by Jenny Penn
Travis had natural leadership skills. He knew how to organize men, motivate them, to accomplish goals with them. Unfortunately he also happened to be a narcissistic, self-absorbed, short-sighted, little prick. He didn’t have the patience to accomplish true greatness. Dennis blamed himself for not recognizing that sooner.
“Travis.” He nodded to the lead deputy as he approached before running his gaze down the line of men he’d hand selected to fill out the police department. “Denny. Marvin. Reggie. Ron. Dave.”
“Sheriff.”
All the deputies returned his greeting, using Dennis’s title in a show of respect that was more based on ritual than an honest sign of esteem. All, that was, except for Travis, who couldn’t be bothered to offer Dennis even that small token.
“Dennis.” Barely bothering to mask his disdain, Travis managed to nod his head a mere fraction of an inch in greeting. “Lindsay Bryne arrived yesterday.”
“It’s a beautiful day, don’t you think?” Dennis asked, turning to glance out of the pastures and down the town far away on the horizon.
“I thought you said you’d handle this problem. That she wouldn’t come to town.”
Dennis thought he had. He’d switched the blood samples when the request had come in. That should have been the end of the matter, but it hadn’t been. Now there was nothing to be done about it but to hide the truth…and enjoy annoying Travis.
“It’s the kind of day that just makes a man want to breath deep and relax.” Dennis tossed a look over at Travis, assessing how much his attitude irritated the boy. He had him good and red-faced now. “I think you need to try doing that more, Travis. Relaxing. You know what I always say—”
“I know you said you’d handle this matter,” Travis spat back. “Lindsay Bryne shouldn’t even be an issue.”
“I always say you might as well relax. Getting upset never helped anybody accomplish anything.” Dennis spoke mostly to himself, knowing that the younger generation just didn’t understand the finer points of living. In the end that’s what it was all about—enjoying life.
“We’ve got over twenty million dollars buried in that bitch’s barn and we’ve lost all access and control over it, so don’t you tell me to relax, old man.” Travis stepped up to breathe down Dennis’s neck as he openly challenged him. “You need to fix this.”
“And I’m going to,” Dennis promised him, though he doubted that Travis recognized the threat hidden in those words. “Don’t worry about the woman. She isn’t going to be around long enough to find the money or anything else.”
“She better not,” Travis warned him before bringing up an option Dennis knew was the real reason for this impromptu gathering. “She should be removed. Permanently.”
“That isn’t a wise move.”
In fact it was the dumbest one around. Then again most criminals were pretty damn stupid. It’s what made them easy to catch. Dennis didn’t plan on getting caught.
“Lindsay Bryne is worth billions,” he reminded Travis. “Her stepfather has connections that you don’t want to test. Anything happens to that girl, there’s going to be an investigation. That’s the kind of complication that will really mess everything up. So for now we stay calm and…relax.”
Chapter 7
“Ah, man,” Cooper groaned, rolling his shoulders in an attempt to relieve the tension gathered in them. Lured by the delicious smell of frying breakfast meats, he padded into the kitchen to find his aunt hard at work.
“Morning.” Sally slid a baking sheet loaded down with white, fluffy-looking dough balls into the oven before casting him a concerned look. “You look like you didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“That’s what paperwork does to a man—wears him out.”
But then so did a woman, or in Cooper’s case fantasizing about one. He didn’t think Sally would appreciate hearing the details of how he’d tossed and turned all night, wondering what Lindsay was doing, or better yet, what she was wearing, and how good she’d look if she weren’t wearing anything at all.
Those musings had haunted him until he’d finally given up hope of getting any sleep and decided to catch up on his paperwork. Of course his twelve-inch boner made it uncomfortable to sit still and concentrate on the numbers demanding his attention. What Cooper needed was a release, but he didn’t think his odds were good at finding one of those. Hell, he’d tried already, but no matter how fast he pumped or hard he came, his dick just swelled back up with a need that he knew only the tight clench of Lindsay’s cunt would satisfy.
