Ricochet (25 page)

“Oh my God,” Katie started, her voice dripping with an eye-roll, “don’t get her started, Rachel.”

The truck’s engine cut off, car doors slammed, and men’s voices filled the air. Excitement saturated their tone, and Rachel smiled at the familiarity. She loved working with men, always had, but really enjoyed the Renegades. They were intelligent, clever, real out-of-the-box thinkers. They were funny and fun loving, living life to the fullest every damned day. She admired that. Thought she’d been doing that too—until Nathan.

Nathan made her realize she’d only been fooling herself into believing she’d been living. She might have stepped outside her family’s realm, but
she
hadn’t changed. Not really.

Then she heard Nathan’s voice, and the sound of it shivered through her. She couldn’t hear his words, just the timbre, the pitch, the tone. And even from here, beneath the desk with her eyes closed, she could hear the difference. He was serious, more subdued. And maybe a little…

“Get your arrogant head out of your ass,” Nathan said.

Yeah, pissed.

The building’s front door opened, and their voices grew louder.

“I’m arrogant just because I disagree with your methods?” Josh asked, his voice also tight with stress. “That’s mature.”

“No,” Nathan bit back. “You’re arrogant because you disagree with my methods for the sake of disagreement, not for any sound reason.”

“Safety is a sound reason.”

“Just because my plan also happens to be the most cost effective doesn’t mean it’s not the safest too.”

Rachel dropped her forehead against her knees. “Oh God.”

“Okay, okay,” Jax cut in, his smooth voice a welcome contrast. “Let’s drop it for now. We’ll all be in a better mood once we eat.”

She needed to get up and get in the shower. And she was thinking about it. She really was. But her body just didn’t want to move. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so tired.

Katie’s and Kelly’s voices joined the men’s, all sugary and congenial. No one would guess they’d just been bitching at each other over a threesome gone wrong.

Wait.
Could
a threesome go wrong?

She shook her head. Whatever. All her frustration and worry was moot. Katie and Kelly would easily distract Nathan. He’d be secretly thanking God she hadn’t taken him up on his offer when he heard they were interested.

Footsteps sounded hollow on the old floors, and Rachel tensed out of her exhausted fog. She straightened her legs, and pain shot through her knees.

Josh crouched in the desk’s opening, one hand on the desktop, frowning at her in concern. “Are you okay? What are you doing under here?”

“Plugging in a monitor.” She tried to roll to the side and get to her knees again to gain her feet. “Ow…ow, ow, ow…”

“Easy,” he said, grasping her forearms and helping her out from under the desk. “I’m sure you’re an awesome little scout, but you can’t expect to just go out one day and hike a ten-mile incline.”

“I figured that out all on my own, thanks.” She pulled out of his hold, and he let her go. He’d been better about the touching and pet names since she’d had another talk with him after the pool party, but he sure as shit wasn’t backing off.

More footsteps stopped in the doorway. Rachel looked up and found Nathan, both hands pressed to either side of the frame and filling the space.

His gaze held on her an intense second, and she realized that even though Josh didn’t have his hands on her, Ryker still noticed how close they stood.

His expression visibly shifted into something lighter, more…cavalier…was the only way she could describe it. He scanned her scraped legs with a grimace and made a sucking sound through his teeth. “Long pants would have taken the brunt of all that on the hike. You shoulda listened to me.”

Rachel narrowed her eyes. The only comments he’d made on her shorts were about the great view they’d given him. Katie and Kelly stepped up to the door, flanking him, their physical gifts well displayed in short skirts and tank tops. And they looked up at him with those big blue eyes, each sliding a hand around one of his arms.

Nathan looked at one, then the other. He tsked, lowered his arms around their shoulders, and smiled. “I bet you girls can take direction well, can’t you?”

“Yes, sir,” they said at the same time, in fucking stereo, grinning at him as if they’d already secured his bed for the night.

