My smile slipped. My heart pounded. My happiness… gone. My cock stand… gone.
CARVER CITY BANK IS NEXT. Noon today.
I’m sorry.
“FUCK!” I shouted.
“What?” Charlie asked. I stuck my arm out and he grabbed the note from me. Read it. “I… I don’t understand.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “She’s one of them.” My voice was as flat as the pancakes I’d hoped to have for breakfast.
“One of them?” He looked from the note to me. “You mean one of the Grove gang? No one ever mentioned a woman being among them.”
I shrugged, paced the room. “She didn’t dress like a woman until last night.”
His eyes flared wide, then narrowed when he finally understood. Had Grace always been part of the gang who’d robbed and murdered, taken for a man?
“She shot two of her cohorts to get the money for herself. Maybe?” He ran a hand through his hair as he considered. “Fuck, she clearly had issues with men. She snarled and hissed like a feral cat until we petted that pussy.”
“No one had been there before us,” I stated, remembering how she’d responded the very first time by the creek.
“So she, what? Hates the Grove men enough to shoot them?”
“She didn’t kill them, just left them for us,” I reminded. “She didn’t think we’d follow her, instead assumed we’d drag their sorry asses to jail.”
“We definitely surprised her at that shanty. But we offered her the perfect scenario.” His gaze met mine. Stated the plain truth. “Married to a fucking sheriff.”
She was legally married to Charlie, but in Bridgewater, there was no difference. She was my wife, too, and I’d proved that to her all last night.
“An outlaw who marries a lawman.” I shook my head, still stunned, still fucking pissed. I felt used. Cheated. Robbed, and not of money. Worse. “I said the vows, I fucked her. I took her virginity, felt that barrier break for my cock. My cum’s still inside her, wherever the hell she is.”
“Carver City, obviously,” he snapped, waving the note in the air. “She’s going to rob the bank.”
“Why tell us then?” I wondered.
He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter if she gets caught or not. You’re her husband. It’s not like you’re going to let her hang.”
I wanted justice. I’d lived for nothing but since my father had been killed. She was one of them, one of the gang who shot him. Had she been the one to pull the trigger? She should hang. Fuck! I couldn’t do it. There was no way I could see that happen.
I stormed outside, let the door slam against the house, set my hands on my hips. I took in the open prairie, the peace, completely at odds to how I felt inside.
“She not only stole from the bank, she stole my fucking dream,” he said from behind me. “I wanted a wife, a family and she took that from me. Used it. Hell, she could be pregnant right now an
d what’s going to happen? She’ll hang along with Marcus and Travis Grove.”
I never thought about a baby. After the night before, it was a strong possibility. Fuck. I turned to him. “I won’t let that happen.”
“What, keep her alive long enough to learn if she’s with child? And if not, hang her?”
I dropped my head, stared at my bare feet. “I don’t know. Fuck, I don’t know. The only thing we do know about Grace right now is that she wants us to stop the bank robbery in Carver City. That’s what we’ll do.”
And everything else, what we shared last night, how she responded, how she’d begged for more of our cocks… it was all a lie. Except her virginity. She hadn’t faked that. Perhaps she’d saved that for just the right man. A man with a badge who could save her neck and a big cock to make her scream.
GRACE
SNEAKING out and leaving Charlie and Hank was the hardest thing I’d ever done. Last night had been perfect. Wild and untamed, gentle and cherishing. I’d felt special, the center of their world. Their everything. I’d given them everything in return.
And I would give even more to see them safe. They’d hate me. By now, they’d have found the note I’d left, know who I really was. Perhaps not my name, but that I was all wrong for them. That I was irredeemable.