by Nicole Helm
Tie it up. Set it aside. Act on fact and order over feelings.
“Take care of my sister, Carson, or you’ll have a lot more than me to answer to.”
Ty scowled at his phone. “She’ll take care of herself.” He hit End without waiting to hear what Laurel had to say about that.
Jen sighed. “Ty. You shouldn’t have said that.”
“Why not?” he returned. “You can and do take care of yourself.”
He wanted to pace, to expend the frustrated energy inside him, but pacing was wasted. Maybe he’d go lock himself in the bedroom and do as many push-ups and sit-ups as it took to clear his mind.
“Yes, but you know how Laurel worries. How my family worries. You just added to it by—”
“They should get a new hobby, and so should you for that matter. It isn’t your job to placate them.”
She didn’t bristle like he’d thought she would. She moved to the coffeemaker, unerringly finding the right cupboard for the coffee mugs. “It’s been a rough year,” she said, and though she sounded unshakable, there was a sadness to those words.
But she hardly had the monopoly on hard years. The Carsons had been through their fair share of what the Delaneys had gone through—though a few more Delaneys had landed themselves in the hospital. Carsons, too, though, so... “For mine, too, darling.”
“I don’t want to fight with you, Ty.” She took a sip of coffee, winced, presumably at the heat. “I want to figure this out so I can go home to my store and live my life.”
“Funny, I thought we could do that and bicker.”
Her mouth almost curved, but the sadness remained. “We can, but I don’t want to.” She held out a hand. “Truce?”
He didn’t want to touch her. There’d been too much already, and his brain had taken a few more detours than he cared for. But the less she knew about all that, the better. “Fine. Truce.” He shook her hand.
The chill that skittered up his spine had nothing to do with the handshake. He frowned, looking at the door. He wasn’t sure what the feeling was, the foreboding signal that something was off.
“I feel it, too,” Jen whispered. “What is it?”
“It’s your gut,” Ty replied, eyeing every possible entrance in the cabin. Not too many windows, but enough. The door would be impossible to penetrate. The secret passageway had been bolted shut after Addie’d had to use it last year.
“My gut says we should get a gun,” Jen said, still holding his hand in hers.
“Yeah, your gut ain’t half-bad.”
* * *
IT HAD BEEN easy to track the motorcycle marks once he’d found them. It had taken him longer than he’d wanted to finally discover the trail, but the Delaney Ranch was rather hard to breach even with all its stretching fields and nooks and crannies.
Good security there, plus a parcel of ranch hands always roaming about and a passel of vigilante residents. He’d nearly gotten himself caught three times.
But now, now he was following the heavy divot in the grass clearly made when a motorcycle had irresponsibly driven up the east side of the property, and then driven off again on dirt roads.
Irresponsible Ty. Always making mistakes. Including driving up the unpaved road, rather than turning back to the highway.
He could track the land—especially since the sun had seemed to bake the tracks in good, different from the truck tires that also marred the dirt.
He clucked his tongue at Ty’s idiocy. Such a shame Ty would make it so easy for him. The laugh bubbled into his throat, escaped and echoed through the trees. He rather liked the sound of it, but he should be more careful. He wouldn’t make a stupid mistake like Ty had.
No. Mistakes wouldn’t bring him peace or closure. Mistakes weren’t his goal. So, he climbed, following the motorcycle track up and up and up.
He was starting to get winded as morning began to dawn in earnest. Mist that had filtered through the trees began to burn off.
The higher he got, the more the trees thickened, but the road remained. Ty’s careless tire tracks guiding him. What utter stupidity.
Jen was better off with him, not Ty. She’d see that eventually. She’d be his prize. Oh, he’d have to hurt her to hurt Ty, but she’d understand. Once she knew the whole story, she’d understand. They could build a life together. Because he’d have peace then. Peace and closure.
Hurt Jen. Kill Ty. Live happily ever after?
It wasn’t the plan. Dr. Michaels told him he did better with a plan. With a goal. But couldn’t plans and goals change? Didn’t he deserve a prize? Jen didn’t deserve to die.
But she’d run away from him. She’d called the cops on him. She was with Ty. Clearly, she needed to be punished. Like Dr. Michaels, who hadn’t listened—not close enough.
So, perhaps it would be up to Jen herself. Defend Ty? Die. Let Ty touch her? Die more painfully. He could envision it. The glint of the knife. The smell of the blood. Just like the uppity doctor.
No, no, that had been only a dream. Maybe he’d dream about Jen, too. Dream about her begging for Ty to save her, but he wouldn’t. Ty wouldn’t be able to. Ty would have to watch her die. Slowly.
He could see it and he needed it. Now. He needed the kill now. Murder sang its siren song. It flowed through his blood. He could feel it there, boiling inside him. It needed release. Knife to throat.
He had his knife out in his hand. Maybe he’d use it on himself. Just a little bit. Just to take the edge off.
Then he saw the cabin.
Chapter Ten
Jen watched Ty sweep the cabin with military precision. It didn’t seem to matter that they hadn’t heard anything, that it had been only this cold chill of a feeling that had gone through both of them. Ty was behaving like they were in imminent danger.
