Guilty as Sin (Sinful, Montana Book 1) Read online

  “Brilliant,” Rafe said. “Walk while you talk, though. A few press-ups, maybe. If you don’t get moving, you’re going to get fat.”

  “When you’re chopping wood for heat like I am,” Jace said, “you can give me stick about not moving enough. I don’t have an assistant to fetch my latte, and I worked out this morning. Ran as well. Ask Tobias.” The Ridgeback raised his head again, his gaze alert. Jace could swear he saw too much. “My heart’s all good,” he told Rafe and Tobias, “if that’s what you’re worried about, so you can shut your gob. I’m doing a knife fight, though. It’s not coming out right. If you’ll walk through it with me, I may forgive you for ringing me in the middle of it. I’m killing somebody here, mate.”

  “Right.” Rafe was all business now. Turning up in the nick of time, as always. Rafe had been born to save. “Who am I?”

  “A woman. Smoking hot.”

  “It’s a big ask,” Rafe said, “but I’m very good.”

  “Girl, more like,” Jace clarified. “Beautiful enough to stop a man’s heart, and an ice-cold assassin, as it turns out. Russian mafia. Matt’s been sleeping with you. You think he won’t be able to bring himself to kill you. You think you’re better than he is. You’re overconfident.”

  He put the phone on speaker, and then it was back and forth across the hickory floor of the cabin, describing his actions to Rafe, his brother offering up his own suggestions, his own counter-moves. When it came to action, Jace’s hands could only type what his body told him, and for that? He needed to move.

  He was ducking, feinting, as Tobias prowled the boundaries of the log cabin like a wraith. Jace—Matt Sawyer, that is—grabbed his adversary’s slim wrist in a hard hand. Even as he did it, she tossed the knife to her left hand and lunged for the kill.

  No softness in her now. Her teeth were bared, and there was nothing but menace in that face. Nothing but hatred.

  He was reading her intention, dropping to his knees, thrusting his head forward instead of back, moving into the fight instead of away from it, shaking up her assumptions and throwing her off-balance. He knew the blade was whistling through the air, ready to take off his scalp, even as he drove the crown of his head into the beautiful body that had been trembling under his a few hours earlier. He heard the whoosh of her breath leaving her lungs, felt the weakness, and he was tumbling her, flipping, ducking behind a wooden beam as she recovered. As she went for the kill.

  And then the mistake. The frozen quarter-second when she stared at the quivering blade impaled in the heavy wood. The moment when she didn’t react fast enough.

  Sawyer hadn’t spent that moment staring, though. It was what he’d told her. She might be good. He was better. He had an elbow crashing into her face and his hand on the knife, was wrenching it from its prison. She lunged for him, her nose spouting blood, her teeth sinking into his left hand all the way to the bone, her legs kicking viciously, and he struck.

  A knife to the heart. The way he’d felt when he’d finally understood exactly why the enemy had seemed one step ahead of him all this time. When he’d realized he’d been betrayed by the woman he loved.

  Yeah, it had hurt. But a real knife to the heart hurt more. He knew that. He’d watched it happen before. He was watching it now.

  She fell to the floor, graceless, in a heap of tangled legs and arms, those thick-lashed golden-brown eyes staring up at him as her failing heart pumped one last time. And then she died.

  “Good,” Jace said to Rafe, breathing hard with effort and adrenaline as Tobias came forward at last and thrust his muzzle into his hand now that he wasn’t Sawyer anymore. Now that he’d switched gears. “Cheers, mate.”

  “Don’t hang up,” Rafe said. “I wanted to—”

  It was two hours later when Jace realized what his brother had said. He only remembered, in fact, when the phone rang again. He picked it up and said, “Sorry.”

  No answer.

  “Rafe?” he asked. “Mate?”

  Still nothing, then a sharply indrawn breath, a low, halting voice. “It’s you.”

  “Pardon?” He held the phone out and checked the screen. Not an area code he recognized, and not a voice he did, either. He put the phone to his ear again and said, “Wrong number.” As he was about to hang up, he heard the voice ask, “Did you get it?”

