Alpha Mountain Boxed Set: Books 1 - 3

Chapter 4

4

FORD

I hefted my ax and swung down to c***k another log. With the sun beating down, I’d ditched my shirt a while ago. Splitting wood was my go-to when I needed to blow off steam, and f**k, in the past three days, I’d prepped firewood for the entire winter. In fact, I had enough to stack in the bed of my truck to take to Buck’s parents.

The frustration I was burning through wasn’t because I was constantly wracked with guilt over the way I’d handled Buck’s death. It also didn’t have anything to do with Indi’s surprise visit. And I definitely wasn’t nursing a set of blue balls after seeing her nearly naked. Again.

Fuck me.

I just had a lot on my mind pulling together my team and figuring out our next moves.

Right.

That’s what I told myself, anyway.

Roscoe came over and dropped a stick at my feet. I grabbed the slobber-covered piece of wood and lobbed it across the field. He sprinted after it.

With my back muscles starting to strain, I finished the last log and left the ax embedded in the stump. I’d be back out here soon enough. Using my discarded t-shirt to wipe my brow, I strode across the field to the back door. Roscoe caught up with me, stick in his mouth.

I was still getting used to thinking of the place as mine. I came to live with my grandparents after my dad’s death when I was in middle school. He and my mom had been split for years, and my mom had been one of those who’d thought a kid was a burden. I’d felt it hardcore, and our relationship had been s**t. My grandparents had wanted me, and hell, I’d wanted them too. Looking back, I’d been desperate for something settled, something safe, and they’d given it to me. I’d come to Montana and made this mountain my proving ground.

Gramps had died two years ago while I’d been overseas. Fell asleep in his recliner one night and never woke up. Gram had been alone here since then, except for Roscoe, who she said she’d gotten to replace Gramps.

After almost fifteen years in the service, I had never put down roots, never even rented an apartment since I’d been deployed, never needed more than base housing. Hell, I had no real home. Except for here. So when I was rather suddenly dishonorably discharged, I’d tucked tail and come back to be here with Gram. Turned out that it was the perfect spot to start up my new private security firm. Gram had been thrilled to have me back and the idea of having a bunch of my buddies here too. She was far from the typical grandmother. While she baked cookies for all of us, she’d also handed over her sewing room to be used as a temporary command center until the new building was finished.

It was one thing to live on the property to keep an eye on Gram, it was another to sleep in my old bedroom down the hall from her. So now that it was finished, I was in the bunkhouse with Kennedy and the others. For now. The contractors were also working on a cabin for me down by the creek where we’d had all the parties.

I banged the screen door open and stepped in, heading straight for the fridge. Roscoe went to his water dish, dropped the stick in his food bowl, then began to lap up his own drink. The scent of pot roast assaulted me. I glanced at the counter, at the olive green crockpot. Kennedy was just as much a cook as Gram, and he used that slow cooker all the time. I wasn’t sure who’d started tonight’s dinner, but it made my mouth water.

“Fucker,” Kennedy grumbled, catching me drinking milk straight from the jug. “You don’t live alone, asshole. If Mrs. L sees you doing that—” He didn’t say more, just shook his head.

I kept gulping it down and ignoring him, the cold air from the fridge on my ass.

“So, keeping these as souvenirs?”

I swallowed hard when Kennedy held up Indigo’s sports bra and panties, dangling from his fingers.

“Put those down,” I snarled before I had the wherewithal to dial back my reaction.

He grinned and set the white scraps swinging. f**k. I’d just given him more fodder for his damned game.

“Most guys save the lingerie of the women they’ve already hooked up with not the ones they’re pining for.” He propped a hip against the counter. He was having way too much f*****g fun.

Hayes clomped up the back steps and came into the kitchen, the screen door slapping shut behind his ass. His eyes widened at the dangling bra. “Who the hell got lucky?”

I pulled my Master Chief face—the one that said, I outrank you, buddy—and shook my head. “Not another f*****g word.”

“What’s the deal? Are you going to hit that? If not, I am totally—”

I slapped the milk jug on the counter then reached out and snatched Indi’s underclothing out of Kennedy’s hands. “You’re not to go near her.” I pointed at him, then at Hayes, but the emphasis was lost with the items in my hands.

“What, are you playing big brother to her now?” Kennedy c****d a brow. I was the serious one, and he was the jokester. The playboy. We’d lived in tight quarters on base and worse on missions, but this kitchen was getting pretty f*****g crowded with the three of us in it.

