Page 92 of Last Chance Love

“You’ve never given a shit before, until it was Riley that got hurt,” I said, ignoring the low whistle Mona gave at my words and harsh tone.

Max, however, shrugged. “Maybe I’ve learned a few things from Riley, like giving a shit about people. Maybe I like the two of them and wanted to be here for them. Maybe I knew you’d be here, and believe it or not, I’ve always been kind of fond of you.”

“Or maybe,” Mona added with a knowing glance toward Max. “You knew your boyfriend would be pissed if you didn’t check on Elliot and Reno because he was pretty fond of them.”

“Riley doesn’t do pissed,” I said and then thought about it for a moment. “Does he?”

Max chuckled, looking pleased for some reason. “Oh, trust me, he does. And he’s got a mean punch too.”

That was surprising enough to take me out of the moment of fear and anxiety as I stared at him. “I…Riley hit you?”

“Hit me, threw me to the ground, and threatened worse.”

“S-seriously?”

“Yeah.”

“Why do you sound happy about that?”

“Because apparently, he has a kink about boyfriends being able to give him the business when he messes up badly enough,” Mona quipped, making me raise a brow at her and Max roll his eyes.

“I deserved it,” Max said simply, which, to be fair, in his mind, it probably had been deserved. I couldn’t picture a time I would need to put a hand on Reed like that.

“Was that before or after you guys, uh?—”

“Before.”

“Oh. Okay, that’s better, I guess.”

“It’s not about better or worse. It is what it is.”

“Getting a boyfriend has really made you more Zen.”

“From what I’ve seen, Reno is experiencing the same thing.”

I hesitated, glancing at Mona and seeing no surprise on her face, only amusement. “Wow, they, uh, haven’t been keeping secrets.”

“Neither have you,” Max said with a snort. “You and Reed spend way too much of your after-hours together to be anything but obvious.”

“Great,” I said. Then, the moment of distraction fizzled out, and I turned toward Mona. “What happened?”

“I don’t have all the details yet,” she said with a light shrug. “Your boyfriend informed me I would have to wait until they’d been given the all-clear before I could interrogate them.”

“His words or yours?”

“His, of course.”

“Of course.”

“Other than that, I was told their wounds appear to be minor. But there’s something off about Elliot.”

My eyes widened. “What?”

“I don’t know,” she said with a sigh. “But from what we can tell, they ran foul of some drug runners, and things, unsurprisingly, went sideways fast. They managed to get out with few injuries. Of the group, we have one in custody that they carried back on one of the horses.”

“Jesus,” I said, rubbing my face and trying to get my thoughts in order. “But they’re not like…they’re okay.”

“Physically, it seems that way, but we’ll have to wait until we get the all-clear,” she told me. Despite her calm tone, I could feel the undercurrent of something sparking and jumping in her head. We hadn’t had issues with the drug runners that occasionally crossed the area in quite a while. The last one had been before Reed and I had come to the ranch, and that hadn’t resulted in more than a jump scare and the other ranches banding together to make sure their presence was known, chasing off any runners in the area.

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