Justice for Laine (Badge of Honor: Texas Heroes Book 4)
Justice for Laine
Badge of Honor: Texas Heroes, Book 4
Susan Stoker
Contents
Blurb
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Also by Susan Stoker
About the Author
Reluctantly taking her best friend’s place at a photo shoot, realtor Laine Parker expects to assist the photographer for the day . . . not drool over the volunteer model, Westin King. The Texas Ranger and real-life cowboy is hot-on-hot sexy, from the tips of his boots to the top of his Stetson. Despite her visceral reaction to the man, the last thing Laine expects is a whirlwind romance—but that’s exactly what she gets.
Wes has been around the block enough to know what he wants, and he wants Laine. He wastes no time showing her how he feels . . . but he may never get the chance to tell her. Laine has disappeared, and it will take every connection Wes has—and a little help from a mangy stray—to get her back in his arms.
* Justice for Laine is book 4 in the Badge of Honor: Texas Heroes series. Each book is a stand-alone, with no cliffhanger endings.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by Susan Stoker
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Edited by Kelli Collins and Missy Borucki
Cover Design by Chris Mackey, AURA Design Group
Manufactured in the United States
1
“No. Absolutely not,” Laine told Mackenzie emphatically.
“Please?”
Laine Parker sighed in exasperation. Mack was her best friend, but sometimes she thought they shouldn’t be friends at all. Mackenzie was curvy and outgoing and somehow seemed to light up a room the second she walked in. Laine was almost the exact opposite. She was tall and slender and would rather spend the night at home in her sweats than go out . . . but it was hard to meet a guy that way. Still, they were thick as thieves, went together like peanut butter and jelly, and were like blood sisters.
“I only said I’d come because you were going. I have no desire to go out to some random guy’s ranch, watch as he takes his shirt off and poses for your charity calendar,” Laine told Mack in an irritated tone of voice.
“I know,” Mack whined, obviously stressed out. “But my new boss asked me to go with her today to check out the venue for our annual charity ball. I wouldn’t normally agree, because it’s not like she can’t go and look at a ballroom herself, but I’m trying to make sure I stay in her good graces. After Nancy left, we floundered a bit before Loretta got here. I don’t want to do anything to make her reconsider her employment choice. And, Laine, this isn’t a random guy. Wes works with Daxton. He’s a Texas Ranger. It’s not like I’m sending you to a Chippendale club or something. Besides, Jack will be there.”
Laine took a big gulp of her iced tea, wishing it was something stronger. Mackenzie had asked her to lunch today, and she’d thought it was so her friend could grill her on her lack of a love life. Ever since Mack had fallen in love with her hunky Texas Ranger, she’d been trying extra hard to find Laine a man as well.
“Jack being there isn’t a positive in my book. I don’t really know him either. I know I’ve met him a few times, but you were always with us. Look, you know I love you, but why do I need to go at all?”
“Seriously?” Mack asked, raising her eyebrows.
“Yeah, seriously.”
“Okay, here’s the thing. Jack is a great photographer. He’s one of the best. We were lucky to get him to take the pictures for the calendar. But you know the kind of men Daxton and his friends are . . . they’re manly-men. Alphas. Cops. They’re not comfortable stripping and having their picture taken . . . especially for another man.” She held up her hand to hold off Laine’s protestation. “I know, I know, Jack isn’t gay, but it doesn’t matter. It’s weird for them. Daxton told me straight out that if I wasn’t there, he wouldn’t have done it. So I need you to go so it’s not just Wes and Jack. Please? Wes is the last model I need to finish this calendar. I don’t have a backup guy, he’s it.”
Laine put her head on the table in front of her in defeat. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have the time. As a realtor, she had the luxury of setting her own schedule. She’d cleared her calendar so she could be there with Mack for the shoot. The Petersons had gladly moved the tour of the house they wanted to see until the next day, and the Whispersons had no issue moving their showing up. So she had the time blocked off to spend with her best friend.
Picking up her head, she acquiesced. “Okay, but you owe me, Mackenzie.”
“Yay!” Mack clapped her hands softly in glee. “It’ll be fun. I know how much you love seeing the old ranches. Wes’s ranch has been in his family for at least a hundred years. Daxton said every second he’s not working a case, he’s out there doing what he loves. He’s a true cowboy in every sense of the word. In high school and college, he was on the rodeo team. He did that roping thing.”
“What roping thing?”
“You know, where they let a cow go and they ride out behind it on a horse and lasso it with a rope . . . mm hmm . . . that’s next on our agenda,” Mack exclaimed. “We need to go and check out a rodeo.”
“We’ve been to a rodeo. We went to one last year,” Laine reminded her friend.
“Oh, but we weren’t really trying to understand anything, we were just there for the eye candy and so we had an excuse to wear our new boots. We need to go and check out what all the events are.”