At the mention of Buck, my chest tightened.

“Big brother… now that’s a weird kink, but if you get a woman out of a bra like that, it might be a—”

“f**k off, Hayes,” I snapped. “Where the hell is Gram?”

“We dropped her car off with Landers, but she got a text and had plans for coffee. That woman’s social calendar makes us look like hermits.”

That was true. My grandmother knew everyone in town. Knew all their secrets, too. She was involved in every program from church to the senior program to T-ball fundraiser. She was rarely home, and if she was, she was flitting about with the continuous hopes of firing the weapons we had stored in the bunkhouse.

She could wheedle someone into doing anything, but the four of us had held our ground where my octogenarian grandmother and firearms were concerned.

“So I took her to the Seed n’ Feed and dropped her off.”

The place was run by Holly Martin. It’d been in her family—like most businesses in Sparks—for generations. What Holly had done, though, was push the envelope of what a seed and feed sold. She’d turned the old grain office into a coffee shop, so now she served more scones than salt licks. When I worked there when I was sixteen, it’d been a completely different place.

“Said she’d get a ride home later and that she wasn’t missing Kennedy’s pot roast for anything. Back to the babe with the bra. Was she any good? Does she have sisters?”

I glared.

He held up his hands as if I would kill him with my eyes. Or with my left pinkie, which I could, and he knew it. While Hayes didn’t have the same easy charm that Kennedy wore like a second outfit, he was no slouch when it came to women. Dimples creased his darker skin, and his dark brown hair had grown out wavy. He wasn’t as tall as Kennedy, but he had a broad chest and could bench press twice his weight.

“I’ll get the story eventually,” he said.

We were like a bunch of sorority sisters in this place, in each other’s business. That was fine and all when he talked about the woman he’d banged at the bar last month, but this was Indi.

Indi. That reminded me I was pissed at Kennedy, so I turned all my anger back his way.

“Buck’s last words to me were about taking care of Indi. There’s no way in hell I’m letting a douche like you—”

“Buck’s last words were about Indi?” Kennedy cut in, frowning. He went to the crockpot, took off the lid, and used a spoon that was on the counter beside it to stir the cubed potatoes. “You never told me that.”

“That’s Buck’s sister’s bra?” Hayes asked, his tone now filled with surprise and his hands still up, this time showing he was definitely going to be hands-off now. “Whoa.”

I ignored him.

We hadn’t been on a mission when he’d died. I’d followed him off base, having his six—or having his back—like a friend and leader should.

Hayes went to the fridge and leaned in to see what was in there.

“Skip the milk,” Kennedy advised.

Hayes grabbed the pitcher of sweet tea Gram always had on hand and pulled a glass from the cabinet.

I put my hands on my hips and watched my friend. “Why would I?” I was referring to telling Kennedy what Buck’s last words were. “It’s hardly relevant.”

“What did he say, exactly?” Kennedy was pushing, and it was annoying as f**k. Like probing an open wound with a sharp stick.

I stalked past him to put Indigo’s bra and panties back on the neatly folded pile of her clothes on top of the dryer, which was in the laundry room just off the kitchen. The pile I’d said I’d take to her. Yesterday. It was the task I’d been avoiding.

Kennedy—the asshole—put the lid back on the slow cooker and followed me. “What did he say?”

I frowned and ran a hand over my beard. “He told me to look out for Indi,” I repeated. For f**k’s sake, I didn’t need to relive the moment with Kennedy, I saw it almost every night in my nightmares.

Kennedy showed his own flash of irritation. “I asked what he said, exactly.”

My gut twisted as I remembered dragging Buck back from the explosion zone. Holding him in my arms as I shouted for help.

I could still feel the heat from the blast. The scents. The screams.

I knelt on the dirty street, c*****e all around. Buck was propped on my thighs, destroyed. One leg was gone below the knee. He had a sucking chest wound and blood slid from the corner of his mouth. He was dying, and there was nothing I could do.

His jeep was upside-down behind him, one of the tires on fire, and smoke rose from the engine.

Still, I shouted. “We need help over here!”

It did nothing. Buck was the linguist who knew Arabic. Not me.

I was lost. Helpless. I didn’t have my team with me. No comms to get a medic or an evac.

Buck was looking up at me. Staring with those dark eyes. There was no pain in his gaze. He knew he was dying.

