by Lexi Blake
He brushed his thumb across her lower lip, staring as though trying to decide how much to tell her. “I don’t want to involve him. He’s innocent, too. He can drink beer and get into fights, but there’s a piece of Bo that’s as innocent as you. I have to go see some people I wouldn’t want either of you to meet.”
She didn’t like the sound of that. “Tell me what you’re doing.”
His eyes hardened marginally.
“Please.”
He groaned but pulled her close. “I’m going to ask a few questions about Bryce Hughes. I think he’s into something bad and I can’t wait for the investigators. I need to figure out how dangerous he is and if he has any connection to the odd things that have been happening around your place.”
She frowned. “Like the chandelier falling?”
His eyes narrowed. “You know something you’re not telling me?”
She hurried to get the words out before he reached for some more rope. “It’s just a suspicion, but I think the chandelier had help. Why would someone want a light fixture to fall? They couldn’t possibly have known we would be sitting there.”
It didn’t make any sense.
“No, they couldn’t have known, but I also don’t believe that kid was looking for drugs. I need to figure out who that kid was coming after. You should know that if I find out he was really coming after you, I’m going to have your ass in Dallas under lock and key, and I won’t take no for an answer. I should know something in a couple of hours. I want you and Shelley to pack a few things and come back here to wait for me. We’ll decide how to proceed after I know something, but I don’t want you to spend another night in that house.”
Her heart clenched. That house was special to her. “Trev, I can’t leave. I need to get to work. At the very least I need to figure out how to protect the house. It’s all I have. Every dime I have is sunk into that house.”
And it hit her.
“That hole in my ceiling is going to cost me a pretty penny. Pennies I shouldn’t have because I couldn’t get a loan. What if someone’s trying to force me to sell the place because it no longer is a doable project? If I couldn’t get a loan, I would have to sell. I wouldn’t be able to fix it up. Is there something I don’t know about the property? Is some big development firm interested in it?”
Trev’s mouth flattened. “I don’t know. If there was, you would think they would make you an offer. No big firm is going to send someone in to loosen your chandelier. They might have the property condemned. I’ll have Ben and Chase look into it. I need to figure this thing out, not only for you, darlin’. I need to know if my sister is married to someone dangerous.”
“She’ll be fine,” Bo said, coming up from behind. He nuzzled the back of her neck. “I’ll take care of our girl. We’ll hit the house, grab some stuff, and lock up the best we can. We’ll be right back here waiting for you.”
“Beth, pick up some clothes for Shelley. I don’t want her to walk into Bryce’s house again.”
“Trev!” Shelley came up from her place on the couch. “I can’t simply leave.”
“Yes, you can,” he replied grimly. “Did you talk to Lucas like I asked?”
Shelley’s big brown eyes turned down. “I did. He got a big smile on his face when I told him I wanted a divorce, and I swear his mouth suddenly had fangs. Do lawyers grow fangs when they sense a good case?”
Beth had heard Lucas say he loved taking douchebags like Bryce for everything they were worth. At least Shelley had a lawyer who would go to the mat for her.
“All the more reason for you to not walk back into that house.” Trev had made his decision, and Beth didn’t think he would be moved.
She walked up to Trev’s sister, slipping her hand into Shelley’s, squeezing reassuringly. “We can go shopping tomorrow. It’ll be fun.”
Shelley took a deep breath. “All right. I think I can handle a little shopping. Though maybe we could drive into Austin. The only place to buy clothes here is Gwen’s Emporium, and she stands there and shakes her head when I try to buy a V-neck. She always asks if I really think my boobs are going to fit or if I want them to spill out all over the place. I won’t even tell you what she says about low-rise jeans.”
“Austin it is.” She didn’t want to admit that Gwen always told her she had such modest taste. She didn’t want to be praised for her modesty anymore. It was time to give the girls some breathing room. “I think I might like some V-neck shirts, too. And really low-rise jeans.”
“Now, we should talk about that,” Trev said, his eyes narrowing.
“Says the man whose idea of fashion consists of thirty yards of rope. Let the woman be. I think Beth’s ass is going to look gorgeous in some tight jeans,” Bo said with a healthy leer.
