Undercover Rebel (The Mighty McKenzies Book 4)

by LENA DIAZ,

  “You would have joined Homeland Security and dedicated your life to helping others? I think you can let go of all that guilt, Ian. You did everything that can be done and more. You’ve done far more to help other people than most ever dream of doing. Maria—Willow—is happy and healthy. And now she can look forward to giving her baby girl the life she never had for herself. You did that, Ian. You and you alone.”

  He stared at her intently, but didn’t say anything.

  Beginning to feel uncomfortable, she forced a laugh and waved toward the barn. “I assumed your family would head up to the house. Why did they go back inside the barn?”

  “Pictures. Mom wanted to snap some of her own on her phone so she can post them on social media without having to wait for the professional photos. You’ll join us, won’t you?”

  “Of course. I’d love to.” She reached for his hand, but instead of turning the wheelchair and heading up the path, he jerked her forward and caught her in his lap, knocking her crutches to the ground. “Ian, what are you doing? I could hurt your ribs and—”

  “My ribs are wrapped so tight I can barely breathe. Trust me. There’s no way you could hurt them.”

  He pushed the button on his wheelchair and carried her forward until they were in front of the barn’s massive entrance, which was standing wide open. His family was smiling and laughing inside at the other end as his mother snapped pictures.

  Shannon smiled and looked up at Ian. “I love your family. I’m going to miss them terribly.”

  He gently cupped her face. “They love you too. So do I.”

  She blinked against the rush of tears that burned the backs of her eyes. “Don’t.”

  He frowned. “Don’t tell you I love you?”

  She twisted her hands in her lap. “It’s cruel. As soon as you’re healed, you’ll go back to work and disappear deep undercover on another case. I’ll probably never see you again.”

  He gently tilted her chin up so she would look at him. “Explain to me how it’s cruel that I tell you I’m in love with you.”

  A single tear slipped down her cheek. “You know why,” she whispered.

  He smiled tenderly. “I think so. But I need you to tell me, to be sure.”

  She shoved his hand away and stared down at her lap again. “Because I’m in love with you too.” She drew a ragged breath. “There. I said it. Okay? We love each other and it doesn’t matter.”

  “Then I wasted a lot of money on this for nothing.”

  She jerked her head up, then froze. He was holding a gorgeous pear-shaped diamond solitaire ring on a band of white gold. And the diamond wasn’t like any other diamond she’d ever seen. She drew a sharp breath and pressed her hand against her throat. “It’s...blue.”

  He laughed, his eyes sparkling. “To match your hair.” He gently brushed the tears from her cheeks. “I thought I knew what I wanted, and then I met you and realized I’d been fooling myself all these years. I’ve been running away from the very things that matter most—family, belonging and, most important, love. I love you, Shannon. You gave me back my family. You gave me acceptance, hope and love before I even knew that’s what I needed. You’re what I need. And it took almost losing you for me to understand that. Marry me, Shannon. Marry me and make me the happiest man in the world. And I swear that I’ll do everything I can to make you happy too.”

  She drew another ragged breath and shook her head. “I can’t.”

  His smile faded, and he slowly lowered his hands to his lap. “Why? We love each other.”

  “Because I don’t want you to hate me years down the road when you look back and realize you gave up the career that you’d worked so hard for, because of me. You’re an amazing special agent. You love the work you do. I couldn’t bear it if I took that away from you.”

  He cupped her face again, the ring sparkling where he’d shoved it on the end of his thumb. “What I want is you, and everything that comes with that. A home, whatever kind of house or cabin you want. And babies. I want babies with your gorgeous green eyes and jet-black hair. The blue tips can wait until their teenage years.”

  She drew a ragged breath again. “You’re being cruel again.”

  “No, I’m putting all my cards on the table. I’m going all in to get what I want. Because we both want the same things. We want a life we can be proud of, a life we can build with each other. And I want to get to know my family again. That means being here, not running off for months and years. I don’t have to be a special agent working undercover to help others. All I have to do is open my checkbook. Think about it, Shannon. If you can’t marry me for love, marry me for money. You can help me use it to build real halfway houses and help victims of human trafficking and other horrors far more than I could as a special agent.”

  She stared at him in shock, too afraid to hope. “You really want to do all that?”

  He nodded. “I do.”

  “Then the answer is no. I can’t marry you for your money.” This time she cupped his face in her hands. “But I will marry you for love.” She leaned forward and kissed him.

  He growled deep in his throat and deepened the kiss, threading his fingers through her hair and showing her just how much he loved her and wanted her.

  “Um, excuse me. Does this mean she said yes?” Adam called out.

  Shannon broke the kiss, her face flushing with heat when she saw that all of Ian’s family was watching them from inside.

  Ian held up the ring. “Well?”

  She grinned and held up her hand. He slid the ring on her finger and kissed her again.

  His family cheered and clapped.

