by Tina Leonard
He pulled the women away from his friends and shoved them toward the doors. “Go, damn it. You, too, Steel.”
“Come again, Steel,” Ivy said, her voice silky, and a bad feeling crawled all the way up Trace’s scalp. The sheriff was in a big pile of steaming shit, and Trace had a bad feeling it was going to hit the fan. Big-time.
* * *
They regrouped at Trace’s out of necessity.
“Shitfire,” Trace said, “I thought that was lipstick on your neck, but it’s a goddamn hickey, Steel! What were you thinking?”
“That I had a python wrapped around me,” Steel said miserably. “I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t think. It felt like my brain was made of Play-Doh!”
“Holy crap,” Declan said. “Your ass is so grass with Judy. Serious, fucking grass.”
“You’re going to have to hide for a week,” Saint said—wearing a hickey of his own, Trace noticed, though he didn’t think Saint realized it. “Are we all dumb as rocks, or did something really weird happen back there?”
Trace shook his head, grabbed a whiskey bottle to help them think. He poured several stiff ones, and they emptied the glasses fast, staring at Steel’s lip-peppered neck and face. “Weirdness always happens at Ivy’s. It’s why we don’t let Steel go there alone. Or any of us, for that matter. It’s a mantrap, which is fine if a man wants to be trapped.” He did not, and he knew Steel sure as hell didn’t.
“Deputies were of little use,” Saint muttered. “Pretty sure you didn’t get those two new deputies out of there alive, Trace. Thanks for saving my big dumb ass, though. My God, I could have awakened tomorrow morning with real trouble on my hands.”
“Yeah,” Declan said glumly. “If we ever see those deputies again, it’ll be a miracle. They were way too wet behind the ears to survive a night in the Honky-tonk.”
“I don’t care about any of that,” Trace said. He studied the sheriff. “What the hell are we going to do about him?”
They all stared at Steel, who looked stricken.
“May I just point out the obvious?” Declan said. “This is Friday night. Tomorrow is Saturday. Hickeys don’t go away in a day. But if Steel doesn’t show up for his Saturday night at Judy’s, there’ll be trouble in paradise.”
Steel grabbed another shot of whiskey and sank back into Trace’s leather sofa. “I’m going to stay here,” Steel said.
“You can’t hide from her. You got the call at her house. She knows we went to Ivy’s place. In fact, any minute now, your mobile is going to start lighting up with the mayor’s calls.” Trace took a deep breath. “And when Judy doesn’t get an instant answer from you, she’s going to hit our cell phones next.”
The men whipped out their phones and shut them off. Trace shook his head. “It’s not going to work. Judy’ll be suspicious as hell. She’ll bust us instantly. We’re going to have to play it cool, somehow.” He looked at the sheriff, worried.
“How come you got off so easy, Trace?” Declan asked.
He frowned. “Dee wasn’t trying all that hard.” He considered that for a moment, studying his shell-shocked buddies. He and Dee had shared many things, but he’d barely thought about her since the breakup. All he’d had on his mind was Ava and that teeny bikini, so he hadn’t been receptive to her; still, Dee hadn’t put up much of an effort. Not like what his buddies had gotten hit with. “In retrospect, I think she was just trying to sidetrack me. There’s nothing between us anymore.”
“She was a decoy?” Declan asked. “So we’d get the full treatment?”
Trace looked at the sheriff, nodding. “Yeah. Because he’s in deep now. Those cell phone photos have hit many phones in Hell by now.” He swallowed, hating to say what he suspected. “You can bet they swiftly made their way to Judy’s phone.”
“I’m screwed,” the sheriff moaned. He collapsed against the sofa. “I can tell Judy that nothing happened, that it was an—what’d you call it?”
“Ambush,” Saint said helpfully.
“Yeah,” Steel said, “but Judy always says excuses are like assholes. Everybody has one—if they’re an asshole.”
“Great.” Trace put the whiskey away, realizing they were past the assistance liquor could provide. “Here’s the thing. We have to confront this head-on.”
“I don’t like the sound of that,” Steel said.
