Cowboy frowned, and then everyone in the room laughed. Everyone, that was, except Colleen, who stood watching him with her face set in a neutral mask.

  Fig rolled out a desk chair and stopped in front of him. “In case you need to rest your old bones.”

  The women seemed to be really enjoying the moment, and it struck him that they were all sneaking glances at Colleen. What the hell was going on?

  “Maybe I should cut the cake, seeing as how he’s a little weak right now,” Laura said with a sly wink.

  Just what the hell had she been saying about him?

  Fig patted the seat. “Come on, Cowboy. Let’s go for a ride.”

  Chuckles filled the room, and he felt his face begin to heat. “I don’t need to be wheeled around. I can walk just fine, thank you very much.”

  “Good to hear,” Cage said. “You almost ready to come back to work?”

  Cowboy blinked. He’d thought he’d have a few more days to rest up and heal, but now, he wondered if his job would be on the line if he didn’t get back sooner.

  “Got a new hunter coming on board,” Cage said. “If you feel like you’re not ready, I can partner him with Chase to get him trained up.”

  Cowboy glanced around the room but didn’t see any new faces.

  “All kinds of new hires,” Elaine said, then sipped her soda.

  Cowboy blew out a breath that filled his cheeks. “I’m thinkin’ I can come back in tomorrow. I can manage some surveillance, cold calls, but I might not be up to chasin’ anyone anytime soon,” he said, frowning.

  “Good to hear,” Cage said. Then he waved at Cowboy. “Come on around the counter. We all don’t have to stand around.”

  Cowboy walked slowly around the counter and into the bullpen.

  The desks had been rearranged. Fig’s large corner desk was still in its place, but there was another desk with a shiny new brass nameplate, just behind the counter, and it read, “Colleen Bradley.”

  Cowboy shot a glance at Colleen, who was chewing on her bottom lip. “You’re working here?”

  The room went silent.

  She nodded and moved toward him. “I started while you were out hunting Sidney Coleman. Fig’s been training me to help her with the admin—not the payroll,” she said wrinkling her nose. “But I take calls, make cold calls, answer the phone. She’s been teaching me how to do background checks, and the like, to free her up for more operational duties.”

  Cowboy felt a smile slowly stretch his mouth. “Sure this job is something you’ll like?”

  Her eyes widened. “Are you kidding? I get to talk to targets’ grandmas and cousins. I get to look them up in their high school yearbooks and figure out who their friends are. Do you know people actually like talking to me on the phone, and have no idea I’m tracking down their scumbag brothers or sons?”

  Cowboy shook his head. “Bet they tell you everything.”

  Fig laughed. “She’s got a gift. They think they’re talking to an old girlfriend who’s left a bad marriage, and they’re eager to set her up with their sons.”

  He laughed. “I’m happy for you.”

  She chewed on her lower lip. “Are you sure? I mean, if we don’t work out, you’ll still have to see me every day.”

  Cowboy read the doubt in her eyes and realized she’d been worried about his reaction—and for the wrong reasons. He walked toward her and reached out for her hand. “Seeing you at your desk will be the second happiest part of my day.”

  “What will be the first?” Rhonda asked loudly.

  “Waking up next to her. What’d you think it would be?” he said, arching an eyebrow at the woman. “So, who’s cutting the cake?” he asked, “Seein’ as how I’m all decrepit and can’t hold a knife.”

  Laughter followed as everyone helped themselves to a slice of red velvet cake with pink buttercream frosting and the words, Welcome Back, Cowboy, drawn across it.

  He sat in the rolling chair next to Colleen’s desk.

  “Looks right,” he said, looking at her sitting at her desk. She’d already decorated her space with an African violet, a flowered desk pad, and a pretty coffee cup filled with multicolored pens.

  “I wanted to surprise you when you got back, but…”

  “But I had the audacity to go and get shot.”

  She nodded.

  “Was I a bear to deal with?”

