Chapter Two

 

“You say you have no other insurance? Nothing at all? What were you thinking?” Hammer Dugan needn’t be so shocked. He’d given his best sales pitch months ago, but had Ash signed the papers committing his limited finances to another debt? Not bloody likely.

“So there’s nothing you can do for me then?” Ash had to ask. Bankruptcy seemed his only recourse, but Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. He’d worked his fingers to the bone these past years, yet he had nothing to show for it. Unfilled orders—the burnt kind—meant unhappy customers, and unhappy customers meant his name was mud.

“I’m sure you signed something,” Hammer mumbled over the rustle of paper shuffling. “Least, I thought you did. I was pretty hammered. Hang on a sec, mate. Lemme check.”

Clank. It sounded like the phone hit his desk.

It was hard to miss the irony of their given names. Hammer being the one who got hammered, Ash being the loser whose life turned to ashes.

Aye, nah funny, God. He squeezed his free hand over his forehead, rubbing at the migraine now firmly entrenched behind his eyeballs, battering him from the inside. It’d be good if Hammer found something on his desk, but chances were slim. They’d been throwing back a couple Guinnesses over that come-on-down insurance spiel, but signing on the dotted line? Ash would’ve remembered that. Gods almighty, if he hadn’t so much bad luck, he’d have none at all.

It was a risk he’d taken with deliberate forethought, though, never expecting he’d need to replace his whole bloody inventory, not to mention the building he owed his soul for, within the month. As if he could. His credit had burned with the fire, along with his reputation as one of the country’s premier woodcarvers. As an artist? Nothing but—ash.

He hated his given name as much as he hated the POS serial arsonist stalking the docks. Why hadn’t his mother named him Patrick or Sean? For the love of Mike, what madness drove a man to burn other people’s property?

The phone clanked again in his ear. Not good. Hammer called out something to his secretary. Dread climbed up Ash’s neck while he waited. He had a place in Southie, a walk-up flat fit for a single guy, but most of the time, he’d end the day sleeping in the backroom at Callahan Woodworks. Some might say he was one lucky bloke not to have been there when the fire broke out. But now, he almost wished he had. He was as good as dead without his business.

Without her…

“Ash?” Hammer called out.

“Here.” Give me the bad news. I’m royally fecked. Just say it.

A blown out sigh and, “You’re uninsured, not a good business strategy, my friend.”

No shit. “Thanks anyway.” Ash dropped the call, needing a Guinness, not advice. Might as well start drowning me sorrow now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“You looking to lose that foot?” Colby asked point blank.

She’d stopped to refuel outside Sacramento. She’d seen the redwoods. They were—tall—and behind her. This side of the Pacific was as wild as the Chinese side, but more beautiful since it was American. A home on the beach in California would definitely curl her toes. But the big-bellied bruiser with his dirty motorcycle boot on her bike’s high temp, shotgun tailpipe was pissing her off.

He turned his red-whiskered face and spit to the pavement like the gentleman he was not. Civilians. Jerks like this guy were quick to claim the camo, and they talked the talk as if they’d done time in the Corps like their tats and OTC medals—as in over the counter—declared, but they don’t know squat. No one knew what real, up-in-your-grill combat was unless they’d been there. This guy hadn’t. He was a poser. A bona fide loser. All talk, no brains, no action.

She’d take odds he hadn’t fought for a single one of those phony scout sniper badges pinned over the brim of his grimy baseball cap. Maybe someone ought to tell the real leathernecks about this pretender. Let them educate his dumb ass.

“I reckon you and me need to get to know each other better, little darlin’,” he drawled, like that southern twang would get her all hot and bothered.

She cocked her head, her sunglasses offering a firm wall of anonymity, and her personal favorite, a Smith and Wesson 22 Victory, already lose in her underarm holster with one in the chamber. “You reckon, huh?”

Beer Gut flashed an array of dingy yellow teeth. Gah. She turned her head, not surprised at his lack of dental hygiene. The scary thing was that guys like him made little children like him. Not with her, though.

He closed in for the kill. “Maybe a lot better, know what I mean, sugar?”

Stop with the smarmy name calling already.

She topped off the Harley’s tank, slapped the gas nozzle back in its slot, needing to make another two-hundred fifty miles before she called it a day. Until this confrontation, she’d planned to grab a bite in Truckee, not to grab ass at a truck stop in California. If Beer Gut backed off, she could still make Reno by dinnertime. If he didn’t…

“Not interested.” She stuck as close to diplomacy as she could.

Beer Gut slapped his thigh, like he was coaxing a dog to come play. “I sure wish you’d reconsider.” Good luck with that. He bobbed his shaved head back at his boys, three uglier-than-shit bikers standing in the shade at the gas station’s Travel Mart, all of them watching like they had a chance in hell of bedding her.

Many have tried, boys. None had what it takes, none except… Her heart skipped a beat, damn it. None except—almost—him.

“I said no, now back off.” Loud and proud, she made her point clear.

When Beer Gut scraped his boot off her tailpipe, his pudgy nose twitched. “Now look, princess, I know your type. You’re on the road and you’re alone. You think you’re tough riding a hog all by your lonesome, but you’re not. You’re just a little girl that’s lost. What’s more, I don’t see nobody ’round here willing to stick his neck out for you, do you? Don’t make a scene. We’re just gonna talk for a spell.”

