Gray Wolf Security: Wyoming

by Glenna Sinclair

  Her screams were deafening.

  Grainger had Trouble under control. He released the other horses, leading them to us. They weren’t as agitated, but they were happy to race away from the smoke and the heat. We rushed back to the barn, Hank holding a now silent Becks against his chest. And then we were in his Jeep, rushing into town, her silent head resting in my lap. I almost wished she were still screaming.

  *****

  “Third degree burns…”

  I listened to the doctor explain Becky’s condition to Lance and Hank, heard the words, but my heart couldn’t handle it. I turned away, walked down the hall with the idea of getting some fresh air as another spasm of coughs burst from my lips. I had to stop, had to hold onto the wall as the spasms worked their way through my body. Thickness filled my throat, making it impossible to take a decent breath. I found myself gasping, sounding like my father-in-law in the days before his death. If this was what emphysema did to the body, I’d much rather die of anything else.

  I heard laughter down the hall and looked up just in time to see a nurse nearly swoon at the sight of one of her favorite actors. I could hardly blame her. He was an incredibly good looking guy. Bodhi Archer. Not only was he tall, broad shouldered—the epitome of the handsome, manly man—but he had this mane of dark, wavy hair that tended to fall over his forehead, and blue eyes that seemed to burn into your soul when he really concentrated on you, like he was doing to me right in that moment.

  The nurse and one of her friends stepped in front of him.

  “Excuse me, but you’re Bodhi Archer, aren’t you?”

  Irritation flashed only briefly in his eyes. Then that charming smile appeared and then that deliciously beautiful New Zealand accent.

  “I am indeed.”

  “Could I have your autograph?”

  “Of course.”

  The star of a whole series of sci-fi, and adventure movies, he’d made quite a name for himself in Hollywood. If he’d thought he could find anonymity by buying a ranch in the middle of nowhere Wyoming, he’d been mistaken. Even my own daughter was a huge fan of his.

  I dragged my fingers through my unruly hair, pressing the smoke and the soot deeper into the roots, and continued down the hall, moving a little slower after my coughing fit. I didn’t know why Bodhi was there, didn’t want to know. He was a complication in my life I wasn’t sure I needed right now. I’d been alright, before he came along, clinging to the memory of my dead husband, raising my child, running my ranch. But then Ash dropped this new branch of Gray Wolf Security in my lap and it brought with it so many complications…a romance was the last thing I needed.

  But when he grabbed my upper arms and directed me into a small bathroom, flipping the lock on the door as he pushed it closed, something inside of me that I couldn’t quite ignore jumped to its feet and began to twerk in celebration.

  “How do you always know to show up when my world is falling apart?”

  He pressed me against the slim edge of the sink and covered my mouth with his, his touch barely restrained urgency. How could I keep from responding, keep from wrapping my arms around his neck and pulling him closer, keep from leaning on his incredibly capable shoulders for a moment?

  I was a strong, independent woman. I’d gone toe to toe with dozens of ranch hands over the years who thought they knew so much better than me what MidKnight needed. I’d not only kept the place afloat for more than a decade, but I’d brought it out of the financial disaster it’d been in during my father-in-law’s management and brought it back to the way it was in its early glory days. And I did it alone. I didn’t need a man to help me, didn’t need a man to lean on.

  But that didn’t mean I didn’t want a man to lean on occasionally. It didn’t mean that I couldn’t enjoy the feel of his arms around me, that I couldn’t lose myself in his touch and gain strength from the oblivion that touch allowed me.

  I buried my fingers in his perfect hair, my tongue past his perfectly straight and veneered teeth. I breathed deep of his expensive cologne, pulled myself up and wrapped my legs around those hips millions of women would swoon to feel against their bodies. For a moment, I forgot that I was running a multi-million-dollar operation, that I was responsible for the livelihood of nearly a hundred families, that I was in charge of a security outfit that was currently fighting an criminal organization that was holding our founder, that two of my closest friends in the world were currently in the hospital with horrible injuries…for a moment, I was just a girl, the girl who was lucky enough to be making out with Bodhi Archer.

  His hands, his big, strong hands, slipped over my ass and tugged me closer against him, his hard body pressed so hard against me that there were no secrets between us. His heart was pounding, his pulse racing almost fast enough to match mine. I slid my own hands under the tail of his shirt, running my fingers over his smooth, warm skin, remembering how good it had felt the first time and the second, remembering how touching him did things to my equilibrium that nothing else had ever done.

  I wanted him. As exhausted and stressed as I was, I wanted him. I should have been with Becks, should have been back at MidKnight trying to figure out how to save Ash. I should have been helping with the grass fire, deciding what to do about the herd of cattle that grazed less than a mile from where the smoke and scorched earth now lived. I should have been doing a million things, but I was here, taking the selfish road, taking from this man things I would never be able to repay.

  I pushed at his chest, halfheartedly trying to do the right thing. He pulled back, but only long enough to turn me around, to bend me over the counter and tug at the button of my jeans.

