Gray Wolf Security: Wyoming

by Glenna Sinclair

  If not for Robert, maybe…

  A car horn began blaring so loudly I couldn’t hear what my buddies were saying. Then the dream began to fade and I found myself in an unfamiliar room surrounded by boxes and containers, not quite sure where I was. The sound had come out of the dream with me, blaring until I wanted to put my fist through the wall to express the frustration that was becoming overwhelming.

  What the hell?

  It took a second to realize the blaring horn was real, that some idiot was out on the street holding his horn down. I glanced at my cell and realized it was three in the morning. An accident?

  I jumped out of bed and yanked on my jeans, shoving my feet into my sneakers as I headed to the door. Eve was coming out of her door as I marched out, dressed in nothing more than a thin nightie that was cut too low and was far too short to be something a good church going girl wore.

  “What is that?” she asked, groggily brushing the back of her hand over her mouth, a movement that only made the cut of that nightie more distracting.

  “I don’t know. I’ll go check it out.”

  I hesitated a moment, wondering how a girl with so many heavy curves could look so good in something so skimpy. I never would have imagined a little extra thigh could look that good under a touch of silk and lace.

  I had to shake myself, force myself to remember why the hell I’d gotten out of my warm bed in the first place. She bit her bottom lip and… fuck me! It hadn’t been that long, had it?

  “Go back to bed,” I grumbled, forcing myself into action.

  Marko stood at the window in the front office, staring out at the street.

  “Is there an accident?”

  He turned, fear radiating off him in waves. I don’t know why it never occurred to me that this could be trouble from the developers. That was why I was here, wasn’t it? Sometimes I was a little too slow for my own good.

  I ran out into the parking lot and grabbed an ax handle that I’d taken out of my Bronco earlier in the evening and stashed behind the ice machine, holding it out from the side of my body so the asshole could see it. When I spotted him, and realized it was the same jerk from earlier in the day, I almost smiled.

  “You have five seconds to get the hell out of here!”

  His eyes widened when he saw me. “Try anything and I’ll call the fucking police! I’m on the street! I’m not hurting anyone!”

  “You’re waking everyone up, asshole!”

  “No law against that.”

  “Oh, I’m sure we’ll find one.”

  I continued to storm across the parking lot, raising the ax handle higher.

  “Four, three, two…”

  Jim Bob jumped into his car, but he had a little trouble starting it. I thought I’d help him along. I smashed out his right taillight and was making my way to the left when he managed to get the old piece of junk started. He peeled out, driving away so quickly he almost took out the light pole that stood on the other side of the road.

  “Fantastic!”

  Marko raised his hand for a high five when I walked back to the office. I almost ignored him, but then decided a little celebration wasn’t such a bad thing. He laughed, I smiled. Not bad for a night’s work.

  “Maybe that’ll keep them away for a while.”

  “Maybe.”

  “At least long enough for Eve to decide what her next move’s going to be.”

  I set the ax handle down on the floor beside the front door and leaned back against the wall, watching Marko.

  “I thought she wanted to keep the place, that she wanted to keep her mother here.”

  “She does. She believes that her mother’s disease would progress slower if she were able to keep her here. The thing is, she might not have that choice.”

  “Because of the developers?”

  “The developers are only part of the problem.” Marko moved around the back side of the desk and settled in the office chair there. “A motel in the middle of nowhere Wyoming? Business had never been that great, just good enough to keep Rachel and Eve with a roof over their heads. But, between Rachel’s illness and the cost of her medications, the MRIs they do every year, and the few hospitalizations she’s had and then the price of replacing the plumbing system in more than half of the rooms, Eve had to take out a mortgage on the place. And the payments… she’s barely been able to make them. She’s not going to be able to keep it up much longer.”

  This wasn’t what Sutherland, Kirkland, and Hank had told me back at the ranch. I was under the impression that chasing off these goons was going to fix things for Eve. But if she was going to lose the place anyway…

  “Then why am I here? Why doesn’t she just take their offer?”

  “Because she wants to hold on as long as she can. She’d rather default to the bank then let those people buy her out.” Marko shrugged. “And she knows that selling out would mean putting her mother into a facility and putting me and Angel and Sara out of work.”

  “But if she could walk away with money in her pocket—”

  “That’s what I told her. But she won’t hear of it.” Marko leaned against the counter and studied me. “She feels responsible for everyone.”

  “Except herself.”

  Marko shrugged with his head rather than his shoulders. “That’s Eve.” He sat up a little, his expression growing almost darkly serious. “I don’t talk about this much, but… I was in prison. I was screwed up when I was younger. I dealt drugs and was sentenced to fifteen years. Rightfully. When I got out, I was clean and I’d completely changed my outlook on life. I met my wife and she’s from here, so we came here to be close to her family, but I couldn’t get a job. My record scared people. They would stare at me when I walked into their businesses, this look of disgust on their faces. No one wants to hire a criminal. Everyone believed I was still dealing drugs and I was going to corrupt this small-town mentality they have around her. Everyone. Except Eve. She never asked about my prison record, never asked about my parole. All she wanted to know was if I was willing to work nights. If not for Eve…” Marko choked up a little, clearing his throat before he continued. “We wouldn’t have our house. We wouldn’t be expecting our first child. I’m not even sure we would still be here. And when this is over—when they push her out—we probably will have to move back to the city.”