Yes, dressing was going to be fun from now on. She finally understood why women spent hours shopping and picking out the right clothes to wear. She made a mental note to take the trunk of clothes she’d found in Maudine’s bedroom with her. The fifties style seemed to suit her. She noticed Bo was holding something in his hand. She rolled her eyes. “You are not bringing Roxanne.”
Bo pulled his Remington Model Seven rifle to his chest, clutching it the way he would a woman. “You don’t listen to her,” he said to Roxanne. “She doesn’t understand. No, sweetheart, after everything we’ve been through together, I’m not dumping you for her. She doesn’t even take short action magnum cartridges.”
Beth cocked a hip. That rifle was not sleeping in her bed. “And Roxanne doesn’t take double input. You think about that before you bring her to bed with you.”
Trev doubled over. “You are both insane. Bo? Seriously? You named your rifle?”
“Well, tell me you didn’t name your favorite football. Beth had like a thousand stuffed animals, and every single one of them had a name. And she slept with all of them. They’re in a box waiting to be picked up and moved. And my rifle is way more useful than a faded pink hippo named Horace,” Bo argued.
She opened her mouth to give Trev a piece of her mind, but Shelley was smiling.
“He called it Troy, after Troy Aikman,” Shelley said with a laugh. “He slept with that football. He carried it around for years. And, at one point in time, he named his biceps. Smith and Wesson. Because they were his guns.”
Trev flushed and shook his head. “Brat.”
Shelley hugged her brother. “You bet. Now go and do what you need to do. I’ll follow Bo and Roxanne’s instructions.”
“Finally a woman who respects you,” Bo whispered to his gun, but he gave Beth a wink.
She couldn’t help but kiss him. He was crazy, and he was going to make their lives so much fun. Her heart skipped a beat as she looked at Trev and Bo together. So different and yet they fit. She was suddenly looking forward to the rest of her life.
When Bo hustled her into the cab of the truck, she held Roxanne for him.
* * * *
Bo pulled up to the house, his mind on the events of the afternoon. He could still feel Beth plastered to his body. Despite the shower he’d taken, he swore he could still smell her arousal. It had been the hottest sexual experience of his life. And he was worried.
Trev hadn’t said he would stay. He knew it wasn’t fair, but he wanted commitment. A couple of days before, he’d wanted nothing more than to see Trev McNamara’s back as he walked out of town. But now he couldn’t imagine it. He couldn’t imagine a life with Beth that didn’t include the Dom. For the first time, he was excited. He had so much to learn from Trev, and not merely about how to bind Beth’s breasts.
He looked through the front window as he parked Aidan’s truck behind Beth’s “car.” He knew he should pull closer so Trev would have space when he came home, but he didn’t want to run the risk of breathing on the Pinto and having it explode in a fiery mass. Yeah, she was getting a new car, and she was learning to drive it properly. He took Roxanne from Beth’s hands and eased out of the cab. He opened the door for the women and looked around.
&
nbsp; Everything was quiet. The late-afternoon air was cool and calm. Everything seemed to be the way they had left it. Trev had him paranoid.
“Come on. Let’s get what we need and get back to Aidan’s.”
Beth frowned, looking at the house. “I don’t want to leave it. Now I’m nervous that I’m going to spend the night at Aidan’s and someone will have taken a wrecking ball to it when we come back. I wanted to get started so bad.”
Shelley put an arm around Beth. “It’s a beautiful place, and it’s going to be standing when we come back. When Trev is satisfied that Bryce is nothing more than a douchebag, we’ll return, and I’ll help you. This is my specialty, you know. Before Bryce talked me into refurbing politician’s offices, I used to flip houses. I love working with my hands. And I am handy with a jigsaw.”
Beth smiled, her face lighting up. “Good, because I have about two thousand square feet of bamboo flooring to put in.”
Bo groaned. He got the feeling there would be a whole lot of home improvement work in his future. “Let’s get this done.”
