Branded by the Sheriff

by Delores Fossen

  Her hand went lower, while their gazes stayed locked. A muscle flickered in his jaw. His heart was pounding. Hers, too. So much so that she wasn’t sure if that was her own pulse in her fingertips or if it was Beck’s.

  When she made it to his stomach, she slipped her fingers inside the small gap between the buttons of his shirt and had the pleasure of touching his bare skin.

  You can do this, she told herself. She wanted to do this.

  “You still need time to think?” Beck asked her. She was surprised he could speak with his jaw clenched that tight.

  “No.” She eased her fingers deeper inside his shirt, loosening a button until it came undone. “I don’t need any more time.”

  Before the last syllable left her mouth, he kissed her. It was hard and hungry. If it hadn’t fueled the need inside her, it would have been overwhelming. Suddenly, she wanted to be overwhelmed. She wanted everything she knew Beck was capable of giving her.

  With their bodies still facing each other, he scooped her up in his arms. Faith wrapped her legs around him, and he immediately started toward his bedroom. They bumped into some furniture along the way. And a wall. Neither of them were willing to break the kiss so they could actually see where they were going.

  Beck used his foot to shove open the door. The room was dark, with only the moonlight filtering through the blinds and thin curtain.

  Several steps later, Faith felt herself floating downward. Her back landed against his mattress. And Beck landed against her with his sex touching hers through the barrier of their jeans.

  She didn’t want any barriers. She kicked off her shoes and went after his shirt.

  Beck went after hers, stripping it over her head and tossing it onto the floor.

  Everything became urgent. Frantic. A battle against time. She cursed her fumbling fingers but then gave a sigh of pleasure when she got his shirt off and put her hands on him. He was all sinew and muscle. All man.

  And for the moment, he was hers for the taking.

  So Faith took.

  She kissed his chest and explored some of those muscles. Not for long though. Beck had other ideas. He unhooked the clasp of her bra, and her breasts spilled out. He fastened his mouth onto her left nipple and sent her flying.

  Mercy, was all she could think.

  He kept kissing her breasts and lightly nipped her with his teeth; all the while he worked to get her jeans off. She worked to get his off, too, though she had to keep stopping to catch her breath.

  Her jeans surrendered and landed somewhere on the floor where Beck tossed them. Faith shoved down his zipper. He shoved down her panties. And for only a moment, she felt the cool air on the inside of her thighs.

  The coolness didn’t last.

  Beck kissed her. The heat from his mouth warmed her all right and had her demanding that he do something about the fire he’d created inside her.

  He stood and rid himself of his boots and jeans. She wished the light had been on so she could see him better, but the moonlight did some amazing things to his already amazing body. The man was perfect.

  Beck reached in the nightstand drawer and pulled out a foil-wrapped condom. Safe sex. She was glad he’d remembered. She certainly hadn’t.

  He tugged off his boxers while he opened the condom. She got just a glimpse of him, huge and hard, before he came back to her, moving between her legs.

  Faith forced herself not to think. She wanted this to happen. With Beck. Right here, right now.

  Their eyes met. The tip of his erection touched her in the most intimate way and sent a spear of pleasure through her. She gasped and gasped again when he pushed deeper.

  Wow.

  With just that pressure, that movement, that sweet invasion, she was certain this was as much of the tangle of heat that she could take. She felt on the verge of unraveling.

  But Beck stopped.

  In fact, he froze.

  Faith wanted no part of that. She hooked her leg around his lower back and shoved him forward.

  There was a flash of pain. But it was quickly overshadowed by a flood of pleasure.

  Beck didn’t move. He stayed frozen.

  She focused, trying to see his face, and the confused expression she saw there probably matched her own. He had questions.

  “You’re a virgin?” he asked.

  Now it was her turn to freeze. “Sort of.”

  Sort of? Sort of! She wanted to kick herself for that stupid response. And she wanted to kick herself again because the moment was gone. Even though the need was still there, racing through her, she knew this wasn’t going to continue until Beck got an explanation.

