Wicked Ride (20 page)

After leaving a note for Auralie
on the mattress beside her, I crept out of the trailer and got in my
truck.

The minute I hit Highway 191, I
dial Bridger, wincing slightly when it’s
clear I woke him up and also clear he’s not happy about it.

“This better be good,”
he growls into the phone, his voice clogged with sleep and
irritation.

“It’s Logan,” I
told him succinctly, and so he would understand the urgency I boil
the circumstances down to the most dramatic facts. “I’ve
got to talk to you now about Magnus. He’s a con artist, and
Auralie is being blackmailed.”

“What the fuck?”
Bridger grumbles but his voice is clearer. “Where are you?”

“On my way to see you,”
I tell him. “Can we meet at your office?”

“Come to my house,”
he says.

I blink in surprise, but I don’t
question. I’ve never been invited there before. No one I know
from The Silo has, except Woolf, but he warrants the exception since
he’s Bridger’s best friend. “Know where it is?”

“No clue,” I admit.

He gives me directions. I’m
not surprised to find his house sits on Double J property, which is
owned by Woolf. I have no clue exactly how big the Double J is, but I
know the parent company, JennCo, has over three hundred thousand
acres spread over three states. The Double J is first and foremost a
cattle ranch—largest in the nation—but it also
surreptitiously leases a small tract of land to Bridger upon which
The Wicked Horse and The Silo sit. But interestingly, his house sits
about as far from the Wicked Horse and The Silo as possible, actually
putting it closer to the city limits of Jackson. Rather than taking
me almost forty-five minutes to make the trip, it will only take me
about fifteen.

Bridger meets me at the door
wearing a pair of loose, black track pants and a white t-shirt. His
hair is sticking up all over the place, and he has a cup of coffee in
hand. As he closes the door behind me, he walks into the kitchen and
I follow.

Bridger’s
house is really nice and that surprises me. Not that he can’t
afford “really nice,” but it’s just that outside of
his red Corvette, Bridger never really seems to be moved by money. I
know he makes a shit-pot full between the bar and sex club, but he
never flaunts it. He doesn’t wear super expensive clothes,
preferring jeans and cowboy boots, and he never takes vacations.

While his house is nice, it’s
not ostentatious like Woolf’s. I’m guessing about
three-thousand square feet, built in the classic western cabin theme
with pine logs and large, rectangular windows that look out over the
Teton Mountains. The mountain range is so large and sweeping, there
are not many places on the Double J where you can’t see the
beauty of it.

The kitchen is state of the art
with granite counters, custom cabinetry, and high-end appliances.
Bridger silently pours me a cup of coffee from one side of a kitchen
island, pushing it across to me with a nod toward one of the
high-backed stools done in wrought iron and reclaimed wood.

I park my ass on one and pull the
coffee toward me, grateful for it since I didn’t
bother to make any before I left. Didn’t want to chance waking
up Auralie.

“So spill it,”
Bridger says gruffly.

“Magnus is a con artist and
Auralie’s dad works for him. He skimmed some money, pissed
Magnus off, and now Magnus is using Auralie as repayment to run a con
at The Silo.” I think that was about as succinct as I can make
it.

“And you know this how?”
Bridger asks, not because he doesn’t trust my word, but he’s
angling to know what my connection to Auralie is.

So I tell him with brutal
honesty. “She’s
not a virgin. I fucked her after she admitted it to me, and I plan on
fucking her for the foreseeable future. She laid the entire story out
to me last night.”

Bridger cocks an eyebrow at me,
and there’s no
mistaking the skepticism in his tone. “Logan… hate to
point this out because I’m getting clearly that you like this
woman, but she’s playing the part really well; she didn’t
seem too averse to sucking dick.”

I get what he’s
inferring. That Auralie is as much into the con as Magnus is, and to
some extent, that’s true. She was all in when it came to
portraying the innocent virgin, and she didn’t seem reluctant
at all to get on her knees to suck strange dick.

He’s
doubting her endgame.

