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Surrendering to the Sheriff
Delores Fossen
“Drop the gun, Sheriff.”Discovering Kendall O’Neal being held at gunpoint at his ranch isn’t the homecoming sheriff Aiden Braddock expects. And now Kendall’s captors are demanding he destroy evidence in an upcoming trial in exchange for the Texas attorney’s life…And the life of their unborn baby.Three months ago, Aiden and Kendall gave in to their long-simmering attraction. Now, with a child on the way, the stakes have shot sky-high. But even after he pulls off a daring rescue, Kendall isn’t safe. Before long, they find temporary haven in each other’s arms—which could be even more dangerous than facing down a killer.
“You could have been killed.”
Her voice was strained, barely a whisper, but he heard the emotions loud and clear.
That wasn’t ordinary concern for a fellow human being. That was concern for her baby’s daddy. Maybe even for him.
It only added another layer of complications to their already complicated situation.
Kendall was pregnant with his baby. They were a Texas version of Romeo and Juliet. Star-crossed lovers. And since that story hadn’t had a happy ending, this extra layer only made him worry more.
He’d clearly developed a fondness for complicated layers. Apparently, a fondness for having Kendall in his arms, too.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“For what?”
“Everything.”
Kendall stared at him, those eyes so green that they looked like spring itself. Spring with heat, of course. Even now the heat was there.
Surrendering to the Sheriff
Delores Fossen
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
DELORES FOSSEN, a USA TODAY bestselling author, has sold over fifty novels with millions of copies of her books in print worldwide. She’s received the Booksellers’ Best Award and the RT Reviewers’ Choice Award, and was a finalist for a prestigious RITA
Award. You can contact the author through her webpage at www.dfossen.net (http://www.dfossen.net).
Table of Contents
Cover (#u83d101e7-447e-5fef-a59c-68731b24a3ce)
Introduction (#ube673770-14cd-50ac-afc4-bdcfb0cb1de1)
Title Page (#ud2afea67-85a2-559f-bf0a-bd09ce9932e5)
About the Author (#ue7cdbd96-d0bb-53c7-9dac-a817b728d44b)
Chapter One (#ufcdbf679-379b-56e0-ba33-26993e6c975c)
Chapter Two (#u5bfa3a6a-9997-50c7-8cfd-b7cb0bcf3da3)
Chapter Three (#u46b2cd3c-8e42-54f3-9fc0-382d08052abd)
Chapter Four (#u7f393267-c5e5-5ded-b246-197db6912f6e)
Chapter Five (#u77665aad-7dfb-59d5-ad6d-526748e22ff1)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_8ca51df6-cebc-5fe5-9ea3-7acdf2833b8e)
Sheriff Aiden Braddock shut the door behind him, tossed his truck keys on the kitchen counter.
And stopped cold.
He didn’t hear anything unusual. The whir of the A/C and fridge. The April breeze rattling the oaks outside the window over the sink. All the sounds he should be hearing, but he still got the gut feeling that something wasn’t right.
Since that gut feeling had saved his butt a time or two during his time as county sheriff, Aiden listened to it.
He drew his Glock from his holster.
Aiden didn’t move yet. He just stood there a few more moments. Listening. And then he heard the thing that didn’t belong. A whisper, maybe. Or somebody breathing. Because he lived alone, there darn sure shouldn’t be anyone else whispering or breathing in his house.
“Mom?” Aiden called out just to make sure. Though it’d been longer than a blue moon since she came out to his place. Too far in the sticks, she had always complained.
“Laine? Shelby?” Aiden added in case it was one of his sisters. Again, a serious long shot, since they rarely visited, either.
No answer. But he hadn’t expected one.
Whatever was going on, this likely wasn’t a social visit and could even involve some attempted bodily harm. After all, he was the county sheriff and had riled more than a person or two over the past decade. One of those riled people had perhaps come to settle an old score.
Aiden huffed. He was so not in the mood to bash some heads, but he might have to do just that.
“Let’s make this easy for you,” Aiden called out. “I’m a damn good shot. Plus, I’m hungry, tired and not feeling up to any idiot who’s stupid enough to break into a lawman’s house.”
“Aiden,” someone said in a hoarse whisper.
Even though the person hardly made any sound when she spoke, Aiden thought he recognized the voice.
Kendall.
But that didn’t make any sense. This was the last place on earth she’d come.
Especially after...well, just after.
Aiden didn’t lower his gun, but he inched his way toward the sound of her whisper—in his living room. It was just a few yards away past a half wall, but he kept watch all around him. Kept listening, too. Until he could move into the arched opening that divided the rooms, and he snapped his gun in the direction where he’d pinpointed Kendall’s voice.