Rachel’s stomach compressed into a ball of lava.

She had no idea whether this was his attempt at showing her how well he could ignore her in the company of others or not. If it was, he was damn convincing. If it wasn’t…

Just as well.

Ryker chuckled and sauntered out of the room wrapped up with the girls. When he reached the door, he extricated himself from Katie and Kelly, glanced at Jax and Charlie where they’d dropped into side chairs in the other room, and said, “I’m hitting the shower. Be back in ten.”

When the door shut, Katie and Kelly were grinning like kids with a secret chocolate stash. And Rachel felt sick to her stomach.

“Rach,” Jax called from the living room. “You should do the same. What time is the food coming?”

She grabbed Josh’s wrist and looked at his watch. “It’ll be here in twenty minutes.” She passed into the other room. “I lost track of time,” she told Jax. “The dining room is all set. Just round everyone up, and I’ll be back soon.”

Rachel stepped out into the cool night air and closed the door behind her. The brisk darkness and supreme quiet of the property seemed to wash away some of the fatigue, and she breathed easier. But only until the sound of running water pulled her gaze to a single light in the bunkhouse near the back fence, closest to the trail leading up to the bridge—Nathan’s room. And Nathan’s shower.

She paused there in the middle of the gravel drive, with the sound of crickets filling her head. But Troy’s warnings to her that morning drowned out the soothing sound.

“He’s in a bad place—emotionally, mentally. He’s broken—on the inside. He’s hurting in a place that can’t always be healed. The Army is his life. It’s all he knows, and it’s what he loves. It’s as much the air he breathes as Renegades is mine. Without it, he would spiral into self-destruction.

“Here’s the truth about you, Rachel. You may not be interested in serious, but you care.”

While Troy might understand how she cared about everyone, he didn’t know caring was a true Achilles’ heel. And by disclosing the depth of Nathan’s damage, Troy had only added another magnetic field to the man for Rachel. Because, as she’d told Nathan, she liked to fix problems, heal wounds, restore happiness. Which was why this situation with Nicole and her parents was a thorn in her side. And why Nathan had, ironically, been the worst possible person for her to hook up with.

The water in his shower shut off, pulling Rachel back to the present, and she crossed the main drive and continued to her cabin.

In a confused, exhausted daze, she moved through the motions of showering, washing her hair, and moisturizing her skin in the only individual residence on the property, a tiny two-room guesthouse she’d tried to assign to Nathan, only to be overruled by Jax.

With a slight second wind, she stood in front of the three-drawer pine dresser with the top drawer open, trying to decide what to wear. Which was ridiculous. No matter what she put on or how she wore her hair or makeup, she’d never compare to the sexpot Darling twins.

“Not all guys like flash.”
Nathan’s words floated into her head.
“And there’s a lot more to beauty than what’s on the surface.”

She lifted her gaze and scanned her naked reflection in the mirror atop the dresser. Her fingers floated over a red mark Nathan had left on her breast, and her nipple instantly puckered.

This was a once-in-a-lifetime chance. In a few weeks, he’d be gone, and the chances of ever seeing him again were slim. The chances of getting this opportunity with him, even if she did see him again, infinitesimal.

“I can find bunnies anywhere, but there’s only one Rachel Hart.”

Tonight she was going to see if he was a man of his word, or if he used words to his benefit, like the men in her past, because those bunnies would have their magic ramped up to full power and aimed directly at Nathan.

If he had been sincere, she might have to seriously reevaluate her belief system, because there was also only one Nathan Ryker. And only one window of opportunity Rachel would ever get to take him up on this offer. A window that was quickly closing.

Ryker couldn’t say he felt better after the shower, just cleaner. He was still tense, pissed off, horny, hard, and frustrated. The night air felt good on his skin, and he needed the extra chill to keep his temperature down when he saw the light on in Rachel’s cabin. He also needed all his focus to keep his feet headed toward the dining room.

