Page 118 of The Last Promise You Made

I moved to Ryder, pulling his hands into mine and setting them both on my chest. “What do you want to do?”

He stared at me for a long time, finger trailing over my cheek. “I can’t live with a threat hovering over us, and I sure as hell am not letting you go in there alone. We promised Addy we’d try to finish this. I don’t want to break that promise to her.”

I swallowed hard, hoping—now that he’d given me the trust I’d asked for—that I didn’t let him down. That I didn’t let any of them down. The weight of it fell heavier than normal on my shoulders. I lifted my phone and said, “Find Enrique, Rory. We need eyes on him. Then, talk to Leland and see what boots we can get on the ground quickly. If you don’t hear from me by midnight, send in whatever cavalry you can pull together.”

“Okay, Cinderella. Midnight it is.”

She clicked off, and I wrapped my arms around Ryder, setting my head on his chest. The thud of his heart pounded against my ear, echoing my rapid pulse. I wasn’t sure we’d walk out of this unscathed tonight. I wasn’t sure what would happen to either of us. But if I could plant Ravyn’s Trojan horse, and if we could get authorities not in Laredo’s pocket to show up, we’d bring down the entire cartel. Addy would be safe, even if the worst happened to Ryder and me.

I wished I’d called my parents and told them I loved them. But if I did it now, Dad would hear my fear, and even Mom would know something was wrong. They’d worry, and their worry wouldn’t change the outcome. It was better this way. Better they didn’t know until it was over—whatever that ended up looking like.

? ? ?

Even though I was covered, I still felt naked after I’d zipped up the dress from Ryder’s grandmother’s attic. There was no way I could wear a bra with the back dropping down to practically my ass cheeks and nothing more than a scrap of tiny beads holding up the scooped neck. I had nothing on beneath the satin except a thong. And once I’d added the gaudy, thirties-style jewelry, it felt like I was wearing more gems than I was clothing.

The lack of color in the dress had put the bruising on my neck on display. I'd had a hard time covering it with makeup and then decided to let the necklace do the bulk of the work, wrapping it close before leaving a long loop to dangle between my breasts.

I turned, catching sight of myself in the full-length mirror behind the bathroom door, and my feet stalled in the kitten heels I’d bought at the mall. With the gems and the champagne-colored gown, I almost looked bride-like. If I’d ever considered getting married, I would have picked a dress like this. Simple and elegant without all the frills and lace. The thought of wearing this today, walking alongside Ryder in a tuxedo, made my pulse beat erratically. It made visions of a candlelit room and families standing by while whispered promises were made seem suddenly possible.

Tomorrow. If we made it out of this, I’d think about it all then. I’d tell Ryder I loved him, and we’d figure our future out. Something we could both live with.

As I stepped out of the bathroom, Ryder had his back to me, looking out the window. The black tux fit him perfectly, even though it was rented. It hugged his broad shoulders and tapered over his trim waist, making him much more a James Bond image than I’d ever been. As if he felt me watching, he turned from the hotel window, and my breath caught at the beauty of him. His hair was slicked back, putting on display the strong, square lines of his clean-shaven face. I hadn’t seen him without his scruffy beard since I’d arrived in Willow Creek days ago. While I missed it, I also found myself desperate to explore all that smooth skin with my lips and tongue.

His gaze slid down me slowly, taking his time. When his eyes finally returned to mine, the longing, the utter fire I’d seen in them since the moment he’d caged me in his office last summer, burned even brighter, like a solar flare ready to leap out and scorch me.

Losing ourselves in each other last night hadn’t done one damn thing to tame those flames. It had only added fuel to the already existing pyre.

I couldn’t pull my eyes from his. Could barely breathe. Certainly couldn’t move. It was Ryder who closed the distance between us, voice dropping as he said, “You’re even more stunning than normal. Resplendent.”

“Resplendent?” The word jerked me out of my stupor with a laugh, and his lips quirked.

“I hate that he’s going to see you this way. That he’s going to think about touching you. I don’t like the idea of any man touching you, but especially not him.” The darkness in his tone wound through me. It wasn’t just the possessiveness of it. It was protectiveness too, and it made me want to curl into him when normally it would make me toss my fist and shout my independence.

“You’ll have plenty of beautiful women eating you up with their eyes tonight. You think I’ll enjoy that? You think I enjoy knowing you’ve had a sea of women in your bed?”

Jealousy seared me, and he saw it. Instead of making him unhappy, it made his lips curl upward ever so slightly.

“I’m not going to lie to you, darlin’. For a long time after Ravyn left, I tried to scrub the hurt away with sex. But I never brought any woman home. Not a single female besides my family ever crossed my doorstep. The ladies I was with always knew exactly what I was offering, and it was never what I’m offering you.”

My pulse skittered around, that love I was feeling bouncing back to the forefront of my mind. But it was the last thing I needed to be thinking about at the moment. I needed to think about Laredo. How to get him alone and how I would make him believe what I had on the flash drive was legit before he did something permanent to Ryder. But still, I let myself savor this one last moment when a man I loved was offering me a future. I leaned in, kissing him slowly, languidly, as if we had all the time in the world, before pulling back and swiping my lipstick from his mouth.

He caught my hand, turned it over, kissing the palm, and I could practically feel the worry vibrating off him.

I swallowed hard. “It’s going to be fine,” I told him. “You know how to work the camera app. You’ll be able to see what’s going on with me. You’ve got a GPS tracker in your pocket, so I’ll know where you’re at. And if something goes wrong…” I lifted my dress so he caught sight of the gun I’d strapped around my knee where the dress flared out so it wouldn’t show. “I have this to help us.”

“That’s not the comfort you think it is,” he said quietly. He reached up to stroke a path from my jawline down to the gem-covered strap at my shoulder. My skin prickled at the fiery trail. He bent and kissed my shoulder softly. More goosebumps broke out, and my nipples hardened, clear as day in the thin material of the dress.

When he lifted his head, there was a pleased look in his eye at my physical reaction to him. I inhaled the heady masculine scent of him, suddenly wishing we were going to a real party. That he was in the handsome tuxedo and I was in an elegant ball gown, attending an event where we’d spend the night brushing fingers, dancing tantalizingly slow, and drinking just enough to enhance the yearning until we could do nothing more than rush back to our room, shed our clothes, and lose ourselves in each other.

My eyes fluttered closed, letting myself enjoy the mirage for one long heartbeat before purposefully brushing it aside once more.

It wasn’t just Ryder’s or Addy’s life at stake. It was our entire civilization. If the Lovato cartel got its hands on a working Houdini box, the destruction would be almost as large as a nuclear bomb. It would change our future.

I couldn’t fail. I wouldn’t.

I stepped away from the warmth of Ryder’s arms, picked up my clutch with the flash drive and my phone, and headed for the door.

He met me there, took my hand in his, and rested it on his arm. Then, he looked down with a smile and a wink, saying, “Out of all the ranches, in all the world, you sneaked into mine. Let’s not ruin it by ending tonight with some cliché gun battle, shall we? Let’s get in, get out, and go make some movie-worthy memories.”

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