  “Hurry up,” his father called out. “The governor only swore me in as a temporary judge until midnight. If I’m officiating, we have to do this in the next few minutes.”

  Ian drew back, laughing.

  Shannon stared at his family, who’d all suddenly lined up at the front as if they were a wedding party. And his father was standing behind the podium with a Bible on top, just like he’d done hours earlier when he’d officiated at his other sons’ weddings.

  “A surprise wedding, Ian? You planned this?”

  “Let’s just say I was really, really hoping. I didn’t want you to leave tomorrow and go back to the duplex. What do you say?” He searched her gaze. “I was banking on your love of the unconventional. But if you prefer to wait and get a white wedding dress and—”

  She pressed her fingers against his mouth. “No. This is perfect, better than anything I could ever hope for. I love you, Ian. More than you could possibly imagine. I love you, and I want to marry you right this minute.”

  “That’s good,” his father called out. “Because that’s about all we have left. Hurry!”

  Ian pressed the button on his wheelchair and zipped up the aisle. Shannon laughed as she held on to the arms of the chair to keep from falling against his chest and hurting him.

  “I do,” he said, as soon as they were in front of his father.

  Laughing, Shannon said, “I do too.”

  His father blinked and looked around, then shrugged. “Then I guess I pronounce you husband and wife. Go on. Kiss or whatever.” He rolled his eyes and closed the Bible.

  Ian’s family cheered and surrounded them as he planted a laughing, sloppy kiss against her lips.

  * * *

  Look for more books from

  Lena Diaz coming soon!

  And don’t miss the previous books in

  The Mighty McKenzies miniseries:

  Smoky Mountains Ranger

  Smokies Special Agent

  Conflicting Evidence

  Available now from Harlequin Intrigue!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from South Dakota Showdown by Nicole Helm.

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  South Dakota Showdown

  by Nicole Helm

  Chapter One

  Bonesteel, South Dakota, wasn’t even a dot on most maps, which was precisely why Jamison Wyatt enjoyed being its attached officer. Though he was officially a deputy with the Valiant County Sheriff’s Department, as attached officer his patrol focused on Bonesteel and its small number of residents.

  One of six brothers, he wasn’t the only Wyatt who acted as an officer of the law—but he was the only man who’d signed up for the job of protecting Bonesteel.

  He’d grown up in the dangerous, unforgiving world of a biker gang run by his father. The Sons of the Badlands were a cutthroat group who’d been wreaking havoc on the small communities of South Dakota—just like this one—for decades.

  Luckily, Jamison had spent the first five years of his life on his grandmother’s ranch before his mother had fully given in to Ace Wyatt and moved them into the fold of the nomadic biker gang.

  Through tenacity and grit, Jamison had held on to a belief in right and wrong that his grandmother had instilled in him in those early years. When his mother had given birth to son after son on the inside of the Sons, Jamison had known he would get them out—and he had, one by one—and escaped to their grandmother’s ranch situated at the very edge of Valiant County.

  It was Jamison’s rough childhood in the gang and the immense responsibility he’d placed on himself to get his brothers away from it that had shaped him into a man who took everything perhaps a shade too seriously. Or so his brothers said.

  Jamison had no regrets on that score. Seriousness kept people safe. He was old enough now to enjoy the relative quiet of patrolling a small town like Bonesteel. He had no desire to see lawbreaking. He’d seen enough. But he had a deep, abiding desire to make sure everything was right.

  So, it was odd to be faced with a clear B and E at just a quarter past nine at night on the nearly deserted streets. Maybe if it had been the general store or gas station, he might’ve understood. But the figure was trying to break into his small office attached to city hall.

  It was bold and ridiculous enough to be moderately amusing. Probably a drunk, he thought. Maybe the...woman—yes, it appeared to be a woman—was drunk and looking to sleep it off.

  When he did get calls, they were often alcohol related and mostly harmless, as this appeared to be.

  Since Jamison was finishing up his normal last patrol for the night, he was on foot. He walked slowly over, keeping his steps light and his body in the shadows. The streets were quiet, having long since been rolled up for the night.

  Still, the woman worked on his doorknob. If she was drunk, she was awfully steady. Either way, she didn’t look to pose much of a threat.

  He stepped out of the shadow. “Typically people who break and enter are better at picking a lock.”

  The woman stopped what she was doing—but she hadn’t jumped or shrieked or even stumbled. She just stilled. Closer now, he could see long dark hair pulled back into a braid, and an oddly familiar beat-up leather jacket that would hardly ward off the chill of a spring night in South Dakota.

  Slowly, the woman stood to her full height, back to him. He rested his hand on the butt of his gun, ready for anything, even though he didn’t feel particularly threatened by the tall, slender brunette.

  The set of her shoulders reminded him of... something he couldn’t put his finger on.

  Until she turned, slowly, to face him.

  He supposed it would have been a shock if he hadn’t known the perpetrator, but this wasn’t a local. It was someone he hadn’t laid eyes on in fifteen years. “Liza.”

