We spent the day wrapped up in one another. In my bed, on the floor, up against the glass looking out across the ridge—a personal favorite of mine and, if I judged by the way Katie had gone wild on my cock as I’d pinned her against the windows, the same for her. All in all, the day had gone exactly as I’d always hoped it could.

The evening? Well…I should have known that would go to shit.

The temperature outside had dropped significantly as the sun had gone down, and I’d have bet anything there was snow on the horizon for us. Early for the season, but not unheard of in these parts.

Coming in off the back deck, I hurriedly closed the door behind me and tucked my gun into my hip holster. I’d taken Rex outside for a quick perimeter sweep before the sun set completely, not wanting to leave Katie alone once night fell. Too many bad things could creep up on you in the dark forests of the Rockies, including humans with ill intentions. Katie had said something about needing to find a new recipe, so I’d hooked her up with my laptop and tucked her into the bed to work. I was hoping I’d find her there still—a little pre-dinner tumble in the sheets sounded like the perfect plan to warm me back up after spending time in the icy wind.

But as I made the turn from the hallway to the bedroom, I knew sex wasn’t in the cards.

“What’s wrong?”

Katie sat stiff as a board, her face pale and her eyes wide as she stared at my computer screen. “You already knew about him.”

“Who?”

She looked up, those hazel eyes filled with something close to anger. Closer to hurt, actually. Something that scraped along the walls of my chest and made me want to roar into the night at whoever had upset her.

Which, apparently, was me.

“My mom’s brother,” she said, practically spitting the words at me. Throwing knives with every syllable. “Mark Baker. Sheriff Baker. You knew everything already when you asked me about him.”

Fuck. I always deleted my search history, so she hadn’t seen anything there. But something—I’d left behind something, some trail to my research. Some proof of what I’d done. I hadn’t considered she’d find any of that, thought I’d covered my tracks well enough. Apparently, I’d been wrong. “I did, but I—”

“But you pretended like you didn’t. You lied to me.”

“I didn’t lie intentionally. I just wanted you to tell me about him instead of making assumptions and guesses.”

“You made an assumption thinking it would be okay with me to research—” she looked down at the laptop and ran her finger over the trackpad “—his work history, his current salary, the houses he’s owned, other family.” She closed the laptop lid, shaking her head. Looking ready to cry. “You knew he was my mom’s brother, not my dad’s. And you knew I was a Gaines.”

There was no way to explain the depth of my guilt at the look on her face. “Katie, I didn’t—”

“You did.” She tossed my laptop to the side and jumped out of bed. “You absolutely did. You looked into my mom’s brother without telling me. You researched me and my life because of that. And you never said a word about it. Do you know how creepy that is? You looked up everything but know nothing. Everything you found is garbage.”

I grabbed her arm as she tried to run past me. “Stop. Creepy? I never meant it to be, I never meant to look into your life at all. We needed information on your uncle—”

“He’s not my uncle.” She tugged her arm from my hand, pushing her way into the hallway. “All you had to do was ask me, Gage. If you wanted to know that sort of bullshit about Mark, you could have asked me. You didn’t need to lie to me.”

“Katie, I didn’t lie to you. I just…didn’t tell you.”

“You’re still not!” She spun, hands raised in the air and voice growing loud. “Why were you looking into him? What did you find out? And why didn’t you tell me anything, with all the time we’ve spent together?”

“Katie, I didn’t want to—”

“Tell me. Right. You don’t seem to want to tell me anything.”

That was bullshit. “What do you want me to tell you? That Mark Baker is crooked as fuck? The whole damn town knows that. You want me to tell you he’s in the Soul Suckers’ pockets? Because that’s a rumor too. Or do you want to know that he ordered your kidnapping at the restaurant?”

She blinked, her face growing pale. “He what?”

Balls to the wall time. “They knew you’d be there, Katie. Those guys who broke in didn’t do it randomly. They had intel on your schedule. They even knew you were there because of a soup.”

She started to pace, not looking at me. Not really looking at anything. I could practically see the cogs turning in her head, the pieces of the last week fitting together.

“Because it was gumbo night,” she said, her voice barely over a whisper.

“Right.”

