Undercover Groom

by Lovelace, Merline

  Her heart froze.

  Was it true? Was he a killer?

  Before she could speak, before she could even draw a breath, he whipped off his belt and flipped the man onto his face with brutal disregard for his unconscious state. A few quick twists of the belt lashed her attacker’s wrists together.

  Then Mase, her Mase, turned and gathered her in his arms.

  Eleven

  Never, ever, would Chloe have believed that the terror and violence she’d just experienced could produce bright, shining moments she would savor forever.

  The first moment came when Mase took her in his arms. Voice shaking, hands trembling, he cradled her against his chest.

  “Chloe, baby, are you hurt? Did he hurt you?”

  She blinked to clear the last of her tears, only to blink again at the fierce, unrelenting love on his face.

  “I’m not hurt.”

  Much. She bit back a wince as he rocked her against his chest. White-hot needles shot up and down her bound arms.

  “Mase. Please, my wrists.”

  Somehow she wasn’t surprised when he produced a deadly looking knife from nowhere and sawed through the duct tape binding her arms. Gently he drew her limp arms forward.

  Not so gently, he began to massage them.

  “Ow!”

  Chloe abandoned any and all attempts at heroic fortitude as pain needled her numb limbs.

  “I know it feels as if you’ve got glass in your veins,” he said, his voice rough and tender at the same time. “But this will get the blood circulating faster.”

  She scrunched her eyes shut, enduring the agony as blood pumped back into her flesh. Mase finished one arm and went to work on the other. Slowly, achingly, feeling crept back into her limbs.

  Pam Hawkins’s arrival on the scene speeded the process considerably. The brunette burst out of the trees, weapon drawn and held two-fisted before her. Two complete strangers charged behind her, similarly armed. All three skidded to a stop when they spotted Mase and Chloe.

  “We heard a shot,” Pam panted. Her glance swept to the figure sprawled unconscious on the rocks. “That’s Greene all right. Dammit, Mase, you should have waited for backup to bring him down.”

  “I didn’t bring him down. Chloe did.”

  The brunette’s reaction provided the second, shining moment, one Chloe would savor for years. Stunned out of her seemingly unshakable cool, Pam gaped at the kidnappee.

  Chloe tried. She really tried not to smirk. She wasn’t totally successful, but she did manage to bite back the snide little observation that Hawkins wasn’t the only one who could play hard and fast and rough when necessary.

  The third moment came a few hours later, after a small army of law enforcement officials had descended on Crockett by land vehicle and helicopter. Using Mayor Dobbins’s café as a sort of impromptu command post, they took custody of a swearing, handcuffed Dexter Greene. Chloe gave her statement, then stood on the sidelines as Mase briefed them on the background leading up to the afternoon’s events.

  This was another Mase, another one she hadn’t seen before. He wore a bruise high on his left cheek from direct contact with Greene’s rifle butt. His dark hair sported an assortment of pine needles and a layer of dust. The jagged rocks had ripped out one knee of his jeans, and his blue shirt had taken as much of a beating as he had during the desperate struggle. Yet he carried himself with an air of crisp authority that the others instinctively deferred to... and he certainly knew far more about the apprehension and disposition of criminals than your everyday, average business executive.

  The state and federal officers took Dexter Greene with them when they left. Pam Hawkins and her team departed a short time later in a whir of chopper blades and flashing strobe lights that cut through the rapidly descending mountain darkness like knives.

  The small crowd of residents who’d gathered to find out what all the fuss was about retreated inside the café. Even Hannah, whom Mase had driven down from the store, joined the group. Exclamations circulated as fast and as freely as the ice-cold beers, with half the population asserting that Greene had looked suspicious from the first moment they’d laid eyes on him, while the other half shook their heads and wondered what the world was coming to. Chloe made sure Hannah was settled comfortably with her friends before she detached Mase from the loquacious group.

  “I need to talk to you. Privately. Can we go upstairs?”

