One to Keep

by Sophie Oak

  tears. Something heavy had lifted from her, and it felt good to cry and laugh and just be with these women. It didn’t matter that every tourist in the place was watching them like they were crazy and all the locals were on their cell phones telling the people who weren’t there about

  the waterworks.

  “So Stef is dumb,” Jen said in a rush of joy.

  “Very, very dumb,” Callie agreed with a smile.

  Dumb she could handle. Jen reached out to pick up her cocoa, but

  she met Stella’s hand, and the mug spilled off to the side, dripping to the floor.

  Q was up and running for the door, his big body hitting it with a

  force that sent it flying open. Jen got a glimpse of the dog as he ran through the snow.

  Rachel pointed to the street beyond the window. “We’ve got about

  five minutes before Max gets here. He’s at the feed store. Ever since

  Dennis bought it and turned it into a church on Sundays and started

  only giving discounts to those who attend services, Max has been on

  his ass. Better order him a burger, or better yet, call Zane. He might need a beer.”

  “Don’t worry about it, hon.” Stella got up and started mopping up

  the mess. “Hal keeps a bottle of whiskey in the back. If that doesn’t

  work, we can call the doc. I’ve heard he keeps tranquilizer darts

  around for Mel. I figure they’ll work on Max, too. I like that doctor, I tell you.”

  Stella walked off, her boots clanging lightly on the floor.

  Callie leaned forward, her elbows on the table. “So, you going

  after Stef?”

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  That was the question, wasn’t it? How much did she want him? A

  whole, whole lot, her heart replied. It was pounding at the thought of going another couple of rounds with Stef.

  “I can’t change how old I am.” It was a barrier she would have to

  find a way around.

  Rachel put a hand on her stomach. She looked more peaceful than

  before. “You just have to push him. He’ll get it through that thick

  skull in the end. You’re his woman. You just have to prove it.”

  That, Jen decided, might be easier said than done.

  * * * *

  Alexei had to move quickly to get out of the way of the enormous

  animal that burst from the small diner’s doors. He thought it was a

  dog, but it might have been a small bear. It wasn’t the strangest thing he’d seen this afternoon.

  This was an odd place, but friendly. The people were very

  talkative and open. He’d spent much of the hours since he’d left Ivan

  walking around the town. He’d browsed through the stores with their

  odd combination of ticky-tack tourist merchandise and gorgeously

  made works of art. All around him the mountains climbed their way

  to a gloriously blue sky. Was it any wonder the people here seemed so

  happy? They were surrounded by beauty. He’d found himself

  wandering. Up and down Main Street people were out decorating and

  putting up small booths for the festival that was set to begin the next day. There was a happy hum of energy from the tourists who grabbed

  ski wear and fuzzy socks with bears on them. This was a good place.

  “Hi,” a breathy voice said.

  Alexei looked down at the small woman with dark auburn hair.

  She was petite with a curvy body that had Alexei’s eyes roaming. His

  flare of attraction was shoved aside as he read the tight shirt she was wearing. Stella’s Café.

  His stomach churned as he remembered he had a job to do.

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  “Would you like a booth or a table?”

  His eyes briefly skimmed her name tag. Holly. Holly was a lovely

  woman. Luckily, she was not the woman he was looking for.

  “I will sit at counter, thank you.” He felt a bit weary as he took a

  seat at the counter. He’d briefly forgotten himself. He sent Holly a

  tired smile and ordered a cup of coffee.

  “Anything else?” she asked. Her bright green eyes were wide with

  expectation.

  Alexei found he couldn’t disappoint her. She was sweet, and if

  circumstances had been different, he would try to seduce her. How

  long had it been since he’d taken a nice girl out? Never, he realized.

  His brother had died when he was a teenaged boy. All he had thought

  about since was revenge. As he climbed up through Pushkin’s

  organization, the women he’d had access to had mostly been

  prostitutes or the sort to couple with gangsters. Not a one of them saw past his wallet or his position. Not a one of them had looked at him

  with wide eyes and a truly soft smile.

  “You pick for me?”

  Her head cocked a little to the side, and she bit at her bottom lip,

  causing Alexei to shift uncomfortably in his seat. She was so

  beautiful.

  “Savory or sweet?” Holly asked.

  “Sweet.” Definitely sweet. She would be sweet. She would be

  sweet in his arms. She would make sweet sounds. And her taste, that

  would be sweet, too. He would bury his face between her legs and lap

  up all the sweet cream he would draw from her cunt.

  She clapped her hands together. “Excellent. Stella makes the best

  chocolate pie ever! Be right back.”

  Alexei took a long, deep breath and tried to get his dick under

  control. He was always in control. He was on a mission, and that

  mission had nothing to do with a woman named Holly with soft

  breasts and wavy auburn hair that would look beautiful spread across

  a pillow.

