Текст книги "Burn It Up"

Автор книги: Cara McKenna

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 24 страниц)

“Casey.” She held him tight and shut her eyes, lost to it—a rushing, rising force, as startling as it was pleasurable. It came to a head at the point where his hard cock stroked her seam, dropped her from the sky and back into her body. She came down breathing hard. Panting. Shocked and exhilarated and thrilled.

Her nails were dug into his skin and she let him go in an instant. “Sorry.” Shame chased the pleasure as the dusk chased the day—inevitably, inextricably.

“Don’t be sorry. Did you . . . ?”

“Yeah,” she murmured, barely able to believe it. “Yeah, I did.”

“Awesome.”

She laughed, feeling tipsy now. Like the orgasm had been a shot of something strong, leaving a warm buzz in her muscles and her head. Even as a very young, deeply religious girl, she’d had a hard time believing God had made her body capable of feeling this good, only to proclaim it a sin. “I just need a minute.” A minute for the burn of the shame to mellow, and a minute for her clit to recover enough for Casey to continue.

But for now . . . “Here.” She reached between them, and Casey scooted up, straddling her thighs so she could clasp him. He groaned as her fingers closed around him, his hips jerking. She pumped him slowly in her fist.

“Fuck, that feels good. Little tighter.”

She gave him that, trying to ignore an ugly pang as her brain fixated on that word once again. It didn’t warrant dwelling on. She turned her focus to this moment, to watching his excitement mount.

“Could you . . .” He trailed off, looking lost to the pleasure.

“Anything,” she prompted.

“Spit in your hand,” he said. “I want to imagine it.”

Imagine us actually having sex, she thought as she wet her palm. She slicked it along his shaft, then again. The rubbing became gliding, and she didn’t know how anything could ever feel even half as intimate as this.

He put his hand over hers, speeding her touch. Showed her what he liked, curling her fingers around him just under his crown, working him in tight, short pulls. “Like that. Exactly like that.”

She shivered at those words, excited all over again.

“Feels fucking amazing, honey. Don’t stop.”

“I could use my mouth . . .”

“No, no. Just like this. I’m so close.”

“Good.”

“Say my name,” he murmured, eyes shut.

“Casey.”

“Yeah.”

She drew him down by the shoulder, said it again, and again, whispered it against his neck and kissed him there. She bet he was noisy in bed, normally—right now it seemed it was all he could do to keep his mouth shut. Every grunt and groan came out muffled and wild, a barrage of moans and hisses.

“Fuck,” he whispered. “I’m gonna come. Don’t stop.”

“I won’t.”

“Say my name.”

She raked his earlobe softly with her teeth, then said it, right there.

“Fuck.”

His hips were bucking into her grip. He was there. She tugged her top up to her bust, held him against her belly as he came—a long, warm, body-wringing release. She could feel his cock throbbing in her grip, then softening, spent. He was panting like he’d just fled a burning building, pulse thumping a million miles a minute against her palm.

“Jesus.”

She smiled. “Good?”

“Fucking unbelievable.”

He took a long moment to come down, then moved to the side, seeming to scout for something to tidy her with.

“My towel,” she said, and pointed to where it hung on the doorknob. She admired his naked back and butt and legs as he crossed the room, and hid a smile when he returned, holding the towel in front of him, wary eyes on the crib.

Abilene cleaned herself up and gratefully pulled her shirt back over her belly. Once Casey was under the covers, he urged her to face him, both on their sides.

“Hi,” he whispered, smiling.

“Hi, yourself.”

“You okay?”

Now, there was an understatement. “I didn’t . . . I didn’t know I could still do that. Get there.” And so easily. Orgasms had never come easy to Abilene. She’d had sex well before she’d ever attempted to touch herself, and could never bring herself to give a man instructions. Casey, though . . . He hadn’t needed any, but she also bet he’d take them, and eagerly. She could imagine finding the nerve to do that—to tell him faster, or slower, or harder, or deeper. Could imagine him taking the orders with pure excitement in his blue eyes.

