Luke: Armed and Dangerous (23 page)

She slipped away into her own bedroom, locked the door behind her, then stripped off
her soiled clothing and tossed it all into the hamper in the adjoining bathroom. While
she ran the shower until the room filled with steam, memories of her wild evening
with Luke continued to scroll through her mind.

Gripes.

No doubt she was becoming some kind of sex fiend. That’s all she’d been able to think
about from the moment she’d met Luke. Not to mention that tonight she’d gotten off
by knowing Skylar had watched them.

Water pelted Trinity’s skin as she climbed into the shower, the warmth chasing away
the sweat of exercise and sex. From head to toe her muscles had the pleasant ache
of being well used and sweetly tender, all over her body. Even her ass felt different—like
she missed Luke’s cock there, too.

The comforting smell of her peach-scented shampoo filled her senses as she squirted
a generous dollop into her hand and then washed her hair. When she rinsed it out,
streams of lather flowed over her sensitized breasts and nipples, down her flat belly,
and over her mound. Traveling over her like Luke’s hands had.

She hadn’t been entirely honest with him about wanting to face Skylar alone. Once
she was away from the heat of the moment, away from her need to have him inside and
his arms around her, fear had started to replace the desire. She needed space away
from him, needed time to think about the future, everything.

What if she was pregnant? She definitely wasn’t ready to be a mother. Luke claimed
he wasn’t about to let her go, but was that what she wanted?

He was still a cowboy for goodness sake. What would they do? Live here on her sister’s
ranch and raise a passel of kids? Not that he’d asked her to marry him, but what if
he did... would she be expected to be a good little ranch wife who cooked dinner for
her man?

Okay, so that was a bit stereotypical. Trinity had to smile at her own generalization.
She knew plenty of women ranchers, like her own sister, who ran an entire ranch operation
on their own, or side by side with their men. Heck, on the other side of the mountain
she knew of two women who ran their ranch together, as partners in every way. Renee
Duarte and Shannon Hanes had one of the most profitable operations in the county.

Closing her eyes, Trinity turned her face to the water, letting it splash over her
forehead and down her face. She’d worked so hard to get to a position like she’d accepted
with DropCaps. Four years of busting her ass, working countless hours to rise to the
top, and she had the job she wanted now. Her perfect dream job. Staying in Douglas—it
would be hard to keep her position, so far away from the main hubs of activity in
the company.

She’d already made one monumental decision and had walked away from the caring man
she’d dated for the past two years. Tossed that relationship right out the door. She’d
left security and her comfortable world and headed straight into the wilds and the
unknown.

What, am I insane?

With a groan Trinity opened her eyes, grabbed the luffa sponge and squirted peaches-and-cream-scented
shower gel on the pad. As she scrubbed her body, thoughts of Luke tried to push aside
her doubts and fears. Memories of how he’d touched her, how he’d filled her.

Was sex enough?

Yet it wasn’t just sex that attracted her to Luke, or the way he looked at her and
made her feel as though she was the most important thing in the world to him. Since
she’d been at the ranch, she’d taken what opportunities she could to watch him interact
with the other ranch hands, observe his leadership and fairness. And even though he’d
been mad as hell at the arsonist, she’d seen the concern in his eyes for her the night
the barn was set on fire.

But was that enough foundation to begin building a relationship? And was it worth
leaving everything that she’d worked so hard for?

No matter how she tried to fight it, though, Trinity knew she was falling in love
with one cowboy named Luke Rider. What she was going to do about it...

At this moment she didn’t have a clue.

***

After Luke walked Trinity to the front door of the ranch house, he headed straight
to his cabin. If his quarters weren’t so close to the bunkhouse where the half-dozen
ranch hands lived, Luke would have hauled Trinity out here with him and kept her all
night long.

Course the night wasn’t over yet.

When he faded into the darkness, out of sight from the house, Luke stopped and quickly
retrieved the small firearm from the top of his boot. Even though he couldn’t stop
thinking about his woman, he wasn’t so far gone that he would fail to ensure his building
and surroundings were secure.

With practiced skill he listened for any unusual sounds, but all he heard was the
faint creak of his leather chaps and the light brush of his boots over dirt as he
continued toward his cabin and up to the front door.