  That was odd. Annoying as well. He didn’t bother to say anything more, just hung up and turned back to his laptop screen. Somehow, it had become afternoon. He could tell by the angle of the sunlight streaming through the window at his shoulder. The first Tuesday in May, barely spring in the Montana Rockies, the chill of the mountain night ready to fall around you like a blanket of snow.

  He picked up his coffee cup, and the liquid within it was cold. Huh. He had been working longer than he’d thought. He could’ve sworn he’d just refilled that.

  The urgency had abated, that burning need to get the words down before he lost them, and he became aware of the tension between his shoulder blades. He stood up, interlaced his fingers, stretched his arms overhead before swinging them in giant circles, then headed out the door of the cabin with Tobias padding behind him.

  Rafe was right. Jace had run the mountain with the dog that morning and had worked out after that, but other than the choreography for the knife fight, he’d barely moved since. He was hungry, he was thirsty, he was stiff, and he wanted a beer. But he had one hell of a story, with only the epilogue to go. He smelled money, but more than that? He smelled satisfaction.

  Might as well empty the mailbox while he was out here. He ran a hand over his beard, then pushed back his hair and tried to remember when he’d checked the mail last. He couldn’t, so he jogged lightly to the intersection with the main road, inhaling the sharp, clean smell of evergreens, then pulled open the door of the galvanized iron mailbox with an effort.

  It had been longer than he’d thought since he’d been down here, apparently. It took some time to prise the contents loose, they were wedged in there so tightly. Rubbish, mostly. Why did people still mail things? Who looked at advertising? He walked up to the house again, sorting along the way. Catalog, catalog, grocery store circular, flyer from the hardware store, oil-change coupon. On and on. And one hand-addressed legal-sized envelope.

  Retirement-planning seminar, probably, and they were trying to make it look like personal mail so you’d open it. He was only thirty-six, but that didn’t seem to stop anybody. Even though they didn’t know who he was, as far as he could tell, other than that weird bloke up on the mountain. He ventured only a few times a week into the fleshpots of Sinful, Montana—the town where he’d bought this cabin on a desperate whim during that low point nearly six months back. Had made the down payment, in fact, with the money from returning the ring.

  He kept his distance. From Sinful. From people in general. Dogs, now—dogs might not be fantastic conversationalists, but at least they were honest. What you saw was what you got. He went to the grocery store, the gym, the hardware store, and his favorite café, with an occasional foray into the library when the cabin’s walls closed around him. He’d never sampled the glories of the his-and-hers spa treatment room as he’d originally planned, let alone the master suite at the Sinful Inn. He’d never set foot inside Montana Gems, and as for the lingerie store where you could buy your lady something fragile enough to rip straight off her? He’d crossed the street to avoid that one.

  But he hadn’t run away. He’d been too stubborn for that. He’d stayed here and finished his book, and then he’d written another one. Which meant he’d won. He kicked open the door of the cabin again, tossed the rubbish into the burn box, then hesitated over that white envelope.

  “May as well,” he muttered, then ripped it open, unfolded two stapled, printed sheets, and sighed. Some wannabe author sending him a story, wanting him to “help me get started.” He was about to toss the whole thing into the burn box with the rest of the junk when something caught his eye.

  His name. His real name. Not Jason Black. Jac
e Blackstone. They were the first two words in the manuscript. And wait, he thought, his gaze flicking back to the ripped envelope. This hadn’t been forwarded by his agent. It had been addressed here. To him. What the hell?

  He sank down into the rocking chair that sat in front of the enormous green wood stove, pulled the manuscript all the way out of the envelope, and began to read.

  Jace Blackstone opened his eyes. At least he thought he did.

  Blackness. A void.

  Something was wrong with his brain. Some fuzziness. He started to sit up, and he couldn’t.

  Wait. He couldn’t move.

  Choppy breath coming short. Panic beginning to twist in his gut. Arms. His arms were splayed overhead, fastened by the wrists with something hard. Not cloth. Something that cut at his skin when he tried to pull free.

  Ankles, too. No play in them at all. He was spread-eagled on something soft… a mattress. Blindfolded and secured with… with zip ties, maybe. Hard, cutting plastic.

