by Nicole Fox
She wasn’t sure where exactly they were going — just that they needed to get out into the desert. She wasn’t in a hurry to leave the smooth highway for the rough terrain beyond, but sooner or later, she’d have to.
The wind slammed her face and whipped back her hair, chilling her. She felt frightened and exhilarated — wishing she had a helmet, wishing she were wearing something on her legs besides thin flats and jeans, but relishing the freedom of being out here, unhindered, wild, swallowing gnats and feeling the vibrations of the machine beneath her.
She rode until they were about six miles from Romedo, out where the highway became a narrow county road. She tried to call to Gunner, asking if he was okay, but received no answer. Fear seeped into her again. What if he didn’t make it? After all this, what if…
No. We’ll be fine. Wehave to be.
Though the moonlight was faint and there weren’t vehicles to illuminate their surroundings with headlights, she could see that the terrain to their left was ideal for hiding out — low, rocky plateaus that might lend them shelter. Shit, she couldn’t believe she was really about to do this, but…
“Hang on!” she called back to Gunner.
She was relieved to feel him tighten his grip on her. She accelerated, jolting off the highway and onto the scrubby desert sand. She headed for the plateaus, realizing as she approached that she wasn’t sure exactly how to stop the bike.
She applied the handbrake tentatively, but there were other things she needed to do—with the clutch, the throttle, something…
Gunner reached around her and put his hand on the lever. Good, so he was still with her. She braked gently, and the bike slowed near the base of a plateau. She killed the headlight. They came to a halt, the bike juddering beneath them for a moment before she shut the engine off. Looked around in the sudden silence at the night that stretched all around them, lonely and wild, a sliver of moonlight spilling down on them.
She dismounted and put down the kickstand. Gunner had climbed off the bike too, but he swayed dangerously. She caught him, offering her shoulder for support. As they hobbled toward the rocky incline that at the very least might shelter them from the chilly breeze, Kelly looked up at the magnificent array of stars.
Well, Daddy,she thought grimly.Good luck finding me here.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Gunner didn’t want to let on how much he was hurting, but holy shit. Every step was agony. Several times during the ride, he’d come close to letting go, to giving into the blackness that swarmed the sides of his vision. But he’d held on becauseshewas holding on. Because this brave-as-fuck woman had climbed onto a motorcycle and gotten them through a high-speed chase withguns. Because she wasn’t giving up yet, even though they were between a rock and hard place, for sure.
They reached the base of the plateau, and she eased him onto the ground.
He grinned up at her. She knelt close enough that her body was nearly touching his, and shivers of desire went through him.
“You ride hard, darlin’,” he said softly.
She smiled back. “I’ve picked up a thing or two, living around you.”
His smile faded but didn’t disappear completely.Damn, what a woman. Knew it from the moment I saw her.
“You gonna say I told you so?” he asked, thinking about how she’d begged him not to go to the border last night.
She shrugged. “I’m not that petty. Though…”
“Go on. Say it.”
“Cam.” Her expression was serious. “I don’t want to joke about this right now.” She placed chilly fingers against his forehead, as though checking to see whether he had a fever.
“Sorry.” He didn’t know what else to say. He’d gotten them into a hell of a mess.Sorry seemed a little inadequate.
But if I’d refused to go, Powers would’ve had me killed anyway. Sooner or later, the shit would’ve hit the fan.
His gut clenched guiltily.Maybe I shouldn’t have gone home. Maybe, if I’d disappeared out here on my own, Powers would have sent his men searching for me and left her alone. Now she’s stuck in this too.
But when he’d gotten back to town after the bloodbath in the desert, the only place he’d been able to think to go was home.
Home. It wasn’t his home. But it was whereshe was. And that made it a kind of refuge — the place he was drawn too even as his mind grew increasingly foggy, his vision increasingly black.
She pulled out her phone. Wiped the screen with her sleeve and swiped to unlock. “No service out here.”
He tried to prop himself up on the elbow of his good arm. “Did you really think there would be?”
She shot him a dirty look that played just fine even in the near-darkness, but she seemed amused too. “It was worth a try.” The blue glow of her screen was eerie out here in the middle of nowhere.
“Know what I think?”
“Do I want to know?”
“I think you liked that, back there. Not the almost-getting-killed part, but the speed, the chase…”
“No comment.” She slipped her phone back in her pocket.
Gunner shifted. “Actually, some of the hills out here have service. But I’m not really in the best shape for climbing right now.” He grunted in pain as he shifted again, trying to get comfortable. “Besides, who’re we gonna call?”
“I don’t know. I guess it depends on what we’re going to do.”
