by Marla Monroe
Two days later, a family member found her dead, hanging in the barn. She’d rigged up the ladder and tied a rope from one of the overhead beams. A note taped to the stall of Dalton’s horse had said that she’d made a mistake that couldn’t be rectified. She’d left a sealed envelope for Dalton on the bed with her wedding band. Bo hadn’t been able to live with the guilt but felt as if he had no choice since he’d essentially taken her life.
Dalton wasn’t going to be able to make it home in time for his wife’s funeral since he’d been deeply implanted on a mission. They wouldn’t compromise the mission even to allow Dalton to come home for his wife’s funeral. So Bo had seen to everything for his friend, making sure no one ever knew of what had happened. The family member had been Dalton’s cousin and agreed that it was best to keep the truth from the nosey ears of gossips. Instead, they said she’d been depressed over having not been able to conceive when Dalton had been home, something everyone knew they’d both talked endlessly about, and had taken her own life out of despair.
Once the funeral was over and arrangements had been made for Dalton’s horse and home to be cared for, Bo had packed up his belongings, sold everything that wouldn’t fit into his truck and trailer, and fled. Four months later, he’d found Apocalypse, a pale grullo horse about to be put down for being too dangerous and bought him just before they’d shot him dead. He’d found a ranch in need of a wrangler and for room and board for he and his horse as well as a few extra dollars, Bo had worked and spent all of his spare time working with the pale, slivery, smoke-gray stallion with all of the patience a man with no future had to spare.
That was how Dalton had found him that first time, over a year later. And so their dance had begun.
Chapter Three
The first thing Dalton saw when he stepped into the little living area between the three apartments over the store was that Bo’s door was ajar. He checked his watch, admittedly a little blurry eyed and found it was going on midnight. Early by most standards. Where was Bo? Had the bastard run off again? Usually he stuck around at least six months before he tried his disappearing act.
“Fucking bastard,” he mumbled as he kicked the door open wider and clicked on the light.
To his surprise, the bastard in question was sitting on the floor with his back against the foot of the bed and an empty whisky bottle on the floor next to him. The snores coming from him were loud enough to wake the dead.
“What the hell?” Dalton walked farther into the room and noticed the backpack on the floor with clothes strewn out of it and the closet door was wide open with a few shirts half on the hangers and a few more on the floor.
He squatted down in front of his old friend and shook his head. “Guess you were planning on running again, weren’t you? What happened? One too many for the road?”
Bo blew out a breath and the whiskey fumes nearly knocked him out. He ended up on his ass as he tried to back away from the stench.
“Hell, Bo. You need to brush your teeth, guzzle a gallon of Listerine, and finish it off with a shower. You smell like the wrong end of a sour mash garbage dump,” he said in disgust.
Once he’d stood up, Dalton considered leaving him there to sleep it off then wake up feeling like death warmed over in the morning to serve him right for thinking of running off again. In the end, though, he couldn’t do that to his blood brother. With a snort of disgust, he backtracked to the living room and dropped his hat on the back of the couch before pulling off his boots and setting them by the back door in the boot tray. Then he returned to Bo’s room and closed the door behind him.
It wouldn’t be the first time he had to sober the bastard up, and he doubted it would be the last time either. When memories swam too close to the surface, Bo drank. Didn’t drink socially in between those times, but when he couldn’t outrun the past, he downed a fifth and passed out, leaving Dalton to clean his crap up.
“Come on, Bo. Let’s get you in the shower before someone calls for the coroner over the smell.”
It took two tries to pull the big man to his feet, but Dalton had a firm hold of the waistline of his jeans and another on the front of his shirt. With the second tug, he managed to heave him upright on noodle legs with feet that only seemed to bounce around like a puppet.
“Heavy son of a bitch, aren’t you?” he fussed as he draped one of Bo’s arms over his shoulder and wrapped an arm around his waist to half drag him toward the bathroom they shared between their rooms.
“Daaltown?” Bo slurred, managing to open one bloodshot eye.
“Yeah, yeah. It’s me, Bo. Help me undress you so you can wallow in the shower for a while. I’ll squirt some hand soap on you.” Dalton might love his blood brother but he wasn’t about to go rubbing all over the man just to clean him up. He could take another shower after he’d sobered up some.
“Soorrrry mhan. Letchudown,” Bo said in a morose voice made worse by his slurred speech.
It took a massive effort, but Bo finally managed to get him propped up on the toilet so he could get his boots off. Why hadn’t he gotten like this after pulling off his boots, or better yet, while he was naked in bed?
Yeah, right. Bad visual there. He shook his head.
“It’s in the past, man. When are you going to get that through your stubborn, thick-as-hell head? I’m tired of following you all over the fucking country just to mop your ass up every few months when you get sloppy drunk,” he snarled in disgust.
“What the hell set you off this time?” Dalton finally asked as he pulled the second boot off of his friend’s foot.
“Gonna get fired,” he said letting his head drop backward to bang against the wall behind him.
Dalton winced. That was going to hurt in the morning. “Fired over what?”