  She caught onto him when he tried to move off her. “I tried to have sex with my boyfriend in college, but it didn’t work out. I panicked.”

  “You’re twenty-eight,” he reminded her. This time, he did move off her. He landed on his back next to her and groaned. “There would have been other opportunities since college.”

  “One other, a few years ago. I panicked then, too.” Faith hesitated, wondering how much she should say, but since she’d already messed this up, she went for broke. “When I was fourteen, one of Sherry’s drunk boyfriends sneaked into my bedroom one night and tried to rape me. He didn’t succeed, obviously. Darin came in and hit the guy with an alarm clock. Anyway, it took me a long time to get over that.”

  Beck cursed under his breath. “You’re over it now?” he asked, staring up at the ceiling.

  “I’m over it.” Beck seemed to have cured her. Amazing that he could do what therapy hadn’t.

  He turned on his side and faced her. “Why didn’t you tell me before I got you onto this bed?”

  “I didn’t want to explain what’d happened in my past. I wanted to have sex with you. And besides, I didn’t think you’d notice.”

  “I noticed.” It sounded as if he’d worked hard to keep the emotion and maybe even some sarcasm out of his voice. “Did I hurt you?”

  “No.” Since that sounded like a lie, she tried again. “Just a little, that’s all.”

  This time the cursing didn’t stay under his breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “No need to be. I’m not.”

  He stared at her, groaned and looked up at the ceiling again. “You just turned my life upside down. Now I’ve got positive proof that my brother’s been lying all these years about what happened in the motel. And everything I’d ever thought about you was wrong.”

  “You thought I was a slut.” She put her hand over his mouth so he wouldn’t have to confirm that. “Everyone did. Because everyone believed I was just like my mother and Sherry. Guilt by association. But the truth is, I went in the opposite direction. I didn’t want to be anything like either of them.”

  He stayed quiet a moment, before he reached for her and pulled her to him gently, and just held her.

  “I never wanted to be any woman’s first lover,” he said. “It was sort of a badge of honor for some guys in high school. Not me. I figured it created some kind of permanent bond that I wasn’t sure I wanted.”

  That stung a little. Was he saying he was sorry this had happened? Apparently. Because he wasn’t doing anything to continue what they’d started.

  “You don’t owe me anything, Beck,” she assured him.

  “Oh, I owe you. An apology for starters for the way I’ve treated you.” He kissed the top of her head. Cursed softly. And looked down at her. “What the hell am I going to do with you now?”

  Though he probably didn’t want her to answer, she considered pointing out that they were naked on his bed. But a soft thump stopped her from saying anything. The small sound came from the direction of the window. It sounded as if someone had bumped against the glass.

  Beck shot off the bed.

  “Get down on the floor,” he told her.

  Her heart banged against her rib cage, and Faith did as he said. Beck ran into the bathroom and seconds later emerged with his boxers on. He gathered up his jeans and started to put them on whi
le he reached for something in his nightstand drawer.

  A gun.

  That got her moving.

  She hurriedly crawled around, collected her clothes and got dressed. Once Beck had on his jeans, shirt and boots, he raced to the window. Pressing himself against the wall, he peered out the edge of the blinds.

  “Hell, someone’s out there,” he let her know.

  Her heart banged even harder. “Who is it?”

  “Can’t tell. He’s dressed all in black, and he’s crouched down near the rosemary bush in the side yard.”

  A ringing sound sliced through the silence. It was her cell phone. She’d left it in the family room.

  “Stay put,” Beck instructed. But a moment later, he cursed again. “The guy looks like he’s trying to sneak away.”

  Oh, mercy. She didn’t want him to get away. If it was Nolan, they could use this to arrest the man for trespassing. If he had a weapon, even better, because they could possibly charge him with criminal intent.

