Special Ops Cowboy

by Addison Fox

  Loretta stared at the class and Reese had the eerie sense that Loretta was looking through them. “What kids?”

  “The ones. Here. The children in my class.” Although she knew fifteen-year-olds chaffed at being called children, Reese kept pressing the point, willing something to break through whatever shield of madness had gripped the woman.

  “I remember this room. When we were all here. When Jamie and I used to sit back there and hold hands before homeroom.”

  Jamie?

  Reese struggled to keep up, her panic for her students at odds with the mention of her brother. What did Jamie have to do with this?

  “I know you dated my brother. I didn’t know this was your classroom.”

  “Here. The cafeteria. The auditorium. The football field. All of them bring back so many memories of how he and I used to be.” Something sparked beneath the dull. “Before.”

  “I know.”

  That spark leaped to flame instantly, Reese’s words the obvious accelerant. “Of course you know. You’ve always known but you’ve ignored it! Damn priss of the century, the little perfect ice queen who was never willing to dirty your hands or accept that your brother had a problem.”

  Protests leaped to her lips but Reese held them back. Whatever twisted assessment Loretta had arrived at relative to Reese’s relationship with Jamie wasn’t steeped in anything but the woman’s mad musings.

  So she held back.

  And struggled to find a way to get them all out of there.

  Hoyt paced the Midnight Pass High School parking lot, as close to the police barriers as he could get, and wondered how it had come to this. A gun in the school? An active shooter, although no one had yet been reported wounded. Every child and teacher accounted for except one class.

  Reese and her students.

  Belle had assured him repeatedly that they had eyes on the place and were even now getting sharpshooters positioned in the ceiling. It should have provided comfort, but it didn’t. Nor did it give any rhyme, reason or clue why a member of the PTA was holding Reese and her students hostage.

  Belle waved him over, a listening device in hand. “Reese has her talking. You’re well trained and even though you have a vested interest in this, we need all the help we can get.”

  “Of course.”

  “I want your take on this.” Belle waved the earpiece. “Anything you can think of or might know. Anything Reese might have mentioned. We need it all.”

  Hoyt shoved in the offered earpiece and felt the tears welling as he heard Reese’s voice. Clear and sweet, it was the voice of the woman he loved.

  And now, she was the hostage of some deranged shooter.

  “Loretta. Please talk to me. Tell me what this is about. You’re a mother of two beautiful boys. You’re on the PTA. Surely you can tell me what’s wrong?”

  “You really don’t know?” Hoyt heard the emptiness in the other woman’s voice and it cratered through him like a ramrod to the chest. He couldn’t see her but that only made what he heard that much more devastating.

  The absence of hope.

  “No. What should I know?”

  “Typical.”

  The laugh was high and tinny to his ears, but Hoyt drowned it out as something else Reese had said tried to take root in his mind. When the thought didn’t come, he keyed back into the exchange, desperate for some glimmer of hope that Reese could pull the woman out of this untenable path.

  “I remember this room. When we were all here. When Jamie and I used to sit back there and hold hands before homeroom.”

  “I know you dated my brother. I didn’t know this was your classroom.”

  “Here. The cafeteria. The auditorium. The football field. All of them bring back so many memories of how he and I used to be. Before.”

  “I know.”

  “Of course you know. You’ve always known...”

  Hoyt struggled to bring it into focus. What was so important?

  The PTA?

  Loretta dating Reese’s brother, Jamie?

  The fact that they went to school together?

  Hoyt dismissed them all one by one. Belle and the assembled team knew all of that already.

  But what—

  “Her kids!” Hoyt reached for Belle, gripping her fingers. “Loretta has kids. Two boys. You need to use them. Use the kids.”

  “Use the kids how? The cops have them back at the station with a social worker.”

  Once more, his training kicked in. He’d assessed and identified. Now it was time to act.

  “We need to break through, and her kids are the only way. Put them on the PA.”

  * * *

  Reese stared at the clock and knew they were losing precious time. Loretta hadn’t said much more to her in the past twenty minutes, nor had she given any indication she was even mentally present, despite Reese’s repeated attempts to engage her in further conversation.

  Maybe it was for the best.

  The more time that went by, the more time SWAT had to get into position.

  But shouldn’t they have been in position already? If there was a shot to take, wouldn’t they have taken it?

  “Loretta Chapel.”

  The sudden blast of the loudspeaker pulled all of them upright. Everyone’s gazes snapped to attention, twenty-five students waiting for whatever would come next in the discussion between two adults.

  “Loretta. Maybe they want to make a deal.” Reese kept her voice calm, forcing a bit of hope into the words. “I know you want these children to get out of here safely. That’s what they want, too.”

