A Wild Ride

by Vivian Arend

  “It’s from having to stare at your ugly mug,” Troy retorted. “That’s a pretty sour expression you’re wearing.”

  Mike offered a twisted smile. “Nic’s driving me mad.”

  Good to know he wasn’t the only one. “What’s she done now?”

  His friend hesitated. “I hate the guys she’s seeing, but it’s reaching the point I can’t keep interfering. Last night she threatened to castrate me.”

  “That’s nothing new.”

  “She was holding a butcher knife when she said it,” Mike offered wearily. “Life was so much easier before she got on this dating kick.”

  Troy agreed one hundred percent.

  “I guess it’s time for me to let her be in charge.” Mike stirred another spoonful of sugar into his coffee. “She’ll figure it out. She’s smart enough to know who’s good for her.”

  Everything in Troy itched to deny it based solely on the guys he’d seen her with lately.

  “Maybe she needs to sign up for one of those online dating places,” Mike commented. “Would give her some—”

  “Are you out of your freaking mind?” Troy demanded. “Have you seen the kind of bullshit that goes on in those places? You really want her getting pictures of guys’ junk from all over the country?”

  Mike glared at him. “Not everyone online is an asshole.”

  “I thought you were trying to protect her, not hook her up with some ax murderer.”

  “I think they screen out the ax murderers,” Mike deadpanned.

  The idea made his skin crawl. “Still think it’s a bad idea.”

  “I know.” His friend nodded. “You’re right.”

  The conversation lingered in his brain far too long. Even a day later when he was at the shop working with Mitch, he was still trying to come up with the answer.

  Where could Nicole find someone good enough for her?

  “Are you planning to stand there all day staring at that wrench, or can you get your ass over here and put it to work?”

  Troy shook himself alert, glancing over at his brother who was smirking in his direction. “Sorry.”

  Mitch frowned. “You feeling okay?”

  “Fine, why?”

  Mitch took the wrench from him then leaned over to loosen the bolts. “You’re not nearly as talkative as usual.”

  “Lot on my mind.”

  His brother didn’t say anything for a second. “Something wrong?”

  Everything. Nothing.

  Troy ignored the dilemma of Nicole for a moment, and instead gave voice to one of his other concerns. “Is everything okay between you and Anna?”

  Mitch twisted the wrench harder than he should have and swore as the bolt snapped in two. The shaft remained jammed in position while the head fell to the concrete floor with a metallic rattle. “Shit. Get me a pair of pliers.”

  Troy grabbed the tool, bumping his brother out of the way. “Let me get this. I’ve got a more subtle touch,” he taunted.

  “You keep telling yourself that,” Mitch muttered.

  “So, you and Anna?”

  Mitch said nothing for a minute.

  “Your Len impression is good,” Troy said. “Only he doesn’t glower as hard as you.”

  “Shithead.”

  “Ass.” The insults were as natural as breathing and calmed the waters. Troy had been worried since he’d caught them fighting. “You going to tell me what’s up?”

  Mitch checked around the shop, but the other guys were either outside the open bay doors or in the main office. “She’s being stubborn over something important.”

  “She’d hardly be stubborn over something stupid,” Troy pointed out. “She’s smarter than that.”

  “You’d think, but this is different. This time she’s wrong.”

  Troy held his tongue. “About what?”

  Mitch sighed as he leaned a hip against the car. “We’re thinking about kids, but she refuses to put in for a desk job.”

  More kids. They were haunting him.

  He examined Mitch’s face. His brother was dead serious, and dead concerned. “You want her to put in for a desk job now, or after she’s pregnant?”

  “As soon as she’s pregnant. She thinks she should go at least half—” Mitch frowned deeper. “Hang on. You don’t seem surprised about the kid thing.”

  “I’m not.” Or not since Nicole had knocked a simple fact into him, hard. “I figured it out the other day. Her family and ours are mostly settled down. The next stage seems to be kids, and with Katy and Gage working on number two—well, I figured it wouldn’t be long before everyone’s thoughts turned that way. And once there’s something in the water, every woman in the area will get the itch.”

