Bounty (Colorado Mountain 7)

That was Deke. Even in ways I didn’t consider, he did and he looked out for me.

So I settled in beside my fire pit that Deke gave me, put my feet up on the edge so the pit toasted the bottoms of my cowboy boots, and I texted my designer that she could send the stuff for the study whenever she was ready.

Then I did what I’d been meaning to do for a couple of days.

I called Joss.

Surprisingly, since my mom was always busy, she answered on the first ring.

And she answered with, “Good timing. I’m at a photoshoot with Kenzie Elise, a woman who’s decided to embrace the nonexistent rock chick within in the hopes of reinventing herself…again. A woman who also works my last nerve. And her manager gives me the serious creeps. So I’m not looking forward to today but I am looking forward to telling her she’s gotta wait while I take an important call from my daughter seeing as it’s high time you share with me all your Chain Link’s talents.”

Hearing her words I knew that I shouldn’t have waited this long to call Joss. Like any mom or best friend (and she was both), juicy news like me hooking up with Deke wasn’t something she’d be hip on waiting for.

And by the by, Kenzie Elise was an actress. Reportedly a difficult one to work with on all levels. Not Joss’s usual client. She did musicians, mostly, not actors. But if someone was going to pay her, Joss didn’t tend to turn any gig down.

We could just say she’d made shopping her living for a reason.

“You do know I’m not gonna go into detail about that,” I shared.

“How ’bout you going into detail about how one second, the dude didn’t know you and the next, he’s so close to you when you’re on the phone, I hear his voice like it’s him on the phone?” Joss only semi-suggested since mostly she was demanding that I go into detail.

“It’s a long story,” I told her.

“The more I can make Kenzie wait, the happier I’ll be. So spill,” she told me.

I looked from the fire, turning my head to stare into the trees.

I had until April there. If Deke and I kept going as strong as we were (and stronger), when the weather turned, I’d be on the back of his bike.

That gave me a happy shiver and while having that I thought I had plenty of space at my place to park his Airstream.

Then again, if we parked his trailer here, we wouldn’t have the lake.

I needed to give Deke his time at the lake.

“Justice!” Joss snapped, bringing my attention back to her.

“He likes me,” I said softly, not able to stop my lips from curling up while saying it.

“You’re likable,” Joss replied. “Then again, you were probably likable the first second he clapped eyes on you again and didn’t remember you.”

“Well, uh…there came a point when he remembered me,” I shared. “This point being before my drama with Anca’s psycho.”

“Let me guess, this was around the time you hit social media kicking the shit out of Ronstadt.”

I blinked at the view before I turned my head again to not quite focus on my knees.

“What?” I asked.

Joss didn’t say anything for a few beats before I actually heard her sigh over the phone.

Even though I heard that, she still didn’t say anything.

So I repeated my, “What?”

“Baby, you sure this guy didn’t remember you?”

I straightened in the chair at what she was insinuating and again asked, “What?”

“You know,” she said gently and carefully, “there are those who can play the long game.”

At that, mildly ticked, reminding myself that Joss had not yet met Deke so she didn’t know what the hell she was talking about, I took my feet from the side of the pit and put them to the deck.

I leaned forward and put my elbow to my leg as I hissed, “That’s not Deke.”

“I hear you’re pissed, Jussy, but I’m your mother. I worry. I have not met this guy. And you sound…” She paused before she went on, “I don’t know how you sound because I’ve never heard you sound this way before.”

This was because I’d never been in the throes of falling in love with a mountain man before.

Or any man, mountain or not.

I didn’t tell her that.

“You think I can’t spot a player?” I asked.

“I think he’s ‘Chain Link,’” she answered.

“As you know, he is ‘Chain Link,’” I returned.

“And I think if he knows he’s ‘Chain Link’…”

She let that lie.

I did not.

“Joss, he’s…” I shook my head and sat back, lifting my feet to the edge of the pit again, forcing myself to stay calm. “If you met him, you wouldn’t say this kind of thing. He’s not that guy.”

“There are a lot of those guys out there, baby girl,” she reminded me cautiously. “And they’re all real good at making you think they’re not that guy.”

“Yes, and Deke’s not one of them,” I told her firmly.

“What does he do?” she asked. “Who is he? Because I know what you do. I know who you are. I know what you have. And some dude who works construction who knows that too can—”

I cut her off, informing her, “When Mr. T introduced himself to Deke, he did it as Bill.”

“Holy fuck,” Joss breathed.

Yeah, she knew how big that was.

“Unh-hunh,” I mumbled. “And when Deke rolled up to my house the morning I got attacked, he saw the police cars and drove right back into town, right to the police station. And I don’t know if they told him he couldn’t see me or what. All I know was that I was talking to the detective and then I heard Deke shouting. Shouting for me. He was out of his mind with worry, Joss. The way you would be. The way Dad would be. The way Lace would be. I didn’t recognize it when I ran out to get to him because I was out of my mind about something else. But I’ve looked back and he was out of his mind with worry. About me.”