The Hard Way: Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 5
Page 19
A lot of things in Baylortown were somehow smaller or shabbier than I remembered, but the old pasture edge was more beautiful than ever. The far side we were looking at was shaded by old oaks and hickory trees. I used to love this side. We’d bring the sheep out here during the hottest days of summer.
A bell rang out. The dinner bell.
“That’s our sign,” Zeus said. “Come on.” He headed to the giant pine that was a few yards outside of our fence line, one of the best climbing trees with limbs like ladder rungs and enough foliage to conceal you. Almost like a giant tent, that pine.
Zeus handed me the binoculars. “Let’s do it.”
I strapped them around my neck, and we climbed.
I hadn’t been in that tree since childhood, and it made me love Vanessa even more for thinking of this as a vantage point.
We arranged ourselves on the branches that jutted out horizontally from the trunk. Zeus and Odin were on the other side from me, Thor just below. I shifted around so I could see through the pine boughs. I heard Petey the dog first.
“Shit! He’s going to smell me!”
“Can he get out the fence?” Odin asked.
“Hopefully not,” I said.
“Just a squirrel,” Odin said. “That’s all they’ll think.”
“Petey has way higher standards than that. Just a squirrel indeed!” I put the spyglasses to my eyes. The herd had grown—I knew it from the newsletter, but it was exciting to see. Petey raced back and forth behind the four dozen or so sheep, nipping and barking.
I spotted Vanessa, coming down the field. And then there was Kaitlin, running behind her.
My heart skipped a beat. Kaitlin.
She’d grown her red hair out and had it caught up in a ponytail. Her face was filled out—she looked more mature. Like a young woman. Vanessa had said she’d made the soccer team, and I felt like I could see that confidence in her movements.
I couldn’t stop looking; every step and glance she made gave me a new hit of how much I loved her—and missed her. She glowed with energy. She caught up with one of the ewes and ruffled its back. She’d always gotten close to those animals. Well, we all had. We celebrated those animals. Some of them were like family.
Candace came into view, running to catch up to Vanessa. When she got there, they walked as a pair. Candace had her phone out and was talking to Vanessa at the same time. She wore a baseball cap and a side braid and a blue jacket I recognized.
“My jacket,” I said, like that was the most important detail of the whole scene. “Once upon a time, she would’ve gotten in a lot of trouble for borrowing that without asking.”
Thor put a hand on my shin. “You okay?”
“Yeah.”
“How do they look?” Zeus asked.
“Happy,” I said. “Amazing. They’re going on.”
Without me.
It was here that it really hurt. I couldn’t climb down there and run over and congratulate Kaitlin for making the team. I couldn’t laugh with her or look over those college catalogs. Or watch old movies with Candace, or do crafts with Vanessa while we watched Sleepless in Seattle for the millionth time. Or make cheese and fight about who had to get in there to do the smear or turn a batch in the middle of a movie.
“They wouldn’t have all this if you weren’t sending that money,” Odin reminded me.
“It still hurts.”
Sure enough Petey came to the edge of the fence, a black and white streak. He went wild, barking in the direction of our tree.
Candace went up and petted him. I held my breath as she squinted at the tree we were in, but I knew she wouldn’t investigate.
Eventually she turned away, leaving Petey to his freakout. They headed up and inspected a rotting section of fence. Candace and Vanessa seemed to be consulting on a repair. Vanessa slung down her pack, and they banged a pair of two-by-fours into place. At one point, while Candace was hammering, Vanessa smiled in my direction.
I passed the binoculars to my guys and let them look. I loved that they got to see it all.
Candace and Kaitlin took off after a while, but Vanessa lingered. “What’s she doing?”
“Maybe she wants to talk,” Zeus said.
Eventually my younger sisters disappeared from sight, and a few minutes later, a diesel engine roared to life. Candace would be taking Kaitlin to school in the truck.
Vanessa waved us over.
We climbed down, trekked over to the fence, and jumped it.
Petey jumped up on me, barking madly. I knelt and let him lick my face, ruffling his scruff.
Vanessa was all smiles. “Did you see?”
“Of course! Oh my god.” There were no words. I introduced Zeus. Vanessa shook his hand with an undisguised look of awe.
“I wanted to see you again. To thank you. Nancy Zietlow confessed, and they charged Hank.”
“Thank goodness.”
“There is still a bad aura around our cheese, just from all the coverage, but we’re getting so much goodwill. You know that monthly cheese box I started? Twenty-some sales this morning already. And the news hasn’t even broke in the Reporter yet.”
“People will come around. They may wait, but they’ll come back.” We strolled into the herd, and I looked at the sheep. So many of my old favorite ewes were there. My eyes welled up a bit as I patted their fluffy backs.
“Probably stronger than ever,” she said. “You saved us. Again.”
“I should be thanking you—for this. It meant so much. I didn’t know if I could do it.”
