Bounty (Colorado Mountain 7)

“Wasted good money on a goddamn plane ticket and rental car,” he muttered, burning an angry glance his sister’s way and looking like he was about to stalk off.

“You don’t know,” Joss began, and Maverick jerked his pissed-off eyes her way, “that mere weeks ago, an intruder broke into this home, kicked the shit out of your sister and nearly strangled her to death.”

The vibe on the deck instantly shifted. Tense still, absolutely. High alert as well.

And tweaked.

“What?” Maverick asked.

“Joss,” Justice said low.

“He did,” Joss confirmed casually, eyes locked on the kid. “The man is no longer a threat but not far from where you’re standing, Jussy nearly lost her life to a maniac.”

“That isn’t even funny,” Maverick bit out.

“No,” Joss said, dead calm, dead serious, her gaze flint. “It isn’t.”

Maverick took her in long beats before he slowly turned his gaze to Jussy.

“Did that really happen?” he asked.

“Yes, Mav, but—”

Deke prepared to move when he watched the kid’s entire body wind up before he roared, “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”

Deke got closer to his woman, doing it stepping slightly in front of her.

When he did, Maverick’s eyes slashed up to him, he took a step back and then he jerked his head so he was looking over his shoulder at the people in Jussy’s yard, keeping watch over his sister.

The fullness of the situation he couldn’t totally understand because he didn’t have the information dawned and Deke watched the color drain from his face.

“She didn’t tell you because you’d hurt her so badly, she didn’t feel you had that right,” Joss announced.

“Dammit, Joss—” Jussy tried.

But Joss kept talking.

“Mostly, that was her excuse for not telling you because, first, it’d freak you out and she’s your big sister, she wouldn’t want to do that to you. Second, because that would open the door to more of you and your mother’s shit and she’d nearly lost her life, she didn’t need to deal with that.”

“That can’t be why you—” Maverick began, eyes to Jussy.

Joss spoke over him and he looked back to her.

“My point in telling you this is, in all you’re missing in all that’s happening, in all you’ve missed for as long as you’ve been alive, when you lost your father, you missed learning a very valuable lesson. The people you love will not be around forever. They won’t be there to catch you when you fall. They won’t be there to listen to your shit when you have to unload it. They won’t be there to laugh with you or give you hell or help out when you need it. So you spend every goddamned second on this earth treating the people you love with the respect and affection they deserve. Because if you lose time with them because you didn’t offer them that, the only person you’ll have to blame, should something happen to anyone else you care about, will be yourself. I sense this will be lost on you as it seems it already has. But it bears saying anyway. I miss your father even if he wasn’t in my life any longer. He meant a lot to me. But months later, I nearly lost my fucking daughter, and I’d already learned that lesson. But I learned it again, fuck yeah. And I’ll never forget.”

“Joss,” Jussy whispered.

Joss turned fierce eyes to her daughter. “Tore me up not to be with you. But Rod says you’re me with longer hair and a few less years. And if I told you what I needed to deal and you went against that, I’d lose my mind. He knows me. He knows you. And he was right. He said I had to do what I’d want you to do. Do what I told you to do. So I did that.” She drew in an audibly harsh breath. “It still tore me up.”

“I was taken care of,” Jussy replied.

Joss’s eyes flicked to Deke before they went back to her girl and she returned, “I’m seeing that.”

“Jussy, who did this shit?” Maverick demanded to know. “And where are they? Did the cops catch him? What the fuck?”

“It’s taken care of, Mav.”

“What the fuck?” he repeated.

“It’s over. I’m healed. Breathing. Safe. It’s all good.”

“What the fuck?” he repeated, his last word emphasized at the same time it broke.

Deke went still.

Jussy shifted closer into his side.

“What the fuck?” Maverick whispered. “You didn’t call me? Some fuckwad strangled my sister and you didn’t call me?”

His gypsy pulled at his hand, Deke let her go, and then she was gone. To her brother. In his space. Both her hands to either side of his head, pulling it down so his forehead was to hers.

“Breathe, baby brother, look at me. I’m right here.”

“I miss Dad,” he said suddenly, his voice hoarse.

“I do too, Mav,” Jussy replied, her voice husky.

“I miss you,” he kept at her.

“Me too, Maverick,” she whispered, pulling him into her arms. “I missed you too, brother.”

“You got hurt and you didn’t call me,” he said on a croak.

“I’m seeing I probably should have done that,” she kept whispering.

He shoved his face in her neck, Deke saw his shoulders heave and he looked to Rembrandt.

The man gave him a chin lift, pulled himself out of the chair, and with a tug on her hand, pulled his wife to the back door.

Deke followed them and with a look to tell Chace he was off duty, he took Chace’s place, leaning against the counter, arms crossed on his chest, eyes out the glass watching Jussy with her brother.