Her Cowboy Avenger (19 page)

They took their time exploring each other’s bodies, until it wasn’t enough. He rolled away and reached for his wallet, pulling a packet from it and covering himself. Then he came back to her.

Elena parted her legs, letting him move between them, wanting him there. Matt positioned himself above her and leaned forward to kiss her again. She breathed in the experience of it, basking in the weight of him above her and between her legs. The tip of his erection nudged insistently against her folds, as though asking for admission. She was more than ready. And when Matt finally thrust into her, she raised her hips to meet him.

The breath caught in her throat as they remained there for an instant, locked together. It was so right. She smiled, unable to believe she’d existed without this, without him for so long, that giddy joy spiraling through her. He smiled back at her, that gorgeous smile he offered far too rarely, that the world seldom got to see. Her heart felt on the verge of bursting, from this moment, from this man, from the beauty of his smile.

They began moving together in perfect rhythm, hips moving apart, finding each other again. Elena wrapped her arms around his neck again, unable to get enough of touching him, needing to feel as much of him as possible. Bracing himself above her on his arms, he drove into her, harder, faster, pushing her to greater, seemingly impossible heights. She stared up into his eyes, watching his face, the emotions flashing across it, the pleasure. As she came closer and closer to the edge, she saw him approach it with her, the tension building in his face, his neck and shoulders. And when she reached it, he was right there with her, looking deep in her eyes at the moment of their release.

And as the waves of her release ebbed away, they left amazement in their wake. Amazement at the rightness of this moment, of having found each other again, of a new beginning she’d never dreamed possible.

Yet here it was.

Here
he
was, back where he belonged.

With her.

Chapter Fourteen

Matt woke to darkness.

Drifting awake, he slowly peeled his eyelids open to peer into the shadows above him. It was night, he registered. The ceiling above him was unfamiliar. So was the bed.

Still, he didn’t have to look to see where he was. He knew. He recognized the feel of the woman at his side, the sweet smell that was uniquely hers, as a deep, warm contentment spread through him at the knowledge.

He was with Elena. Where he belonged. There was nowhere else he ever wanted to be.

His mouth curving in a smile, he lay there and simply basked in the feeling, better than anything he’d ever known. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d ever been this happy. Maybe not since they’d parted ways before, maybe never at all. He breathed in the scent of her, absorbed the thump of her heartbeat from where her body was pressed against him, listened to the soft sound of her breathing.

He didn’t know how he’d survived without this, without her, all this time. He only knew that he couldn’t again. God willing, he would never have to.

He would have loved nothing more than to remain where he was, closing his eyes and drifting back to sleep with this amazing woman curled up beside him. But even as he started to do so, he remembered what had happened last night, and the night before.

He opened his eyes fully once more. It had still been early evening then. Judging from the darkness, it was now much later, well into the night. The time their nasty visitor liked to come out and play.

Hard determination replaced the contentment that had filled him just moments before.

He was going to catch the bastard. He wasn’t getting away with anything tonight.

He should do a check of the grounds. At the very least, he should make sure the house was secure. He couldn’t remember if they’d locked any of the doors, and it was worth checking out. Their troublemaker had been getting bolder. He’d feel a lot better if he knew more definitively that they were safe.

Swallowing a sigh of regret, he eased himself from the bed and quickly dressed. Sitting down to tug his boots on, he glanced back at Elena. The sight of her there, curled up on her side facing him, nearly cracked his resolve and made him crawl back in beside her.

Soon. He’d be back soon enough. In the meantime, he had work to do.

He retrieved the gun he’d placed on the bedside table, keeping it in hand. With one last, lingering look, he headed downstairs.

The house was still and quiet. His footsteps as silent as possible on the hardwood floor, he kept his ears peeled for the slightest noise, the faintest disturbance. He detected nothing as he made his way down the stairs to the front.

He stopped at the front door, checking the lock, giving a perfunctory glance outside through the window. So perfunctory he almost missed seeing it, the shadow at the edge of the barn moving toward the house.

