Chapter 7

seven

. . .

Walker

B lue nudged me as I stood near her stall, begging for the sugar cubes I'd stashed in my pocket. My leg ached from how long I'd been on my feet today, but I wouldn't baby myself any longer. I needed to be as close to one hundred percent as possible before we got River back.

"Impatient, huh? You don't even really want to see me. You're only in it for the sweets," I told the horse, but I held out my palm, sugar cubes in the center. She snubbed me, refusing to take my offering. "I beg your pardon. This is your favorite."

"She's mad at you. You've been gone too long," Tex said, striding out of the tack room with a smirk on his face. "I've been taking care of her for you."

"Moving in on my best girl, huh?"

"Someone had to make sure she had attention."

I stroked the side of her neck, chuckling to myself as I realized horses were no better than most of the women I'd dated. They were just as needy and vindictive, if not more so. It was a small mercy they couldn't speak, or text, for that matter. Pretty sure Blue would have blown my phone up with her demands otherwise.

"I sure do have a type, don't I?" I muttered.

Except River wasn't like that. She was complicated, sure, but she'd never been any of those other things toward me.

"Where's the boss lady been? Trouble in paradise?" Tex asked, making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.

"She's just taking care of something back in Alaska. She'll be home soon."

Tex's brows raised. "I thought she was supposed to stay here for a year or risk the ranch going up for auction."

Fuck. I'd forgotten about that. Senior's bullshit stipulations didn't seem all that important in the wake of River's kidnapping. But to the folks on the ranch, it was their livelihoods at stake. It would sure as shit matter to them.

"Since this was an emergency, the three of us agreed in writing that her leaving would have no bearing on that."

Tex lifted his hat and scratched at his head. "You can do that?"

I let out a laugh that I was pretty sure sounded as fake as it felt. "Oh, sure. You can do anything so long as a lawyer drafts it up and makes it sound pretty."

"Well, she'd better get back here soon. There's been rumblings, and her absence has been noticed."

Narrowing my eyes, I asked, "Rumblings? What kind of rumblings?"

Tex leaned back against the stable wall, pulling his phone from his pocket as he did. "Like this, for instance. Not even an hour ago, the gossip mill started posting online about your sad brother being left by his new bride."

He shoved the device at me, and I stared down at a photo of a frowning Cross at dinner tonight, alone with an untouched glass of whiskey. Sure, the man was almost always frowning, but this time he looked... haggard.

Not sure what to say to that, I laughed it off. "You set up a Google alert or something, super spy?"

Tex shrugged and pocketed his phone. "I like to stay in the know when it comes to the ranch, and since you and your brother are the ranch..."

"Fair 'nuff."

A twist of anxiety in my gut had me itching to bring out my own phone and scroll through every last post that mentioned us. But I also knew that wouldn't do anything to bring River back to us.

"She'll be back soon. Any day now."

"Good. I wouldn't want to lose my job just because Cross can't hold on to his wife."

I was hit with the unfamiliar need to defend my brother. Usually I was the first to shove his sorry ass under the bus. But things between us had started to mend. Lately it didn't feel like we were adversaries so much as, well, brothers.

"You might do best to watch your mouth, Tex."

He straightened and cleared his throat. "Roger that. Didn't mean nothing by it, just thought you should know the boys are worried and see if there was anything I could pass on that might soothe some ruffled feathers."

"Everything's fine," I spat, knowing on the inside absolutely nothing was.

Blue took that moment to nudge my shoulder so hard I nearly lost my balance, but I was thankful for the distraction. I needed something to break the tension between Tex and I. Offering her the sugar once more, I sighed when she finally took it.

A car door slamming from outside caught my attention, followed by a second and then indecipherable but definitely raised voices.

Tex craned his neck, looking toward the ruckus. "Seems like Cross is on a tear. If it's all the same to you, I'll make myself scarce."

Unfortunately, I couldn't do the same. He needed to know that the media had caught on to River's disappearance and were posting about it. Good thing he was already in a foul mood, because I was about to make it worse.

Using my cane, I moved as fast as I could through the stable, cursing my injuries because they slowed me down. I heard them as soon as I got inside the house, Cross shouting and Bishop's calm responses. My brother's volume rose with every step I took toward them.