“Well,” he said, smiling, “you did. You got there.”

“It’s been a long time.”

“Been a long time since I got to do that for a woman,” he countered.

She studied his face. “Really?”

He nodded, the pillow scrunching his beard.

She narrowed her eyes, intrigued. “How long, exactly?”

He laughed. “Ages, it feels like. Since last spring.”

“That’s the last time you dated anybody?”

“Well, no. I was seeing someone right before I moved back here, but . . . Jesus, you don’t want to hear about my exes.”

She bit her lip, grinning, and poked his chest. “Of course I do.”

“Liar. Chicks only say that to get you to talk; then they find something to hold against you for the rest of eternity.”

“Casey, you’re here because my ex is a violent gunrunner. You really think I’ll be all that scandalized?”

He smiled at that. “Fair point.”

“So tell me. Just about the last one.”

“She was . . . She was a little weird. Actually, all my exes are at least half-crazy. This one never let me get her naked or even touch her, really. It was just, like, making out and blow jobs for two or three months.”

“That is a little weird.”

“Anyhow, that made it extra nice to get you off, just now. Feels like way too long since I’ve gotten to do that. Since I got to give something, after feeling like I was getting spoiled, never allowed to reciprocate.”

She felt a blush blooming at that. “Felt real nice to me, too.”

He scooted closer, close enough for the tips of their noses to touch. “You know I’d do more, if you wanted. Give you my mouth, if you like that.”

Oh, now she was blushing. “Maybe. Sometime.” She turned over, letting him spoon her. “Promise me something,” she whispered, twining her fingers with his at her belly.

“Sure.”

“Sleep here later, with me. Just for tonight.”

A breath, and then, “Of course.”

“It doesn’t have to mean anything. I just need that. Just this once.” The orgasm had been a shock, not a need. A pleasant surprise, but not a primal craving, like the way she wanted his body pressed to hers through the night.

She felt his lips and the tip of his nose against the nape of her neck, his warm exhalation. “Whatever you need.”

Just for one night, let her fall back on her old ways. Let her fall apart, need a man, use her body to keep his close. Just one night.

Tomorrow, she’d be stronger.

Tomorrow, she’d leave her old ways behind for good.

Chapter 11

Miah slid his rifle out from behind his driver’s seat and strapped it across his back, slammed the truck’s door in the icy night air.

“That’ll do, King,” he told his dog. She leapt from the bed, paused for a quick scratch behind the ears, then trotted off behind the farmhouse in search of a late dinner.

Miah’s own stomach rumbled at the thought. His entire day had been thrown off by an unexpected visitor—a high-pressure rep from a large property management company, calling with an impressive buyout offer for the ranch. It wasn’t the first they’d received since talk of the casino had begun, but it had by far been the largest, and its pitch the most aggressive.

Miah had been at the house grabbing lunch, and his dad had called him into the office, the impromptu meeting having just begun. It had been a hard sell, to say the least, and the prick had done his research. He knew the cattle market had been lousy, and the weather worse. He knew exactly what to say to get every last one of Miah’s nerves up and humming, every last worry that kept him up late rising to the surface. “If recent annual rainfall continues at its current trend, you’ll be looking at a full-on, extended drought in the next three years. That really how your family wants to go out? The slow and painful way? Now, I’ve got an offer here that no sane man would be too proud to pass up. Get out while the getting’s good, as they say.”

His offer had been obscene, but at the end of the day, the guy had wasted his own time. Generous figures or not, even in the midst of a nasty rough patch, the Churches would never sell. Three C had faced the Depression and the recent recession, a thousand fluctuations of the market, the encroaching threat of foreign-raised beef, dry season upon record dry season, and come out on top through it all. Granted, the last year had been brutal, and the books hadn’t looked this grim in a decade or more. But that was the nature of the beast, and it’d take a real blow to ruin them. A multiyear drought, a sustained drop in the market. They might currently be one of the biggest businesses in Brush County, but they were still modest compared to the industrial operations. They weren’t invincible, but they also weren’t going anyplace, thanks very much. He and his dad had shared a good eye roll at the rep’s expense after he’d been seen to the door.

