Page 71 of Tempting Fate
“What people are you referring to?”
“The kind who try to act all badass when they’re clearly out of their league.” No thermos, but he found a travel mug. He took the coffeepot from her and filled the tumbler. “Give me ten minutes to get supplies.” Including his Sig and NVGs. He planned to see the bad guys before the bad guys saw them.
He spun her around. “Stay put, you hear?”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re bossier than anyone I know.”
And she was the biggest pain in the ass. This was supposed to be his friggin’ vacation. He drove to L&G instead of walking, to save time. He collected his trusty Stingray to track cell phones in the area and a Range-R radar device in case he wound up chasing the dirtbags. Using radio waves, the detector could pinpoint even the slightest motion inside a building from fifty feet away. Gabe gathered up a few other necessities and hightailed it back to the house, fearful that Raylene would leave without him and blow any chance of going in quietly and staying out of sight. No, she’d be more like a bull in a china shop, as his mother liked to say. And these people had the potential to be dangerous, especially if they were connected to that homicide in Utah. The whole thing was a mystery, and he wasn’t about to let Raylene go charging in like Wonder Woman.
He found her waiting on the porch with enough gear to go camping for a week. “What the hell is that?” He pointed at two quilts she’d obviously heisted from the house as she tossed them in his back seat.
“In case we get cold.”
He laughed. “Did you bring your horsey jammies, too?”
She got in the front seat and socked him in the arm. “Just for that, I’m not sharing.” Raylene held up a small ice chest.
“What’s in there?” He tried to lift the lid, but she slapped his hand away.
“Food, and it’s all for me.”
“We’ll see about that. Buckle up, buttercup.” He stepped on the gas and took a shortcut to Raylene’s property.
“What are you doing? This isn’t the way we go.”
“It’s the way I go, because we’re parking over at Rosser Ranch. Up on that knoll right behind your land. There’s a water tower there, and I figure we can take cover behind it and still have a clear vantage point if anyone comes back to Rancho Raylene tonight.”
“Flynn will run us off his property with a shotgun if he finds out.”
“He’ll runyouoff, not me. He likes me. I’m not trying to depreciate his property values with a motocross track.” He flashed her a tight grin.
“I’m not building a motocross track. I’m selling my land to folks who made me an honest offer. He’s a big-deal lawyer. He can fight it, or he can buy the property himself. Here’s an idea: if it’s such a problem for Lucky, Clay, and Flynn, why don’t they go in together and buy it from me?”
“Maybe they don’t want to be jacked up like that.”
“Look, my father got a variance for the land a long time ago that would let it be used for something other than agriculture. They should’ve raised a fuss then, or raised the funds to buy the land. What am I supposed to do, let them determine who can and who can’t buy my property?”
He shrugged, because she made a valid point, yet he sympathized with the neighbors. Having a motorcycle track in your backyard would suck.
He pulled off the road and cut across a field, bouncing every time his tires hit a rut. Good thing for all-wheel drive. Raylene didn’t seemed phased by it, and he figured she’d probably taken similar routes to look after her father’s cattle.
“Kind of reminds me of the terrain in the Hindu Kush,” he said, remembering the years he spent near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
“Was it hellish?”
“Not a lot of creature comforts.” He didn’t really know how to answer that question. It was war. He lost friends, saw people get blown up, and watched a lot of brothers go home forever changed. But he was proud of what they’d accomplished and how he’d served his country.
“Do you miss it?”
The truth was he was still doing a lot of the same kinds of missions as a contractor. They were just more under the radar. But he missed the camaraderie of the teams. He still had Logan, though. His brother from another mother. “Nah, all the red tape was a drag. And the money is better in contract work.”
“Do you ever think of doing something less dangerous?”
“What’s up, Ray, you worried about me?” He slid her a sideways glance.
“Definitely about Logan. You?” She shrugged. “So what happened with the pregnant girlfriend after she lost the baby?”
“Nothing I want to talk about. Let’s talk about you instead. You find someone to take care of your horse?”
