Owned (4 page)

“Thanks, Nick,” I said, handing him one of my business cards.

“You own your own company?” he asked, his eyebrows shooting up in surprise.

“I co-own it. I figure I’ll explain it all to the group tonight. Get all the facts on the table before everyone starts gossiping, if they haven’t already.”

“You really don’t fuck around, do you? Straight for the jugular?” he chuckled as he shook his head.

“We’re all busy people and there’s no point in beating around the bush. I know Gramp didn’t tell you guys much about my life, some people have issues with what I do and who I am. But if you’re all going to be working for me, I need to trust you. Hard to give your trust to someone who you don’t know much about. It’ll just be easier if I tell you all in one shot.”

“You act—” he started to say, before I interrupted him.

“It’s not an act, Nick, this is how I really am,” I snapped. I hated getting the lecture about how it’s just an act that I’m tough and no nonsense. After years and years of getting it, it just got old. Just because I was a woman didn’t mean I was just a ball of emotions. I could handle any situation without falling apart.

“Let me finish,” Nick said in a soft voice. “I was saying you act just like your grandpa. I can see a lot of him in you.”

“Thanks, I’m sorry, I’m just a little raw, especially after what happened with Sean.” I took a cleansing breath and let it out slowly. Nick didn’t deserve my anger. “I’m going to head into town. Thanks for looking after things.”

“No problem, Kate. You can rely on me,” he said, putting that goofy grin back on. It made me chuckle as I headed back to my car. I really didn’t want to handle any of this shit. But really who
wanted
to make arrangements for buying a loved one?

Let the games begin
.

Jared

“Yeah, Nate, what’s up?” I asked as way of greeting when I accepted the call. I didn’t even have to look at the display. There were only two people who knew my new number, Nate and my twin, Dean. Dean was standing right next to me.

“Hey, you guys still lost?” he chuckled, trying to keep the tone light when the conversation topic was heavy.

“Nah,” I lied through my teeth, intentionally missing his meaning. Dean shook his head as he blinked back tears, Nate’s words coming at a bad time. “We’re Marines. We don’t get lost. We were taught how to read a map in our sleep, blindfolded, or already dead. You know that, Navy boy.”

Nate sighed, probably shaking his head at how difficult I was being. “You know what I mean, Jared.”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see it, trying to swallow the grief I was feeling.

“I can’t look at this shit anymore,” Dean whispered before turning away. I glanced at my twin before looking back at the housing development that had once been our family’s ranch. That land had belonged to an Acker for generations until our parents died… Now it was a few thousand cookie-cutter houses that all looked the same, were built cheap, and were so generic that it made me sick.

For those reasons alone this development should have been a crime. Too bad it went so much deeper than that.

“Jared?
Jared?
You there, man?” Nate yelled, obviously having been trying to get my attention for a while.

“Sorry, yeah, I’m here,” I said, clearing my throat as I turned away. No point in staring at the proof of how life doesn’t turn out the way it should all day. We can’t change the past and living in it won’t do anything but hurt our present and future.

“Jared, where are you?”

“Went to check out what they did with the ranch.”

“Shit, I’m sorry, man. You think that’s smart? You
just
got out. Like you’re not already all over the place and feeling fucked in the head. You gotta take that on?”

“We’re Marines,” I chuckled bitterly as I walked over to my beat-up old truck and got in, patting Dean’s arm before starting it up. “We’re always fucked in the head. It’s part of our charm.”

“Amen to that,” Nate mumbled. “Look, I feel like an ass asking what I called for now given where you are, but I’m sorry, I have to. I know you didn’t want guarding jobs and all—”

“We’re not babysitters,” Dean bitched, more than able to hear the conversation. I set the phone on the center console and hit speakerphone as I pulled away from the curb. “We said we’d learn your company and come to work for you on the rescue missions, Nate. We’ll dive into hell to save doctors or kidnapped Americans. We’re not risking our lives or taking a bullet for your Hollywood or politician clients.”

“Yeah, we’ve risked our asses enough for them,” I added, annoyed with the idiots making decisions in Washington. “Hell, would it be so bad if there were less of them?”

“Wow, okay, ignoring the bitter twins you’ve both turned into,” Nate drawled. “I give you a pass because I know seeing the housing development had to be hard, but just shut up and listen to me. I have only a little bit of time before I have to get on a plane and I need your help.”

I shot Dean a glance. While Nate was normally direct, he wasn’t the type to ask for help without it
really
being needed. Plus his tone was slightly panicked.

“What do you need, brother?” Dean asked, his mood changing from difficult to curious and easier to deal with.

I had a couple of questions to add to that. “And why are you getting on a plane? What did we miss?”

“My friend, Kate Boyle, her grandfather died. You guys remember me talking about her, right?”

“Yeah,” I snickered. “The one you’re half in love with and she’s oblivious to it. You only talk about her all the time.”

“And made sure we’ve never met her and stayed far away from anywhere she
might
have been when we were stationed in remotely the same areas,” Dean drawled. “Sorry to hear around her grandpa though. You liked him, right? That was the last of her family or something if I remember.”

“Yeah, he was all she had and he was the best. Great guy. And you get your wish to meet her now. She’s the one I’m calling about. I didn’t get details because neither of us could talk freely, but she called me for backup. I don’t know what the threat is but—”

“It’s got to be bad if she’s calling in for help,” I surmised as I glanced at Dean again.

“Or she’s too grief stricken to see much of anything and smart enough to know that.” Dean gave me a half nod and looked at the phone, the glance saying we needed to talk when Nate wasn’t listening. I agreed.

“Why us and not your trained guys?” I asked. Nate had access to dozens of employees he could just order to watch his friend. “She request us?”