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  There was movement to his left as someone sat down next to him.

  Alexei turned to see a man with reddish hair settling into the last chair left at the counter.

  “Cup of coffee, please?” the man said.

  Alexei sized him up immediately. This man oozed authority.

  There was a hard line to his jaw and a stiffness to his bearing, as

  though he was always ready for something to go wrong, and he would

  be the one to fix it. Alexei knew it well because he saw it, felt it,

  every day.

  “Sure thing, Caleb,” Holly said, turning around. “You need a

  menu or just the regular?”

  And just like that, the man named Caleb turned into a sputtering

  mess. “I…yeah, great. Great. Regular sounds good.”

  Holly shook her head. “I have no idea how you can eat the same

  thing every day, Doc.” She placed a big piece of pie in front of

  Alexei. “There you go, big guy. You make sure you tell me how you

  like that pie. There’s more where that came from, you know.”

  Alexei bet there was. Holly turned, and Alexei admired the way

  her ass looked in a pair of jeans. She was not skinny. Those cheeks of hers were round and curvy. He’d like to get his hands on her.

  He turned to grab some sugar for his coffee. Cold green eyes

  stared right through him. The man named Caleb wore a frown that

  would have intimidated a lesser man. Alexei had sat with a gun at his

  head, not knowing whether he would live or die on more than one

  occasion. He found the man’s jealousy amusing.

  “I am not trying to steal girl,” he assured the man. “But I am not

  blind.”

  “You could be,” Caleb shot back.

  Alexei shrugged. He dug into the pie. Holly had been right. It was


  excellent. “I don’t see ring on her finger.”

  Now the man was staring at his coffee. “I didn’t say she was mine.

  She’s just a nice girl. She doesn’t need some tourist pawing at her.”

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  “I will attempt to keep paws to self, but if you want girl, you

  should take her. She is too lovely to be alone for long.”

  “Thanks for the advice, but I think I can handle it.” Caleb turned

  away, his part in the discussion obviously over.

  The door to the café swung open, and Alexei turned to see two

  boys walk in. They were twins, with dirty blond hair, oversized coats, and hockey sticks. Neither boy looked like he could handle a hockey

  stick. They were slender, with not an ounce of muscle between them.

  They shrugged out of their coats and took a seat in one of the empty

  booths. Their heads sagged as though the weight was too heavy to

  carry. Each boy had sad brown eyes. They stared at the tabletop as

  though it was the only thing in the world.

  Holly set Caleb’s mug in front of him. She was staring at the boys

  as she walked around the counter. She got to one knee, and Alexei

  knew if the booth hadn’t been so close, he wouldn’t have heard her

  soft words.

  “They wouldn’t let you play again, would they?”

  Both heads shook.

  “Little pricks,” Caleb muttered under his breath.

  Alexei was curious enough to risk the man’s wrath. The boys,

  though American and twins, somehow reminded him of himself at

  that age. There was something in the way their heads hung in

  disappointment and the way they clutched those sad hockey sticks.

  “Those young boys?”

  Caleb’s eyes flared as though he’d forgotten he wasn’t alone and

  was pissed to be reminded. He shook his head as though to clear it,

  and his voice got low. “Nah, those are the Farley brothers. They’re

  twelve and flat-out geniuses when it comes to school, but they can’t

  get the boys from the next town to let them into their hockey game. It must be lonely for them. They’re the only kids their age here in

  town.”

  Alexei turned back, and the kids were accepting comfort from

  Holly. An older woman with frothy blonde hair and cowboy boots

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  was serving them hot chocolate and ruffling their hair. They seemed

  like nice kids.

  “They are not picked for team?” Alexei asked. “Perhaps they were

  too many players?”

  “Nah, they’re just not very good,” Caleb said with a little snarl.

  “Those other kids are jerks because they think Will and Bobby are

  nerds. They have genius-level IQs and have photographic memories.

  You know what a nerd is?”

  Alexei searched his brain. “Yes, this is smart person. I do not

  understand why your country does not like the smart persons. In

  Russia, these boys will one day make all the money and get all the

  women. Why does this mean they cannot play hockey? How will they

  get better if no one will let them play?”

  He would never have learned if Mikhail had not taken the time to

  teach him.

  “They won’t,” Caleb replied. His mouth became a stubborn line.

  “I swear, sometimes I’d like to take those other kids by the throat and teach them what it means to be a bully. But I’m not supposed to do

  that anymore.”

  Alexei slapped him on the back as an idea occurred to him. “Then

  we should put your anger to the management.”

  One reddish-brown brow rose. “Excuse me?”

  He searched for the words. Sometimes English was hard. “We

  should teach the boys. If they learn, then they play. No one will call them nerd when they learn to put their asses on other boys.”

  “God, I hope you meant to say put the other boys on their asses,”

  Caleb said with a shake of his head.

