by Lora Leigh
“Did you check out the car?” Crowe asked as he watched Rafe move through the house, the light curtains on the windows giving a clear view into his home. It appeared Rafe had followed Cami for some sort of confrontation.
Crowe could have sworn he’d taught Rafe better than that at some point. You never confront a possibly enemy face to face, especially if that potential enemy was female.
“I checked out the car,” Logan affirmed. “I couldn’t see anything that suggests the accident was anything but an accident, but the drifts are piled high around it, and digging it out enough to get under it wasn’t high on my list of priorities.”
He was wearing military-issue cold-weather gear that would have kept him toasty warm for up to forty-eight hours in the coldest spot in the world and he couldn’t dig through a few feet of snow to check the tires.
After the deaths of their parents, Rafe’s uncle, and other suspected enemies of the barons on the treacherous Corbin County roads, Crowe no longer believed in accidents or coincidences.
“What is high on your list of priorities, Logan?” Crowe asked absently. He wondered if Logan even understood what direction he was headed in. Or if he had any idea about the woman he was heading in that direction with. Sometimes, that worried Crowe more than the fear that Logan would care about the wrong person too much. His cousin was doing more than simply caring too much. He was on the verge of becoming too involved. Even more so than Rafe.
“Tying my dick in knots, unraveling it, then tying it again?” Logan chuckled. “Whatever it takes to stay footloose and fancy-free, Crowe, while having all kinds of fun. What about you?”
There were very few things Logan allowed himself to possess or to care about. His home had been in Crowe’s name for years. It was an attempt to keep Logan from giving it the hell away and Rafe had insisted on it.
The Harley was in Rafe’s name; the black Denali SUV was in Crowe’s name. The only thing Logan owned, sort of, was the snowmobile, and it was simply in all their names.
Logan had a serious problem where owning things were involved. Even he didn’t know why he didn’t want to own anything, and Crowe also hadn’t yet figured out why.
“I didn’t hear an answer there, Crowe,” Logan said as he leaned forward, dislodging the snow that had gathered on his shoulders.
“Footloose and fancy-free sounds fine to me.” Crowe shrugged. “Seems to me that as long as we’re in Corbin County, footloose and fancy-free is all we have.”
It wasn’t as though a future were going to happen with any of the fine ladies in Sweetrock or at the outlying ranches. Too many people knew their pasts. There were too many of the fine citizens of Corbin County willing to follow any and every order the barons gave.
The barons. His grandfather, James Corbin Rafer, Marshal Roberts, and Logan’s grandfather Saul Rafferty. The three largest ranch owners and three of the most powerful financial families to reside in Colorado. Their ranches were the size of small countries. Each ranch resided in a different county, but strangely something tied the three patriarchs of these families together. A loyalty and friendship that spanned decades, fluctuating riches, and the temperaments of three power-hungry men.
Logan sighed. “There’s always Aspen. Lots of pretty ladies there. Who says we have to pick from Corbin County anyway? Hell, we might get tired of footloose and fancy-free.”
There was an edge of regret in Logan’s voice, as though he’d actually had someone in mind. Someone he knew he couldn’t have. Hell, Crowe just hoped it wasn’t who he thought it was. That was just going to turn into a mess if it was.
“What about your neighbor?” Crowe looked back at Logan, restraining the knowing mockery in his tone. “She’s not from Sweetrock.”
Logan’s eyes widened in shock and male outrage. “That O’Brien girl? Hell no! I watched her tear that builder Ken Stiles’ ass up one side and back down the other a few days ago. Accused him for ten minutes of milking hours on that back porch he was building for her. She was right in his face, that little finger shaking like a weapon, and she was ready to use it.” He gave a mock shudder. “I think I prefer something a little softer. A little less temperamental.”
Crowe snorted. “You mean a little less able to kick your ass when you’re acting like an ass?”
Who the hell did Logan think he was fooling?
“That’s cold, man,” Logan sighed. “So cold.” His eyes twinkled in laughter. “But so fucking true.”
