Woman on Top [McQueen Was My Valley 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

by Karen Mercury

  “Basically,” Gabriel agreed. “But basically isn’t good enough. I can express this letter back to my lab and try to get some DNA, try to see if he was stupid enough to leave any prints, say on this broken bottle. But just seeing someone driving away isn’t good enough. He could’ve been leaving the lodge, for example.”

  Adrian was livid. Gabriel had never seen him that irate, and it was a sight to behold. He stepped so close to Gabriel that he could feel his angry huffing against his face. Adrian pointed a stiff finger at the floor. “Gabriel. These asshats are threatening the woman we love, and you’re just going to wait for DNA results? That’s not how we do things in Beirut.”

  Now Gabriel was getting pissed. “We’re not fucking in Beirut, Adrian! Maybe you mercenaries run around whacking each other every time someone forgets to say ‘thank you’ or blows their nose on their sleeve, but out here we need to abide by the laws!”

  “Yeah, and they just broke about ten more of them!”

  It was a showdown, both men standing toe to toe, and practically nose to nose. Gabriel had the advantage of about four inches on the tall marine, so he snorted hot air down onto him. Gabriel knew there was no solution to this mess, other than waiting for those jackoffs to make another stupid move. But he was an officer of the law, and he couldn’t operate beyond the parameters of his power. Maybe Adrian could, in his job. Gabriel had to uphold things by the book.

  Luckily the woman they both loved came between them gently. “Boys, boys. Let’s bag up this broken glass, let Gabriel dust for prints, and we can all shower back up at the lodge in my suite. I’m not afraid of any toilet-papering morons with pantyhose on their heads. These guys are amateur. Believe you me, I used to hang with professionals. Listen. Leif’s serving some corn crab soup in the restaurant. The entrée is T-bone of lamb with goat yogurt.”

  The menu seemed to take the upper hand in the men’s minds suddenly. “Goat yogurt?” queried Adrian. “You mean goat cheese yogurt?”

  Brooke shrugged. “The menu said ‘goat yogurt.’ With baby mint.”

  Gabriel asked, “Isn’t all mint ‘baby’? I mean, it’s not very big, is it?”

  Brooke waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, you know how flowery those menus get. He also has something called chimichurri, and something called kurizo. Beats me what either of those are. I’m going to call Xandra to get someone down here to paint over that graffiti on the outside.”

  Brooke drifted away with her phone to her ear, and Adrian said, “I’ve heard of kurizo sausage. Maybe that’s it.”

  “How do you know I’m in love with Brooke? It’s obvious you are.”

  Adrian’s face softened, and he looked amused. “It’s plain to anyone with eyes in their head that you are. I just guessed. Accurately, I presume.”

  Gabriel snorted. “Accurately,” he admitted. They were about to have another showdown of an entirely different kind when Gabriel remembered something. “Bring that shampoo up to Brooke’s suite. I’m completely out.”

  “Will do,” said Adrian, sprinting off to the bedroom.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Brooke and Doug swished into the run out at the bottom of Spectacular Run, so named because, well, it was spectacular. “Hoo-wee!” she cried loudly, invigorated with the bracing air of the bluebird day.

  “Hoo-wee!” Doug agreed. He’d been saying that, Xandra had told Brooke, ever since she’d signed the ranch over to him. Doug Ostrovsky was a great boon as a stepbrother. He was so happy-go-lucky he made one’s stomach hurt with laughter. And, like now, he made a good bodyguard. Adrian and Gabriel couldn’t be with her every minute until Wade and Dave reoffended and were hauled to the Monticello jail again. Her two men—I still can’t get over that, “my men”—were on the expert run not far behind them, but they’d trusted Doug to escort her down Spectacular Run.

  And besides, like she’d said. “Meth heads don’t ski.”

  Doug panted steam in her direction. His bulbous nose was one giant Rudolph bulb, it was so red. “Hey, why don’t you come with me to the PRCA in July?” Today it was so warm out he was wearing only his usual Pearl Jam T-shirt, of which he must have had a closet full. He probably owned a dozen Nirvana shirts as well, with the occasional Stones or Led Zep sprinkled in to keep things exciting. Today for some reason he’d added a bolo tie with a silver and turquoise clasp to the mix, probably to display his cattle ranch affiliation.

