Opening his desk drawer, he reached inside to withdraw the crushed red velvet box that contained Honor’s gift and slid it into the inside pocket of his jacket, grinning the whole time. He knew she was going to complain about the fact that he’d gotten her a gift, but he couldn’t help it. Whether she understood it or not yet, she belonged to him, and as long as he was breathing, he’d try to spoil her when he could get away with it. Valentine’s Day was definitely a holiday where gifts were acceptable, and not even Honor would convince him differently.
~~**~~
“Alright, Deputy Lindsey, you’ve got command for the remainder of the day,” Zeke called to his second in charge as he stood from his desk. “I’m about to head over to Hooks & Books and then I’m out for the rest of the afternoon. If there are any problems, call me…but do me a favor and try real hard to not have any, okay?” he requested with a grin.
“Gotcha, boss,” the older man declared with a knowing grin. “I heard you on the phone earlier. Reservations at The Block, huh? You’re pullin’ out all the stops for Miss Honor this year,” he noted, lifting a hand to scratch his graying beard.
Zeke nodded, unwilling to pretend that he wasn’t actively pursuing the woman he loved. It didn’t really matter anyway. Unless you were blind, deaf, AND mute, if a body lived in Paradise, a person knew how he felt about his girl. “She deserves it,” he offered the other man with a shrug. “Plus, I’m in the mood for a good, juicy steak and as much as I love Honor’s restaurant, that’s just not something she has on the menu.”
His cell phone rang on the corner of his desk as he was pulling his gun from his desk drawer and sliding it into his holster. Glancing at the screen and seeing that it was Honor, he answered quickly. “Hey, Kitten,” he greeted her. “I’m running a few—“
“Sorry, sugar, but we’re gonna have to stop your sinfully sexy ass from doing that. And you’re gonna need to put that phone down real nice and slow,” Zeke heard an unfamiliar voice order.
“Honor?” Zeke barked, his eyebrows furrowing as he gripped the phone and listened, trying to distinguish what was going on. “Honor, answer me, damn it!” he demanded as he heard a phone ringing outside his office. Hearing cursing outside in the common area, Zeke stomped toward his office door, holding his cell phone away from his ear. “What’s going on out here?” he snarled at one of the young cops standing outside his door.
“Sir, we’ve got calls of a disturbance at that new store, Hooks & Books. Reports of two women entering the premises with guns. The two calls we’ve gotten say that they’ve taken the store hostage. Dispatch has already rolled black and whites. It’s gotta be a mistake, right?”
“Shit,” Zeke swore, pressing the phone back to his ear.
“I want to concentrate on the real reason that we came up here to the back of beyond,” Zeke could hear a women sneer. “Get over here and gag him! And if you try anything funny at ALL, Rhythm, I’ll put a bullet in you,” he listened to the faceless woman threaten.
Zeke closed his eyes at that. “Fuck,” he ground out.
“Uh, Boss?”
Deputy Lindsey had joined the younger cop outside his doorway and both men were staring at him, looking for guidance. “Get every unit we’ve got over to Hooks & Books. Nobody makes a move until I get there. Tell ‘em to go in quiet. No lights. No sirens. The customers inside the store have been taken hostage, and MY woman is among those hostages. I mean it, you tell everybody to stand down and access until I arrive,” Zeke ordered as he rushed toward the door. The station was only a couple of minutes away from Melody’s store. “And call Slade Cansler. Tell him I’m gonna need his help and where I am.”
“Slade Cansler, the former Seal that lives up in that shack at Miller’s Peak, Slade Cansler?” Deputy Lindsey called as Zeke raced toward his SUV.
“He’s a former Seal and the McKinnon girls’ cousin. Ice is in the store with the rest of the hostages. I can hear his voice in the background. And since my brother’s out of commission, if I need a sharpshooter, Slade’s gonna be my next best bet. Tell him to move his ass double time,” Zeke ordered, mentally calculating it would take Slade at least ten minutes to get into town and get positioned. Ripping open the door of his vehicle, he climbed behind the wheel and held the cell to his ear with his shoulder as he shifted the SUV into drive. “Honor, babe? Can you hear my voice?”
