Page 57 of Tracking Down the Lawman's Son

Bree wanted him naked, and she wanted it now so she went after his boxers. Luca went after her panties and bra, but he clearly wasn’t in the franticnowmode. Not yet anyway. She did something about that by closing her fingers around his erection.

He cursed her, and the sound that rumbled in his chest was all male, all need. All now. Finally.

It was Bree who did some cursing when it seemed to take a couple of lifetimes to get the condom on, and she might have cursed, too, at the immense pleasure when he pushed into her. She didn’t have breath to form words. The only thing she could do was feel, and she was having no trouble with that.

Luca and she had been lovers for a long time so she knew the familiarity of this rhythm they found. And because he knew every inch of her body, he knew how to draw out the pleasure. He knew how to take her to the peak, right to the edge and then bring her back down so it could last a little longer.

He kissed her again but then pulled back, spearing her gaze as he made those now frantic thrusts inside her. Bree couldn’t have come down from the peak now even if he stopped. She was past the point of no return, and Luca knew it. That’s why he gave her exactly what she needed to feel the climax slam through her.

Bree let herself shatter, let the sensations wrack her body and wash over her. And when it was Luca’s turn to take that fall, she gathered him into her arms and held on.

Chapter Fifteen

Luca eased Gabriel back into his crib, and he hoped now that the baby was fed and dry he would sleep for another four-hour stretch. A stretch that might give Bree some rest and him as well.

They’d managed a couple of catnaps, but they needed more. Despite being revved from the incredible sex, Luca knew they were both exhausted. That’s why he’d done the midnight feeding and diaper change.

Luca slid back into bed, and Bree made a sleepy sound of satisfaction and automatically snuggled against him. She was warm and naked, and he wished they didn’t have the threat of danger hanging over their heads so they could truly enjoy every moment of this night. It was still amazing, but Luca figured this was just a short reprieve. Tomorrow, they’d need to dive back into the investigation, and maybe they’d finally get the break they desperately needed.

After that, after the killer was caught, well... Luca wasn’t sure what would happen, but he sure as hell wanted the chance to have some time to try to work out things with Bree. Unfortunately, that working out might mean they still continued to be apart, but he thought this night was a good start in repairing their relationship.

“Thanks for giving Gabriel the bottle,” she murmured.

He sighed because Bree obviously wasn’t asleep as he’d thought. Of course, that only gave him an excuse to brush a kiss on her mouth. She brushed one right back, causing him to smile. A kiss from Bree was something to be savored despite everything else going on.

Luca didn’t have a second condom or he might have pushed the kiss to something deeper, but the deeper didn’t get a chance to happen. Bree and he both groaned when his phone vibrated. He’d turned off the ringer so it wouldn’t wake Gabriel, but his phone was practically skittering across the surface of the nightstand, which meant it was making plenty of noise. Luca snatched it up and saw Slater’s name on the screen.

Hell.

This couldn’t be good. Not at this hour. The ranch should have been locked down for the night.

“What’s wrong?” Luca answered in a whisper. He didn’t put the call on Speaker, but Bree moved closer to him.

“Two of the ranch hands aren’t responding,” Slater quickly said. “We’ve been doing check-ins every hour, and they both missed the midnight one. I’ve tried to call them, but they aren’t answering.”

Luca mentally repeated his,Hell. “Where were they positioned?”

“Both by the back fence. One on the east corner, the other one the west. Yeah,” Slater muttered when Luca groaned. If someone was going to try to sneak onto the ranch, those’d be the places to do it.

Luca got up and started dressing. Bree did the same. “I’ve got thermal imaging binoculars,” Luca explained. He’d brought several back to the ranch from the sheriff’s office, and Duncan had arranged for more to be delivered so the hands could use them. “Let me go to the window and see if I can spot anything.”

“I’ve asked another of the hands, Mike Travers, to use his binoculars to see if he can locate them,” Slater explained. “Mike’s not at the best angle for that, but I don’t want to pull him away from his area since he’s guarding the spot near the road.”

Luca made a quick sound of agreement. The road was a vulnerable part, too. Heck, there were lots of places that a killer could use to gain access to the house.

“The security system is on, right?” Luca asked, already knowing the answer, and Slater gave him instant confirmation.

“Woodrow’s monitoring that,” Slater explained. “He’s trying to get some sleep, but he’s got it set to alert him if there’s any movement in or around the house.”

The perimeter security and cameras were a new addition, put in just hours earlier. A series of motion-activated sensors had been staked into the ground around the entire house, and some had been positioned in the backyard.

“Good,” Luca said, putting on the rest of his clothes and hurrying to the window that would give him a somewhat limited view of the east back corner of the pasture. Limited because of trees and the outbuildings.

Luca handed his phone to Bree who’d joined him at the window, and he looked out with the binoculars. He got a jolt when he saw the glowing eyes but then realized it was a deer. He picked up the livestock, too, and a couple of raccoons. What he didn’t immediately see was a ranch hand or anyone else.

He shifted his view, panning the binoculars over the grounds, and he caught just a flash of a heat source. For a moment, he thought it was another animal, but then Luca realized the red blob was a torso. The person was on the ground, partially hidden by a tree, and he or she wasn’t moving.

“I think someone’s down,” Luca relayed just as he saw another slash of red. He muttered a single word of profanity because he had no idea if this was one of the hands or a killer coming their way. “I’m pretty sure we’ve got a breach,” he said, figuring the guy on the ground was indeed one of the hands.

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