Chapter 62

Some of the goons gesture for us to walk out the front door and out onto the porch and I grimace, glancing at Dakota. This seems bad, but maybe it’s all part of the plan. Dakota’s face is as calm as always. He’s a steel trap for his emotions, giving nothing away, which means it’s always difficult to read him.

“What do we do?” I whisper.

He glances at me. “We stall for time,” he whispers back, before turning toward the door, moving in the direction the goons gesture for us to move. Together, the six of us all walk out the front door and stand on the porch, watching as the boss comes out and adjusts himself. He holds out his toe, pointing to the small missing piece where I’d shot him, but I clearly missed his foot in his shoe.

“These were my favorite shoes, Kate,” he says, but he doesn’t sound angry. If anything, he sounds amused.

“Oh no,” I tell him, sarcasm dripping from my lips. “Should I apologize?”

“No,” he chuckles. “It’s better if you didn’t. I enjoy your attitude.”

I blink at him, confused. This man could probably have any woman he wants. He didn’t have to chase me across the country.

One of the goons hits Dakota with the butt of his gun. “On your knees.”

Dakota snarls but my snarl is louder. “Don’t fucking touch him!” I spit, taking a step toward them.

Dakota glances at me in surprise. He holds his hands up and slowly sinks to his knees, just as Jimmy and the others do, leaving me the only one standing. When I try to move closer to Dakota, another goon points the barrel of his gun at me and I freeze, not wanting to cause too much trouble.

Where the fuck are Wiley and Levi?

“This is fucking nonsense,” I say, glaring at the man. “I don’t even know your name and you chase me?—”

“Lennox,” he interrupts. “You can call me Lennox.” He glances at the goons. “Not you fuckers though. It’s Boss to you.”

I snap my mouth shut for a second. “Okay. . . Lennox. What’s so goddamn special about me? Look at you! You could have anyone you want. There was no need to chase me across the country.”

“On the contrary,” he purrs. “I think you might be the first person to evade me for so long. You have no idea how difficult it was to find you. People out here are pretty tight-lipped when people come looking.”

“That doesn’t make me special,” I point out. “It just means I got lucky.”

Lennox levels his eyes on me. “I beg to differ, but we’re not here to debate on why I want you. What I want, I get it. There’s no other option.” His eyes trail over to Dakota where he watches the exchange calmly, letting me take the lead in dragging things out. “You’ve done well for yourself, Dakota Steele, despite your. . . past.” When neither one of us respond, Lennox glances back at me. “Did he tell you? This man shot his dear old daddy. Well, he might as well have. The court ruled that he was innocent, but these days, coercion to suicide is a crime.”

“I know who he is,” I say, tilting up my chin, standing strong with him. He’d explained the story, and yes, it’s not a nice one, but sometimes, life gives us a shitty hand. Sometimes, we have no choice but to act.

Dakota’s face darkens with Lennox’s words. “You remind me of him,” he says, his voice full of gravel.

“Who?” Lennox asks, tilting his head in curiosity.

“My father,” Dakota says, his eyes flashing. “Weak. Desperate to be loved while doing everything in his power to sabotage any chance of actually being loved. I see it in your eyes.”

Lennox’s eyes crinkle in amusement as he strolls forward, his cigar still in his hand. He steps up on the porch and stops before Dakota. I take a step forward, but a gun raises on me again and I stop.

Lennox leans down so his face is in Dakota’s. “I hope you wear that same expression, Dakota Steele,” he says. “The same look when I fuck your woman right in front of you. I hope you bare your teeth as she moans my name.”

Fury fills Dakota’s eyes, but with so many guns on him, he can’t do anything. No one is looking at me right now. They’re all watching the exchange with amusement.

And no one ever checked if I’d gotten rid of all my weapons.

I jerk up my shirt and pull the small handgun from the waistband of my jeans. Lennox glances over at me, his eyes widening.

“Good luck with that,” I snarl, and pull the trigger.

I can’t hesitate. Don’t hesitate, Dakota warned, and I take it to heart. The moment I pull the trigger, I’m jerked backward, the goons knocking the gun from my hand, but it’s too late. The bullet slams into Lennox’s arm, slicing through muscle and exiting out the other side. Lennox snarls and jerks back before clamping a hand over the wound. But the move does exactly what I need.

Everyone starts to move. Dakota seizes the moment to tackle Lennox off the porch. Someone fires their weapon and then screams in pain. More people stream out the door, Naomi and the others, all with guns, all fighting. What happened to the goons inside? I don’t know. Chaos is all around me. Someone slams into me, and I’m shoved off the edge of the porch to sprawl on the grass with an oomph, but the person is gone a second later. I drag myself to my knees, watching as Dakota and Lennox wrestle on the ground, both trying to gain the upper hand, both trying to keep the weapons from their faces. Dakota manages to knock the gun from Lennox’s hand, but Lennox does the same to Dakota’s knife.

“Kate!” Naomi screams and I turn to find a goon grabbing her and slamming her against the wall. She screams and kicks at him, trying her best to free herself.

Lennox kicks Dakota off him and stands despite his injured arm. It barely slows him down as he turns and finds me, his eyes wicked dark, before he takes a step toward me. Fuzz appears from beneath the porch, and I gasp in surprise. I’d wondered where Fuzz had went, but when I see him come scrambling out from beneath the porch, all five pounds of fury, I panic.

