Cross felt a cold, dark shadow waft through him. Without Jace, there was no plan. No ‘together.’
“We can be anyone we want in Montana,” Jace had stated more than once as if it were gospel. But without Jace, the Montana dream was dead.
So now what? Did he try to withdraw his papers or muster out in another two months and a handful of days and go where? Do what? His unit, his brothers—they were all he knew. But did he deserve their trust and respect now? He’d missed his extraction point, and it had taken precious days to ghost out and work his connections to return to base. Two days late. And Jace was gone.
He should be the one in the box—of course his mind returned there. But maybe not. He was seven inches taller than Jace. Broader. Maybe the hits wouldn’t have been lethal for him. But still, it should have been him.
The plane barreled down the runway. Slight lift and then faster acceleration as the runway ran out, wheels up.
As one, they raised their beers—Jace’s favorite brand, favorite flavor though he’d loved them all, and had dreamed of starting a brewery—and why not? He’d certainly tried to brew and distill plenty of beverages both on deployments and on base—secretly, yet not so secret.
Moose Drool. Cross looked at the label. A moose standing upright, skiing.
“He wanted us all to go skiing our first winter out,” Cross remembered, a little surprised to hear himself speak—again. Some kind of record.
“He wanted us to do a lot of things,” Wolf said. “Jace was full of big plans, and they were always in Marietta. He made that tiny town sound like Main Street in Disneyland.”
It was like that in a lot of ways. But Cross hadn’t confided in Jace that as a child he’d lived in Marietta, because then Jace would have wanted to know why he’d left, and Cross did his best to forget his past.
The plane had taken off and was fading into the hazy air and fuzz of heat, looking more like a mirage than a plane carrying precious cargo.
“Jace made going back home sound so easy.” Rohan’s lip curled.
“Don’t you got a ranch to get back to in Marietta?” Otis asked, his freshly shaved angular jaw pale compared to his deeply tanned face.
Rohan, looking unusually kempt—his sandy-blond hair freshly cut and slicked back—said nothing, just wiped his mouth with his forearm, and pocked the bottle. His vivid green gaze never stopped tracking the progress of the plane.
“Maybe we can build a future in Marietta,” Ryder Lea said. His thick dark hair was, for once, combed. “The Montana summers could warm our souls.”
“Yeah and the winters will freeze our balls,” Rohan said.
No one laughed. The silence felt toxic, choking off Cross’s air.
“He made Montana sound like salvation.” Otis stared at the empty, shimmering sky. “Like we’d pool our resources and start a church.”
“We do got Cross,” Ryder said casually. “Churches don’t get taxed.”
“We’d get smited walking into a church. I’m thinking cult.” Wolf Conte laughed grimly.
“Amen.” Cross finished his beer and stared at the bottle, not sure what to do next.
“Jace said something,” Huck finally spoke, his voice a tortured whisper.
The air around them went electric. Huck stared mutely at Wolf.
“Jace had a list,” Wolf said, his voice going leader on them. “Things he needed to do.”
Chapter One
Anyone who predicted Cross would be in an Irish-themed hotel bar on a Friday night in Marietta, Montana, would have been hostilely dismissed as a liar. But here he stood. A few days out from his exit interviews. Three days on his Harley driving west like Marietta had a homing beacon trained on him. Weirder still, the bar and the hotel had been conspicuously renovated and remodeled—upscale and historically accurate to his untrained eye.
The Graff Hotel had been a fenced-off, boarded-up eyesore when he’d lived in Marietta. The roof leaked, the walls wept water and black mold, the windows sagged, jagged with broken glass. The once grand building had become a dark, broken hulk taunting residents about better days during the brief copper boom, the arrival of the railroad and then finally ranching. The only sway the hotel held when he’d been a kid was over the imaginations of residents. Ghost stories had been swapped during school lunches. Dares had been issued by teens on weekend nights.
Now the Graff boasted suites and single rooms, each one individually and historically decorated to showcase the glamour of a long-ago era. Globe sconces glowed golden throughout the lobby and antique-looking mirrors reflected elegance and history. It was a world Cross doubted had existed as it was portrayed. Still, he felt the pull of nostalgia and resented it.
Marietta wasn’t Disneyland. And he wasn’t on a movie set.
None of the Graff seemed real including the long, highly polished dark wood bar that had a plaque detailing how it had been shipped over from an Irish pub that had closed its doors after four hundred years.
People like him didn’t belong in a place like this.
Why the hell was he here?
Dumb? Insane? Dangerously curious? Take a pick.
Coming into the hotel bar had nothing to do with honoring Jace’s memory, and it sure as hell had nothing to do with his vow to his brothers when they’d each pulled a task to complete out of Jace’s damaged helmet.
Coming to the Graff felt all wrong. A waste of time and he was verging into stalker territory. A grim smile ghosted his lips. Stalking was his brand. Cross had stalked targets across the globe, and he’d been in high demand. But he still didn’t trust the side hustle he’d been handed. He’d been heading to Marietta when he’d been summoned, and wanting Jace’s death to have some meaning, he’d answered the call, but now he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do.
Shane Knight had been absurdly easy to find. And working and living in Marietta—where he’d been heading. Cross wasn’t a believer in coincidences. But twenty-five thousand dollars had been dangled by a former army major Cross had rescued, if Cross could return an expensive heirloom watch. Cross didn’t care about the money, but Jace’s friend, Alex Holt, whom Cross was in Marietta to meet, would likely appreciate the extra cash since he was a single dad.
Remy still wasn’t convinced this errand wasn’t one last middle finger of manipulation by a master, who’d already created havoc in Cross’s life. So here he was, curious. Stalking.
“Can I buy you a drink?”
Cross dragged his attention away from his sour musings back to the dark wood, green leather booth seats and soft golden lights welcoming him to the pub if he’d take one more step inside. A breathless blonde wearing a tight pink T-shirt proclaiming her to be the maid of honor was hitting on him.
“No.” He made no effort to soften the rejection.
Her mouth dropped open and her eyes rounded. Had no man turned her down before? Jace would have flirted. Cross didn’t know how and didn’t care to learn. His life had been geared toward survival from a young age.
He was in Marietta to complete a mission for Jace. And maybe one for the former major he’d rescued like an idiotic hero in an action movie, from a cartel prison. Then he’d ride out of Marietta for good a free man. No expectations. No responsibility.