  The loudspeaker echoed again, suddenly a new presence filling the room. “We’d like to talk to you. Miss Grantham has an intercom on her wall, to the left of the door. You can speak back to us from there.”

  Loretta made no move to acknowledge the initiation, nor did she move from her place by the window, the gun never wavering from where it aimed at Reese.

  “Mommy?” A child’s voice warbled through the intercom, the first sound to truly get Loretta’s attention. “Mommy, it’s Ben.”

  Reese wanted to say something but she waited, willing that small little voice to be the tool that would finally break through.

  “Are you there?”

  Before Ben could say anything else, another small voice came in. “Why are there all these police around?”

  “Shh, Charlie,” Ben admonished. “We have to help.”

  “The police help,” Charlie said, his little boy voice matter-of-fact.

  Reese saw it, the moment the veneer of bravado and boldness cracked wide open, revealing a wellspring of pain and hurt that had clearly accompanied Loretta for far too long. The woman stood and walked toward Reese, lowering the gun as she moved closer. “Take this. Please.”

  Reese hesitated for the briefest moment, hardly daring to hope, before she took the offered piece, both of them wordless.

  And then she watched Loretta walk to the unit mounted on the wall, depressing the button to speak to her children.

  “Ben. Charlie. Are you still there?”

  “Hi, Mommy!” Twin shouts greeted her as hard racking sobs convulsed her shoulders.

  All that had happened seemed to fade. The weeks of terror and the near loss of life, human and equine in the Reynolds stable and the raw, achy fear that had filled her today as Loretta took over her classroom.

  It would all still be there.

  But in this moment, someone Reese knew was hurting. Someone who she might still be able to help, unlike her father, who hadn’t asked for help before it was too late.

  Determined, she cracked open the shotgun, removing every bullet and stowing them in her desk drawer. She crossed to the row of desks and her still unmoving students and handed the gun to Rob Consuelos in the front row. His love of hunting was well known and she dir
ected him to lock the gun in her back cabinet.

  And then she went to stand beside Loretta.

  Her hand on the speaker, she let her voice ring out, determined to be the light for this woman who clearly lived in such darkness.

  “This is Reese Grantham. I’m with Loretta Chapel and twenty-five of my students. We are all safe. Mrs. Chapel is unarmed. When you’re ready, I can open the classroom door. Please let my students come out first.”

  A set of instructions came winging back over the intercom, and with calm, steady movements, her students filed out one by one, hands up as they were told.

  “Thank you, Robbie.” Reese saw he’d done as instructed, handing her the cabinet key before he filed out behind his class.

  It was only after they were gone and she was alone with Loretta that Reese pulled her close. Anger and fear still worked through her system like heavy sludge, but she fought to get past it. Somewhere in that swirling morass, Reese fought to find the small light that kept telling her someone else’s child wasn’t going to pay the same price she was for a parent’s loss of self. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Loretta shook her head. “I don’t think that it is.”

  “Your boys still have a mother. You can work on everything else.”

  Belle walked into the room first, followed by several agents and SWAT team members covered head to toe in gear. Loretta went to them willingly, the anger that had carried her into the school and through the classroom evaporating like mist. In its place, Reese saw fear and resignation, but she also saw resolve.

  And as Belle and the team escorted the woman out, Reese hoped desperately that she could find peace.

  * * *

  Hoyt kept edging closer to the front entrance of the school, desperate to race through the barriers to get to Reese. He’d heard her voice, calm and competent, asking the officers to come in and he’d never been more proud.

  He’d also never been more relieved and more ready to get down on his knees and beg than in that moment.

  Belle came into view through the glass front doors, along with the officers who’d followed her in. Loretta Chapel was between them, her hands behind her back as she was escorted out of the building.

  Someone from child services had already taken Loretta’s boys off campus and were even now arranging for them to spend time with their grandparents. Hoyt wanted to ask after them, but things had happened so fast. He knew Belle would have the details and he was committed to seeing that they both had help through the coming months and years.

  But for now, all he wanted was Reese.

  And then he saw her, that tall, slim form, the coltish gait and the thick swirl of dark hair that framed her face before falling down her back.

  His Reese.

  His love.

  She’d barely cleared the door when he was there, pulling her close, desperate for the feel of her in his arms. He held her against his chest, his arms tight around her, hers equally tight around his waist.

  “I thought I’d lost you.”

  “I know.” She whispered it, nodding her head against his neck as they both stood there and simply held on.

  “Why’d she do it?”

  “I think it was about Jamie—” Reese started, before stopping. “Just like I think that’s why my father acted, but who really knows? I only hope she can get help. That her boys can get help.”