He took the porch steps two at a time and opened the front door, allowing Beth and Shelley to enter. The women walked into the front hall, chatting about stained concrete and how to best knock out the wall between the office and the kitchen.
“Stop.” His heart raced as he heard the sound. It was quiet, but the floor above them creaked with an unmistakable pattern. Someone was walking on the second floor. And it wasn’t Trev.
He put a finger to his mouth. Beth’s eyes widened, and Shelley reached for her hand. “Stay here.”
As quietly as he could, he walked up the stairs, sticking to the side where there was less chance of a creak alerting whoever was upstairs to his presence. He wasn’t taking any chances this time. He held his rifle, his finger on the trigger. It was just like hunting, he told himself. Patience would win the day.
“Fuck.” Bo heard the soft curse and the frustration behind it. Bryce Hughes was here. Trev had been right, but Bo would be the one to figure out the mystery. He intended to call in the police, but not until he had a few questions answered for himself.
“Come on, come on. Barry, you were such a fucker. Goddamn it. If I could kill you twice, I would.”
Bryce sounded past desperate. The words came out of his mouth in a harsh whisper, as though the dead man could hear him speaking from beyond the grave. Bryce had killed his partner? Barry Bellows had died in a car accident, and no one in Deer Run had really looked much past that fact. Had Bryce set up that accident? What the hell was he looking for in Beth’s bedroom? It sounded like he was tearing the place apart.
He eased up to the second-floor landing and onto the carpet runner. He could move more freely now. Bryce was making enough noise for both of them. The door to Beth’s bedroom was open, and even from his vantage point, Bo could see that Bryce had been hard at work. Beth’s pretty comforter was on the floor, feathers from the pillows littering the hallway. Bryce stood in the center of the room with a sledgehammer. He pulled it over his head, the wall that separated the bedroom from the bathroom his obvious target.
“Stop right there.” He wasn’t about to let this asshole start tearing out walls. That was Beth’s job.
Bryce stopped, staring at the rifle aimed solidly at his chest. The sledgehammer fell to the floor with a crack. Bryce turned, his normally perfect hair disheveled. His lower lip was busted, blood oozing onto his chin. One eye was swollen. It looked like a purple egg had made a nest of his face. “I have to find it.”
“What?”
“They’re going to kill me if I don’t find it. It has to be here. Why else would Barry have come here? He hated that old bitch. He fucking couldn’t stand her. He hid it here, the bastard. I built this business. I was the one with the contacts. He had no right to hold out on me. He tried to fucking blackmail me. No one blackmails Bryce Hughes. I showed him. I showed him.”
Bo took a deep breath. Bryce Hughes seemed to have found that “edge” everyone talked about, and he’d gone straight over in a happy swan dive. “I think we need to go downstairs and wait for the sheriff.”
Bryce’s head sagged. “No cops. Cops won’t stop them. I have to find it. Fuck. I have to find it or we’re all dead. You’re an idiot. You should never have walked in here. You’re supposed to be at Aidan’s. Shelley said she was meeting you all out at Aidan’s for the afternoon. Now we’re all dead.”
“Bo?” Beth’s soft voice nearly made Bo’s heart stop. He turned, ready to yell at her to get her ass out of here and take Shelley with her.
Beth and Shelley stood in the doorway, their faces sheet white.
“Beth?”
“You told me I had to tell you the next time someone tried to kill me.” Her voice was strained, a tight whisper. “Well, someone’s ready to kill me again.”
“I told you he’d kill us all.” Bryce shrank back.
Bo turned and saw an immaculately dressed man. He was roughly six foot three and wore an air of disdain, as though the world always disappointed him. He also carried a .45 in his gloved hand, pointed straight at the back of Beth’s head. His other hand was on her arm, keeping her close to his body. Beth was his shield.
“I need more time. It’s here,” Bryce insisted.
The man with the gun shook his head. “You made a deal with my employer. You took my employer’s cash in exchange for your products. You set yourself up as a distributor. No one forced you to do that, Mr. Hughes. But we do expect to get what we paid for. I want the drugs now. We’ve been more than patient. It’s been months. You, put down the gun or I’ll shoot both of the women. I assume at least one of them is yours.”
