Page 66 of Outlaw Ridge: Ryker
“I do love you,” Janette sobbed, the words slurred by her tears.
Janette squeezed the trigger. The shot went wild, kicking up a plume of snow ten feet from where they crouched.
Emma exchanged a glance with Ryker. Janette was cracking. Breaking apart under the weight of Ethan’s madness. And that might just be the opening they needed.
Ryker shifted closer, his breath misting the frozen air near her ear. “I’m going to circle behind her,” he whispered. “Try to disarm her.”
Emma turned her head, their eyes locking. She didn’t have to sayBe careful.It was written across her face, clear enough that Ryker’s mouth curved into the barest hint of a grim smile.
The tight, aching worry coiled deeper in her chest. Before last night, before they’d crossed that line between partners and something more, she’d been able to keep her fear for him buriedunder professionalism. But now… now it was raw and clawing at her insides.
He brushed her gloved hand lightly with his fingers, quick, barely a touch, and then he was gone, slipping low through the snow-dusted trees.
Emma swallowed hard and forced herself to focus.
Focus on Ethan. Focus on Janette.
She couldn’t let her mind follow Ryker through the trees, couldn’t let herself imagine all the ways this could go wrong. Not when the man they’d once trusted was waiting to kill them both.
Emma shifted her weight slightly, careful not to make a sound louder than the whisper of the breeze. Somewhere in the trees, Ryker was moving, silent, calculated, and she had to buy him every second she could.
She drew a breath and called out, loud enough to carry across the clearing. “Janette. You can still end this. For Ethan’s sake.”
There was a beat of silence, a hesitation she could feel in the air.
But it wasn’t Janette who answered.
Ethan’s voice cut through the cold, ragged and filled with venom. “You ruined my life, Emma.”
Emma’s heart pounded against her ribs, but she kept her voice even. “You ruined your own life, Ethan. You hurt the people who cared about you. You even hurt the woman you’ve been staying with.”
A sharp, barking laugh echoed from behind his tree. “Veronica was collateral damage,” he snarled. “She saw my face on the fuckin’ news. I didn’t have a choice.”
Emma gritted her teeth, anger biting harder than the cold. “And Charlotte?” she demanded. “What about her?”
“She came after me,” Ethan snapped. “Tried to turn me in. Tried tosaveme.” His voice twisted on the last word. “I asked her for help. She chose you instead. Just like everyone else.”
The silence that followed was thick and poisonous.
“She’s in the trunk of my car,” Ethan added, vicious satisfaction threading every syllable.
Her stomach dropped, nausea clawing at her throat. “Is she alive?” Emma shouted.
“It doesn’t matter!” Ethan roared. “None of it matters anymore.”
Emma tensed, watching as movement flickered from the corner of her eye, Janette shifting behind her cover.
“Do it, Janette,” Ethan screamed. “Now.You promised you would.”
Emma braced herself, pulse hammering, the world narrowing to the shaky barrel of Janette’s gun starting to lift.
Seconds stretched razor-thin.
Emma edged slightly around the tree, eyes darting between Janette and Ethan, heart thundering so loudly she could barely hear the wind.
Movement.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of Ryker. He was moving low and fast, closing the gap toward Janette.