  Beck started for the bedroom door. “My cell’s not in here either. Use the phone by the bed and dial nine-one-one. Ask for backup. But I don’t want sirens. I want a quiet approach so we don’t scare this guy off.”

  She dialed the number as he asked. The dispatcher answered right away, and she relayed what Beck had told her. The dispatcher said he would send the night deputy immediately.

  “Are you thinking about going out there?” she asked Beck the moment she hung up.

  “I need to catch this guy,” was his uneasy answer.

  The silence lasted several seconds. “I have another gun on the top shelf in the closet,” he instructed. “Get it and then stay low while you follow me to the back door. Lock it when I leave and set the security system. I won’t be long.”

  “You don’t know that. This guy could shoot you.”

  “I’m the sheriff,” he reminded her. Plus, if he could end this tonight, then Aubrey wouldn’t be in danger.

  Her little girl could come back home.

  “I’m doing this,” Beck insisted.

  Faith considered arguing with him, but she knew it would do no good. She hurried to the closet and took the .38 from the shelf. They crouched down and hurried to the back door.

  “Be careful,” she told him. But that was it. All she had time to say.

  “Six-eight-eight-nine,” he explained, disarming the security system so it wouldn’t go off when he made his exit. He shoved a set of keys into his jeans pocket. “Lock the door, reset it and then get back into the bedroom. Stay on the floor. I’ll let myself back in when I’m finished.”

  And just like that, he hurried out.

  Faith followed his instructions to a tee, added a prayer that he would be okay, and headed to the bedroom. She hadn’t even made it there when the house phone rang. Five rings and the answering machine kicked in.

  “Sheriff Beck Tanner,” the machine announced. “I’m not here, so leave a message. If this is an emergency, hang up and call nine-one-one.”

  She waited, her mind more on Beck than the caller. And then she heard the voice.

  “Faith?”

  It was Darin.

  She scrambled across the room and picked up the phone. “Darin, it’s me. I’m here.”

  “I’m here, too. Outside Beck’s house. I need to see you. I have something to show you.”

  Oh, God. Beck was out there expecting to catch a killer. He might shoot Darin by mistake. Of course, there was that possibility that Darin was the killer.

  “I’m in the yard,” Darin continued. “By some rosebushes. There’s a window nearby.”

  So he wasn’t by the rosemary. He’d moved from the side yard to the back, where Beck had just exited. They’d probably just missed each other. She needed to tell Beck what was going on, but he didn’t have his cell phone with him.

  “I won’t hurt you,” Darin promised. And for a moment, she remembered her brother, the one who’d saved her from Sherry’s drunken boyfriend. The brother she loved.

  With the cordless phone in one hand and the gun gripped in the other, Faith crawled back toward the kitchen. Toward the window with the roses.

  “What do you need to show me?” she asked Darin.

  “Sherry had some pictures of her with a man. I found them, and I think they’re important.”

  It was likely the photo that Sherry had sent Pete and Roy, the one that proved she’d had the affair that might earn her some blackmail money.

  When she reached the kitchen window, Faith lifted her head a little and looked out. She didn’t spot her brother. “Darin, listen. Beck’s out there, and if he sees you, he might shoot first and ask questions later. So I want you to stay put. Don’t run. Don’t make any sudden moves.”

  She saw something then. Was that a shadow in the shrubs or was it Beck?

  She couldn’t tell.

  “Stay down,” she told her brother in a whisper. She waited until Darin had gotten to the ground. Then she opened the window several inches, and in a slightly louder voice, she said, “Beck?”

  Nothing. Not even from the other end of the phone, and she wondered if Darin had hung up.

  Faith lifted the window a little more. The shadow didn’t move. “Beck?” she called out.

  She waited. Not long. Seconds, maybe. And a swishing sound came right at her. It happened in the blink of an eye.

  Something tore through the mesh window screen.

  There was a stab in her neck. Sharp and raw. But she didn’t even have time to scream.

  Faith felt herself falling, losing consciousness, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

  * * *

  BECK STAYED CLOSE TO the house so he could use it for cover in case something went wrong and so he could make sure no one got inside to go after Faith.