Laine shook her head. Mack was a goof. She tended to ramble too much and was clumsy as all get-out, but they’d been best friends since middle school. Laine would move heaven and earth for her if she asked, especially after almost losing her to a psycho serial killer. Knowing Mack had found the love of her life made Laine happy, even if she was a bit sad at the same time that she herself hadn’t found someone yet.
For so long it’d been just the two of them. They’d make spur-of-the-moment plans, hang out all night at each other’s houses, and they were confidants. But Laine could see the writing on the wall. Now that Mack had Dax, he was the center of her life . . . as it should be. They’d tried to find the right man for themselves all of their lives, and now that Mack had, Laine felt as though she was being left behind. It was a difficult thing to get used to.
“What time do I need to be out at his place?” Laine asked Mack, trying to get her back on track.
“Ten. I’m not sure what Jack has planned for the shoot, but he said he’d like to use a barn in a shot, if
it works out when he gets there. He’s been very good at being able to put the other guys at ease. He can figure out the best place to pose them for the shots that show off their assets. Seriously, Laine, you should see some of the pictures so far. Daxton, of course, is hot, but you’d never guess that under his lab coat, Calder is totally ripped. And Quint? Hot damn. Seriously, they could all quit tomorrow, start their own strip club and make millions.”
“What about Hayden?”
Mackenzie smiled an evil smile. “Oh, she didn’t want to do it, but I bribed her.”
“With what?”
“I promised I wouldn’t ask her to go shopping with me for at least six months.”
Laine giggled. “No wonder she agreed. The last time you dragged her out, she was traumatized for life.”
“That’s not true!” Mack protested. “Just because I thought she’d look good in that corset thing and the zipper broke and the manager of the store had to come in and cut her out of it, doesn’t mean she was traumatized.”
“Uh. Yeah. It does.”
“Whatever.” Mack waved off the incident.
Laine had heard all about the shopping trip from Hayden one night at the bar. The men had thought it was hysterical, but Hayden had glared daggers at everyone for the rest of the night. She wouldn’t admit it out loud, but Laine would’ve paid big bucks to be a fly on the wall during that incident.
“Anyway, I swear you’d think Hayden was a model by looking at the pictures Jack took of her. They went to the shooting range and he somehow convinced her to take off her deputy’s jacket, and the picture I think we’re using of her is a profile shot where she’s aiming downrange. She’s wearing a white tank top and her red hair against it is absolutely beautiful. She wanted to keep it up in the bun she always wears it in, but Jack convinced her to take it down. It’s a bit curly and the wind blew at exactly the right time for the shot. It’s as if she had a fan in front of her, wafting her hair back perfectly. Seriously, I was jealous as all get-out of her hair. Even though she’s the only woman in the calendar, I’m so glad we convinced her to do it. The rest of the guys are gonna crap their pants when they see her. She’s usually so . . . mannish. Even I had no idea she was so beautiful. She hides it well.”
Laine suddenly looked at her watch. “Crap, I gotta get going. I have an appointment in twenty minutes.”
“You going to look at another ranch?” Mackenzie asked, knowing how much her friend loved showing the properties on the outskirts of San Antonio.
Laine wrinkled her nose. “Nope, this one is a plain ol’ suburban three bedroom, two bath.”
“Poor thing.”
“I know, right?”
Mackenzie stood up with Laine and hugged her. “Thank you so much for doing this for me. I swear I wouldn’t ask you to go if I didn’t think it was important.”
“Have you met this Wes guy?” Laine asked Mack, putting her purse strap over her shoulder.
“No, but Daxton says he’s easy to work with and he respects him. I guess they’re pretty close work friends.”
Laine shrugged. “I guess that’s as good of a recommendation as the man’ll get.”
“Damn straight.”
They hugged again. “Be safe. I’ll call you tomorrow night and you can tell me all about it,” Mack said.
“I will. Love you.”
“Love you too. Bye.”
As Laine headed out to her car, she wondered just what in the world Mackenzie had gotten her into now.
2
Laine parked next to a large, black pickup truck and turned off her engine. Gazing at the house with her realtor hat on, she was impressed. It was big, two stories with a huge wraparound porch. She didn’t know what it was about porches, but they seemed to make a house cozier and homier. She thought the house was probably at least three thousand square feet, maybe more if it went back farther than she could see from the front.
It was painted a steel-blue color, which stood out among the plains surrounding it. There was a large red barn off to the left and fences as far as she could see. A few horses grazed on the land around both the barn and the house. Overall, it looked idyllic, and Laine could almost imagine little kids running around while their mother sat on the porch swing watching them play.
