Stormy Glenn - Blaecleah Brothers 06 - Cowboy Convenience (9 page)

Yancy was pretty sure he was dead. Of course, the pain flaring through every single inch of his body said he was very much alive. But he still felt dead. He had to be dead. No one survived getting tossed through the air like that.

“No, we’re not dead,” John replied. “But if we don’t get out here, we might wish we were. Whoever shot out the tire might be coming down here to finish the job.”

“Someone shot out the tire?” Yancy slowly turned his head to look at John. “Who’d you piss off?”
John grunted as he rolled over onto his hands and knees. “I thought it was you, but I’m starting to reassess that conclusion.” He dug into his pocket and pulled out a key, holding it out to Yancy. “Here, unlock yourself.”
Yancy grabbed the key and quickly unlocked the handcuffs around his wrists. He started to drop them onto the ceiling of the cruiser then decided better than that. He held them out until John took them back, putting them away.
Yancy climbed out through the shattered back window then leaned back against the side of the vehicle. A moment later, John climbed out, looking over the top of the vehicle.
“Do you see anything?”
“No. I think whoever shot at us is gone. There’s no movement anywhere.” John dropped down onto the ground next to Yancy. “I assume you know how to use one of these?”
Yancy’s eyebrows shot up when John held a pistol out to him. “You just arrested me and now you’re arming me?”
The man had to be insane.
John shrugged. “If you haven’t killed me before now, you’re probably not going to.”
“The day is not yet over,” Yancy replied as he took the gun and checked the magazine. Once he was assured that John hadn’t given him an empty gun, he slapped the magazine back in and glanced over at the man. “So, want to fill in the rest of the class?”
John’s shoulders slumped as he rubbed his hand down his face. He dropped his hand into his lap and looked out toward the trees as if his head was floating off somewhere else.
“A few weeks ago I started receiving threatening phone calls. Threats are part of the job, and they were just words, so I dismissed them. Then they started coming more often and getting more lethal. When I found my neighbor’s dead cat on my doorstep, I knew whoever was doing this was serious.”
“Who in the hell did you piss off?” Yancy asked again.
John shook his head. “I don’t know. What I do know is that whoever is doing this means it.”
“If they are threatening you, what do they want?”
“That’s just it, Yancy,” John said as he waved his hand emphatically around in the air. “There are no demands, no words about getting off this case or that case. No dropping charges. Nothing. The caller just tells me over and over again what he plans to do to me and those I care about.”
Yancy sucked in a sharp, shaky breath. “That’s why you refused to talk with Seamus.” The words hurt to speak, but he had to say them. He had to see John’s face as the man replied. He knew the truth. He could feel it festering deep down inside of him. He just prayed that John lied to him.
John nodded, anguish darkening his grayish-blue eyes. “That didn’t happen until I found the cat on my doorstep. I couldn’t…” John licked his lips, his eyes dropping to his hands. “I couldn’t put Seamus in danger.”
“Even if it meant he left you and went to me?”
John’s hands clenched, fisting so hard that they turned white. “Even then.”
Yancy so didn’t want to be having this conversation. Seamus was supposed to be his. He had given Seamus every chance to just have friendship between them but the man had given him the green light. That meant Seamus was his.
Only, he was beginning to suspect that Seamus really wasn’t his.
“You love him?”
“Yes, I love him. I think I’ve loved Seamus since the first moment I saw him.” A cold, bitter little laugh fell from John’s mouth. “Not that that will do me any good now. He’s in love with you.”
Yancy leaned his head back against the side of the cruiser again and let those words flow over him. He wanted to believe that more than anything, maybe even more than he wanted Sheriff John Riley out of his life.
He just couldn’t.
“Seamus is in love with you, John.” Yancy swallowed hard as he admitted the knowledge he had been wrestling with for so very long. “He always has been.”
John’s eyes rounded as he looked at Yancy, complete shock draining the color from his face. “If he’s in love with me, then why in the hell is he with you?”
Yancy shrugged, trying to look nonchalant when his soul was withering away. “I was convenient.”
And that sucked on so many levels.
“You’re in love with him, too.”
“Yeah.” Yancy grimaced. There didn’t seem to be any need to expand on his answer. John would understand exactly how Yancy felt.
“Oh man.” John started to chuckle. “We are a pair, aren’t we?”
“Right?” Yancy leaned his head back against the cruiser again. He felt like banging his head into the hard metal. It might make him feel better or at least give him something else to concentrate on other than his aching heart.
“I’m not giving him up, Yancy.”