  “Yeah.” Mitch offered him a twisted grin. “If there was ever a time for you to practice safe sex, it’s now, little bro.”

  “Tell me about it.” Troy managed to remove the broken piece, tossing it aside and going for the next bolt. “Except Janey and Len won’t be jumping on the band wagon.”

  Mitch paused. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Never heard her talk about wanting kids.”

  “Never heard you talk about it either.”

  “It was never on my radar until Anna,” Mitch confessed. “I still don’t know how the hell I could possibly be someone’s dad, but if Gage can do it and make it look like fun, maybe it won’t be so bad.”

  It was wicked, but being horrible was required in the little-brother handbook. “I can see you now, sitting through parent-teacher interviews. Asking for extra homework for Mitch Junior. Or bailing him out of detention.”

  “Fuck.” His brother’s eyes narrowed. “You evil bastard. It’s bad enough to think of dealing with babies. I don’t need to imagine teenaged versions of me.”

  Troy patted his brother’s shoulder on the way to the workbench. “Don’t worry, we survived taking care of you. I’m sure you can figure it out as you go along.”

  “Ass,” Mitch muttered softly.

  Troy grinned, then considered. “I don’t think you need to worry about Anna. They have a bunch of rules regarding what active RCMP need to be able to do on patrol. Plus, she’s not going to put a baby in danger.”

  “Yeah, I suppose.” Mitch gave him a searching look. “I don’t know why I told you this in the first place.”

  “Because you tell me everything, eventually.” Troy put on his most endearing smile. “Everyone does.”

  “Yeah, bullshit on that.” His brother tossed him the part they needed, then motioned to get back to work.

  It’s funny how even with the truth trotted right out in front of them, his brothers didn’t seem to notice. Mitch did tell him everything. Clay and Len as well. Sometimes it took a bunch of prodding, but over the years Troy had learned to read his family well.

  He didn’t need to start a conversation with Clay to know him and Maggie were probably also heading down the kid route. He didn’t need to ask to know Janey’s parents were giving them grief about living together. Or that Janey didn’t give a damn about making things official between her and Len, or that Len only cared about making Janey happy. If that meant getting married, Len would have had her in front of the justice of the peace within a week.

  Hell, he even knew things like Katy wasn’t nearly as sick this go-round, but instead of being happy about it, she was worried that something was wrong with the baby. At least until he’d casually dropped in and let her talk to him about it until she’d decided maybe she was having a girl this time around and the hormone thing was the difference.

  Troy knew his family. He knew how to make them happy, and how to ease their fears. That ache inside was still there, though. The one he got every time he thought about Nicole.

  Goddammit, he missed her.

  Yeah, he knew his family, but it seemed he didn’t know how to make himself happy.

  Chapter Six

  Things ramped up to high speed for the summer, and Troy was working his ass off. Falling into bed at the end of every day w
as the only thing keeping him from turning his damn truck around and ending up in Nicole’s driveway.

  He’d just finished three different backbreaking jobs in the shop before getting called to go haul some trucks out of a mud bog. The teenage drivers hadn’t quite figured out that the concept of mud bogging was to avoid getting stuck. Or if you did, get your own ass out of trouble.

  A group of a half-dozen youth with their jeans muddy to the knees stood sheepishly to one side as he drove up. Four trucks were buried past their hubcaps in stinking, sticky sludge.

  Troy was covered with mud by the time he’d gotten the last one out, and was in no mood to answer yet another call from the shop.

  “What?” he growled into the radio.

  His oldest brother laughed. “I take it you’ve enjoyed your day?”

  “Goddamn princesses were barely old enough to see over the fucking steering wheels. I had to wade into a fucking slough to hook up because the brainiacs forgot to leave one truck free to haul the others out. I need a damn shower.”

