Hero (Alpha Mountain 1)

“So, keeping these as souvenirs?”

I swallowed hard when Kennedy held up Indigo’s sports bra and panties, dangling from his fingers.

“Put those down,” I snarled before I had the wherewithal to dial back my reaction.

He grinned and set the white scraps swinging. Fuck. I’d just given him more fodder for his damned game.

“Most guys save the lingerie of the women they’ve already hooked up with not the ones they’re pining for.” He propped a hip against the counter. He was having way too much fucking fun.

Hayes clomped up the back steps and came into the kitchen, the screen door slapping shut behind his ass. His eyes widened at the dangling bra. “Who the hell got lucky?”

I pulled my Master Chief face—the one that said, I outrank you, buddy—and shook my head. “Not another fucking word.”

“What’s the deal? Are you going to hit that? If not, I am totally—”

I slapped the milk jug on the counter then reached out and snatched Indi’s underclothing out of Kennedy’s hands. “You’re not to go near her.” I pointed at him, then at Hayes, but the emphasis was lost with the items in my hands.

“What, are you playing big brother to her now?” Kennedy cocked a brow. I was the serious one, and he was the jokester. The playboy. We’d lived in tight quarters on base and worse on missions, but this kitchen was getting pretty fucking crowded with the three of us in it.

At the mention of Buck, my chest tightened.

“Big brother… now that’s a weird kink, but if you get a woman out of a bra like that, it might be a—”

“Fuck off, Hayes,” I snapped. “Where the hell is Gram?”

“We dropped her car off with Landers, but she got a text and had plans for coffee. That woman’s social calendar makes us look like hermits.”

That was true. My grandmother knew everyone in town. Knew all their secrets, too. She was involved in every program from church to the senior program to T-ball fundraiser. She was rarely home, and if she was, she was flitting about with the continuous hopes of firing the weapons we had stored in the bunkhouse.

She could wheedle someone into doing anything, but the four of us had held our ground where my octogenarian grandmother and firearms were concerned.

“So I took her to the Seed n’ Feed and dropped her off.”

The place was run by Holly Martin. It’d been in her family—like most businesses in Sparks—for generations. What Holly had done, though, was push the envelope of what a seed and feed sold. She’d turned the old grain office into a coffee shop, so now she served more scones than salt licks. When I worked there when I was sixteen, it’d been a completely different place.

“Said she’d get a ride home later and that she wasn’t missing Kennedy’s pot roast for anything. Back to the babe with the bra. Was she any good? Does she have sisters?”

I glared.

He held up his hands as if I would kill him with my eyes. Or with my left pinkie, which I could, and he knew it. While Hayes didn’t have the same easy charm that Kennedy wore like a second outfit, he was no slouch when it came to women. Dimples creased his darker skin, and his dark brown hair had grown out wavy. He wasn’t as tall as Kennedy, but he had a broad chest and could bench press twice his weight.

“I’ll get the story eventually,” he said.

We were like a bunch of sorority sisters in this place, in each other’s business. That was fine and all when he talked about the woman he’d banged at the bar last month, but this was Indi.

Indi. That reminded me I was pissed at Kennedy, so I turned all my anger back his way.

“Buck’s last words to me were about taking care of Indi. There’s no way in hell I’m letting a douche like you—”

“Buck’s last words were about Indi?” Kennedy cut in, frowning. He went to the crockpot, took off the lid, and used a spoon that was on the counter beside it to stir the cubed potatoes. “You never told me that.”

“That’s Buck’s sister’s bra?” Hayes asked, his tone now filled with surprise and his hands still up, this time showing he was definitely going to be hands-off now. “Whoa.”

I ignored him.

We hadn’t been on a mission when he’d died. I’d followed him off base, having his six—or having his back—like a friend and leader should.

Hayes went to the fridge and leaned in to see what was in there.

“Skip the milk,” Kennedy advised.

Hayes grabbed the pitcher of sweet tea Gram always had on hand and pulled a glass from the cabinet.

I put my hands on my hips and watched my friend. “Why would I?” I was referring to telling Kennedy what Buck’s last words were. “It’s hardly relevant.”