  I looked down at the floor, not sure how to respond to his story.

  “Eve is an angel,” Marko said.

  I bit back a snide comment, my eyes moving up to his face.

  “There’s no such thing as angels.”

  Marko shrugged, not offended. “Maybe. Maybe not. But Eve… she’s as close as a person can get.”

  “Just because she’s not selfish like ninety percent of humanity—”

  “It’s not just that she’s not selfish. She goes out of her way to be kind to people. That cop that was here earlier? He separated from his wife and she let him stay here free of charge for nearly three months.”

  “Because she’s attracted to him.”

  Marko shook his head. “That? That’s all one sided.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “What about the fire victims?”

  “What fire victims?”

  “There was this family living on the wrong side of town, ten people in one teeny, two-bedroom house. They left a candle burning in their living room while they were out and the whole place burned to the ground along with the empty house next door. Eve put them up here at the motel—three rooms!—free of charge for nearly six months. Do you know how much money we could have made off of those rooms in that amount of time? More than enough to pay a huge portion of the mortgage she owes. But she let them stay here, provided them with meals for the first month, and put up with some of the rudest, most inconsiderate behavior I’ve ever seen in motel guests.” He shook his head in disbelief. “They’d still be here if Steve hadn’t had mercy on her and quietly told them to leave.”

  “Then she’s an ineffective business wo
man.”

  “No. She knows what she’s doing. She’s increased business here ten-fold since taking over for her mother. If not for that loan and the medical expenses for her mother, she’d be sitting on a comfortable nest egg right about now. She knows what she’s doing.”

  Marko got up and came around the counter.

  “You don’t have to believe it. I know you’re just here playing house because she’s paying your little security firm. But Eve is an angel.” He stood in front of me, clearly a little intimidated by my bare chest and the fact that I had a good three inches on him. But then he pulled himself up to his full height and looked me hard in the eye. “If you hurt her, I won’t be the only one you’ll have to deal with. There are a lot of people here in town who love her. And we’ll all make your life miserable.”

  I bit back a smile and nodded. “Of course.”

  Marko studied my face like he was trying to make sure I’d gotten the message. Then he returned to the chair behind the desk.

  “You should probably go let her know everything’s okay.”

  He was dismissing me. The amusement was beginning to turn to annoyance.

  Eve was waiting for me in the living room when I returned to the apartment. She’d put on an old, ratty bathrobe that had more holes in it than it had viable material. She stood the moment she saw me, drawing it tight around her waist. That robe didn’t do much to hide the curves that nightgown revealed; did she know how attractive she had suddenly become?

  “Was it Jim Bob again?”

  I nodded. “He thought he could stand on the street and make as much noise as he wanted without consequence.”

  “Has he ever heard of a noise ordinance?”

  “Apparently not.”

  She shook her head, her arms around her waist making her breasts seem fuller at the top of her robe. I looked away, rubbing my eyes with the heels of my hands, wondering if I was going to get anymore sleep tonight.

  Probably not.

  “You made him leave?”

  “He’s gone.”

  “Do you think he’ll be back?”

  “Not tonight.”

  “Good.”

  She moved passed me to go back to bed. I’d not noticed earlier, but she smelled really good, like strawberries and cinnamon. I’d never really liked that artificial strawberry scent, but on her… why couldn’t I stop? She wasn’t my type. Why was I suddenly so completely attracted to her?

  “Night, Grainger,” she said, her voice soft and low, almost breathless.

  Lovely.

  “Good night, Eve.”

  She wasn’t an angel. She didn’t look anything like a supermodel. Compared to Misty, she was dumpy—one of those women whose bodies resembled an egg more than a female goddess. Yet, she had all these lovely curves, more than a handful where her breasts were concerned, and her hips were—what did my mom used to call it? Childbearing hips. More like erotic handles…

  It had to be the break up. It had to be the anger I was still carrying around. I was so angry with Misty that I was completely drawn to the first woman who was as opposite to her as was possible.

  That had to be it. This was a rebound thing. I’d get over it.

  I just hoped I got over it before I did something completely stupid.

  Chapter 7

  At the Ranch

  “Grainger called in,” Kirkland announced as Sutherland walked into the study. “He scared off that guy, Jim Bob Wallace a couple of times yesterday, but there hasn’t been any other activity.”

  “Good.” Sutherland settled behind her desk, taking a long sip of her coffee. “Apparently, word has already spread. I went to pick up a package at the post office and heard some people talking. If a small town is good for anything, it’s spreading gossip.”

  “That’s what she wanted, right?”

  “Yeah. It should help. If the goons are all local people, maybe it’ll scare them off.”

  Kirkland nodded. “Sure. I can see that.”

