Page 11 of Rogue
“Report back here at seven a.m. sharp next Tuesday. Ring the bell on the gate three times, then two times, then once, and you’ll be let in.”
“I can’t do Tuesday mornings,” I ground out. Heknowsthis already. Before he can act, I grab my notebook off his desk and secure it inside my shorts pocket.
“You remind me of someone.”
I pause. There’s a gruffness to his tone that makes me think she’s someone special to him. “A girlfriend?”
“Something like that.”
Well, well, well. Mr. Dangerous has a soft spot.
“Your temper is going to be an issue, as it was with hers.”
“Was? What happened to her?”
“Gone.”
“Gone? What does that mean?” Gone, as in dead?
He narrows eyes at me as he stands, clearly done with this conversation. “Prove your worth in Hell Camp, Kylie, and I’ll take you on.”
“I haven’t said yes.”
“You didn’t need to.” He sticks a hand in his dress-pants pocket and tosses a few hundred-dollar bills onto the desk. “This isn’t going to be easy. You’ll be training with former military men, street thugs, ex-cons. Men who’ll hurt you if provoked.”
Jaxson’s smug face flashes across my mind. What kind of man is he? Capable—the bump on my head is proof enough.
“I recruit only the best—the men understand that.”
“Why me?” I whisper.
“I’m a man who likes it when things go my way. I detest bullshit. I don’t tolerate failure. I’m not the kind of guy you fuck with. But my current team has come up short. They, too, will be competing for rerecruitment.”
I suck in a breath, for the first time, really seeing Hayden clearly. Straight past his handsome face and into his bleak, soulless eyes.
Dangerous.
“Why you, you ask?” His eyes flash, and a shiver rolls up my spin. No, he’s not a man to fuck with. Not with the simmering rage rolling about just below his calm, collected manner. “Once I get the information I need, I’m going to terminate every Prick out there, beginning with Novák.” He leans forward and lowers his voice to a low rumble. “And you, my clever beauty, are going to be the one no one sees coming.”
3
Shelby
With my habitual Prick Patrols, Tuesday mornings are always a mixed bag of the unexpected. This Tuesday morning is like an angry pit bull tore into the bag and gave it a good shake with its teeth, scattering surprise after bleeding surprise at my feet. Least of all being the fact I’m actually back at the Ranch and ready to participate in something called Hell Camp.
Especially here, on the northern outskirts of town. Everyone avoids this area after it experienced its own kind of hell two years ago, when a tornado ripped through, leveling the place and destroying everything; lives, livestock, farms, and crops. Rumor has it a Texas cattleman bought up most of the cleared acreage, then built a wall around the property line. Rumor also has it that local aid money earmarked for rebuilding never made it to this side of town but instead was redirected to the wealthier west end of Shelby. Everyone knows Franco DiCapitano had something to do with that. Yet the Texan—Hayden?—never made a fuss about the misappropriated funds. It’s a never-ask, never-receive policy around here. And even when you do ask . . . beg . . . plead . . . for someone to do something, even investigate your father’s death, you still end up with nothing.
I don’t know what I was expecting. Devastation. Sadness knowing lives were lost out here on this now uninhabitable side of town.
Not this.
Not the sign that greets me, which hangs over the entrance of what has to be acres upon acres of red Oklahoma soil.freedom’s bluff. Bluff, as in to call someone’s bluff—something I immediately realize after keying the code into the monitor, passing through the gate, and, avoiding the electrocuted, barbed wire–topped fence that likely surrounds the place, walking the ten minutes of unpaved winding driveway to the Ranch. The last time I was here, I’d been ushered out an exit doorway next to the library and into a car. The driver took off before my bottom touched the seat, like a bat out of hell up this very same driveway and out the gates, slowing only to drop me off in town. Why bring any more trouble home, right?
No one is getting inside—and quite possibly outside—Freedom’s Bluff without a code. Not without Hayden’s thumbs up.
The second shocker is the Ranch itself. I thought Hell Camp would be held in either some kind of military base, complete with tin-roof structures and armed soldiers running amok. The entry gate—that fence—did nothing to dispel this idea. I certainly wasn’t expecting an exquisitely beautiful, sprawling ranch, with its grand entryway and large bay windows. There’s even a wraparound porch, like inSouthern Homemagazine, complete with freaking white rocking chairs.
A tall tank of a man waits for me at the double-doored entrance. He’s an intimidating sight, with cropped blond hair, taut muscles that seem to cover every inch of him, an icy aura about him that’d freeze fire, and a vocabulary the size of a toddler’s. “Come,” he grunts and strides away, fully expecting me to follow him.
