Guilty as Sin (Sinful, Montana Book 1)

by Rosalind James

  “Nah,” Paige said. “I’ll get over any pesky lingering serenity soon enough, I’m sure.”

  Lily studied her too closely. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  A crashing sound, a muttered curse, and a flurry of activity out of the corner of her eye made Paige look. Made her whirl, in fact, her hand going for the butt of a weapon that wasn’t there, until she saw what it was. A guy in a suit had just walked by them, run into a column, and bounced off it. As Paige watched, he grabbed the handle of his fallen suitcase and headed off with I-meant-to-do-that purpose in his step, then wrecked it by looking back again.

  Blonde still worked miracles if what you wanted was male attention. For your looks. Paige had wasted almost a full day and an eye-crossing amount of money in the ridiculously pricey salon attached to the spa, but now, not only were her nails and eyebrows and skin and every other bit of her uncharacteristically smooth and perfect, her hair was back to her natural color, too. Lily’s color. Golden blonde with streaks of platinum. And she’d clearly forgotten that gold was the color of the sun and Scrooge McDuck’s money bin. In other words, blonde was magic, even if the curls didn’t even reach your shoulders.

  The real star power, though, wasn’t in blonde hair, wide-set brown eyes, or her newly pretty eyebrows. It wasn’t even in the femininity that came off Lily in waves, and that Paige damped down ruthlessly. It was in the twinship—a special quality that wasn’t really special at all, because it wasn’t about you. It was about the two of you. Just like your hair color wasn’t one bit who you were, whatever men projected onto it. And neither were waxing and brow shaping and makeup and this stupid outfit.

  “How many layers is this?” she’d complained to Lily as they’d dressed. “What’s wrong with jeans?”

  “Would jeans truly be more comfortable?” Lily had asked serenely, adjusting the neckline of the cream camisole that peeked out from under Paige’s asymmetrically-hemmed, lace-edged, pale-blue tunic, then handed her a midnight-blue velvet jacket for yet another layer. “More comfortable than leggings and a tunic? I doubt it. You know, you can actually be comfortable and beautiful. Just remember—if you’re me, you have to actually look in the mirror before you leave the house.”

  “Waste of time,” Paige had retorted. “You can’t be comfortable and beautiful and exquisitely groomed and on time, I’ll tell you that. And by the way? You look too good to be me. Lose the scarf. I don’t accessorize.”

  Lily had tossed the filmy rose-colored silk scarf over one shoulder and said, “You took a course on vacation. You learned.”

  “There are courses in accessorizing?”

  “It used to be called charm school. I like to call it ‘paying attention.’ You never know. You might learn something being me.”

  Now, as Lily hugged her one last time and said, “Love you. Call me,” something occurred to Paige for the first time.

  “Hey,” she said. “Why did you really agree to this? It’s not because you think I need it, is it? Because I don’t. I’m doing great. I’ve been counseled and everything. My leg’s all good, too.” It wasn’t, but it was getting closer. “I’m fine.”

  “I know, sweetie,” Lily said. “I’m so proud of you, too. I brag about you all the time.”

  Paige felt managed. She didn’t get managed. She managed. “I have to go,” she said. “Wish me luck.”

  “Good luck,” Lily said. “Fix my problems. Just don’t forget: mirror before door. Take your time. Own it. You start making an impression before you open your mouth.”

  That was a bracing thought to leave on. Not.

  Handing her driver’s license—Lily’s license—to the security agent was a breath-holding ordeal, but when he handed it back without a word… something happened. It was more than a release of breath. It was a release.

  She wasn’t herself. She was in her skin, but she was Lily. Lily, who had more than sex appeal, more than a way of hesitating for that half-second before she spoke, that way of smiling at a man and making him feel ten feet tall. Lily, who always had a kind word.

  Who got taken advantage of much too easily.

  Well, that was why Paige was here. She smiled at the security screener, showing her dimples Lily-style, got a smile and a spark back, and went on through security, looking at the scene with a Lily-brain, through Lily-eyes.