Fuck. f**k! “Stay with me.”

He shook his head, but the motion was so small. “Indi…safe….watch out.”

“What?” I’d demanded. He wasn’t making sense.

“Watch out for Indi,” he said, his breath shallow and raspy.

I shifted him, tried to press on his chest wound. I’d used my shoelace for a tourniquet above his knee, but it wasn’t strong enough. His blood spread across the ground.

“You’ll take care of her yourself,” I countered. “You got this, Buck.”

Five minutes ago, he was whole and fine. I was mentally hating him for making me follow him from base. To figure out what the f**k was up with him lately. Why he was on edge. Distant. Going off solo. Something had been up with him, and it was my job as his best friend and his team leader to help him.

I’d been behind on his s**t. And I’d been behind following him. That was why he was ripped up, and I was fine. How I’d missed the blast without a scratch, and he was—

“Indi.” His hand flapped up, and he tapped his chest. “They can’t know.” He coughed and blood dribbled from his lips.

I winced, then held him closer, as if I could put him back together. “She won’t know about this,” I vowed. “Your parents too. I got you.”

But I didn’t.

I whipped my head around, trying to figure out what to do. We were almost a mile from base in the middle of the civilian area. This was a local street bazaar now blown to bits. Buck wasn’t the only person dying.

I’d been trained to lead, to make split-second decisions. To keep my men alive. I couldn’t do anything now. Totally f*****g helpless.

“Stay with me, Buck. Stay. Stay…”

I shook off the memory and cleared my throat, as if trying to rid myself of the smoke that was only now in my memory. “It’s not important.”

Kennedy shrugged but watched me closely. “What if it is? Listen to this—Lincoln called. Someone else is dead from that Ranger team.”

After Kennedy set up security on the property and between jobs for Alpha Mountain, he’d put his expertise to use collecting intel to figure out what the f**k had happened to Buck besides being killed. Two days after his death, word had come down that they’d found evidence he’d murdered an Afghan police officer who was investigating a drug-smuggling operation. One he believed had ties to the U.S. military.

Buck, a murderer. Right.

I’d lost my s**t because I knew something was up with my friend since he’d started to take on work with a different division, but s**t…drugs? Murder? No chance. I didn’t believe it then, and I was even more certain it was a lie now.

Of course, when I started poking into the matter, I was dismissed on bogus charges.

It had been obvious something was up. Someone in the military higher than me or Buck was covering something up.

The men on my former team were too loyal not to side with me. One by one, when their contracts were up, they started to join me to work in private security as we figured out what exactly had happened.

To finance the upgrades to the property—the security, the bunkhouse, the new command center that was almost done, my cabin—we took jobs. Wet work. Security and protection. Rescue.

My former commanding officer, Lincoln, had tossed us a few private security gigs—whether it was out of pity or to keep me from digging into Buck’s death more, I couldn’t be sure. The upshot was that word of mouth made Alpha Mountain take off. Private mercenary work was lucrative. Lucrative enough to fully fund an entire team of ex-special forces guys, which I would need to continue to grow my business. And if I was going to keep digging into whatever happened back in Afghanistan.

Clients who paid seven figures for a job. We were flush in cash but not answers.

I pushed past Hayes and grabbed the pitcher of tea and shoved it back on the shelf in the fridge. “Who and how?”

Kennedy sent me a meaningful look that had my skin crawling before he even delivered the news. “This is what I’ve been working on the past few days while you’ve been moping around over a girl.”

I gave him the finger. “Tell me.”

“William Gentry. The original translator from the Ranger Beta Team. They’re calling it a suicide.”

“The original translator? The food poisoning guy?”

Buck had said he’d been asked to fill in for the rangers as a translator because a guy on the team had food poisoning.

“Holy s**t. Was it?”

“Too much of a coincidence for me. Two translators from that team dead?”

I stared back at Kennedy as the words sank in. This was news. Big news. I didn’t want another soldier dead, especially knowing it happened, but this was something. “This means it’s not a Buck thing.”

“Our buddy couldn’t have planned that s**t from the grave.”

“This proves it’s bigger than Buck just as we f*****g knew.” I slapped Kennedy on the shoulder.

When I glanced Hayes’ way, he nodded.

My mind swirled. Buck had been the translator for our team. The Navy quickly learned the fucker had a talent for picking up languages like a hooker did sailors during Fleet Week. After the fill-in for Mr. Food Poisoning, things started to go sideways. Even after the guy recovered, Buck kept getting called in for missions with them. Missions he couldn’t discuss with our team. That wasn’t anything new, but over the next few weeks and months, he’d grown agitated and withdrawn.

