by T. S. Joyce
Helena looked at her with such hatred it chilled her blood. “Your uncle is requesting another dinner with you tonight.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I’ll have to decline. I made plans already.”
“What plans?”
Okay, this was the part that really got to Amber. She was grown and had been independent for a very long time. “None of your business. I have the weekend off, so I made plans with my downtime.”
“Sloane thinks you’ll be fine in this position, but I don’t share his optimism. If it was up to me, we would’ve already let you go.”
Amber lifted her chin. “Well, I suppose I’m grateful it’s not up to you. Have a good weekend, Aunt Helena.” Amber closed the laptop and grabbed her purse from where it hung on the back of the chair. She stood, made her way out, and shut off the light—on Aunt Helena—before she walked out the door.
“Threaten my job,” she muttered under her breath. “They were the ones who offered me this position. I moved my whole life around to come here.” She stomped down the hallway and out the door into the barn area where one of the bulls was mooing it’s head off. The bulls she recognized had all been moved, and this loudmouth had been brought into this barn. Yay.
She made her way through the open barn doors and to her ATV.
“Remember your loyalties,” Aunt Helena called after Amber as she climbed onto her four-wheeler.
Amber’s loyalties were to her grandmother, her mom, and now to Train Wreck because they were actually in her corner and kind to her. Don’t preach to me about loyalty. You cut the funding for your own sister’s care. Yeah, she’d looked through the old finances and seen exactly where they’d stopped the automatic payments to the long-term care facility Mom lived in. Helena had signed off on it. Preach to her about loyalty.
Feeling watched, she turned the key in the ignition and zoomed her ATV toward the trail that would lead her to the cabin.
They gave her such a strange, suspicious feeling in the pit of her stomach—Helena and Sloane did. Like they were always watching her, waiting for her to make some mistake she didn’t understand.
The second she made it through the gate and closed it behind her, she hit the accelerator hard. She wanted to get home to Frog and call Train Wreck back. She didn’t want him to think she’d just lost interest and hung up.
One minute more, and Amber pulled up to the front of the old cattleman’s cabin. The crows were cawing in the pines that surrounded it, and her car had three fresh plops of bird crap on the windshield. She wasn’t mad, though. She would trade bird poop for this view any day.
She cut the engine and inhaled deeply, blew it out, and told her body to relax. The second she opened the door, she called for Frog who was always, always, standing on the back of the couch, meowing and waiting for her to come home. Today, the couch was empty, though.
“Frog?” A soft mew sounded from the bedroom.
Confused, Amber made her way past the small dining table to the open bedroom door. She didn’t see Frog, but the cat meowed again, so Amber made her way around the bed and found her crouched over something. Her cat reached out a paw and swatted at something small and round and green with a miniature circuit board on it.
“What have you found?” she asked, kneeling down. She picked up Frog and cradled her, then picked up the little contraption. It looked like a…
She dropped the recording device and fell back with a yelp. Someone was listening. Someone was listening to her right now. To her breathing and to Frog’s mewling. Someone had put this in here. Frantic, she set Frog on the bed and began searching the room. Under the nightstands, inside drawers, checked the molding along the ceiling. Nothing. In the bathroom, she searched under the toilet bowl, along the towel racks, and under her toiletries that were on the counter. Nothing. But when she ran her hand under the ledge of the countertop, something was there. She knelt down and, yep, it was another tiny green listening device, like in the bedroom.
She found another one in a fake potted plant in the living room, and one under a drawer in the kitchen.
Shit.
The back door closed with a bang, and she jumped hard. The wind had kicked up outside, whipping around the cabin and, frantically, Amber bolted for the bedroom. In the back corner of the closet was the bag Train Wreck had given her. With shaking hands, she pulled out the handgun and aimed it fast behind her. She didn’t even know how to load the dang thing. She hadn’t paid attention, but maybe this would be enough to scare away the intruder. She clutched the four bugs in her sweating palm and made her way through the bedroom and living room and bathroom again before she finished her search in the kitchen. It was a small home with nowhere to hide.
She was so uneasy.
She locked the back door and stood there staring at the empty woods out the window. Was she being watched right now?
Breath coming in short bursts, she ran for her purse and pulled out her phone, connected a Facetime call to Train Wreck.
“Hey,” he answered with a deep frown marring his handsome features.
“Someone is listening to me. Someone was here!”
“What? Slow down. What’s happened?”
“Did you put these in my house?” she demanded, aiming the phone at the bugs on her palm. “You put them in Sloane’s house. Are you spying on me?”
“Here,” he said, rummaging through something. She could hear the static of him moving stuff around the back seat of his truck. He put a box in front of the screen. It was for a listening device, but the picture didn’t look like the one she had in her hands. “I put six of these in Sloane’s house. They’re all round and black, just like this picture. Look.” He panned the camera over four opened boxes, all identical. “I didn’t put those in your cabin, Amber.”
“The back door was open when I got home, and it slammed shut.” She showed him the handgun in her shaking hand.
“Go to the bag and get the clip out. I already have it loaded. Just slide it into the handle. Do you understand?”
She nodded jerkily.
“Good. Let me see you do it.”