Steel was an excellent sheriff because he was nice to everyone, and everyone in the town always knew they’d get a fair shake from him. Steel was more interested in getting along and extolling Hell as a pleasant place to live than cracking heads. Which helped explain why they were in this jam at the moment, because Steel was a marshmallow when it came to Judy. “Steel, look, man. Either you do some hard hell-raising over at Ivy’s and figure out what she was up to, or Judy’s gonna do it. I can assure you of that.”
He and Declan and Saint looked at each other, and a dawning, horrible comprehension came over Trace. “Judy has her own team now.”
“Her own posse.” Declan nodded. “She’ll drag the Belles with her to Ivy’s when she goes.”
Trace stared at his boots, thinking. “I think that’s Judy’s real goal. She’s got her own Judy-gang, so she’s never alone when she wants to make Ivy’s life miserable.”
“I did ask Judy tonight what she was really up to,” Steel said. “I figured she was just trying to matchmake you boys.”
“Matchmake us?” Saint demanded. “Good luck with that.”
“Yeah.” Declan scoffed. “Who’d tie us down? We’re so untie-able even Judy couldn’t pull off that wonder.”
Trace shook his head. “We can’t let Judy drag her Belles over there, Steel. You’re going to have to buck up, find out what Ivy was really up to. That whole thing was planned and staged. Who put the call in so you’d go out there?”
“I’d have to check with the router.” Steel looked perplexed. “I don’t generally ask who’s called something in. I get a call and I go. Plus, I had sufficient backup, even for Judy’s comfort.”
“I know. I had my guard down, too.”
His phone rang, and he pulled it out. It was Ava, and his heart gave a slow double-jump, painful in its intensity. “Here we go,” he said. “Ye ol’ shit hitteth the fan. Hello?”
“Trace? It’s Ava.”
“I know. I see the Virginia area code. I’ll save your number,” he said, sounding way too friendly and nonchalant, even to his own ears.
“Um, Judy can’t get in touch with the sheriff.”
Trace glanced at Steel, noting his friend’s sickly demeanor. “He’s here with me.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“I don’t know,” Ava said. “I was getting ready for bed, and Judy called. She seems to think something might have happened to Steel.”
He glanced at Steel’s hickey and wished he was vacationing in Hawaii. “Everything’s fine. Tell Judy to calm down. I won’t let anything happen to the sheriff.”
“You went out to Ivy’s?”
He wondered how long it took for hickeys to go away. He hadn’t had one since high school, and he recalled all too well that nothing helped hide them. Which had been the point: to brand Steel and get him in big trouble. “Yeah,” he said, rubbing his face. “But we’re at my place now.”
“Trace, I don’t really want to get into this, but Judy’s here. She wants to talk to you.”
“Can you put her off?”
“No-o,” Ava said slowly, and he wished he were in bed with her, or even just sitting on the porch step talking to her, rather than dealing with a problem that was about to explode the training relationship they had. “No, I don’t think I can, Trace. I think someone sent her some photos that have upset her terribly.”
“Shit,” Trace said. “Tell her we’ll be there in a minute. Can you calm her down?”
“I’ll try,” Ava said. “But I’d put the pedal to the floor if I were you.”
“I’m on it.�
�� He hung up. “Steel, buddy, I know this sucks the big one, but tonight’s the night you earn your badge, man.”
Steel pushed himself off the sofa, looking like a dog with nothing in his dish and no hope of anything appearing. “All right,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.
“You want us to come?” Saint asked.
Declan looked a bit ill as he glanced at the sheriff, but he said, “We can saddle up for support.”
“I think,” Trace said, looking at the condition his friends were in, “we try to dole this out in spoonfuls.”
He and Steel got in his truck and headed over to Ava’s.
“I feel sick,” Steel moaned.
“I don’t blame you.” Steel was a big, tough man—except when it came to Judy. Trace hoped he never let Ava get under his skin the way Judy was under Steel’s. He resolved to put a little distance between himself and the pretty brunette. Keep that relationship strictly professional.