So, I have to be brutally honest
with him. “She was
raised by a grifter father to be a grifter herself. That has been her
life up until recently when she got out. Was going to enroll in
college. She’s only doing this because Magnus will kill her
father if she doesn’t run this con with him. She’s
getting nothing out of this but her father’s life.”

“Fuck,” Bridger
mutters and leans onto the counter, his forearms flat and hands
clasped to support his weight. “So if she doesn’t go
through with this, her dad’s in trouble.”

I nod stiffly, because that is
the real bone of contention I have with Auralie right now. She’s
determined to see this through to protect her dad, and I’m
determined that she not step foot in The Silo again.

Which brings about a startling
thought.

Am I willing to do the same
thing? Am I willing to give The Silo up if I could have Auralie to
myself?

I have no fucking idea, but my
gut instinct tells me I could be wholly satisfied with what she gives
me.

I think.

No real fucking clue, but that’s
not what my immediate worry is right now. It’s trying to figure
out how I get Auralie out of this mess so the only dick she touches
is mine. Her dad isn’t even my real priority, but I know he has
to be a consideration because unless his safety can be guaranteed,
Auralie will be on her knees tonight—and not before me.

This was a calculated risk coming
to Bridger. My ultimate hope is that he may have an idea on what to
do. Maybe we can reverse con Magnus somehow. Maybe Bridger can pull a
fire code violation that closes The Silo down for the next six
months, which I get is really unlikely, but I hold out hope.

Mostly, though, I’m
revealing this shit to Bridger because I know the minute I spilled
the beans on the fraud being perpetrated in his place of business, he
was never, ever going to let it go any further. I know Bridger’s
initial reaction will be to kick Magnus’ ass and kick him out
of the club. My risk in bringing Bridger in on this is if he reacts
swiftly and does something like that, Auralie’s dad will be at
risk and Auralie will never forgive my rash actions.

I am hoping beyond hope that
Bridger will put his trademark calm, reasoning, and brilliant mind to
task to help me figure out what to do.

“How was this supposed to
be pulled off if she’s not a virgin?” Bridger asks.

“She was supposed to drug
whoever purchased her before they had sex. She and Magnus would slip
away with the money.”

Bridger growls and his face goes
thunderous. I hastily remind him. “Remember…
she’s only doing this to protect her dad.”

“I get that,” he
snaps at me. “Doesn’t mean I like the plan or that your
girl is involved in a scheme to dupe one of my customers.”

“Just,” I start off
by saying but my throat gets clogged. I don’t beg and this is
as close to it as I’ll come. “Just… can you figure
out a way to help her?”

Bridger lets out a huff of
frustrated breath. “When
is Magnus coming back from New York?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Any idea when he expects
to make the sale?” he asks.

“No,” I admit with
annoyance. “He’s kept Auralie in the dark on everything.”

“Here’s the thing,”
Bridger says as he pushes up off the counter to a straightened
position. “Any type of idea to reverse con him is not going to
work as Auralie’s dad will pay for it.”

“Agreed. But what if we
just spread the word to those thinking to bid that it’s a con—”

Bridger shakes his head and
glares at me. “We
are not letting this cat out of the bag. I don’t want my
customers knowing that shit is going on in my club. It will damage
the trust people have in the safety of it.”

“So we have to bring Magnus
down in a way that makes it so he can’t harm Auralie or her dad
in the future,” I conclude.

“You can’t murder
him,” Bridger says, and it makes me realize how menacing my
tone just was. But he’s not serious. He knows I wouldn’t
do that.

Or would I?

What would I do to keep Auralie
all to myself and never let another man touch her?

I’m
amazed at myself that I’m even considering these options seeing
as how I never thought I’d ever be proprietary over a woman
again. Never contemplated having a relationship again.

Guess I’ve
changed, but the real question is, what have I changed into?

“Is he expecting her to go
to The Silo tonight?” Bridger asks, and I blink to chase away
my thoughts about murder and commitment.

“No clue.” Although
in my heart of hearts, I’m positive he’ll tell her to go.
The question is will I let her?

“Well, I can’t close
down another night,” Bridger says with that look in his eyes
that says don’t even bother to ask. “So you best be
prepared to let your girl do what she needs to do until we can figure
something out. I have an idea, but it’s not going to happen
overnight.”