He’d been about to turn away from the door. Instead, he froze, eyes returning to the figure as it crept forward, trying to remain in darkness as much as possible. The figure was dressed in black, a ski mask covering his face.

Triumph surged from deep in Matt’s gut. This was it. He was going to get the guy.

Not about to wait and see what the bastard had in mind, to miss the chance to catch him, Matt quickly considered his options. If he went out the kitchen door and circled around the back, he should be able to get the drop on the person.

But only if he moved quickly.

As soon as he thought it, he sprang into motion, bursting away from the door and racing through the house on the balls of his feet to the back.

Reaching the kitchen door, he slowly pulled it open, careful not to make a sound. When he had it open just wide enough for him to pass through, he slipped through the gap and hurried outside.

It took him less than thirty seconds to make his way around the side of the house to the front. He paused at the corner, carefully looking around the edge to scan for the trespasser.

He instantly spotted him, standing almost in front of the house. The man was looking down, something clutched in his right hand. A glass bottle. In his left he held a lighter, which he started to ignite. Once he had a flame he started lifting it to something dangling out of the mouth of the bottle—

Recognition slammed into Matt.

It was a fire bomb. Which could only mean one thing.

He was planning on throwing it into the house.

No.

Without a second thought, Matt burst from the shadows and charged the bastard, automatically shoving the gun into the back of his waistband with one hand, fighting to outrace the rag’s ignition. At the last second the trespasser must have spotted the motion out of the corner of his eye, jerking his head up in Matt’s direction.

Too late to do anything about it.

Matt crashed into him, locking his arms around the trespasser and knocking him clear off his feet. In the back of his mind, he heard the bottle the man had been holding crash to the ground and break into pieces. The smell of gasoline filled the air.

They landed hard on the ground, rolling away from the odor, tumbling against the packed dirt. The man started to fight him, throwing his arms and knees and his body weight against Matt as best he could. The bastard was strong as hell, Matt had to give him that. Matt fought to keep a hold on him. He finally managed to get on top of the intruder, straddling him with his legs. He pulled back long enough to draw a fist, driving it hard into the man’s masked face. The punch was enough to get the bastard to stop struggling for an instant. Matt drew his fist back again and landed another blow, making the man weaken further. Matt wasted no more time, reaching for the gun he’d shoved at the small of his back and aiming it directly between the intruder’s eyes.

“Stop it,” Matt ordered when the man would have started fighting back again. He cocked the weapon, drawing the intruder’s attention. The bastard froze, eyes slowly focusing on the barrel of the gun less than six inches from his face.

Matt read the calculation in those narrowed eyes. “Go ahead,” he said, satisfaction pulsing through his veins. “You don’t know how badly I want to pull the trigger.”

They stared at each other for a long moment, locked in a silent battle of wills. There was no way Matt was going to blink first.

Finally, the other man relaxed slightly, his eyes reflecting his acknowledgment that he’d been bested—and fury that he had been.

Matt barely restrained a triumphant grin. This wasn’t the time to get cocky. Remembering their battle the night before, he knew how quickly the balance could change. “Now let’s see who the hell you are.”

Reaching down with his free hand, he ripped the mask off, baring the man’s face. He wasn’t at all surprised at what he saw.

As expected, Deputy Travis Gerard glared back at him, his expression mutinous, unrepentant.

It was all Matt could do not to drive his fist into the deputy’s arrogant face one more time. “I should have known you were behind this, you bastard,” he forced out, his jaw tight. Keeping the gun steady, Matt slowly rose, never shifting his aim. Travis never took his eyes from the gun, either.

When Matt was on his feet, he took a couple steps back and away from the man. “Get up,” he ordered.

From the look Travis shot him he was tempted to defy the order just for the hell of it. But he gradually climbed to his feet, taking his time, making a big show of it. When he finally straightened, he brushed some of the dirt off his clothes and stood facing Matt, meeting his eyes.