As he checked to make sure his cabin hadn’t been entered since he’d left that morning,
an impression in the dirt by his doorstep caught his trained eye. After a quick glance
around, his senses on full alert, he examined the print.

Easily about the size of a woman’s booted foot, but a little larger than Trinity’s
or Skylar’s, he’d wager. He frowned as he dug his key out of his front pocket and
checked the thin strip of paper he’d lodged between the door and the frame, close
to the threshold. Still there, so likely no one had been in his place. Who the hell
had been snooping around his cabin, and why?

After he’d done a quick sweep of the apartment and locked the door, Luke yanked his
cell phone out of his pocket and dialed his partner.

“Rios,” the man answered after one ring.

“Denver here.” Luke ambled into the kitchenette as he spoke. “I’m going on a field
trip tomorrow. It’s mostly personal—for pleasure—but there’s a cave I want to check
out in the mountains behind the Flying M.”

“Yeah?” Rios said over the whinny of a horse. The man must be doing some fieldwork.

With his free hand, Luke yanked open the fridge and grabbed the carton of milk. “Got
a gut feeling we’re getting close to something again. Maybe right on top of it.”

“Yeah, well, we’re definitely on top of something with your friend Gina Garcia. Get
with me tomorrow, so we can go over everything that’s come in. And watch your ass,
Denver.”

As Luke popped his phone shut, he slammed the carton onto the counter and let the
fridge close.

Gina Garcia came out of the darkness behind the refrigerator door like a blond avenging
angel, only she wasn’t carrying a flaming sword. She had a Ruger SR9, 9 millimeter,
and she had it gripped in both hands, aimed like she knew how to use it.

Luke let go of the carton on the counter and raised his arms enough to show her he
wasn’t carrying. He was pissed as hell that she got the drop on him just like her
brother. Only, Gina Garcia and her pistol looked a lot more serious about causing
him pain than Brad Taylor had been.

“I thought my brother asked you to stop digging around in my life, Luke Denver.” The
sarcasm in Gina’s tone was unmistakable, and the pistol in her grip didn’t so much
as wobble. “I should have known you’re law enforcement. What are you? Fibbie? ICE?”

Luke kept his arms up. She’d heard him talking to Rios. No reason to bullshit now.
“DEA.”

Gina’s expression stayed flat and deadly. “It’s all the same to me. You and your partner
made inquiries about my past.”

Luke leaned against the counter slowly, careful not to give the woman any reason to
pull that oh-so-sensitive trigger. “How do you know that?”

“Because a friend called me to give me fair warning.” Her green eyes went from furious
to something like tired. “Cruz Rios got the scoop on me—and I’m figuring you’ll meet
with him tomorrow to find out the juicy details. Want to know what you’ll learn?”

Luke didn’t say a word.

Gina was about to tell him what she wanted him to know, and as long as she kept talking,
he kept breathing. Sometimes, the little victories mattered the most.

“You’re gonna find out that I was young and stupid and impressed with bad boys, so
I married one.” Her accent got a little rougher, a little more northeast as she went.
“I hooked up with a man who killed people for money, only I didn’t find that out until
Lola’s sixth birthday. I barely got out of New York City alive, and now, thanks to
you, the fucker I ran away from has a pretty good idea where I am—and worse, where
Lola is. I should shoot you for that. I should shoot you right between the eyes.”

Luke couldn’t argue that point with her, if what she said was true. “All we did was
check around under your real identity.”

“You sent an inquiry that went to New York and then to New Jersey where I’m from.
When it hit Jersey, the FBI field office handled it as a favor.” Gina sounded sure
of her information, and that tiredness he had sensed in her eyes, came through in
her tone, too. “Because all inquiries involving my name get routed there. Want to
guess why?”

A sinking feeling made Luke lower his arms, but not too much. “Your ex is FBI, and
he has a trap and tracer on your name?”

Gina’s laugh made his heart hurt. No humor in it. Only animals in pain made that kind
of sound.

“My ex is James Scorcise,” she said. “He’s a made man in the Cordano crime syndicate,
and yeah, he’s FBI. The mob infiltrates you assholes just like you infiltrate them—so
now maybe you’re getting it. I’ve got nobody to protect me, and you just fucked up
any chance I had at some peace in this place.”