The windows lit up the night, and even from yards away, Ryker could see everyone was there milling around the tables but himself and Rachel—one more reason to get his ass in there. If he and Rachel were going to be MIA at the same time, he wanted to maximize those times for premium sexual exploits.

Wishful thinking. But he was holding on to it.

He joined the group, falling into the food line behind Charlie. The man’s employment application showed him as fifty-eight, but he’d lived hard and looked closer to sixty-eight with leather-like skin, a gray head of hair, and a logger’s beard to match. Still in pretty good shape, if not excellent health from decades of smoking, the retired Marine was one hell of a smart guy. Someone Ryker would learn a lot from.

“If you can set up the explosive lockers tomorrow first thing,” Ryker told Charlie, “it will free me up to work on the action-sequence plan with Rachel.”

“Sure thing,” Charlie said, piling his plate with pizza and grabbing a soda from the cooler. He carried his food toward the end of the table, where Jax and Marx already sat, the roll of bridge plans sitting at the center.

Kelly and Katie came up behind him, picking at salad and chattering about a party they’d been invited to the following week. Something swank and Hollywood.

Ryker picked up another breadstick and dropped it on his plate. He was hungry, but all the stress was making him edgy. One of the twins—he didn’t know which one; they really did look identical—slid her hand through his arm and leaned close. Her very full breasts pressed against his biceps, and the heavy scent of perfume grew even heavier.

They were alone at the table now, Ryker and the twins, everyone else seated. And the woman took the opportunity to pour heat from those huge blue eyes. “Kelly and I are up for a private party tonight, army boy,” she purred, squeezing his biceps. “We’ll show you a
real
good time.”

His gaze darted to Kelly, standing right behind her sister, her gaze equally seductive as she raised her brows in a what-about-it? expression.

He picked up a brownie with chocolate frosting and glanced over his shoulder, toward the door. “Have you ladies seen Rachel?”

“Ryker,” Kelly crooned, lowering her voice and leaning in to her sister. “What do you say you skip the brownies? Katie and I will give you plenty of sugar tonight.”

A week ago, the offer would have been a bull’s-eye for Ryker. Now, the proposition of a threesome with Hollywood twins made his mind jump to Rachel, not the nearest hotel. Also made him realize he wanted Rachel a hundred times more than he wanted
both
Katie
and
Kelly,
together
.

“Ryker…?”

“That’s an amazing offer, ladies”—he met their eyes—“but it’s not going to work for me. I’m sorta…into someone right now.”

“It’s not Rachel, is it?” Kelly said from behind her sister, a sudden frown of utter disbelief on her face. “Because she doesn’t do Renegades, and, don’t get me wrong, I like Rachel and all, but I don’t see her as enough woman to satisfy you…if you know what I mean.”

Oh, he knew what she meant, but thinking back to his night with Rachel, Ryker knew Kelly couldn’t have been more wrong, because he’d never felt more satisfied.

“No, honey, it’s not Rachel.”

He turned away from the women and started toward the open seat beside Charlie, then looked at Marx. “Jamestown Bridge in Rhode Island, 2006.”

“Huh?” Charlie asked.

“The example Josh wanted,” Jax told him. “Of a real-life bridge taken down in the same way Ryker wants to take out this one.”

Marx picked up his second piece of pizza. “That bridge didn’t have any cracks in the foundation pillars. It didn’t have a smaller blast happening prior to the main blast, which could weaken the structure. And it didn’t have the weight of filming crew and equipment. It also wasn’t taken down piece by piece, but blown in one blast.”

The front door opened behind him. It had to be Rachel. She was the only one missing. But he held Marx’s gaze. “None of that matters. The crack I found would only threaten the stability of the bridge in an earthquake. And the amount of RDX I plan on using to blow chunks out of the asphalt in the first blast are so small they won’t touch the structural integrity of the road or the bridge. You’re creating problems where there are none.”