Romance the De Wolfe
A Romance Bundle
Kathryn Le Veque, Violetta Rand, Sarah Hegger, Anna Markland
Text copyright by the Author.
This work was made possible by special permission through the de Wolfe Pack Connected World publishing program and WolfeBane Publishing, a dba of Dragonblade Publishing. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original World of de Wolfe Pack connected series by Kathryn Le Veque Novels, Inc. remains the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Kathryn Le Veque Novels, Inc., or the affiliates or licensors.
All characters created by the author of this novel remain the copyrighted property of the author.
De Wolfe Pack: The Series
By Aileen Fish
The Duke She Left Behind
By Alexa Aston
Rise of de Wolfe
By Amanda Mariel
Love’s Legacy
One Wanton Wager
By Anna Markland
Hungry Like de Wolfe
By Ashe Barker
Wolfeheart
By Autumn Sand
Reflections of Love
Reflections of Time
By Barbara Devlin
Lone Wolfe: Heirs of Titus De Wolfe Book 1
The Big Bad De Wolfe: Heirs of Titus De Wolfe Book 2
Tall, Dark & De Wolfe: Heirs of Titus De Wolfe Book 3
By Cathy MacRae
The Saint
The Penitent
By Christy English
Dragon Fire
By Danelle Harmon
Heart of the Sea Wolfe
By Emmanuelle de Maupassant
Master of the Moor
By Emily E K Murdoch
Whirlwind with a Wolfe
By Hildie McQueen
The Duke’s Fiery Bride
By Jennifer Siddoway
De Wolfe in Disguise
By Kathryn Le Veque
River’s End
By Lana Williams
Trusting the Wolfe
Ruby’s Gamble
By Laura Landon
A Voice on the Wind
By Leigh Lee
Of Dreams and Desire
By Mairi Norris
Brabanter’s Rose
By Marlee Meyers
The Fall of the Black Wolf
By Mary Lancaster
Vienna Wolfe
The Wicked Wolfe
By Meara Platt
Nobody’s Angel
Kiss an Angel
Bhrodi’s Angel
By Mia Pride
The Lone Wolf’s Lass
The Last Wolfe Lass
By Michele Lang
An Honest Woman
By Rosamund Winchester
The Defender and the Dove
By Ruth Kaufman
My Enemy, My Love
My Rebel, My Love
By Sarah Hegger
Bad Wolfe on the Rise
By Scarlett Cole
Together Again
By Sherry Ewing
To Love a Scottish Laird
By Victoria Vane
Breton Wolfe Book 1
Ivar the Red Book 2
The Bastard of Brittany Book 3
By Violetta Rand
Never Cry de Wolfe
Table of Contents
River’s End by Kathryn Le Veque
Never Cry De Wolfe by Violetta Rand
Bad Wolfe on the Rise by Sarah Hegger
Hungry Like de Wolfe by Anna Markland
River’s End
De Wolfe Pack
The Series
Kathryn Le Veque
Prologue
Highway 80
Just outside of James Town, Wyoming
The Hi-Way Café
WINTERS WERE BITTERLY cold this far north and this particular season had seen its share of sub-zero days. The Hi-Way Café, situated along a major east-west corridor through Southern Wyoming, seemed to invite a good deal of frozen truck drivers and weary travelers.
The building was old, immune to the cold with its thick, masonry walls because it had once been a stage stop back in the days of the cowboys when outlaws and lawmen would roam the barren hills in search of both prey and shelter. The structure had a vibe about it that was simultaneously inviting and foreboding; it looked like it was off of a studio back lot where the only people who entered it were those who were taken by mutants in the hills, never to be seen again.
It had been a bitterly cold night that had translated into a bitterly cold morning. Close to noon, the temperature was still flirting in the teens and the café had seen a lot of cold truck drivers crammed into its small dining room that morning, now cleared out because they all had some place to be. All that was left was some old hobo seated at the counter, a half-filled cup of coffee in front of him as his distant gaze stared off into nothingness. It was the face of defeat.
But the employees didn’t pay much attention to the tired old man as they went about their chores. Two cooks in the kitchen were prepping for the noon meal while the busboy, a local kid who worked more than forty hours a week to support his alcoholic mother, swept up the old, linoleum floor. The owner, a former truck driver with the smell of smoke about him, sat in the tiny and cluttered office talking on the phone to his shrew of a wife while the two waitresses wiped off tables and tidied up the dining room.
The older waitress was a brunette with eyes that went in different directions while the younger waitress, in her mid-thirties, looked sorely out of place. She was a beautiful woman in the midst of worn out and colorless surroundings. A few inches over five feet, she had a spectacular figure concealed beneath her plain white blouse and faded black work pants, and her long honey-colored hair was pulled back in a tight bun against the back of her head. She didn’t wear much make-up and she usually had circles around her green eyes, but neither detracted from her stunning beauty.