“Camp out here until I come up with a genius plan.”
“I see,” she said drily.
He closed his eyes for a few seconds. Damn his fucking shoulder.
“You okay?” she asked.
“Oh, just peachy.” He let out a long breath. Winced, his head tipping back. God, that ride really had taken it out of him. “There’s … stuff … in the saddlebags,” he panted. “’mergency kit. Some food, water. Blanket. First aid.”
“I’ll go bring the bike over.”
As she walked away, he took the opportunity to study their surroundings as best he could. He spotted something.
She walked the bike over to where he rested. They were far enough from the road that they were unlikely to be spotted even when the sun came up, but he nodded approvingly as she hid the bike behind a nearby boulder anyway.
“Look,” Gunner said as she approached him with the saddlebag slung over her shoulder. He pointed.
She squinted through the moonlight. “Oh. Well isn’t this our lucky night?”
There was a small cave in the rocks several yards away. “We can camp there,” he said.
She turned to him. “What if … I mean, are there … predators?”
He chuckled. “Well, never say never. But no, I think if there were coyotes or mountain lions hanging out in there, we’d smell them.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. A puma would’ve bolted by now, and coyotes would be howling up a storm. I’d say we’re safe.”
“All right,” she said skeptically. “I’m gonna trust you.”
He gazed at her, wishing he could put what he was feeling into words. Wished he could tell her how close to impossible it had been to turn his back on her when she’d begged him not to leave that night. How jumbled things had become in his brain — the memory of his mother begging him to stay with her, making him promise. The knowledge that sooner or later, he hurt the people he loved.
Wished he could tell her about the faces of his dead brothers. How it cut through him like a white hot blade, the image of Durango falling. Of Mica using his last moments to help Gunner escape. How it chewed on him, to know that they were dead because of him. Because he should have recognized sooner that they were sitting in a trap. Because he never should have gone along with any of this in the first place.
Every relationship had power dynamics that were established within the first few minutes of an introduction. The question was always, were you gonna be the dog that put its paw on the other’s throat? Or the dog that rolled over and wiggled and pissed itself? He ought to have s
tood on Russell Powers’ throat the first moment they met. Let someone take advantage of you once, and they’d do it again and again. Same with his mother. Why, when she’d begged him to stay, had he rolled over and pissed rather than showing his teeth?
And yet, as he grew older, it got more and more difficult to want to fight. Fighting was exhausting. It was such a surface-level interaction to have with somebody. He craved something deeper. A relationship that wasn’t about struggling for the upper hand, that wasn’t about taking advantage or exploiting weakness. A chance to know somebody, trust somebody. Be equals.
That was what scared him so much about Kelly. He wasn’t looking for a way to be right, with her. He wasn’t looking to be in control. He simply wanted to be around her, to feel her warmth, her gentleness. The hope she carried with her despite the awful things she’d faced.
But how the fuck could he tell her any of that?
“It really was amazing, what you did,” he said softly. “Never seen anyone ride like that.”
She knelt beside him. “Oh, please. That kind of stuff’s probably just a typical Tuesday night for you and your brothers.”
He ignored the stab of sadness at the phrase “your brothers.” “Still. You’re a natural.”
“Well. I’m just glad we’re both alive. For now.” She hesitated, then leaned forward and pecked him on the lips. And damn if he didn’t start getting hard. Adrenaline rush plus smokin’ hot woman? One boner, coming up.
“Mmm,” he murmured. He tried to shift closer, lifting his hips.
“Down boy.” She patted his knee gently, then grinned, her teeth flashing in the moonlight. “I’m gonna go get our new home set up.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Kelly crouched in the shallow cave. She opened the saddlebags and took out the flashlight. Turned it on. It flickered for a moment, but stayed lit. She took the saddlebags over to the cave. Swept the dark hollow with the flashlight beam, afraid she’d suddenly see the glinting eyes of a coyote or something. But the cave was empty.
She took out the blanket and spread it over the cave floor. Searched the supplies — a flint striker, matches, dehydrated meals, trail mix, a couple of canteens of water.
She looked up as Gunner limped to the cave entrance. “Hey. You should have stayed there. I would have come back to help you.”
“I’m fine,” he said gruffly.
She gazed at him tenderly as he supported himself on the cave doorway. She was still a little drunk on his praise for the way she’d handled the chase. “You’re not fine. I need to look at that shoulder.”
The grin was back. “You wanna play doctor with me?”
She cocked a brow. “I want you to lie back and let me look at that shoulder.”
“You’re no fun,” he grumbled, going to his knees and then stretching out awkwardly on the blanket.
