I kneel to check Earl’s pulse and find it pounding away. “He’s fine. Just unconscious,” I say. “You need to leave before Ronnie gets back. I’m not going to risk my ass for you again. Consider us even for the warning you gave me about what he was planning.”
“So you’re the one who tipped him off?” asks a deep voice from behind me.
I turn to see Ronnie, who is striding through the front door, followed by the same two men he had with him at my ranch before. One of the burly men is guiding Mila inside by the shoulder. She gives me an apologetic look, but seems otherwise unharmed.
“They were following us when we hit town. They cut me off before I made it here and--”
“Shut her up!” shouts Ronnie, who suddenly looks far less composed.
The man gives Mila a shove and she clamps her mouth shut.
My teeth are clenched so hard together I think they might shatter, and my fingernails are digging hard enough into my palms to draw blood. I’m going to fucking kill someone.
“Take your fucking hand off her unless you want to lose it,” I growl.
The man scoffs, but when he meets my eye, he swallows hard and pulls his hand back.
Ronnie steps toward Cynthia and pulls his hand back to slap her. “You could’ve ruined everything! You stupid bitch.”
I step between them, gripping his shirt and lifting him to slam him against the wall. I’m about to smash my head into his face when one of the men grabs me from behind and pulls me back. I spin, smashing my elbow into the man, but the man behind Mila joins in now, and I can’t break free with both burly men holding each of my arms. Ronnie takes the opportunity to punch me in the stomach.
He’s never been very strong, and the punch barely stings, but I can’t do anything except watch.
“Mila! No!” I shout, when I see her running toward the men holding me with a lamp held like a baseball bat.
But she doesn’t stop. She slams the lamp into the man on my right’s head. He stumbles back, letting go of my arm and giving me a chance to shake free of the hold on my arm. I kick Ronnie in the chest, elbow the man to my right, and tackle the man who is trying to go after Mila.
The telltale metallic click of a gun being cocked makes everyone freeze.
“Off him. Now!” Ronnie shouts aiming a matte black pistol at my head.
I move slowly off the man, glaring at my brother the whole time. “What’s the plan, Ronnie? Shoot me? You know you won’t see a dime if you do, right? I already made arrangements for the land to be donated as a nature preserve if anything happens to me.” It’s a lie, actually. I just called a lawyer and had a will made that left the land to Mila if anything happens to me, but he doesn’t need to know that.
“No. The plan is I see how many holes I have to put in your pretty little girlfriend before you make the necessary calls to sell the land or put it in my name.”
His arm jerks to the side. Time slows down. I see the muscles of his forearm tense and his knuckles go white. I see his eyes locked on Mila, and I know he’s going to do it. He’s going to fucking shoot her.
I lunge to the side with all the strength I can muster, throwing my body between the gun and her.
Orange fire and a plume of smoke explode from the barrel of the gun and I feel a dull thud in my shoulder. It feels like being punched, followed by an excruciating warmth that grows and grows until it’s like a white-hot poker has been jammed beneath my skin.
“Fucking idiot,” says Ronnie. “Check him. Make sure it’s not lethal.”
“Lucas!” Mila cries out, trying to come to my side but is held back by one of the men, who she swings and kicks at with all her might.
Cynthia suddenly stands up from where she was cowering behind Ronnie. She looks at the gun with a feral sort of intensity that tells me she’s about to try something crazy. I don’t have long to think about what to do--I just know if Ronnie sees that look in her eyes he’ll hurt her. My split-second hesitation is enough time for her to rush at him and lunge for the gun.
“What the--fuck!” he roars, as she manages to strip the gun from him. There’s a brief struggle and complete chaos as Ronnie and Cynthia wrestle for control of the gun, one of Ronnie’s thugs draws his own gun, and I move to put myself between Mila and danger, wincing against the lancing pain in my shoulder. A cold numbness is spreading from the wound as the heat fades, which I doubt is a good thing.
