas stared at Angel. The hard set of her jaw, the fierce look in her blue eyes, made him want to shake the truth out of her. She was heading into trouble. He knew it as sure as he knew cactus had thorns.
    He turned and started away again, moving fast, causing Angel to have to run to keep up with him.
    “Slow down,” she cried. “I—”
    All of a sudden Dallas stopped and turned and caught hold of her arms. “There was no bank robbery in San Antonio a week ago,” he said.
    “Maybe not in 1992,” she said bitterly. “There was in 1864.”
    “Why don’t you give up this make-believe—”
    “It’s not pretend! It’s real!” Angel retorted in frustration. “I know it sounds farfetched. I wouldn’t believe it myself, except I can’t argue with these—these gadgets of yours.” She waved the flashlight at him. “You don’t have to believe me. Just get me back where I was. That’s all I ask. The rest will take care of itself.”
    “And if you can’t get back?”
    “I’d rather wait to worry about that until I have to,” she said.
    “Trouble. Nothing but trouble,” Dallas muttered.
    Angel arched a brow. “Look who’s talking.”
    He turned on his heel and stalked off. She followed him. He walked slower, at least slow enough that she didn’t have to run. But the water got deeper, first to Angel’s calves, then to her knees.
    “Let me know if you start to get chilled,” Dallas said.
    “I’m fine.”
    “If this gets any deeper, I think we’ll have to turn back. I—”
    Angel saw the light at the same time