“No joke, honey,” Brody proclaimed. “It was as real as my love for you, which means you and I can take up right where we left off.” He flashed her a smile she was sure had melted her heart the first time she’d met him. Now she felt nauseous.
“Take up where we left off—after a decade?”
“Okay, calm down, everyone,” Boone said. “Let’s go to the bunkhouse and sort this out. We’ll call Fulsom. He’ll be able to put someone on it and determine whether you two are actually married.”
“We’re not,” Avery said again. Why wouldn’t anyone listen to her?
Boone turned toward the bunkhouse. Brody shrugged and followed him, trailed by Gabe, who was still complaining.
All Avery could do was follow suit.
Behind her, Sue said, “Guess it’s a good thing you’re marrying Elizabeth after all.”
Avery didn’t wait to hear Walker’s answer.
“I’m not going to talk to you until you put down that ax,” Boone said several hours later.
Walker didn’t remember how he got to the wood lot, or when he’d stopped to fetch the ax and head out that way, but his shoulders and biceps ached from the activity, so he must have been here for some time.
He had no desire to hear what Boone had to say, but he knew the man too well to think that continuing to chop wood would deter him. Boone would shout his news if he had to. Walker didn’t think he could take that.
Anger, fierce and hot, still burned through his veins the same as it had the moment Brody showed up and pronounced Avery his wife. He expected a woman Avery’s age would have a past. Assumed she’d had partners. So had he.
The thought of that two-bit fake cowboy being intimate with Avery in a way he’d never gotten to made him want to bash a fist in the man’s face, though. Nothing against the guy personally. Everything against Fate for arranging things in such a thoroughly idiotic way.
How the hell had Avery ended up with him?
No. He didn’t want to know any of it. Wanted Brody gone from Base Camp. The memory of him erased from his mind.
Was this how Avery had felt when Elizabeth showed up?
The thought made him sick.
He hadn’t realized he’d lowered the ax until Boone came and took it from him. He carried it several yards away and leaned it up against a tree. Now that Walker’s strokes weren’t ringing out, the woods around them were quiet until a bird chirped timidly somewhere close by.
“They’re married,” Boone confirmed.
The knot around Walker’s heart tightened.
“It’s going to take time to get the marriage annulled. Too much time, because Brody won’t cooperate.”
Icy cold fear replaced the heat of his anger in his veins. Avery was married to Brody.
To Brody.
To that wise-ass punk of a fake cowboy. And there wasn’t enough time to annul the wedding?
“So the question is are you going to lose your shit, or are you going to keep it together and marry Elizabeth?”
Every muscle in his body was tight, tensed for action. Walker forced himself to unclench his hands. None of this was Boone’s fault. Not really. He was simply trying to remind him of the greater good.
“How could she not know she was married?” Walker couldn’t even bring himself to think about Elizabeth right now.
“Like she said, she thought it was a joke. Fake, I guess. I don’t know what happened. What I do know is she’s miserable, you’re miserable—everyone’s miserable, and we still have a goddamn ranch to win.” Boone began to pace. “I wish I’d never come up with the stupid idea. It’s been twelve months of hell and for what? What have we even accomplished?”
He didn’t have time for Boone’s angst. That’s what you got when you thought you could change people: disappointment. No one changed. Nothing changed.
You never got what you wanted.
The cancer got you. Or a car crash. Or you put a gun to your head, pulled the trigger and did the job yourself.
“You need to come back to where the rest of us are and see this shitshow through. There’s a crazy man stalking us, remember? No one gets to be alone anymore. We’ve got twenty-five more days of this crap, and we’re going to survive it if it kills us!”
Boone’s raised voice penetrated Walker’s bad memories. His friend was losing his cool, something Walker hadn’t seen too many times before. Twenty-five more days. Boone was right. No matter what came at him next, he’d survive it.
That’s what his time with the SEALs had taught him—humans could survive almost any trauma. It was what came next that really hurt.
With a sigh, he fetched the ax and started for the bunkhouse.
“I’m sorry,” Boone said as they walked. “I never should have asked you to be part of all of this. It wasn’t fair.”
“I could have said no.”
“You joined only because you didn’t want to disappoint us.”
“You’re wrong about that. I joined because I wanted to be with my friends.”
Boone stumbled. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard you call us that,” he said a minute later.
Walker turned to him sharply. “Course I have.”
“No you haven’t.” Boone walked on. “You’ve never admitted you’re one of us. Every time Riley called us the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse I always thought, ‘It’s the three horsemen and the guy who’s hanging around waiting to see if what happens next will be worth his while.’ Never thought you were all in on us, you know?”
Walker was stunned. All in on them? Was Boone shitting him? “Never knew if I was really welcome.”
Boone stopped and faced him. “Never knew you were welcome? Hell, Walker, nothing got going until you arrived. You know that.”
Did he? Walker didn’t think so. In fact, he thought Boone had it all wrong.
“You three came as a unit,” he said. “Met you all at once. You were already thick as thieves. Had known each other since birth, practically.
