Addie couldn’t believe that she’d called Dan to come to her rescue. Her subconscious must have known he was the only one she could trust. And he’d come through for her. She hadn’t remembered doing so. And then to hear his beautiful, but gruff and worried voice next to her hospital bedside? If she’d been conscious enough to respond at the time, she would have given him a heartfelt hug. She’d only vaguely heard him talking about making her a deputy sheriff. Despite the pain medication she was on, she had immediately thought: what if she wanted to be sheriff?

She used his bag for a pillow, after pulling out a soft, blue hoody of Dan’s to wrap around herself as a makeshift blanket, and one of his black T-shirts so she could ditch her bloody shirt, loving his masculine and wild cat smell. Even though she knew they were not out of danger and could be in the thick of it at any time, she luxuriated in the smell of him wrapped around her, thankful to God that he’d come for her in her hour of need.

She heard him talking to his friend Chase, telling him all about the trouble they were in. And Chase telling him he’d make arrangements to send reinforcements at once. In that instant, she wished they hadn’t kept their agreement secret from his friends. And she knew they could be trusted, though she still felt the only way to learn the truth about this dirty business was for her to return to work.

Sometime during the drive, she stirred and found herself wrapped in a real blanket, a soft pillow for her head, Dan’s hoody tucked under her chin and spread out over her chest and waist, and she wondered when and where he’d picked up the blanket and pillow. And how she’d never been conscious enough to notice. The pain medication had to have really knocked her out. Any little sound or movement usually woke her. She took a deep breath of Dan’s scent on the hoody, listened to the SUV’s motor running, the tires rolling along the road, the wind whipping past the vehicle, feeling tired, sore, and soothed, and drifted off again.

When Addie woke the next time, the car was still rumbling along the highway, the windows dark. She wondered how long they’d been driving. Dan was probably dead tired. And she was feeling better.

“How long have we been driving?”

“Six hours. How are you feeling?”

“Much better.” She tried to sit up, but her muscles, where she’d been cut, screamed in agony. “If I don’t move. Are you stopping for the night?” She had planned to drive, but that wasn’t happening.

“In Twin Falls, Idaho. That’s about nine hours from Yuma Town. We’ve got reinforcements coming. They’ll get there about the time we do.”

“Reinforcements?” Then she vaguely remembered Chase and Dan talking before she had drifted off.

“Hell, yeah. Cougars, who will have our back, no questions asked.”

“After everything that’s happened, they can ask away.” She thought he’d already told Chase all about them. Then she recalled he’d only mentioned about the hospital—the nurse, the two guys who burst into her room, and the missing agent. “I can’t trust the people I work for. If it helps with your people to learn the truth, I’m an open book.”

“Are you from Boston?”

“Yes. And my name is Addie Ann Davidson Steinacker.”

He chuckled. “Damn right. We have a contract that says so. And the hobbies you listed? Cross-country skiing, hiking, running, your favorite color is blue, and you love romantic suspense stories? All true?”

“Yep.”

“It wasn’t part of the cover?”

“Nope.”

“And the physical connection you and I have?”

She chuckled. “I think you know our pheromones wouldn’t be reacting to one another’s if it wasn’t real.”

“Yeah. That’s what I was thinking. I want you to move in with me.”

“And be your deputy sheriff?”

“You heard me telling you that in the hospital room?”

“Vaguely. And thinking I might want to be sheriff.”

He chuckled. “We really don’t have elections, but you can get one going. I won’t oppose you, just anything to ensure you stay there with me. Or you can work for Leyton Hill. Or even work with Hal and Tracey as agents who take down animal traffickers. You name it, we have several different kinds of law enforcement types in Yuma Town. And the best part? We’re all cougars and best of friends.”

“Until I get them killed,” Addie said wearily. She would like to settle down, but not until she found the mole and exposed him or her.

“Any of us know, with the kind of work we do, we deal with dangerous suspects a fair amount of the time. It’s always a likelihood. No way are we going to let one of our own do this by herself.”

“I’m not—“

“You’re my wife.”

“Pseudo.” She sighed. “I don’t want to quit my job, not until I learn the truth.”

“Or it gets you killed?” Dan sounded annoyed with her.

“How would you feel if someone was trying to kill you and nearly succeeded a couple of times? Would you just leave it alone, or would you track the culprit down?”

