Alpha Mountain Boxed Set: Books 1 - 3

Chapter 2

2

FORD

I put the safety back on the M9 I’d palmed when the security system alerted us that someone had breached the fence at the property line and tucked the weapon in the waistband of my pants. This time when the sensor went off, it hadn’t been a deer jumping the fence. Or a bear.

No, it was Indigo “Indi” Buchanan.

I debated if I’d rather wrestle a bear than this woman. f**k, no. I wanted to roll around with her. Too much. She’d have claws, and I kind of hoped she bit, just a little. At least that was my d**k talking.

I tried—f**k, I tried—not to look below her waist. I couldn’t, shouldn’t, drink in the sight of those long, toned legs. The bare skin that…

No.

Nope.

Fuck—not going to look.

Not going to even think about checking out what color, cut, and style of panties she wore. Not when I remembered all too well what she looked like out of them.

In my bed.

Indi.

The woman who haunted my dreams. Who taunted me still, even though this was the first time I’d seen her since she was eighteen—except across the church at Buck’s memorial service. All those years ago, Buck and I had been on leave. The summer she’d graduated high school. The night she’d left her bra dangling as an invitation and climbed naked in my bed with the intention of letting me punch her V card. The night Buck had found us thirty seconds after I’d covered my eyes and told her to get out. He’d wanted to hand me my balls for breakfast.

Now? She wasn’t for me even though she was no longer jailbait. She never had been, and she never would be, no matter how f*****g gorgeous she was. She was my dead best friend’s little f*****g sister. Off-limits.

I’d promised Buck I hadn’t and wouldn’t touch her. It had been because of the bro code before that night, then after, Buck explicitly told me to stay the f**k away from her. No screwing around with younger sisters.

Even if they weren’t young or little any longer. Hell, she was… I did the math…twenty-seven and standing half-naked and dripping wet in the old greenhouse we’d converted into a gym.

Indi’s eyes flashed, teeth clenched tight. Besides wet, her skin appeared wind-chapped, but there was no mistaking the additional flush crawling down her neck.

Clenching my fists, I avoided reaching out and wiping away the rain dripping down her cheeks. Back then and even now, one touch, and I knew I’d be f*****g ruined. Because her skin would be silky soft against my calloused palms. Sweet beneath my lips. She was spirited and wild, and I knew her passion would have no depths. I’d drown in her.

I would not break a promise to the man who’d bled out in my arms. The man whose death—and actions leading up to it—I was investigating and intended to solve, even if it catapulted me to my own early grave.

It was clear she wasn’t here bent on seduction. Sure, seeing her like this was sexy as hell, but there was no peekaboo lace or sultry looks. No lacy bras in my grasp. She looked like a dunked cat. A gorgeous, perfect dripping cat.

Fuck, now I thought about her p***y. How it might be dripping. I growled.

“Ford Ledger. Still an ass, I see,” she shot back, tipping up her chin and glaring.

I deserved it, and not just for my unnecessary taunt. If I’d had any honor left at all, I’d have gone to the Buchanan house in town or even their hardware store every week to see what I could do to help Buck’s parents. To try to ease their pain and grief over their dead son. But they hadn’t wanted to see me—too painful, his mother had said at the funeral—and I couldn’t face them again, either. What could I say besides their son’s death was my fault. Buck had gotten into something and hadn’t confided in me. Hell, he’d been accused of buying drugs and murdering Abdul Tareen, a local Afghan law enforcement officer looking into the case a few weeks before his death. It wasn’t f*****g possible. I knew Buck, and he wouldn’t do that.

Still, he’d been involved in something. And I had been his Master Chief and should’ve known what the f**k had been going on with him. Protected him from the s**t he’d gotten into—whatever it was.

No, I couldn’t face any of the Buchanans until I figured out who killed Buck and why. The day he’d died, he’d left the US base without authorization. Yes, he’d gone to meet someone in the village—I didn’t know who. Knowing Buck, there had been a damn good reason. One that got him killed. I intended to figure out who was behind it all.

I took a few steps forward. Not because I wanted to be closer to Indi. Hell, no.

Because I wanted a better look at her face while I questioned her. Not that she required interrogating. She wasn’t on some kind of mission to destroy me. No, it was pretty obvious what happened here.

“Got caught in the storm?” I asked. I was soaked too just from the sprint from the house, but my clothes were staying the f**k on.

She shoved her wet honey-colored hair out of her face and c****d a hip like she was ready to stand her ground with me. In just a shirt.

Which was cute. Damn cute. I was a f*****g SEAL. Former f*****g SEAL. I did s**t for exercise that would kill a regular guy. And she was a tiny slip of a woman in comparison. If she kicked my shin, I wouldn’t even feel it. Although the way she was looking at me, I expected her to aim a little higher.

“Sure did.” She said it like a challenge, lifting her chin at a haughty angle. That cockiness had my d**k going rock hard.

I was still having a helluva time not looking down at those legs. Especially with the way she stuck one out at an angle toward me.

“So you decided to break into my greenhouse.”

She shrugged as she glanced around, taking in all the exercise equipment. “Shelter’s shelter,” she explained as if I didn’t know a thing or two about survival skills.

I c****d an eyebrow and crossed my arms over my chest. My t-shirt was damp against my forearms. “Rather than try the house?”

She rolled her eyes like a brat. “Can you blame me? You’re not exactly the welcome wagon.”

Now I was offended. “You think I’d turn Buck’s little sister away in a storm?” I asked incredulously.

She flinched at the mention of her brother—and probably the fact that I’d done just that once before—and I immediately regretted it, but then I was distracted by something else.

Her t**s.