The engine of his truck roared to life as she bolted for the bedroom, and she could hear him peeling out of wherever he was.
She set the phone on the bed, angled toward her, and got the bag. Loaded the clip like he said.
“Cock it,” he said, taking his eyes off the road for just a second to look at her.
She did as he’d shown her in the parking lot. “Now what?”
“Now that gun is loaded, and if you take the safety off and pull the trigger, it will fire. Don’t put your finger on that trigger unless you are ready to shoot. Never put your finger on that trigger unless you are ready to pull it. You understand?”
“Y-yes.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
Chapter Nine
Amber was scared.
He could tell the second he drove up and she was waiting for him by the door. The look on her face made him want to murder whoever had been on this property.
The second he stepped out of his rig, he smelled that cowboy Dillon, Sloane’s right-hand man.
That motherfucker was going to pay for the tremble in Amber’s hand. She handed him the gun and stammered out, “I-I don’t know how to unload it.”
“Look, just like this.” He showed her how to eject the bullet and make sure the chamber was empty. And then she shocked the hell out of him. Amber wrapped her arms around him and held him tight, as though she felt safe around him. Around him. Even after he’d showed her the bull.
He stood stock-still for a few moments, unsure of what to do. He’d never been a hugger. Then slowly, he slid his free hand to her back and pulled her in tighter. “It’s okay.” He leaned his head against hers just to see if she would stiffen up, but she didn’t. And something happened to him. Relief flooded him. Relief and a protective instinct he’d never had with anyone. He wanted to keep her safe, and also everything she loved. “Where’s Frog?”
“Inside in her carrier. I already packed for tonight.”
“Good woman. Hey.” He eased her back to arms’ length so he could look her in the eyes when he assured her, “You’re safe. No one will fuck with you when I’m around. Okay?”
Amber nodded and puffed out a breath of air. “The door slamming just…” She waved her hand around. “I was already so creeped out finding the bugs, and I thought someone was still in the house with me. I don’t like feeling scared. I like being tough.”
“Ain’t no shame in getting scared when your place gets broken into. Get on in the truck and I’ll get Frog and check the cabin. Was anything out of order?”
“The drawers of my dresser weren’t closed all the way. I always close them. It’s a pet peeve of mine. And I found that when I came outside.” She pointed to a black box on the front eaves of the cabin. “Is that a camera?”
It sure was. Fury boiled right through his blood, but he was careful to keep his face composed. He didn’t want to frighten her more.
“It’s okay,” he lied, knowing damn-well he was about to go over to Sloane’s house and shove those bugs straight up his ass.
He opened the truck door for her—his momma had taught him how to be a gentleman—and then closed it gently because right now his inner bull was raging and his strength was a little overpowering to humans when he was like this. The door still slammed.
Sorry, he mouthed over his shoulder as he made his way to the cabin.
The inside of the cabin surprised him. The walls were shiplap and painted antique white, as was the dining table. The counters in the kitchen were sparkling gray granite, and the light fixtures hanging from the ceiling were modern. From the outside, it looked like a little log cabin, but on the inside, it was a seaside bungalow. There were yellow accents in the curtains and fake flowers on the table. Even the couch was a mustard yellow. On the mantle over the small stone fireplace was a single picture in a white frame. Train Wreck approached it slowly and canted his head as he studied the black and white photograph. It was of a younger Sloane and a tall woman with honey blond waves of hair trailing down her shoulders and tickling the cheek of a baby in her arms. On her other side was a tall black man built like a tank. He was looking down at the baby. At Amber. He wore a soft smile, and her mother was beaming. Sloane was somber.
This was a reminder that Amber had blood ties to this family. Of course, this would be the only picture Sloane placed in here. It was probably the only picture he had with Amber.
It stunk of Dillon right here by the fireplace. Train Wreck picked up the picture frame, turned it over and, sure enough, there was another bug.
Rage burned through every nerve ending in his body. The cabin was small, and this was five bugs total. They must not want to miss a single word, but why? Why was she so important to Sloane?
Train Wreck looked around the newly rehabbed cabin. It still smelled of paint and sawdust. Why would Sloane go to all this effort to bring her deeper into the family? He didn’t strike Train Wreck as a sentimental man.
“Meeoooow,” Frog complained from her floral-print cat carrier by the door.
“I’ll hurry,” he assured her and then did a search of the rest of the house.
Chapter Ten
Train Wreck sure was taking a long time getting Frog and the bags.
Amber leaned forward in his truck and searched the woods again. She’d never felt so unsettled in all her life.
Finally, the door to the cabin opened, and Train Wreck strode for the truck with Frog’s carrier in one hand and her duffle bag and gun bag in the other.
She smiled a greeting when he opened the back door, but he didn’t meet her gaze. “Stay here,” he murmured.
“Why? Where are you going?” she asked as he unzipped the carrier to set Frog free in his truck. That seemed like a good idea now, but he was going to regret that. She traveled. And by traveled, Amber meant she was a psycho that couldn’t sit still on a ride and moved constantly from seat to seat. Already she was climbing up into the back window as best as her short little legs would allow.