“I’d go after him.”

“I rest my case.” She wrapped his hoody tighter around her. “You still have three more hours to drive?”

“Two and a half now. It won’t be long. We’ll either get a hotel, or one of the agents coming to help out will take the driving over for me. They’ll swap off with each other.”

“Who’s coming?” While trying to keep her identity secret from the residents of Yuma Town, she’d never learned who they were, except for the few times Dan had mentioned them, pride in his voice for knowing them.

“Bridget and her husband, Travis, with the Cougar Special Forces Agency. Dr. Kate Parker-Hill will check you out. My part-time deputy, Chase Buchanan, and Kate’s husband with the Cougar Special Forces, Leyton Hill, will be coming too. Hal Haverton, the one who takes down animal traffickers, is going to take one of their ranch hands, Kolby Jones, with him into town and help my full-time deputy, Stryker Hill, to run things in case we have any trouble. They know to be on the lookout for anyone who’s new in town, searching for where I live, or your whereabouts.”

“Which would be at your place. Unless you’re planning to set a trap for anyone coming there, we can’t stay there.”

“We could stay at Hal’s ranch. Between Hal and Tracey, their ranch foreman, Ted Weekum, and Kolby Jones, and his brother, Ricky, we should be secure. If we think we need more firepower, we’ll get it. In the meantime, the Muellers will contact friends they still have in the FBI. You can tell them what you know and suspect, and they can take it from there.”

“Thank you, for coming for me, Dan. I can’t thank you enough for coming to my rescue.”

“Hell, I nearly had a heart attack when I heard your weak voice on the phone and I knew you were in serious trouble like the last time, and then you vanished. I was shouting forever, trying to get your attention again. Once I used cell tower triangulation, I located where you were. Then I spoke with your floor nurse.”

“And she was a real nurse.”

“Yeah. She had to have been. I had a hell of a time getting into the room to see you, and then the agent outside your room told me I only had five minutes with you. I assumed after an hour, and he hadn’t made me leave, that he felt I was good for you.”

“You are.”

“I wasn’t sure you could hear anything I said.”

“Bits and pieces. I kept drifting in and out, but I was so glad to feel your hand on mine.”

“I didn’t think I’d have to steal you away from the hospital. I didn’t know who to—“

Hearing the abrupt end of Dan’s comment, Addie feared the worse. “What’s the matter?”

“I’ve had a tail for the last half hour. Could be nothing, just someone headed in the same direction as us.” Dan got on his Blue Tooth. “Hey, Bridget, I might have a tail. I’m an hour from Mountain Home.”

“Do you want us to keep going then and meet you there?”

“We don’t have any way of really protecting ourselves out here. We’ll just keep driving and if we get into trouble, you know what to do.”

“Can you see the make and model?”

“It’s too far back, and it’s too dark. All I see are the headlights. It’s a car, not a truck.”

“Are you in a compact or mid-sized vehicle?”

“I could only get an SUV rental, so we have a little more weight behind us, riding a little higher.”

“Good. We’re making good time and are an hour south of Twin Falls. Keep in touch about the car that’s following you.”

“If it’s following us. Have you heard any news about the hospital, the missing patient, the missing sheriff, and the three dead bodies?”

“No. Travis has been monitoring the news, but it appears a cleanup crew took care of it. No warrant out for either of your arrests for leaving a bunch of dead bodies in your wake. Though I’m sure if anyone had reported it, they would have blamed it all on you. Addie was too injured to have done any of it. No word on the missing federal agent either. We found one transmission about hospital security getting a false alarm. When they investigated, they found nothing suspicious. Just a prank call.”

“Hell.”

“Yeah, whoever orchestrated this is good. But so are we.”

“I see a vehicle in the dark, half-hidden in the trees and brush on the side of the road, and the car behind me is speeding up. I’m forty-five minutes from Mountain Home. I’m speeding up. Hope, it’s not a cop sitting in the bushes.”

“We’ll call ahead to verify. We’re coming your way, unless you learn it’s no problem.”

“Keeping the line open.” Dan sped up and was going ninety on the sixty-five-mile per hour road, hoping it wasn’t a cop sitting on the side of the road. He didn’t want to have to explain what was going on, or his version of it. If it wasn’t a cop, it was possibly someone who wanted Addie dead. Not to mention they’d want him dead too now for interfering and knowing something about what was going on.