“And this weather is fucking cold.” Crowe couldn’t feel the cold; the Thinsulate he wore was military issue and would keep him warm at far colder temperatures.
Where he felt the chill was in his spine, a sure sign that things were going to go from sugar to shit soon. And that chill had the power to send ice coursing through his veins. The last damned thing they needed, no sooner than they returned to Corbin County, was trouble. Especially when women were a part of that trouble.
“Think we should disturb the little lovebirds?” Logan suggested. Anticipation filled his voice, as did amusement. Logan sometimes seemed years younger than his age.
“I think someone should,” Crowe said as he turned his gaze back to the house. “This will be over soon, and when it is, the whole town of Sweetrock will converge on him once they learn where Miss Flannigan had been forced to stay during the storm. I think Rafe could probably use the backup if that happens.” Especially considering the fact Cami’s uncle was a part of that road crew.
“Protection is more like it,” Logan retorted. “Talk about a man with his dick and his heart tied up in knots. Our little cuz is there, I believe.”
But then Crowe had a feeling Rafe had been there for a while; he just hadn’t been aware of it. There had been too many chance meetings between Rafe and Cambria over the years. Too many near misses. And in the past few years there were too many times Rafe had obviously been watching, waiting, for someone who hadn’t shown. His anger then had gone soul deep.
“Well, the road crew isn’t far from finding the car, or making their way to our little cousin’s love nest. I guess the kindest thing we could do is warn him, don’t you think?” Crowe drawled.
Logan’s curse sizzled through the line, seconding Crowe’s thoughts and sending a wave of tension to clench his jaw and tighten his muscles.
Breathing out roughly, Crowe twisted the handle grip of the powerful machine he’d ridden down from the mountain, listening to the low, carefully muffled power that vibrated through the machine. He’d modified the machines himself, his as well as his cousins’, to ensure the power that vibrated and throbbed through the motors was silenced as much as possible. Worst-case scenario, he would bank the power and speed and run at near silence if absolutely necessary.
There were times that more power and more sound could be a life-threatening hindrance. And times that any sound could mean certain death.
“Let’s go see if we can help him unknot his dick then,” Crowe said as he gave a hard twist of the opposite grip and shot down the mountain, carefully balancing his weight, watching the terrain and landmarks for known hazards beneath the snow, aware Logan was riding in his tracks.
Exactly where Crowe needed him to ride.
Crowe had done this all their lives, going first to clear the way for the other two. All but once. Rafe had managed to race ahead of Crowe just one time, and they hadn’t been the only ones who had paid for Crowe’s lack of speed. Jaymi Flannigan Kramer had paid with her life, and her death had left a mark on their souls ever since.
“He’s not going to be happy with us,” Logan promised, the wry humor coming through the earpiece he wore as Crowe navigated around the heavy trunks of the sheltering trees.
“But he’ll live, and that’s the point.” Actually, that was really all that mattered to Crowe. That Rafe and Logan lived, stayed free, and managed to find some small portion of happiness.
Crowe hadn’t been certain that returning to Corbin County was the best way to achieve that, but he knew it would never stop
haunting them, that the nightmares wouldn’t cease until they faced what had happened there and the consequences of it.
And if he was lucky, very lucky, then Crowe himself intended to face whoever or whatever had begun the events that had destroyed all their lives twelve years before.
* * *
Rafe paused the coffee cup halfway to his lips as a low muted sound reached his ears.
He knew that sound. There were two snowmobiles approaching the house, and he knew the sound of the muffled motors, barely discernible above the sound of the wind howling outside the house.
The storm was over, the sun rising to a crisp, icy-cold morning and reports of crews beginning to move out in force to dig out drivers and houses alike from the massive amount of snow that had fallen.
That had been hours ago. He was living on borrowed time where his time with Cami was involved. That borrowed time could run out at any time. Any moment. But he’d expected his time to run out with the road crews slowly making their way from the road to the ranch house, with only one purpose in mind, and digging him out wasn’t it.
He knew of plenty of times that those same road crews had refused to do more than pile more snow at the mouth of the graveled road that led to the house.