  “If that mean to hurt them in an entirely legal fashion, then yes.

  This is what I mean. I am good hockey player. Do you play?”

  “Yeah,” Caleb said, his lips curling up a little. “Actually, that

  sounds like fun. I wouldn’t mind a little practice.” He turned and

  slipped out of his seat. “Holly, can you get us a thermos of coffee?

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  Come on, Bobby and Will, the big Russian guy and I are going to

  teach you how to put the older kids on their asses—I mean butts.”

  Alexei paid his tab quickly and was rewarded with the twins’

  shining faces, and Holly, who looked at him like he was the nicest

  man alive.

  She could never know the things he’d done.

  But maybe he could help a couple of kids out.

  He followed Caleb and the boys out the door just in time to dodge

  two men in cowboy hats running for their lives. The large dog he’d

  seen earlier ran behind them.

  “Sorry, mister,” one of them said. “We gotta move. Our wife’s

  having a baby.”

  His English must be really bad, Alexei decided. It almost sounded

  like they shared a wife. He found that idea entirely entertaining.

  “You coming, mister?” one of the young twins asked.

  “Sure,” he replied and followed his new friends.

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  Chapter Eight

  Stef strode through the double doors of Trio with one thought on

  his mind—get Jen and get home. He’d searched all over the fucking

  town for her. From the moment he’d realized she’d left the house,

  he’d been looking for her. He’d tried Stella’s, where he’d found out

  she’d had lunch with Callie and Rachel. He’d moved on to the

  Trading Post, where Teeny and Marie had admitted they’d talked to

  her for half an hour about everything that had happened in Dallas,

  including her unfortunate incarceration. Marie had made it plain that

  she blamed him. Jen obviously wouldn’t have gotten into trouble if

  he’d had enough of a brain to marry her. Laura Niles at the Stop’n’

  Shop had said roughly the same thing.

  How had she left everyone high and dry, but he was the villain?

  “This place is new, Stefan. It used to be a hardware store.”

  And he’d done all of his roaming with his father riding his ass. He

  wasn’t sure how much worse the day could get.

  “Mr. Weldon died back in ’05, and he didn’t have any kids. The

  place was empty until Callie’s husband decided we needed a bar he

  didn’t almost get murdered in,” Stef said under his breath as he

  looked around the little tavern.

  It was filled to the brim with tourists. Stef wanted to growl when

  he remembered the damn Winter Festival started tomorrow. His brain

  went over all the things he’d promised Callie and Rachel that he

  would help with. It was a lot. He was supposed to host the final

  night’s dinner and call out the raffle prizes. Could he get out of that?

  Shit. Rachel would probably get upset. A stiff wind was all it took to get her crying these days. He was stuck. That was just what he

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  needed, his whole damn town overrun with strangers while he was

  trying to keep an eye on Jennifer. Despite what Nate had said, he

  woul
d feel better when that damn painting turned up.

  “Which husband is that? Nathan, or the large, ill-tempered

  character?” His father glanced around the place with the same

  enthusiasm he’d shown all day.

  Yeah, that was a good way to describe Zane Hollister. “It was the

  big one, Dad.”

  His father’s brows came together in a concerned V. “And you say

  that Maxwell and Ryan are involved with a single female as well?”

  “Yes,” Stefan replied shortly. After the incident he’d started to

  mentally refer to as Anal Plug Armageddon, his father had all kinds of questions about the relationships in Bliss. He’d been shocked to

  discover that ménage was rapidly becoming a way of life in the little

  mountain town.

  “But you aren’t sharing Jennifer with someone, are you?”

  Stef felt his face flush. He reminded himself that he was thirty-

  two years old, independently wealthy, respected in the art world, and

  responsible for himself. So why did talking to his father about sex

  make him feel like he was an eleven-year-old boy who had just gotten

  caught with a Playboy? Of course, he allowed, when he’d gotten caught with a Playboy, it had been by Stella, who’d given him a stern lecture about respecting women and taken it away. Max and Rye had

  been so pissed off because it was the only one they had. Two days

  later, Mel had replaced it. He’d given Stef a lecture, too, to always make sure the women in his pornography were humans.

  He had to contain a laugh at the memory. “No, Dad. I’m not even

  dating Jennifer, much less passing her around to my friends.”

  And he wouldn’t. Not ever. He loved Max and Rye like brothers.

  He felt the same way about Nate, and he’d gotten to where he was

  rather fond of that Neanderthal, Zane. But he would never understand

  how they could share the woman they loved.

  And he didn’t love her.

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  A soft, twinkling laugh flitted through the bar. There were so

  many people talking and laughing, but that one sound had all of Stef’s attention. He could pick Jennifer’s laughter out of a crowd of a

  hundred thousand.

  His father pulled at his coat sleeve. “So you just tie her up? You