“No, she asked me for guys who blended. The ranch is hers now and I have a feeling that’s where the trouble is stemming from,” Nate hedged.

“And that’s why you were worried about asking us given we fit the bill,” Dean said, bobbing his head as he swallowed loudly. “We’re good, man. It would be nice to be on a ranch again. There’s nothing for us in Idaho anymore. We just had to see it with our own eyes.” He looked at me and I saw the truth in his eyes. My twin needed this.

I gave Dean a nod. Fine, I was in. We could do this for Nate. We’d heard enough about his friend that I looked forward to meeting her and if it was something to pull Dean out of the funk he’d been in since we signed our papers to get out of the Marines, I was all for it.

“She’s in Montana, right? Where?” Nate gave us the address and details, Dean taking it all down. I plotted out the map in my head, knowing the general area and the route to get there. “We’re about seven hours away. We’ll stop for the night outside Wisdom and be there in the morning. See you then.”

“Thanks, guys,” he said before hanging up. Dean finished writing some notes and tucked away the pad in his bag as I turned us around and navigated us to the highway. We were quiet for about twenty minutes until I got off at the first exit with a gas station because we needed to fuel up.

“I saw her once from a distance with Nate,” Dean admitted when we stopped. “She’s fucking gorgeous.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen the pictures he always had in his bunk,” I chuckled, shaking my head as I stretched out before turning to the pump. “But we all get older.”

“Those pictures didn’t do the live version justice, brother. Besides, some things don’t fade with age. Last Nate said Kate was looking better than ever.
Success has agreed with her
were his exact words.”

I shot him a nasty look as I shoved the nozzle into the truck’s tank. “We’re going to protect her because of whatever threat as she deals with losing the last family member she had, Dean. Remember that, okay? Don’t let just getting out of the service make you act like some hormone-filled teenager and be insensitive to Nate’s friend or a jerk.”

“Give me more credit than that, Jared,” he snapped, his eyes filling with anger. “I know you’ve fantasied about her too. Nate’s put her so far up on a pedestal that it would be impossible not to. All those stories about her, seeing the pictures, and hearing her voice when they talked on the phone when we were lonely was enough to make you want her too.”

“Yeah, this might be a bad idea,” I agreed with a sigh.

His eyes went wide as he glanced at me as if I was nuts. “Why would you say that?”

“When have you ever known the fantasy to be even close to the reality?” I drawled. “Maybe I don’t want to know that the perfect woman really isn’t once we get to know her.”

* * * *

As I drove into town, I noticed some of the changes from over the years. Even though I visited Gramp every other weekend since I got out of the Navy, I never really headed into town. I wasn’t much of a social person, and when I wasn’t working, I tended to keep to myself.

My first stop was to the funeral home, where I made the arrangements and wrote them an actual legal check this time. After I was pointed in the direction of the flower shop, I got that off my list as well.

Next I headed to the bank. Harry, the bank manager, gave me such an apology, it bordered on begging my forgiveness. I let it slide on the assurance nothing like it would ever happen again. I was impressed that the Sheriff handled it just as he said he would.

After I got all of Gramp’s stuff out of his safety deposit box, I decided to swing by the Sheriff’s office. After parking my car out front, I went in and saw a cute deputy sitting behind the main desk. Couldn’t have been more than twenty-one, but he was exactly what I would have gone after in college. Blond hair, blue eyes, neatly dressed, with a twinkle of mischief in his eye.

“I’m here to see Sheriff Swick, if it’s possible?” I asked.

“Are you here to report a crime? Is there something I can help you with?” he asked, smiling at me like we were on a first date and he was just waiting for the chance to kiss me.

“No, thanks, though. Sheriff Swick was at my ranch earlier and I wanted to follow up with him.”

“Oh, you’re Kate Boyle then? Sorry to hear about your grandpa, he was well liked around here.”

“Thanks. Yeah, it was real easy to like Gramp,” I agreed, giving him a sweet smile. It was the kind of smile someone would give a younger brother who I didn’t want to encourage in any way.

I know that might sound conceited, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I knew I wasn’t bad in the looks department, but I was in no way beautiful. At five ten and one-seventy, I wasn’t skinny, but most of it was muscle and I worked hard to keep my figure. With long strawberry-blonde hair that I normally had up in a twist, and green eyes, I knew some would call me pretty.

I had kept my size-ten figure since college, but I knew I was well endowed in the breasts category. Having 36D’s actually helped me at times and made hiding my guns easier since I normally had to get a bigger suit jacket to accommodate my girls. But they were a bitch to run with.

“Go on in back, the Sheriff just got off the phone,” he informed me.

“Thanks.” I saw where his office was and headed back that way.

“Any more problems, Kate?” Sheriff Swick asked me as he saw me in his doorway.

“Thanks to you, everything’s getting in order now,” I said with a laugh. “You have a few minutes?”

“Sure, shut the door and have a seat,” he answered, raising an eyebrow at me.

“Sheriff, I’m going to do something I don’t normally do,” I started when I took a seat across from his desk.

“And what would that be?”

“I’m going to trust you without knowing you yet. My gramp spoke highly of you, and I know he trusted you. Now that I know you were one of his men back in his Army days, I know you have to at least be an honorable man. Plus, you handled the bank fiasco as you said you would, that is something to respect. A lot of people don’t do what they say they are going to anymore.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” he agreed, giving me a smile. “I appreciate the confidence, but I’m sensing you have something more to tell me than that.”

“You really don’t miss a thing,” I chuckled. “You said Gramp told you about what I do and I wanted to know exactly what he told you and make sure the air was clear between us. Most law enforcement don’t like what I do and now that I’m going to be living here, I want to make sure you and I are on good terms.”