Matt stared back, his sense of victory quickly dimming as he considered the reality of the situation at hand. Because he hadn’t just caught someone committing a crime on private property. He’d caught a sheriff’s deputy doing it. A sheriff’s deputy in a department that wasn’t going to be inclined to believe anything Matt had to say, that would probably have no problem with his actions or with covering them up.

“So what the hell are you going to do now?” Travis snapped, regaining some of his bravado.

That was the problem. “I haven’t decided,” he said coldly. “If I call the sheriff, he’s not going to believe me, is he? He’ll somehow turn this around on me, probably charge me with assaulting an officer and let you off scot-free, won’t he?” And if he got arrested, Elena would be alone out here, openly vulnerable to whatever attack Travis decided to launch next. Which he would, of course. If he got away with this there’d be nothing holding him back from trying again.

Travis’s smirk said he shared Matt’s analysis—and fully expected everything to unfold as described.

At the sight of the man’s smugness, Matt saw red, nearly hitting his breaking point with this dirtbag and this whole situation. In an instant, all he wanted was to see the bastard squirm.

“Hell, I might as well shoot you then,” Matt said, gratified to see the smirk slowly fade from Travis’s mouth. “If I do, then there’s no way he can turn this around on me. We have you dressed all in black, trespassing here in the middle of the night. I could always claim I didn’t know who you were. Nobody could blame me for shooting some guy who was getting ready to throw a firebomb into the house.”

“You wouldn’t,” Travis challenged, not looking entirely sure about that. “You’d never get away with it.”

“I should,” Matt said. “It’s what you deserve. A firebomb? What the hell were you thinking? She could have been killed!” Travis simply stared back at him, as if Matt wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t already know, or something he couldn’t care less about. “Did you slash her tires in town, too?”

He said nothing, his mouth a tight line, but the glint in his eye looked too much like pride.

“You bastard. Do you have any idea what you’ve put her through?”

“Good. It’s what she deserves.”

“What the hell do you want from her?”

“I want her to confess! I want her to admit what she did. Until she does she doesn’t deserve a moment’s peace. She doesn’t deserve to have a good night’s rest in this house that she damn well doesn’t deserve to own.”

In the wake of his outburst, Travis stood there, chest heaving, face mottled with emotion. But there was more than anger in the man’s words. There was pain, in his face, in his voice, almost like he was on the verge of tears. The man truly believed Elena killed his best friend, practically his brother, Matt acknowledged. He could understand the man’s motives, even if he damn well couldn’t condone his actions.

The best he could do was try to come to some kind of understanding, some way to get him to back off.

“All right. I’m going to tell you this once, Gerard. The sooner you realize this, the sooner you can start figuring out who’s really responsible. Elena did not kill Bobby.”

“Then who the hell did?”

“Maybe if you opened your damn mind and even considered the possibility that someone else is responsible you’d figure it out.”

“You think I haven’t? You think I haven’t considered every single person in this town, thought of every possible reason any one of them would have killed Bobby? I haven’t come up with a damn thing. The only person with a reason, the only person who could have done it is
her.
”

“Just because you haven’t found the answer yet doesn’t mean it’s not there.”

“Or else I’ve already found it.”

“Damn it, Gerard. I can promise you, Elena didn’t kill him.”

“And how do you know that, huh?”

“Because I know her. And you should, too. You should know she’s no killer.”

“Yeah, I know her,” he scoffed. “I know she’s a gold digger who trapped a good man into marrying her when she didn’t even love him. It took him a while to realize it, but Bobby knew it. It used to eat him up. She didn’t love him. He just didn’t know that she was hung up on somebody else. It was you, wasn’t it? All this time. And now you come back here the minute he’s dead, sleeping in his house, with his wife—”

“It’s not like that—” Matt began.

“The hell it’s not!” Travis said. “So don’t tell me she didn’t do it. You don’t tell me a damn thing, because I sure as hell don’t believe a word you say.”