Upper Hand (Cedar Tree Book 5) (25 page)

Mal presses in beside me and pulls the receiver back from my ear so he can listen in.

“But I don’t know where he is... Dylan...and even if I did, I can’t...I couldn’t!” I’m hyperventilating and Mal puts his arm around my shoulder, giving me a reassuring squeeze.

“Better find him then. I will call your cell phone in six hours from now. You don’t answer? Your man pays the price.” Then I hear a click. Gone.

“Where was Clint gonna be at, Beth?” Mal asks urgently keeping his hand on my shoulder and squeezing it when I don’t respond right away.

“His office—meeting Jed to talk about the business. That’s all I know.” I lean forward with my head against the doorpost, vaguely registering Mal on his cell phone, when Seb moves in and maneuvers me into the kitchen, away from prying eyes. His arms come around me and his hand pushes my head in his neck.

“Bethie...” he mumbles. From behind me I can feel another body crowding me and just as I’m about to sink through my knees, I’m being held upright in a Seb and Arlene sandwich.

-

-

“T
hat woman is a vulture, I’m telling you.”

Jed’s just finished telling me how Sarah Creemore, the client in Cortez whose house reno was almost done, had not left an opportunity by the wayside to get her hands on him. A slight shiver of disgust rolled down my back at some of the ways in which she’d tried to get his attention. Last one apparently a suggestion for a threesome between brothers. Yuck. Not that there’s anything wrong with a threesome, necessarily. I might’ve tried that on once or twice, in my much, much younger years, when I was in college. But being in one that involved my brother? Not ever. I can’t help the smile that steals over my face at the thought of Jed having to ward off an apparently very singularly focused woman.

“You laughing at me?” he asks, the side of his mouth lifting slightly. I just shrug, smile still on my face, which should be enough of an answer.

“Asshole,” he mutters, shaking his head. “And by the way, you gonna keep wearing this thing? You look like some kind of cowpoke.” He’s playing with the brim of my cowboy hat, which I’d plopped on the desk when I sat down.

I run my hand over the fine stubble on my head, feeling the ridge of scar tissue left behind by surgery. “I’ve gotten used to it. Keeps the cold off my head.”

“Guess you’re keeping the bald head and the scruff then?” He rubs his own rather unshaven chin while still toying with my hat.

“Beth seems to like it,” I point out, earning me a full on smile. Something I have to admit changes Jed’s face right back to where I recognize him again. It makes him look his age, rather than about ten years older.

“She’s a good woman. Rarely ever left your bedside, constantly in the hospital staff’s faces to make sure you were getting all you needed. Hell, she even took to exercising your muscles while you were out. She’d read somewhere it could prevent muscle tissue from deteriorating and demanded to know why no one was doing it for you. When the nurse told her they simply didn’t have the staff  or the funding for that, she took it upon herself to do it. Pretty damn good woman, if you ask me.”

I didn’t know that. Granted, I’d lost a month and that was still at times fucking with my head. Despite the fact that I’d gotten up to speed on most things, no one told me about that. The thought of Beth caring for me so obviously, when I wasn’t aware, hits me deep. I wasted my time with her. A fucking year I let her keep me at bay. As far as I can tell from what I know now, she’s cared all along. Not going to waste any more though, the first chance I get, I’m gonna quit beating around the bush and tell her exactly how I feel. Been hinting at it, but never quite said the words to her.

“She is,” I agree, “and the first chance I get I’m gonna let her know.”

“Maybe it’s the hat,” Jed jokes. “Can’t be your ugly mug, ‘cause we both know I’m the better-looking one.” With a flourish he plants the cowboy hat on his head. Tugging on it until the brim throws a shadow over his eyes.

“Wanna leave my hat alone?”

“Think I’m gonna borrow it and go out on the town tonight. I hear the diner’s the place to go for picking up hot chicks. I’ll wear the hat, see if it can make me lucky.” He leans back in his chair, crosses his arms over his chest, and plants his feet on
my
desk, smiling widely.

I shake my head, just thinking about how easily we’ve reverted back to a familiar comfort level, not far from where we were before Luanne entered the picture, when the outer door of the office slams open. I watch Jed’s eye’s bug out, and I hear a gravelly voice behind me. “Mason?”

“That’s me, what’s all this?” Jed says, dropping his feet from the desk and sitting up straight. I start moving my chair around but before I have a chance to turn all the way, my world goes black.

-

-

“S
it down, Beth.” Arlene is pushing me down in the chair in her office, off the kitchen, “before you fall down. Now talk to me.”

Easier said than done, I’m not usually prone to panic but I’m fucking panicking now. Seb walks over with a tumbler of something and shoves it in my hand. “Drink,” he orders, and without thinking, I toss back whatever’s in the glass, only to feel it burning down my throat.

“Holy shit,” I gasp, “what’d you give me?”

“Brandy. Got a bottle I use for cooking. Figured it would work well to knock the edge off the shock.”

I shake my head to clear it and have to admit, the stuff had its merits, if only as a kick in the ass. “It’s working,” I tell him and to Arlene I say, “They’ve got Clint. Want me to trade Dylan in for Clint. I don’t even know where he is.” The panic is working its way back into my body, I can hear it in my own voice. I close my eyes and focus hard on keeping myself in check. When I open them again, Mal is standing in front of me, a concerned look on his face. That can’t be good. Right?

“Gus and Joe are on their way to Clint’s office now, babe. No one’s answering phones, not at the office, not Clint’s cell phone, or Jed’s for that matter. As soon as they get a lay of the land they’ll call. In the meantime, Neil is trying to see if he has any luck with the tracer on Clint’s phone.”

