Page 36 of Hell or High Water

He didn’t respond at first, and I wondered if he’d go back to loathing me. Maybe he had mood swings, and this was one of them.

“I thought this would be short-term, but it looks like it’s going to take longer than I expected. If we have to live together, then we might as well get along,” he told me.

Why had he expected it to be short-term? It had always been three months. Hadn’t it? Or was there something I didn’t know?

I bit my bottom lip and debated asking that or letting it go for now.

Than put the bacon on the plate with the eggs and toast, then picked up both plates and set one in front of me and the other beside me. “Let’s be friends.”

His eyes met mine as he said it. They looked sincere. I was just hesitant to trust him.

“Okay,” I agreed. “And thank you for breakfast.”

“You need to eat more than a banana. It’s the most important meal of the day.”

Fifteen

Than

My phone buzzed in my pocket, alerting me of a text message. I didn’t take my eyes off Montana as she kept Jack at a walk. She’d gone around the ring like this several times, and she seemed to have finally relaxed. Jack wanted to canter. I could see it in his body language, but she wasn’t ready for that. Maybe a trot before I helped her down.

My phone buzzed again. I knew without looking that it was Linc. He’d not been satisfied with my telling him that there was nothing in Montana’s things to use against her. She was clean. Fucking innocent in all this shit. So, I’d been tasked with getting her out of the cabin so he could go through her stuff.

Baskin was freaking the fuck out over his nephew’s interest in her. Crew had apparently come home, talking about her, and his mother had called her sister-in-law to find out what Baskin knew about her since she was a friend of the family, so Baskin’s wife mentioned to him that Crew had a crush on a new girl.

Sending her to the public high school had been a terrible idea. If Baskin didn’t want people to notice her and start asking questions, then he should have asked Linc to keep her in the cabin the entire time she was here. Anywhere she went, she was going to be noticed.

When I didn’t reply to the text, my phone started ringing.

Rolling my eyes, I took out my phone, saw Linc’s name, and answered it.

“Yes, sir?” I asked, keeping my eyes on Montana, who was smiling so damn big that it was hard to look anywhere else.

“You’re right. Nothing. She doesn’t even dog-ear the pages in her books. Fuck.” He muttered the last word.

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“She can’t go back to school. Baskin wants her out of Crew’s sight.”

“Did he consider it’s going to be odd if she never shows back up? Folks in this town are nosy as fuck.”

He sighed. “Yeah. I’m working on a story to tell the principal that will hopefully get spread around.”

“How’s she going to graduate? That is part of her deal.”

She laughed, and I thought even Jack was mesmerized. Damn, she was hard not to want. It was impossible. The image of her last night with that camisole sticking to her and her hair mussed and draped over her shoulders came back to me. She’d had a nightmare, and all I could think about was how she’d look after having been fucked for hours. Then I’d waited until she had time to fall back asleep and given in to jerking off with her front and center in my head.

“The virtual program,” he said. “I’m having her registered today, and she can start tomorrow. She’s already got the laptop from the school and the things she needs.”

Awesome. She was going to be with me twenty-four/seven. And I wasn’t supposed to touch her. Fucking hell.

“I doubt she’s gonna like that,” I said while she and Jack made her way over to me.

“Doesn’t matter what she likes. Just matters that she keeps her mouth shut.”

Reaching into my back pocket, I pulled out my pack of cigarettes. I’d cut down to just having one when I was tense. This pack had lasted me two weeks so far. Tapping one out, I stuck it in my mouth before putting the pack back and getting my lighter.

“All right, gotta go,” I told him through my teeth.

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