The vehicle shot out of the bushes, intending to hit him and knock him off the road, and he swerved to miss it, gunning the gas. “It’s not a cop,” Dan warned, cursing under his breath as the SUV began to rock, and he had to get it back under control before it rolled. He turned the SUV hard and smacked the other car’s front bumper, shoving their assailants back into the brush. The pursuing car crashed with a loud bang.

Car doors opened and two men ran after them, pausing only long enough to aim at them. Addie struggled to sit up. “Stay down,” Dan shouted, his heart racing.

Three rounds hit the back window, and Addie ducked down. “Give me your gun.”

Dan sped out of range. The car behind him stopped briefly to pick up the other men. He handed her one of his revolvers.

“Two vehicles, one dead on the side of the road, the other in hot pursuit, at least a driver and two shooters that exited the stranded car.” He glanced back at Addie, buried in her blanket. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, just keep driving. And keep the sharp turns and crashes to a minimum.”

He smiled. “I’m on it.”

“Next time though, I’m shooting back.”

Chase had been listening in on the conversation and said, “These guys sound like professionals.”

“Hell, yeah, they are,” Dan said, hoping they had a chance to take them out.

Chase swore. “I’d call the local police, but I’d be afraid we’d have some real trouble trying to explain all of this. I should be at your location in thirty-five minutes.”

“Chase is driving just a little over the speed limit,” Bridget said.

“You better believe it. We finally learn Dan’s got a wife, and we aim to keep it that way.”

Addie groaned.

“You hear that, Addie? Everyone knows it. We just have to make it official,” Dan said.

She let her breath out on a tired sigh. “I’m likely to get you killed.”

“The other car’s coming in for the kill,” Dan warned.

“Hell, I wish I could fly,” Chase said.

“They’re shooting, damn it,” Dan gritted out.

“I’ll take them out,” Addie said.

“You’re in no shape to be shooting at anyone. You can barely sit up. I only gave you the gun in case they wrecked our vehicle and you could defend yourself.”

“If they take us out, we’ll be dead. I’m doing this.”

He hated that she had to in the condition she was in, but she was right. The men behind them fired at the back windshield, finally knocking out a section of it, and she leaned over the back seat, using it to steady her aim, and fired.

“One down,” she said, her voice weak and breathy, the guy leaning out of the window in the car behind them, the gun dropped on the asphalt.

“Hell, good shooting.”

“I can see better than they can, if I can just keep my eyes open long enough.” Then she shot the driver, and he twisted the steering wheel hard and the car drove off into the trees on the side of the road with a loud bang.

Then she laid back down, placing the gun next to her on the floor, pulling the blanket and hoody over her, and closed her eyes.

“Are you okay, Addie?”

“Your gun is next to me in case we have any more trouble. Tell me when we get there, will you, if we don’t have any more problems before then?”

“Yeah, honey, just sleep. We’ll be with the rest of the gang shortly.”

“You okay, Dan?” Chase asked.

“Yeah, I’ve got Addie riding shotgun. What an amazing shot. They’re down for the count. We’ll be there soon now.”

When they finally rendezvoused with everyone at a service station, Addie was sound asleep. He was glad Kate had come along to check her out, though with her being pregnant, he hoped the hell they didn’t get into any more trouble that might put her in the crossfire. At least Leyton would also help to protect Kate.

“Her blood pressure is low. She needs blood. We need to take her to the hospital and watch over her there. Just for a few hours,” Kate warned.

“They won’t like it that you’re not a doctor there,” Dan said, worried about anyone getting word where they were headed next.

“I did a rotation there. I still know a lot of the doctors there. In this small town, there’s barely any turn over.”

“Okay, I hope the hell this works,” Dan said, feeling like, at any moment, someone could pull what they did at the last hospital.

When they arrived at the hospital, Kate had already called ahead and made arrangements for Addie’s care for a few hours. Dan and his friends helped Addie onto a gurney, and she was rolled through the hospital and into a room. A dark-haired doctor met with Kate, saying, “It’s been a long time.”

What Dan was even more shocked about, the doctor friend of hers was a cougar too. He checked Addie over, while Dan stayed in the room with her and the others guarded the room. Dan felt much better knowing they had protection, and Kate and another doctor were checking Addie over.

A nurse started an IV.

“I want to get her home soon,” Kate told Dr. William Rugel.