She shook her head, pacing faster. Eating up space along the windows and looping back again. “He wouldn’t have sent someone to try to kill me. He doesn’t want me dead.”

“He sent them to take you. I know you don’t want to believe me, but I’m telling you the truth. Your uncle—”

“He’s not my uncle.” Her words pounded like fists, hitting hard and violent. Slamming across the space. My head spun, those hits not making sense.

“But he’s your mom’s brother.”

“Exactly. My mom’s brother.” Eyes like stone, she snarled my way. “Not my uncle.”

“I don’t get it.”

“You don’t need to.” She wrapped her arms around herself, looking so small and fragile and yet…fierce. Angry. This wasn’t a kitten with her claws out—this was the queen of the jungle defending herself. “You betrayed me.”

That cut deep, leaving what felt like gaping holes in my chest. “I was only trying to keep you safe.”

“By lying to me. So my body could be safe but not my heart.” She pushed past me again, heading for the bedroom this time. Back the way we’d come.

I chased after her. “I never lied.”

“You did…by omission, but still a lie. Jesus, Gage, I thought you were actually interested to learn stuff about me.”

“I was. I am.”

“Bullshit.” She rushed into the room, grabbing her jeans and tugging them on. Looking like a woman about to make a run for it. “You think I can’t take care of myself? That I’m so helpless, I have to have you hulking around or else bad things will happen to me? Bad things have already happened, Gage, long before you ever even showed up in this town. And I survived. I made it through them. I’m not some weak little girl who’s too afraid of her own shadow—”

She stopped, took a deep breath. Shook her head as if to clear it, to reorganize her thoughts. I had no idea what just happened—what had made her go down that road—but I knew a tangent when I saw one. She hadn’t been talking about me, about us, about what I’d done. She’d been focused on something else. Bad things have already happened—things I wasn’t around to protect her from. Fuck, what had I missed with her?

But before I could ask, before I could figure out how to make her tell me everything bad so I could see if there was a way for me to repair the damage other people had wrought, she stabbed me right in the heart. “I think it’s time for me to go home.”

“No.” My answer exploded out of me, unstoppable and immediate. She was running, and I… No. I couldn’t let her. So I set myself in front of the door as I told her, “You’re not going anywhere.”

And apparently, that was really, really wrong.

“No?” she said, her voice deadly cool and calm. Too calm. Dangerously so. “You’re going to stand there and tell me no, that I can’t leave? Do I not have the right to go when I choose to?” She stepped closer, fury burning hot and bright in her gaze. “Are you just as bad as the Soul Suckers, Gage Shepherd? Have I been kidnapped?”

Her words ripped out something inside of me, leaving an empty sort of burn that hadn’t been there before. That hurt like a motherfucker and made it hard for me to breathe. “I’m not like them.”

“Then let me go.”

No. I wanted so badly to tell her no, but I couldn’t. “You won’t be safe at your apartment.”

“Then I’ll call Alder and see what he thinks I should do.” She pushed past me, refusing to look me in the eye. Running away from me. “I don’t want to stay here anymore.”

“Katie.” I reached for her, grabbing her elbow out of instinct more than anything. How could I let her walk away? How could I let her put herself in danger? I couldn’t, but she was going to anyway.

She yanked her arm away from me, turning to give me a glare that froze me in my tracks. “Don’t touch me.”

That’s when reality stabbed me in the neck. I was behaving just like the Soul Suckers and that guy she’d told me about. The one who’d touched her when she hadn’t wanted him to. Demanding her time and attention, not letting her make her own decisions. I’d completely screwed the pooch on this one, and the only way forward was to back up. To retreat. Something I was loath to do but knew I needed to.

“Okay, princess,” I said, putting my hands up as if she had a gun on me. Unsurprising—this girl was deadlier than any weapon ever made. She could obliterate me with nothing more than a word, nothing more than a simple bye. I’d be destroyed if she left me, so I needed to be cautious. “I won’t touch. I won’t keep you here either. Please stop for a second and listen to me, though.”

Emotionless, her hazel eyes looked past me. “I’m done listening to you.”

