Chapter Sixteen
MASON
WATCHING MARLEY working with her horses is always a sight to see. She rehabs abused horses that have been re-homed and the trust between the horses and her, no matter what they have been through, is nothing short of a miracle.
It’s almost like the horses know she has been through her own abuse and trauma and can trust her.
She can walk into an equine marketplace and even the grouchiest, meanest horse will let her walk right up to it. The hardest part for her is having to choose.
She just got a new horse yesterday and was up with the sun this morning to be in the stable.
She’s in the middle of the paddock nearest her stable when I walk across the yard to her.
The chestnut gelding she’s in the paddock with is watching me as I get closer, his fur is twitching all over his shoulders and back.
She turns around to see what he is looking at and a smile spreads across her face. “Hey, what are you doing out here?”
The closer I get, the horse’s ears get stiffer and point backward, he does not like me. “I thought I would come say good morning, I don’t get to see you enough.”
When I step up to the wooden fence of the paddock and lean on the top rail, the horse stomps his foot and his head jerks up.
Marley gives him the freedom to be disagreeable if he wants to but loosely holds onto the reins.
“I’m just glad you were here to decorate the tree this year, it’s never the same without you. ”
She’s not looking at me as she talks, she’s rubbing the nose of the gelding that almost looks like he wants to protect her from me by the way he’s hanging his head so close to her.
Her smile is still there but I can hear the sadness in her voice and I grimace as guilt floods me. “I know, I’m going to try and be here every year from now on. I can’t promise, but I’m gonna try.”
The pony jerks his head again and stomps and she shushes him, clucking her tongue at the same time. She doesn’t turn around when she says, “How’s Sloane this morning?”
Aw fuck.
Sloane has actually been avoiding me again, I haven’t seen her much since I pulled her away from Kinley a couple of days ago. Even when I try to find her in the house she seems to sense my presence and ducks away, I know this because I can still smell her scent in the room I think she’s in.
I shrug my shoulders even if she isn’t looking at me to see it, “Don’t know, I haven’t seen her today, you’ll have to ask her.”
She presses her lips to the nose of the pony and he lets her as she rubs her hand along his chin and throat, “Don’t think I don’t see how you look at her, or how you relax when she’s close to you.”
Not really knowing what to say, I’m not going to lie to my sister and it’s no use trying to deny it because she knows me as well as I know myself. Setting my chin on my fist that’s on the top rail, I choose not to say anything.
She walks the pony to a part of the fence that’s shaded by a big maple tree and loops the reins before she walks over to me.
She crosses her arms on the top rail and sets her cheek on her hand, her eyes smiling, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen my big brother look at a woman like I see you look at her. ”
I mirror her and turn my head to set my cheek on my fist, “The type of life I lead is not woman-friendly, Marley. I’m gone too much and I need my focus to be on the job when I’m out with the team.
” I don’t mention that little spark of unease when I think of losing a wife like Dad and Gray did. I keep that fear buried.
Her lip tips a little on the one side, “You know, there are women out there that can handle the type of life you lead. Otherwise, all military men would be single.” She extends one of the fingers on her hand close to me and pokes my arm, “And don’t forget that you have a family here that will always take care of their own. ”
My phone buzzes in my pocket right then, but I still look at my sister because I’ve never thought of it that way. I look down to see Callum’s code name on my phone, “I have to take this, Marley.”
She winks at me and pushes off the fence as I walk away to take my call, “Hey.”
“Hey, I got some background on your girl.” He says and I hear gunshots in the background.
“You at the range?”
“Yeah, I brought the kids for some target practice.”
Callum has been married since before he left the Seals to start his own security company, he has a son and a daughter, “They any good?” I joke.
“Addy’s aim is exceptional, she’s practicing with the rifle today, that girl is a wizard with any type of gun and the crossbow. Emmet prefers handguns.”
“How does Grace handle you being gone so much?” The question is out of my mouth before I can stop it.
“She knows what she signed up for, and to be honest I think she likes the extra space to do what she wants. The only time she gave me a hard time was when she was pregnant and she was emotional all the time, I just tried to be home as much as possible and we got through it.”