  “Bodhi…”

  I wanted to object, but he was watching me in the mirror, this parade of thoughts running through those expressive eyes of his. He knew what I needed, knew what I was willing to accept. And he knew what he needed from me.

  He tugged my jeans down and was inside of me in the time it took me to take a breath. I cried out, another spasm of coughs threatening to overtake me. But I held it back as pleasure burst through my body with his touch, as his fingers did amazing things against my clit and his cock moved with slow precision against all those spots deep inside of me that had been left untouched for too long. I pushed my hips back against him, rolled them in a way that sent even more waves of pleasure through my body.

  Make me forget. Make me forget everything!

  I watched him in the mirror, watched him watch me. Every move he made seemed to be in response to the expression on my face. I’d never had a lover so intent on my pleasure, on my needs. Sex was naturally a selfish thing. I’d never faulted my lovers with seeking their own pleasures. But this…it took sex to a whole new level.

  And looking into the familiar beauty of his face…that was just an added bonus.

  He brought me up to an edge with his slow, easy movements, taking me to the very precipice of pleasure, then stopped, closing his eyes as he stood impossibly still, as his fingers moved away from my clit, as he took away everything but the reassuring pressure of his swollen cock. I wiggled my hips to encourage him to continue moving and he smacked my ass, punishing me for daring to take a modicum of control.

  I groaned, arching my neck, pressing back against him as close as I could get. He groaned in response, his hands coming around my hips, using my bones as handles. And he began to move, pounding against me, thrusting so hard that it should have been painful, but it was the most pleasure I had ever known. I’m sure half the hospital heard me when I cried out, when my orgasm burst through me and I found it impossible to hold it in. I lay my head on the counter as exhaustion finally overwhelmed me, only partially aware when he reached his climax, his body jerking against mine as he filled me with his own orgasm.

  I don’t know how long we stood there. A long time, I think. The next thing I was aware of was him gently wiping at my face, washing away the dark soot that had settled there like mud against the side of truck. I touched his hand, pulling it away.
r />   “You don’t have to take care of me.”

  “If I don’t, who will?”

  I shook my head, his soft-spoken words inexplicably bringing tears to my eyes.

  “I take care of myself. Always have.”

  “I know.” He kissed the tip of my nose. “But you don’t have to anymore.”

  I shook my head. “You don’t know me, Bodhi. You don’t know anything about me.”

  “I think we’ve already had this conversation,” he said with a smile. “And I think I told you that we have plenty of time to fill in the details. But I know enough about you to know that I want to be here for you, to carry some of the burden for you.”

  I touched his face, pressed the palm of my hand against it, loving the feel of his warm skin. I thought about that nurse out in the hallway, wondered what she would think if she could see us now, if she could be in my place. She’d probably fall all over him, fall for his charm and his wit. She’d probably do just about anything to have him say to her the things he was saying to me. He could have any woman he set his eyes on. He was Bodhi Archer, for God’s sake!

  Why me?

  “I appreciate the thought,” I said, dropping my hand, “but my life is too complicated right now. You have no idea what’s been going on.”

  “I think I have an idea.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s a small town, Sutherland. I’ve heard things.”

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were somehow involved in all of this. You always show up just when things begin to explode in my life. When Becks disappeared, when the raid in Casper went wrong, now…”

  “I just keep my ear to the ground. That’s all.”

  I jumped down off the counter where he’d set me again, moving around him to grab a couple of paper towels from the dispenser, to wipe at my face again.

  “I need to go check on Becks. Then I need to get back to the ranch and figure out what our next move should be.”

  “I heard the fire was under control.”

  I glanced at him. “I hope so.”

  “I know you think someone on my ranch is behind these fires, behind the busted fence and damned up stream, but I can assure you that no one working for me would do any of that.”

  “Nice to know.”

  “But you should be careful. It does seem like someone’s out to hurt you.”

  I snorted, the words seeming almost absurd. But he was right. Too many things had gone wrong on the ranch these last months for it to all be a coincidence. I tossed the paper towels in the trash, my eyes falling slowly on his face.

  “Why did you buy that ranch? What are you planning on doing with it?”

  His eyes were a little wary as they moved over my face, a weariness that spoke of a deep exhaustion there, too. He didn’t like the question and I wasn’t quite sure why that would be.

  “Horses. We had horses on our ranch in New Zealand and I wanted to get back to that, raise a few show horses, maybe get into racing.”

  It seemed truthful, the way his words easily rolled off his tongue. But there was something about the way he looked away as he spoke, the way he refused to meet my gaze, that told me there was more to it than that. And it was that unspoken bit that planted a seed of doubt deep in my chest.

  He was lying to me. I couldn’t have liars around me.

  “I should go. I should be with Becks.”

  “I’m sorry about your friend.”

  I looked at him one more time, studied his face for one moment longer. There was something about him, something that I wanted so desperately to trust. But trust was something I didn’t do easily. Trusting someone I was sure had just lied to me was something I could never do.

  “I have to go.”

  I walked away feeling as though another burden had been placed on my shoulders. I wasn’t sure why or what, but I could feel it weighing me down.