“I understand, but you have nine more hours to travel to reach Yuma Town. What’s with all the uniformed officers? And the undercover cops?”

“She’s a federal agent. Someone tried to kill her at the hospital in Portland. The whole thing’s been covered up, hush-hush. No word concerning it on the news or anything.”

Dan hadn’t really wanted Kate to tell any of this to anyone, but he understood she wanted the doctor to know if these people caught up with them here, they could have a similar fight.

“Dan met up with trouble on the road, so they knew they were headed this way. The only thing they hadn’t expected was for a contingent of law officers to meet up with Dan to help get them home safely.”

“The cougar cavalry,” William said.

“Right. By the way, since I’m expecting, we sure could use an excellent family physician to take my place for a few months.”

“The town’s completely cougar run,” Dan said.

William nodded. “I’d like that. What if, after I’m there for a few months, I don’t want to leave?”

“We can always use some extra help. I never have a chance to get away.”

“I’ll check out your place in about a week. I have some time off then.”

“Okay, good. Thanks, William. We could really use your expertise out there.”

“Is Addie going to be all right?” Dan asked, coming close to take her hand and squeeze it.

“Yeah,” William said. “If she gets plenty of rest and fluids, she’ll be fine. A few more days and she’ll be almost as good as new. The rest of tonight and tomorrow, she needs complete rest. You’re welcome to take the bed next to her and get some rest too.”

“Thanks, Doc. We still have a long drive ahead of us tomorrow.” Dan stripped down to his boxer briefs and climbed under the sheet.

Kate was going to take a seat near Addie, but William said, “Why don’t you lie down in the physician’s break room. You can get some quality sleep before you have to take care of your patient on the next phase of your journey, especially in your condition.”

“Thanks, I’d like that.”

William walked out with Kate. “Tell me, who’s the lucky guy?”

She motioned to Leyton, serving guard duty already. “Leyton Hill. You would never believe how we met, but if you come to work with us, I’ll tell you all about it.”

Leyton joined her and gave her a hug and a kiss. “Camping out has never been such an adventure.” He offered his hand to William. “Good to meet you, William.”

They shook hands and Dan was glad Kate had worked at the hospital and had an in so that they could take care of Addie right away. It would be great too, if the doctor decided to come work with them for a few months, while Kate took off to have her baby. He might even decide to stay once he worked with so many cougars. They’d make it their business to ensure he felt welcome.

Dan slept for a few hours, woke, then left the room so Bridget could lie down on the bed he’d used for a while. Chase was pulling guard duty in front of Addie’s room now. Travis had found a couch in the nearby waiting area to curl up on. Leyton was downstairs in the lobby, watching for any signs of trouble. “No problems at all?” Dan asked Chase.

“None. They probably don’t know you have reinforcements who met up with you to watch your backs. It’ll probably take them some time to regroup and discover where you’ve escaped to after you wrecked their other vehicle and two of their men are dead.”

“Good thing for that.”

“So, what’s going on?”

“She’s an FBI agent, working on a task force to take down certain kinds of criminals, but she believes one of the people on the taskforce is a mole who is leaking their plans, and Addie seems to be the target.”

“And your involvement with Addie?”

“Uh, yeah, sorry, buddy. I couldn’t tell you or any of the others. I was sworn to secrecy, concerned that telling anyone could get her killed. I signed a contract with the FBI to work with Addie as her husband when they needed me. Strictly undercover. Six months earlier, she dropped into Yuma Town, wounded, but she wouldn’t stay for fear those who wanted her dead would come there and take some of our people out. Me, especially, being that I was her husband. She left the house shortly after she’d arrived, when I came into work, not telling me that she was going to leave again, and I had no way to find her. Truthfully, I believe she was desperate to find a safe haven for even a couple of days before she took off again.”

“Then Kate came to see her at your place, to take a look at her injuries.”

“Yeah, and she said she’d be fine in a few days. That’s all Addie had to hear. She didn’t say anything, but I knew the look she cast me said if she would live, there was no reason to put me in danger. It’s been hell for me, really having feelings for the woman, not being able to keep in touch, worrying she’s going to get herself killed, and I’ll never hear from her again, or know what had become of her.”