“Do you ever worry about anything?” I didn’t want to come right out and ask him if he ever wonders if his wife would cheat on him, but I know a lot of guys who divorced when I was still in Delta Force because their wives got tired of being alone.
“Not a chance, that woman is fiercely protective of our family. Does she get flirted with when she goes out with friends? Yes, but she goes home to me every night whether I’m there or not.” He pauses and asks, “Would this line of questions have anything to do with the beauty you had me look into?”
I don’t answer the question, but change the subject with one of my own, “What’d you find out?”
He chuckles, “Sloane Marie Hayes, twenty-six. She had a promising start in ballet, but her parents died in a car accident during her senior year at the School of Dance in OKC, she had to drop out because her brother stopped payments to the school after they died.
“After her parents died, she got her own place and took a job in Tulsa that she had for a couple of years. What’s strange is that almost two years ago, she completely dropped off the map, there is nothing on her, no tax returns, no bank account, no vehicle registration, abso-fucking-lutly nothing.”
“How is that even possible?”
“It’s possible, but we usually see this type of activity with criminals. Based on her life up to a couple years ago, she doesn’t seem like a criminal.”
“What about her brother?”
“Well, speaking of criminals, he’s a piece of work. He seems to be involved in every gambling circuit from here to Las Vegas to New York. He’s dabbled in the skin trade, guns, and drugs. There is nothing that piece of shit won’t do for money.”
“Does he live local?”
A gun racking and Callum mumbling something to one of his kids is in the background for a few seconds. “He has a place in Tulsa and Las Vegas. When the parents died, he drained every account they had, sold the house, cars, stocks, everything within months, it added up to be a considerable amount.”
“Did she get anything when her parents died?” Anger is moving up my spine as the picture is coming together in my head.
“She has two accounts, one was set up by her mother, did I mention that her brother is from her father’s first marriage?
Anyway, the first wife died when the brother was fourteen, his father married soon after and Sloane was born a year later.
Anyway, the account set up by her mother is just a few hundred K.
There is another much larger account set up by her father, it has a few million in it.
She never touched either, never even accessed them to check amounts, she may not know about them. ”
“How could she have not been told?” I already know he’s going to tell me the brother kept them from her somehow, but I want to hear him say it.
“You’re not gonna like it.” Callum’s voice lowers.
I don’t say anything but wait for him to continue.
“Her brother filed to have her declared dead eight months ago and is filing to claim her assets, it’s a years-long process, but he didn’t waste any time.”
My hand curls into a fist as my anger is about to boil over. “Anything else?”
“That’s all I got, brother.”
“Thanks.” I end the call and turn to go find Sloane.
Maybe now isn’t the best time to talk to her.
I stop, I’m already angry because, based on our encounter last weekend, it sounds like her brother has done something that has her shaking in her shoes.
There is also the anger because she won’t trust me, I know she was avoiding my questions, but I thought giving her space was the best way to go.
Lacing my fingers behind my head and over my ballcap, I turn and look at the barns and the stables at the back of the house. Dad knows what’s going on but won’t tell me, he’s paying her under the table to hide her here. Why is she hiding and why does my dad think it is severe enough to hide her?
It obviously has something to do with her brother, but what?
Fuck this.
Turning to the house, I find her in the laundry room, when I walk in she is bent over pulling clothes from the dryer into the basket under the door. I lean against the door frame and watch her perfect ass while she works.
When she stands up, she sees me in her peripheral and drops the basket as she jumps and yelps, “Damn it, Mason, stop doing that!” She cries and slaps her hand over her chest, taking a deep breath.
I step toward her and say, “You’re always so jumpy.”
“You’re always sneaking up on people!” She leans on her hand on the dryer, “What do you want?”
Cocking my head to the side, I give her a small smile, “You’re avoiding me.”
Her eyes soften and she crosses her arms over her stomach, hugging herself, “I’m just trying to do the right thing.”
Sliding my hands in my pockets to stop myself from reaching for her, I ask, “What’s the right thing?”
Her eyes look down and back to me, “Not getting involved with my employer is the right thing.”
I want to pull her to me, to feel her hands on me again, but lean my shoulder on the wall instead, “Is that the only thing?”
