Forsaken (2 page)

Jaw set, he closed the distance between them, stalking right past the gun and her outstretched arm. He didn’t even try to take the weapon. Instead, he leaned within millimeters of kissing her and blew a soft, whiskey-free breath in her face. “Wrong. Wearing it, thanks to you, but didn’t swallow a drop. Where’s the rifle?”

He stared the short distance into her eyes. Uncertainty clouded their brilliance.

She lowered her arm. “Why are you here? My God, all I asked—”

“Where’s the gun? Was it stolen?”

After a moment’s hesitation, she said, “No. At least I don’t think so. That safe is like Fort Knox, and no one knows the combination but me.” She bit her lip as tears again threatened to spill down her cheeks. “I don’t go in there much.”

He didn’t have to ask why not. “Can I see it?”

“If I show you the rifle, will you leave?”

Though walking away from her again just might kill him, he nodded anyway.

She waved the gun in a gesture for him to walk past her, farther into the house. He obliged, not at all thrilled to turn his back on a woman who probably wanted him dead and wouldn’t have to wish hard to make it happen. All reasons he thought better of mentioning it.

He knew where to go, so he went, tamping down guilt with every footfall. The past year melted into nothing, and the little house that once felt like the only real home he’d ever known echoed with an emptiness that broke his heart. How she lived here, day in and out, with those vacant rooms was far beyond what he could understand.

Because the only thing worse than living with those old memories would be leaving them behind.

God, a conscience was a bitch. She should have sent him to prison when she had the chance. He found the closed door and swung it open.

The knock of her boots on the hardwood behind him ceased the moment he entered the bedroom. A choked sob filled the silence.

Then he knew. He turned to face her. “You haven’t been in here since, have you?”

Tears welled up and over the rims of her eyes, and just like that, she was in his arms again. He wasn’t about to question the oddity of being the one to comfort her. He just drew her in and held her, trying with only moderate amounts of success not to lose it himself. Standing in that room again brought back memories he had trouble swallowing, so he could only imagine what Riley felt.

Her parents were dead, and he was the last person who had a right to share her grief.

Because he had killed them.

Seconds passed into minutes. He couldn’t pretend not to like the feel of her in his arms, but he was a bastard for it. She was right. He did have a lot of nerve coming here again—even if only to save her. But from what? Nothing made sense. He suspected it was supposed to be him with a bullet in his head, not his brother, and someone wanted Riley to go down for it.

She ducked from his hold without warning, as if she realized the brutal irony of the situation. Squaring her shoulders, she led the way to the tiny closet. Still sniffling, Riley pulled the cord on the closet light and parted a wall of clothing, the hangers making an awkward screech over the wooden pole.

Dust swayed through the dim air, giving him an edge of hope. The line of hangers hadn’t been disturbed in quite a while, so maybe there really was someone else with an old Sharps. Or maybe he’d been wrong about the caliber.
Anything but what it looked like
.

The gun safe was built into the back of the closet, hidden behind a wooden panel. Oren had been a fanatic about his guns—everyone in the county knew about his collection, but Gage was the only one outside of immediate family who knew where the safe was. That hidden compartment might have been Oren’s best kept secret, but it didn’t bode well for Riley if her rifle fit the crime scene. In fact, it only served to poke the guilty finger directly at her.

Seconds passed before Riley backed out of the closet. Empty handed, except for the revolver. Even with the light at her back, he could make out the horror in her expression. “It’s not there.”

His heart pounded. “Was the safe locked?”

She nodded, her hand drifting to cover her mouth. “Everything looks just like it did the last time…” She crossed to the bed and sank onto the edge, clutching a corner post. “No one had access to that safe. Absolutely no one. No one has even been in this room—” She jumped to her feet, alarm tainting her features. Staring at the corner of the bed she had vacated, she took several steps backward toward the door.

Then she bolted…and took his gun for the ride.

Gage swore, not bothering to be polite about it. After a moment’s hesitation, he ducked into the closet to see the safe for himself. Long guns lined the rich velour interior. He recognized every one of them, but it was the one missing that got his full attention. It took a great deal of self-control not to slam the door, and if not for the respect he had for the late Oren Beckett, he’d have done just that. Instead, Gage pushed the door shut with the tips of his fingers and put everything back in place before he killed the light and left the bedroom behind.

He followed the sound of sniffles to the kitchen, where he found Riley at the table with her head in her hands. He reached for the light switch and missed.

She looked up as he felt for it. “Don’t. I don’t want you to look at me like this,” she said, sending another chip of his heart to the floor in shards.

“Okay.” He gave up the search and leaned against the doorway. “I believe you. I don’t think you did it, but the cops will.”

“So what do we do?”

