by Kaylea Cross
Tala grinned. “It’s Sergeant Stumpy. And no, he’s at home resting on my bed at Tate’s place. But next time I will. We need to get some pictures of the three of us on an adventure together.”
“I can’t believe you named him that.”
“What? That name is awesome.”
He shook his head, the hint of a grin playing around the edge of his lips. “How did he wind up losing his foot, anyway? You never told me.”
She relayed the story. “So, yep, he lost his foot the same day I did,” she finished.
“That’s how Sergeant Stumpy came to be?” Braxton asked, looking scandalized. “You literally took a pair of scissors and hacked his foot off the same day I gave him to you?”
“Well, you wanted to know.” When he shot her a horrified look, Tala laughed. “I was lying there looking at him, and I thought it would be fitting if we could go through rehab together.”
He eyed her a moment. “I had no idea you were so savage.”
“Don’t worry, it was all very humane. He didn’t feel a thing, I made sure, and one of the surgeons offered to do the suturing for me after. He’s got a perfect little stump under the prosthetic they made for him at the rehab facility.”
“Well, I’m glad he kept you company through everything.”
“Me too.” Sgt. Stumpy had first accompanied her on the long flight home from Kandahar, then through the grueling process of her rehab, and a lot of places since.
Now she took him with her whenever she traveled or went on little adventures, then took a picture of him and sent it to Braxton. She had all kinds of shots of her little stuffed companion on airplanes and in hotels, out in the boat with her in the summer, or in his custom-made biathlon gear when she trained.
He pulled into a parking spot near the range building. The lot was empty, apparently all the local shooters home enjoying the holidays. “I liked the photo you sent me of him when you carved pumpkins at Halloween.”
She smiled at the memory. “First time Rylee wasn’t there to carve with me, so I wanted the company.” She’d dressed Stumpy up in a little Jason mask and taken pictures of him holding a toy chainsaw and covered with orange bits of pumpkin. “I used a Dremel tool to carve the designs, so it looked like a pumpkin slaughterhouse in my kitchen. There were even pumpkin bits on the ceiling fan and windows at the end.”
“It was a picture that said a thousand words.” Braxton shook his head, his lips curving in amusement as he turned off the ignition. “Can’t believe you still have him.”
“I could never get rid of Sergeant Stumpy, we’ve been through too much together. And, he reminds me of you.”
Those deep brown eyes cut to her and held, and she blushed as an answering wave of heat swirled through her. She hadn’t meant to say that last bit out loud, but it was true. That bear symbolized Braxton for her, and had helped her through a lot of hard times.
“Why, because we’re both dark and furry?” He ran a hand over his scruffy jaw.
She laughed, thankful he was letting her off the hook so easy. “No. Because you’re both good listeners, and you’ve both supported me through everything.”
He continued to hold her gaze for a long moment, and that all-too familiar yearning began to expand inside her once more. “Well then, I’m glad.”
“Me too. So,” she said, changing the subject to a safer topic. He’d been busy all morning with Tate and Mason, visiting the building site on the property they’d bought for Rifle Creek Tactical. Now it was almost three, giving them only another hour or two of daylight to work with.
“What do you want to get out of this session today?” he asked her. “I know you’ve got something specific in mind.”
As a matter of fact, she did. “By the time we leave, I want to be hitting all five targets consistently from a standing position.”
He shot her a knowing look. “By consistently, you mean always.”
Her lips quirked. “That’d be nice. How do you want to do this?” She reached into the backseat to grab her custom .22 biathlon rifle. Tate had ordered her ammo and targets as a Christmas gift so she could train while she was down here.
“Want to start inside, or just go straight to the outdoor range?” he asked.
It was cold and the wind was icy, but no worse than what she’d face in a lot of competitions. “Whatever you think’s best. You’re the expert.” There was no one better to help improve her shooting. As a master sniper, Braxton was one of the best shots in the world, and knowing she was about to get personal instruction from him had her giddy with excitement.