Though his dad had seemed to shrug it off as bluster and brass, Miah didn’t shake his own feelings so readily. He felt upended, if he was honest, and unsettled by the guy’s pitch. There’d been something edgy behind the slick sales-speak, something jagged and a touch threatening. Then again, that could be fatigue making him paranoid. He hadn’t been sleeping well lately, between the business worries and the Ware situation.

That little interruption had turned Miah’s sit-down lunch plans into a hasty scarfing of leftovers at the kitchen sink. He’d meant to grab something between finishing up the day’s work and going out on a patrol, but then one of the hands had hurt herself and been driven to the clinic by yet another worker, so he’d filled in, helping the others get the horses bedded down for the night. He still smelled like the stables now, in fact, and a hot shower was next on his priority list, after food.

He pocketed his keys and headed for the front steps. The porch light came on when he triggered the sensor, and he froze at the sound of scuffing, just around the edge of the house.

That was no animal. That noise was shoes on gravel, no mistaking it.

He slid his rifle around, perched it on his shoulder. No need to cock the thing just yet—could be a ranch hand or just his dad puttering. “Who’s there?” he called, edging back down the steps.

No words answered him, but instead the thumping of feet on dirt.

He bellowed “King!” and took off running himself.

It was a man—already half-lost to the dark, but definitely a man—tallish, dressed in black, face obscured by a ski mask. He all but hurdled the low wooden fence that enclosed the front lot, boots pounding down the highway shoulder.

“Stop!”

If anything, the guy ran faster. He had a fifty-pace lead or more, and Miah wasn’t gaining any ground, rifle banging him in the ribs.

“Stop or I sic my goddamn dog on you!”

The guy kept on running, and Miah couldn’t risk slowing down long enough to fire a warning shot.

In the distance, taillights broke the darkness. Shit. There were no streetlights out here, but the glow from the lot was just strong enough to reach the bumper. Though son of a bitch—the license plate was nothing but flat gray. Fucking duct tape.

The truck peeled away and screamed off westward, back toward town. Miah scrabbled to a halt, shouldered the .22 again, but his dog shot out from behind him. He couldn’t risk it. His entire body was heaving from the sprint, anyhow. He slung the rifle back around his body and swore, then whistled.

King came trotting over. “That’ll do, girl. Bit too slow, sadly.” They walked back toward the house.

“Miah?” It was his mother, calling from the porch.

“Yeah. Hang on.” The winter air burned his rushing lungs, and the adrenaline was pulsing through his head, bringing an ache to his temples.

“What was all that yelling?” she asked as he hopped the fence.

“There was somebody skulking around the side of the house.”

“What?”

“A man. I chased him, but he got away. Had a truck parked down the road.”

Her eyes widened. “A truck? A black one?”

“Maybe. Tough to tell, but dark, in any case. Why?”

“Shit.” She wasn’t usually one to curse. “Abilene’s ex—he drives a black truck. Casey had a run-in with him this evening. He just said.”

Shit indeed.

“Guess he found out where she’s staying.” Miah mounted the front steps. His mom turned for the door, but he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder. She turned back around.

“You think we should tell her?” he asked.

She glanced down the road, worry creasing her brow. “Better she be scared than left in the dark.”

He nodded. “Goddamn shame, though—she barely gets any sleep as it is.”

“Tell your dad to turn the security cameras back on.” Three C had about two dozen of them positioned around the house and stables and barns, as well as out on the range, for catching burglars and poachers alike. They rarely kept the ones near the buildings on. Waste of electricity and computer space; their threats usually came from four-legged predators, and more recently from those suspected drug dealers, two demographics who preferred the vast anonymity of the badlands.