He worked on his shirt next. Getting it off over the man’s head wouldn’t have been all that difficult if his friend hadn’t had his hair braided. Now the damn thing acted like an anaconda, doubling up on itself and blocking his efforts to maneuver the T over his head.
“Prophshng ffismanger.” His voice, already slurred came out muffled by the T-shirt and his braid.
“You did what?” Dalton asked once he had the smelly, wet T-shirt off the man’s head.
He threw it next to the door and took a step back, contemplating the next step in getting him into the shower. Jeans had to come off unless Bo had gone commando today. Then he’d just have to figure out how to get out of soaking wet jeans all on his own if he had. Belt and belt buckle came next. They didn’t need the shower.
“What did you do, Bo? Why are you getting fired?” Dalton dearly wanted to know what he could possibly have done to warrant firing.
The twins were fairly laid back as long as the horses and the guests were taken care of. He couldn’t imagine anything Bo might have done worthy of firing. Sure, he was an ornery bastard on the best of days, but normally that was just for his benefit. He didn’t talk enough to offend anyone, and unless it was to eat or work, he rarely left the barn or his room.
Bo opened his eyes for a brief millisecond then sighed. “She smelled sooo damn good. She din’t need batteries ’n lube. Told her I’d show her how to take care of it. They’ll fire me now.”
Dalton stood there holding Bo’s belt and buckle in his hand and gaped at him. What the hell? He did what? To Who? Grabbing Bo by arms he pulled him up and all but slammed him against the wall.
“You what? Who the hell did you do that to?” Please don’t let it be Billy Jean, their wife. Oh, hell no!
“Don’t know what came over me,” he said, trying to reach his face with one hand.
Dalton half dragged him to the shower and pushed him inside where he turned on the cold water full force. Bo’s yelp of surprise did little to appease him at the moment. He pulled him half out of the shower again.
“Who, Bo? Talk damn you!” He shoved him back under the ice cold water.
This time Bo managed to hold himself up and jerked out of Dalton’s grasp, propping himsel
f up against the opposite side of the stall. He rubbed a hand over his face and shook his head as if to clear it.
“Shelby. I propositioned Shelby,” he shouted back.
“Ah, hell, man. Why’d you go and do that? She’s a nice lady.” Dalton squeezed his eyes shut. He liked her—a lot, but didn’t have anything now to give a woman like her.
“Don’t know. Smelled so good. She’d been looking at my ass while I was getting groceries out of the truck and one of the bags nearly fell. When I bent over to grab it, she’d stepped closer to grab it at the same time and I could smell her arousal. I said something at the time, but I don’t remember what it was, and she ran off to her office.” He shoved his face, neck, and shoulders under the cold spray once more then rubbed at his face after pulling back out.
“After I’d taken in the rest of the groceries, I noticed she’d left another sack on the floorboard in the front of the truck and grabbed it to take to her. There were batteries and lube and sleeping pills, the kind you get over the counter at the drug store, in the bag. It just hit me wrong and I lost it.”
Bo turned off the shower and started unfastening his jeans and Dalton stepped back out of the doorway. He didn’t need help now. Bo was enough himself to manage to get out of wet jeans. It wouldn’t be easy and no doubt he’d lose a few pubic hairs in the process, but it served the bastard right. Dalton would have approached Shelby himself if he’d been in any position to offer more than a fun time. She wasn’t that kind of girl.
“What did you do?” he asked quietly, almost afraid to hear the rest.
“I took the bag to her and told her something about how I could show her the natural way to fall asleep but that if she needed that fake stuff to help her get off maybe she needed help with more than falling asleep. Or something like that. I can’t really remember for sure. Fuck me! Why did I do that?”
Dalton started to lay into his friend over it, but then stopped. He’d actually come on to a woman. Bo hadn’t been near a woman as far as he knew since he’d left back home. Hell, he hadn’t even shown an interest a woman.
“Fuck! Ow! Damn you, Dalton! Couldn’t you have pulled my jeans off before you stuck me in the fucking shower?”
“Deal with it, man. You did this to yourself.”
What was it about Shelby that had finally gotten through Bo’s tight protective shield? It wasn’t lost on him that they both had a thing for her just like had happened with his first wife. The only difference being that Dalton wasn’t going to screw it up this time if there was any chance he could make it work.
“Let’s get you dried off and in bed to sleep this off, buddy. You’re going to hate yourself for more than one thing when you wake up in the morning,” Dalton snickered, throwing his friend a towel as he stepped out of the shower.
* * * *
A soft knock at the door had Shelby looking up from her e-reader with blurry eyes. She squinted at the time on the reader and frowned. It was nearly one in the morning. Who would be knocking at that hour? She stood up, setting the reader on the table next to the chair and stretched. Then she pulled the small automatic from between the seat cushions and walked over to the door. The one downstairs had been locked when she checked, so only someone with a key should be able to get in. It didn’t make her feel all that much better though.
“Who is it?” she asked, standing to one side of the door. She had her weapon by her side.
“It’s Dalton. I know it’s late, but I was hoping we could talk for a few minutes. Um, Bo told me what he said, and I came to help him apologize,” Dalton said.
“Look, there’s no need. I’m not going to complain or anything. He was just being a guy. I get it.” She started to close the door, but Dalton wrapped his hand around the edge of the door to stop her.