  A mother lugging a car seat, diaper bag, and purse onto the conveyer belt while still somehow holding her pigtailed daughter on her hip, proving that mothers really did have superpowers. A fifty-something guy in full Western regalia removing a metric ton of accessories into his own bins, proving that some men could give Lily a run for her money in that department. Cowboy hat, canvas jacket, tooled boots, a belt with an enormous silver buckle, a bolo tie with a chunk of turquoise on it that had to be weighing him down, and all of it a little too clean, a little too new.

  Paige wasn’t going to think about whether he could actually recognize the business end of a cow, or about everyplace he could still carry concealed. She wasn’t a screener, and right now, she wasn’t a cop. She grabbed her stuff out of the bin, put her own Western-style blue boots back on, and didn’t rush off.

  She was going to walk. She was going to look around, and not for threats. She was going to do this. She stopped at a coffee kiosk, bought an iced mocha like a woman who’d been drinking herbal tea for days, took a sip of chocolate-flavored caffeine—food of the gods—ignored the persistent ache in her leg that whispered so seductively, “Sit down. Take a pill,” and looked in windows at clothes Lily would buy, except that she wouldn’t. They probably weren’t good enough. Not cutting-edge enough, or not old-fashioned enough, or whatever the criteria were now. The rules always confused Paige.

  Never mind. She had her reckless back, and Lily had her little bit of wild. They were leaving caution behind, because they were free from their lives and living their sister’s.

  Her phone—Lily’s phone—dinged in her slouchy purse, which was much too large to find a phone in. By the time she’d dug the phone out, it had gone to voicemail.

  “I forgot to say,” Lily said. “Don’t worry about the bees.”

  Who said that and then didn’t pick up when you called back? Paige hated bees. Lily knew she hated bees.

  Wait. That was probably exactly why she’d told Paige not to worry. She was saying that the bees around Sinful weren’t Africanized, Paige’s worst and most stupid nightmare. Which Paige already knew. Montana was too far north. You could say that she kept up with bee travel patterns.

  Let it go. You didn’t get stronger by dwelling on your fears. She put aside all thoughts of a swarm of killer bees chasing their victims down and stinging them in the eyeballs and got onto the plane, a little commuter thing on its way to Denver.

  Lily had a window seat. New identity or not, Paige wasn’t sitting in that seat. It took away your options, gave you no room to react. She stood in the aisle and checked out the young business type who was tapping at his phone and frowning as if he were telling his broker, “Sell!” And ignoring her.

  A hand on her hip, a shove of her newly-loose, newly-blonde hair back over her shoulder, her best slow, sweet Lily-smile, and she was saying, “Hi. I’m sorry to bother you, but would you mind terribly switching seats with me?” She was a little bit proud of the “terribly.”

  His expression would have done justice to a cartoon character. She wanted to tell him that men got themselves manipulated that way, but since she actually wanted to manipulate him, she didn’t. His frown vanished, and he stood up, moved into the window seat, and said, “Please. Join me.”

  “Where are you off to?” he asked her when she’d stowed her bag and was buckling up. “Ending up in Denver?”

  “No. Kalispell.” Normally, she’d have lied, but she was practicing being Lily. Being open. Which could feel more like “being a target.”

  “Oh, really?” He was smiling like he thought he was charming. He looked more like an alligator. “Is that home? You look pretty sophi
sticated for a Montana girl.”

  “But I am,” Paige said—yes, sweetly. “Actually, I’m from Sinful.” She opened her eyes wide and gave a little smile. More Lily-work. In six hours, she’d have to be sweet, sexy, and vulnerable. She needed the practice.

  “Really.” He put his right hand casually over his left. Covering his wedding ring. Which he was taking off, and trying to be sneaky about it. Whoops. Time to turn down the Lily-wattage. “Sinful, Montana? Is that a place?”

  “It is.”

  “Marketing gimmick, or…?” The safety briefing had started, but he clearly didn’t care where the oxygen masks were.