  “I was thinking…” Sutherland settled back in her chair. “If this was real, if I had heard this just this morning at the post office, I would throw them a party.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s the neighborly thing to do. So, I think we should do that.”

  “Throw them a party?”

  “Sure. Play along. Keep everyone believing the story.”

  “And what happens when everyone learns that he’s one of our operatives? Don’t you think it might backfire?”

  “I don’t think so. We’ll just make it seem like we hired him after the party… or something.”

  Kirkland shrugged. “It’s your town, your friends.”

  “I think we’ll do it. Do you think Mabel would help me plan it?”

  “She’d probably get a kick out of it.”

  Sutherland got up to go find Mabel and found a massive bouquet of flowers on the dining room table instead. She pulled the card free and her heart sank when she saw the message.

  If you want your cows, you should go to dinner with me.

  It was signed simply, BA.

  Bodhi Archer.

  What was she supposed to do with that? If that man was sabotaging her ranch in order to buy it out from under her, going out to dinner with him would be a massive mistake. But if he was just a man interested in her… and she was a woman interested in him…

  It was complicated. And she didn’t need complications in her life right now.

  Sutherland balled up the card and tossed it away before continuing her search for Mabel.

  Chapter 8

  Eve

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Grainger without his shirt on. He came out of his room with just his jeans on, and my thoughts stopped being about panic that all our customers would check out and began to be about wanting to run my fingertips along the curves and valleys of his muscles. It was like one of those fantasies women are supposed to have, one of those fantasies that were often the highlight of some heroine’s day on all those chick flicks I used to watch with my mom. The hot guy, half dressed, rushing to the heroine’s rescue.

  And he was rushing to my rescue. No man had ever done that for me before. Not even my father.

  He was outside working on the loose railing outside the second-floor rooms right now. I could hear his hammer slamming against the nails. In my imagination, he was still half naked even though I knew he was wearing a dark blue t-shirt that fit snug over his chest. That was almost as erotic a sight, but I preferred the naked chest thing.

  What did that say about me?

  “Eve?”

  I had to sort of shake myself, yank my mind out of the gutter. Angel, the head of housekeeping—of a department that consisted of just herself and Sara—was standing in front of the counter, a bemused smile on her face.

  “Sorry,” I muttered.

  “You were lost. What were you thinking about? That hot new husband of yours?”

  I shrugged, because I couldn’t really lie. She laughed.

  “You are a mischievous one, aren’t you? Hiding that guy all this time. How come you never said anything?”

  There was nothing to say, but I couldn’t tell her that. Playing this game on all my friends was proving to be more difficult than I thought it would be. It never occurred to me how many lies I’d have to tell to make this work. And when I first saw him, I assumed nobody would believe it, but they did. That made it even harder to lie, because I was struggling to believe it myself.

  “I never thought it would go this far. I never thought he’d be willing to come stay here with me.”

  “He clearly adores you,” Angel said.

  “You think so?”

  She nodded, her thoughtful gaze moving to the door. “I saw the way he was looking at you this morning when you were talking to Marko. No question in my mind that he adores you.”

  I blushed, a big smile I couldn’t control bursting onto my lips. I knew it was all pretend, knew that he was playing a part, but the fact that he was con
vincing enough to make Angel say that made my heart beat a little faster.

  The man himself chose that moment to come walking through the door. It still surprised me a little to see his dark blue eyes land on my face the moment he came into a room. He’d been here three days, and it was still so brand new. He took in the room in one, quick glance, then his charming smile fell on me.

  “The railing’s fixed. I thought I’d tackle the leaky faucet in ten next.”

  “Thank you,” I said somewhat breathlessly.

  His smile just widened as he headed to the maintenance closet to exchange his hammer for a wrench.

  I bit my lip as I watched him walk, as I watched his ass move under those tight jeans. Angel was watching too, and that made me feel like the kid in class who has the fancy new pen, or the best lunch in the cafeteria. Prideful. Look at me, sinning with my every thought.

  “Which app did you meet him on? Maybe there’s another one out there for me.”

  “He might be a once in a lifetime sort of thing.”

  “For you, maybe.”

  The bell that alerted me to my mom’s attempts to open the front door of the apartment rang. I pushed away from the desk and glanced at Angel.

  “Watch the desk?”

  She nodded, her eyes never really leaving Grainger. I found myself wondering if I should be worried about leaving them alone, and then realized I shouldn’t have these feelings of possession. He wasn’t really mine. If he wanted to flirt with Angel, that was his choice. Right?

  But that didn’t stop the spark of jealousy that had ignited in the center of my chest.

  Momma was standing at the door when I unlocked it, her face a mask of confusion.

  “Why is that door locked? Why would you do that?”

  “It’s for your protection, Momma.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not right. I’m a grown woman. I have the right to come and go as I please.”

  “You get confused.”

  Her eyes narrowed and she glared at me. “I am not confused. This is my home, my business! I need to be out there running it.”

  “Momma—”

  “Why do you keep calling me that? I don’t know you.”