She was down the hall and heading toward the door in seconds. Before I could even force my feet to respond. Before I could start my heart pumping again. Leaving. She was leaving.

Once I wrapped my head around that fact, I hurried after her, desperate to get her to stay. Or to convince her to take me with her. Anything, really, so long as it ended with us in the same place. But she didn’t stop on her path to her escape, only paused long enough to grab the keys to my truck from where they sat on the windowsill before pulling the front door open.

Before taking that first step to walk out of my life.

My heart wanted to pour out of my body and onto the floor, but something stopped it. Something caught my attention and made every bit of my military training rush to the forefront. It was nothing, really. A tiny dot. One single spot of red on Katie’s shirt that shouldn’t have been there. Most people would have overlooked it, but I’d seen that light before. I knew what that was, and it didn’t belong on Katie. Not anywhere near her.

A laser sight. Someone had a handgun aimed at my girl.

“Katie, down.” I was running before I had the words out, watching in slow motion as she turned toward me. Still mad. Still so damned furious with me. Not that it mattered in the moment. She could be angry with me for the rest of my life as long as hers didn’t end right there in my entryway.

I hit her just in time, jumping in front of her body and shoving her back into the house as the shot rang out loud and sharp. Whoever was out there wasn’t concerned about being caught because there was no silencer on that weapon. They were also awfully close.

Pain ripped through my shoulder as we fell, causing flashbacks of that day I’d been shot. Of Bishop lying on the ground in a puddle of blood. Of the fear that I’d messed up, that I hadn’t been quick enough. That I’d lost my best friend because I simply hadn’t been enough.

But I hadn’t lost Bishop that day, and no way was I going to lose Katie now.

As soon as we hit the floor, I put a plan in motion. Jumped off her body and dragged her farther into the house as I kept my body in front of hers. Trying to cover her from what I knew would be coming through the door any second. To keep me between her and whoever had just shot at us.

Shot her, apparently, because there was blood on the floor. A lot of it. Panic unlike any I’d ever felt flooded me.

“Fuck. I’m sorry, Katie.” I worked my hands over her body, trying to find the shot. The hole. The damage. I tried hard, but I was suddenly so tired and my shoulder burned as if it was on fire. Fuck, where had she been hit? I could help her if I found it…could save her if I could stop the bleeding. But my eyes wouldn’t focus right, and my right arm wouldn’t do what I needed it to. “I’m so sorry. Let me help you.”

“You’re sorry?” Katie slapped me away, pushing back and sliding along the floor to get out from under me. To get away from me, it seemed. I tried to pull her back against me, but she only fought harder. “Gage, stop. You’re bleeding.”

It took a second for her words to make sense. I was the one bleeding? That meant she wasn’t shot—I was. Oh, thank Christ for small miracles. I’d taken the bullet, not her. Not my princess. She wasn’t going to bleed out all over the floor. That didn’t mean she was safe, though.

“We need to move,” I said, trying hard to keep my focus off the incredible pain in my shoulder. Yeah, that felt like a gunshot wound, all right. And if we didn’t get out of the path of whoever had fired on us, there would be more.

I kicked the door closed behind me and sat up, pushing myself back and leaning against it. Blocking anyone’s way in. Roadblock in human form. It took me three tries to pull my phone from my pocket because my right arm simply couldn’t move the way I needed it to and I’d already grabbed my gun with my left. I wasn’t setting the fucker down again either. Left may not be my normal firing hand, but it would have to do.

“Gage, stop moving around,” Katie said, looking as if she wanted to pull me away from the door and drag me into the living room. As if she wanted to do something to help but didn’t know what. “Why are you bleeding?”

“I’ve been shot.” I couldn’t worry about the way her eyes went wide at those words. I had to get backup called in case whoever was outside had friends. Blood ran down my hand as I pulled up Alder’s number and hit call, putting the phone on speaker so I didn’t have to hold it up.

Alder answered right away. “What’s up, Gage?”

“Handgun with a laser sight, close range. They were aiming for Katie. We need backup.”

“Fuck. We’re on our way.”

“He’s shot,” Katie yelled, sounding way more collected than she should have been. “They shot him in the arm, and he’s bleeding pretty bad.”