He hadn’t expected his time to run out in the form of his cousins’ arrival, though. Especially Crowe’s.
Grimacing, Rafe pulled extra coffee cups from the cupboard, set sugar and creamer in the middle of the table, and glanced toward the stairs that led to the second floor.
Cami was showering.
She had borrowed a razor, and the water in the shower had only just begun running. He might get lucky and his cousins would be gone before she finished.
He had a feeling it would be the other way around. His cousins would arrive and wouldn’t leave until after she did. That was more the way things ended up working for him.
His fist clenched at the thought of her leaving. At the thought of not holding her in his arms when he climbed into his bed. Of not being there to share that first cup of coffee, even if she was madder than hell at him.
And he sure couldn’t use the kitchen table properly if she wasn’t there, he thought with amusement as the snowmobiles moved quickly toward the house. Damn, Crowe and his tinkering with the vehicles’ motors. They were now twice as fast and twice as powerful as they had been when the cousins first bought them. That meant if Crowe were of a mind to, he could easily get Cami back to town. Just as Rafe could have.
It wasn’t long before the steady, hard throb of power eased into the yard, pulling up to the small area of shoveled show that Rafe had worked on as Cami slept that morning.
He opened the door, standing behind the glass of the storm door as his cousins stepped off the low-built machines and looked up at him.
He almost frowned. They were dressed in the lightweight, ultra-cold-weather gear that Crowe had managed to procure in the military as he worked in some of the coldest climates in the world. A ride from Crowe Mountain to the house wasn’t long enough and the weather really not cold enough — was it? — for the snow camo outerwear.
Rafe stepped back as Logan reached the porch and watched him grip the door handle and lazily pull it open.
Even his eyes were hidden behind the dark goggles until he stepped inside, stripped off his gloves, then eased the goggles from his face.
He would have to make certain he thanked Logan nicely for slipping out, obviously well before dawn, to inform their cousin Crowe of Rafe’s houseguest.
Logan’s dark pine-green eyes were filled with laughter as he stripped the cold-weather gear and hung it carefully on the specially made hanger at the side of the door. Crowe was following suit, but unlike Logan, his eyes weren’t filled with laughter. He was staring around the kitchen and living room carefully, no doubt noting even the slightest change to the rooms since he had been there the week before.
“You two are out early,” Rafe stated as he moved back to the coffeepot, slid the decanter free, and set it in the center of the kitchen table, close to the cups, sugar, and cream.
“Not early enough, it would appear,” Crowe grunted. “Where’s your houseguest?”
Rafe slid Logan a look of promised retribution. “Had to run and tattle, didn’t you, Logan?”
“I know; it’s normally your job.” Logan sighed mockingly. “But you appeared to be slacking this week, so I thought I’d help you out a bit.”
Rafe almost rolled his eyes.
Logan could be the bane of his existence when he wanted to be. There were times that Rafe and Crowe wondered if Logan had ever matured past the age of sixteen.
As the middle cousin, he seemed to have inherited Rafe’s father’s sense of practical jokes and teasing games.
“’Preciate that, Logan,” Rafe drawled. “I’ll be sure to return the favor soon.”
Logan chuckled as he followed Crowe to the kitchen table and the coffee.
The two men couldn’t have been more different.
Logan had his mother’s dark blond coloring rather than the dark Callahan hair. His skin was bronzed, a trait all Callahan men had, a reminder of their deep Irish roots. His eyes were the same the deep pine-green his mother’s had been.
Mina Rafferty Callahan had been slender, delicate, and winsome. Thankfully, her son had only inherited her coloring. The rest of him was pure, tall Callahan. At six feet-two inches tall, powerful and broad, he could be a mean gutter fighter in the face of the enemy or project a charming, teasing familiarity with vulnerable children or frightened women.