“Good idea.”

“Shall I talk to her?” his mom asked.

He shook his head. “Nah, I can. Ought to describe what I saw, anyhow. Ask Case if the truck sounds like Ware’s.”

She propped the door wide and he passed by, stepping inside. First things first, he stowed his rifle and got his dad up to speed, then went to the kitchen, where his mom was finishing loading the washer.

“You know where Abilene is?” he asked, shutting the fridge and twisting open a longneck. Christ knew he could stand a drink just now. He’d been hoping to cap off a long-ass day in front of the fire, put his feet up, nurse this beer with nothing on his mind except how good his bed would feel under his achy back. It was one drama after another today.

“Den,” she said.

“Thanks.”

He’d expected to find Casey there with her and to find the both of them on high alert from the shouting, but instead it was just Abilene, sitting cross-legged on the couch. The baby was nestled on a blanket between her thighs, nursing a bottle of its own. She looked up and smiled. “Hey.”

“Hey, yourself.” He sat on the coffee table, facing her. “You hear all that commotion just now?”

Her brow furrowed. “No. What happened?”

“Where’s Case?”

“Upstairs bathroom.”

The man appeared just then, on the landing above.

“We have a little situation,” Miah told the both of them.

Casey’s expression darkened and he jogged down the steps. “What do you mean?”

“Ware was just here.”

His blue eyes widened, hands curling into fists at his sides. “What?”

“I didn’t talk to him—didn’t even see his face. But somebody was creeping around the side of the house when I pulled up. I chased the guy but couldn’t catch him. He was white—I saw his hands when he jumped the fence. And he was driving a truck with the plate taped over.”

“Black truck?” Casey asked. “A Ram, maybe? I ran into him this afternoon, but I was too busy memorizing his plate number to catch the make. Sounds like I shouldn’t have bothered.”

“It was dark, for sure. Older. Not a Ford—that’s all I could tell you.”

“I can’t remember what brand it was,” Abilene said. “But it wasn’t new. And it wasn’t big, not like your truck,” she said to Miah.

“This was midsized. Probably mid-nineties.”

“Who the fuck else is it going to be?” Casey asked grimly, then paused, glancing at the baby. “Sorry.”

“He’d parked a hundred or more yards down the highway,” Miah went on. “By the time I ran back to my truck and got it on the road, he’d have gotten far enough to disappear down the residential streets. I just wish I could’ve taken a shot at his tires, but my dog was in the way.” He sighed, pissed and tired and frustrated, and took a drink deep enough to drain half his bottle.

“I can’t believe he’d have the gall to come here,” Casey said. “Not after I gave him a perfectly reasonable way to get in touch.”

“Guess the man isn’t the perfectly reasonable type,” Miah offered, then looked to Abilene for confirmation.

“He is and he isn’t,” she said. “I mean, when things were good between us, he was pretty rational. But he can get mad, too, and when that happens I couldn’t say where his head goes.”

“One too many drinks wouldn’t help matters, either.”

“He was never a drinker.”

“Maybe not, but the man’s been stewing in prison,” Casey said. “And I’m guessing he doesn’t like doing things on another man’s terms. What I fu—frigging want to know, though, is who told him where to find her. Who knew, and who’d tell? It was Dancer who told him to see me, but who would’ve told him Abilene was staying here?”

“Just about anybody might, if threatened,” Miah said. “I’ll ask all my hands tomorrow. They could’ve easily run into him at the bar. They were all told it was strictly confidential, her staying here, but threats are threats.”

“Duncan wouldn’t have told,” Abilene said. “Or Raina.”