She unzipped his jacket. She’d forgotten that he’d had no time to put his shirt back on. The poor guy was gonna freeze.
His muscular body sprawled before her, the ink especially beautiful in the gold glow of the flashlight. The bandages were bloody, but it wasn’t as bad as she’d feared. “You heal quickly,” she remarked. She met his gaze. “Good thing.” She brushed the backs of her fingers across his cheek, heart clenching a little when he closed his eyes and tilted his head slightly toward her hand. “Troublemaker.” Her voice was barely a whisper now.
His eyes opened, and the naked longing she saw in his gaze made her swallow hard. He was a gorgeous man. Infuriating, at times. But gorgeous.
“You’re good to me,” he whispered back. “I know I don’t always show how much I appreciate you, but … I do.”
Kelly searched for the words she needed. She could tell him now. Tell him he was going to be the father of her child. Find out whether or not she could count on him to be there for her, for the baby, if they made it out of this.
How do I spring that on him now? When our lives are in danger? When he needs to rest and heal? When I don’t even know if we’ll even survive tonight?
She glanced out over the desert. Had anyone followed them? If they had, surely, Kelly would have seen them somewhere out on that lonely road. She looked back at Gunner, whose expression had hardened. “It’s my fault,” he muttered.
“What is?”
“All of this. They’re dead,” he said coldly. “They’re dead, and it’s my fault.”
Kelly’s heart rate picked up. At first, she thought he meant their pursuers, and she wondered how he knew. But then she saw the anger in his expression give way to grief, and she realized that of course — he meant his fallen brothers. The men her father had killed.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “Sorry for your brothers. I know what they meant to you.”
“Durango…” His voice was gruff, but she could hear the emotion in it.
“I know.” She paused. “We have to stop my father. We have to make sure Durango and the others didn’t die for nothing.”
The flashlight flickered as she spoke, and her breath caught. That light wasn’t going to last much longer, but for now it illuminated the strong angles of Gunner’s face, turned his skin gold, set fire to his eyes.
“I’m going to kill him,” Gunner said, his voice calm, almost casual, on the surface, but with an underlying fierceness that sent a chill through her.
He means it. He absolutely means it.
She hesitated. What did she say to that? She thought he was entirely justified in wanting revenge, sure, but … this was still her father they were talking about. Her last remaining blood tie.
She placed a hand on her belly, closing her eyes briefly. Not her last. If they survived this, she’d have her own family. Even if it was just her and the baby. No Gunner.
She caught Gunner’s eye again uncertainly. “Maybe there’s another way?”
“There isn’t. That man’s a psychopath. He killed my brothers. He owes me his blood.”
“This isn’t the 1800s, Cam,” she said, surprising herself with the sharpness of her voice. “There won’t be pistols at dawn. There are legal channels…”
Gunner barked a laugh. “I’m not exactly on the right side of the law, Kel. I don’t think turning Russell in to the police is gonna go well for me. ‘Why yes, officer, I was at the border to grab a massive shipment of cocaine and carry it back to town for distribution, but then these assholes startedshooting—”
“But we need to think—”
“The time for thinking things over is done. If we let him go, he’s gonna go on killing people. We’ve already waited too long, let him get completely out of control. I should have nipped this in the fuckin’ bud; I should never have gone along with his plan to have us married—”
“Well thanks,” she snapped, startled by her own vehemence. Why was she angry? Sheagreedwith him. They shouldn’t have gone along with her father’s crazy scheme. She’d likely been a fool to ever let herself get this close to Gunner Wilson. And yet…
What if I don’t regret it? What if I can’t stop seeing the good in him? Can’t stop imagining the man he’ll be when we’re out from under my father’s thumb?
Gunner sighed. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“How did you mean it, then?”
“I just… If I’d put my foot down then. If the guys and I had driven him out of town, instead of showing our bellies like dogs…”
“Then I would have been driven out of town with him,” Kelly said coolly. “We’d never have gotten to know each other. And that’s not what I want.”
His eyes flickered sharply. “You’re saying you want to be here? In this mess?”
I want to be here with you.
She hadn’t realized how true it was until this moment. But she meant it. No matter how disastrous things were, she’d fallen for this man. This man who’d been broken as a child, but who had pieced himself back together as someone who was trying to do right, trying to protect those he cared about. He was wild, he was obnoxious, he was dangerous
. But underneath that, there was beauty, there was hard-won wisdom. There was a man who might make a damn fine father, if he got his shit together.
“We’re heretogether, aren’t we? That ought to be something,” she replied. “So yes, I do see some good in this ‘mess.’”