Of course, her excitement level was also in part because he was the sexiest man alive and she was about to have his undivided attention for the next few hours.
“Let’s start inside, so I can watch you there and see what we’re working with,” he said.
“Okay. I won’t be able to simulate everything perfectly, because I’ve got a special prosthetic for my skis. Sometimes after I finish a tough sprint, I’m a little wobbly when I come into a range on a course, especially near the end of a race when I’m exhausted.”
He nodded. “I’ll take a look at your positioning.”
The idea of having his eyes on her so closely was simultaneously thrilling and nerve wracking. But he wasn’t here to admire her figure or stare at her booty, he was a professional who’d come at her request to offer her critical feedback on her shooting. Hopefully the nerves buzzing in her stomach would disappear once they started working.
The range master was expecting them, since Tate had called ahead to inform him they were coming. He introduced himself, set them up inside the empty indoor range, then went back to his desk.
“Bet you’ve never seen one of these up close before, huh?” Tala said to Braxton as she took her rifle out of its case, then added proudly, “A custom .22 with non-optic sight and a straight-pull-bolt action.”
“No, never.” He accepted it and checked it over with practiced motions, and just seeing him holding her rifle sent a shiver of longing through her as she imagined those hands handling her instead.
She would bet he was just as confident and controlled with a woman as he was with a rifle. It was so unfair that she’d never find out firsthand.
“How much does it weigh, around ten pounds?”
“Mine’s just under eight. Extra mags are stored in the stock, and each clip holds five rounds.”
He handed it back to her, his eyes full of interest. “Zero it out, and let’s see what you’ve got.”
Right. Down to business. “In para biathlon we shoot from the prone position at ten meters, and the targets are one-point-eight inches wide for prone. Just so you know. But there aren’t many para events for me to attend in B.C., so I’ve mostly done regular ones and shoot from fifty meters. Also, my wrist can’t touch the ground when I shoot prone.”
“Got it.” He folded his arms across his chest, momentarily distracting her with the way his deep blue sweater clung to the muscles in his chest and shoulders.
She thought about the hug at the airport, when she’d been held against all that male power, and went a little weak at the knees. She wanted to rub her face all over his chest like a cat. “Okay, I guess I’ll start standing, since it’s my weakest stance.”
Damn, she was way more nervous than she’d anticipated. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. Maybe she should have asked Tate and Mason to come with them, to have a buffer. Improving her shooting enough to give her a shot at making the national masters team was her new dream—and then maybe the Paralympics. This was important to her.
Pushing all of that and Braxton’s distracting presence from her mind, she focused on the task at hand. Conditions inside the range were optimal, so she didn’t have to compensate for temperature, wind and poor light conditions.
But when they finally got around to moving outside, that was another story, and it was where Braxton would really shine. He had an incredible amount of experience and knowledge to draw from in compensatin
g for a myriad of conditions. She couldn’t wait to pick his brain about all of that.
She adjusted the paper row of five small, circular targets she’d brought and moved it out to fifty meters. Once ready, she assumed her stance, aimed, and fired two shots. Both missed the first two circles slightly up and to the left.
Her face heated, embarrassment washing through her because Braxton was watching everything. As an elite military sniper he routinely took shots from a distance of up to a kilometer or more with a large caliber weapon, and here she’d barely hit the paper target fifty meters away.
She bit back the urge to babble about being much better than this usually, and quickly adjusted the rifle’s sight, the metal hand-screws clicking with each turn. Two clicks down, two clicks right. With that done, she put the butt of the weapon into position against her shoulder, tried to shove Braxton from her mind and awareness, and fired again.
“Almost dead center,” he said from behind her, the impressed note in his voice warming her to her bones.
She relaxed a little. “Obviously, I’m much better at ten meters. And normally I do this after finishing a hard ski when my heart rate’s through the roof, I’m gasping for breath and my hands are freezing. I find standing position a lot harder than prone. Mostly because of my balance when I get fatigued.”