“So does a woman,” Thomas retorted, echoing Cooper’s thought. The ranch foreman had an uncanny ability to read Cooper’s mind, which in part was what made him so good at his job. It also made him a little annoying.
“The question is, which woman?” Thomas eyed Cooper over the rim of his coffee mug, a smug, knowing smirk pulling at his lips. “Rumor has it she might be short, round, and a little crazy.”
The bastard knew about Lindsay. It had to be Chet, or Buddy. Both of them like to run their mouths, and if they had then everybody in town probably already knew that he’d kissed the girl. Everybody that was but Cooper’s aunt, but thanks to Thomas she was about to find out.
“What is this?” Sally paused as she poured coffee into small thermoses to glance between Cooper and Thomas. “Have you met somebody, Andrew?”
“Yeah, his new neighbor.” Thomas’s grin grew more lecherous as he wagged his eyebrows at Sally. “Apparently, he offered the girl a real friendly greeting.”
“It was nothing,” Cooper assured his aunt before she could begin pestering him with questions. “The only thing I offered the girl was a business agreement.”
“Business?” Sally frowned at that correction as she turned back toward the stove. “Just who are you talking about and what deal did you offer this girl?”
“He’s talking about Elton’s kin,” Thomas chipped in as he munched away on a bowl of cereal.
Cooper eyed the bowl of nuts and grains, thinking it must have been torture for his foreman to sit there every morning eating a crunchy bowl full of fiber while the rest of them got to enjoy their food, but Sally insisted. Ever since Thomas had received a negative review at his last physical, Sally had been systematically changing the cranky old hand’s diet.
“I didn’t think Elton had any kin.” Sally shot Cooper a questioning look as she began scrapping a small mountain of scrambled eggs into a serving tray and set it out on the counter.
“That’s what everybody thought,” Thomas assured her. “That is until Lindsay Bryne produced a DNA test that proved she was Elton’s granddaughter.”
“Well, I’ll be.” Sally shook her head after considering that for a moment. “Lindsay Bryne…why does that name not ring a bell?”
“She’s Victoria Lynn’s daughter. I guess she took her stepfather’s last name.” Thomas shrugged.
“I don’t think she took it so much as it was pinned on her,” Cooper corrected that assumption, remembering the vehemence with which she’d corrected him. “I gather she’s planning on taking the name Howell.”
“It don’t matter,” Sally dismissed Cooper’s conclusion. “Nobody around here will think of her as anything other than a Lynn.”
That name was a good as dirt as far as most people were concerned. That wasn’t his problem, Cooper told himself as he watched Sally unload the biscuits from the oven. She piled them high on another serving tray before she turned back to the griddle to start pulling the bacon off.
She piled several pieces high onto a paper plate, allowing Cooper to snatch his ritual first serving before the rest of the boys showed up. Like always, the ranch hands slammed into the kitchen at exactly seven fifteen. They flew through the back door and stampeded through the room like a hungry herd.
Snatching up paper plates and pilling them high with biscuits, gravy, eggs, and bacon along with a scoop of fruit salad, each man grabbed a thermos before heading back out to the porch. The men would eat their breakfast
outside before heading down to the barn to check the day’s chore list.
Normally Cooper joined his men but today he had more important things to see to, starting with Lindsay…and Nick. Cooper scowled at his brother as he came stumbling down the steps. Normally Nick rose before everybody else and got in a morning jog before making it back in time for breakfast.
“I thought you were out running.” Cooper eyed Nick, taking in his clean, ironed slacks and button-down shirt. “And what the hell are you all dressed up for?”
“For breakfast,” Nick retorted as he brushed past Cooper on his way to the refrigerator door. “And why are you so cheerful this morning?”
“He’s been working on the books,” Sally murmured, shooting Nick a look Cooper could clearly read.
They thought he was in a mood but he wasn’t. What he was, was suspicious. He could have sworn he heard Nick’s bedroom door opening and closing at around five that morning and assumed his brother had taken off for one of his morning runs. What he hadn’t heard was Nick returning.