"I should fucking fire you," Cross growled.

"You should put some ice on that."

I moved into the room right as my brother snarled and raised his fist like he was about to take a swing. "What the fuck is going on?"

Cross spun toward me, and I clocked his face. "Ouch," I winced, noting how the skin beneath his eye was already an angry red moving toward purple and guessing it wouldn't be long before the eye was swollen shut. "You really should put some ice on that. Or peas. Maybe a steak."

"Fuck off, Walker. No one asked you."

I gestured toward my cane. "I'm sort of the resident expert on the subject these days. Maybe you should ask me."

Cross grunted and shook his head, returning to the whiskey he'd been pouring into a glass before Bishop goaded him into a reaction.

"So, which one of you is going to tell me how that happened? There's no way Ted did it. The man's a pussycat."

"I punched him," Bishop said, no shame in his words whatsoever.

If looks could kill, the glare my brother shot Bishop would have had him bleeding out all over the floor. I, however, found the situation amusing as hell.

"You're not the first. Doubt you'll be the last. What he do this time?"

Cross's grip was tight enough on his glass I worried he'd break it. "Not a damn thing. That's the fucking problem."

"I'm not following."

"Volkov was there. He was trying to get Cross to step out of line."

My eyes widened, anger surging through me at the bastard's name. "Why the fuck would he do that? Why now?"

My brother sighed. "It was a blatant power move. He wanted us to know we couldn't touch him. Except, I could have shot him right between the eyes then and there."

Bishop snorted. "And then your ass would be in jail, and we'd be no closer to getting River back."

A vein bulged in Cross's neck, his jaw clenched so hard I could practically hear his teeth grinding. "Which is the only reason that motherfucker is still breathing."

I released a breath I hadn't realized I was holding, hating that the explanation made sense. Then I immediately tensed again, remembering I still had news of my own to share.

"Well, we've got other problems too. The ranch hands are getting antsy. They've noticed River is gone, and so has pretty much all of Devil's Grove. If we don't get her back soon, it's gonna be hard to keep the property in our hands. We'll lose everything, her included."

Bishop crossed his arms over his chest, focusing on the empty fireplace. "And Volkov will swoop in and steal this place from under you."

"I bet that asshole is behind the press catching wind of it," Cross grumbled. "Even though he's the one who took her, he's the one who benefits the most from people knowing."

Goddammit, the Russian was a slippery sonofabitch. "Course he's behind it. As soon as people find out the stipulations Senior set forth in the will have been breached, he'll get everything he wants. And the press didn't do us any favors when they practically published the will like it was a damn novel."

"Goddamn public record. No one cares unless there's gossip to be had." Bishop's low rumble was more to himself than us.

"Or you're Volkov, looking for a way to fuck us over," I said, one thing becoming increasingly clear as we discussed our current predicament.

Dominik had planned all of it. Not just the kidnapping, but how to use the will against us. It would have been impressive if it wasn't our lives he was fucking with. If it wasn't our woman he was hurting.

Bishop's phone rang, and to my surprise, he answered, excusing himself from the room and leaving the two of us to wallow.

"I fucking hate this. Volkov has us hamstrung. Dad would be ashamed to see us like this," I muttered.

Cross dragged a hand through his hair. "What do you want from me? I've shut down their ability to ship with us, cut them off, and would've killed the asshole if Bishop hadn't stopped me. What else can I do? Buy off the damn papers? For every one I silence, three more pop up. Not to mention the social media posts from people in town."

His frustration mirrored my own. "I don't know, but we need to do something. I can't just sit around waiting for Dom to make his next move. It's time we start making moves of our own. I mean, fuck, we're the sons of Daniel Cross. If anyone knows about making moves, it's us. We all but cut our teeth on Senior's mind fuckery."

A smirk twisted Bishop's lips as he rejoined us. "I think I have an idea. As long as you're up for some shady shit."

I laughed. "And you call yourself a special agent. It's like you don't know us at all. Shady shit is our bread and butter. Hell, I'm pretty sure it's coded into our DNA or, at the very least, the heart of our family motto."

Cross gave an exasperated huff, stopping me before my ramble went any further. "Go ahead, Bishop. We're listening."