He drove with heart thumping down the mostly empty downtown streets of Paradise, his gut clenching painfully as he pressed the phone harder to his ear, trying desperately to pick up any scrap of conversation. The idea that his woman had stumbled his way into senseless danger made him want to put his fist through somebody’s head. Preferably, whatever idiot was holding a gun on her. If his gut was right – and his gut was seldom anything but – this all revolved around Melody’s ex-asshat of a fiancé. And if that son of a bitch got Honor or any of his other extended family hurt, he’d take the bastard apart piece by motherfucking piece. “Honor? C’mon, baby…just say a couple of words let me know that you’re okay,” he begged into the phone, throwing on his break when a teenager decided to bolt across the street in front of him.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t the sound of Honor’s sweetly modulated voice he heard in his earpiece. It was his brother’s agitated tone instead.
“Woman, if you draw those two crazies attention over here I will personally feed every last pair of those fancy ass shoes you love so much to my Rottweiler,” he heard his brother threaten on a low rumble. And it didn’t take rocket science to figure out who the recipient to that threat was. For some reason, Ice and Maggie Winstead got on like cats and dogs, each one rubbing the other the wrong way.
Silently praying that for once Maggie would keep her cool, Ice couldn’t help but chuckle when he heard Maggie hiss back at him, “Like hell you will! Are you feeling up my ass, you horny hillbilly? Now, of all times!”
“Stay still,” he heard his brother growl back at the woman, his tone a warning.
Like a lightning strike out of the blue, it dawned on Zeke what Ice was doing and his smile widened. For the first time, he was thrilled to know that Maggie Winstead was always locked and loaded. And unless he missed his guess, Ice would be trying to get his hands on that gun.
Reaching the perimeter that his deputies had set up around the store, Zeke quickly pulled his SUV to the side of the road and climbed out, hurrying toward his waiting officers. As he’d ordered, they were surveying the scene without approaching. Looking across the street, Zeke could see bodies inside the store, but nothing clear through his naked eye. “Update,” he clipped to his subordinates as he saw Deputy Hightower running up the street on his left. Jerking his head toward the younger man, Zeke commanded, “Please tell me that there’s a good reason that you’re out here instead of inside with the woman you’re supposed to be guarding, Hightower!”
Hanging his head in defeat, Deputy Hightower shook his head. “She sent me back to the car for her sweater, sir. She said she was cold,” the man almost whimpered holding up the pale pink sweater in one hand.
Shaking his head as he fought a howl, he muttered, “Of course she was.” Looking at the other man again, Zeke growled, “You’re lucky that she’s still in one piece, boy. If anything happens to her in there, I’m gonna skin your ass alive. I’m only lettin’ you live now because I’ve got more important chores to do and because Honor would be pissed if I ended you. For some reason, you’re the only deputy she’ll let near her without throwing up a fuss. I’m guessing it’s because she’s got you wrapped around her little finger. That changes today, Hightower.”
“Understood, Sheriff.”
“Take position on the west corner of 2nd Avenue,” he ordered Honor’s former guard. “We’ll address whatever issues we have tomorrow after this is over,” he informed the other guy before turning his attention to the other cops present. “What do you have?” he questioned the nearest one.
“Sheriff,” one of the other officers greeted him gravely. “It looks like we’
ve got two armed women, both possessing at least one firearm each, holding at least twenty individuals hostage. There could be more. Mostly women. No children that we can see. Of the hostages, we were able to identify your brother and the McKinnon sisters and aunt. We’ve got two units in the back alley behind the store in question, a unit on the opposite side of the street, and officers taking positions on the rooftops opposite the street. Dispatch just radioed that Slade Cansler will arrive shortly. Would you like to take a look, sir?” the young officer asked, offering Zeke the high powered binoculars.
Quickly grabbing the binoculars, Zeke raised them to his eyes as he still held the cell between his cheek and shoulder, listening. Adjusting the lenses, he quickly zoned in on where Honor stood, flanked by Ice on one side and her Aunt Orla on the other. “Holy hell, is that crazy old bird reaching for a candy bar?” he muttered, watching as Honor yanked the elderly woman’s arm and whispered something in her ear.