Yancy clenched his jaw as he turned to glare at John. “I’m not giving him up either.” Assuming he could convince Seamus to stay with him. He’d have to live with the knowledge that part of Seamus’s heart belonged to John, but half of Seamus was better than none of him.
“Then we have a problem.”
“We’ll let Seamus decide.”
“Yeah.” John started to laugh again. “I don’t think Seamus wants much to do with us right now. We kind of fucked that up back at the ranch.”
Yancy grinned as he reached up to rub his swollen lip. “We did at that.”
“You weren’t hurting him, were you.” It was a statement, not a question, but Yancy felt compelled to answer it anyway.
“No.” Yancy shook his head. “Not in the way you were thinking. I would never lay a hand on Seamus.”
“So, what were you arguing abo—oh.” John blinked. “You were arguing about me.”
Yancy nodded. “We were supposed to be coming to dinner to tell his folks that we were dating and that it was serious. We had no idea you had been invited.”
“How serious?” John growled, all traces of amusement gone from his voice.
“I’d marry him if he’d say yes.”
“Damn.”
Yancy cocked an eyebrow as he turned his head to look at John. “Are you saying you wouldn’t do the same?”
“No, I would. If Seamus gave me the green light, I’d tie him to me any damn way that I could. I just don’t think that’s going to happen.” John’s face suddenly tensed, the expression on his face reminding Yancy of a hunter visualizing his prey. “But first, I have to make sure that no one is waiting to hurt him.”
“I’ll help.” Yancy was as surprised as John when the words came out of his mouth. He had to be out of his ever-loving mind.
“Why on earth would you help me?”
“Because Seamus loves you.” Yancy rubbed his hands over his face, knowing that what he was about to do could quite possibly lose Seamus to him forever. “Because I can’t stand the idea of him being in pain. Because he loves you and I want him to be happy even if it means he’s with you instead of me.”
“But what if he wants you?”
“He can have me.” Yancy snorted. “I’ll even tie a bow around my neck and put myself under the fucking Christmas tree.”
“It’s not Christmas.”
“I don’t care. If Seamus says he wants me, he can have me.”
“I thought you said he loved me.”
Yancy had a strong urge to smack John. He was only able to stop himself because it took too much energy to lift his hand. “Rub it in, jackass.”
“I’m just saying, if he’s in love with me, why would you be willing to be with him?”
“Because, damn it.” Yancy pushed himself to his feet so that he had the higher position of standing over John. “Because half of Seamus is better than nothing at all.”
John stared at him for so long that Yancy began to grow antsy. He moved his weight from one foot to the other, then back again. Finally, when John continued to remain silent, Yancy rolled his eyes and let out an exasperated grunt.
“What?”
“What if we shared him?”
“I…you…” Yancy frowned. “What?”
“It’s a good idea, Yancy. Think about it. Seamus loves you, and he loves me. I love him. You love him. But we both want Seamus to be happy, and the only way for that to happen is for him to have both of the men he loves.”
“I thought we were going to let Seamus choose.”
John shrugged. “I like this idea better.”
“Why?” Yancy had a pretty good idea. John had the same fears he did. “Because you’re afraid that Seamus will choose me over you.”
John didn’t bother answering. He just turned his head away. But Yancy could see the truth in the deep breath the man drew into his lungs. Yancy stepped over and sat back down beside John.
He took a moment to gather his thoughts and figure out if he was about to make the biggest mistake in his life. If he agreed to this, he could lose Seamus. If he didn’t agree to it, he could still lose Seamus. Either way he looked at it, he could lose Seamus.
This sucked.
“How is this supposed to work?”
“I don’t know. It was just an idea that came to me.” John shook his head. “It was stupid. Forget it.”
“If we can figure out the dynamics of it, you might actually have something.”
John’s jaw dropped as his head snapped around. “Are you serious?”
“Are you willing to give Seamus up?”
“No.”
“Well, neither am I, so we either figure out a way to work together to keep Seamus or we’ll both lose him.”
“Are you actually sure either of us really had him?”
Yancy tossed his head back as laughter overwhelmed him. “No, but he sure had us, didn’t he?”
“I think he still does.” John chuckled as he waved his hand around in front of them. “We’ve been in a fight, got shot at, crashed my cruiser, and now we’re quietly sitting here discussing how to keep the man. If that doesn’t say Seamus has us both by the short hairs, I don’t know what does.”
“Point taken.” Yancy nodded in agreement, mostly because John was absolutely right. “But we have to keep that information from Seamus. We’d never hear the end of it if he found out just how far we’re willing to go to keep him.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.”