They were covered—completely covered—but her n*****s still poked through the thin material. They were stiff and erect under her Sparks Outdoor Adventure company t-shirt. Even after all this time, I remembered how pink those tips were, how they were upturned and… f**k, lickable. Even though I hadn’t gotten close enough to do any licking.

They were like that now, probably from the cold. Or the rain. Except, wouldn’t I have noticed them right away? No, it seemed like they’d gotten stiff talking to me, which, unfortunately, made me harder.

Buck’s sister, I reminded myself. She was Buck’s sister. f**k.

“Jesus, I’m not just Buck’s little sister.” She raised her hands and made air quotes to go along with the sass. “I’m my own woman, Ford. I was then. I am now. How did you even know I was in here?” She turned the convo back to me.

I’d been out of the military and back in Montana for less than a year. One of the first things I'd done to the place when I returned was to set up top-notch security. I didn’t f*****g trust anyone. Especially not the US government who was supposed to have my back. The only people I trusted were my grandparents—and Gramps had been gone for two years now—and my team.

I’d called in Kennedy, Alpha Team 5 expert data analyst, who’d left the service right after I had. After the s**t that went down, he’d chosen not to reup. Instead, he’d showed up in a f*****g snowstorm and gotten to work, putting up sensors to let us know of anything over four feet tall—keeping the alarms from pinging with every wild animal—crossed onto the land or was moving about. Every inch of the Ledger land was monitored. The compound the men and I were building was like a fortress with impenetrable, invisible walls.

Gram had welcomed me back with open arms, regardless of the military’s reason for kicking me out. She’d also welcomed Kennedy, Hayes and Taft. Said it had been boring around here and was having fun watching us set up my new venture: Alpha Mountain Security.

“I knew the second you stepped over my fence,” I said.

She tossed her hands up and shook her head. “You know what? This isn’t worth it. If you’re going to be an asshole about me getting out of the weather and wave your freaking gun around then—”

“Why were you out in it in the first place?” I hadn’t been waving a gun. Jesus. Either way, I wasn’t going to correct her about that. She didn’t know about my post-SEAL mercenary work. How I took jobs needing my military-trained skill sets that paid a s**t-ton more than a Master Chief.

If she thought I was an asshole mountain man, all the better.

“It wasn’t raining when I headed out, you i***t,” she snapped.

“You should be better prepared.”

Her mouth fell open, and I had a feeling if smoke could come out of her ears, it would be now. “Prepared? I had everything I needed, and I found shelter, more than others out hiking today probably did.”

“No one else ended up here.” I raised my hand indicating not just the greenhouse but my property.

“You sure? Maybe I’m to pull your attention one way while my team of tourist hikers overrun your house.”

That sass. Holy s**t, she needed her ass s*****d for that sass.

“And part of that plan was to take off your pants? I didn’t think you teased people that way… any longer.”

The second I said that, I knew it had been a mistake. A low blow. A true asshole move. I bit my tongue, but I couldn’t take it back. While I’d been pissed she’d been in my bed and offered herself all those years ago, I always appreciated that she recognized her s****l needs, even at eighteen. She hadn’t been shy about them. No, she’d f*****g owned her sexuality, and I’d snubbed it. And her.

The biggest thing I’d thought of since then? She’d come to me. To my bed. Offered that gorgeous p***y and sweet cherry to me. Me.

Now? f**k… I was a d**k.

She flushed then glared daggers. “I’d rather be out in the storm than do this with you.” She tried to breeze past me, but I caught her elbow.

What a mistake. Total. f*****g. Mistake. Now I knew how soft and smooth her skin was. Caught her rain and cucumber scent. She was close enough that I wanted to touch other parts of her, too. Lift her up, so she’d wrap those bare legs around my waist, press her against the glass and have my way with her. Lay her over the weight bench and push those thighs nice and wide. Have her bend over the weight rack and take her from behind. Get deep inside that sweet p***y I’d craved for years.

Yeah, thoughts of her forbidden body had gotten me through some of the worst f*****g hellholes.

“Stop.” I sounded gruff like I was dressing down a team member, not protecting a friend’s sister. Even if it was from only a storm.

I would’ve dialed it back, but that would have been a mistake, too. I couldn’t encourage any feelings on her part—not that she even remotely still harbored the same ones she’d had at eighteen. She thought I was an asshole, and that would keep her away.

Because if I found her in my bed again, I wasn’t sure if I’d turn her away. I’d take her. Intimately. Aggressively.

I wasn’t a gentle lover.

“You’re not going anywhere but into the house where you can warm up and dry your clothes.”

“Oh really?” she fumed. “You have a lot of nerve, Ford. You haven’t said ten words to me or my parents since Buck’s death, and now you’re acting like we’re all still buddy-buddy? You didn’t want me all those years ago, and you think I’m back for what… more? More humiliation and embarrassment? I don’t think so.” She yanked her arm out of my grasp and tried to pass me again.

I could’ve stopped her. Easily. Could’ve wrapped an arm around her waist to keep her from the door, or tossed her over my shoulder and carried her to the house. Hell, I could’ve even apologized, but the list was so long, I didn’t know where to even start.

She could stay here and wait out the storm, but there was no way I was letting her do that. There was a much easier way to get her to do what I wanted, and it had me smirking. I might fight against having Indi beneath me, but she sure as hell was going to do what I said.

I grabbed her wet clothes and backpack from the ground then beat her to the door. “See you in the house,” I tossed out before walking out into the storm, letting the rain cool my need for the one woman I could never have.

“Ford!” she yelled. “You f*****g asshole. I’m going to—”

The pounding rain cut off the rest of her words as I made my way across the field to the house. I was smiling for the first time in months.