Читать книгу A Weaver Wedding - Allison Leigh - Страница 11

Axel stifled an oath as he watched the white SUV roar out of the school parking lot. He looked up at the pale winter sky and blew out a breath that made rings around his head.

No matter what Tara had said, he doubted that she’d be back for the dance that evening. What had he expected? That she’d welcome him back with open arms?

He’d had plenty of female encounters in his life; all with women who had played by exactly the same rules as he had. That weekend in Braden with Tara, though, had been different. She was different. She always had been. Right from the first time he’d met her, five years earlier.

His pocket buzzed slightly, and he pulled out his vibrating cell phone, flipping it open. “Axel here.”

“Have you talked to her?” His uncle’s voice greeted him.

Axel stared after her but the SUV was already out of sight. “Not exactly.”

“This situation isn’t open for inexactly. Sloan McCray is a valuable contact for us and I’ve given him my word that we’ll continue taking care of his sister. I want daily reports.”

Tristan Clay wasn’t only Axel’s uncle. He was his boss and he’d made his points plain already. Not that Axel could blame him after the mess he’d made of his last assignment for Hollins-Winword.

The primary concern of the highly secretive agency was security, whether on a personal scale or an international one. At times, they even worked—to use the term loosely—along with governmental agencies, handling matters that couldn’t be handled through normal channels. Such was Axel’s last assignment, which had been a monumental failure.

He hadn’t kept anyone safe, particularly Sloan McCray’s lover.

As a result, Tristan had done exactly what he should have done. He’d put Axel on suspension. Which was where Axel had remained until earlier that day when he’d met with his uncle, fully intending to tender the resignation from Hollins-Winword that he’d been holding off on ever since he’d earned that suspension.

Ironically, Axel hadn’t resigned.

Instead, he’d found himself nearly begging his uncle for this latest assignment. Not because of his record with Sloan McCray. But because of the assignment, herself.

Tara Browning.

The fact that she was McCray’s sister only made the situation that much more complicated for Axel.

Considering everything, it was a wonder that Tristan had agreed. After all, Sloan must have discovered that Tristan had sent Axel to the Suds-n-Grill that night four months ago and kept right on moving, despite the fact that he’d arranged to meet his sister there, too. But Tristan had agreed to give Axel the assignment and though McCray had pitched a mighty fit about it, he wasn’t in a position to demand someone else.

“Daily reports,” Axel assured him, disconnecting before Tristan could decide to change his mind.

He strode through the crowded parking lot until he reached his truck, parked blatantly in a No Parking zone.

The parking ticket tucked beneath his windshield wiper waved gaily in the biting breeze.

He yanked the paper out and climbed in the truck. He shoved the ticket into the glove box where it joined a couple dozen others, a tire gauge and his holstered GLOCK.

He’d barely gotten his key in the ignition when the phone buzzed again. “Yeah?”

“Is that how you always answer your phone?”

He grimaced at his mother’s familiar voice and started up the truck. “I guess you’ve heard.” There was nothing like the Weaver grapevine when it came to spreading news, whether you wanted it spread or not.

“That you’re back in town?” Emily Clay’s voice was tart, but beneath it he could still hear the love that had always been a constant. “Imagine my pleasure hearing it from someone other than you. I’ve gotten three different calls from people reporting that they’ve seen your truck driving down Main Street.”

“Sorry. I had some business to take care of.”

“With Evan, I imagine,” Emily concluded, making Axel feel that much guiltier.

“I haven’t talked to Evan, yet,” he admitted, knowing perfectly well that she was probably already aware of that fact. Evan Taggart was the local vet and his brother-in-law, but they’d thrown in together to breed horses even before Evan had married Axel’s sister, Leandra.

The business partnership was real and increasingly profitable. It also provided a highly convenient cover for Axel’s other activities. Activities of which Evan had always been aware, even before Axel’s own immediate family had been.

“Hmm,” Emily was saying. “And when will you be making your way out to the farm?”