Miah shook his head. Much as he loathed Welch, the guy was too stubborn and pompous to let anyone bully him into doing anything. And Raina would no doubt whip her shotgun out from under the counter the second somebody got pushy. No, one of the ranch hands was the most likely source. Miah just hoped if that was the case, the party in question would have the balls to own it. They were good kids, but they were young, most of them, still prone to self-preservation above most things.

“I guess in the end,” he said through a sigh, “it doesn’t really matter who told him. He knows now, and what we need to figure out is, do we need to move you two again?” He nodded to Abilene and the baby.

She looked stricken in a breath. “No.”

Casey’s expression was grim. “This is still the most secure place in town. I mean, I can’t keep them at mine—I live on the main drag. Everybody would know inside an hour. Same as the motel. Plus she’s got your parents’ support here, not to mention there’s cameras. The only other option might be to take her out of Fortuity.”

Miah nodded, thinking maybe that would be best. Abilene’s safety was paramount, no doubt, but he did have a business and his employees to think about, as well. Hell, the thought of Ware returning and threatening his mom had his blood boiling.

“Talking to Ware is still the most direct route to getting this shit resolved,” Casey went on. “I sure wish I’d taken down his goddamn number when I gave him mine.”

“Could he have the same one from before he went downstate?” Miah asked, looking to Abilene.

She shrugged. “Even if he did, I don’t have it anymore.”

“Vince might,” Casey said.

“Maybe.” But doubtful. The men had met in prison and spoken only during visiting hours these past few months. As unlikely as the prospect now seemed, they might just have to wait for Ware to call, or else go in search of him around town.

“One good thing,” Casey offered, “is that he didn’t appear armed, right? He ran. Didn’t pull anything on you.”

Miah nodded. “That’s true.” Maybe Ware hadn’t come with entirely malicious intent; perhaps merely with a stalker’s agenda, wanting to confirm that Abilene was indeed at the ranch. With her car in the shop, spotting her through a window would be the man’s only chance to do so. Still, no rational person could look at this situation and tell himself that stalking was the best course of action. Hell, the psycho could’ve fucking knocked.

“My dad’s going to get the security cameras turned back on tonight,” Miah told Abilene. “They’re hooked up to motion-sensor lights, but don’t panic if it goes bright outside in the middle of the night—could easily be the barn cats or a coyote or any other thing. Just tell me or Case and we’ll go out and investigate. Okay?”

“Sounds good.” Sounds terrifying, her expression corrected.

“Anyhow, not much we can do for the moment.”

“Except wait for him to call,” Casey said.

Miah nodded. “Yeah. There’s always that.”

Casey eyed Miah’s beer. “You done with work for the night?”

“Believe it or not.”

“Would you do me a favor? Hang with these two for ten minutes while I grab a shower?”

“Sure. And I checked with my dad—I can handle things here in the morning while you run your errands.” Casey had texted that afternoon to ask about it. “Only until about eight, though.”

“That’s fine—I just need to catch Vince before he goes to work, then swing by the post office. Thanks. And for this shower,” he added. “It’s in everybody’s best interest, I promise.” He grabbed his bag from beside the couch and headed back upstairs to the guest wing, leaving Miah alone with the ladies.

He couldn’t help but notice the way Abilene’s gaze followed Casey up the steps, and prayed it was innocent apprehension at watching her bodyguard disappearing out of sight. He loved his friend, but the last thing this girl needed was to develop feelings for Fortuity’s prodigal son. Kid had come a long way since he’d skipped town, and he was a step up from James Ware, no doubt, but he wasn’t exactly ready to take on the commitment this girl would require.

Still, far be it from Miah to tell anybody how to conduct their love lives.

I’ll do my damnedest to keep her safe from one criminal, but if she’s got it bad for Casey, that’s straight-up above my pay grade.

•   •   •

At five thirty the next morning, Casey woke to the buzz of his cell in his jeans pocket.