He nodded. “Try again and I’ll watch your stance closer.”
Tala faced the target, ignored the new little butterflies swirling in her stomach, and cleared her mind. She focused on her breathing, sharpened her aim, and fired at the last three targets. She hit two of them, but not center, and the last one missed a half-inch to the right.
She lowered the rifle, her pulse picking up when Braxton approached her from the side. Without a word, he reached out to grasp her upper arms and turned her upper body slightly, the innocent contact sending a rush of heat through her.
Then he grasped her hips, gently pushing her forward a little, and her belly flipped at his touch, her mind imagining his hands moving over other parts of her. “Widen your stance. More weight on your left leg, bend your knees a bit more, then tuck your chin down a little farther.”
She did as he said, feeling the warmth of his hands through her clothes even after he removed them. Hell. She exhaled and centered herself. “Like this?”
“Little wider, and more weight on your left leg.”
She complied, automatically bending her right knee a bit more to compensate. “Okay?”
“Try it.”
The paper targets were all marked up, but it didn’t matter for now. She loaded a fresh clip, took aim at the first target, and fired. This time she hit all but one circle.
Lowering her weapon, she looked over at him and smiled, surprised but excited by how quickly he’d been able to help her. “Okay, you’re the best shooting coach ever.”
One side of his mouth kicked up, his dark eyes warming. “Yeah?”
“Without a doubt.” Just those small adjustments had improved her aim and balance so much. Her coach was great, but Braxton was elite on a rifle, and he’d been able to see subtle problems no one else could have in such a short time. A product of a lifetime spent honing his skills, and conducting joint missions with the world’s most elite SOF units like Delta and DEVGRU.
Energized and feeling more confident, she loaded another clip and fired at the targets again. This time she hit all five.
Grinning, she faced him again. “Well, then. Let’s hope I can replicate this outside during a race.” Conditions were much trickier then, but what he’d taught her so far was definitely helping.
He grinned back, and her heart damn near did a somersault under her ribs. He was a gorgeous man, but when he smiled… Damn, he took her breath away. “Happy I could help. Wanna try prone now?”
“Yes.” Pumped, she loaded a new clip and lay down on her stomach. Assuming her firing position with her legs spread out in a V, she hooked the rifle’s arm sling to a firing cuff on her upper arm and took aim. This time she hit three out of five targets.
“You’re faster prone,” he remarked.
“Being prone helps steady everything, but it’s still hard for me to slow my heart rate down during a race. I’m still learning how to slow that and my breathing when I ease into a range after a ski segment.” It was a damn hard sport, but that’s why she was so hooked on it. She loved the challenge of it, pushing herself and competing against the elements as well as the other athletes.
He nodded again, as if that made perfect sense. “Do what you normally would during a race, and hit it again.”
She focused back on the target and snugged the butt of the rifle against her shoulder, pretending she was in a race. Body relaxed, breathing slow and easy, she counted her heartbeats and squeezed the trigger between two.
Three shots hit close to center. The other two, barely within the edge of the circles.
She glanced over at him. “See? There’s definitely more room for improvement.” He made her feel scattered.
Her pulse kicked as he approached her again, anticipation curling inside her as he crouched next to her left side and grasped her hips in his hands. Sparks tingled across her skin, a dozen erotic images exploding into her mind. Of them both naked, his hands closing on her hips with firm authority as he positioned her how he wanted her, his lips caressing the side of her neck as his deep voice caressed her like velvet.
You’re gonna come for me, Tala.
Oh, shit. She shook the thought away, annoyed that she couldn’t control her wayward thoughts around him.
Braxton’s grip tightened on her hips. “Relax,” he murmured, jostling her gently.
His touch and nearness made relaxing impossible, because her entire body was going haywire. She forced out a breath and consciously relaxed her muscles, aware of the sensual warmth sliding through her, like warm honey.