The “farm” was Clay Farm, the larger and considerably more significant horse farm owned by his parents outside of town. It was where he’d grown up and where he always returned. Never before, however, had he returned with the weight on his conscience that he had now, and there was no denying his reluctance.

It was the same reluctance that had dogged him when it came to returning to Weaver at all.

“Soon,” he said. “I still have things to take care of in town.”

“There’s a Valentine’s dance at the high school tonight. Your father and I will be there.”

“I stopped at the gym already. Looked in.”

“Did you see Courtney, then? She’s doing the kissing booth this year, if you can believe it.”

The last time he’d seen his cousin Courtney, she’d been inconsolable at the memorial service that her parents, Rebecca and Sawyer, had finally held for their missing son, Ryan.

“She had a line stretching around the gym,” Axel said. “I didn’t want to get in the way of the moneymaking.”

“It’s just good to see her having some fun again. Since Ryan’s service last year, she’s had a tough time.”

There was nothing Axel could say to that. Not now. He couldn’t exactly tell his mother the real reason he’d avoided Ryan’s little sister, now could he?

Ryan had made him promise.

“Did you run into Hope or Tristan?” his mother continued.

“Not at the festival.” At least that was the truth. He’d met with Tristan at his office over at Cee Vid.

“Then if you’re still in town, come by the dance.”

If he believed that Tara had any intention of going to the dance, he’d be there all right. As it was, from here on out, he was going to be where Tara was. “We’ll see.”

His mother just “hmmed” again as if reading his mind. She’d always known when he was up to something.

“You do realize that tomorrow is Sunday, right?” Emily said after a moment. “If I don’t see you tonight, I’m certainly going to expect to see you tomorrow.”

Axel pinched the bridge of his nose. “Who’s got Sunday dinner this week?” His mom and his aunts all rotated the duty. Sometimes it was just a handful of family members who were there. Sometimes it was the entire freaking family.

All two hundred of them.

It was an exaggeration, but sometimes it felt as if it were only a slight one.

“Jaimie’s cooking,” his mother answered. “We’ll be at the big house.”

At the Double-C Ranch then, where his father and uncles had been raised and where his grandfather, Squire, and his wife Gloria, still lived with Axel’s aunt and uncle—Matthew and Jaimie. Going there felt no less of a betrayal, though, than it did going to his own home. “Is everyone going to be there?”

“It’s been over a year since you’ve been home, honey. What do you think?”

Way too many family members is what he thought. “If you don’t see me until tomorrow afternoon, don’t worry.”

“I always worry about you. It’s what mothers do.”

He caught a glimpse of himself in the rearview mirror after they hung up, and he looked away. He didn’t want to think about mothers and sons just now.

Which spoke directly to the reason why he’d been reluctant to come back to Weaver at all. He had a good family. To the last one, they were all good.

None of them deserved the secret he was keeping from them about Ryan.

But if he didn’t keep Ryan’s secret, Axel was more afraid that his cousin would go even deeper underground and it had taken Axel too long to find him in the first place.

Maybe he couldn’t do anything about his own family. But he could definitely do something about McCray’s family.

He pulled away from the curb and headed back toward Main Street where Classic Charms was located. He trolled past, drumming his thumb on the steering wheel as he studied the light he could see burning inside her eclectic little shop.

He could either sit in the warmth of his truck and watch the shop, or he could brave the frost—both from the weather and from her—and go talk with her.

Make her understand the gravity of the situation.

It would have been a helluva lot easier to do that if he hadn’t already done the unforgivable by getting involved with her that weekend in Braden.

He’d been ordered to that bar by Tristan for a quick “meet” with McCray. The last person Axel had expected to see there was the man’s sister.

But there she’d been.

From his corner in the bar, he’d watched her sit by herself for more than an hour. Watched the way her gleaming, dark hair would slip from behind her ear where she kept tucking it. Watched her debate with herself each time the cocktail waitress came by to replenish her drink. Watched the way half the men in the place watched her, and the way she’d seemed oblivious to them all.