“Are you glad now?” Thor asked.
“It was hard. But no, I’m glad.”
“We miss you,” Vanessa said.
“I miss you.”
“Someday,” Thor said, rubbing my shoulders.
“You think?” Vanessa asked. “You think you could come back? Just for a visit, even?”
“Only if things change,” I said. “I so want to.”
“Things do change, though, right?” she said hopefully.
“Sometimes.” I brightened up. “I would’ve never thought I’d stand here being jealous of going out with the herd to fix a fence issue. So I guess things do change.”
Vanessa got a mischievous look. “Funny you should say that. So very funny.”
“What?”
“Kaitlin’s at school all day, and Candace is heading out to her temp job. Those girls will be gone until sundown. And I can’t help but notice you’re here with three capable-looking guys.”
I widened my eyes. “You wouldn’t.”
“What?” Odin said.
I couldn’t keep the smile off my face.
“You know we can’t go through summer with those tarps,” Vanessa said. “It’s shantytown central in there. And the shearing shed has major issues…”
“And you have the materials…”
“Of course.”
“We’re in,” Zeus said. “Give us a list of things to do.”
Shivers went over me.
“Come on.” Vanessa picked up her pack, and we trudged all the way back with the herd and Petey, who continued to jump on me like crazy. He went even crazier when I threw a few sticks for him. God, I’d missed that dog.
Back near the house, Vanessa and I showed my guys the lamb pen. Ten lambs, going on a month old by now. A totally cute age. Before I knew it, we were in the hush of the main barn.
My guys got to work on the wall, and Vanessa and I went over the spreadsheets on her laptop and talked about the operations. She told me her ideas for marketing and expansion. She’d been taking classes at the local college.
Later, we went into the house and made lunch and brought it out to the guys. It really was like we were a family, and for a moment, with the five of us sitting there at the picnic table outside the shearing shed, I allowed myself to imagine a world where ZOX wasn’t chasing us. A world where my guys and I weren’t being hunted. A world where they got the fucking commendation they deserved instead of a life on the r
un. And we could come out and help. Hang for holidays.
We explained a little more of the situation to Vanessa, and she looked sad. Worried about me being in the life of a fugitive with ultrapowerful, ultradeadly enemies.
I tried to explain the good parts to her. Not getting graphic about our sex lives, but about the places we went, the thrills, the luxury hotels. Vanessa was impressed, but it sounded empty to my ears. What did we really have?
But then Zeus came behind me and put his arms around me and his chin on my shoulder. “We’ve burned through the list,” he said, “but we’ve noticed a few other things we could repair. and Odin wants to have a look at the HVAC.”
“You can’t repair the mechanicals. That takes an expert.”
“He’s an engineer,” I said.
Vanessa sat up. She was interested, I could tell. “You’ve done so much. All the drudge work and now mechanicals?”
“It’ll never be enough,” Zeus said. “And it’ll never be hard or a drudge. You’re family.”
She raised her eyes to mine. That’s what I had.
Family. My sisters were family and always would be—I hadn’t lost them. And Zeus and Thor and Odin and I were our own fierce little family, fighting against all odds. And winning.
~finis~
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed your time with the kinky bank robbers as much as I did.
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Acknowledgments
I just want to shout out my wild and huge thanks to Katie Reus and Skye Warren who are always there to look at my early drafts and give me insights, ideas, and much needed feedback. You are the best! Thanks also to proofreader Sadye at Fussy Librarian for excellent proofreading and fun little tweaks. And as always, crazy gratitude to my wonderful readers and my fabulous Facebook gang for keeping the kinky bank robbers torch burning bright! You all mean the world to me.
About the Author
I love writing sexy stories about dangerous heroes, kicking snow clumps off the bottoms of cars (Minnesota FTW!), and taking long walks with my husband and wishing our two cats could come along with us on leashes, but that turns out to be a road to utter misery. I’ve been writing all my life while working various jobs, from waitress at a zillion different places to advertising copywriter. I’m into running and yoga and saving animals and the planet. My favorite TV shows are the Americans and Daredevil, and my favorite musicians are Elliott Smith and Sia. I spend way too much time in coffee shops. In my spare time I write as the RITA award-winning author Carolyn Crane.
www.annikamartinbooks.com
annika@annikamartinbooks.com
Also by Annika Martin
Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers
The Hostage Bargain (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 1)
The Wrong Turn (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 2 - a novella)
The Deeper Game (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 3)
Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers (the 3-book set)
The Most Wanted (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 4)
The Hard Way (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers 5)
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Dangerous Royals:
Edgy, sexy, yummaliciously dark (read in order)
Dark Mafia Prince
Wicked Mafia Prince
Savage Mafia Prince
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Criminals & Captives
PRISONER (book #1) by Annika Martin & Skye Warren
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Carolyn Crane books: See www.authorcarolyncrane.com
The kinky bank robbers thank you for reading.