“That’s better. Now come up just a little more on your elbows and settle into the position. Yeah, like that.” His hands closed around her shoulders, firm and sure, steadying her as he squared them more. “How’s that feel?”
Distracting. And really damn arousing, because it made her want his hands on more of her.
“Good,” she managed, hoping the hell he couldn’t tell what was happening to her. She was acutely conscious of his eyes on her as he stepped away, and that forbidden curl of heat deep inside her that she couldn’t quite ignore completely as she focused on improving her aim.
She lost count of the number of rounds she fired as the lesson progressed, but finally she was down to her last clip. She managed to hit all five targets with it, and finished with a real sense of improvement and accomplishment.
When she started to get up, Braxton was there, gripping her left hand to help her to her feet. “That was really great, thank you,” she told him, trying not to stare at him at such close range. He smelled delicious, and she recalled with acute detail every touch of his hands.
“I barely did anything. You were already solid, we just needed to make some subtle tweaks.”
She loved that he said we. “Maybe next time we can try it out on the trails, if you’re up for some cross country skiing while you’re here.”
The corner of his mouth lifted, and she wanted his lips on hers so bad she almost moaned. “I’d like that.” He glanced at his watch, breaking the spell. “We’d better get back. Mason and Avery are making me dinner.”
“Oh, sure.” Squelching her disappointment, she quickly packed up her stuff and followed him back out to Tate’s truck. They talked about shooting on the way back, but she was preoccupied, her mind still back in that shooting range.
It was getting harder and harder for her to conceal the depth of her feelings for him. And sometimes when she caught him watching her, she’d wondered if maybe there’d been a glimmer of interest there, but it had to have just been wishful thinking. In all the time she’d known him, he had never hinted at being attracted to her, and he’d certainly never made a move.
Somehow, she ha
d to accept that they would never happen. He was married to his unit. The last thing she wanted was to make things awkward between them going forward, or to be hurt later on.
Braxton meant too much to her. She would rather live with this constant ache in her chest than not have him in her life at all.
****
Tate grabbed his keys from his desk in his office at the station and stopped by Avery’s door on the way out. She glanced up from her computer when he knocked. “Hey. You heading out?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He walked in and stopped in front of her desk. “You see the new alert that just came in?”
“I glanced at it, but didn’t read it yet. Why, bad news?”
“It’s not good,” he allowed. “You should take a look.” He waited for her to pull it up on her computer.
She frowned slightly as she read it. “Jason Fenwick. Twenty-six, gang member with a long rap sheet, currently based out of Missoula.” She glanced up at Tate. “Let me guess, the Red Phoenixes?”
“Yep.” The gang had reorganized itself early last year, and had become a force to be reckoned with.
For months now they’d been embroiled in a turf war against local biker gangs in the state and surrounding region, but had recently concentrated their power base in Missoula. They’d taken over a lot of territory, at great cost. The body count continued to grow each day, and the sudden explosion of gang violence in the city had been all over the news for the past several months. Authorities there were trying their best to stop it, and getting nowhere fast.
Avery went back to reading aloud. “Wanted for murder now in addition to multiple weapons and drug charges.” She looked at Tate. “He’s a suspect in the killing of the Red Phoenix leader last night? And now he’s missing. Go figure.”
“Reported missing, and rumors say he was killed in a shootout late last night. Missoula PD dragged a burned body from the river early this morning. Still waiting for confirmation from the coroner whether it’s him.”
She leaned back in her chair and arched a strawberry-blond brow at him. “And you’re concerned about this because…?”
“Because I just got a tip from a concerned local who saw the story on the news today. He reported seeing someone matching Fenwick’s description close to Rifle Creek late last night—well after the alleged shootout with the Red Phoenix leader, and before the guy they pulled from the river was killed. I looked into it, and apparently Fenwick stopped in town briefly to get food, then was sighted later walking along a trail leading up into the mountains.”