Surely it was just coincidence or...something. It unnerved her more than the feeling itself that he’d felt it, too, and that he took it seriously.
People didn’t just feel things. If they did, her dream last night about Laurel was a lot more ominous. But Laurel had called this morning with a lead and everything had been fine.
Everything was fine, because Ty found nothing. He was now perched in what appeared to be an uncomfortable position, looking through the slight gap in the curtain at the front of the cabin.
“Ty, this is silly. There’s nothing out there. We’re both wired and worried.”
“We both felt something,” Ty returned, as if that was just a normal thing people experienced. As if a shared feeling of discomfort or unease magically meant someone was out there.
“But that doesn’t make any sense, Ty. It can’t be possible.”
He shrugged, his gaze never leaving the small patch of yard. “In the rangers you learn to roll with the things that don’t make sense. It’s not like we ever made any sense.”
“Why not?” she asked before she remembered that this constant mix-up of them and this situation was only going to cause more heartache. She’d had her epiphany last night about asking for what she wanted, but what about things she didn’t know if she wanted?
Part of her wanted Ty, but she didn’t think it was a very intelligent part of herself.
Ty scoffed at her question. “Aside from the fact we’re opposite in just about every way—a Carson and a Delaney. Ring any cursed bells?”
“That’s not holding much weight these days.”
“That’s these days. Besides, we’re still opposites.”
“And opposites attract.”
Ty shook his head, but his gaze was outside and his demeanor was completely unreadable. “There’s got to be some common ground for all those differences to rest on. Attraction is easy.”
She didn’t know why she felt the need to argue with him, only that she did. It made what they’d had before seem...doomed. An unimportant castoff.
It wasn’t
that. She wouldn’t let it be that to him. “Then how do you explain Laurel and Grady?”
“Aside from the fact they both love and would protect the people they love with their life, they love Bent. They believe in it. Honestly, deep down, Laurel and Grady have more alike things than different.”
Even knowing it was true, even having said the same to her brother Dylan in defending Grady and Laurel—back before he himself had been felled by a Carson—it irked her that Ty of all people recognized it.
“All right. Explain Dylan and Vanessa.”
“Again, they might antagonize each other, but it’s only because they’re so alike deep down. They want the world to see the persona they put forth, not who they actually are.”
It had taken her years to understand that about Dylan, and Ty said it like it was common knowledge.
But there was one truth he was refusing to acknowledge, and since he was irritating her with his truths, she’d irritate him with hers. “We’re the same deep down, too.”
He snorted. “I don’t think so, darling.”
“You don’t have to. I know so. You’ve only ever tried to harden yourself against that gaping need for someone to love and cherish you and let you protect them, and I’ve hidden myself against the very same thing.”
She watched those words land—that stillness, then the slight rotation of shoulders as if he was willing the words to roll off his back.
But truths weren’t easy to shrug away. That she knew.
Then everything in him stiffened, and he brought the binoculars he held in one hand to his eyes.
“Don’t pretend you see something just to get out of—”
“There. He’s out there.”
She rolled her eyes and fisted her hands on her hips. She was not this stupid, and it was insulting he thought she was. “You are not going to change the subject by—”
He thrust the binoculars at her. “He’s out there.”
Frowning at the binoculars, Jen took them hesitantly. “How do you know it’s him?”
“Movement.”
“It could be an animal,” she replied, studying the binoculars in her hands. She didn’t want to look out the window. Didn’t want to be fooled into thinking something was out there, and what’s more, didn’t want something—or someone—to actually be out there.
“I know what I saw.”
She looked back to find him checking a pistol. She’d had no doubt there were guns hidden throughout the Carson cabin, but it was a bit of a jolt to see him efficiently working with the weapon.
He was serious, though. This was no dramatic attempt at changing the subject. His movements were too economical. His jaw was too tight. In his eyes that fierce protector light she’d always loved.
She swallowed at the mix of fear and love and turned back to the window. Lifting the binoculars with no small amount of trepidation, she studied the small part of the tree line she could make out through the natural gap in the curtain.
“I don’t—” But then she did. First it was just a flash, the sun glinting off something metal. Then she could make out the faint movements of something that blended into the trees but was clearly human.
Human. Her breath caught in her throat, and for a full second or two, she was completely frozen in fear, watching the movement of someone.
“See him?”
Jen had to force herself to swallow, and then embarrassingly had to clear her throat in order to speak. “Yes,” she managed, but it was little more than a croak. Fear was paralyzing her and it was demoralizing, but she couldn’t seem to control it. “What do we do?”
“You stay put. I go out there and shoot him.”
“You can’t...” She trailed off. If this man was here to harm them, shouldn’t Ty shoot him? She watched the figure, then the glint of light. What was the sun reflecting off?
“I’m not going to kill him. I want to know why the hell he’s trying to torture you and me. But I’m not going to give him a chance to hurt you either. Stay put.”
“I should call Laurel.” But she didn’t drop the binoculars. She kept thinking she could figure something out if she could only see his face.