She shook her head. At thirty-seven, she was too old to have mommy regrets. It wasn’t that she couldn’t have kids, she knew women were able to have them later and later nowadays, but she was at a point in her life where kids weren’t high on her priority list anymore. It was interesting, however, that with all the houses she’d shown and sold over the years, none had made her think about what she might be missing in her life more than this one.
A knock on the window next to her head made her screech and duck to the right in fright.
Jack. The photographer was standing next to her car, grinning like a maniac. Laine put a hand to her chest and willed her heart to slow. Criminy, he’d scared her.
She opened the door and stepped out, smacking the large man on the shoulder as she stood next to him. “Not cool, Jack.”
“Couldn’t resist. You were sitting in your car like a zombie.”
“Maybe I was thinking.”
“Yeah, well, think on someone else’s time. I need to get this done so I can go and take pictures of a Quinceañera.”
“Have you seen Wes yet?” Laine asked, pocketing her keys. She’d dressed for comfort today, as she did most days, in a pair of well-worn jeans and her old brown cowboy boots. They were scuffed and not that pretty looking, but they were comfortable. She’d learned after her first trip to a ranch, years ago, that sandals or sneakers weren’t the best footwear for the uneven ground of a working farm in Texas.
“Not yet, but one of his employees said he was in the barn and that he was expecting me.”
“Let’s get this over with, yeah?” Laine asked, already walking toward the large open doors to the spacious building. “Do you have a plan?”
“Not yet. I want to see what the inside of this monstrosity looks like . . . see if there’s a decent place to take some shots. The light is good this morning, but if it’s too dark inside, I’ll need to find a more appropriate place outdoors instead.”
“How many other cowboy shots have you done for the calendar?” Laine questioned as she matched the photographer’s stride.
“Actually, none, they were all more law-enforcement based. The other guys and Hayden aren’t exactly the cowboy types. That’s why I’m excited about this one. Mackenzie told me this guy’s the real deal. I’m thinking if I can get what I want, it might be a good cover picture. We do live in Texas, after all.”
Laine didn’t respond, withholding judgement. She’d known a lot of men in her life who wanted others to think they were stereotypical Texan cowboys, but she could count on one hand the number who she’d actually classify that way. Wearing boots and a Stetson did not make a man a cowboy.
They stopped inside the sliding doors of the barn and waited for their eyes to adjust to the dimmer light. After a few seconds, when she could see clearly, Laine almost gasped at the sight that met them, but managed to refrain.
There were several stalls on either side of the space; most were empty, except for two. There was an obviously pregnant mare in one and a younger colt in another. The loft over their heads held hay bales stacked and ready for the colder months, and on the entire back wall hung various leather tack for the horses and other ranching tools.
But it was the man, who hadn’t sensed their presence yet, who stole her breath. He was shirtless, and his jeans rode low on his hips, highlighting his flat, muscular stomach. He was tall, probably a few inches taller than her five-nine, and he wasn’t a young guy either . . . which actually relieved Laine. She would’ve felt uncomfortable if she’d been attracted to someone in his twenties. There wasn’t anything wrong with it, but she’d always preferred older men.
His profile was to them as he shoveled manure out of one of the stalls. The muscles in his back and s
ide rolled and stretched as he scooped the waste out of the hay on the floor and into a wheelbarrow next to him. His biceps flexed as he turned back to the empty stall and continued with his chore.
Laine could’ve stood there all day doing nothing but watching this amazingly beautiful, rugged man work, but Jack was seemingly not as gobsmacked as she was, because he cleared his throat loudly and asked, “Westin King?”
The man at the other end of the barn lifted his head and nodded in greeting when he saw the two of them standing at the door. He rested the shovel against the wall and headed toward them. He grabbed a rag hanging off the rail of another stall and used it to wipe his hands as he walked.
Laine felt as if she was stuck to the floor. He’d obviously been in the barn working for a while, because even though it wasn’t exactly hot yet, his chest was covered with a sheen of sweat. He had dark hair, and some strands were stuck to his forehead, and the hair on his neck was wet as well. With the way his jeans fit, Laine could clearly see the mysterious and sexy-as-hell V-muscles that she’d only seen a couple times in her life. Laine had no idea what they were really called, but whatever they were, this man’s were highly defined and pointing toward the Promised Land.
His abs were equally as impressive and she could see a clear six-pack that flexed as he came toward her and Jack. Her eyes roamed down his legs, over his well-worn and dirty jeans to the tips of his brown, well-used boots.
“My eyes are up here,” he drawled, clearly amused at her intense perusal of his body.
Laine knew she was blushing, and immediately looked up into his face. His eyes were a dark brown, the color of the mahogany desk she had at home, and he had laugh lines around them. His lips were full and pink and currently pulled up into a smile, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. Which would be extremely embarrassing, since she’d undressed him and had her way with him in her mind during the few seconds it’d taken for him to get to them.