  “PRCA?”

  “Pro rodeo cowboys. Big rodeo in Oakley.”

  “Oh, that sounds like a blast, Doug! I’m definitely in. Our trip could be a tax write off, too, right?”

  Doug guffawed. “Man! You’re really getting right on top of things, now that you’re the office manager at the ranch. I’m glad to have Adrian on board, too. He’s a good man.”

  Brooke’s mind went blank. “Adrian? On board?”

  “Yeah. His new position as assistant ranch manager under Cody. Cody’s relieved to have the help. I never knew this, but Wanda, bless her heart, was somewhat of a tightwad. No big surprise I guess, since Cody was being forced to do all the ranch paperwork all these years in addition to the actual running of the ranch. Now he’s got both of you to help.”

  Brooke shook her head to rid it of cobwebs. “Excuse me…Adrian will be working there? Oh…my.”

  Doug frowned. “He didn’t tell you?”

  “Well, there was some idle talk. Nothing concrete. Does this mean he won’t be flying overseas anymore on missions?”

  “Well, we talked about that. Calving season is coming up, and the beeves need to be fed every day until the new grass grows. It’s exciting, Brooke—I never thought I’d be so damned interested in cows, but I am.”

  “So you’ll make Adrian stick around for calving? After that there’s branding. It never ends, Doug. You could force him to stay here year-round. There are always a bazillion chores to be done.”

  “We realized that. We’re just treating Adrian more as luck than our god-given right. We can’t stop him from jetting around acting like Indiana Jones looking at rare daggers. And he’s not actually a rancher, yet, not like me, so it’s not like the ranch revolves around him.”

  “Yeah.” Brooke snorted. “Because you wear a bolo tie. You’ve only been doing this a few months, too.”

  Doug waved an arm. “Hell, we’re all learning! Cody and the old hands are the real backbone of this organization. We’re just figureheads. Well, except you. You have to be there every day, operating those financial spreadsheets.”

  “Which is where I probably should be now. Let’s say we head back down the mountain after this run.”

  “Good plan. I’m going to traverse over to that Rotgut Run, and we can reach Camp Walden that way. Hey, dudes!” Doug’s sudden holler hurt Brooke’s ears. He had spied some cronies who had just appeared in the clearing. Doug had many cronies in Bird in Hand. Doug had been the general manager of the Triple Play Lodge under Wanda for many years before Xandra had arrived and handed him the ranch. He knew pretty much everyone in southeastern Utah. “Hang on a sec, Brooke. I’ve gotta harass this doofus about some dough he owes me. Come with me, why not? This dude owns a rival ranch down closer to Mexican Hat. He’s a good guy to know.”

  “I’ll be right there,” said Brooke vaguely, waving her stepbrother off. He swished away toward the group of ranchers—one of them actually wearing a cowboy hat on the slopes—while Brooke paused, lost in thought, leaning on her poles.

  “Dude!” Doug shrieked. “You owe me big-time!”

  Adrian staying? This had been her number one hope for weeks now, since she’d first laid eyes on that exquisitely rounded ass passing in front of her reception desk. Why hadn’t he told her, though? Probably because it wasn’t really a full-time job, not in the strictest sense, if they were going to allow him to continue to fly to Lebanon and Uzbekistan or any of those other counties that ended in –stan.

  This is perfect! A slow smile spread over Brooke’s face. The fact that he had accepted the ranch position—and
had called her “little one” the other day—gave Brooke a sense of security, of calm. She had always mindlessly flitted from boyfriend to boyfriend, knowing they would move on if she didn’t. Nothing in that circle of Charleston friends had been permanent or had a sense of security. Knowing Adrian was staying in Bird in Hand made her feel safe and protected, for some reason. Her life up until now had been a series of stupid, pointless parties. The stupidity had probably been enhanced by her ridiculously large modeling salary that meant she didn’t have to work nearly as often as most people. She’d never had to take responsibility for anything.

  Now? She looked forward to the responsibility of the ranch. Maybe Adrian would even want to spend the night out there in that cabin she’d napped in once. It was extremely basic, but since they loved horses, shouldn’t they become accustomed to the basics? Adrian was probably highly accustomed to sleeping on the floor, or on a mat—

  “Hey! Brooke! Over here!”