We
. His heart made serious strides toward recovery when that particular word slipped from her lips.

Before he could answer, headlights swept the wall of the front room.

“Expecting someone?” Gage asked, plucking his gun off the table. For the second time that night, he took advantage of the dark. It gave him a decent amount of cover. The porch light filtered through the huge front windows, but most of the room remained bathed in shadows.

Loud pounding resonated from the front door. “Riley, open up!”

“Is there a reason someone is trying to beat down your door?” he asked, edging toward the door.
Someone male
.

Riley rushed past Gage. “That’s Dawson. He’ll know what to do.”

Gage grabbed her by the back of the shirt. He drew her close and spoke through the curtain of her hair. “Dawson…as in Sheriff Burke? First name basis?”

“Yes.” She elbowed him in the rib, hitting a sore spot left by the heel of her boot.

Dawson Burke had tried to get his do-gooder palms on Riley while she and Gage had been an item. Gage could have broken the guy in half with his bare hands for it, but Riley always smiled that sweet smile and told Gage he had nothing to worry about. Back then, Gage refused to examine the inkling that Burke’s crush on Riley might have done most of the convincing for her when it came to keeping Gage out of jail. At the time, he was too torn up about the whole situation to care, but after having Riley in his arms again, those jealous synapses were misfiring like crazy. His grip on the weapon tightened.

Her blue eyes blazed. “We’ve been seeing each other. Now let me—”

The blast of a gunshot put an end to her sentence.

Riley bolted for the door. Before Gage could stop her, she’d thrown it open.

Dawson Burke slumped through the threshold, all decked out in his official uniform with a rather unfortunate pair of accessories: one bullet hole and a blood stain to match.

Chapter Two

“This day is not going well at all,” Gage muttered, yanking Riley away from the open doorway.

She steadied herself against the front wall and heaved a shaky breath, fighting not to look at Dawson. It wasn’t the first time she’d shared space with a dead man, and the bitter reminder of the past sickened her—a hard edge of regret cutting into memories she’d fought to erase. “Well, you’ve never been one for exaggeration,” she said weakly, her voice faint over a pounding in her head.

Gage knelt to feel for a pulse. A halfway sympathetic look crossed his face. “I’m sorry about your boyfriend.” He drew to his feet and shoved his boot against Dawson’s body.

The sheriff met the indignity of the attack with the blank expression of unseeing eyes, not budging from his position as doorstop.

“Don’t think he felt much.” Gage pushed harder against Dawson’s shoulder, grunting with the futile effort.

Riley stiffened against a wave of nausea. She liked Dawson well enough, but the truth was the only reason they’d been seeing one another was because he wouldn’t leave her alone. He was a nice guy, but he was no Gage Lawton.

Of course, neither was the Gage standing in front of her. He had three years on her and the past year seemed to have widened that gap. The man she’d known before always wore a playful expression, but that ended the night of the accident. The first days after the wreck, he’d been a shell of his former self, and she hadn’t seen him since. This Gage seemed stronger, not just as evidenced by the hard lines and flat planes of muscle still visible beneath his long-sleeved T-shirt, but also by the quiet understanding in his expression. An expression not of regret for the past, but of…determination? And she wondered for the first time what the past year had been like for him. She’d spent it assuming—hoping, even—that he suffered through it trapped in his own brand of hell, but his expression hinted he’d grown.

She
had wallowed.

Riley blinked, still trying to wrap her brain around Gage’s reappearance in her life. Then her focus slid to Dawson, and her thoughts went to the murderer lurking outside. “We’ve got to call the police.”

“The hell we do.” He gave up trying to push Dawson onto the porch, grabbing him instead by the shirt and dragging him just inside the doorway. “Sorry about your floor, but if I move him the other way, I’ll have to go outside to pull, and if I do that you’ll probably have two of us to deal with. No offense, but I’m not putting a bull’s-eye on my back for a dead man.”

Riley took several deep breaths, making a mental dive for the last moment her life had been even remotely normal. It felt like hours had passed since she’d been in her car, singing off-key and tapping her fingers on the wheel at ten and two. Now… “Wait, you’re locking him in with us?”

Gage had already closed the door. He paused with his hand on the bolt, appraising her with mild amusement. “Thought I might. Bad guy outside and all.”

Bad guy inside.
But she didn’t tell him that. Instead, she gave Dawson a wide berth and made a grab for her phone. “I’m calling the police.”

Gage put a hand on her arm, stopping her in her tracks. “Wrong. We’re getting out of here.”

Riley glanced at Dawson and was rewarded with another tide of dizziness. She pitched to the side and once again found herself in Gage’s forbidden embrace. She swallowed—hard—and tried not to inhale. The smell of the whiskey he wore took her back to a time she had no business remembering, much less wanting. “Where are we going? Bad guy outside, remember?”