Most particularly, he’d watched the fading of animation from her lovely face the longer she sat there alone, leaving her enormous brown eyes looking darker and more haunting than ever.

He shouldn’t have stepped in her way when she was leaving. But he had.

And damned if he could make himself regret it even if Tristan could now yank him from his assignment to protect her if he found out about that night.

She was a petite package of feminine curves who didn’t even reach his shoulder. He’d been halfway beyond crazy over her from the first time he’d seen her when she’d moved to Weaver, five years earlier.

The fact that she’d been placed there for her own safety by none other than his uncle Tristan had kept Axel from acting on his feelings.

That night in Braden, though, his attraction had been more alive than ever. And he’d been on the verge of giving Tristan his resignation.

He blew out a rough breath along with the justifications that amounted to zero. He shouldn’t have touched her and he knew it. No matter how unforgettable their time had been.

He pulled a U-turn and parked in front of her shop. Her front door was a fanciful thing of stained glass. It was locked, of course. He knocked purposefully as he looked through the glass window beside the door.

He couldn’t see her moving around inside, but that wasn’t surprising. The place was artfully packed with furniture, clothing and a host of other doodads.

He knocked again, as hard as he dared against a deep red triangle of glass.

Finally, she appeared.

The sleeves of her thigh-length pink sweater were pushed up above her elbows. She’d twisted her hair up into some kind of knot that wasn’t particularly effective, judging by the strands of hair that had slipped free to graze her elfin chin.

She made a face when she reached the door and tapped the sign that she’d posted in the lower corner of the window.

Closed.

“I’m not going away, Tara.” He knew she could hear him through the glass.

“Leave me alone. Or do I have to call the sheriff?”

“Call him,” he said easily. “I haven’t seen Max in a year. Good chance to catch up.”

“Must be nice to count half the people in town as a relation.”

Sometimes it was as much a curse as a blessing. “Open up.”

Her bow-shaped lips tightened and she made no move to unlock the door. “Can’t you take no for an answer?”

“No.” A gust of wind blew down the street, bringing with it a rolling cloud of old snow. “So you might as well let me in.”

She looked past him to the street. Whether it was his truck parked there or the sedan slowly driving past that made her grimace he couldn’t tell. Didn’t much care, considering she finally reached over and with a rattle of keys, opened the door.

“You could have at least parked in the alley behind the building,” she muttered, as she shut and locked the door again once he stepped inside. “Everyone in town can recognize your truck.”

Warmth engulfed him. “So?”

“So, I don’t want people wondering why you’re hanging around me.”

On that score, she was going to be sadly disappointed.

“Don’t bother taking that off,” she warned when he unzipped his jacket. “You won’t be staying long.”

He slid out of the jacket anyway and dropped it on the Ushaped mahogany bar that served as a counter in the center of the store. “There’s been a hit issued against your brother,” he said bluntly.

For a long moment, her wide eyes just stared at him. Then she slowly blinked. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me. There’s a price on Sloan’s head.”

The lovely throat that he knew tasted as sweet as cream worked in a hard swallow. She abruptly sat down on a weathered-looking leather couch whose massive lines made her look even more defenseless. “H-how would you know that?”

“Because I work for the same agency that placed you in Weaver when your brother went undercover with the ATF.”

Her face blanched and he quickly moved to her, placing his hand against her back. “Put your head down.”

But she pushed him away. “You know Sloan? Is—” she swallowed visibly “—is he all right? He’s still under protection somewhere in Chicago, right?”

Truthfully, Axel wasn’t entirely certain where Sloan was. The man had shunned the normal protocols and who could blame him? “He’s keeping contact,” he said instead, truthfully enough, though Tristan was the only one with whom McCray was maintaining the briefest of communications.

He eyed Tara’s fearful expression and shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching for her again.