No one knew much about her, however. She had shown up six months earlier and spent twelve hours sitting in one of the booths, drinking cup after cup of dark coffee, before the owner approached her and they struck up a conversation. Next thing he realized, he’d hired this mysterious and beautiful woman who went by the name of Clover. He paid her cash under the table and she seemed fine with that. She worked seventy hours a week for her five hundred dollars a week pay envelope, no questions asked.
The owner had never seen a more diligent worker; she was smart and knew how to deal appropriately with any customer. In fact, she had a lot of regulars who came around just to chat with her, but no one knew much more than her name. She never gave out any more information than that and when pressed, she would joke her way out of it. This elegant, sweet, intelligent and beautiful woman was a complete enigma to the employees and customers of The Hi-Way Café.
With her portion of the restaurant cleaned up, Clover made her way back to the counter and began wiping it down. The old hobo, still staring off into space, lifted his cup when she passed by as if remembering to drink. It was too cold to go outside so he needed to pretend that he was still working on his coffee so they wouldn’t kick him out. Clover, a rag in hand, finally glanced over at the old guy with the torn coat and heavy bag. Casually, she picked up the coffee pot and filled his cup back up to the rim. When he looked at her, she winked.
“Don’t worry,” she said softly. “You’re not going anywhere anytime soon. Just relax.”
The old man smiled, displaying the only two teeth he had in his head. “It’s sure cold out there.”
Clover set the coffee pot back down on the warmer. “Yes, it is,” she agreed, looking out of the windows at the snow covered landscape beyond. “I’ve never seen a winter like this.”
The old man sipped at his hot coffee. “I don’t know what made me come to Wyoming,” he said, looking over his shoulder at the same landscape she was looking at. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
Clover grinned, showing off a spectacular smile. “That’s what I thought when I came here. Now I’m not so sure.”
The hobo turned to look at her. “Where are you from?”
Clover’s smile faded. “Far away,” she said. “Very far away. We don’t have snow where I come from.”
“Where’s that?” the old man pressed, purely for the sake of conversation. “South?”
Clover nodded. “South,” she said. “How about you? Where are you from?”
The hobo threw a thumb back over his shoulder, indicating one of a million directions. “Texas,” he said. “Van Horn. Have you heard of it?”
Clover nodded, noticing that a sheriff’s unit was pulling in to their parking lot outside. “I’ve driven through it,” she told him. “I used to take road trips with my folks when I was a kid. My parents had an old tent trailer they used to pull around behind my dad’s 1971 Ford Pinto. We camped in Van Horn once. There’s not much there.”
The old man lifted his bushy eyebrows as if to agree. “That’s why I left.”
He went back to sipping his coffee and Clover put her cleaning rag under the counter, moving to start another pot of coffee as a sheriff’s deputy came inside. Bitter wind howled in after him, lifting the old vertical blinds on the windows nearest the door as he shut the panel behind him. Clover looked up from measuring coffee.
“Sit anywhere,” she told the deputy.
The man nodded in thanks and lumbered towards the counter. He was bundled up in a regulation uniform and duty-issued cold weather jacket, fur-lined. He had heavy gloves on his hands, pulling them off as he approached the counter. The regulation cowboy hat came off next and he sat that, and the gloves, down on the white Formica counter. Clover alternately poured the water into the coffee machine and watched the deputy as he unzipped his coat.
“Coffee?” she asked him.
He nodded as he pulled off the jacket. “Please.”
Clover finished pouring the water and flipped on the machine. Picking up a mug and a half-filled coffee pot that had been on a warmer, she went to the deputy and poured him a full cup as he slung his jacket over the back of the chair next to him.
As she poured, she began to notice just how big he was; he had enormous hands and, once the jacket came off, enormous arms and very broad shoulders. He was at least four or five inches over six feet and when she happened to glance at his face, she could see an extremely square jaw on his cold-pinched face. His dark hair was neatly cut and she was seriously checking him out as his bright blue eyes fixed on her.
“Thanks,” he said as he sat heavily and picked up the coffee cup.
“You’re welcome,” she said, tearing her gaze off of him as she set the coffee pot back on the warmer. “Do you want to see a menu or do you know what you want?”
He sipped at his very hot coffee. “Do you have a BLT sandwich?”
Clover nodded. “On white or wheat?”
“Wheat.”
“French fries or fruit?”
“Fruit. Can I also get a salad with that?”
“Ranch, Italian, honey-mustard, or bleu cheese?”
“Italian.”
“You got it.”
Clover turned around and picked up her ticket book, writing the order down and posting it for the cook. Then she went to go fill up a glass of water for the deputy and a second one for the hobo. She set the glass down in front of the old man first and then two chairs down the counter, set the second glass in front of the deputy.
“Busy out there today?” she asked the man pleasantly.
He pulled a couple of Advil out of his pocket, giving her a half-grin. “A little,” he said. “Hopefully the rest of the day will be calm.” He thumped on the counter in a “knock on wood” gesture.
Clover grinned at him. “Then I wish you luck,” she said, her gaze lingering on him for a moment. “We haven’t seen you around here. Are you new?”
He tossed back the Advil and drank the entire glass of water to chase it. “No,” he said, shaking his head and wiping his mouth. “I’m not from Sweetwater County. I’m from up north in Fremont County.”