“Looks that way, sir,” one of the other cops murmured as he, too, stood looking through a pair of binoculars.
Zeke frowned as the radio on his belt squawked and the dispatcher’s voice alerted him that Honor’s cousin was on scene. Glancing between the two young cops that didn’t look much older than the early twenties, Zeke directed, “Alright, boys. We’re gonna hold positions until I say otherwise. I’m gonna get our shooter into place on the roof. Once he’s squared away we can see what can be done about getting those folks out of there. Radio me if the situation inside changes. Nobody – and I mean NOBODY gets trigger happy without my direct order. Get on your radio and let the rest of the team know my orders as well. Earcoms in, but silent for now, boys.” Zeke quickly pushed his tiny earpiece into place as he turned and moved to where Slade stood beside his pickup truck.
“Who the fuck does he have in there, Zeke? The dipshits that called me wouldn’t say,” Slade asked harshly as he began to stomp toward Zeke, his rifle hanging from a belt over his shoulder.
Eyeing the other man, Zeke noted that today he was dressed in a torn and dirty black sleeveless tee shirt and a pair of torn and dusty faded jeans. His light brown hair looked unwashed and windblown and his eyes were slightly bloodshot. Frowning, Zeke growled, “You sober, Slade? Man, I can’t have you involved if you’ve been in the bottle again no matter how good a shot you are.”
Slade nodded. “You got lucky. I’m sober. I hadn’t started drinking yet today. I wasn’t even at home. I was still at the Potts’ construction site,” he returned, mentioning the housing area Logan Potts was building just north of town. It’s the site his brother Ice had been working, too.
Zeke nodded. “To answer your earlier question, most of your family is in there including, but not limited to your Aunt Orla and Honor. Good news is that Ice is in there, too, and there’s a good chance he’s carrying.”
“How many targets?” Slade questioned bluntly, the muscle flexing in his jaw the only indication that he was the least bit affected by what Zeke said to him.
“Two. Both women,” Zeke answered flatly.
“Women?” Slade echoed in disbelief.
“I’ve got an open line into the store,” Zeke quickly began to explain, briefly lifting the cell phone away from his ear. “I can hear inside, but I’ve got nobody on the other end of the phone. The call is from Honor’s cell phone. Best I can figure, she was calling me for help when one of the hostage takers told her to drop the phone. From what I’ve gathered off the call and what I know of the situation already, the woman that owns the store – Melody - has an ex-fiancé that had wandering dick disease. It’s what broke ‘em up several months back. These girls waving the guns around are the women he was screwing. When the ex-asshat decided he wanted Melody back, these ladies took it personal-like. Now, they’ve got Melody, Melody’s boyfriend, Cal- who happens to also be former military, Melody’s brother – also currently serving in the military, my brother, your family, and evidently half the damn town in there with them. I want this fuckin’ standoff ended fast, Slade. You up for this?”
“They got my family. Of course I’m fuckin’ up for this,” the former Navy Seal muttered. “What are my orders?”
“I want both hostage takers neutralized as quickly as possible by whatever means necessary,” Zeke informed him sharply.
“Shoot to kill?” Slade questioned, his bland voice apathetic.
Zeke eyed the other man critically. Everybody knew that Slade had been hitting the bottle fairly regularly since he left his SEAL team a couple of years back, but nobody knew why, and Slade was not a guy inclined toward sharing. However, he’d always known the guy to be both loyal and honest, and if Slade said he was sober, then he would be rock steady. With Honor potentially in the line of fire, though, he felt compelled to ask again. “You sure you’re good to do this?”
“I’m good to go, Sheriff. Said it once already. Don’t like repeating myself,” Slade warned tersely, his fingers tightening around the rifle as he situated it under his arm.
“Then do the job, Slade, and take whatever shot you can get, but most importantly, let’s get Honor and the rest of those people out safe. Now, where do you want to set up?”
Slade eyed the surrounding buildings, finally zoning in on the insurance office directly across the street from Hooks & Books. “McCready’s Insurance will offer the best nest.”
Passing the other man an earpiece, Zeke jerked his head toward the building. “Keep that in the entire time, man, and remember to use your words, Slade. We can’t read your mind down here. Get moving!”