  “We can,” he replied, his gray eyes glinting behind their screen of black lashes. “I’ll give you the same warning I gave you last time, though. If I take you upstairs, I’m not promising I’ll keep my hands off you.”

  The less-than-subtle warning had made Chloe shy off a few nights ago. This time she matched him gleam for gleam.

  “Did I ask for any promises?”

  Mase sucked in a sharp breath, then hustled her out of the café and up the stairs so swiftly that the residents of Crockett stared at them in astonishment. All except Hannah. Chloe caught the tail end of the grin that creased her employer’s weathered face before she turned to the mayor/bartender and demanded another beer.

  Once they reached his room, Chloe turned to Mase. “I think you should know my memory’s come back,” she said.

  “Chloe!”

  Delight and relief lit his eyes. He was halfway across the room before he absorbed her militant stance and the cool note in her voice. He stopped a few feet away, regret and a wary sort of caution in his face.

  “I wanted to explain about Pam, Chloe. I had an explanation all ready, but you took off before I could lay it on you.” His lips twisted. “I guess it’s just as well. The story I’d patched together was a careful collection of lies and half-truths.”

  “I don’t want lies and half-truths between us. No fake engagements. No shadows from our past. No secret lives. Ever again.”

  “Pam isn’t between us. She never was.”

  Chloe dismissed the doubts and insecurities that had plagued her all those weeks ago with an impatient wave of one hand.

  “I know that now. I guess I knew it then. It’s taken me a while to figure it out, but I realize now I didn’t run away because I found Pam draped all over you, Mase. I ran away because I’d fallen in love with you. No, that’s not true. I’d fallen in love with someone I didn’t even know! A secret agent, for heaven’s sake!”

  “I’m not making any excuses. I did what I did for so many years because—” he lifted a shoulder in a small shrug “—it needed to be done. I couldn’t tell you about it. I couldn’t tell anyone. That was part of our code.”

  “No! You don’t understand! I don’t blame you. I blame myself. All this time, all these months we’ve been engaged, I was so selfish, so self-absorbed, so damned blind! I never guessed, never even had a clue what you were up to during those extended business trips.”

  Mase couldn’t help himself. She looked so thoroughly disgusted that he had to reach for her. She came into his arms still stiff, still militant.

  “It wouldn’t say a whole lot for my image of myself as the nineties’ answer to James Bond if you’d picked up what I did during those trips.”

  “This isn’t a joke! How could I love you when I never saw the real you? How could you love me?”

  “Chloe, darling, you weren’t supposed to see the real me.”

  “That’s no excuse. I feel so...so stupid!”

  “If it helps any, I feel pretty stupid, too.”

  “You? Why?”

  “I should have spotted Greene.” His voice roughened. “I should never have let him get to you. The last thing I wanted was to expose you to this kind of danger. I’m sorry, so sorry.”

  “You’re forgiven. This time.” A shiver rippled through her as she remembered the malevolent look in Greene’s eyes just before he was led away. “I’m not sure I’ll be so forgiving next time, though.”

  “There won’t be a next time. I quit the agency, Chloe. Months ago. I decided you were far more important to me than what I did before.”<
br />
  “You did?” She hiked a brow. “Was that why Pam came to Minneapolis? To entice you back into playing—how did she put it?—hard and fast and rough with her?”

  Mase felt a flush creep up his cheeks. Her memory had returned, all right.

  “That was one of the reasons,” he answered with brutal honesty. He wouldn’t lie to her. Not anymore. “The other was to brief me on Greene.”

  She thought about that for a moment or two. Mase found himself holding his breath. Would she believe him? Could she trust him after all these months of subterfuge?

  He’d started to sweat by the time she uncrossed her arms and slid one hand up to pluck a long, dry pine needle from his hair Twirling the brittle spike between her fingers, she gazed at it thoughtfully.

  “I take it your resignation means you won’t be taking any more extended trips?”

  “Not without you.”

  She tossed the pine sprig aside. Her violet eyes filled with a love that knocked Mase’s heart all around his rib cage. “Good! Because the next trip we take is going to be our honeymoon.”