  “At times. But I understood. The girls,” she said, tilting her head toward Elaine, Rhonda, and Laura, who sat close together and were watching them closely, “warned me what to expect. Said their men are…a handful, when they’re not feeling good.”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “No need to apologize,” she said softly. “I know you’d do the same for me.”

  “I would,” he said. “Although, you’re never going to do field work.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Fig said she’d train me to man the ops van. Said it wasn’t a good idea to be one person deep on any job.”

  Cowboy shot a glance at Fig, who waggled her eyebrows and smiled back at him. He’d have a talk with her some other time.

  “I like this job. I like these people,” she said softly.

  Cowboy realized she’d been looking for connection throughout her multi-storied work history, and she’d finally found it. “I support you,” he said, although the thought of her ever being in danger made his belly tight. “You be you, Colleen.”

  Her smile was all the reward he needed for his generous words.

  Chapter 11

  For Cowboy, his recovery felt as though it had taken forever. But here he was now, running around the track of the Stallions high school football field on a bitterly cold winter day. Snow was piled up on either side, but the track was clear. He wore long johns under his track suit, mittens on his hands, and a beanie on his head. The woman he loved was standing on the sideline holding a stopwatch, shouting at him like a drill instructor to get his “flabby ass around the track one more time.”

  Flabby ass? He’d show her. Actually, he had earlier that morning. Her fingernails had dug deep and sharp into his skin, and she’d seemed pretty happy with the present level of his “fitness”. No more painful twinges. He could draw a deep breath without wincing. His scar was a healthy pink and fully healed.

  He’d been back at work, fulltime in the field, for a month now.

  Life was going well. He and Colleen had already started house hunting during their free time, although his idea of the perfect home was a far cry from hers.

  She tended to see everything through rose-colored glasses. A rickety porch just needed a little TLC, and, “Can’t you just see a porch swing hanging there?” Everything she looked at needed to be gutted, repainted, or just plain torched, while he was hoping to move into something actually livable from day one.

  Ten acres of hilly woodland was “so pretty to look at from the back door,” but he wanted usable flatland to raise a couple of horses and a steer or two.

  But there were moments of compromise. “I’d like to have chickens, too,” she’d said yesterday. “If I can have goats.”

  He’d made a face but laughingly agreed.

  Making the last turn around the track, he kicked up his speed, stretching out his stride. He felt good, whole. Back to his old self, if not a little better. Because he was happier.

  The reason was the woman still shouting for him to “get the lead out!”

  Running past her, he slowed, and then made a little circle and jogged back to her.

  “Two minutes better than the last time,” she said, showing him the face of the watch.

  He picked her up and whirled around and around.

  She shrieked. “If you rupture your gut, I’m not going to be the one taking you to the hospital.”

  When he set her on her feet, he reached around and placed his hands on her ass to bring her against his body. “See? No rupture. I’m back, baby.”

  She tilted her head downward and glanced up at him through her eyelashes. “We really ought to head into work.”

  He gave her butt a slap and leaned down to kiss her. “I’ll have to shower first. And someone needs to dry my back.”

  “You’ll be drying mine—on the sheets again.” She laughed, reaching around to cup his butt. “Good thing you’ve been tipping housekeeping.”

  “It’s worth it. Beat you to the car,” he said, dropping his hands and stepping back.

  She turned and jogged, rolling down the waistline of her joggers to show him the tops of her buttocks. Yeah, she won that race.

  * * *

  Colleen could barely contain her excitement. She was on an actual hunt. Or at least a stakeout with Chase and Cowboy. Sure, she was sitting in the backseat with chains soldered into the floorboard to hold manacled prisoners, but she could hear and see all the action.

  Mostly, the guys were doing a bunch of chitchatting. Talking smack about Marti and Hardman, who’d been caught by Cage doing it in their SUV while on their own stakeout.

  “Cage say what he said to them?” Cowboy asked Chase, who’d gotten the scoop from Rhonda, who’d heard about it from Elaine.

  Colleen had actually heard the story before the guys, but she wasn’t about to let them know that “the girls” had a better comm network than they did.