  “Been there, done that. Sucks. I’m sorry, but you’re in the neighbourhood to take care of this call, and you might be able to fix it on the spot. Car stalled by Logan’s corner. Guy knows nothing about vehicles, so he could be out of gas for all I know.”

  “Jeez, what the hell is he doing this direction?” There was nothing out here except idiots with oversized trucks looking to tear up government land, or planning to camp for free tucked back into the heavily wooded area a few kilometres to the west.

  “Touring the countryside?” The radio buzzed with static for a moment. “Mitch’s shouting at me. You got it?”

  “Yeah, I can be there in about five minutes.”

  He was grumpy in the first place, he’d admit that. But when not two minutes later he spotted someone walking on the road toward town, and recognized Nicole, he wasn’t as polite as he could have been.

  He stopped in the middle of the road and rolled down his window. “What the hell are you doing?”

  The frown on her face deepened. “None of your business.”

  No. Fucking. Way.

  Troy was out of the truck and in front of her, blocking her path in under five seconds. “Just out for a stroll, were you, sweetheart?”

  Nicole glared at him before letting out a heavy sigh. “Don’t get pissy with me. I’m not in the mood for it.”

  It took all his concentration to keep control of his anger. “Answer me. Where’s your car? How did you get way the hell out here?”

  She folded her arms over her chest. “I was on a date, okay?”

  “You seem to have lost him,” Troy pointed out, sarcasm dripping from every word. “I take it his car broke down?”

  A quick nod, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes, and now he wasn’t pissed, he was borderline furious.

  He carefully caught hold of her upper arm, twisting her toward him so he could lift her chin until she had to look him in the eyes. “If you don’t tell me why you’re out here, I’m going to assume the worst, which means I’m going to kill someone.”

  “He didn’t do anything,” Nicole insisted, only her nose wrinkled a moment later as a low admission escaped her. “Well, not much.”

  The fucker was a dead man walking.

  “Get in the truck.” Troy spoke quietly, pushing her toward the door.

  This time Nicole caught hold of him, fingers digging into his biceps. “I mean it. He’s a jackass, but that’s it. You’re not allowed to go and rip off his arms.”

  “He was enough of a jackass to make you willing to walk an hour and a half back to town,” Troy snarled.

  “I didn’t want to wait with him, okay?” She shook his arms, which had about as much effect as if she’d hit him with a bag of feathers. He waited, unmoving, for her to continue. “He was pretty…” her cheeks flashed red “…handsy, that’s all.”

  Troy rolled on past furious to white-hot anger.

  “Get in the truck,” he said softly.

  It must have finally registered how near the edge he’d been pushed. She moved like lightning, settling in the passenger seat and doing up her seatbelt without a word.

  They sat in silence until he spotted a car ahead of them. It was tucked off the road in amongst some trees. A nice private spot to park and fool around, which was fine as long as everyone had the same agenda.

  Ice flowed through Troy’s veins. “You swear I don’t need to kill him.”

  “No. I swear.”

  “If I find out later you’re lying, I will find him and bury him. Alive.” Announced as if he were telling her about the latest fishing trip he’d taken.

  “I swear, Troy. He was a jerk for not stopping the first time I asked him to, but I might have overreacted, walking away,” Nicole answered quietly. “Please don’t do something foolish.”

  Define foolish. Troy pulled the tow truck to a stop, reaching behind him for a bottle of water.

  “Stay in the cab,” he ordered before dropping to the ground and pacing the narrow dirt road to where the fellow leaned against the bumper, hood raised, as if he’d known what to check for.

  The guy was somewhat familiar, but not anyone Troy had spent a lot of time with. Joshua? Jordan? That.

  Nic’s date smiled as he came to his feet, apparently not aware he was seconds away from pain. “Good timing. I thought I’d be out here for hours.”

  Troy walked past him and leaned over the engine. “What happened?”

  “Oh, she just died.” Jordan paused. “I parked her, and when I went to restart, the engine wouldn’t turn over.”

  “Strange place to park.” Even. Calm.