“So when did you get back from your run?” Cooper scowled as he studied his brother. Given how well groomed Nick was, he must have gotten in a while ago.
“What do you care?” Nick shot back as he pulled the milk out of the fridge.
“I’m just curious. You appear to be a man with a plan—Oh, come on, use a glass. Other people got to drink out of that.” Cooper managed to get the complaint in before the plastic rim of the milk jug hit his brother’s lips.
“Here.” Sally shoved a glass at him as she nodded toward the stack of paper plates. “Go on and grab what you want off the buffet so I can start to get things cleaned up.”
“Oh, don’t wait on me.” Nick waved toward the food, causing both Sally and Cooper to stare at him in openmouthed amazement.
“You don’t want breakfast?” Sally asked with obvious shock and a little bit of horror. “But I made bacon and biscuits.”
“Yes…well, I’m just going to grab something on the road. I’ve got—”
“On the road?” With a hand on her bosom, Sally wheeled back as if Nick had slapped her. “Oh, honey, no!”
“But, Sally—”
“I don’t want to hear it.” Sally cut through Nick’s attempt at an explanation with a shake of her head. “Unless you want to put me in the ground, you are not going to eat any food on the road. You’re going to go over there and fix yourself a plate of good, home-cooked food.”
“Fine.” Holding his hands up in surrender, Nick moved toward the buffet. “I’ll eat.”
“You sure are in a rush this morning.” Certain now that something was going on, Cooper studied his brother while he tried to figure out just what. “And when did you say you got back from that run?”
“I didn’t.” And he wasn’t going to apparently.
Nick’s evasiveness combined with his defensive tone could only mean one thing—he hadn’t left at five in the morning. He’d been returning. Only a woman could keep his brother out all night and still have him looking clean cut and well dressed in the morning. Cooper could easily guess just who the woman was.
“You—”
“—got to get going,” Nick cut him off, bolting for the back door without a second’s hesitation. Cooper blinked, watching him go as he grappled with the revelation that Nick probably spent the night with Lindsay, with his Lindsay, doing all the things Cooper had wasted his time dreaming about.
“Sonofabitch!” Cooper bolted out of his stool, sending it tumbling back as he took off after his brother. “Nick!”
“It’s not what you think.” Pausing in front of the back door, Nick threw his hands up in a vain attempt to ward Cooper off. “We didn’t do anything, okay? We were just hanging out—”
“Hanging out?” Cooper repeated, finding that a little hard to believe. “In the middle of the night?”
“I needed to clear my head, so I went for a run.”
“And just accidently ended up at Lindsay’s?”
“Well…yeah.” Nick shrugged, looking more confused than Cooper felt. “I was thinking about her but I wasn’t aiming for her but then I was there and the lights were on…which by the way was because she has propane canisters and little hunting lanterns. If you want to go yell at anybody you should try aiming for a mirror.”
“What?” Cooper scowled.
“You know what I’m talking about.” Turning the tables on Cooper, Nick leveled a finger at him as his voice rose to assure their aunt heard every word. “The poor girl doesn’t have any electricity and can’t find anybody willing to come out in help thanks to you.”
“I didn’t—”
“Andrew Cooper!” The censure in Sally’s tone cut through his desperate denial, assuring Cooper it was too late to save his ass now. “Is that true? Did you block that girl from getting the help she needs?”
“No!” Cooper shot back, not that anybody was listening to him.
“Just imagine what mom would say.” Nick shook his head sadly at Cooper.
“You’re an asshole, you know that?” Cooper snapped.
“Don’t talk to your brother that way, Andrew.” Just like she always did, Sally injected herself right into the middle of their quarrel, siding with Nick as usual. “He hasn’t done anything wrong. You, on the other hand, have some explanations to give and possibly even an apology.”
“And I have my help to lend.” Grinning like the cat that had just caught the canary, Nick eased open the back door as he offered his good-bye. “So if you’ll excuse me, Lindsay’s waiting for me to take her to breakfast.”
