Page 37 of Ms. Fortune
I thought back to the night of the storm when I saw someone down by the river. It took Risky forever to get the generator going, and after he finally did, he showed up, covered in mud and drenched from the rain outside. It never occurred to me thathemight’ve been the suspicious person I had watched through the windows.
My racing heart slowed, to the point that I could be declared dead. A whoosh filled my ears as the bottom dropped out of my stomach.
Risky never claimed to be a hero. He’d even hinted that he was more familiar with villainy. I’d thought he was giving a playful warning, not confessing to his criminality.
“If the Bookers were worried about me leaking company secrets, they never would’ve let me leave. If Charley keeps sending you guys after me and my new boss, I’m going to send all of you back to her in pieces. I don’t owe her a damn thing.”
I heard a scuffle, and the man in the leather coat was pressed against the railing of the deck. There was a loudcrackandrealized the part of the deck closest to the house was burning. When the fire reached the bar, it was going to go off like a bomb.
I wanted to shout a warning to Risky, but the struggling man laughed again and taunted, “Maybe stop sleeping with your bosses in the future, and you can avoid trouble following you when you move on to the next job.”
There was a heavy grunt and apopthat I recognized from the day I had been shot at on the hiking trail. Someone up in the scuffle on the deck had just fired a gun. I couldn’t tell who it was. I couldn’t deny that I hoped that Risky was all right.
The sound of sirens grew closer, indicating the fire department had finally made it up the mountain. There was no time to puzzle through all the new information I’d learned about Risky or worry about his reasons for sleeping with me. Honestly, if he simply had an authority kink, it would make walking away from him so much easier.
“Don’t tell me that all of this has been about Charley’s ego? She’s upset I found a new job and a kind woman after walking away from my previous obligations? This nonsense is overly dramatic, even for her.”
There was another pop, followed by a lot of swearing.
The sirens were right on top of the lodge. I heard the gathered crowd speaking with eager voices. That and the still-rushing wind drowned out the sound of a large man being kicked over the railing and tumbling hundreds of feet into the steep, icy valley below. He didn’t scream or call for help as he fell. He just dropped, like a dead weight, disappearing out of sight as the fire creeped farther onto the deck.
Moments later, steady footsteps came down the stairs. I watched as Risky lifted the tail of his flannel shirt and tucked something into the waistband of his jeans. His movements were practiced and calm, like the world wasn’t in flames around him. He was clearly no stranger to stashing a recently fired gun outof sight and acting like he hadn’t just shot some guy and then punted him to his death without breaking a sweat. He had to reach out and grab the handrails when the deck began to shift away from the house with acrack. The fire was growing in intensity. We needed to get away from the building before things collapsed and we got trapped by the wreckage.
Risky came around the corner and stopped, still as a statue, when he caught sight of me. I saw a flash of concern cross his face. He had ash in his hair and soot smeared across his cheek. He smelled like smoke, and the back of his hands were burned and starting to blister. We stared at each other in a tense silence, neither of us knowing if we should move forward or take a step backward.
Risky looked behind me. The flashing lights from the fire engine cast his skin in an eerie red glow. He looked like a demon.
“They set your house on fire. They tried to run you off the road. They wanted you to be the one who fell off the deck. And they shot at you.” Risky shook his head. “The original guy they’d sent didn’t get a chance to do anything to you because I found him first. These aren’t the sort of people who deserve a second chance, Lucky. It’s you or them, and I’m going to pick you every time.”
I let the words sink in and asked in a rough voice, “Are they going to keep coming?”
I didn’t have anything left to lose. If his former employer kept attacking me, the only thing remaining for her to take was my life.
Risky shook his head. I flinched when he reached for my elbow. I saw his expression stiffen, but he didn’t pull away. His fingers wrapped around my arm, and he started to drag me back toward the front of the building. I stumbled behind him, my eyes locked on the slight bulge at the back of his waist.
“I’m going to make them stop.” There was no hesitation in his tone.
“Did you know it was your ex-girlfriend doing all of this to me from the beginning?”
If the answer was yes, that might be an even bigger betrayal than what Banner had put me through.
He shot me a look over his shoulder and moved faster. The roof of the lodge started to cave in, and the crash sounded like the end of the world.
“She was never my girlfriend. She’s my boss’s daughter. She’s someone who makes life easier if you keep her happy instead of putting up a fight. That family and the business they’re in?” He shook his head. “You don’t want to end up on the wrong side of either. I was the best at what I did. I knew Charley didn’t want me to quit when she took over. But I was done with it. Done with her. Done with being indebted when I’d never asked for my life to be saved. I was confused as to why she had sent my previous competitors after you rather than trying to take me out directly. She never struck me as the jealous type.”
“She set the lodge on fire because she didn’t want you to have a new job?” I was so baffled by that type of logic.
I’d thought I was well versed in the worst sort of humans, thanks to Baker and my parents. Apparently, I was too shortsighted, and those I’d encountered weren’t all that bad. Well, at least not as awful as the people who moved within Risky’s world.
“She had it burned because she doesn’t want me to be happy. And because she’s cruel and ruthless. Charley Booker got all the hardest parts of both her parents. I’m going to get her to leave you alone and make her pay for everything she’s taken away from you, Lucky. Trust me.”
I would’ve trusted him blindly a handful of minutes ago.
Now, I didn’t know how to feel.
I’d joked about bringing him home despite not knowing if he was a serial killer or not. With irrefutable proof that he could indeed take a life without a second thought, it wasn’t funny anymore.
When we rejoined the crowd, Risky had to hastily explain why he had gone running into the fire. He made up a lame excuse that he’d thought he saw a staff member trapped inside and felt compelled to go in and make sure everyone had gotten out of the blaze safely. Some made a fuss and called him brave and fearless while others looked at him like he had a screw loose. I kept my mouth shut. Now that the fire was starting to burn itself out and die under the watchful eye of the fire department and the situation was mostly under control, all the feelings I’d brutally suppressed broke free.