He was in Abilene’s bed, and he’d worn pants to sleep for two very good reasons—so his phone’s alarm wouldn’t wake anybody, and so he wouldn’t get any more reckless ideas, pressed up against the girl in his shorts. And he was pressed up against her. Had been all night, except for when the opposite had been true, and she’d been hugging her warm body to his back, her breasts pressing gently with every breath. She’d dropped off the second they’d settled in, but Casey had probably lain there for two hours, caught in a calm persuasion of restlessness, pinned as always, lately, in some territory that lay between protective and horny. And since he’d run into Ware, the former seemed to have only ignited the latter. Still, no time to panic about what had gone down, this time—they’d both agreed, it was what it was, and nothing more. He’d made her absolutely zero promises, so he had no worries about breaking any. Plus overthinking it all was a luxury he didn’t have this morning.

He eased the covers away, slid his arm out from under hers. February had never felt so damn cold as it did just now, leaving this bed.

Thirty minutes later, he was parking his bike a couple blocks down the street from his mom’s house. Maybe it was naive, his hoping Ware didn’t already know where his family lived, but why take the chance?

He didn’t like this feeling. He’d experienced plenty of paranoia in his old line of work, but back then it had come bundled up with adrenaline. It had been pleasurable, in a way, that fear of getting caught. But there was too much at stake now, way more than just his own skin.

He grabbed the LifeMap package out of his cargo box and walked up the road.

Vince left for work at six thirty, so the kitchen light was on, predictably. Casey knocked at the side door and Vince pulled it in, nodding a greeting.

“Morning, cocksucker. Ready to get swabbed?” Casey heard the TV droning in the den, and no surprise—his mom was up at five and asleep by nine, every goddamn day like a rule of physics. Kim must’ve still been in bed.

Vince eyed the box as Casey opened it and set three clear cups on the kitchen table. Kind of like extra-narrow prescription bottles, with a plastic-sealed, one-ended Q-tip-looking thing inside, and a label printed with a barcode and each of their first names—Casey, Vincent, Deirdre.

“What’s this going to entail, exactly?” Vince asked.

Casey pulled out the instructions and read them aloud. “Remove swab from sleeve. Rinse mouth with warm water before collecting sample. Swab the inside of one cheek with firm, up-and-down motions. Close swab inside provided cup immediately. One sample per cup only,” he read aggressively, the final step set in all caps.

“Easy enough,” Vince said, and the two of them swished their mouths out at the sink. The whole thing was done inside a minute.

“Cool. Now just sign this paper,” Casey said, finding the form with Vince’s name at the top.

He considered asking Vince to walk their mom through the paperwork and the swab, but he knew deep down that was cowardly, so he gathered the form and the cup and a glass of water and headed for the den.

Sure as the sun rising, she was awake, glued to an infomercial. Or to the glow of the screen, anyhow—only God knew if she was actually retaining any of what was flashing by.

“Morning, Mom. You sleep okay?”

Her gaze moved slowly to his face. Here was where things turned either heartwarming or heartbreaking—fifty-fifty chance, lately.

“Good morning,” she said slowly, and finally added, “Casey.”

A wave of relief rolled through him at that. More and more, she recognized him. It was progress you couldn’t discount, not when the first time she’d seen him after he’d come back to town, she’d shot him in the leg, thinking he was a burglar.

“Can you do me a favor, Mom? It’ll only take a minute.”

“Oh,” she said spacily, slowly, attention drifting back to the screen, “I suppose I could.”

“Great. Just take a drink from this,” he said, handing her the glass. He let her drain it in a half dozen lethargic swallows. “Great. Now I just need you to open your mouth real wide so I can rub this Q-tip on your cheek, okay?”

“Q-tip?”

“It’s for the dentist,” he lied. What was he supposed to say? You probably don’t realize it, but you’ve gone completely batshit and now I need to figure out if I’m doomed to follow in your footsteps. Open wide. “Won’t take a second.”

“If you say so.”