And then what? Gang rape? Yeah, no.

Colby cocked her chin to the left. She pushed her Ray-Bans topside into her hair and out of her way. Maybe this jerk-off needed to see the whites of her pretty gold eyes before he got the drift. “You use that line all the time?” she asked, her right hand reaching under her leather jacket, seemingly for her left breast.

His beady eyes followed her move. Like a pig in rut, the slimy tip of his tongue slid over his bottom lip. “Most girls don’t need a line to do what I like,” he hissed. Confident now, his chin pitched forward as if challenging her to put on a show for him. The bloody fool.

Damn it. Where’d that come from? Now I’m channeling Ash Callahan? Not hardly.

Shifting her feet, Colby angled her shoulders to block the view of this little showdown from the nice folks inside Travel Mart. They didn’t need to see the gunplay this confrontation might end in.

As easy as pie, she eased that handy dandy little pistol out of its snug holster and leveled it at Beer Gut’s crotch. “I’ve got a better idea,” she purred. “Why don’t you go home to Mama and explain why Daddy can’t play with his hairy balls anymore?”

Beer Gut lost that lusty gleam in his eye. Both meaty hands lifted palms forward, willing to placate instead of bully a lone woman on the road. “I don’t want no trouble.”

She let her Mean Bitch loose, the one who’d earned every stripe of her sergeant’s rank, three up, two down. “Then buzz the fuck off, Bozo. I’ve got business in Reno, and you’re making me late.”

When his gaze shifted over her shoulder, she knew she had trouble on her six. No matter. Four-to-one was still considered good odds in her line of work. “Tell your boys to back off or so help me, I’ll neuter you and feed them your testicles.”

He nodded even as he said, “Go ‘way, Jenner. This one ain’t worth tanglin’ with.”

Wise-guy Jenner thought he knew better. The asshat had the nerve to throw a leg over her bike. So that’s the way it’s going to be.

With her pistol on Beer Gut’s zipper, she swiveled her head like an owl to assess the situation. Tall, dark, and ugly, the guy on her bike, crossed his arms over his barrel chest. The Nazi German-style, spiked metal helmet on his fat head screamed white supremacist. Another wanna-be. Another loser about to eat asphalt.

“Get off my ride,” she said evenly, her heart not even close to racing. Or I’ll make you.

They thought they were making trouble? Try storming an Al Qaeda bunker in the middle of the night only to find an ambush, three-to-one-odds, waiting for you. Jimmy up a tourniquet with your holster because you’ve already used the two tourniquets and the belt you brought along for the ride. Take on a shooter from a half-mile away while lying on your belly inside an AGM-114, laser-guided Hellfire’s frag zone. Yeah, these guys had no idea how to spell trouble.

He grunted, his big chest heaving under his dirty shirt. “Whatcha gonna do about it, little girl? Slap me silly?”

Enough with the little girl shit already.

The two toughs standing behind him with their swaggers on, guffawed at his effeminate twist to the last three words out of his mouth, which—if she had her way—would be his last. But killing him would be breaking the law, so…

With one eye still on Beer Gut, she let her fingers glide down her leg to her last chance at negotiation. If these guys were smart, they’d know what she was going for, but smart men didn’t travel in packs.

Straightening, the blade now hidden up her sleeve, its grip in her palm, Colby rolled one shoulder, because, really? These guys thought they stood a chance against one of America’s few women Rangers? The gals who’d had to run faster and try harder to make the grade in a world of real men?

She reached up as if to run her fingers through her hair, but used the momentum of that ruse to cock her arm over her shoulder. Child’s play. With precise accuracy and a mental ‘Up yours’ for all the defenseless women in the world, she brought the blade down and stabbed Tall, Dark, and Ugly three inches above his right kneecap.

He jerked. What guy wouldn’t? He probably thought she was aiming for his balls. Expletives dribbled off his tongue, but by hell, he moved. So did the two at his rear. Backward.

Colby hitched her neck, just once, annoyed these guys pushed her as far as they did. “You just spoiled my day, gentlemen. Now git.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Beer Gut muttered.

“What? Just leave? Did you see that? She stabbed me!” Tall, Dark, and Ugly whined, off her bike now, and limping away with one hand on his knee.

Beer Gut kept walking, not looking back. “Told ya let her be.”

“But that ain’t right,” TD&U sniveled. “I oughta call the cops on her.”

“Do it,” Colby dared them. She wouldn’t put it past a gang of losers like these guys to run crying to the law when they lost the game they’d started.

“Just go,” Beer Gut ordered, his fist on TD&U’s elbow. “Before someone calls the cops on us.”

Enough said.

Colby holstered her pride and joy after she wiped her blade on one of those blue towels, the kind most folks used on their windshields. She cleaned her leather seat with another, disgusted at the nerve of those guys.

She’d met heroes in her line of work, and a few cowards, but the majority of Army soldiers were just nice guys with a need to stand up for their country while others only stood for themselves. It was the heroes who’d always caught her eye, the stronger than most type, who laid down their lives for their fellow soldiers when others ran. Who stood for the weak despite the odds. Those were her type, if she had a type. Strong men with rock solid wills and stronger ethics.

In the long run, she had yet to meet that certain someone, not that she’d been looking. Her initial observation of the opposite sex still held. Men will be men.

And a female Ranger will kick their asses every time.