Bo let the rifle drop. Roxanne wasn’t going to help him out now. Terror threatened to claw at his insides. One slip of that man’s finger and Beth’s life would be over. His life would be over.
“Look, mister, I can see you have some business with Bryce here. I can’t stand the man, myself. Why don’t you let me take the women, and you can conclude this transaction in private?” He was pretty sure it wouldn’t work, but he had to try.
“Call me Carlo. I think we’re going to be friends, Mr. O’Malley. Yes, I know all the players in this sad little town. My employer pays me well to keep up with everything. Including his product. You see, Mr. Hughes here started out as a small-time meth dealer. I believe your employees work out of a trailer park in another town.”
“Bryce, what is he talking about?” Shelley’s hands shook.
Bryce’s hands shook. “Shut up, Shelley. This isn’t any of your business.”
Carlo chuckled, though the sound was slightly sinister to Bo’s ears. “It is your business, darling. He used your business to do an enormous amount of our work. He’s laundered money through it. He’s gotten us some incredibly interesting information with which to blackmail certain politicians. It isn’t easy to get drugs over the border these days. It certainly helps to have a few, shall we say, influential people in our pockets. You weren’t aware of the hidden cameras you placed in your clients’ offices when you redecorated? I can see not. It was probably smart of you to keep your wife out of it, Hughes. Now, Mr. O’Malley, get to your knees, please, and allow Mrs. Hughes to use the zip ties I carry around for such an occasion. It’s shocking how often I find the need to tie people up in my line of business.”
Bo felt his whole body harden, every muscle screaming for him to not allow this to happen.
Carlo’s eyes narrowed. “I wouldn’t play the hero, Mr. O’Malley. You might be able to take me down, but not before I kill her. The instant I see you move, I will put a bullet through her brain. Is that an acceptable outcome? Do you not believe that I will kill someone? I think you need a demonstration of my willpower. Mr. Hughes, as you obviously can’t even manage to properly search a home, I have no further use for you.”
He watched in utter horror as the gun in Carlo’s hand moved slightly and he fired, the discharge pounding through the small room with the force of a grenade. Beth sc
reamed, trying to put her hands to her ears, but Carlo held fast. Shelley stood in shocked terror.
And Bryce Hughes stood in the middle of the room, perfectly still for a moment, as though frozen in time. Then blood bloomed from the neat hole in his forehead. He tottered, as though his body wasn’t sure which way to fall. It seemed to take forever for him to find the floor. All the while, Bryce stared out, his eyes as blank as a doll’s. He hit the floor, and time seemed to speed up again.
Shelley cried out. Carlo tightened his hold. Bo wanted to run, to tackle the fucker, but he couldn’t risk it. Beth’s left ear was bleeding. Her face was so pale. He couldn’t stand the thought of her hitting the floor, her body still forever, her strong heart silenced.
Bo got to his knees, his hands behind his back. “Shelley, you’ve got to do as the man says.”
“Excellent, Mr. O’Malley,” Carlo said with an approving nod. “Mrs. Hughes, bind the young man’s hands, and then this one here will bind yours. We’re going to see how well Miss Hobbes knows this house. Bryce was convinced his partner hid a half a million dollars’ worth of cocaine somewhere in this house. You can find it, or I’ll start killing your friends.”
“I can find it,” Beth promised, her eyes finding his as Shelley slipped the zip tie on and tightened it. He could feel Shelley’s hands shaking.
He had to pray Beth could do what she’d promised.
* * * *
Trev pulled into the rickety trailer park and sighed. The whole place had an air of neglect he recognized. This was one of those desperate places. Every city and suburb had them. Every small town, too. This was a place without hope and that few escaped from. It was definitely the place to get drugs.
It had been remarkably easy to get the information he wanted. Everyone was willing to buy that he wanted to score. Apparently Marty had come through, drinking and asking the same questions. He’d been looking for drugs for his client. No wonder no one believed him when he said he was straight. His former agent had blown his reputation before he’d even had a chance to settle in.