“You just can’t understand how much I love her. When that woman is all soft and gentle, it’s like being in an angel’s arms. My girl is a big woman, Trace, she’s strong and fit—but when she’s in my arms, she’s like a delicate flower that only I get to pick.”
“Damn, Steel.” Trace blew out a breath. “It’s going to be okay, man.” He hoped it was, anyway.
But he wouldn’t put money on it.
* * *
Ava didn’t let herself gasp when Trace ushered Steel into her bungalow, but she barely managed not to. Steel had lipstick on his neck, and Trace looked plain miserable for his buddy. He glanced at her, and she couldn’t help the sympathy she felt—no wonder the sheriff had been trying to hide from Judy.
It wasn’t going to work. Judy’s normally smiling face wore a scowl, which grew when she noticed what Ava suddenly realized wasn’t lipstick at all but something more incriminating. She glanced at Trace, stunned, and he shrugged helplessly.
“Oh, Steel,” Judy said. “What happened?”
“It was horrible, Judy!” the sheriff began, and Trace said, “It was a setup.”
“A setup!” Judy put her arm through Steel’s, gazing up at him. “What kind of setup?”
“A terrible one,” Steel said. “You have no idea how fast that crowd can come at a fellow.”
“I have some idea,” Judy said, her tone dry. She glanced at Trace. “I trust you to protect him from this very kind of thing. How are those photos going to look when Steel goes up for election this year?”
Steel sagged into a chair, seemingly defeated.
“I don’t care,” Steel said. “I don’t have to run for election again.”
“Steel!” Judy looked at her sheriff with concern. “Don’t you dare allow Poison Ivy to win!”
Ava went to get a glass of wine for everyone, not knowing what else to do with herself. She was just glad Judy seemed to realize that the enemy was someone other than her handsome sheriff.
She wondered what had happened to Trace while he’d been at the Honky-tonk, supposedly “protecting” Steel from Ivy. He came into the kitchen and helped her rinse out the wineglasses.
“You never saw anything like it,” Trace murmured. In the den she could hear Judy and Steel talking. “It was like a pack of bees descended on us.”
“I don’t want to know. Please don’t tell me anything. I’m just glad Steel’s all right.”
“He’s fine. Now that he knows Judy isn’t going to cut him off of Saturday nights, he can go on to the next phase.”
“Which is what?”
“Groveling.” Trace poured wine into the glasses. “We all do a pretty good grovel around here when needed.”
She wasn’t going to ask any questions about what had happened, and she didn’t want to know.
“No one kissed me,” Trace said cheerfully.
“I find that very hard to believe.” She tried to keep the jealous note from her voice.
“Believe it. Now, if you can keep a secret about my buddies—”
“I can keep secrets,” Ava said. “I just don’t want to hear them in the first place.”
“Yeah, well, I kind of need your help.” He carried the wine out to Steel and Judy, came back into the kitchen. “At least they’re talking. I was afraid Judy might be really angry.”
“I’m sure she’s angry, but I don’t think it’s Steel who’s going to feel it. Judy’s too cagey. She can read the signals that were sent.” Ava eyed Trace, not wanting to admit that she was quite happy the big, lanky cowboy hadn’t gotten any kisses from Ivy’s girls.
Or so he claimed. He wasn’t bearing any scars or lipstick trophies, as Steel was.
“What help?” Ava asked. “Not that I’m going along with whatever it is.”
“Declan and Saint didn’t fare as well as I did. And I don’t know what happened to the deputies, though they did radio that they’d escaped by the time we got here.”
“You’re thinking about Cameron’s date tomorrow night with Jake.”
“Yes, I am.” Trace leaned against the counter, his face thoughtful. “By now those photos have made it to everyone’s phone, so Cameron and Harper have seen them, too.”
“If Cameron’s got an eye for Jake, there’s nothing much that’s going to matter.”
“I know that Fallon called Harper and asked her out for a drink.”
“This is true,” Ava said. “Does it seem like there’s a lot happening, or is this the way Hell always operates?”
“It was certainly a lot more quiet before you ladies arrived.”
Ava looked at him. “You want me to put in a good word for the Outlaws with my team members. That’s what you’re going to ask me.”