“Right. And either it’s the same guy who shot Billy, or it’s a bad day for coincidences. Grab what you need, but leave your cell phone.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“GPS. It’s traceable. Leave it.”

“No, back to the part about me going anywhere with you.” Finding the Sharps missing had shaken her every bit as much as seeing Gage again. Knowing someone had gained access to the gun and used it to kill Billy—whether or not Gage was the intended target—frightened her to the core, making her want to believe in him. Especially since his appearance under the circumstances marked the first time, as far as she knew, that he’d ever gone back on his word. But with Dawson dead and both of them clearly innocent of the crime, some of the logic in fleeing was lost on her. Nevertheless, her heart sided with Gage.

But her mind wasn’t ready to go there again.

He sighed, pulling her deeper into the shadows. “Didn’t we cover this? The guy out there with the gun is probably the one who framed you for what was supposed to have been my murder. Someone wants me dead, and they want you to take the blame for it. Someone doesn’t like us, Riley—collectively or otherwise—and the least I owe you is to keep you safe until we figure this out.”

She jerked her gaze from the unfairly sexy line of his jaw. “No. The least you owe me is to stay away from me like you promised.” The words were quiet but harsh, and she didn’t miss the flash of pain in his eyes. “Consider your obligation over. I’m calling the police.” She jerked free from his arms, but she’d overestimated his hold. The ease with which she slipped free tore at her heart.

He’d let her go. Exactly as he had promised.

“Gage—” His name was a guilty whisper on her lips.

Another shot bellowed through the darkness. The front window shattered. Glass flew through the front room, glittering in the faint light.

Cursing, he dropped to his knees.

“Gage!” He was only a stride away, but she jumped for him.

His arm bloomed red. “Get down, dammit.”

She didn’t hesitate to oblige.

He tipped his head in the direction of the table by the door where she’d dropped her stuff. “Last chance to get your bag,” he said, clutching his arm through his shirt. “I’d grab it for you, but it doesn’t go with my shoes. Besides, if I get blood all over it you’ll never let me hear the end of it.”

Was he kidding? “You’re bleeding—”

“Happens when you’re shot. I might have been wrong about you going to jail,” he added through clenched teeth. “Might be the morgue. Your call.”

Riley glanced around the room.
Home
. The place where she kept her memories.

The place she spent the last year hiding from them.

He wasn’t asking her to leave forever. She inhaled deeply and got a hint of whisky and a heart full of Gage.

“Bleeding here. You coming or not?” Tension ricocheted through his half-hearted attempt at humor.

“Coming,” she said, her voice watery. She felt for her purse on the table behind her head and dragged it to the floor. Remembering his earlier warning, she removed her cell phone. After a moment’s hesitation—common sense still on the side of calling the law—she pressed the power button and slid the phone under a short-legged plant stand.

He gave quick appraisal, the scrutiny uncomfortably intense. “Stay down and stay in the shadows. I’ve got a truck parked in the shed in the back. I’m guessing our guy doesn’t know you have a way out other than what’s sitting in the driveway, but don’t count on it.”

Riley nodded. She tried to gather her wits, but the sweat beading on Gage’s exposed skin made her nervous. How bad had he been hit? She didn’t ask. It wasn’t as if his answer would change anything. They still had to get to his truck.

She followed him in an army crawl to the kitchen, cursing the expansive windows and wondering with dismay when she’d last swept the floor. And she worried. Tension in Gage’s movements told her he was in pain, as did the way he kept his left arm tucked against his body with his weight lodged on his right side.

When he reached the back door, he waited for her to draw even with him.

“This door still scream when you open it?” He gave a faint, rueful smile through heavy, worrisome breaths.

Riley was barely winded.

“Yeah.” The last time they’d tried to sneak Gage out of the house, the screen door squawked alarm, rousing her parents. Gage had explained to Oren that Riley had only been letting him in after he had some truck trouble.
Funny it quit in your usual parking spot
, her father had observed. Almost twenty at the time, she was still very much her daddy’s little girl.

Warmed by the memory—in spite of everything—she smiled.

Gage returned a crooked grin. “Figured as much. I’m going to cut the screen. When you step through, make sure you don’t hit the panel at the bottom.”

“Got it.”

“Stick to the trees and shadows. Go slow. Unless our guy is on the move, I don’t think he can see back here—not with that angle he had on the front porch to take out Dawson—so take it easy and try not to draw attention, okay?”

She nodded.

“One more thing. If anything happens, run. Take my truck—the keys are under the front seat. Just get the hell out of here. There’s a cell phone in there too. Hit redial and tell the guy who answers everything. Do what he says. You can trust him.”