  Still, not able to help herself, she leaned between the two seats. “Cage knocked on the window and asked them if their radios were working—calm as can be. And there was Marti, her pants on the floorboard, straddling Hardman.

  “Hardman was so embarrassed, he couldn’t get a word out, but Marti said, ‘I was planning to answer your call the second I came.’”

  Chase snickered. “What’d Cage say to that?”

  “He couldn’t look at them. Kept clearing his throat. Then he said, ‘Well, I’ll let you two get back to…whatever it is you’re doing.’ Only, he gave Hardman a stare that had him shoving Marti off his dick and into her seat a little too soon because Cage heard her holler.”

  Chase slapped his thigh and laughed.

  Cowboy glanced out the windshield. “That’s Logan, coming out.”

  The three of them trained their gazes on the man leaving his girlfriend’s mother’s house.

  “Who goes on the lam and hides out at his girl’s mom’s house?” Colleen asked, feeling a little disgusted at their perp’s lack of manners.

  When Logan moved toward the Jeep parked on the side of the street, Chase punched the ignition.

  “Make sure we park well in front of him,” Cowboy said, glancing back at Colleen.

  It was obvious he was being super-cautious because she was in the vehicle.

  “And just how are we supposed to block him in?” Chase asked.

  Colleen aimed a glare at Cowboy. “You’re gonna let him get away because I’m in the car?”

  Chase shook his head and slowly pulled away from the curb, like they were on a Sunday drive. Before they pulled up alongside the Jeep, Colleen leaned around Cowboy’s seat and gave him a big kiss, while she kept her eyes trained on Logan, who was glancing their way.

  “Only thing he saw was someone making out in the front seat,” she whispered when they passed.

  “Baby girl,” Chase said. “Stay in the car.” He turned the wheel and parked sideways in front of Logan’s vehicle.

  Cowboy cursed and exited the vehicle at the same time Chase did. As she watched through the windows, the men drew their weapons and approached Logan’s Jeep.

  “Fugitive Recovery Agents!” Chase shouted.

  “Put your hands on the steering wheel where I can see them,” Cowboy said.

  As she watched, Logan looked from Cowboy to Chase then narrowed his eyes. No way was he going to surrender.

  She crawled over the console separating the seats and slid behind the wheel of Chase’s SUV. Gripping the steering wheel, she executed a three-point turn and hit the gas.

  Logan’s Jeep was backing up, so she aimed at a spot behind him and cut him off at an angle. He could hit the SUV or drive forward and aim for the two men running toward his vehicle.

  Thankfully, Logan had two braincells left in his meth-soaked brain. He raised his hands and stuck them out his window.

  As Cowboy cuffed his extended hands, he turned to give her a blistering glare.

  Colleen was too giddy to be worried. She’d stopped the bad guy from getting away.

  * * *

  Cowboy sat drumming his fingers on the conference room table as Chase regaled the hunters with Colleen’s maneuver.

  “Girl’s got good instincts.”

  Colleen was grinning, and her cheeks were still red from the high fives Marti and Fig had given her.

  Hardman sat shaking his head. “That’s how it starts, man,” he said to Cowboy. “It gets in the blood, and there’s no stomping on the brakes.”

  “What does that even mean?” Cowboy muttered.

  “She’s got the bug. She wants to be a hunter.”

  “Do you think I can do it?” Colleen asked, all wide-eyed.

  Marti shrugged. “Maybe not in the same vein as the hunters here, but you’ve watched Lacey’s videos. She’s not hardcore, but she uses her smarts and sex appeal to get the drop on targets.”

  “Sex appeal?” Colleen said, and her smile dimmed.

  “Think you don’t have plenty?” Cowboy asked, and then wondered why he was encouraging her.

  “Yeah, the way you planted one on Cowboy when Logan was giving us the side-eye—you totally owned him,” Chase said.

  Fig cleared her throat. “We could send her up to Lacey for some training.”

  “Like hell,” Cowboy said.