  Grinning, he bent down to brush her lips with his. “Let’s go somewhere with lots of sun and blue sky and sparkling lakes.”

  “Funny,” she murmured against his mouth. “That sounds a lot like Crockett.”

  “So it does.” In one quick sweep, he had her up in his arms. “If you’re willing to risk making love under that rack of antlers, I’m all for starting our honeymoon right here, right now.”

  Smiling, she framed his cheeks with her palms. “Right here, right now sounds pretty good to me.”

  When he planted a knee on the narrow bed and lowered her to the chenille spread, the springs creaked. They groaned in earnest when Mase shed his clothes and joined her a few moments later.

  Slowly, deliberately, he peeled off her top. Slowly, torturously, he took down her jeans and panties. His tongue found her navel, her breasts, her throat Finally, he worked his way to her mouth. Her toes curling in delight, Chloe added a few groans of her own to those of the bedsprings.

  Her hands were as busy as his, her mouth as warm and willing. She was ready long before Mase. More than ready. Wet and eager and on fire with a need that went far beyond physical, she opened herself to him.

  He settled his weight between her thighs, and the rest of the world faded from her vision. The intimidating stag mounted above the bed blurred. The scrubbed pine walls disappeared. The world narrowed, centered, joined, until there was only Mase.

  She held nothing back. Nor did he. Their loving was so deep, so all consuming, that Chloe knew she’d never again feel lost or confused or alone.

  By the time they lay limp and exhausted, she wasn’t sure she’d ever feel anything again. Her body was numb from pleasure, her mind languorous. Her arms and legs tangled with Mase’s, as much to keep from tumbling off the narrow bed as to maintain contact with the man who filled her heart as well as her soul.

  With some effort, she pried open her eyes. Above her, the stag gazed down at their sweat-slicked bodies with what looked very much like amusement. Chloe grinned back at him. This could, she decided in lazy, sensual satisfaction, stretch into a very long honeymoon.

  At which point it occurred to her that they ought to think about a wedding. Which, naturally, led to a tumble of thoughts about the extravagant ceremony she’d been, roped into planning and the invitations Mollie was waiting to send out and her father’s stew over what to buy them for a wedding present.

  Her father. Chloe smiled, her heart overflowing with memories. Her elbow poked the sweaty chest behind her.

  “Mase.”

  “Mmmm.”

  “I need to call my father.”

  He mumbled something into her hair about not having either the energy or the fortitude to face Emmet at this moment, even by phone. Nevertheless, he untangled his legs, rolled off the bed and pulled on his jeans. Retrieving his shirt and a small portable phone, he handed both to Chloe.

  “This is one call I’m not looking forward to,” he admitted wryly. “Your father isn’t going to appreciate the fact that I almost got you killed.”

  “Then we won’t tell him.”

  She poked her arms through the shirtsleeves. A few moments later, she cradled the cell phone to her ear, crying, laughing, feeling completely whole at last as her father poured out a torrent of love, long-suppressed worry and instructions.

  “I’m sending a plane out for you,” Emmet boomed. “It’ll be airborne two minutes after we hang up. Come home, Chloe. Come home and stay home. Marry Mase and make lots of babies and don’t ever put me through what I’ve gone through these past weeks again.”

  “I plan to marry Mase, Daddy.” She flashed a smile at the bridegroom under discussion. “I also plan to make lots of babies.”

  “Good! I’ll tell Mollie to send out the wedding invitations.”

  “Tell her to take care of the rest of the arrangements, too.”

  “What?”

  “She’ll have to take care of all the details. I won’t be home for a while yet.”

  Emmet’s violent protest exploded in her ear. Wincing, Chloe held the phone a few inches away while several secondary detonations took place. Finally the noise level at the other end of the line had died enough for her to be heard.

  “I can’t leave Crockett. Not yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “I have to make sure Hannah’s taken care of.”

  “Hannah! Who the hell’s Hannah?”