She opened her mouth and he held her cheek, her skin cool and papery, a little eerie. Man, she’d been beautiful when she’d still been lucid. Prettiest woman in town, everybody had agreed. Now she was just a ghost, floating through the days with her brain half-gone, the rest of it lost to whatever was on the TV or outside the window, her once-red hair faded almost completely to white. Casey checked his own head for grays at least once a week, thinking they were as good an indicator of his chances at insanity as any. So far, none.

“Perfect,” he said, sealing the swab. “And now I just need you to sign this paper, down here. To tell the dentist that he can check your Q-tip, okay?”

“The dentist?” She looked perplexed but took the pen willingly enough and signed her name, the signature a faint, loose shadow of its old self. How many times Casey had practiced and faked that signature, he cared not to guess. Probably as many times as he’d been sent home with detention slips.

“Thanks, Mom.”

“Come and watch the news,” she said in that unnerving ethereal voice, and patted the cushion beside hers. “There’s so much happening in the world.”

He eyed the screen, the logo of the shopping channel in the bottom corner. “Wish I could, but I have to get to the post office, then back to work. But Nita will be here soon. She likes the news.” Or barring that, great deals on faux-sapphire jewelry.

“Yes. Nita.”

He bent down and kissed her cheek, the sensation leaving him cautiously proud these days—not as unsettled as it had at first, when he’d come home. He was growing used to how her skin felt now, how she smelled. His mother was gone and she was never coming back, but he could do his duty, pay his respects to the living, walking effigy she’d become. “Bye.”

In the kitchen, he sealed the cups and papers up in the padded plastic envelope that had come with the kit, preprinted with express postage. Last step, drop them off in a mailbox. Last step until the time came to hear the results. He swallowed, stomach souring. Blamed it on two cups of black coffee and no food.

“So when do you hear?” Vince asked.

“Soon. They’ll schedule a call after this makes it down to fucking Palo Alto.” Casey tossed the instructions and the scraps of plastic wrap and the box in the trash, then made for the door. “Later, motherfucker. Say hi to Nita and Kim for me.”

“Will do.”

He pulled up at the post office, said a little prayer to a god he had zero right to be asking any favors of, and dropped the box into the slot. And with that, there was nothing more to be done on that front except wait.

As he hit the road once more and aimed himself east, he couldn’t say if he’d expected to feel lighter or heavier with that package turned over to fate. What he did feel for sure, though, was surprise. Surprise that he’d just pulled the trigger like that, when he was pretty certain that even a week ago he’d have found a hundred reasons to procrastinate on the task and let that package collect dust on some shelf. Things had changed, in recent days. He’d changed, though in exactly what ways, he couldn’t yet say.

He had two phones on him this morning—his relatively public one that the Desert Dogs and Abilene had the number for, then the shady untraceable one that Emily and his other bygone business contacts—and now James Ware—had. And he knew which was ringing now from the mere pitch of the buzzing at his hip. If it was Ware, the guy had one fucking massive nerve on him.

Casey swerved to a hairy stop at the shoulder of the quiet highway and killed his engine, whipped the phone out. Private, as always.

“Yeah?”

“It’s Ware. I’m ready to talk.”

Casey laughed into the bright morning light, steam rising. “Oh, are you? That’s fucking hilarious, considering how shy you got last night.”

“’Scuse me?”

“Who told you where she was staying?”

“Listen, Grossier, I got no idea what you’re talking about. I’m just following your fucking orders here. You going to facilitate this shit or what?”

“You tell me which motherfucker told you where she’s at, and maybe we’ll find out.”

“Listen,” Ware said again, voice jabbing like a finger in the sternum. “I got fuck-all clue what you think I got up to last night, but whatever it is, you’ve got it wrong. Now, you tell me how this is going to work, and I’ll play by your rules. Just let me talk to her. I’m way better at threats than begging, but hey, I’ll pucker up and kiss your ass and say pretty please, if that’s what it’s going to goddamn take.”