  Cage gave Cowboy a look then turned to study Colleen, who squirmed a little in her chair. “Wouldn’t hurt to have someone with what Lacey calls, ‘soft skills.’ We go into a bar looking for a lowlife and everyone goes on alert. Someone like Colleen goes in, and she distracts them. They let their guards down.”

  “They tell her their secrets,” Chase said, nodding. “And we both know the girl can talk.”

  Colleen looked so hopeful, her excitement was impossible to subdue.

  Cowboy wrestled with his need to keep her safe and his duty to make sure he didn’t stand in the way of her living her life. “Maybe we can talk Lacey into coming down here.”

  Chase groaned. “The woman will be all up in our business.”

  Marti scowled. “The women will enjoy having her around.”

  Chase rolled his eyes. “You know she’s gonna be talkin’ about the show and how we can pump up the action.”

  “She’ll probably want Colleen to be featured—you know, to add interest for the male viewers,” Fig said.

  Cowboy shook his head.

  Colleen’s eyebrows shot up. “Cameras add ten pounds. Or is it twenty?”

  Chase gave her a pointed look. “Girl, you are damn beautiful. A savory mouthful. Don’t matter what your inches say, men look!”

  As her boyfriend, Cowboy wasn’t sure he appreciated his partner’s appreciation of his woman.

  “I’m telling Rhonda you said that,” Marti said, grinning.

  “Rhonda knows I have a thing for Colleen’s ass.”

  Cowboy turned his chair to face Chase.

  Chase held up a hand. “Man, you know she’s fine.”

  Colleen began to giggle. “I guess my Spanx might come into good use.”

  Cage cleared his throat. “So, we’re agreed. We’ll add some field training for Colleen. Cowboy, you can take her to the firing range to get her qualified.”

  Cowboy grimaced but gave his boss a nod.

  “Hardman and Marti, you can work with Colleen on some basic self-defense moves. She doesn’t have to be able to take a target down, but she needs some moves in case she ever gets into a situation. And it doesn’t hurt for a woman to be able to fight off a kamikaze shopper trying to land the same Pioneer Woman fry pan on Black Friday.”

  “That was pretty specific,” Fig murmured.

  Chase laughed. “That was Rhonda. She must have told Elaine.”

  “In the meantime,” Cage said, looking around the table. “We’re building a good team here. We all have our talents.”

  “Heard something about a new hunter,” Hardman said.

  Cage nodded. “Yeah, another ex-SEAL.”

  Cowboy perked up. “Anyone I know?”

  “Not sure. He may have left the teams before you were there. Eli Pope.”

  Cowboy’s eyebrows rose. He’d heard of the man. He was damn near a legend among the SEALs. “We need a sniper?”

  Cage cleared his throat. “Lately, he’s been working as a tracker.”

  “Who works as a tracker?” Chase asked. “He with the police?”

  “No. Freelancing. He likes to be on his own.”

  “Then why’s he joining our crew?” Marti asked.

  Cage shrugged. “He doesn’t trust many people.”

  “But he trusts you,” Cowboy said.

  “He does.”

  “And I thought this place was interesting enough,” Chase said.

  Colleen sat so quietly that Cowboy knew a million thoughts were bouncing around inside her head. He liked it when she was excited, but boy, was he going to get a million questions when they were alone tonight.

  Cage pointed at Cowboy. “Elaine’s friend Ethan Palmer, the realtor, says he has a place for you to check out. She said she thinks it might check all the boxes.”

  Colleen and Cowboy shared a glance.

  “I’ll call her for the address,” Colleen said. “See if I can set up an appointment for us to see it.”

  Yeah, life was going well, but the pace was about to pick up.

  Chapter 12

  To Cowboy’s dismay, Collen shot the same way she drove. Whatever she was looking at was where the weapon pointed.

  “Sweetheart,” he said, gritting his teeth as he reached out and gently placed his hand on top of her gun and moved it to point downrange toward the target. “Don’t ever point at something you don’t intend to kill.”

  “Right,” she said and moved her earmuff back over her left ear.

  Raising his voice so she could hear him, he said, “Now, remember to look down your sights—”