Page 1 of Captive at Rescue Ridge

Prologue

Your twin brother is dead.

What kind of screwed-up text was this? No number? No contact name? Just a message. How was that even possible?

Archer Sturgess Googled whether it was possible to send a text without an identifying phone number. The search result said that, yes, it was possible to send an anonymous text using a web-based service.Shit.

Other questions quickly followed. Was this real? Someone’s idea of a joke? Should he take it literally? Seriously?

The text would haunt Archer if he didn’t investigate and his twin brother Owen turned up missing, or worse. Considering everything that had been happening lately at Rescue Ridge Ranch, he wouldn’t risk ignoring the message. Plus, there was an easy way to find out if this was legit.

Archer fired off a text to Owen while standing in the back of the small gathering being held for Harrison Guidry, the family attorney who’d been murdered on ranch property. Guidry and Archer’s father had been two peas in a rotten pod while they’d both been alive. It was somehow fitting they would meet their end within months of each other.

Archer glanced around the crowded room as he waited for Owen’s response—a response he hoped would come any second now. There was familiarity in the sea of faces. He’d walked away from Saddle Junction fourteen years ago at the ripe age of eighteen. After being summoned home for his dead father’s will reading, he’d expected the town to be the same as when he’d left—frozen in time.

Glancing around the room, his gaze landed on the Baker boy. He should still be an annoying thirteen-year-old instead of a grown-ass twenty-seven-year-old man. It was evident that everyone had aged in the more than dozen years that had passed. It was funny how the mind worked, believing he’d be the only one who’d grown older.

Kade, the oldest Sturgess sibling, and Bree were there with their new baby. Archer didn’t begrudge his older brother’s happiness, but it was impossible to escape witnessing their newfound bliss with the three of them living on the ranch. Archer’s gaze shifted to Chloe, her son Grayson, and Travis. The only Sturgess daughter had found true love with Travis, who happened to be the town’s acting sheriff. Three-year-old Grayson sat between Archer’s newly minted brother-in-law and Chloe. The pair held hands behind the little boy. It was just more of that sappy love filling the room. Archer’s brother Conrad sat next to his future bride, Nikki Guidry, daughter of the murdered family lawyer. The circumstances of their courtship were unusual, to say the least. But their love was the one good thing that came out of the tragedy of her father’s murder. Conrad had found the love of his life in Nikki.

Good for all of them. Archer, on the other hand, had no plans to settle down. Not as long as Sturgess blood ran through his veins. He had no intention of carrying on the genes of Beaumont Sturgess. The man had been a tyrant and an abuser. Hell would freeze over before Archer risked handing those traits down to another generation.

Dropping his gaze to the phone, he waited for those tell-tall dots that said Owen was responding. Nothing. His brain refused to believe his twin was in trouble or worse—dead like the text said. For a split second, he thought about sounding the alarm with the family. Except Owen might be out of cell range and Archer would upset everyone for no reason.

Besides, if his twin was in trouble, wouldn’t Archer know? Wouldn’t he feel something? Some kind of twin telepathy?

Hudson wasn’t present at the remembrance, either. Were his two brothers together? Safe?

Of the six siblings, four were present and accounted for. Actually…

There was another brother in the room…correction,half-brother. Technically, there were seven Sturgess siblings. Much to everyone’s surprise and shock, their half-brother had been summoned to the will reading, where he’d been introduced to everyone. Beau sat with his hands folded and his head down. He’d saved Conrad’s life. Nikki’s, too. The family owed him. But trouble had shown up alongside their half-sibling, and Archer still couldn’t bring himself to trust the person who looked so much like their father.

Again, Archer checked the cell in his palm. Still nothing.

Unease settled over him, but he tamped it down just as quickly. Was he overreacting? Letting panic mode kick into high gear without proof because of recent events? Or maybe he couldn’t accept the possible reality of anything bad happening to his twin. Could he ask around to see if anyone had heard from Owen or Hudson? Or would he be stirring up a hornet’s nest, worrying everyone for no reason? The text couldn’t be real, could it?

Should he respond? Leave it alone until he heard from Owen?

His siblings weren’t going anywhere in the next few minutes. He could call an emergency meeting at any point.Give it a few more minutes.

His gaze swept over the room. A woman caught his attention. A bolt of lightning struck the center of his chest. Dressed in black, she sat in the back of the room, closest to the exit. The rim of her hat covered her face as she kept her head bowed. She seemed oddly familiar, but only one person had ever caused that reaction in his body. This couldn’t be her. She’d disappeared a long time ago, taking his heart with her.

The woman shifted in her seat, clearly uncomfortable as he tried to get a better look.

Once again, electricity zapped him. Did he know her? Or, the more obvious conclusion might be that she was somehow connected to Harrison Guidry.

Archer’s gaze shifted to Beau again, unable to maintain focus on a topic for longer than a few seconds while concern over Owen tightened its grip. As much as Archer didn’t trust their half-sibling, the man had saved Conrad’s life. Reminding himself of the fact every day, dozens of times, might help Archer get over Beau’s likeness to the father, who had been nothing but cruel until the day he’d been put in the ground.

Archer needed to get over it, thank Beau, and shake his hand. He put the thought on hold as the tiny hairs on the back of his neck pricked. Was someone watching him?

He turned to get another look at Black Hat to see if she was responsible for the goose bumps raising the tiny hairs on his arms.

Black Hat was gone.

1

The door nearest to where Black Hat had been sitting closed with acu-clunk. The side door wasn’t an emergency exit, yet it struck Archer as odd that someone would use it as a way out when most folks made their way back through the vestibule. Then again, the holding area had been wall-to-wall people when he’d first arrived. He’d scarcely been able to breathe without bumping into the person next to him.

Black Hat slipping out the side door didn’t seem as suspect when he remembered how many shoulder and elbow bumps he’d taken to his back and arms.

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