Then she did.
And she screamed.
* * *
JEN’S SCREAM ECHOED through the cabin almost in time with a crash against the window, but the minute her scream had pierced the air, Ty had lunged.
The window glass shattered above them, pieces raining down on his back. He thought he’d protected Jen from the brunt of it, thanks to the help of the curtain that kept most of the glass contained.
“Are you okay?” he asked, panicked that maybe something had shot through and reached her before he had.
“I’m fine,” she said, her voice muffled underneath him. “What was it? A bullet?”
Ty looked at the curtain. There was a slight rip. He checked around the trajectory of the shot and frowned at what he saw.
An arrow piercing the thick area rug. Not just a flimsy Boy Scout arrow, though. This was a three-blade steel broadhead, the kind used for hunting. Which explained its impact on the window.
The window. Ty rolled off Jen, crouched and waited for someone to try to come through the window. When nothing happened, he looked down at Jen.
She was sitting now but looked dazed. “An arrow,” she muttered. “That’s...weird.”
“A stupid, pointless stunt,” Ty muttered. Oh, it was an arrow that could do some damage, but he didn’t think that had been kill-shot aim. It was more scare tactics.
Ty got to his feet, done with these childish games. He flicked the safety off his pistol and strode for the door.
“Wait. Wait, Ty, there’s a note.” Jen crawled over to the arrow and cocked her head to read the piece of paper affixed to the back of the arrow.
Ty said something crude about what he could do with the note, but Jen crouched down to read aloud.
“Why don’t you come and find me?”
She wrinkled her nose, but Ty barely heard what she’d read aloud. Rage spread through him like a wildfire. He was nothing but heat and hate. She was bleeding. Just a little trickle from a spot on her cheek, but he’d make someone pay for that.
“I’ll find him,” he said, low and lethal. He reached the door, ready to jerk it open and start shooting. “I’ll—”
“Ty.” Jen’s gentle admonition did nothing to soothe the riot of fury and worry inside him, but it did stop his forward movement. “He wants you to.”
“Yeah, well, I’ll give him the fight he wants.” His hand was on the knob, but Jen kept talking.
“He doesn’t want a fight. He could have had that back in Bent.”
“He doesn’t want to hurt me, then, or he could have done that, too.”
“He wants to hurt you, but he’s playing a game. I don’t understand it, but it’s a game. Come and find me—he wouldn’t want you angrily going after him if he didn’t have a plan to take you down.”
Ty flicked the lock. “Let him try.”
“Use your brain,” Jen snapped with surprising force as she stalked over from where the arrow stuck out of the rug. She flicked the lock back in place and glared up at him. “He’s trying to mess with you, and has been this whole time. Not only does he know we’re alone up here, but he knows us. We don’t know a darn thing about him. You don’t even recognize his name. We can’t underestimate him.”
She’d never have any idea of how those words hurt. He knew, intellectually, she wasn’t blaming him for not knowing the name, for not recognizing the man, but he felt the blame anyway.
Who had he let down? Who had he hurt? How had he lured Braxton Lynn to Bent, Wyoming, and Jen Delaney?
“You can’t leave me here without my phone. I need to call Laurel,” she said, sounding calm and efficient. “And you need to do something about the window. Maybe duc
t-tape the curtains to the wall? I know it doesn’t keep him out, but it seals us in better.”
“That could have hit you,” he said because he didn’t understand her calm. Didn’t understand how she could talk about calling the police and duct-taping curtains of all things.
He needed to eliminate the threat now, and she wanted to do housekeeping.
“I know it could have.” She rubbed her palm over her heart. “Or you.” Her gaze met his. He’d convinced himself that ache in his heart was nostalgia or even remorse. It was sweet memories but had no bearing on the present.
Except looking at her now, knowing she could have been—and still could be hurt by all this—there was nothing past about it. He still loved her, deep into his bones. The kind of love time didn’t dull or erase. Something all but meant to be, stitched together in whatever ruled this crazy world.
She felt it, too, in the knowledge he could have been hurt. In the realization, if she hadn’t beat him to it already, that what they’d had once upon a time lived and breathed in the here and now—no matter how little either of them wanted it.
Or could have it.
He pointed to his phone on the table. “Call Laurel. I have to go out there.”
“Ty—”
“Call Laurel.” Then he stalked outside, ready to fight.
* * *
HE HUMMED TO HIMSELF. The shattering crash of arrow against window had been satisfying enough to put a little levity in his step.
He didn’t think he’d hit anyone—surely he’d have heard a scream of pain or someone would have run out. But the fear...there had to be fear now. He looked up as he heard something. The door opening.
So, Ty had taken the bait to come after him.
He tsked under his breath. What a foolish man Ty Carson turned out to be.
Bending down, he pulled another trap out of his backpack. Antique bear trap. All steel and menace. He’d brought them lovingly back from rusty relics to shining pieces of beauty.
He hadn’t been sure how or where to use them, but he’d hauled them around just the same. Now he set the three he had hefted up the hill at three separate points around the cabin.