There had already been too much touching between them. He was still losing sleep from the burning memory of those white-hot hours they’d shared. “How much do you know about the case he’s been working on?”

She swiped a strand of hair from her cheek. “Only that when he infiltrated the Deuce’s Cross, he wanted me far away from Chicago just in case the gang suspected he wasn’t the ex-con he was pretending to be.” Her hands fell back to her lap. “He was exaggerating the situation. Nothing’s ever happened to me. Not during the years he rode with them, and certainly not in the time it’s taken to get the case to trial.” She looked around the shop, avoiding eye contact. “I gave up the only home I’ve ever known to come here. It’s temporary. Just until all that’s over.”

Five years didn’t seem all that temporary to Axel, but he kept the thought to himself. “A few years before Sloan was finally accepted into the gang, another federal agent had gotten in. But his cover was blown. They killed his family before they executed him.” There was nothing he could do to soften the facts. They were what they were.

And they were only part of the reason behind Sloan’s rightful concern, now.

But Axel still felt like a bastard when her face paled all over again. His hands fisted in his pockets. It was either that, or reach for her, and he was pretty certain she’d push him away. Again.

“The Feds couldn’t make a murder case stick at that point,” he continued quietly. “Your brother was the one who finally came up with the glue.” About murder and a host of other felonies. “Now that the trial is finally going forward, it’s likely they want payback more than ever.”

“But Sloan’s identity was supposed to be protected.”

“There’s no guarantee about that,” he said carefully. “Information has a way of getting out. Your brother’s not taking any chances that it might lead to you.”

“I don’t even use my maiden name. I’ve spoken with Sloan once in the past five years! I don’t have a phone number for him or even an address. All I can do is sit around on my thumbs waiting for him to contact me.” She grimaced. “And to blow me off again even after he has. Why…why would anything about my brother lead to me?”

“You’re not some far-flung relation of his. You’re his twin sister.” Sloan’s only living family.

Her lips compressed. “So what am I supposed to do? Give up everything again and go start somewhere new?”

He frowned at the assessment. “Right now, Weaver is still the best place for you.”

“And how long have you known about all of this?”

“You mean about the order on Sloan, or the reason you moved to Weaver?”

She looked ill. “Both.”

He finally pulled his hands out of his pockets. “Since this morning, and since you came to town five years ago.”

“Great.” Her expression grew even more pinched. “So all that talk in Braden about your horse-breeding business was just a story. A line. You’re with the ATF, too.”

They hadn’t just talked about his business. They’d talked about hers. About movies and books and politics and religion. And they’d made love. Again. And again.

“I didn’t lie to you. I am a horse breeder.”

“But that’s not all you are,” she said her voice flat. “Right?”

“No,” he allowed. “But I’m not with the ATF.”

“But you said you were with the agency—”

“The ATF didn’t move you here to Wyoming. An agency called Hollins-Winword did that.”

Her lips parted. “But Sloan told me—”

He lifted his hand. “It doesn’t matter.” In a perfect world, the ATF would have been able to see to the full protection of its own agents. But he’d learned long ago that the world wasn’t perfect. McCray had done what Axel would have done in the same situation. He’d found someone to take care of what his own agency wouldn’t. “Sloan trusted Hollins-Winword to keep you safe before, and Hollins-Winword is going to keep you safe now.”

She closed her eyes for a moment as if she were searching for strength. He started to reach for her no matter the chances of rejection but she planted her slender palms on her knees and pushed abruptly to her feet.

Her brown eyes looked like bruises against her pale face. “Fine. You’ve told me. Now will you go?” She started toward the door. “Your five minutes are long gone.”

He closed his hand around her arm and absorbed the frisson that raced through him at the contact. “It’s more than a matter of just keeping you updated on the situation.”

She’d gone still the moment he touched her. Her gaze seemed focused on his hand on her arm. “Meaning what?”

“Meaning, I’m your new bodyguard.”