LITMIR.BIZ

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didn’t think Forrest was going to stick around much longer,” she said. “Won’t he move on to the next natural disaster, with the rest of the Cowboy Heroes?”

      “Whisperwood needs them for more than rescue-and-recovery efforts right now,” Maggie said. She shuddered again. “There’s a killer on the loose.”

      “That’s why we should postpone our honeymoon,” Bellamy said.

      “No,” Rae and Maggie said again, their voices soft this time, though.

      Bellamy sighed. “Okay, but you both need to promise me that you’ll be extra careful.”

      “Of course,” they agreed, again in unison.

      “I know Jonah won’t let anything happen to you,” Bellamy told her sister. “But you...”

      Rae smiled. “I can take care of myself.” She’d done it for most of her life.

      Bellamy took the sleeping baby from her arms and snuggled him against her. “But you have Connor to worry about, too, and your classes. I’m really concerned about you living out there in the country, alone.”

      “I’m not alone,” Rae reminded her.

      Bellamy pressed another kiss to the soft hair on Connor’s head. “He’s not going to be much protection against a bad guy—at least not for a few more years.”

      “Like twenty,” Maggie added with a chuckle.

      “I don’t need a man to protect me,” Rae said. She’d never had one. Her father had been more likely to put her and her mother in danger—at least financially—than to protect them. “I don’t need a man at all.”

      “You proved that by having this little guy on your own,” Maggie said. “I admire you.”

      “Me, too,” Bellamy added. “Although I think I had more fun conceiving mine the way we did.”

      Rae stared at her friend. “What?”

      “I’m pregnant,” the new bride announced, her face glowing with happiness and love.

      Tears rushed to Rae’s eyes. “That’s wonderful.”

      “So wonderful,” Maggie agreed as her eyes filled with tears, too. “I’m thrilled for you.”

      “Me, too,” Rae said. “You and Donovan are going to be amazing parents.”

      “I’m going to drive you crazy,” Bellamy warned her, “with all the questions I’ll be asking you.” Bellamy’s mom was gone, like Rae’s was.

      Rae missed her mom every day. They’d been so close; Georgia had been more of a friend than a mother to her. Now that she was a mother herself, she’d never needed her more.

      “You won’t drive me crazy at all,” Rae assured her. “I’m not sure I’ll have all the answers, though.” Mostly she felt as if she was stumbling around in the dark, blindly finding her way as a parent and as a student again at thirty-five.

      “You’ll have more than I’ll have,” Maggie said. “You’re the smartest, most independent person I know.”

      The tears already stinging her eyes threatened to spill over, but Rae blinked them back to smile at her friend. “I’m not sure about smartest. Law school is tougher than I thought it would be.”

      “Because you just had a baby two months ago and you’re working,” Bellamy reminded her as she stared down at Connor, who was sleeping so peacefully in her arms.

      If only he slept that peacefully at night...

      “It’ll get easier,” Rae said. That was what she kept telling herself.

      Bellamy chuckled softly. “You’re smart, but I think it’s your stubbornness that keeps you going.”

      A smile tugged at the corners of Rae’s mouth. She couldn’t deny that.

      “Just don’t be so stubborn and independent that you put yourself in danger,” Bellamy advised. “Promise?”

      Rae sighed. “Of course I’m not going to put myself or Connor in danger,” she assured her. “Stop worrying about me. And let’s get you ready for your honeymoon!”

      “Since she’s already pregnant, I think she knows about the birds and the bees,” Maggie teased.

      They all laughed, rousing Connor from his impromptu nap. But he didn’t cry when he awakened; he just groggily looked up at Bellamy, who was holding him. She was like an aunt to him, and Maggie was fast becoming like another. These women and her baby were the only family that Rae needed.

      She didn’t need a man for protection or for anything else. But when she left Bellamy’s cute two-bedroom house and headed home with Connor safely buckled into the back seat, an odd chill passed through her despite the warmth of the August night. Fear.

      Maybe it was all of the talk about bodies and killers.

      Or maybe it was her postpartum hormones.

      She preferred to blame the hormones. Because she had nothing to fear.

      * * *

      The television screen illuminated only the area of the dark room around the TV. From the shadows, he watched the evening news report from the crime scene at Lone Star Pharma.

      Her body had been found. His hands clenched into fists as rage coursed through him.

       Damn it...

      The news crews had been kept back, behind the police barricade. But the camera zoomed in on the scene and captured the people investigating the discovery. The Cowboy Heroes.

      What the hell were they doing there?

      He unclenched one fist to turn the volume up.

      “Chief Thompson has enlisted the help of former Austin cold-case detective Forrest Colton,” the reporter announced. “Colton has been given special dispensation from the Whisperwood Police Department to lead the investigation of this murder and the body discovered last month in a mummified condition. Colton holds the highest clearance rate in the Austin Police Department, so an arrest seems imminent.”

      He cursed again.

      No. An arrest was not imminent. Forrest Colton might have gotten lucky in Austin, but his luck was about to run out in Whisperwood. And maybe his life, as well.

       Chapter 2

      A week had passed since his brothers had ambushed him at the crime scene. A week of frustration that gripped Forrest so intensely, he wished he’d never accepted the position no matter how temporary it was going to be.

      The hurricane had caused so much damage, and not just physically. Emotionally people were dealing with the loss of loved ones and their homes or their livelihoods. The Whisperwood Police Department was stretched thin. The crime-scene techs were understaffed and overworked, so nothing had been processed yet from either scene. And the coroner...

      She hadn’t even taken the bodies from their refrigerated drawers yet, let alone begun the autopsies. And until he had more information, Forrest didn’t want to parade in the family members of every missing person to see if the dead woman was their loved one. He didn’t want to put every family that was missing someone through that kind of pain.

      Hell, he didn’t want to put one family through that kind of pain. But it was inevitable. Once they figured out who she was.

      Everybody expected miracles from Forrest, but his hands were nearly as tied as the poor victim’s hands had been—bound behind her back.

      He wrapped the reins around his hands and clenched his knees together as the quarter horse he rode scrambled over the uneven ground. Despite taking the detective

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