  The fuzziness cleared some, enough to remember sipping his drink as he sat backwards on a bar stool, one booted foot on the rail, surveying the room. And the moment when he’d seen the blonde, her hair falling over one eye, her dress and her mouth as red as sin, as hot as hell, and everything from her deep cleavage to her swaying hips speaking the language of lust.

  The language of lust? No. Too much. And this woman sounded like Jessica Rabbit. Jace kept reading anyway.

  She’d walked straight over to him, not bothering to drop her eyes. Not hiding what she wanted. Then she’d tossed that mane of blonde hair back, looked sidelong at him, and purred, “Buy a girl a drink?”

  He remembered that, and he remembered buying himself another one, too. Remembered taking a sip, the whisky burning a path down his throat as hot as her gaze on him. But that was all. And now he was here, in the dark, tied like a sacrifice.

  Helpless.

  “Hello?” he called out, then hated the weakness. He wanted to ask, “Who’s there? Where am I?” But he didn’t.

  When the soft slap came, he flinched. And his heart, which had already been racing, turned it up another notch. Because the blow wasn’t from a hand. It was something else. Something flexible, but with a sting. Then the nearly tickling touch as it was drawn down his body, and he was tensing more.

  He wanted to ask, “Who are you? What do you want?” He wanted to say, “Let me go.” But he was damned if he’d give her—him—the satisfaction. The blonde? Somebody else? Was this about sex? Money?

  The next blow fell.

  It was about pain.

  Jace could hear his own ragged breathing, clearly audible in the quiet cabin. He turned the page. The next one—the last one—was blank.

  Movement beside him. A faint sound. A hum.

  “Huh!” The exclamation was out before he could stop himself, and his body jerked, sending the rocking chair into motion and startling a sharp bark out of Tobias. The Ridgeback was standing by Jace’s chair, whining softly, the source of the movement and the noise.

  Jace shook his head to clear it, then jumped up, leaned down for the handle of the wood stove, shoved the manuscript inside, struck a match, and lit the whole mess up. He caught sight of the envelope—no return address—grabbed it, too, and tossed it on top before slamming the door shut.

  Wait, he thought as he watched the glass window glow yellow as the flame flickered and died. What would Matt Sawyer, super soldier, have done in this situation? Something much more clever, of course. Sawyer would have preserved the evidence, obviously, because something else was clicking into place in Jace’s brain now. That phone call.

  “It’s you,” the husky voice had said. “Did you get it?” Male or female, Jace hadn’t been able to tell. Phone numbers could be traced, though. Envelopes with no return address, even if he’d noticed the postmark, which he hadn’t? Not so much.

  He hadn’t been so stupid after all, then. It was a one-time thing, or it wasn’t. If it wasn’t, there would be more evidence, and next time, he’d save it. Anyway, it wasn’t news that fans could send you some crazy stuff. Invitations to their birthday parties six states over, offers to come to your home and “take care” of you while your wife was away. And if you were a six-foot-three Aussie thriller writer with some female readership, a few muscles, and blue eyes—invitations into their lives and their beds.

  But not on the phone.

  Not using your real name.

  Not in your home.

  Time to get prepared.

  That evening, Paige was still thinking about what Lily had said. Not about her chakras. She’d given up on those. The tea had been disgusting, so it seemed her crown chakra was destined to remain uncleansed. Or dirty. She liked the thought of dirty chakras. It sounded so sexually adventurous.

  Ha. As if.

  No, thinking about Lily’s problem, that was what she was doing. Maybe because it was their birthday, and the waiter had just brought out two micro-thin slices of vegan, gluten-free chocolate cake with a candle stuck in each, prompting the roomful of spa guests to sing “Happy Birthday” in the most embarrassing way possible. Lily smiled and thanked them, and Paige saw the shadow beneath the smile as if Lily’s soul were laid bare—because to her, it was.

  During Lily’s marriage, Paige had gotten jumbled, confused messages from her sister, because that was the way Lily’s thoughts had been—tangled like snakes, and just that deadly to her peace of mind. Now, her twin’s mind felt different. Anxious and unsettled, but clear. Paige said, “You can call me before and after, you know,” before taking another sip of champagne. Much better for chakra-clearing than tea. At least, she felt bubbly and light, and non-grumpy for the first time today. She was made for drinking and combat, not purity and enlightenment.