His heart slammed against his chest.
Because it was Kendall O’Neal all right, but this definitely wasn’t a social visit. She was on her knees in the center of the floor, and there was a hulking man on each side of her. The men were wearing black ski masks, and both had automatics pointed right at her head.
“Drop the gun, Sheriff Braddock,” the bigger one on the right growled.
Aiden held on to his Glock, trying to figure out what the devil was going on here. He didn’t get many clues from Kendall. She only shook her head. Like an apology or something.
But that was pure fear in her wide eyes.
He didn’t see any signs of injury, but then most of her body that he could see was covered with a pale blue shirt, skirt and business jacket—her lawyering clothes. However, her hair was a mess, her blond locks tangled on her shoulders.
So maybe she’d been in a scuffle with these guys after all.
Kendall wasn’t the messy-hair type. Nope. All priss and polish for her and never a hair out of place. People didn’t call her the ice princess for nothing.
However, that wasn’t an ice-princess look she was giving him now.
“What do you want?” Aiden asked the men.
“Your gun on the floor.” Again, it was the one on the right who answered. No unusual accent. He was a Texan. And the nondescript dark pants and T-shirt didn’t give Aiden any clues, either.
“Do it now,” the man added, and he jammed his gun against Kendall’s head. “Or else she’ll pay the price.”
The last thing any lawman wanted to do was surrender his weapon, but Aiden was wearing his usual backup gun in a boot holster. Maybe he’d be able to get to it in time if things turned uglier than they already were.
Of course, things were already plenty ugly enough.
Aiden didn’t make any fast moves. He eased his gun onto the floor. “Now, what’s this about?” he demanded. Thankfully, he still sounded like a sheriff even though it was hard to sound badass and in charge with guns pointed at Kendall.
“You’re going to do us a favor,” the gunman said. Even though the ski mask covered most of the gunman’s face, Aiden could have sworn the guy was smirking. “And if you don’t, then we’ll hurt Kendall here. Won’t kill her at first. But we’ll use her to make sure you cooperate.”
The threat was real enough—the real guns were proof of that—but Aiden had to shake his head. “You do know that Kendall O’Neal and I aren’t exactly on speaking terms, right? Everybody in town knows it. So why use her to get me to do anything for you?”
But his question ground to a halt, and Aiden’s gaze snapped back to her.
“This is some kind of sick game, isn’t it?” Though he couldn’t imagine why Kendall would be playing it with these two armed thugs. “Is this connected to your sister?”
Aiden didn’t wait for an answer. His attention went back to her captors. If they were indeed linked to her sister and not paid help trying to trick him into doing something crazier than what they were already doing.
“Just in case you don’t know,” Aiden told the men, “Kendall’s half sister, Jewell, is about to stand trial for murdering my father twenty-three years ago. If this was a real hostage situation, you’d have taken someone that I actually care a rat’s you know what about.”
Kendall flinched at his stinging remark, but she quickly recovered. The fear, or fake fear, was still in her green cat eyes, and she hiked up her chin in that way that always riled him to the core. She looked darn haughty when she did that.
“There are things you don’t know.” Her voice cracked on the last word. A nice, theatrical touch.
“Clearly,” Aiden said with a boatload of sarcasm. “But let me guess. You’re a thousand steps past the desperate stage, and you’d do anything to save your precious, murdering sister. So you want me to try to fix the trial or something.”
Aiden rammed his thumb against his chest and had to finish through clenched teeth. “You picked the wrong mark, Kendall. I don’t break the law for anybody, especially the likes of you.”
And he got another lightbulb moment.
A very bad one. One brought on by the likes of you comment. It hadn’t been that long ago that he said those very words to her.
Not in the heat of the moment like now.
More like after the heat.
Yeah, Kendall and he had had the hots for each other since middle school. Forbidden fruit and all that crap. Aiden had always resisted her because he’d known it would tear his family apart.
Until three months ago.
He’d had to kill a man that day. A domestic disturbance gone wrong. Then he’d had a run-in with his mother. Then another run-in with one of Jewell’s smart-mouthed daughters. To make matters worse, he’d dropped by the Bluebonnet for a drink or two. Which had turned into four. All right, five.
And he’d run into Kendall.
Aiden hadn’t asked her what kind of bad day she’d been trying to erase with those shots of high-end whiskey she was downing like water. But the drinks had dumbed him down just enough that he’d gone over to talk to her. A mistake.
A big one.
Because the next thing Aiden knew, they were doing more than talking. They’d landed in bed for some drunken sex, and he’d committed one of the worst mistakes he could ever have made.
Did that night play a part in this, too?