  She let out the breath she’d been holding and stepped forward as if it had been days since they’d last seen each other, instead of years. “Thank God, Jamison. You don’t know how long I’ve been trying to find you.”

  He took her in. Fifteen years should have done more to change her, but she looked so much the same. Tall, scrappy, with dark, expressive eyes that had always gotten her into trouble with her father. And his own...

  Then there was her mouth, which was full and could make a grizzled sailor blush with the creative swearing it could utter.

  Once upon a time anyway. This was fifteen years later. Maybe it wasn’t half his life, but it was pretty darn close. Liza might want to act like they were old pals, but he wasn’t young and easily fooled anymore.

  “I need you to come with me,” she said, stepping forward, placing her hand on his arm as if they were more than old pals as they once had been.

  He laughed, not missing how bitter it sounded, and how it made her wince. Undeterred, she scanned the dark around them, fidgety and afraid. When her brown gaze met his, it was with fear.

  “Do you really think I’d be here if I weren’t desperate?” she asked in a tremulous whisper.

  For a second, a terrible split second, he believed in that fear and was ready to jump in to help. Then he remembered who he was dealing with. “Desperate? Or working for my father?”

  She released his arm as if it was a snake that had bitten her. She even managed to look hurt. Quite the touch.

  He’d saved her once. Secreted her out of the eagle eye of her father, who was always in league with his own.

  After managing to get his brothers out and to Grandma Pauline, it had taken some time to get himself out. In part because he wanted his father to know—to really know, once he was gone, that it was he who had gotten the others out.

  He’d been eighteen to her sixteen. They’d been friends, though he’d known she was ready and willing to be more. It had felt wrong, like taking advantage. Still, he hadn’t been able to leave her behind. Not with her father being as bad as his own. Not with all those feelings buried deep inside.

  So, it had taken longer to plan, to work out the route and figure out a time when they’d both be out of the careful watch of their fathers’ men.

  He’d done it, too. Grandma hadn’t been able to take her in, not with all those wild boys she was raising. But Duke Knight, Grandma’s neighbor, had. He and his wife had only been able to have one child of their own despite wanting more, so they’d fostered girls over the years, even adopted some.

  They would have adopted Liza. If she’d stayed.

  But she’d run off, back to the biker gang, and to everything his father ruled with an iron fist and, sometimes Jamison was quite convinced, pure evil.

  Even now he couldn’t regret it. Maybe Liza had chosen to go back, but he’d given her the chance. Her choosing to throw it away was her deal. Not his.

  “I’m not working for your father,” she finally said, vibrating with a loosely controlled anger. The same kind of fury he’d once felt himself.

  He’d stopped letting the world make him angry. It had been a hard lesson, but an accomplishment he took great pride in. Or so he had thought, at least before she’d shown up. Instead he could feel that old anger like a geyser getting ready to burst inside him.

  But he would control it. He’d built a career and a life on maintaining steady emotions. On being detached enough to get the job done, and engaged enough to care to.

  “You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t take anything a biker gang member says at face value,” he managed to utter without too much bitterness tingeing his words. “Not when so many things you said to me once upon a time were lies.” Okay, that sounded a little bitter.

  She shook her head, but she didn’t deny it. “You don’t understand.”

  “No, I don’t. And I don’t want to. Go home, Liza. Back to the life you chose.”

  “You have no idea what I chose.” She cut him off and grabbed his arm again, but this time hard. “Or why I chose it,�
� she added, looking up at him with an emotion he didn’t understand. “More important, it doesn’t matter. Do you remember Carlee Bright?”

  Jamison didn’t like to remember anything about his life in that place. His father’s camps, or the times they’d take over an entire town and drive people out. Because inflicting pain was Ace Wyatt’s currency, and he was a very rich man.

  But Jamison remembered the name. “Wasn’t she Cody’s age?” His youngest brother was nine years his junior, but it felt more like a century considering it was those nine years.

  “Yes. My dad knocked her up a few years ago.”

  “Sounds about right, but I don’t see why that concerns me. Or you, for that matter.”

  “Carlee is dead.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. If you’re looking for police help—”

  “Police help? Police help? God, Jamison, you never change. A woman is dead, her daughter witnessed it and—”

  “How am I supposed to think this isn’t a matter for law enforcement?” he interrupted, frustration getting the better of him.

  “What are the police going to do about a woman in that gang who is dead? Nothing. You and I both know it.”

  He didn’t respond. He knew the case likely wouldn’t have gotten the same kind of attention as another. Certainly not as much as someone who appeared on the grid with no gang association. But it wouldn’t be ignored.

  Liza would never believe that.

  “Is there a body?”

  “No. There’s a terrified little girl. My half sister. She told me something, Jamison, and now she’s disappeared, too. I need help, and I’m not going to get it from the inside.”

  “But you think you’ll get it from me?”

  She studied his face for the longest time before she finally smiled, if sadly. “Yeah, I do.”