“Let me get you and Lola out of town. At least let me give you some contacts to help
you before you blow my head off.” He felt like shit over this. He really did. “Can’t
say as I’d blame you for it, and I mean that.”

Gina started to cry—not sobbing or sniffling. Just angry, frightened tears, sliding
down her cheeks as her grip on her gun seemed to become surer. “I don’t want your
contacts, and I don’t want to shoot you any more than my brother did. I just want
you to understand—things aren’t always what they seem.”

Luke tried to think fast, to figure out why Gina had come here, if it wasn’t to kill
him for wrecking her life. “Did you set Skylar’s barn on fire to try to get my attention
or make your point?”

Gina thrust the pistol closer to him, and her tears flowed faster. “I haven’t done
anything to Skylar or the Flying M, and I never would.”

“Sorry. Had to ask.” He had his arms down now, but he gripped the counter behind them
to keep his hands in plain view. “There’s a lot going on in Douglas.”

“Look after Brad. I’ll get in touch with him once I’m settled somewhere, but we won’t
be able to see each other for a while.” She was keeping Luke sited, had the barrel
aimed right at the sweet spot where his heart thumped—steadily for now. “Brad’s in
a mess there at Fenning’s. You want to make this up to me, get him out of it, and
get him out of it clean. I don’t want to be calling my brother in jail. He’s all I’ve
got.”

Now they were getting to it. She did want something from him—maybe even something
he could give her. Luke risked folding his arms to give his chest a little cover,
and Gina didn’t squeeze her trigger.

“What’s going on at Fenning’s?” he asked.

“If you’re hoping I can hand you Guerrero, keep dreaming.” She blinked her slowing
tears out of her eyes, leaned back, and rested her shoulder blades against the cabin’s
kitchen wall, near the slot between the refrigerator and the wall where she’d probably
been hiding when he got home. “Fenning got lit on the anniversary of his wife’s death
and blew away an illegal he caught sneaking across his front yard. Stuffed the body
in his meat locker, then sawed it up and left it there. Brad found out about it a
few weeks after it happened, and he helped the old man get rid of the body.”

Trinity’s analysis was dead on target, Luke thought, then didn’t like his own word
choice. “That could be a problem for your brother, but it’s something we can work
with.”

Gina’s face reflected a little relief. “Brad doesn’t want anything to happen to the
old guy, and he didn’t want anything to disrupt us here in Douglas, but it’s more
than that. Fenning’s children won’t want to keep the ranch—and who do you think will
be waiting to buy it, just like he bought Zappati’s?”

Luke had felt some respect for Gina before, and what she must have gone through to
get her daughter out of danger. That respect increased as he realized her grasp of
the situation in Douglas.

“Guerrero,” he said, because all the bullshit in town, one way or the other, came
back to that smooth-talking asshole.

“If you’re planning to take down Fenning, you better damned sure have a play ready
to keep the land out of that drug lord bastard’s hands, or Douglas will be screwed
even worse than it already is.” Gina’s tone suggested she hated Guerrero as much as
everyone else, and Luke realized he probably reminded her of everything she had fled
in New Jersey and New York City.

And as long as she was talking—

“Do you know anything about competition for Guerrero, encroaching on most of the Douglas
and Bisbee areas—or where Guerrero’s moving his product?”

Gina flexed her elbows without changing her pistol’s position, but she didn’t have
Luke sited anymore. “I don’t, but I’d wager Joyce Butler does. She was hot for that
deputy who went down in the rustling scheme—what was his name—Woods?”

Luke nodded, then felt a wash of relief as Gina finally lowered her Ruger. She kept
the grip in both hands, and he didn’t make any moves.

“At some point, my husband will show up here searching for me,” Gina said. “If I were
you, I’d stay as far away from him as you can get. Tell your friends in local law
enforcement. I don’t want—” She let out a small, pained sigh. “I don’t want any more
blood on my hands.”

Luke met her gaze, noting the fresh tears trying to push out of her green eyes. “Are
you sure you won’t let me give you some names? I know some honest men, Gina. I’m an
honest man.”