She cocked her head. “You’re a ways from home.”
He nodded and collected his coffee cup. His blue eyes were fixed on her, perhaps studying her as if he just realized how truly beautiful she really was. In fact, his entire manner softened a little as his piercing gaze seemed to study every contour of her face.
“A little ways,” he concurred quietly. “I’m just heading back from some business in Salt Lake City.”
“I see,” Clover said, noticing over his shoulder that another car was pulling in to the parking lot. It was a beat-up four door sedan but she didn’t pay any more attention than that. “Well, drive safe, deputy. The roads are icy right now.”
He sighed wearily. “No kidding,” he said. “I’ve already come across two accidents this morning. I’ve spent the past hour helping clear one a couple of miles west of here.”
“Then I’ll keep the coffee coming. You must be half-frozen.”
“You could probably light me on fire right now and I wouldn’t feel it.”
Clover laughed softly, not really having too much more to say, but her smile was warm. He returned the smile. She turned away, still grinning, thinking that the man made her feel the least bit giddy. He was damn good looking and that baritone voice bubbling up from his toes had her heart racing just a little.
In the cook’s window, his sandwich and salad were waiting so she collected them both and placed them carefully in front of him just as three young men entered the restaurant. They were all bundled up against the cold, which was normal, so Clover didn’t give them a second look as she picked up some extra napkins for the deputy and put them by his coffee cup. She was moving to refill his water glass when one young man threw off his heavy coat and produced a gun.
“Everybody stay put,” he ordered, the gun pointing right at the deputy’s back. “Sheriff, if you turn around, I’m gonna blow your head off. Understand?”
The deputy froze, as did Clover and the hobo. The other waitress, who had been coming to the front of the restaurant from the kitchen door, shrieked when she saw the gun, causing one of the young men to run over and grab her. He forced her into a chair as she screamed and he brought out another gun from his belt and pointed it right at her.
“Shut up!” he yelled at her.
The waitress buried her face in her hands and wept. The third young man, tall and skinny and nervous, rushed at the cash register. He had a grocery bag in his hand.
“You!” he threw a finger at Clover. “Open this!”
Clover did as she was told. She was surprisingly cool as she moved to the register, entered a “no sale”, and the drawer popped open. The skinny kid waved a sharp hand at her.
“Back off,” he ordered.
She did, going back to her original position in front of the deputy. Meanwhile, the deputy calmly set his sandwich down and put his hands on the counter where they were in plain sight. He kept his gaze focused on Clover. She met his gaze with little fear in her face; she mostly looked concerned. She was a cool woman, not one to go crazy with fright. As the deputy gazed at her, he could see that innate control and it impressed him. There was something about her that was magnetic and calm, even under fire. Had he not been so concerned for what was going on behind him, he would have found her demeanor utterly fascinating.
“Sorry we gotta do this,” the first young man with the gun said.
“Times are tough for everybody. Nobody move and you’ll all live through this.”
The employees and patrons of the grill didn’t say a word. The first young man moved closer, keeping the gun trained on the deputy’s broad back. His nervous gaze moved over the restaurant, seeking out anything else he could steal. He passed over the hobo and went straight to Clover.
“You gotta safe in the back?” he asked.
Clover nodded steadily. “There’s one in the office,” she said. “But it was emptied last night. There won’t be any more money in it until the end of the work day.”
The young man looked at her as if he didn’t believe her. Then he looked at the deputy. “Stand up, Sheriff,” he commanded.
Slowly, the deputy stood up, still facing Clover. His gaze never left her and Clover gazed back at him, silently imparting her encouragement to him. But he didn’t seem to need it; there was more than calmness in his gaze – there was utter control, concern for his situation, and perhaps some scheming going on, as if he were planning his big move to see them all safely out of this predicament. Clover could see his determination in his face; he was going to make it out of there alive. He kept his hands where they could be seen as the young man with the gun came to within a few feet of him, the barrel of the gun pointing at the middle of his back.
“Take your gun belt off,” the young man told him. “Let it fall to the ground.”
The deputy unhooked his Sam Browne and the entire belt fell to the ground, service weapon included. Once that was done, the young man with the gun walked up behind him and pistol-whipped him on the back of the head. The deputy fell like a stone.
The waitress with her face in her hands screamed at the violent action. Even Clover jumped, horrified at the sight of the deputy now motionless on the floor. The robber who had been watching the waitress ran into the kitchen and emerged a few moments later with the cooks, the busboy, and the owner, everyone with their hands up. He grouped them all near the weeping waitress.
“Hurry up,” he told the skinny kid collecting the last of the money from the register. “We need to get out of here.”
The skinny kid had his money, or at least all that was in the register. He began rifling through the candy at the counter, throwing that in the bag as well, as the first robber with the gun stood over the unconscious deputy. He reached down and unsnapped the man’s service holster, pulling forth the service revolver. He looked it over.
Romancing the de Wolfe Collection: Contemporary Romance Bundle Page 1