“Right,” she said, her tone flippant. “Trust the total stranger. Gotcha.”

“Dammit, Riley, trust
me
.” He clenched his jaw, the muscle working under a coat of new stubble.

The sight mesmerized her. She hadn’t forgotten how his stubble felt against her skin. She remembered that and a whole lot more, every thought misplaced in light of their shared circumstance, both past and present.

She gave a grim nod. “Okay, let’s do it.”

Gage studied her a moment longer, searching her face. Whether or not he found what he wanted, she didn’t know, but endless seconds ticked by before he broke eye contact and drew to a crouching position. He pulled a pocketknife from his jeans and flipped it open with one hand. A lock of hair fell forward to brush his cheek when he leaned in to cut the screen.

It took concentrated effort on her part not to brush that lock away.

“Ready?”

Adrenaline hit her in new places. She could handle guns. Dodging bullets? Not so much on her repertoire. But she thought better of mentioning any second thoughts. If she did, he’d look at her, and the danger of drowning in those blue eyes made him even more formidable than their hidden foe.

That and the fact that blood now tainted the better part of Gage’s sleeve got her moving.

She looked away. “Let’s go.”

He touched a finger to her chin, drawing her attention back to his face, cradling her in his gaze. Then he straightened just enough to step through the door and disappeared without a sound.

She followed, stopping to pull shut the door as if that single action could mean the protection of her home—her
family.
The sound was final and all too real. The noise seemed to echo over the rugged land. Worried, she found Gage’s eyes.

They were bright and a little glazed and, as such, not much comfort. He stood flat against the back wall of the house, his right hand clamped to his left shoulder. “I’ll lead and cover you.” He tipped his head needlessly toward the shed—a good fifty feet away—and retrieved his gun from his waistband with his blood-soaked hand. Then he slipped from the darker shadows and into the open yard.

Riley held her breath, her heart nearly pounding out of her chest, but he made it to a small cluster of trees situated near the shed without incident.

It took every bit of self-control she could muster not to run after him, full tilt. To placate her nerves, she held her bag in a death grip and pinned it against her body so it wouldn’t rattle, then jogged after Gage. When she neared the trees, he waved her along. She ran past him, slipped into the shed, and stood there in the stale, humid air breathing hard.

And admiring a hell of a truck. Late model, it looked brand new and gleamed black even in the dark—a far cry from the beaters he’d gone through when they were dating. How in the world had Gage ended up with a ride like that?

Seconds later, he joined her. “That was too easy,” he said in a low voice. He switched the gun to his left hand and reached for the driver’s side door.

Before he could pull the handle, Riley put a hand on his arm. “What about the light?” she asked, worried it would be a dead giveaway.
Dead
being the operative word.

Mischief darted across his face. “I disengaged it.” To prove his point, he opened the door and, sure enough, no light. He gestured with his good arm for her to pass.

“Who does this?” Riley muttered, climbing into the cab and scooting to the passenger side. “Awful lot of trouble you went through to be sneaky.”

“Not on your account.” He jumped in after her and pulled the door shut with a quiet click. The gun landed in the console. “Look under your seat for the first aid kit. I need something to wipe off this blood. It doesn’t feel like more than a graze, but I don’t know how bad it actually is. Hurts like hell.”

“You sound like you’ve done this before.” Riley felt under the leather seat and removed a plastic case. “And, by the way, nice truck,” she said, admiring the inside. His ride had to have cost more than her family home. Rifling through the contents of the kit, she found a moist wipe—a feat in the dark. “You win the lottery?”

Gage ignored her question and accepted the thin towelette with a wry look. “Got another one?”

Riley laughed—a nervous sound that gave more away than she cared to admit—and felt inside the box, almost spilling it when he shrugged out of his shirt. In spite of the unexpected distraction, she came up with a handful of alcohol wipes.

“Need help?” she asked, staring through the windshield with exaggerated intensity. Ogling his shirtless chest was no more an option than looking him in the eye, and she was hard pressed to avoid either one.
Not like you’ve never seen him naked
, she told herself. But the sculpted Adonis in her peripheral vision said otherwise. Hardened muscle. Scars she didn’t remember.

All of him achingly familiar, the differences striking because of it.

“If you’re up for it.”

His words jolted her from her thoughts. “Up for what?”

“Help?” The innocence of the word was lost to the bemused grin he wore.

Her cheeks grew warm, then hot when she ripped open one of the foil packets and had an immediate, unwelcome flashback to sex—with him. There’d never been anyone else. The tease of cool night air over tangled limbs, bare flesh and fingertips, butterflies and wild horses. Every moment irrevocably belonging to Gage.