  “Hannah Crockett. She’s the proprietor of the general store where I’ve been working. I owe her for . . .”

  “We’ll pay whatever you owe ten times over! In cash. I want you home.”

  “No, Daddy,” she said gently. “Cash won’t come close to compensating for the comfort and security and friendship Hannah gave me. I have to see that she gets to Rapid City to get the pins in her ankle removed and arrange for someone to cover the store and—”

  She stopped, startled by the idea that suddenly sprang into her mind. It spun through her head, picking up speed and brilliance like a dazzling, pin-wheeling Fourth of July firecracker. Held in thrall by the idea, Chloe glanced at Mase. She should talk this through with him, explore the possibilities, look at the potential.

  No, she didn’t have to talk it over. Not with Mase. He’d supported her desire to break into the business world when her own father hadn’t taken her seriously. He would support her in this, too. The idea was still taking shape when Emmet burst impatiently into her thoughts.

  “And what, Chloe? What do you have to do that’s so damned important it takes precedence over planning your wedding?”

  With a wide smile for the half-naked man across the room, she dropped her bomb.

  “I have to talk to Hannah about buying a partnership in her store.”

  Mase’s brows shot up. As quickly as Chloe herself had, he explored the possibilities. By the time Emmet had finished sputtering and issuing dire warnings about two-bit operations and losing propositions, she saw only approval and encouragement in Mase’s smile.

  If she hadn’t already loved Mase, she would have fallen for him at that moment, and fallen hard. His expression said more clearly than words that they were a team from here on out. He was with her in whatever enterprise she wanted to undertake. Her heart brimming with happiness, Chloe cut off her father’s demand to know if she’d lost her mind.

  “The Crockett General Store doesn’t have to remain a two-bit operation, Dad. With a little strategic planning and some targeted advertising, we could capture more of the tourist trade. We could also add some gourmet items,” she continued, thinking hard and fast. “Maybe even franchise.”

  “Franchise!”

  Emmet went ballistic once more. Mase, bless his heart, took pity on her. Strolling across the room, he held out his hand. Chloe passed him the phone in relief. With cheerful ruthlessness, he cut through her father’s impassioned speech about profit and loss statements.

  “Your daugh
ter’s a Fortune, Emmet. For a little while longer, anyway. She knows what she’s doing.”

  That silenced her father for a few precious seconds. It also earned Mase a very long, very passionate kiss. One kiss led to another and another. Abruptly Mase snapped the cell phone to his ear.

  “We’ll call you back later. Chloe and I have some serious honeymooning to take care of.”

  “Honeymooning!”

  A second before the phone flipped shut, Chloe heard her father’s final shout.

  “Just be sure you two get back to Minneapolis in time for the wedding!”

  Twelve

  They got back to Minneapolis in time for the wedding. Barely.

  Mollie McGuire had it all orchestrated, rehearsed and set in motion when Mase flew them home in Chandler Industries’ corporate jet. He also flew in Hannah Crockett, Harold Dobbins, bushy-bearded young Doc Johnson, retired postal worker and newest employee of Crockett General Stores, Incorporated, Charlie Thomas, and half a dozen other people he’d met only once or twice, but all of whom Chloe had invited to attend her wedding.

  Throttling the engines back to a whining roar, Mase taxied the jet to his private hangar, where Emmet Fortune paced at the head of a long line of stretch limos chartered specially for the occasion. The tails of his soon-to-be father-in-law’s dove gray formal coat flapped in the chill November breeze. Emmet clamped a hand on his top hat to hold it in place as the small, sleek jet rolled to a stop, then lost his headgear to a gust of wind when he rushed forward to fold Chloe into a crushing bear hug.

  While father and daughter held a laughing, weeping reunion, Chloe’s older brother Mac calmly went after the spinning top hat. He rescued it from the path of a rumbling fuel truck and returned to the jet to assist Mase. Courteously he directed the line of guests who climbed out to the waiting limos.

  Mac’s wife, Kelly Sinclair Fortune, gave her sister-in-law a ferocious hug.