Then he was killed. The bombing was officially ruled as drug-related. They said Buck was parked in front of the building that housed a known drug trafficker. Supposedly, he’d been there to make a transaction. They floated out the theory that the drug dealers had killed him.

Kennedy and I suspected it had been an inside job, especially when a murder rap was added after he was dead and couldn’t defend himself.

“So whatever Buck knew—whatever got him killed—this guy knew, too,” Kennedy said.

“Sounds like it.”

“So back to my question. What exactly did Buck say to you?” he asked.

I shook my head and thought of that moment. “He just said Indi. They can’t know.”

He scratched his temple. “That’s all?”

“Yeah. Like I was going to tell Buck’s family about how he died. They have enough with his record. Thank f**k people here in Sparks are forgiving.”

Gram was the first to take the Buchanans a casserole and told them how proud she was of Buck. That whatever happened, she knew Buck had done the right thing.

Except I couldn’t do that with the Buchanans. Not until I knew the truth. Gram’s faith was one thing, but I was the only one stuck with the real nightmare.

“I told you it’s not relevant,” I added.

Kennedy shrugged and unwrapped a lollipop he pulled from a jar on the counter. “Okay. So he didn’t say, keep her safe from Kennedy.” His dimples winked as he stuck the candy in his mouth with a grin.

“You’re not touching her.” I glowered then turned and shared the look with Hayes. “I mean it. I will kill both of you on Buck’s behalf.”

“Are you filling Buck’s shoes protecting her, or is there actually something between the two of you? Because the way you’ve been chopping wood for days screams of s****l frustration, my friend.”

“Yeah, your balls must be so blue, I’m surprised they haven’t fallen off yet,” Hayes added.

“f**k off.” I picked up Indi’s clothes, resolved to finally go into town to the wilderness guide office and drop them off. I wanted to see what kind of outfit she worked for, anyway. It seemed fairly successful, as far as I could tell, but I didn’t love that her boss sent her out in the wilderness alone. Or that they’d f****d. Although she was smart and knew how to take care of herself. I may have had a shitty attitude about finding her in my greenhouse, but she’d done all the right things to get out of the dangerous weather.

I’d remember what she looked like standing there in only her t-shirt for years. f**k, I was hard solely from my thoughts steered that way. Maybe it was because I hadn’t been laid in a while. Maybe it was because I was back in the same town with the woman I’d always wanted. But still could never have.

“No, really,” he prodded. “What’s the full story? I know there’s a story.”

“The story?” I set the clothes down again and stalked past Kennedy and into the temporary command center. We were all ready to get out of Gram’s sewing room and into the new state-of-the-art building being built beside the bunkhouse. The floral wallpaper in here made me angry.

I couldn’t talk about Indigo being naked when I was holding her bra and panties. “It was… nine years ago. Buck and I were home on leave. My grandparents were away, so we had a party in the back forty—where I’m building my cabin. I came inside and found Indi in my bed. Completely naked.”

Kennedy whistled, eyebrows up. “How old was she?”

“Eighteen.”

“Ripe and with her cherry?” Hayes piped in. “I bet—”

I shoved an office chair in Hayes’ direction, and it went careening against his legs.

He stopped it but had to jump back. “What the f**k, man?”

“Don’t talk about her cherry.”

Kennedy grinned. “Did you pop it?”

I tossed my hands heavenward. “For f**k’s sake! I didn’t touch her. I covered my eyes and told her to get out. Then Buck showed up and nearly kicked my ass.”

“Ah. So you wanted to tap it, but Buck cockblocked you,” Kennedy added.

“No!” I exploded.

It was a damn lie, but I wasn’t going to give Kennedy any more ammunition. One look at Indi, all that creamy skin and guilelessness… yeah, and I’d wanted her. Hadn’t wanted anyone else since. I’d had women, but Indi was the f*****g prize. The one I knew once I sank balls deep into I’d never be able to survive. Maybe that was one of the reasons I avoided her now. She was the only thing left, the only person left on this f*****g planet with the power to destroy me.

“I promised Buck I wouldn’t touch her, and I won’t. End of story.”

“Right. Tell that story to your d**k,” Hayes said with a laugh, then hightailed it out of there before I could kill him.