  Sounded badass, anyway.

  She realized after she said the “call before and after” thing that she’d plucked the topic out of nowhere, but Lily, of course, followed her fine. Lily lifted a raspberry off her slice of cake, looked at it on her dessert fork like she wasn’t sure how it had arrived there, and said, “I know. Maybe I will. But I’ll be OK. It’s fine.”

  Oh. Lily was embarrassed for saying something? Huh. Was Paige that judgmental? Probably. “Hey,” Paige said, “I call you too when I need you. Really—if you get desperate, go to the ladies’ room and call me during. Or better yet—email Whatshisname that the answer is no, so there’s no point in pursuing it. And then don’t go.”

  Lily didn’t say anything, and Paige looked past her sister and out the window, where a million twinkly lights swooped around trees set into pots, and beyond them, firepots danced with flame. There was a moonlight hike and astronomy session scheduled for after dinner, complete with Indian star legends. She drank some more champagne to fortify herself for the ordeal and thought—well, not about stars, and not about Lily, not exactly. She thought about paid administrative leave and surrendering her service weapon. About sitting on the couch, staring at the walls of her apartment, and waiting for the investigation to be over so she could go back. She thought about how Lily had always been the little spoon when they snuggled, because even though their bedroom had had two beds, the two of them had somehow always ended up sleeping together. And maybe she thought about all the times she hadn’t been there enough for her sister. How often she’d seen—had felt—that shadow fall and hadn’t pushed past it, hadn’t worked to dispel it, because she’d been caught up in her own life. Because she’d been busy.

  Maybe a vortex pulsed, or whatever vortexes did. They were either masculine or feminine, their guide had told them this morning on the hike. The masculine ones made you tougher. That wasn’t what was happening here, because Paige was already plenty tough. The feminine ones, though—they strengthened your giving side. The side, probably, whose aura was pink rather than brick-red. All Paige knew was, the champagne was sliding down her throat in all its tiny bubbles, tickling her nose, and she felt as relaxed and alert as if she’d—done whatever New Age-y thing made you relaxed
and alert. And she was saying, “You know what we should do? We should switch.”

  Lily still hadn’t eaten her raspberry. Instead, she’d dunked it into her champagne glass and taken her own sip. She looked at Paige from over the top of the flute, her brown eyes widening, then lowered her glass and said, “What?”

  “We should totally switch,” Paige insisted. She drained her glass, pulled the bottle out of the ice bucket, and emptied the contents into first Lily’s flute, then her own. “Here we are, thirty-one today. I’m at a turning point, maybe, and you’ve already turned. You need a break and I need a challenge.”

  “Are you sure that’s what you need?” Lily asked. “You’ve been challenged forever. You need a break at least as much as I do. You’re so… restless.”

  Paige waved her glass in the air. Maybe not as femininely-vortexed as she’d thought, or maybe just a little drunk, because she said, “Being you for a week or so isn’t a challenge. Telling off Mr. Bigbucks isn’t either. Showing powerful men they’ve underestimated me? That’s the kind of thing I live for.”

  “Except that you’d be telling him he’s underestimated me,” Lily said.

  “Same thing. Or—yeah, but—” Paige gave up trying to figure it out. “I’d be telling him, anyway. Telling the town. Taking the heat, and meanwhile, you’re doing whatever San Francisco things appeal to you, because you don’t really have to be me. I’m on leave. I’m free.”

  That was it. That was the ticket. “Free.” Not “at loose ends,” and definitely not something worse. “Free” sounded so much better.

  “You know,” Lily said, an unaccustomed dryness creeping into her tone, “there’s the shop.”

  “You’ve got sales help, right? Or you couldn’t be here. Heidi.”

  “Hailey.”

  “Whatever. And it’s the off-season. Skiing’s over and summer hasn’t started, and most people in town can’t afford your stuff. How hard could it be? When’s the… the meeting thing?”