  How long had that girl been yelling at her? Brooke looked over her shoulder to see a blonde gal in a powder blue ski jacket waving madly over by some piñon pines. She didn’t recognize the woman, so she waved back tentatively. Maybe one of the masseuses from the spa.

  “Brooke! You’ve got to see this! It’s unbelievable!”

  Sighing, Brooke maneuvered her skis in the right direction and poled toward the gal. She seemed happily excited about something, so it probably wasn’t a gross, dead animal. She waved Brooke between a few pines and toward a slight rise. Brooke skied out of the champagne powder and into the mashed potato snow. “Ashley?” The girl had vanished behind the slope.

  How unbelievable can this thing be? Brooke snorted hot air as she trudged up the rise. Cresting it, she looked back and forth for Ashley, or whichever masseuse had called her. No one. What the—

  She was tackled from the side. All the air was wrenched from her lungs as she flew through the air, poles and skis flying in another “yard sale” event.

  Had she been about to smack in to another tree, like that time Adrian had tackled her? No, this had an altogether different feeling. There was no tree in the way, and she hadn’t been going that fast. Their sliding bodies dug a deep groove in the mashed potatoes, the snow piling up behind Brooke’s shoulders until she had burrowed deep into the mushy bank.

  “What the fuck?” she cried before she was silenced by an enormous blow to the temple. She stopped trying to punch the guy, who was of course the tattooed Wade Rivers, and brought her forearms up to protect her face. Now that her midsection was vulnerable, he began yanking at the zipper of her parka. He had walloped her with a pistol barrel, and now he was going to rape her.

  Of course she said the usual things one said when being attacked. They all came out of her without forethought. “Get off of me! What are you doing? What’s wrong with you? Let me go!”

  “Can it, bitch!” Wade straddled her, pinning her to the slush. It never failed to amaze Brooke how even the feeblest man was stronger than the strongest woman. That’s just how it was. “You’re the slut who’s been sucking those fags’ dicks, and I want some of that action before I send you back to them with a message.”

  Brooke’s mind raced to think logically. He had torn her parka from her torso and tossed it aside like a deflated pink balloon in the snow. Ammonia or a cat urine odor emanated from his body as though he sweated it through his pores, a sign of meth withdrawal. “If I’m sucking their dicks, how can they be fags?”

  This only earned her another clout to the temple. “Shut up!” he yelled, apparently confused.

  Now Brooke felt blood trickle into her eye socket. “What message do you want me to give them?” she asked, in an attempt to take his mind off assault. Adrian had forced her to wear a beacon under her alpine shell, one of those skiers wore in case they were caught in an avalanche. It had a range up to 180 feet, but Adrian had to know she was missing first in order to use his transceiver.

  Wade Rivers had obviously just skied down the mountain, too, unless he’d poled over from Camp Walden. She had been wrong. White-power meth heads did ski. Now he fumbled between her crossed arms to grip the zipper pull of her alpine shell. “The message, bitch, is that I want that gung-ho spic off my back. He’s fucking obsessed with me, maybe he’s in love with me, following me around, ticketing me for shit I never did.”

  It wouldn’t do to rile him up by pointing out that he did the things he was charged with. Brooke tried to knee him in the balls, but she had to face it. Struggling only made him angrier. And in that TV show she had seen before where people told survival stories, the vast majority of women survived attacks by playing dead. So she went limp, but couldn’t resist saying, “He’s not a spic. He’s Italian.”

  Wade chortled in agreement with her enthusiasm. “Oh, even better. A fucking dago stalking me. Will you do that, bitch? I ain’t gonna let you go unless you promise you’ll tell that dago to back off. And if he doesn’t, I’m gonna do a lot worse to you than what I’m doing now.”

  He’d gotten her shell unzipped, but now faced the pullover crew shirt with no zipper. He had chosen badly in selecting a skier to rape. He’d need to deal with her ski pants and tights in order to do any real damage. “I promise,” she said, her eyes squeezed tight. Surely Doug would be wondering where she was by now, unless he was deep in conversation with that other ranch owner. He could’ve figured Brooke just stepped behind a tree to pee. Or maybe he’d seen the girl calling Brooke over. Where was that girl? It was particularly odious that a girl would be in on this sickening plot. Women should stick together.