  The figure he’d seen in the yard might be a kid playing a stupid game, but with everything else that’d happened in the past two days, he couldn’t take the chance. He also didn’t want to leave Faith alone much longer, so that meant he had to find this guy and take care of the situation—fast.

  He hoped it was Nolan so he could arrest him. Or beat him senseless, whichever came first.

  Hurrying but keeping his gun aimed and ready, Beck went to the front of the house and looked around the corner. No one was there so he moved across the porch toward the side yard where he’d first seen the figure.

  He silently cursed when he didn’t see anyone there.

  Had Nolan or Darin gotten away?

  From up the street, he saw a cruiser approaching. The siren was off, but the deputy had his headlights on. He turned them off when he was about a half block away, parked the cruiser and got out. It was Deputy Mark Gafford. Beck motioned that he was going to go back around the house.

  Beck stepped down from the porch and into the side yard where his bedroom extended to just a few feet from that rosemary bush. He glanced inside the bedroom window but couldn’t see Faith. Good. That hopefully meant the killer couldn’t see her either.

  With the deputy now covering his back, Beck got moving again. Staying in the shadows. Keeping watch. He half expected someone to ambush him at any moment. Because after all, Sherry and her mother had been ambushed. But with each step, he heard nothing, saw nothing.

  Until he made it to the backyard.

  Someone was on the back porch at the door, dressed all in black. Could it be the same shadowy figure that’d been in the rosemary?

  “Hold it right there!” Beck called out. He ducked partly behind the corner of the house to use it as cover in case the person fired.

  But there was no shot.

  The person bolted off the porch and began to run.

  “Stop!” Beck yelled.

  The guy didn’t. Beck jumped on the porch in pursuit. From the corner of his eye, he saw Faith. On the kitchen floor.

  His heart fell to his knees.

  He called out her name, the sound ringing through his head, and he got a glimpse of the darkly clad figure rounding
the corner, out of Beck’s sight.

  Beck didn’t chase after him. Instead, he raced to the back door, forgetting that it was locked. God, he had to get to her.

  There was blood on her neck.

  “Watch out for a gunman,” Beck yelled to his deputy, hoping the man would hear him.

  He fumbled through his pocket for his keys. It seemed to take an eternity before he got the right one into the lock. Finally, it opened, and despite the fact he’d triggered the security system and it started to blare, he ran to her.

  She wasn’t moving.

  Trying to keep watch to make sure the gunman didn’t return, Beck pressed his fingers to the side of her neck that wasn’t bleeding.

  He felt her pulse. It was faint. But it was there. She was alive.

  For now.

  He reached up, yanked the wall phone from its cradle and jabbed in nine-one-one.

  “Sheriff Tanner,” he said, the second the dispatcher answered. “Get an ambulance out to my place now. Faith Matthews has been shot.”

  He tossed the phone aside and checked her injury to see what he could do to help her. She wasn’t bleeding a lot, and he soon realized why.

  The injury wasn’t from a bullet.

  Beck reached down and plucked the tiny dart from her neck. And he felt both relief.

  And fear.

  Because someone had shot her with a tranquilizer gun.

  Just the way her sister and mother had been shot, right before someone had murdered them.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Faith forced her eyes open. No easy task, because her eyelids felt as heavy as lead. Actually, her entire body felt that way.

  She glanced around and saw she was in a bed in a sterile white room. A hospital. That’s when she remembered what had happened in Beck’s kitchen.

  Someone had shot her.

  Her hand flew to her neck, to the thin bandage that was there. The skin beneath it was sore, but she wasn’t actually in pain.

  “Someone used a tranquilizer gun on you,” a man said. “You’re going to be okay.” It was Beck. He was there. It was his voice she’d heard, and next to him stood Corey, his deputy.

  “We didn’t catch him,” Beck added with a heavy, frustrated-sounding sigh.