Cynthia turns the gun on the man drawing his own. “Don’t move or I’ll fucking shoot you. I swear I will!” she screams hysterically. Her eyes are wide and her hands are shaking, but there’s a conviction in her features I think everyone in the room senses. She’s a woman who has been pushed to the edge and there’s nothing she won’t do now. Nothing at all.
Ronnie puts his palms up placatingly. “Baby, come on. Be reasonable,” he says in soothing tones. He takes a step closer to her and she whips the gun back toward him, then rapidly back to Ronnie’s goon, who was reaching for his weapon again.
The pistol kicks in her hands as she squeezes the trigger, missing the man by a wide margin and blowing a hole in the wall. Ronnie dashes toward her, strips the gun from her hand, and points it at her head just as the front door swings open.
Two men step inside with weapons drawn--it’s the off-duty cops appearing in the nick of time. “Drop the gun!” Screams the taller of the two officers. “Drop it now! Both of you!”
Ronnie’s men carefully put down their weapons and Ronnie follows suit.
Relief floods through me, and all I can do is hold Mila tight. “We did it,” I whisper.
“You’re bleeding so bad, baby,” she says, looking at the rapidly growing red stain in my shirt.
“It’s just a flesh wound,” I say with a grin.
One of the cops keeps his weapon drawn while the taller of the two cuffs Ronnie and his men.
“I don’t care.” she says firmly. “He shot you. We need to get you taken care of. Does this town have a doctor? A hospital? Ambulances?”
The officers are largely ignoring us as they deal with the immediate threats of Ronnie and his men. They seem to have decided I don’t warrant cuffs yet, but I hear them radio for medical assistance.
“There’s Doctor Kershaw,” I say. “But everyone knows he went blind ages ago and just won’t admit it. Not sure I’d trust him poking around in me for a bullet.”
“Well, then I’m going to just have to stop the bleeding till someone comes. They always say to put pressure on it--”
Without giving me warning, Mila practically shoves me down to lay on my back and throws her full weight into pressing both palms into my wound.
“Fuck!” I roar, drawing the attention of everyone in the room.
“Ma’am!” says one of the cops.
“I’m trying to help him,” she snaps. “Which is more than I can say for you two.”
The shorter officer moves over to my side with a look of exasperation on his face. “Not that much pressure,” he says. “If the bullet’s still inside you don’t want to push it around and cause more damage. Here,” he rips a strip of fabric from my shirt and creates a makeshift tourniquet, using the pen in his pocket to twist the fabric on my arm just above the wound until it is tight.
“An ambulance will be here soon. He’ll be fine, ma’am. Just don’t move him around.”
To my amusement, Mila gives the officer a furious look and actually swats at him. “Don’t you tell me he’ll be fine. Look at him! He’s going to bleed to death!”
I chuckle. “Mila. I’m fine. I promise.”
She turns her fury on me. “Don’t you minimalize this. Don’t you dare.”
I wisely keep my mouth shut for the next thirty minutes while Mila fusses over me, the cops take Ronnie and his men away, and they question all of us. Within half an hour, it sounds like an army of cop cars are outside, and a paramedic crew finally comes in and somehow manages to get me away from Mila, who is being adorably protective of me.
“Are you going to fuss
over me like this every time I get shot?” I ask as the paramedics move me to a stretcher.
“Don’t even joke about that,” she says. “You wouldn’t have been shot if I didn’t get caught. It’s my fault.”
“Hey,” I say, pulling her in for a kiss and forcing the paramedics to stop carting me. “I’m going to be fine. You did exactly what you were supposed to do, and it all worked out. Okay? So stop stressing. It’s all over.”
She hugs me again and then bullies her way into the back of the ambulance, even though the paramedics try to tell her she can’t ride in the back. I spend the bumpy ride to the nearest hospital, which is more than an hour away, watching Mila and loving every second of it. Even with the paramedics prodding and messing with my wound, no amount of pain takes away from the overwhelming sense of relief I feel. It’s over.