Pretty bad was a relative term. “It’s not that—”

“We’re coming, Katie. Keep pressure on the wound to slow the blood loss, okay?” I heard the slam of car doors in the background. “Do you know how to shoot?”

Oh, fuck no.

“She won’t need to. I’ll keep her safe. Just haul ass.” I ended the call before pressing the phone into Katie’s hand, which trembled in mine. “What’s the code?”

“I don’t remember. Gage, I’m so sorry we fought—”

“Focus and remember. We’ll deal with the rest later. Right now, I need to make sure you can call for help. The code…think about it.”

She made a sound like a whimper. Still shaking. Still looking so scared. “Gage, that’s a lot of blood.”

“Doesn’t matter, what’s the code?”

“Gage, I don’t—”

“It’s your name, Katie.” Pain shot across my back, a fire burning under my skin. I needed to get her tucked away while I still had a chance to fight back against whoever was on the other side of the door. Get comfortable being uncomfortable was a SEAL motto of sorts—I was real fucking used to being uncomfortable, but this was beyond. This was the sort of pain that scrambled your brain. I was running on borrowed time.

“My name?”

“Yeah, 5284…it spells Katie minus the E. I need you to remember it because I won’t be with you to unlock it. Can you do that for me?”

She whimpered, clinging harder to my hand as she darted another look at my shoulder. “Okay, 5284.”

“Good. Now go hide in the closet in the master bedroom. It locks from inside, so get in there and secure the door. I need you safe.”

She didn’t move, though. “You can’t fight anyone alone—you’ve been shot.”

“Yeah, well…it’s not the first time.” I pushed up from the floor, wishing the room would stop spinning so I could get my bearings. “Go now, Katie. They could be at the door any second.”

Thankfully, she got to her feet. “They could shoot you through the glass.”

“They’re bulletproof.”

“What?”

“My windows—they’re all bulletproof. They’d have to have some serious ammunition to get through them.” I shoved her down the hallway, the sound of footsteps outside fueling my harshness with her. No fucking way were they getting her. Not on my watch.

“Gage, stop—”

I pushed her right into the closet, knowing there were things left unsaid between us. Some that needed saying…just in case. “I’m not them, Katie. They demanded and overpowered you to do you harm. I do it to keep you safe. You want to go? Fine, but not until I know whatever threat is waiting for you outside this cabin has been taken care of. Now, lock the fucking door, and don’t open it until Alder gets here. Not even for me unless I call you princess. Understand?”

She nodded, looking terrified. Something that would haunt me for the rest of my days. But I still had one more thing left to say. Just a few more sentences she needed to hear.

“I love you, princess. I’m sorry I didn’t show you the way I should have, but that doesn’t change the way I feel. It also doesn’t change the fact that if it was your…the sheriff who sold you out, I’m going to kill him because I won’t let a threat to you strike a second time.”

She never said a word, simply rushed at me, pressing her lips to mine in a hungry kiss as Rex began barking madly. And fuck, did her body hitting mine hurt, but I’d take that pain any day.

I had to break the kiss way too soon—hard not to when I heard my dog jumping at the front window. Company was on the porch. “Lock the door, remember?”

“I will. And my name on the phone. Gage, please—”

“Alder’s on his way. Do you know how to shoot?” At her nod, I pulled out the footlocker I kept my weapons in, entered the combination to unlock it, threw open the lid and grabbed a second gun—a Beretta M9 semiautomatic with a fifteen-round magazine and a silencer. Just in case. Then I showed her what was inside. “You feel threatened, grab something out of here that looks familiar, okay? They’re all loaded. I’ll be back for you as soon as I clear the threat.”

I gave her one final kiss, closed the footlocker, and then I walked out of the closet, shutting the door behind me, and headed for the living room. Pain forgotten. Training in place and fueling my stride. No fucker was taking my house or my woman—didn’t matter how many holes they put in me. I’d protect what was mine so long as I had breath in my lungs.

Just as I reached the end of the hall, the front door blew open, knocking Rex across the room and sending pieces of wood flying. Not a gunshot, not a kick—a goddamned explosive had just gone off on my porch. Someone wanted to play with the big boys?

Game time.