  “Well, partly marketing. It was an R & R spot for the silver miners, and I’m sure the name helped. In the beginning, though, it was two brothers who came west together on a wagon train and had a falling out. One of them took most of the party and started a town called Angels Rest, and the other one crossed a mountain and started a different one. Angels Rest isn’t there anymore. Sinful is. Make of that what you will.”

  “Cain and Abel,” her seatmate suggested.

  “Could be. The Angels Rest brother went to swim with the fishes, a sad accident, and the Sinful brother got rich. But then, I don’t think anybody ever went broke underestimating the refinement of miners.”

  She got more charm-beams. “Baths, saloons, gambling, and lovely ladies? Those were the days, I guess.”

  “Maybe not so much if you were a ‘lovely lady.’”

  If he noticed the dryness of her tone, it didn’t faze him. “Oh, I don’t know. Lady of the night with a heart of gold? Marries the sheriff?”

  “I think that’s a movie invention.” She was failing on her Lily, but in her experience, prostitution wasn’t a woman’s first career choice.

  The plane was taxiing, the engines revving, making conversation impossible. When the plane was in the air, though, her new buddy, who apparently wasn’t easily discouraged, said, “So what do you do there in Sinful? No, let me guess. Nurse. Wait. Kindergarten teacher. Or you own a candy store. Tell me it’s something as sweet as you look.”

  “I’m a cop.”

  She should have lied, but watching his expression change was pretty special. You took your entertainment where you could get it.

  Six hours later, she walked out of Kalispell baggage claim wheeling not one, but two suitcases—Lily’s version of traveling light—and started looking for a fiery-red Honda SUV.

  Lily had said, “It’s in long-term parking. Kind of at the back.”

  “Where?” Paige had asked. “Ten o’clock? Two o’clock?”

  “What?”

  Paige had moved her arm in a semicircle. “Clock face as you’re coming into the lot from the terminal. It’s going to be somewhere between nine and three, because those are what’s ahead of you. So—which?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t come into the lot from the terminal. I came in from the entrance. At the back. All right—maybe ten, or eleven, or twelve. Or one or two. I walk around and look for it and press the button on my key. I go with the flow.”

  “That’s how people get washed away in floods. And ‘walking around looking for it’ makes you a target. You need to walk with purpose. Eyes up.”

  “Uh, Paige. It’s Montana. We have grizzlies, not gangs.”

  In fact, despite the fact that she’d apparently entered The Land of the Red SUV, Paige walked straight to the car. She took a diagonal toward the left, and there it was. Which wasn’t twinship—how could she possibly have known where Lily had left it?—just two people with some thought patterns in common. And Lily was right about one thing. The Kalispell Airport wasn’t exactly LAX.

  Paige pulled out of the lot, breathed a few times, and thought, Fancy underwear. Country living. Fresh air. No killer bees. You can do this. Then she headed for the mountains.

  On Saturday morning, Jace took a steeper route up the mountain. His body was in sync with his mind again, which was good news. Time to push it, to move at the extreme limit of his control, keeping his steps deliberate all the same, just this side of too far. If the past couple days had showed him anything, it had been that he didn’t want to lose his edge.

  Or maybe they’d shown him that he needed to be where he was, to be out of the game. He didn’t want to say that living a regular life was flat. He didn’t want to think it.

  Well, maybe just a bit. Maybe so.

  You could bungee jump, of course. You could skydive. But when your last jump had been into a hot zone, drifting down, much too exposed, into hostile territory under cover of darkness—well, the watered-down version didn’t really cut it. It would be like going to the Renaissance Faire aged thirty-five, fencing with your carefully blunted sword and shouting things like, “Die, scurvy knave!” while you kept an eye out in case a pretty girl noticed. Not quite the same.

  On the other hand, needing to fight—and possibly to kill—in order to feel alive was a dark place to be. That was also true.

  He was on his way back down the mountain now, his long legs eating up the ground. Just past the shuttered ski lodge, he saw the sign.