“I’m just going to go talk to someone, and I’ll be right back.” Train Wreck shut the door hard enough to rock the truck.
Shocked, she watched him make his way to the ATV. What was that in his hand? Amber shoved the door open and slid out of the front seat.
“Get back in the truck, Amber.”
“I want to know what’s going on!”
“I’m going to talk to Sloane, but I’ll be right back.”
“No! I don’t want you to talk to him. If he’s hiding bugs in my house—”
“What do you want me to do, Amber? You want me to stand by and let him scare you? Intimidate you? That’s your fuckin’ home.” He jammed a finger at the cabin.
“No, it’s not,” she whispered somberly. “I thought it could be, but it can’t. You said something is happening here. You said you have a plan.”
He stared off into the woods, and never in her life had she seen a deeper fury than what was on his face. “My plans are changing.”
“Will defending me right now screw up those plans?” she asked softly.
His nostrils flared before he cast a glance to her and then quickly away. And that was answer enough.
“Then wait.”
“What?” he asked, a look of bafflement working its way over his features.
“Wait,” she whispered. “Let’s go to the herd dinner and spend a night away from here and come up with a plan when we are calm and thinking clearly. It’s just bugs. Just recording what I say, right? Then they don’t know you’re here. Get in the truck.”
“Amber—”
“Train Wreck, I’m not protecting my uncle. I’m saying let’s do this better than guns blazing. Please get in the truck.”
Train Wreck shook his head slowly. “I don’t think you really understand me yet, Amber. You are safe with me. Your uncle never will be safe. Not after all the bad he’s done.”
“What has he done?” she asked, pleading.
“He hurts people. For money. One of my friends died because of an order he gave. More of my friends got really sick because of the things he did. And countless more are suffering because he wants to make money off of people’s pain.” A snarl took his lips. “That’s the part I need you to stay clear of, and his dumb ass keeps dragging you closer to it. I’ll do what you want. I’ll wait. But I will have my moment with him, and I will be a part of his last breath. That’s a promise.” He twitched his head toward the truck. “Come on.”
Horrified at what he’d just told her, she climbed back in the passenger’s side and waited until he’d pulled past the population sign of Irwin before she asked a burning question. “Was your friend Last Chance?” she asked.
Train Wreck struck one helluva profile. His arm was draped across the steering wheel, the other hand on his muscular thigh. He still wasn’t wearing a shirt from his workout earlier, and she could see the curve of all of his abs. He had on a backward baseball cap, and his silver curls peeked out. He slid her a dark-eyed glance and then put his attention back on the road. “How did you know?”
“It was in the news. He was the bull that was poisoned at the finals of the PBSRC last season. You were also poisoned with that Filsa stuff, and another bull shifter, too. It hurt your numbers in the finals. That’s why you finished at the rank you did. You should’ve made more money, but you couldn’t buck. You were in the hospital. I stayed up all night checking for updates in the news that night.” She huffed a laugh. “I stayed up all night for a stranger.”
“I know someone else who did that, too.”
“Who?”
“Annabelle. Quickdraw’s mate. She didn’t know us, but she came to the hospital the night we were poisoned, and she and Quickdraw stood guard over us to make sure whoever poisoned us didn’t come back to finish the job. They let me see Last Chance as he passed. His family wasn’t there yet, and I didn’t want him to go alone. So, I sat in a wheelchair b
eside his bed and held his hand. I told him about all of his bucks I’d seen, how proud I was of him. And how much he would be missed.”
Amber stared out the window at the town blurring by so Train Wreck wouldn’t see the building tears in her eyes. “Did my uncle do that?”
“He hired the people that did that. He wanted to destroy the circuit to save his own.”
She felt sick, like she was going to retch.
“When we dug into your uncle, we found something so much worse.”
“What could possibly be worse than killing people?” she asked in a trembling voice.
“Selling them.”
“What do you mean by selling them?”
“He sells bull shifters to underground medical testing facilities. That’s why I’ve been sniffing around his property.”
“Human trafficking?” she asked.
“Nah, it’s not that bad. We’re just shifters. Just animals. We don’t count unless we’re famous and make a name for ourselves in the circuit. No one is looking for them.”
“You are.”
He nodded. “I am.”
“I asked you before if you were a good person.”
He was quiet, just merged onto a highway and didn’t answer, so she continued. “You said you were trying to be.”
“I am trying,” he rumbled.
“No. You’re succeeding.”
A small smile curved the corner of his lips. “Your dull human senses probably can’t tell, but I’m wearing that body wash you got me.”
Ah, a subject change, but she accepted it. What she’d just learned was so heavy. How did one even process learning a family member was truly evil?
She held out her hand and wiggled her fingers. “Pink nail polish.”
“Mmm,” he rumbled.
Frog jumped up onto the console and rubbed her face down Train Wreck’s arm.
“I’m sorry you lost your friend,” she said.
Train Wreck reached down and pulled Frog into his lap and nodded. “It’ll be okay if I can avenge him.”
She didn’t know how, but she was going to help him do that. Her family was her mom and her grandma. Just because he was born into the same family didn’t mean Uncle Sloane got a free pass on morals.