“Something like that.”
“What good will it do?”
“They may just need a little encouragement to stay off the bad side of town. Hopefully they’re not the kind of women who go for the dangerous types.”
She thought Trace was probably one of the most dangerous men in town, if not the most dangerous. How else did one get to be a platoon leader, if not because other men respected you and figured you were strong enough to lead?
“Cameron and Harper aren’t going to listen to anything I have to say. You forget we’ve only known each other a couple of weeks. We haven’t quite gelled as a team yet.” Ava studied him curiously. “So how is it that everybody got some action but you?”
He grinned. “Lucky, I guess.”
“Or not.” She wouldn’t have passed him up. “If you’re worried about Declan and Saint, and clearly Steel didn’t come out unscathed, why weren’t you singled out, too?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I’m just not their type.” He gave a careless shrug. “Perhaps my reputation precedes me.”
“What? That you’re not a good kisser?”
He didn’t even blink. “That I’m not anyone to mess with.”
“Oh,” Ava said, enjoying pushing his buttons, “but Saint and Declan are?”
“Wrong place, wrong time for them, I’d say.”
“It doesn’t make sense.” She turned to the sink, rinsed out a couple of glasses that didn’t really need washing. If I was looking for one of the Outlaws to kiss, it would definitely be Trace. Not that I’m looking, but phew. I’d be stuck on his face like—
“If you’re worried about whether or not I’m a good kisser …,” Trace said, taking her face in his hands. He kissed her and she didn’t move, frozen, wanting it so badly.
Wanting to kiss him so much it felt like she’d been waiting a month instead of just a week.
“Hey, you two,” Judy called from the den, and Ava and Trace jumped apart. “We’re going to head home. Thanks for the hospitality, Ava. And Trace, I’ll talk to you later.”
Ava and Trace left the kitchen. She tried to keep herself from looking like she’d just been in the kitchen receiving the kiss of her life, but she had been, and there was really no way to disguise it. She probably had I just got kissed! written all over her face.
“Goodnight, Jud
y, Steel,” Trace said, following them to the door.
“You watch yourself with my girl,” Ava heard Judy hiss to Trace.
“Yes, ma’am,” Trace said. He closed the front door, and Ava walked right to him, giving him a kiss that he would remember for a long time, no matter how many of Ivy’s girls kissed him. If she’d learned anything from the sheriff’s situation, it was that the women in this town didn’t pull their punches, and she saw no reason whatsoever not to do likewise.
“Wow,” Trace said, when she pulled away to gaze into his eyes.
“Thanks for coming over and smoothing things for Judy and Steel. That meant a lot to me. I couldn’t bear it if those two hit a rough patch over stupid stuff.”
“Hold on a minute. We were just getting to know each other better,” Trace said, and pulled her into his arms. There was nothing polite about his kiss this time—there was no getting to know you about it. He tasted her and swept her hard against him. She felt like they were almost two parts of one whole, and as he held her, Ava had the strangest sensation that somehow she’d met the man of her dreams.
Which was totally wrong—except for how badly she wanted to be with him right now.
“Too much too soon?” Trace asked.
“Not at all,” Ava said, hearing herself talk from some place she was floating in. She took the lead again, pulling his head down so she could kiss him, and found herself wondering how kissing a man could be better than anything else on the planet, including riding her horse.
She pulled away, looking up at him. “Maybe we should probably call it a night.” Everything is way too hot; I want more than I should right now.
“Maybe,” he agreed, “but things are just now getting interesting.” He kissed her fingertips, then her lips, and there was no way she would pull away from him. He tasted wonderful, he felt strong and sexy and irresistible—and he definitely knew how to kiss.
“I’m dying here,” Trace said, taking a deep breath and stepping away from her. “I think I’d better go.”
She looked at him, wishing he wouldn’t, knowing if he stayed much longer, he was going to get much more than a kiss. He looked totally shell-shocked, as she’d meant for him to, and which she found totally gratifying. “I’ll see you in the morning. Don’t be late,” he told her. He went outside, looked back at her. “I don’t suppose you’d care to do that again. One for the road, as they say?”
