CHAPTER 8
“Has he lost his fucking mind?” Crowe Callahan asked Logan the next morning, speaking through the voice- activated link to his cousin’s communications set. Crowe sat on the winter-white snowmobile, the winter camo protective gear he wore insulating him against the freezing wind as he held the matching binoculars to the eye slit of the thermal full-face ski mask.
Staring from his position on the snow-covered mountainside, he couldn’t believe Rafe was actually standing out in the freezing cold and smoking yet another of the cigars Crowe and Logan kept trying to convince him to throw away.
“Told you,” Logan said as he leaned back, ignoring Crowe’s intense, questioning look.
Dressed in identical snow gear, Logan rested casually against the pack strapped to the back half of the seat as the now gently falling snow, the final edge of the blizzard, collected on the protective face mask and shaded goggles he wore. “What’s he doing this time?”
The lazy, unconcerned drawl of his voice was distinctly at odds with the worry Crowe had seen earlier in his cousin’s face.
Shaking his head, Crowe turned back, lifted the military-issue binoculars back to his eyes, and watched as his cousin leaned against the support post of the sheltered porch below, the cigar clenched between his teeth, tension radiating in the stiff set of his shoulders and the dark glower on his face.
“He didn’t close the curtains to the living room,” Crowe mused as Cami Flannigan pulled the man’s long- sleeved white shirt over her naked body after rising from the bed of pillows, feather comforters, and quilts that Rafe had obviously made the night before.
Like an animal creating a nest for his mate. Soft, warm, comforting, and protective. The aura of intimacy was so heavy it made Crowe’s back teeth ache in frustrated anger. His baby cousin was making nests, getting intimate, and staring into the stark snowscape furiously. Just before his little lover stalked from the room. Then, Rafe just had to follow the girl.
“Really?” Logan rose from his reclined position. “Let me see.”
Crowe snorted. “Pervert. She’s left the room now.”
“And you got to see her naked?” Logan chuckled. “Hell, man, what made you get so lucky and not me? Can I tell Rafe you got to see his lady naked?”
Crowe shook his head in amusement as he lowered the device once again. “That boy’s going to get himself in trouble.” He sighed. “Cami Flannigan is the last woman he should be screwing, especially under the current circumstances.”
Especially considering the past and the circumstances of her sister’s death. As the sister of Jaymi Flannigan Kramer, the last in a series of serial rapes and murders twelve years before, Cami was a problem waiting to happen. Crowe and his cousins had nearly gone to prison for it at the time. Because of that, Cambria was the last woman in the world Rafe should even be in the same vicinity with let alone in the same bed.
“Hey, I didn’t notice a lot of choice when I was there with him,” Logan pointed out with a hint of laughter. “And I’m sorry, man, but if I was stuck in a blizzard with Cami Flannigan I’d be all about fucking her too.”
“Fucking her, not making yourself crazy over her.” Crowe sighed in resignation. You can fuck your women, Logan, without letting your heart get tangled up with your dicks.”
“My dick’s untangled just fine, thank you very much, cousin,” Logan informed him with a hint of heavy amusement in his voice. “Matter of fact, it’s about as untangled as a dick can get.”
Untangled, Crowe’s ass. Just give it time. Logan was all but hogtied and just didn’t know it yet. Dammit. How the hell was he supposed to protect his cousins’ asses without their help?
Crowe stared back at his younger cousin as Logan’s green eyes twinkled back at him. the laughter in his gaze made the dark green depths seem to shimmer.
“Really?” Crowe drawled mockingly. “And that little neighbor of yours isn’t putting a kink in it at all, right?” He couldn’t see the frown that pulled at Logan’s brow because of the cold weather mask, but Crowe saw the flash of ire in his cousin’s gaze.
“Shut up,” he muttered, his voice muffled by the face mask he wore.
Crowe breathed out roughly in resignation before turning back. He lifted the binoculars back to his eyes, and staring down at the two-story ranch house Clyde Ramsey had willed to his nephew, Rafer Callahan, along with the ranch.
As Crowe swept over the valley with the binoculars, it didn’t take him long to find the road crew slowly working its way up the mountain toward the ranch.
No one might know where Cambria Flannigan was yet, but it wouldn’t be long before her uncle Eddy Flannigan would be the first to figure it out. Shit was going to hit the fan when that happened, and Rafe would be stuck in the thick of it with no way out. Because there was no denying she had spent the duration of the blizzard there. It would be the perfect opportunity for Cami to try for a little revenge where her sister Jaymi was concerned. After all, the rest of her family believed the Callahans had killed her sister; over time, there was the possibility Cami could have been convinced.
It would be too damned easy for her to accuse him of raping her, kidnapping her, or performing any other illegal act that could possibly get him thrown into prison.
This was just what the hell the cousins needed.
Not that the Cami he had known eleven years ago could have done such a thing. But that was eleven years ago and this was now. Who knew how she had changed? And Crowe was a suspicious bastard.
They had to returned to Corbin County to find that “something” missing, not to help Rafe find his way into prison.
“Did you check out the car?” Crowe asked as he watched Rafe move through the house, the light curtains on the windows giving a clear view into his home. It appeared Rafe had followed Cami for some sort of confrontation.
Crowe could have sworn he’d taught Rafe better than that at some point. You never confront a possibly enemy face to face, especially if that potential enemy was female.
“I checked out the car,” Logan affirmed. “I couldn’t see anything that suggests the accident was anything but an accident, but the drifts are piled high around it, and digging it out enough to get under it wasn’t high on my list of priorities.”
He was wearing military-issue cold-weather gear that would have kept him toasty warm for up to forty-eight hours in the coldest spot in the world and he couldn’t dig through a few feet of snow to check the tires.
After the deaths of their parents, Rafe’s uncle, and other suspected enemies of the barons on the treacherous Corbin County roads, Crowe no longer believed in accidents or coincidences.
“What is high on your list of priorities, Logan?” Crowe asked absently. He wondered if Logan even understood what direction he was headed in. Or if he had any idea about the woman he was heading in that direction with. Sometimes, that worried Crowe more than the fear that Logan would care about the wrong person too much. His cousin was doing more than simply caring too much. He was on the verge of becoming too involved. Even more so than Rafe.
“Tying my dick in knots, unraveling it, then tying it again?” Logan chuckled. “Whatever it takes to stay footloose and fancy-free, Crowe, while having all kinds of fun. What about you?”
There were very few things Logan allowed himself to possess or to care about. His home had been in Crowe’s name for years. It was an attempt to keep Logan from giving it the hell away and Rafe had insisted on it.
The Harley was in Rafe’s name; the black Denali SUV was in Crowe’s name. The only thing Logan owned, sort of, was the snowmobile, and it was simply in all their names.
Logan had a serious problem where owning things were involved. Even he didn’t know why he didn’t want to own anything, and Crowe also hadn’t yet figured out why.
“I didn’t hear an answer there, Crowe,” Logan said as he leaned forward, dislodging the snow that had gathered on his shoulders.
“Footloose and fancy-free sounds fine to me.” Crowe shrugged. “Seems to me that as long as we’re in Corbin County, footloose and fancy-free is all we have.”
