“What?” A weight started to lift off my shoulders…until it crashed back down on me with more force than ever. “No, that can’t be true. He would of…”

“It’s true. And he didn’t,” Buck quipped, cutting me off. He leaned back, the leather seat creaking underneath him.

I wanted nothing more than to punch the smug look off his face.

“How long?” I asked, my disappointment quickly turning to anger. I tightened my grip on the door handle once more. Any harder and I’d be snapping it off.

Buck shrugged. “Just about two weeks or so. Case was dismissed. The DA botched the paperwork. The signed confession went missing along with pretty much all of the evidence collected at the scene. Finger prints, even the two guns. Something tells me that lawyer lady had something to do with it. I did some research on her. This wasn’t the first case she was involved in where evidence magically disappeared and it’s not like…”

Buck’s voice faded off into the distance. The only words I registered were playing over and over again in my head. An echo of TWO WEEKS. I was going to be sick.

Bear was out. Free.

He was okay.

I took a deep breath.

He hadn’t come for me.

My chest tightened.

The realization I came to next was dizzying.

Bear wasn’t coming for me.

I was so lost in my thoughts, I barely registered Buck taking my hand in his or how close he’d shifted over to me, or even the arm he’d slung over my shoulder. I didn’t notice a damn thing while I tried to process how I was feeling when he lurched forward and pressed his cracked thin lips on mine. His cold tongue attempted to snake its way into my mouth.

I froze. My eyes open, witnessing the horror that was Buck kissing me. It only took a few seconds for me to remember my limbs and what I could use them for. I pushed against his chest, but he didn’t move. I shouted against his mouth, but he still didn’t budge. I pulled my knees up between us and kicked on his chest. That seemed to do the trick because suddenly the door flew open and Buck was gone.

I was strong, but there was no way I was that strong.

I shifted over to the driver’s seat and spied a very frightened looking Buck on his butt in the dirt. A very large, very blue eyed, very shirtless, very muscular, very tattooed, and VERY angry man was attached to that gun.

Bear.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Thia

MY HEART LEAPT and sank all at the same time.

My focus wasn’t on Bear’s nostrils as they flared out with his ragged breaths as if he were about to breathe fire. Or his knuckles which were white with tension, or his teeth which were bared like a wolf’s. It wasn’t even on the frightened deputy on the other end of his anger and his gun.

It was on the freckles that lined the tanned skin below his beautiful eyes. It was on the way his chest rose and fell, reminding me that not only was he was alive and breathing, but he was right in front of me.

He was free.

And he was fucking pissed.

Fully expect me to break his fucking wrists or end his fucking life. Bear had said to me the last time our paths had crossed with Buck.

Shit.

Buck’s life was on the line. Bear could put a bullet in his chest or head at any second, but instead of fearing for my old friend’s life, I couldn’t help but admire the straining muscles of Bear’s biceps, and again my attentions were on the way his chest rose and fell as he breathed through his anger. Maybe it was fucked up of me, maybe it was just because I hadn’t seen or spoken to him in over six months, but Bear being angry to the point of wanting to kill for me made my heart flutter and the place between my legs throb. And when a memory flashed though my mind of the last time we’d been alone together. Naked. I had to bite my bottom lip to keep myself from writhing on the seat.

My Bear.

My entire body recognized him, and from what I was feeling I knew it had missed him as much as the rest of me had.

Bear squatted down, looking at Buck with pure hatred in his eyes. “I told you not to lay hands on my fucking girl again or I’d end you,” Bear seethed, fire dancing in his eyes. He cocked his gun and aimed it straight at Buck’s chest who was visibly trembling, his mouth wide open, scrambling backwards in the dirt road. A wet spot formed on the front of his pants.

“I’m the la-la-law,” Buck stammered, reaching for his gun. Bear stood up, lifted his foot, and stomped his boot over Bucky’s holster.

“I’m not,” Bear countered. If I didn’t do something, I knew Bear would be seconds away from making good on his threat.

I slid out of the cruiser. “I came here for his help,” I said.

“Looked like you were doing a real good job of convincing him to give it to you,” Bear spat. “That dress for him too?”

“What?” I asked, the reunion I’d envisioned for us looking nothing like what was unfolding.

“Get in the fucking truck,” Bear snapped, jerking his chin to King’s truck which was parked right behind the cruiser.

“No,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “And you know what? I don’t have to defend myself to you or anyone else. I didn’t do anything wrong. Only guilty people need to defend themselves, and I wasn’t guilty of anything but trying to help you.”

I stomped over and shooed away Bear’s boot, which he reluctantly removed from Buck’s holster with a deep growl. I unsnapped the gun and handed it up to Bear. I held out my hand to help Buck up, but he waved me away.

“I can’t believe I was actually going to help you,” Buck muttered, standing up and brushing the dirt from his pants and palms.

Bear took a half step forward, making Buck jump back. “The only thing you shouldn’t be able to believe right now is that you’re still fucking breathing. I’m having a pretty hard time with that one myself. So GO before I change my fucking mind,” Bear said, his jaw clenching and unclenching. The chords in his neck straining as he tried to maintain control.

Buck shuffled to the cruiser but I wasn’t done yet. “If the condition of you helping me was what you just tried to pull then you weren’t going to ever help me,” I pointed out, needing him to know that what he wanted wasn’t ever going to happen between us.

“Get the fuck out of here, now!” Bear shouted. A warning I knew he wouldn’t be repeating again. He pointed with the barrel of his gun to the cruiser.