Yancy and John both jumped when they heard a voice behind them. Yancy gripped his gun tightly in his hand as he leaned up to peek over the upside-down vehicle. He blew out a deep breath of relief as he loosened his fingers, dropping his head down into his other hand.
“Jesus, Rourke.”
Rourke smirked from his position where he was leaning on the edge of the cruiser. “I think my baby brother would be plenty interested in the fact that he has you both by the short hairs.”
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” Yancy snapped as he lifted his head and glared at the man.
Rourke’s eyebrows skyrocketed. “You’re going to shoot me because I’m going to squeal?”
“No, the idiot that shot out our tire is going to shoot you.”
Rourke’s head snapped around as he started scanning their surroundings. “Someone shot out your tire?”
“Granted, I don’t know John all that well”—even if it looked like that was about to change—“but I’m pretty damn sure that he’s a better driver than this.”
Rourke stopped scrutinizing the area around them and pinned his gaze on Yancy. “Who’d you piss off?”
Yancy’s eyes narrowed at Rourke’s accusation. “Now why does it have to be me that pissed someone off? Couldn’t it have been John?”
“Oh, I have no doubt that John has pissed off plenty of people, but they don’t usually shoot at him.” Rourke’s sarcastic grin grated on Yancy’s nerves to the point where he wanted to punch the guy. “We tend to avoid that here in the country. Ruins our flannel shirts.”
“You’re not wearing a flannel shirt, Rourke, and this is not
Deliverance
.”
“I could have been.”
Yancy rolled his eyes and turned away from Rourke before he lunged over the undercarriage of the vehicle and went for the man’s throat. Rourke was purposely trying to piss him off.
Yancy just didn’t know why.
And he really didn’t have time to figure it out right now. John had gone pale and seemed to be listing to one side. Considering the crash they had just been through, Yancy was worried that the man might have internal injuries.
Seamus would kill him if anything happened to John.
“Rourke, I think we need an ambulance,” he said as he squatted down next to John and checked his pulse. The man was alive. Yancy already knew that. But he just wanted to make sure he was really alive. A slow pulse could mean he was going into shock. “John, do you hurt anywhere?”
“Yeah, everywhere.” John laughed, which may or may not have been a good sign.
“Any place more than normal?”
“No, just the usual aches and pains from riding in a vehicle that flipped through the air several times.”
“You forgot the fist fight.”
“The hell I did.” John grinned up at Yancy. “And we’ll revisit that subject once I’m on my feet again. Right now…” John panted for a minute, a grimace crossing his pale features. “I’m just going to rest for a minute.”
“No!” Yancy dropped to his knees and gently slapped John across the face when the man’s eyes closed. “John, come on, wake up. Open your eyes.”
John’s eyes fluttered, but he seemed to be having a really hard time getting them to open the rest of the way.
Yancy did the only thing he could think of. “John, you need to open your eyes. Seamus is waiting for you.”
“Seamus?” John whispered, his eyes fluttering again. This time they raised up slowly. “Where—”
“He’s coming, John.” Yancy actually prayed that that was true. If John didn’t make it, he and Seamus needed to make peace between them. “He’ll be here soon. You have to keep your eyes open or you’ll miss him.”
“Seamus.”
“Yes, Seamus.”
Yancy glanced up at Rourke when the man came around the front of the cruiser. Rourke nodded before squatting down on the other side of John.
“Hey, John, I just talked to Seamus, and he’s on his way.”
“No, no.” John struggled to get up, but it seemed to bring him more pain than anything. Yancy laid a hand on John’s shoulder and gently pushed him back down.
“John, you have to stay here until the ambulance arrives.”
“No Seamus, Yancy. Don’t let him…he can’t…”
“I know, John.” Yancy patted John’s shoulder then looked up at Rourke. “Call Seamus back. Have him meet us at the hospital, and tell some of your brothers to come with him. Seamus’s life might be in danger.”
Yancy watched Rourke’s jaw clench, a tic pulsing along his jaw line before the man pulled his cell phone out again and dialed. Once Rourke started talking, Yancy dismissed the man from his mind and concentrated on John.
He really didn’t like the guy’s pale color. There were a few scrapes and scratches on John’s face, some bruising around one eye and the corner of his chin. Other than that, Yancy couldn’t see a single injury, and that worried him.
John was in shock, but why? A man used to high-speed chases, using a gun in his line or work, and confronting drunk assholes should not be in this much shock from a car crash. Something else had to be wrong.
“Stay with me, John.”
“I’m…I’m here.”
“I can hear the sirens, John. The ambulance will be here in a few minutes, and then we’ll get you to the hospital.”