  What was another among so many?

  Chapter 4

  At the Ranch

  Joss paced in the little bit of lawn behind the main house, the cellphone pressed to her ear. She was listening, for what seemed like the thousandth time, to her husband’s recorded voice.

  I’m not available right now, but if you’ll leave your name and phone number…

  She used to tease him for having such a generic message on his phone’s voicemail, but he insisted it was necessary for business purposes. Right now, she didn’t really care what the reason, she wanted him to answer the damn phone instead of declining each one of her calls.

  She knew Carrington was busy with work. He was trying to get a contract with some big import-export business in Connecticut, trying to get them to use his shipping company as their primary shipper on the West Coast. She didn’t pretend that she really understood the ins and outs of his business—she knew security, not shipping—but she knew this was important to him. The thing was, Ash was missing and that was important to her. She just wanted to talk to him for a few minutes, hear the reassurance in his voice, know that he was in her corner. But she hadn’t been able to get ahold of him since she arrived in Wyoming. He didn’t even know she was here.

  She hated leaving the children without both their parents. McKelty was a teenager now, thinking she could do anything she wanted without consent or help. She adored her baby sister, Aidan, but couldn’t pull herself away from social media or her friends long enough to spend much time with the six-year-old anymore. And she was pissed when she found out Joss was leaving.

  “I have a cheerleading competition! You promised you’d be there!”

  And Joss had. But that was before Ash disappeared. Joss thought about calling the nanny, but she’d spoken to her three times already this morning. She didn’t want to bother her again.

  “Fuck, Carrington,” she whispered under her breath. “Answer your damn phone!”

  Things had been strained between Joss and Carrington for a while now. She had no doubt that he loved her, or that he was devoted to their family. But it felt like there were secrets between them, things he refused to tell her. She couldn’t say specifically what. Nothing had really changed in the almost six years they’d been married. But there was something…it was like she’d been wearing blinders all these years, that the honeymoon period of their relationship had lasted far longer than it should have and they were just now coming out of it. And she was just now seeing things about him that had always been there but the newness of the relationship, the excitement of their new love, had blinded her to it until now.

  He traveled a lot. A lot. He took all these odd phone calls at strange times of the day. He would end a phone call if she happened to walk into the room in the middle of it. Sometimes she’d wake in the night and he’d be gone, no explanation. It was all explainable by his business, surely, but it still bothered her. And then she would wonder if it was just old ghosts making her question the man she loved, the happiness they’d created together.

  Joss had once been married to a good man, a teacher. They had a son together. It was a good life, a simple life. But it all ended when Esteban was killed in a car accident—a drunk driver—and their son died sometime later from injuries he’d sustained in the same crash. It was more than devastating to Joss. It left her so broken that she was ready to join them in death, that she simply gave up. Without Ash…Ash saved her life. And Carrington, McKelty, and Aidan, helped her see that happiness was still a possibility for her.

  Carrington was a good man, a hardworking man who loved his children more than anything. And Joss believed he loved her. But these secrets…and now, his refusal to answer her calls…it was too much to ignore. She slid her phone into her back pocket and crossed the small lawn to the bunkhouse that stood on a gentle hill behind the house. Kirkland was sitting on the edge of a desk, his own phone stuck to his ear, a man in uniform standing in front of him.

  “Steve Hilliard,” the man said, holding out a hand to her. “I’m the local sheriff.”

  “Joss Matthews,” she said, acceptin
g his handshake. “Nice to meet you.”

  Kirkland disconnected his call and moved up beside Joss, sliding an arm around her shoulders.

  “How you doing, sweetheart?”

  She forced a smile. “Good.”

  He could see right through it, she knew he could. He knew her far too well. Back when she refused to speak, he always knew what she was thinking, what she might have said, just by looking at the expression on her face. It was a little late to let words get between them now.

  But he also knew when it was best to allow her to lie.

  “The sheriff here thinks he has an idea where the Mahoneys are hiding out.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “If you do, you’re my new best friend.”

  He smiled, his eyes moving quickly over her as though there was interest, but he was too careful to allow it to show. That might have made a lesser woman blush, but Joss wasn’t a lesser woman.

  “We have reason to believe they might be hiding out on the Big T ranch out on the highway. It’s been empty ever since the family that owned it was foreclosed on and moved back east. The neighbors have seen activity around the place and the electric company reports that someone paid to have the electricity turned back on a little over six weeks ago.”

  “Do we know who?”

  Kirkland jammed his thumb over his shoulder. “Got the computer geeks working on it. Whoever it is, they’re hiding behind a corporation so it might take a while to unravel it all.”

  “We can’t make a move without knowing what we’re getting into.”

  Kirkland nodded in agreement, something he probably wouldn’t have done years ago. But Mabel and his son had mellowed him out, making him more cautious.

  Today, Joss missed the old impulsive Kirkland.

  “So, what’s the plan?”

  Kirkland shrugged. “David and Donovan are out there keeping an eye on the place while we stay here and prepare for the exchange.”