  Jordan laughed. “It seemed like a nice quiet spot, only my date wasn’t as eager as I hoped.”

  Troy waited, but nothing more was offered. No comment from Jordan regarding the location of his missing date. No concern about her walking away, nothing.

  Final score—zero. Troy ripped out the cables connecting the spark plugs and stepped back, closing the hood with one hand. “You got a cell phone?”

  Jordan nodded. “Shitty reception out here, though. It took ages to reach your shop.”

  Troy pulled a pen from his pocket and wrote a number on the label of the water bottle before tossing it to the other man.

  “Thanks, but what’s this for?”

  “Number for the garage in Drayton Valley.” Troy pointed to the ridge about a mile down the road, farther out of town. “You might have better luck getting reception from up there.”

  Then he turned and walked back toward the tow truck.

  “Hey. What the hell are you doing?” Jordan pounded after him, grabbing hold of his arm. “You can’t just leave—”

  Troy whirled on him, catching hold of the man by the throat. “Be thankful I’m leaving you breathing.”

  He tossed Jordan aside, the other man scrambling away as he stared wide-eyed at Troy. “You’re insane.”

  Troy climbed up into the tow truck and put it in gear, ignoring the shouting and the rude hand signal Jordan held in the air as Troy spun tires and left the other man in a cloud of dust.

  Eerie silence hung in the cab.

  Nicole wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t about to say a word until she had to. Which meant during the twenty-minute trip back to the garage, neither of them spoke.

  He parked in the back, coming around and meeting her before she could escape. For the first time she noticed his clothes were caked with mud, a dark smear of it along one of his cheekbones.

  “Will you be in trouble for not bringing him in?” she asked quietly.

  “No law says we have to take a job if we don’t want it.” He caught her by the arm and tugged her toward the back fence. “We need to talk.”

  She walked with him through the gate to where they had a little more privacy. A tall fence separated them from the garage work area, and to the west was the open field connected to Katy and Gage’s yard.

  “Where did you find that winner?”

  The words ground
out as if he was still clenching his teeth, and she sighed. “He works with my brother-in-law in the environment offices.”

  “Does Dale know he’s an asshole?”

  The last thing she wanted to do was defend the jerk, but Troy’s coldness broke through and made her snap. “No, it seems to be a recent development.”

  “Bullshit.” Troy stepped into her personal space. “Assholes don’t bloom overnight, babe. They’re always there, waiting to be exposed.”

  “You’re so gross.” But all her bluster had escaped, and she couldn’t help herself. She stared up at him, and some of her frustration escaped in a long sigh. “Why do I suck so bad at this? Dating. Finding someone to get serious about.”

  It took a minute for him to relax, but then he guided her a few steps farther to where the Thompson family had put a bench. He settled, the wood creaking under his weight as he patted the spot next to him. “You don’t suck at it. It’s hard—I get that.”

  “Damn near impossible,” she muttered. “You know what it’s like. You’ve lived in Rocky all your life. There’re always a few new people, but pretty much everyone else, we’ve known forever.”

  “There’s got to be some good people moving into town,” he insisted. “You just need to find them.”

  She pulled her feet up on the bench and wrapped her arms around her knees, resting her chin on top so she could stare out over the field beside Katy and Gage’s house. A sea of tiny blue flowers spread like dashes of reflected sky all around the edges of their yard. “Traders Pub is hosting a speed-dating session this coming Thursday night. I wasn’t going to go, but I guess I should.”

  He didn’t comment about that, just gave her the lecture she’d already given herself a dozen times over the last hour. “Set up your future dates in public places. Mike is going to have a bird when he finds out what happened today.”

  She was on her feet in an instant, both hands landing on his shoulders as she narrowed her gaze. “You will not tell Mike.”

  “No, I won’t,” he agreed.

  What was going on? “Then why would Mike have a bird if he’s not going to find out?”

  “Oh, I didn’t say he wouldn’t find out. I said I wouldn’t tell him. Dale, on the other hand, will probably have a few choice thoughts on the matter.”