I grimace but nod. I know even as
brilliant as Bridger is, he’s
not going to fix this shit in a matter of hours. Not even sure he can
fix this at all.

Which means I need to prepare
myself to accept a few truths.

Auralie is going to be pissed as
hell I told Bridger all of this.

Bridger is not going to let this
fraud run its course, although he’ll
let it temporarily play out until we can figure something out.

The sale of Auralie’s
“virginity” is not going to take place, which means
Magnus is going to get screwed over. This means that Auralie’s
dad could go
poof
.

Which means there’s
a good chance Auralie’s going to hate me at some point.

Auralie

I lean my head against the
passenger window of Logan’s
truck and watch the scenery roll by with a satisfied smile on my
face. I’m exhausted as we’ve been driving around Grand
Teton National Park all day, taking in magnificent lakes, crystal
clear streams, snowcapped mountains, and meadows filled with
wildflowers.

I had mentioned that day on the
river with Logan that I wished I’d
had time to see Yellowstone while I was here. We had a free day
today—although I suspect Logan’s day wasn’t really
free and he’d cancelled his trips for the day to spend it with
me—and he told me he was going to take me to see “some
things”. This ultimately did not mean Yellowstone, which was at
first disappointing to me because hello—Old Faithful—but
now, as the day is nearing its end, I’m quite pleased with
everything I’ve experienced today.

It started with Logan waking me
up with take-out breakfast from a wonderful place he called “The
Bunnery”. He picked up some gooey chocolate croissants, bagels,
and bear claws, which could not possibly all be eaten by both of us,
and carried them into the tiny trailer where I was sleeping hard. The
sounds of him banging around in the kitchen not five feet from where
I was sleeping woke me up, and I stared at him with bleary eyes as he
made coffee.

So sweet, the way he’d
slipped out early while I slept and went into town to get breakfast.
Just as sweet when he told me we were spending the day sightseeing.
All of this was made infinitely sweeter by the fact he did it less
than twelve hours after me admitting to being a fraud, a liar, and a
cheat to him. All terrible qualities that he’s apparently
chosen to overlook.

We did not make it up north to
Yellowstone, but rather took some time exploring the Bridger-Teton
National Forest, which is 3.4 million acres that sits in between
Jackson and Yellowstone. And while I can’t
speak for the grandeur of Yellowstone, and truly, the only thing I
know about Yellowstone is that it boasts the fame of Old Faithful, I
truly can’t imagine more beauty than what I saw today.

Logan and I took a four-mile hike
around String Lake, which is shallow, and the water so pure from
glacial runoff that the water is a crystal blue. The hike brought us
out to a clearing where we got a magnificent view of Cathedral Group,
which is made up of Teewinot Mountain, Grand Teton, and Mt. Owen,
said mountains with deep green trees at the base, and gray, craggy
rocks thousands and thousands of feet up with snow still glistening
at the peaks even though we were in late summer.

My favorite place by far was
Oxbow Bend, with the Snake River spread lazy and curving with Mount
Moran rising up behind the smooth waters. The sun was perfectly
hanging with not a cloud in the sky, and Mount Moran’s
mirror image was reflected on the river. I couldn’t even fathom
the beauty of it, my mind almost refusing to believe that something
so perfect could exist. I think Logan said something to the effect
that it was one of the most photographed places in Wyoming, but then
my attention got distracted by a family of otters playing along the
riverbank and I was laughing at their antics.

I only became aware of my
surroundings when I heard Logan laughing along with me, and I turned
to face him in wonder. Granted, I haven’t
known the man all that long and yes, we clearly have a deep
connection, but in that moment, I realized there was so much I didn’t
know because his genuine laugh was a surprise to me. While I’ve
seen him smile and chuckle and even look amused, I had not heard him
genuinely laugh until that moment. It amazed me as much as it made me
sad that I’m guessing said emotion is a rarity with him.

And now as we make our way back
toward Jackson, exhaustion starts to take over because despite how
magnificent today was seeing all the grandeur of this beautiful
state, there was almost no acknowledgment between the two of us of
how fucked-up our situation was.