“Please. I just want to talk. I’m not going to try anything, Shelby. I really just want to talk to you.” He sounded so sincere, and after the fantasy she’d had about him and Bo earlier, she lost the battle to just send him away.
She sighed and opened the door. “Okay. Just for a minute though. I was about to head to bed.”
She walked over to her chair and plopped down, laying the gun on her lap when she did. Dalton didn’t close the door behind him, leaving it open she supposed to make her feel a little better about allowing him inside her apartment when the only thing that made her feel better was sitting on her lap right then. When the good-looking wrangler turned around and started across the floor his sudden halt told her he’d finally noticed the weapon on her lap.
“Um, Shelby? You’re not planning on using that on me are you?” he asked, not moving even to breathe.
“Not if you don’t plan on attacking me, Bo,” she replied in her sweetest voice.
“No plans at all. I just wanted to talk.” He stepped just close enough to ease in front of the chair opposite her and slowly sit down.
Nothing like having a weapon to put the fear of Shelby in someone. Of course it had taken her a long time to learn that lesson and follow it up with not only the ability to use it but the willingness as well. One didn’t work without the other.
“What did you want to talk about?” she asked.
“Why do you need something as lethal as a gun?” he asked instead, still staring at it.
“Mugging,” she nearly snapped. “Look, I’m not going to shoot you, Dalton. Just tell me whatever it is you wanted to talk about.” Shelby set the gun on the table on top of her e-reader and replaced her hand in her lap.
“Bo is really torn up over embarrassing you like that. I don’t know what got into him, but he likes you, Shelby.” At her snort, he continued. “The thing is, Bo hasn’t even looked at a woman in more years than you can imagine. Then out of the blue, he pretty much offers to take care of any need you might have. That means something.”
If Dalton hadn’t looked so serious, Shelby would have burst out laughing. It was by far the strangest pickup line anyone had ever used on her and the fact that it was being delivered by the guy’s best friend was almost surreal to her. But the one sitting in front of her was dead serious. One thing she knew about most Indians, Dalton and Bo in particular, was that they rarely joked about serious matters and were more often than not loyal to a fault to their true friends. He was completely serious.
Shelby rubbed her hands up and down her thighs trying to figure out what to say to that. That she was flattered but she wasn’t looking for a man? That was a little too much like placating and she wasn’t one to mince words. She cleared her throat to respond though she didn’t know what she was going to say when she opened her mouth, but Dalton spoke first, cutting her off.
“The fact of the matter, Shelby, is that we are both attracted to you. I’ve held my tongue, because you’re not the type to indulge in one-night stands or even a summer fling, and I didn’t know where I’d be in two years or even two months with the way Bo is,” he said, shrugging.
“What do you mean, the way Bo is?” she found herself asking even though she told herself she didn’t want to know and it would only get her more involved to learn the answer.
“He’s got guilt riding him hard, and as soon as he starts to feel comfortable or satisfied, he has to move on to continue suffering under the guilt. He’s carried it with him for so long now that he would be lost without it. A ship without a rudder to steer him, give him direction and meaning.” Dalton looked down at his hands, seeming to study them for some time before he looked up again and continued. “Thing is, I’d pretty much resigned myself to living out my days on the road following him around until tonight. Now I want more.”
She just stared at him. What was he saying? She’d exchanged a few sentences with him and even less with Bo and now the man was talking about—what? That was just it. She wasn’t sure what he was talking about. The fact that he was there in her apartment indicated it had something to do with her, but what was he trying to say?
“You’re not making a lot of sense to me right now, Dalton. Maybe you need to s
leep it off, and if you still remember what you’re wanting to say, we can talk tomorrow.” She started to stand up, a clear indication that the conversation was over in her eyes, but evidently Dalton didn’t see it the same way. He remained seated.
“Please, just hear me out, Shelby,” he said with a soft smile.
An almost little-boy look stole over his face for an instant, and she found herself sinking back into the chair to listen. No doubt she’d lost her mind, but both he and Bo were handsome men who’d always been nice or at least polite in Bo’s case when most of the guys around the place were walking, talking, randy teenagers with two things on their mind, drinking and screwing. She didn’t believe that either Bo or Dalton fit into that category.
She snorted. Of course they did. Dalton smelled of booze even now, and Bo had all but propositioned her earlier. Yet she had to admit, it had been out of the ordinary for both of them. She’d never smelled booze on either man since she’d known them—until now, and neither of them had ever said an untoward word to her, again—until now.
Was Dalton stringing her along? Had this all been an act to coax her into their beds? Somehow she didn’t believe that. She’d always been a good judge of character, well except for that one time back in Kansas, and she wasn’t going to think about that. Or were they only trying to get her to trust them so they could turn her in? No, that wasn’t very likely since they’d already been working there when she’d shown up to apply for the position.
“What are you thinking, Shelby?” Dalton asked, jerking her attentions back to him. “The expressions that crossed your face were wild. No sooner had one settled in than another was booting it out of the way. I never knew someone could change their feelings that fast before. Their mind, yeah, cause that’s what women do, but not how they are feeling.”