“No! Fuzz!”

The tiny opossum opens its mouth menacingly at Lennox, not necessarily attacking but warning him away. He’s small and can’t do much, but Lennox doesn’t know that. He sees a rat-like creature come out from beneath the porch and bare it’s teeth, he stumbles back in surprise. And Wiley seizes that opportunity to come rushing from around the house and tackles Lennox to the ground again. He jams his thumb into the gunshot wound on his arm and Lennox screams and punches out at Wiley, clocking him right in the face. Wiley pulls a bowie knife and tries to plunge it into Lennox’s face, only for Lennox to grip his wrist so the knife shakes in between them, one pushing, one holding away. One of the goons shoots and Wiley grunts as the bullet grazes his shoulder. Still, it’s the only distraction Lennox needs to shove Wiley off and stand, his face twisted with fury.

“That’s enough!” Lennox snarls. “Give her to me!”

Lennox looks far less put together now than he did before. His cigar was lost somewhere, probably crushed into the grass. His shirt is ripped and there’s blood on it where he was shot. His once pristine hair is now disheveled, and at odds with his appearance. He’s panting heavily, angry, as he looks at Dakota and Wiley where they stand in front of me. I’m holding a knife I’d found on the ground, but I know it won’t do any good if one of the goons shoot me. I just have to trust that the others are keeping them busy.

Dakota grins and switches hands holding his knife. “I told you,” he says. “Come and take her!”

They launch themselves at each other again and all I can do is watch. One of the goons goes down beside me and drops his gun so I launch myself toward it. When I pick it up, I hold it toward Lennox, but I’m not nearly as good of a shot as Dakota. If I fire, my chances of hitting him instead of Lennox are high. So I keep aim, and hope for a chance.

“Give that here!” A goon shouts and grabs the barrel, forcing my aim away. I pull the trigger in surprise as he grabs it, and then blink as the bullet makes its home in his neck where he’d been trying to pull the gun away. He gurgles, blood spurting out across my face as he clamps a hand over the wound.

“Oh, god,” I croak, my stomach roiling. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

He falls to the ground, his mouth working with words he can’t say. Like an idiot, I drop the gun, horrified, and then realize what I did. I hurry to grab it only for another goon to shove me away and I go sprawling again, losing my balance, and plummeting toward Dakota and Lennox where they fight, each holding their own. Wiley is keeping other goons back. The moment I’m close, Lennox shoves Dakota away and grabs me, a gun suddenly against my head.

All fighting stops.

Dakota and Wiley snarl as Lennox wraps his arms around me and holds me tightly. I fight him, but his hold tightens, hurting.

“Stop that,” he orders. “Behave, Kate.”

“I’ll show you behave!” I snarl, kicking at him, trying to dislodge his hold, but it’s like iron.

“Goddamn it!” Lennox snarls. “This shouldn’t have been so goddamn difficult! But fuck if it doesn’t make me want you more.”

“You’re disgusting,” I snarl, trying to claw at his arm, but no matter how much I hurt him, his hold doesn’t loosen.

“I know what kinds of things you enjoy, Kate,” he whispers in my ear. “Calling me disgusting doesn’t really fit, does it?”

I freeze. “What do you mean?”

“Do you think I haven’t been watching you?” he chuckles darkly. “Do you think I didn’t know what happened out in that barn? Or how about on the cattle drive?”

My face flushes, but I tip my chin up. “And so what? That doesn’t make you any less disgusting.”

“No,” he purrs. “But I expect that same mentality when you’re fucking me.”

“Not gonna happen,” I spit, kicking at him. “I can promise you that.”

His goons start gathering around us. I watch as Naomi kicks at the one holding her and then picks up a gun when he releases her. She gets in one shot to his dome before someone else jerks it away from her and smacks her across the face. She falls to the ground with a cry and I snarl.

“If you hurt a single hair on any of their heads, I can guarantee I’ll kill you,” I warn.

“I’m winning,” he says in my hair, his gun trained on Dakota and Wiley. “Alone, you can’t do much harm.”

I snort. “You’ve gotta sleep sometime, Crow.”

A whistle rings out across the yard, not from any of us. I glance around, searching for who I know is the source of that whistle.

“What is that?” Lennox snarls.

I whistle back, just like Levi taught me, and grin when Lennox shakes me.

“What the fuck is that?” he snarls. “The cops?”

“They don’t call 911 out here, silly,” I laugh. “They call each other.”

And then Levi crests the hill before us, but he doesn’t do so alone. He does so on the back of Kill Dozer, the bull spitting mad and ready to rumble. He looks beautiful, like an avenging angel, as he rides the bull that once took his career, and almost his legs. Ninny is beside him, her little feet pawing at the ground, and then more and more animals appear. Chickens, goats, pigs, all spilling over the hill. When Levi charges forward, other cowboys on their horses follow, our neighboring ranches. Tears spring to my eyes. God, it’s beautiful. So fucking beautiful.

Jimmy shoots his arms high and whoops. “Say it, Ms. Kate! You gotta say it right now!”

Despite Lennox still holding me, despite everything going on, I grin. “Yee fucking haw!”