Crowe on the other hand, was one hundred percent Callahan, from his midnight-black hair to his eagle-fierce golden-brown eyes. His harshly hewn features could never be called handsome, but women gravitated to him like bees to honey no matter where the Callahans went. At the very least, the women moved as close as possible, as though to draw in the aura of danger and the oddly shaped crescent birthmark they all carried on their right hip. He was an inch taller than Rafe, more than two years older than Rafe, and always seemed too determined to watch over and protect his younger cousins, whether they needed it at the time or not.
Rafe, on the other hand, was a plainer version. He had the black hair, but he had his mother’s, Ann Roberts’s sapphire-blue eyes rather than the Callahan brown eyes. In looks, the men were more like triplets than cousins, despite Logan’s dark blond hair. Even as infants they had been almost impossible to tell apart until Logan’s hair lightened.
Crowe was the image of the Callahan brothers, Samuel, Benjamin, and David. Rafe missed it only in the color of his eyes. They were as close as brothers and sometimes it seemed they shared the same bond triplets did as well.
Rafe leaned back against the counter with his own coffee as his cousins poured theirs. Strangely enough, Crowe sweetened and creamed his, while Logan took his straight and black. It always seemed as though it should have been the other way around.
It had always amazed Rafe that his eldest cousin could be found adding to the perfectly rich, aromatic taste of the specially grown coffee beans Rafe went to the trouble to buy and grind himself. It was almost a sacrilege, what Crowe did to his coffee.
It was the coffee that always seemed to tie them. Since Clyde Ramsey, Rafe’s great-uncle, had taken then in, he had taught them the value of coffee, the kitchen table, and long discussions.
“So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?” Rafe asked as he arched a brow and brought the cup to his lips, sipping at the coffee and preparing himself. He had a feeling he knew what was coming. Crowe was there because of Cami.
“I thought you might need some backup.” Crowe shrugged as he leaned back in the chair, his oddly colored brown eyes sharp as Rafe met his gaze.
“What kind of backup do I need?” Rafe could almost feel the tension beginning to tighten at the back of his neck.
It was damned foreboding. That sense of coming danger or problems that would result in more trouble than anyone needed.
Hell, all he’d w
anted to do was try to enjoy the few days fate had given him with Cami.
“They’re clearing the snow blocking the road not far from here,” Logan said then. “It won’t be long before they find Ms. Flannigan’s car. And her uncle is in the lead with the plow. Eddy Flannigan isn’t known for his even temper.”
Eddy Flannigan simply didn’t suffer fools gladly, and he sure as hell didn’t tolerate so much as an iota of danger where his niece was concerned. Eddy would know, though, that the last thing Rafe wanted would be to hurt Cami in any way.
Rafe’s lips tightened in irritation at the thought as he moved to the refrigerator, reached up, and flipped on the police and emergency band radio he kept there. Turning the dials, he tuned into the channel he knew the road crew used whenever they were clearing snow and wanted to keep their conversations more private.
It wouldn’t hurt to know ahead of time who else was on that crew and whatever they may have to say.
“Sheriff, I hope you brought that rifle of yours,” a voice drawled over the radio. “Eddy may want to borrow it.”
“Then why are you laughing, Martin?” Archer Tobias, sheriff of Corbin County, a man who had once, long ago, been a friend, came over the line.
“’Cause if that’s Eddy’s niece’s car out there like he thinks it is, then we may get to have a Callahan killin’ after all,” Deputy Martin Eisner came back. “Don’t worry, Eddy, I’ll testify for it. Justifiable homicide.”
Rafe glared at the radio.
“You want me to break your fucking legs, Eisner?” Eddy Flannigan came back, his voice entirely serious. “Because I can. And I will.”
It was obvious the deputy was getting on the wrong side of the smart-assed, wisecracking uncle of Cami’s.
“Hell, Eddy, I’m trying to do you a favor here,” Martin snapped. “Those boys work fast, remember? We’ll be lucky if she’s not already dead.”
“Let’s not allow our imaginations to get out of control here Martin,” Archer snapped.
“Yeah, that’s what your daddy said when Jaymi went missing that night too,” Martin snapped back as the sound of the plow’s motor revved and geared higher. “You saw her car, Sheriff. That tire—”