  Light.

  Reese Grantham was goodness and light and air and every breath that filled his lungs. He knew it—had always known it—but listening to her defend a woman who had nearly killed her only proved it.

  She saw the good in others. Even more important, she believed it was there.

  A light breeze wafted around them, still redolent with heat but just strong enough to suggest that fall was coming. She was alive and unharmed and took the time to savor the warmth that wrapped around them both.

  “You’re sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine. No.” She laughed, dropping an arm to press against her stomach. “We’re fine. You won’t believe this, but I even felt the baby flutter just now as I was walking out to you.”

  “The baby moved?” Hoyt pulled back, his hands going to her stomach, covering the one she’d placed there. “Just now?”

  “Yes. It was the lightest touch, but I can only hope it’s the first of many.” She pressed a kiss to his lips. “The first of many greetings he or she gives to their father.”

  Hoyt pulled her close, unable to do anything but hold her and reassure himself that she was okay and that the baby was still nestled safe in her womb. “It’s a welcome to our future. For all three of us.”

  “Our future?”

  “Marriage is back on the table, Ms. Grantham, whether you like it or not.”

  “Oh, Hoyt, you and those romantic words.” She wrapped her arms around his neck. “I love every single one of them.”

  “And I love you. It took me too long to say it, but know I mean those words and all they imply. I love you and I want a future with you. I want a commitment with you. I want a life with you.”

  “Most one-night stands don’t end in marriage proposals.”

  He nearly interrupted her before she laid a finger over his lips. “Please. Let me finish.”

  He nodded as she continued on.

  “That’s what I kept telling myself. That this couldn’t be real or that there couldn’t be anything between us because of how we started. But I was wrong.”

  Hoyt knew she was wrong because he’d traveled that twisty path himself, confused when he kept coming up with the answer that he loved her, but unable to see quite how they’d gotten there.

  Only they had gotten there. Together.

  “Is there any hope our child won’t be even more stubborn than us?” she asked, her smile broad.

  “I suspect our combined genes can’t produce anything else.”

  “Oh, I can think of something,” Reese said, as she linked their arms and directed them toward the parking lot.

  “What’s that?”

  “A few more to round out our undoubtedly stubborn brood.”

  “More children is definitely on the table, too, my love.”

  “I guess it’s a good thing we got a head start.” She pressed her smiling lips against his and Hoyt’s curved in response.

  He couldn’t agree more.

  It was a very good idea.

  * * *

  Don’t miss Tate and Belle’s story—

  The Cowboy’s Deadly Mission,

  the first book in Addison Fox’s thrilling

  Midnight Pass, Texas, miniseries—

  available now from Harlequin Romantic Suspense!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Tempted by the Badge by Deborah Fletcher Mello.

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  Tempted by the Badge

  by Deborah Fletcher Mello

  Chapter 1

  The noise level in the small classroom rose substantially as the door flung open and students began to parade inside. Joanna Barnes looked up from the papers she’d been grading, a bright smile pulling at her lips. Greetings rang out warmly as one student after the other found their way to a seat for the third-period history class.

  “Good morning, Ms. Barnes!”

  “Hey, Ms. B!”

  “Ms. Barnes! What up?”

  She twisted the cap back onto the red pen she was holding and slid it and the test papers from her previous class into her desk drawer. Rising to her feet, she returned the gesture, greeting each student warmly as she moved to stand by the door.

  “Mr. Parsons, good morning! Miss Hayes, how are you? Take a seat, please, Mr. Tolliver!”

  The energy in the room was palpable, everyone anxious about the test they would soon be taking. This was one of the honors classes, the students all exceptionally bright and especially motivated. Over half had already been notified of their early acceptance into college, with most of them headed to Ivy League institutions. They were considered the elite of their graduating class. They challenged Joanna to insure the curriculum was one that would not only boost their individual class rankings but also kept them interested; boredom was easily the kiss of death for any teacher.

  The test they were taking was on the early Industrial Revolution in England and Wales, with the emphasis on the plight of women during that time period. Joanna had no doubts most, if not all, would pass with flying colors. There were one, maybe two exceptions determined to buck the system, no matter where they were in life.

  The last student through the door was one of her more challenging pupils. Standing a foot taller than most of the class, Damon Morrow was one of their star athletes, playing varsity football and basketball in the fall and baseball in the spring. Keeping him off academic probation had become a full-time job all on its own and, despite his obvious intellectual genius, his was an issue of effort, or rather lack of. He was smart and talented, but he was lazy as hell. Damon Morrow was content to fly through life on his dashing good looks and the trust fund he would inevitably inherit when he turned twenty-one.