Branded by the Sheriff. Delores Fossen

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СКАЧАТЬ out there,” Beck warned. “I think he had a gun.”

      Just like that, she stopped struggling and considered who might be out there. None of the scenarios that came to mind were good. It was too late and too cold for a neighbor to drop by. Besides, she didn’t have any nearby neighbors, especially anyone who’d want to pay her a friendly visit. Plus, there was Beck’s reaction. He obviously thought this might turn dangerous.

      She didn’t have to wait long for that to be confirmed.

      A sound blasted through the room. Shattering glass. A split-second later, something thudded onto the floor.

      “A rock,” Beck let her know.

      A rock. Not exactly lethal in itself, but the person who’d thrown it could be a threat. And he might have a weapon.

      Who had done this?

      Better yet, why was Beckett Tanner sheltering her? He had put himself in between her and potential danger, and once she could breathe, Faith figured that maneuver would make more sense than it did now.

      Because there was no chance he’d put himself in real harm’s way to protect her.

      “Get under the bed,” Beck ordered. “And stay there.”

      He rolled off her, still keeping his body between her and the window. Starved for air, Faith dragged in an urgent breath and scrambled to the back side of the mattress so she could drop to the floor. She crawled beneath the bed amid dust bunnies and a few dead roaches.

      Staying here tonight, alone, had obviously not been a good idea.

      Worse, Faith didn’t know why she’d decided at the last minute to stay. Her plan had been to check in to the hotel, to wait for the renovations to be complete and for the new furniture to arrive. But after stepping inside, she thought it was best to exorcise a few demons before trying to make the place “normal.” So she’d sent the cab driver on his way, made a fire to warm up the place and got ready for bed.

      Now someone had hurled a rock through her window.

      There was another crashing sound. Another spray of glass. Another thud. Her stomach tightened into an acidy knot.

      Beck got off the bed as well. Dropping onto the floor and staying low, he scurried to what was left of the window and peeked out.

      “Can you see who’s out there?” she asked.

      He didn’t answer her, but he did take a sliver-thin cell phone from his jeans pocket and called for backup. For some reason that made Faith’s heart pound even harder. If this was a situation that Beck Tanner believed he couldn’t handle alone, then it was bad.

      She thought of Aubrey and was glad her little girl wasn’t here to witness this act of vandalism, or whatever it was. Faith also thought of their future, how this would affect it. If it would affect it, she corrected. And then she thought of her brother. Was he the one out there in the darkness tossing those rocks? It was a possibility—a remote one—but Beck wouldn’t believe it to be so remote.

      Her brother, Darin, was Beck’s number one murder suspect. She’d read every report she could get her hands on and every newspaper article written about the murders.

      She didn’t suspect Darin, though. She figured her sister’s ex, Nolan Wheeler, was behind those killings. Nolan had a multipage arrest record, and her sister had even taken out a temporary restraining order against him.

      For all the good it’d done.

      Even with that restraining order, her sister, Sherry, had been murdered near her apartment on the outskirts of Austin. Their mother’s death had happened twenty-four hours later in the back parking lot of the seedy liquor store where she worked in a nearby town. The murder had occurred after business hours, within minutes of her mother locking up the shop and going to her car. And even though Faith wasn’t close to either of them and hadn’t been for years, she’d mourned their loss and the brutal way their lives had ended.

      Still staying low, Beck leaned over and studied one of the rocks. It was smooth, about the size and color of a baked potato, and Faith could see that it had something written on it.

      “What does it say?” she asked when Beck didn’t read it aloud.

      His hesitation seemed to last for hours. “It says, ‘Leave or I’ll have to kill you, too.’”

      Mercy. So it was a threat. Someone didn’t want her moving back to town. She watched Beck pick up the second rock.

      Beck cursed under his breath. “It’s from your brother.”

      Faith shook her head. “How do you know?”

      “Because it says, ‘I love you, but I can’t stop myself from killing you. Get out,’” Beck grumbled. “I don’t know how many people you know who both love you and want you dead. Darin certainly fits the bill. Of course, maybe he just wrote the message and had Wheeler toss it in here for him.”

      She swallowed hard, and the lump in her throat caused her to ache. God. This couldn’t be happening.

      Faith forced herself to think this through. Instead of Nolan being Darin’s accomplice, Nolan himself could be doing this to set up her brother. Still, that didn’t make it less of a threat.

      “Listen for anyone coming in through the back door,” Beck instructed.

      There went her breath again. If Beck had been able to break in, then a determined killer or vandal would have no trouble doing the same.

      Because she had to do something other than cower and wait for the worst, Faith crawled to the end of the bed where she’d placed her suitcase. After a few run-ins with Nolan Wheeler, she’d bought a handgun. But she didn’t have it with her. However, she did have pepper spray.

      She retrieved the slender can from her suitcase and inched out a little so she could see what was going on. Beck was still crouched at the window, and he had his weapon ready and aimed into the darkness.

      With that part of the house covered, she shifted her attention to the bedroom door. From her angle, she could see the kitchen, and if the rock thrower took advantage of that broken lock, he’d have to come through the kitchen to get to them. Thankfully, the moonlight piercing through the back windows allowed her to see that the room was empty.

      “You don’t listen very well,” Beck snarled. “I told you to stay put.”

      She ignored his bark. Faith wouldn’t make herself an open target, but she wanted to be in a position to defend herself.

      “Do you see anyone out there?” she barked back.

      She clamped her teeth over her bottom lip to stop the trembling. Not from fear. She was more angry than afraid. But with the gaping holes in the window, the winter wind was pushing its way through the room, and she was cold.

      “No. But if I were a betting man, I’d say your brother’s come back to eliminate his one and only remaining sibling—you.”

      “Maybe the person outside is after you?”

      He СКАЧАТЬ