Ronnie is probably going to be in jail for a long, long time, and I’ve got my girl. I’ve got my ranch, and I’ve still got my cows. What more could I want?
Epilogue
Mila
I close my laptop with a satisfied sigh and look out the nearest window, where I can see Lucas working in the pasture. Thunder rumbles somewhere in the distance, just as a dark shadow passes over the ground outside, covering everything with fascinating slowness. I know I’m already adjusting to the country life, because my first reaction is that the rain will be good for the grazing pastures. That, and I’ve come to love rainy days for totally non-pasture related reasons too. They force Lucas inside, where we can cozy up and listen to the rain pattering on the roof and windows, just the two of us, together and safe.
When the weather is nice, I can’t even keep track of all the work he does around the ranch. During his workday, he’s always fixing something, building something, taking care of the animals, and finding excuses to put his hands on me any chance he gets.
Figuring out the whole working remote thing hasn’t been nearly as much of a challenge as I thought it would. Clients find me on the new and improved website Amy helped me set up, we schedule a video chat, and the whole interview process is handled remotely. I used to do my own search for potential matches for my clients, whether it was using dating sites, striking up conversations in public, or asking around in my relatively large circle of contacts. After everything that happened with Lucas, even that felt too deceptive. Now, I listen in while I coach my clients through breaking the ice with men in various settings.
Once we find a man that works, I help them push past their insecurities and make the conversation happen.
I feel better about what I do for people now than I ever have. Before, it was like I was shopping for a man. It seems artificial in retrospect. Now I’m teaching these women how to find a man who’s the right match for them. It’s like they say, you can give a woman a date and make her happy for a week, or you can teach a woman to date and make her happy for the rest of their life. Okay, I know, they definitely don’t say that. But I say that. At least, now I do.
Oddly enough, business has been exploding ever since I changed the system. I don’t know if it’s the site, the happy customers talking about me to other people, or maybe just my new perspective on love. Maybe it’s a little bit of everything. Either way, I’m thrilled, and so is Amy, who’s currently on a week-long cruise to the Bahamas. Even my dad sounded impressed when we last talked, which was such a surprise I’m still trying to process it.
Lucas opens the front door and steps in, stripping off his shirt and letting out an exhausted sigh. He’s dirty from working outside all day, and the long rack of his abs is caked with dark stains run through by rivulets of sweat. He grins up at me, the white of his teeth dazzling against the streaks of dirt on his face.
I laugh at the sight of him, but the sound is smaller and more in the back of my throat than I intend. I can’t help biting my lip. “What’d you do? Wrestle the cows in the dirt or something?”
“Never wrestle a cow,” he says seriously. “They always win.”
I frown in confusion, not sure if he’s serious or joking.
His smirk widens. “Guess I got a little dirty, but there’s a quick cure for that.”
“Yeah,” I say, crossing my arms. “It’s called a shower.”
“Exactly. And if I can trust my weatherman,” he says, moving toward me.
I step back, holding a warning finger up at him. “Don’t you dare!” I laugh. “Don’t even dare!”
He chases me half-way around the house, finally wrapping me up in his dirty grasp. He hoists me over his shoulder like a bag of feed and starts walking me outside.
“Lucas!” I scream, slapping his back and kicking my feet. “Put me down! You’re going to get us struck by lightning!”
“If you never go running out into the storm you’re not living, darlin’.”
He kicks open the door. Rain is already pouring down and the sky flashes with electric white light.
“No,” I say with frustration. “If you go running out into the storm you won’t be living. Not for long.”
“Pssh,” he says, tossing me into the little vehicle he uses to move around the ranch--something between a golf cart and a four wheeler. “Point is, I had a fucking plan and I’m not going to let a little rain ruin it.”
“Rain and, you know, lightning bolts,” I say sourly, but he knows me well enough to know if I really had objections, I would’ve just gotten up and walked inside. The truth is I just enjoy our verbal sparring matches too much to let the opportunity pass by.