All I can do is nod, remembering something about some software Neil had installed on just about everyone’s phone, allowing him to trace their whereabouts. My heart is feeling a spark of hope.  In the meantime, I’m trying to block images of Jed laying dead in the office or Clint being maimed by these guys.

Half an hour later we’re still waiting. Mal with me in Arlene’s office, Seb in his kitchen while Arlene and Julie, who was called in for her shift early, are manning the tables.

“Should we call?” I ask Mal for the fifteenth time, and for the fifteenth time he patiently shakes his head and tells me they’ll call. I’ve tried calling Clint’s cell phone at least as many times, when finally Mal puts his hand on mine and takes my phone away.

“Beth,” he leans in, his dark, almost black eyes looking intently in mine, “they’ll call. I promise, honey. The second they know anything they’ll call.”

“O—okay,” I stammer. Finally the tears get the better of me and start rolling down my face.

Hooking his hand behind my neck, Mal pulls me up from the chair, sits down, and pulls me down on his lap, wrapping his arm around me while the other presses my face in his neck.

“Fucking finally,” he mumbles, “thought you were never gonna crack.”

How long I’ve been sitting in on Mal’s lap, face buried in his neck, I don’t know. All I know is his shoulder is soaked with my tears, and I can’t help but notice how good he smells. Outdoorsy with a hint of some spice. Nice. My little bout of hysteria over, I finally manage to get my crying under control and start to push back against Mal’s hand, which is still cupping the back of my head.

“Mal, I’m too heavy. Let me up.”

The hand at the back of my head is lifted away, but the one crossing my lap to the opposite hip is still holding me firmly in place. With his free hand he tilts my chin and focuses those dark eyes on me again. Obsidian, that’s what they are. The perfect description. “You good?” he rumbles.

“I’m good. Well...better anyway.” I try to get up, but he’s still holding me down with his arm.

“Mal...”

“I’ll let you go, but don’t let me hear you talking about being too heavy again. That shit pisses me off. That padding you’ve got on you? Makes you soft, pliable—the way a woman should feel. I’m thinking Clint’s a lucky man. Figure if I find me a woman like you one day—all soft and rounded in the right places, but hiding a core of steel—I’d count myself the luckiest guy alive.”

Knew it before, but now I know for sure; some woman is going to count her blessings one of these days with Mal. He’d treat her like a goddess, I’ve no doubt.

“Thanks,” I whisper, but just as I wrap my arms around his neck to give him a hug, a voice booms from the doorway.

“What the fuck?”

“B
uddy, you okay?”

The voice, vaguely recognizable, and the hand on my shoulder, giving me a gentle shake, wake me up to find Joe leaning over me. Disoriented, I look around to find I’m wedged in the tiny bathroom off my office, my torso twisted in the space between the wall and the bowl, and my legs spread and bent at the knees. Joe is standing between them and reaching out a hand.

“Can you move?”

I clasp the hand he offers and let him slowly pull me up to sitting. Aside from the wave of dizziness that should probably concern me, if I didn’t have other things to worry about, I think I’m okay. It’s then I notice that Gus is right behind Joe, just outside the doorway, looking at me intently while talking on his phone.

“Remember what happened?” Joe wants to know, and I tell him what I can, realizing as I’m talking that I haven’t seen my brother yet, but I don’t get a chance to. Gus slips in behind Joe, his cell now tucked away, and mumbles something to Joe I can’t quite pick up.

“Sorry what?”

Gus’s eyes shoot to me. “I said the ambulance is on its way.”

“Is my brother okay?”

“Let’s get you out of here first,” he says, and between Gus and Joe, they pull me up and out of the tiny stall. I’m swaying a bit on my legs, trying to get my balance back.

“Whoa, my friend. Take a minute.”

I should, but I’m more concerned about why they haven’t answered my question, so I repeat it. “Where’s my brother? Is he alright?” This time I can read the answer in their faces, and still I stumble past them to see for myself.
Fuck!
When I swing around, I pin Gus with a stare. “Who?”

“Not sure. I have my suspicions and Neil is trying to track a few things down, but for now he’s in the wind. We’ll find him though. Better fucking believe it.” Gus’s words are delivered with conviction, which makes me feel a bit better. Then he tells me about the phone call Beth received, and how they managed to find me, and there is only one thing on my mind.

“Take me to Beth.”

“Buddy, we’ve gotta wait for the ambulance to check you out.”

“Now. I have to see her now.” I get right up in Gus’s face. Not budging, he gives me a thorough stare down before I can see resolve slide over his face.

“Anything wrong, and I mean
anything,
we head straight for the hospital. You get me?” His voice is clipped and I have no desire to fight him on that. At least not once I’ve seen her with my own eyes. To Joe he says, “Change of plans, redirect the ambulance to the diner.”

Within seconds they have me hustled into Gus’s big Yukon, but not before I snatch up the cowboy hat that lies abandoned on the floor next to the desk.
Jesus
.

Normally, it takes about ten minutes to get to the diner, Gus does it in a little over five and pulls around to the back parking lot. Seb’s eyes go wide when he sees me walking in the kitchen, flanked by the other two. He grins and with a lift of his chin indicates Arlene’s office, where the door is cracked a bit. I push the door open further, only to have the breath knocked out of me at what greets me. Before I can even begin to process, “What the fuck?” bursts out of me.

“Clint...” falls from Beth’s lips as she turns to face me, her face still wet with tears, sitting on the single chair the office contains, on Mal’s lap. Leaping up she slams into me, fresh tears instantly getting my shirt wet. My arms close around her but my eyes never leave Mal, who calmly stands up out of the chair and steps toward us. Apparently not at all concerned that I just found my woman, on his lap, with her face buried in his neck.