  Coming Soon

  Sinful Mountain Cross Country Ski Resort

  Was that a done deal, then? He’d heard that a good-sized section of Forest Service land was up for lease to the development company, but he hadn’t heard that it had happened. He gave a mental shrug and kept going. He was far enough down the mountain for that not to affect him, other than that once it happened, winter would bring more traffic and more crowds, and before it happened, he’d see a lot more construction. He was antisocial enough to avoid the crowds.

  He was flying now, past a couple empty ski cabins to left and right, his mind clicking over in the way it was supposed to do, homing in on that one ambush scene halfway through the book.

  Something wrong there, because he’d rushed it. He needed to draw out the suspense more. To let the reader feel, to let himself feel, the hair literally rising at the back of his neck, because he saw and heard and smelled what a civilian wouldn’t, and he paid attention.

  He was still rewriting in his head when he heard the commotion. Animal noise, and heaps of it, like a barnyard was revolting. Tobias started to bark, adding his voice to the mix, until Jace snapped, “Quiet.” The dog subsided, but Jace could still see the tension in him. What the hell? He ran faster.

  The two of them rounded the bend in the road, and he saw the woman.

  The blonde. His closest neighbor, the one who lived just up the mountain from him.

  She wasn’t in her garden this morning, even though he’d have expected to see her there as usual, maybe trimming the lavender bushes that were exuberantly attempting to overhang the winding brick walk to the front porch of her storybook-perfect cottage. Or maybe doing… something, whatever a person did, to the giant pink flowers that were bent over on their stems by their own weight like drunken sailors.

  Yeah. Normally, she’d be doing something garden-appropriate outdoors, and he’d nod at her, notice once again that she was pretty, wonder how many lacy items of clothing she actually owned and why he wasn’t stopping to find out, and know why.

  It was that edge. That last step before the darkness, when you were flirting with going too far. He wasn’t saying it was a good thing to need, but it had to be there, or his feet didn’t stop.

  She was too perfect. Even her perfect house made him itchy. She was too good for him, or he was too bad for her, and his feet knew it.

  So why were his feet slowing now? She was down closer to the road this morning, in the barnyard that ended in a wooden shed, painted white with a roof of green metal, and all of it as neat and tidy as the rest of her place. Cutesy, he guessed a woman would call it. Naff, he’d call it. She looked soft and sweet, like always, in every way but the wellies, the knee-high black rubber boots that would have been at home in Queensland. At this moment, though, even as he turned up her drive like he’d been drawn there, she was stripping off a pale-pink cardigan with jerky, impatient mov
ements and hurling it toward the fence. It fell short, landing in the dirt, but Jace didn’t pay too much attention.

  You could say that the stripping-off had refocused him. Because underneath the sweater, she was wearing a white tank top with multiple skinny criss-crossing straps that showed off a trim but muscular upper back, an apron that tied around her waist with a giant pink bow and somehow managed to say come-on-boy-let’s-go in a way no apron should, and a pair of gray leggings that traced absolutely every curve of an absolutely spectacular arse.

  Normally, with her, everything was flowers, lace, or both. She was missing some ornamentation today, but she still had the apron. Why she was wearing it in a barnyard was anybody’s guess. And why her clothes, or she, or something had made him stop was another question.

  Maybe because she’d cut her hair, and it looked—free. You could even call it “wild,” falling not quite to her shoulders in wavy blonde abandon.

  Unfortunately, she also seemed to have gone round the bend. What he’d thought at first was some kind of bizarre farmyard game was something else. She’d always looked serene before. Sweet. Seriously not his type. Now? She just looked seriously pissed off.

  As he approached, she spat out a string of words that didn’t match her girly pink apron one bit and lunged at one of the two knee-high milk goats that were running crazy patterns around her, bleating up a storm. Three baby goats barely bigger than cats, meanwhile, scampered along the fence separating them from their mothers and took turns jumping straight up in the air and leaping over each other like they were on springs. If goats could be said to be shouting encouragement, that was what the babies were doing. And that wasn’t all. What looked like an entire flock of chickens were running around the enclosure as well, flapping their wings and cackling like maniacs. If it had been a battlefield, it would’ve been one that had turned to custard.