He turns on the vehicle, which is too quiet to hear over the rain, and starts driving us toward the tree-line at the south end of his property. “Lightning gets a bad rap, but haven’t you ever seen those superhero movies? You’d probably just get super powers or something.”
I laugh. “Yeah, the superpower of turning into human toast.”
“Negative Nancy,” he grumbles.
I smile when he’s not looking. I have to squint my eyes against the onslaught of rain pouring down on us, but there’s a beautiful chaos to it. I can barely see a hundred yards away with how thick the rain is, except when lightning splits the sky and blasts everything with a blinding burst of light. The thunder rolls through the thick country air so powerfully I can feel it in my chest.
He comes to a stop near a section of tall trees where the cows are sheltering from the rain. “Okay, even I have my limits. You’re not telling me we’re going to go stand under the trees during a lightning storm, right?”
“What do you think I am? Crazy?” he asks.
I take in the sight of his wet hair and chiseled body washed clean by the rain, from the shimmering peaks of his bare torso to the way his jeans cling temptingly to his wet legs.
“Maybe a little,” I admit.
“Good. Cause anybody who isn’t at least a little crazy is doing it wrong.”
“I’m not sure who told you that, but it doesn’t sound right.”
He shrugs dismissively. “I told me that. So it’s definitely right.”
“So… your plan that you couldn’t wait for was to drive me to the cows?” I ask.
“No. We have to wait for the lightning to stop before you see the surprise. We’re actually safe in this thing. Lightning would just go down the metal sides and poof, we’re fine.”
I laugh a little. “You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t fully believe you know what you’re talking about.”
“Not forgiven,” he says. “But I might consider forgiving you if you fulfill a fantasy I’ve always had.”
“We might be able to work something out.”
“See, I’ve always wanted to make out with a hot girl during a thunderstorm. You know, outside.”
“Oh? Well I don’t know if I can find a hot girl on such short notice.”
“You’re right. Hot doesn’t do you justice,” he says, moving his hand across my thigh and pushing my soaked dress up so his hand rubs against my pussy. He brings his lips close to mine, eyes boring into me like two hot coals and making my insides
heat up despite the chill of the rain. “You’re fucking gorgeous.”
“Then I hope gorgeous is using protection,” I say with a grin.
He pauses, narrows his eyes, then barks a laugh. “I think I’m rubbing off on you.”
“That’s fine, just don’t get any on my dress.”
He laughs even harder now, burying his head in my neck and letting his laughter rock through him. When he pulls back his eyes are heavy and he still wears half a smile. “You will never understand how much I love you.”
“I think I can,” I say, kissing him. “I think I know exactly how much, because I feel it too.”
We kiss with the rain washing away the dirt on our skin and the thunder rumbling through the sky, with our hands seeking skin and heat hungrily, with our tongues dancing together. We kiss like it’s our first time and our last, and I know I’ll never forget a second of this. Every sensation, from the way his wet hair feels under my fingertips to his coarse fingers between my legs, working their way beneath my panties and into my waiting heat--I’m locking it all away to cherish forever.
We blur together, just two bodies moving in the rain and among the rumble of thunder.
At some point--I don’t even remember when--his jeans came off and so did his briefs. My legs are over his shoulders and he’s pinning me against the back seat, working his perfect body into me with the precision of a surgeon, every movement calculated to drive me closer and closer to the explosion of orgasm.
He rakes a hand through his hair, pushing his dark hair from his face and leaning forward to kiss me, pressing my thighs against my chest as he does and his cock deeper and deeper within me.
“I fucking love you,” he growls over the sound of the rain.
“I love you too,” I whisper.
When his cock finally pulses within me and sprays hot cum deep inside, I’ve already had more orgasms than I can remember. They all washed together into just one of thousands of perfect moments I’ve had since finding Lucas.
“I think the lightning stopped,” I say breathlessly. I find my panties and slip them back on, fixing my dress to cover my thighs again.
Bad for the Billionaires: A Bad Boy Billionaire Bundle Page 107