Her eyes flick to the side, but this time her face tightens as she thinks.
When was the last time someone did something for her? When was the last time she felt safe? I wait a few more moments and ask again, “Is that the only thing, Sloane? Is there something you want to tell me?”
Her eyes snap back to mine and I briefly see panic, but then she narrows them at me, “I already told you, I’m not sacrificing a perfect job so you can get a piece of ass.” Her tone is sharp now and her eyebrows pulled together, do I make her feel cornered?
Anger bubbles in my chest and I straighten to take a step toward her, “And I already told you that I don’t think of you that way and I never will. What if I want more?”
She transforms in front of me, her body relaxes and her face softens as she looks at me like I said exactly what she wanted to hear, but in that same amount of time her gaze lowers to my chest and defeat makes her shoulders slump.
“What was that?” I ask and she lifts her eyes, “What were you thinking that made you shrink like that?” After a moment of silence, I say, “You can trust me, Sloane.”
When she doesn’t say anything, I continue, “Why did you disappear off the grid two years ago? What has your brother done?”
Her eyes snap up and shock and panic are written in her wide eyes. Her voice is barely a whisper when she says, “You looked into me?” The look of betrayal that crosses her face nearly guts me, the hurt in her eyes is because I got impatient and couldn’t wait for her to tell me on her own.
Feeling like a shit heel, I cross my arms over my chest and say, “I had to. After you saw your brother, you wouldn’t talk to me, I had to find out what I was dealing with.”
The small step she takes back nearly breaks my heart, it’s only a step, but it means I’ve become the enemy.
Not willing to let that happen, I step toward her, I won’t let her shut me out completely. I softly grasp her wrist and slide my thumb across her soft skin. “You can trust me, Sloane.”
She tries to school her features so I can’t read her. She looks down at my hand on her arm and then tips her head back to look me in the eye, “Obviously, I can’t. And I already told you, I’m not interested.”
My chest squeezes and a jolt of pain shocks my heart, I hold her eye contact looking for a crack in her fake facade. The glare she is leveling at me contrasts the shallow breaths lifting her chest and I can feel a slight tremble in her arm under my hand.
I let go of her arm and turn away from her, I pull my cap off and scrub my hands through my hair and down my face as I turn to face her again, this woman drives me crazy, never in my life have I felt such a strong need to protect a woman. Never have I felt that a woman is mine to protect.
I decide I won’t let her push me away even further. I’m going for broke.
“Bullshit.” I move closer to her and lower my voice so only she can hear me, “Your chest and cheeks are flushed, your pupils are dilated, and I can see your heart rate in this little spot right there,” I lightly touch my finger to where her neck meets her shoulder and lower my head closer to her ear, “and I’m willing to bet my boots that if I touched you right now, you’d be soaking wet. ”
Sliding the tip of my finger up her neck sends a shiver across her shoulders, I wrap my fingers around the nape of her neck to cup her head.
Her shallow breaths are coming faster, “Admit it. Admit you want me as much as I want you,” I let my lips move against the shell of her ear as I talk and I can feel her softening under my touch, “I’ve wanted you since I first saw you in that bar and not a day goes by that my fingers don’t itch to touch you.
I wake up every morning wanting to taste you and I go to bed every night wanting you next to me. ”
Her forehead slowly drops forward and rests on my chest, a small act of surrender.
I’ll take it.
I move my nose to her hair and inhale, “I can smell when you’ve been in a room and I immediately want to find you so I can be close to you.” I slide my thumb across her neck under her ear, “Let me in, Sloane.”
The muscles in her neck go rigid again and she lifts her head, I move my head so that we are almost forehead to forehead, her beautiful eyes have turned the lightest color of green as they fill with tears and her nose turns red.
She looks at me for the longest moments and I can feel her starting to crack, she swallows and her eyebrows briefly pinch together.
Tears start to fall down her cheeks as her eyes are glued to mine, but she seems to shake the softness from her expression and takes a deep breath, “I can’t.”
She takes a step away from me and I open my hand to let go of her, she takes another step, her eyes still locked on mine, before she turns on her heel and walks out of the room.
Fuck!