Just like that he slipped out the back door, leaving Cooper stuck making his excuses to Sally.
* * * *
“Are you sure about this? I don’t want anybody to get hurt.”
Lindsay eyed the pile of furniture Nick had stacked in the middle of the yard as she cuddled Jack to her chest. While the rational part of her mind knew the feline wouldn’t be dumb enough to jump into the bonfire pit Nick had made, she still clung to him, worried about his safety.
As for Nick, she was more worried about his sanity. Given the size of the bonfire he stood ready to ignite, she had reason for her concern. Circled by a ring of stone and filled with towering variety of stuff, the stack barely looked stable, leaving Lindsay to envision a burning avalanche that would soon topple down on them. Nick, however, suffered no such hesitation as he began spraying gas over everything.
“Don’t worry,” he assured her without any real attempt to offer her comfort. “It will all stay within the circle. I promise.”
“Forgive me for having doubts.”
“No forgiveness needed.” Nick waved away her comments as if they had been sincere.
“That was sarcasm,” Lindsay hollered back. “Just so you know if you burn down my cabin I expect to see you here every morning, hammer in hand and ready to work.”
“Hammer in hand?” Nick repeated, making the words sound more illicit than she’d intended. Carrying the orange gas can back over to where she waited by the porch steps, he dropped it by her feet and straightened to toss her a quick wink along with a flash of a double-dimpled smile. “Don’t worry, lil’ bit. Fire or no fire, I stand ready to serve.”
Lindsay’s heart did a little happy dance that had her blood flushing hot through her veins. The man was an irresistible tease and so sweet a woman could get a cavity from just looking at him. If she didn’t watch out she’d end up doing something foolish, like falling for the man.
Lindsay kind of feared that she’d already started to. Nothing else could explain how she ended up passed out on his chest last night. Despite having sworn never to trust any man, much less allow herself to be vulnerable to any one, Lindsay melted into Nick’s side as his fingers rubbed the tension from her neck while the deep timbre of his voice lured her to sleep. She’d woken up that morning to find herself still cuddled innocently in his arms.
Nick hadn’t taken advantage of the situation despite the fact that he’
d been as hard then as he was now. Lindsay blushed and tore her eyes from the massive bulge tenting his jeans, but it was too late. He’d already caught her peeking.
“Or maybe you’d prefer it if I brought a whip and a set of cuffs,” Nick offered, sizing her up with a look hungry enough to assure Lindsay he wasn’t joking.
“Or maybe I’d prefer it if I had the whip with you bound at my mercy,” she shot back, trying to sound more confident than she felt.
“Just name the place and time, lil’ bit, and you know I’ll be waiting on my knees.”
“That is if you haven’t burnt yourself up in a fire.” Flustered by his teasing and unused to flirting, Lindsay waved him away. “Go on and start your inferno and I’ll sit here practicing saying ‘I told you so.’”
Tucking Jack onto her lap, she settled down on the porch steps to watch with concerned eyes as Nick started the fire. At the first whoosh of the flames Jack started and took off for the barn as if Satan himself had jumped out at him. In moments heat began to fill the yard as the flames danced and licked, eating up the dried-out paper with a swiftness that had Lindsay praying a wind didn’t kick up. All that ash could become real dangerous, real quick.
“Stop worrying,” Nick instructed her as he came back to lean against the step’s railing. “I swear the fire won’t get out of hand. Your cabin is safe.”
Reaching out to settle his hands over her shoulders, Nick began to massage the tension right out of her. Electric tingles shot down her spine, radiating out from his gentle touch to fill her with a sense of warmth that went so much deeper than mere pleasure. A part of her craved the feel of his arms around her again, wanting that sense of peace she’d never experienced before last night.
Shifting closer toward Nick, she adjusted her position so he had better access to the rest of her back. He took immediately advantage, his fingertips starting to slowly work their way down her spine. Within seconds he had her chin drooping as drool started to pool in her mouth.