“I completely understand your reasoning for keeping it secret, though I wouldn’t have breathed a word of it to anyone. On the other hand, I know how by-the-book you are. And I get it. In your shoes, I would have done the same thing. I’m all for helping you to keep her there in Yuma Town, and helping you to protect her.”

“That would be my plan. No way would whoever’s after her be able to win against us. It’s the keeping her there that’s the difficulty. Once she’s feeling better, I’m afraid she’ll vanish, just like she did before.”

“We’ll do what we can to keep her there. Doc said we could get on the road around noon. Addie’s vital signs are looking good. She still needs plenty of rest, but she’s doing well. Mostly because she’s a cougar and is healing faster than a human would, or she’d be down for a lot longer than that. Of course, this is your call because she’s your wife”—Chase smiled at Dan and shook his head—“and you know her better than any of the rest of us, not to mention you’re the sheriff, but if you want to try this—you stay at home with Addie. Protect her, and keep her under lock and key so she doesn’t run off again. These guys are bound to come there looking for her, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, I do. It wouldn’t be hard for them to learn where I live. The options we have are for us to stay at my place and wait them out, or stay with someone else, but that could mean endangering someone else too.”

“You know that’s not an issue. We will all work together to get this done. All of us have dangerous jobs. It’s just what we do.” Chase stretched out his legs, leaned back on the chair, and folded his arms. “If you don’t stay at your place, I was thinking Hal’s ranch might work because they have two ranch hands, a foreman, Hal, and Tracey, all firearms qualified. All trained in hand-to-hand combat.”

“And they’ve got the babies.”

“True, but for the time-being, maybe Tracey could take them home to her parents. Maybe even stay there with them until we resolve this.”

“Okay, that’s a possibility. Or we could stay with Stryker. He’s got extra room, serves as my deputy sheriff, and would be a good protector.”

“Right. Also, you could stay at my place—at one of the cabins on the lake. Or with Rick and Yvonne Mueller. They are still trying to track down some information from their FBI friends to see if they can learn anything.”

Chase glanced down the hall as a nurse moved about. “Good. I hope they learn something soon. Or we could stay at the Cougar Special Forces Agency safe house with Travis and Bridget helping to watch out.”

“Yeah, any of those would work and wherever you decide to go, all of us will back you up with additional firepower. Did you get some sleep?”

“Yeah. Thanks for coming to our rescue as fast you did.”

“Are you kidding? We couldn’t get here fast enough. I sure hope she wants to be a deputy sheriff and stay put.”

“Yeah, me too. She’s a crack shot. Exhausted, she was still able to hit two of the men in the car pursuing us.” Dan stretched his legs out.

“Leyton’s going to want to recruit her, you know. Bridget would love to have another woman to work with on the cougar force as an agent.”

“Don’t I know it. I just hope I can convince her to stay in Yuma Town with us. With me.”

“We’ll all help in whatever way we can.” Chase smiled then. “Stryker was grumbling about missing all the action, and he swears the mystery woman you’ve hooked up with is the mystery woman who intrigued him when he was playing Santa for charity last Christmas.”

“Not this woman. She only wanted me.” Then Dan frowned, realizing that she said she’d checked out Chase, Hal, and Stryker also when looking into Dan’s background. That was way before he began working with her and before Chase and Hal had mates even. She definitely had not been the woman who’d been checking Stryker out last winter when he was playing Santa Claus for a charity event.

“I can’t believe you slipped out of the Hamburger Spot with her before we could see her, and hassle you a bit.”

Dan smiled. “I knew that was coming. I’m getting some coffee. Want some?”

“Sure. We thought we’d take shifts getting breakfast, and then pick up lunch on the return home.”

“Sounds good to me.” Dan went to the breakroom, fixed a couple of coffees, one with extra milk and sugar for Chase, and returned to where he was sitting.

“The two of you must have some real chemistry between you. You’d never take off work for pleasure. Ever. What did the colonel say when you returned to work the next day?”

Dan took a seat next to him. “He only smiled at me and said he hoped I had a nice break. You know me, I never took breaks. I wanted to tell you guys about her in the worst way. Once I signed a contract, that was part of the agreement, to keep all this secret from family and friends.”

“I understand. She’s beautiful. I guess the business where someone’s trying to kill her negated the contract.”

“Hell, yeah. If I have to ask my friends to help me to protect her when the FBI can’t be trusted, the deal is off. And she’s mine, if I can swing it with her.”