Twenty minutes later, it was all over. When the dust settled and the echo of gunfire had faded, both of the hostage taking women had been taken down in a barrage of bullets, one of them by his brother and one of them by Slade. Cal Valentine’s arm had also been winged by one of the assailants, but he’d recover fine. Ice was giving his statement to one of the senior deputies, but Slade had disappeared like smoke in the wind once he’d seen that his family was safe. That was fine. Zeke would make a special trip to Millers Peak to thank him later.
For now, all he wanted was to wrap his arms around Honor and never let her go. It had been another totally too close call for her, and he knew she’d be shaken up. Finally spotting her standing slightly apart from the milling crowd with a hand against her left temple, he nodded quickly to Deputy Lindsey, letting the other man know he was now in charge before rushing toward his girl.
“Honor?” he called as he hurried toward her. Watching her turn her head toward the sound of her name, Zeke saw her blink slowly as he continued to walk in her direction. “Kitten, are you okay?”
“How in the world does this keep happening to me?” she asked him huskily when he finally reached hearing distance. “First the café, then that shack in the woods where Tanner died, and now the freaking book store… are gunfights just going to be a normal part of my life now?” Honor asked shrilly, her cerulean eyes wide and dilated as she looked around her. “Because if this is my new normal, I’m moving, Zeke. I’m moving far, far away. Maybe somewhere in Scotland. Maybe Ireland. I’ve always wanted to see the Irish village,” she murmured. “Do you think they actually still have cobblestone streets there?”
Relieved to be in touching distance, Zeke wrapped his arms around her smaller body and yanked her against his chest, burying his nose in her tawny, silken hair. “You’re not ever going anywhere without me,” he muttered into her soft tresses. “Damn it, I’d give anything if just one time in our lives the trouble could happen far, far away from you.”
“Me, too,” she admitted with a hysterical little chuckle as she pressed the side of her face into his chest. “Facing crazy women with guys really wasn’t an item on my agenda today, I swear.”
“I know, baby,” Zeke admitted, keeping his arms around her. “But seriously, if you ever decide to bolt, pick somewhere warm with a nice beach. I won’t be as grumpy when I catch you if there’s sunshine and sand,” he shared, gratified to hear her giggle against his shirt.
�
�I can’t swim,” she whispered, lifting her face to stare up at him with soft eyes.
“I’ll teach you anything you need to know,” he returned easily, rocking her slender body from side to side in his arms. Dropping his lips to rest against her forehead, he felt the tension slowly leak from Honor’s body as she rested against him. Lifting one arm to check the time, he groaned. “Well, we lost our reservations by about three hours,” he grumbled.
“What reservation?” Honor asked blankly, looking up at him.
“Well, I was going to take you out to lunch at The Block over in Parkersburg to celebrate Valentine’s Day, but things kinda happened that put a damper on those plans.”
Honor made a face. “Cupid can kiss my can, Ezekiel. I no longer recognize Valentine’s Day as an official holiday if this is that cherub chump’s idea of a good time,” she declared passionately.
Zeke couldn’t help chuckling over her well-deserved feelings about Valentine’s Day. “Well, don’t clam up on me, Kitten. Tell me how you really feel about it,” he teased as Honor shifted in his arms.
“Don’t make fun of me,” Honor complained, lightly smacking his arm as she finally began to put some distance between them.
“Sorry,” he apologized, sliding his hand into the inside pocket of his jacket and withdrawing the velvet box that held her gift. “Maybe this will help.”
Staring at the flat red velvet box he offered her for a moment, Honor slowly lifted her confused eyes to his. “It’s not my birthday, Zeke.”
“Nope, that’s next month,” Zeke agreed with a shrug. “This is Valentine’s Day.”
“But I’m not your Valentine,” she whispered, dropping her eyes back to the proffered present.
“Guess again, Kitten,” Zeke recommended firmly. “Take it and open it.”
Honor’s eyes darted around them to ensure they weren’t creating a spectacle. Finding everyone absorbed in their own conversations, she extended her hand toward the gift, taking it in her trembling hand. “Zeke, you really shouldn’t…”
Man of Honor (Passion in Paradise Book 4) Page 13
