“Fuck!” Kaleb cursed. “I don’t like this, but you know I trust you, Wyatt. You know what you’re doing. You were special forces for a long time. I suppose if I have to trust anyone with Shelby’s safety, I’m glad it’s you.”

“Every friend she has is married to a guy who was in special forces,” Wyatt told Kaleb in a confident, reassuring tone that I’d never heard before. “Every one of those guys will be watching out for her.”

I gaped at Wyatt, shocked to discover that Hudson, Jax, Cooper, and Chase had all been special forces, too.

I’d known that all of them had been in the military at one time, but Tori, Taylor, Harlow and Vanna had never mentioned their connections to special forces.

Then again, I hadn’t really known them for all that long. It was possible that their husbands didn’t really want many people to know about their previous connections to special forces. Wyatt certainly didn’t.

“You told me that earlier, and I’m not doubting any of your abilities to keep her safe,” Kaleb grumbled, obviously already aware of a fact that I hadn’t known. “But it sucks to be this far away from Shelby when something like this is happening. We’re family, and our family sticks together when bad shit happens.”

“I’d feel the same way if this was happening to Tori and I wasn’t in the same city with her,” Wyatt commiserated. “But you’ll have to trust me for now. We’ve got this. There’s nothing more you can do that we aren’t already doing.”

“Do I have a choice?” Kaleb asked drily.

“No, you don’t,” I cut in calmly, knowing it was time to remind Kaleb that I was a grown adult and had been for a very long time. “It’s my decision to stay for now. I’ll keep you all informed, but I have too much going on right now to run and hide from whoever did this. I can’t exactly go offline and hide out. Blogging is my main income now. We don’t even know if someone is really stalking me. It could just be some kids doing a high school prank of some kind.”

“Nothing strange like this has happened before,” Wyatt pointed out. “And Shelby doesn’t know of anyone who would want to harm her.”

“There is someone who’d like to harm her,” Kaleb muttered vehemently. “But the bastard is in prison.”

I swallowed hard. That wasn’t something I’d expected Kaleb to announce.

Wyatt shot me a disgruntled expression as he asked huskily, “Who exactly would that be?”

Shit! Shit! Shit!I really didn’t want to go there.

“It doesn’t matter,” I said in a rush. “Heisin prison, and I don’t think he had anything to do with this incident.”

“Fuck!” Kaleb mumbled. “I’m sorry, Shelby. Wyatt doesn’t know? I guess I shouldn’t have assumed that he did. I thought you’d tell him because he’s trying to help investigate this, and you’re obviously comfortable staying with him.”

“Nobody here knows yet,” I said, my comment barely audible.

It wasn’t like I was trying to hide my past from my friends. I just hadn’t had an opportunity to tell Tori and my other female friends yet.

And Wyatt? There was probablynevergoing to be a time when I’d feel comfortable pouring out the details of how stupid I’d been or the mistakes I’d made in Montana.

I’d been trying like hell to leave all of that behind me.

It wasn’t like Wyatt and I were close enough to be sharing our deepest secrets with each other, but he was helping me. I had planned on telling him later this evening, at least the parts that he needed to know to help his friend investigate.

I looked at Wyatt, and when our eyes met, I nearly flinched at the intensity in his molten gray eyes as he drawled smoothly, “Shelby and I will talk about it as soon as we get off the phone. Is this guy a danger to her? Is it possible that he convinced someone to do this even though he’s in prison.”

“Doubtful,” Kaleb commented. “He’s in a federal prison with a high level of security. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it’s probably unlikely.”

Without breaking eye contact with me, Wyatt replied, “It’s definitely something I’ll check out.”

I made the appropriate responses over the next few minutes as the three of us continued to talk, but my eyes stayed locked on Wyatt’s because his fiery gaze wouldn’t allow me to look away.

My stomach flip-flopped as I wondered what kind of reaction I was going to get once he was off the phone.

I released a tremulous breath as we ended the conversation.

“Do you want to tell me what that was all about?” Wyatt asked in a modulated tone right after he disconnected the call. “I can’t force you to trust me, but I can’t thoroughly investigate unless I know what I’m dealing with in your past.”

He was right.

I knew he was right.