  Apparently frustrated with the layers of clothing, Wade had only succeeded in yanking the lower hems of her first two layers up above her tits. He grabbed a handful of her sports bra and pulled. Her rebellious tits popped out, the nipples shriveled into raisins in the icy air. For lack of anything better to do, Wade slapped them.

  “Damn! How you get those two big fags to hump you when you’re built like a boy, bitch?” Pain shot through her torso when he pulled at a nipple as though it were a dipstick under his hood. She gripped both her wrists into an unbreakable steely bar and managed to shove his hand off her nipple, but as predicted, this angered him, and he bashed her cheekbone with the gun barrel again.

  “Bitch!” he shouted, and got to his feet. He yanked her to stand by grabbing her hands. “We’re heading over here to get cozier!” And he dragged her like a cartoon zombie into a grove of piñons.

  Maybe reasoning would help. “Wade, you really don’t need to do this. We got your message loud and clear the other night.” A fresh surge of anger welled in her that her couch had been ruined. Well, her sister’s couch. But it had been ruined. “We had to paint over the slurs you spray-painted, and by the way, Gabriel and Adrian are not gay. Just so you know.”

  “They are, too! Dave peeked through the curtains before he spray painted the writing, and he saw the white guy jacking and fucking the spic.”

  “Italian,” Brooke corrected. “Well, where was I during this? I was there. Gay men don’t have other women in the same room with them.”

  “You were on your knees, but you refused to suck the dago’s prick.”

  Boy. He sure has a memory like a steel trap for gay events—Wait a minute. If Dave had been watching her on her knees before Gabriel while Adrian screwed him up the ass, that meant he’d been peeking through the curtains for an awfully long time. Because she hadn’t been down there long before she’d decided to stand behind Adrian and unsheathe the collapsible police baton to stimulate him. The unfolding of events had evidently been so seared in Dave’s memory he’d recounted them with precision to Wade.

  “Oh, yeah?” He smashed her into the rough bark of a pine. “And what was I doing while this was happening?”

  Wade again looked confused. “How would I know? I wasn’t even there. Dave just told me how the Aryan fag was really getting off screwing the dago up the ass.” He tried to explain himself, as though he were a teacher. He looked even more ridiculous with
his forehead tattoo declaring “Property of Brittany” showing beneath the edge of his absurd knitted chullo hat. “You know. Jacking him and all. Like he was real into it. Guy coming all over the mirror.”

  “Dave sure stood at the window for a long time,” Brooke said. Now that Wade stood a couple feet from her, albeit still gripping his pistol, she was able to tug her bra and shirts down. Wade was probably a very easily distracted person. “He sure got an eyeful before he completed his important tasks.”

  “What are you implying?” Wade yelled like the Cro-Magnon goon that he was. “You’re trying to say Dave enjoyed watching the fags?”

  “They’re not ‘fags,’” Brooke said patiently. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

  “Oh yeah? Last time I checked, one guy jacking another makes him a fag!”

  “Listen, Wade. If you don’t let me go, how can I give them your message? And they’re going to be even angrier if you molest me. They’re not going to care about any murder charge if you hurt me—they’re just going to be blind with rage, and they know where you live. My stepbrother Doug’s right over that hill—”

  Wade’s hand, shaped into a steely U, wrapped around her throat so fast she didn’t have time to gulp. It felt like she was trying to swallow an I beam. Her hands automatically scrabbled to release his iron grip, but his eyes bulged from red-rimmed lids. She didn’t know much about meth, but assumed he was probably jonesing. His decayed teeth were bringing bile into her throat, so she looked to the side. “Where’d you put my three kittens, bitch? There were three kittens in a guitar case.”

  Again without forethought, her knee came up. Her aim was true, and she got him right in the gonads, causing him to release his grip and double over in pain and surprise.

  She sprinted off, each boot sinking a foot into the mashed potatoes, not giving her much traction. But again, the longer lengths of mens’ legs stood Wade in good stead. It was rarely a fair match, physically, between men and women. The only manner women could best men was in endurance. Besides, Wade didn’t need to catch her to shoot her. Purposefully or not, he shot her right in the calf. An overall warmth rushed to her head, dizziness overtaking her. Next thing she knew, she was face-first on the ground.