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Chapter Two

Blue heard the voices and opened his eyes.

Big mistake. The light stabbed through his head like razors, and a very unmanly sounding groan clawed its way through his parched throat.

That stopped the voices.

He heard movement. People shuffling around, and despite the pain, he reached for his gun.

Not there.

Even though it was hard to think, he figured this couldn’t be good. Unarmed and in god-awful pain. He hoped he didn’t have to fight his way out of there, because judging from the way he felt, he’d already had his butt kicked bad.

Blue had another go at opening his eyes. This time he took things slower and cracked just one eyelid so he could have a look. There was an elderly man with salt-and-pepper hair looming over him. No gun, either, but he was sporting a very concerned expression.

“I’m Dr. Wilbert Howland,” the man said. “I did your surgery.”

It took Blue a moment to process that. Surgery likely meant a hospital, so he glanced around.

Yep.

He was in bed, flat on his back, surrounded by sterile white walls and an antiseptic smell.

“Surgery?” Blue repeated. He tried to pick through the images and sounds that spun like an F5 tornado through his head.

“You were shot,” the doctor provided. “And you have a concussion.”

With the help of the ache in his left shoulder nudging him, Blue remembered getting shot and being smacked in the head with a piece of flying rock. Hard to forget the blistering pain from those two things. He also remembered the gunmen.

Three of them.

That gave him a jolt of concern. “Where are the guys who shot me?”

“Two are dead. The other one’s missing.”

Blue groaned again. “The missing one will come for me.” At least Blue thought he would.

“You’re safe here. And you’re going to be fine,” the doc assured him. “The bullet didn’t hit anything vital, but you did lose a lot of blood because it took a while to get an ambulance out there to you.”

No memory of an ambulance. Zero. No memory of how much time had passed, either. Definitely something he should be able to recall.

“Where are my clothes?” he asked, glancing down at the hospital gown.

“Bagged. I’ll have someone bring them to you if the sheriff doesn’t need them for processing.”

Right. Because the clothes might be needed for an investigation. “I want the Stetson and the vest. They’re my good-luck charms,” he added.

The doc gave him a funny look. No doubt because he was in the hospital. But he was also alive.

That meant the good-luck charms had worked again.

The doctor leaned closer and waved a little penlight in front of Blue’s eyes. More pain. Heck, breathing made it worse, too.

“If it hadn’t been for Rayanne,” the doctor said, “you might have bled out. She added pressure to your wound to slow down the blood flow.”

“Rayanne,” Blue managed to say, and he got a glimpse of her peering over the doctor’s shoulder.

The relief was instant, and Blue released the breath he didn’t even know he’d been holding.

Yeah, it was her, all right.

She had her ginger-brown hair pulled into her usual ponytail, though strands had slipped out and were dangling around her face and shoulders. When she stepped to the doctor’s side, he saw the blood on the front of her buckskin-colored jacket.

“You’re hurt.” Blue tried to sit up, but the doctor stopped that.

Rayanne shook her head. “That’s not my blood. It’s yours.”

More relief. It was bad enough that he’d been shot, but it would have been much worse if the bullet had gone into Rayanne instead.

But why did she look so, well, riled at him?

This wasn’t the first time they’d gotten shot at together. As an ATF agent, he had worked on a few cases with her when the investigations had landed in her jurisdiction. So why was she eyeing him now as if she wanted to rip off his aching head?

And the questions just kept coming.

Why had he been shot, and where the heck was he? He knew the hospital part, but he’d been in several hospitals in San Antonio, his hometown, and this wasn’t one of them.

“Why’d those men want you dead?” Rayanne asked. “Why aren’t you dead?” she tacked onto that.

Clearly she had some questions of her own.

Blue opened his mouth to get busy answering them and realized he didn’t have a clue. “Start from the beginning,” he insisted. “I want to know what’s going on. Why can’t I remember how I got here?”

Rayanne huffed. More eye narrowing, and those gray eyes that at times could take on a warm, sensual glow certainly weren’t warm or sensual at the moment. They were like little slabs of ice jabbing at him.

“A sensor alarm went off at the ranch,” she finally said, “and when I rode out to check, I found you trying not to draw the attention of three gunmen who drove up on the back side of the fence.”

On one level that gave him a serious shot of adrenaline, but on another it was just plain confusing.

Think, Blue.

Not easy to do, but he sorted through some of the fog and remembered going to the ranch that Rayanne’s family owned.

Estranged family, he mentally corrected.

Rayanne had told him that she might have to go back to Sweetwater Springs because her mother was possibly going to be arrested for the decades-old murder of an alleged lover, Whitt Braddock.

And that was where Blue’s memories came to a grinding halt.

“Why were the gunmen there?” he asked. “And why are you so mad?”

Her next huff was considerably louder. “Could you give us a minute?” Rayanne asked the doc.

Dr. Howland didn’t seem exactly comfortable with that, but he eventually nodded. “Only for a minute or two. And go easy on him.”

“You want to know why I’m mad?” Rayanne repeated once the doctor had stepped out. “Well, for starters you slept with me almost five months ago and then disappeared without so much as a Post-it note.”

Oh, man.

He’d slept with her?

Blue remembered the attraction between them. Felt it blood-deep even now. But he’d always fought falling into bed with her because he had a strict rule about not having sex with coworkers.

Blue shook his head. “I don’t remember.”

And that was saying something. Rayanne wasn’t exactly forgettable, and sex with her should have stuck in his mind like permanent glue.

“I have amnesia?” he asked. That was sadly the best-case scenario here. The worst would be some kind of permanent brain damage.

She lifted her shoulder. “You’d have to ask the doctor about that.”

And he would, the second the man came back. For now, though, he needed as much info as possible. “What happened after I disappeared?”

Rayanne studied him, the way a cop would study a suspect she thought was lying through his teeth. “I got word that you were dead. I can’t think of any good reason you’d let me believe that other than you really did want me out of your life.”

Oh, mercy.

It felt as if twin heavyweights had slugged each side of his jaw at the same time. Blue couldn’t speak. Heck, he couldn’t even catch his breath. Yeah, he was pretty much the love-’em-and-leave-’em sort, but there was no way he’d do something like that to Rayanne.

Would he?

“I looked for you when you left,” she continued, “but I got a message from your foster brother saying you were dead. That you’d been killed in Mexico.”

There was a massive amount of fog in his head, but he could sort through enough to remember some things.

“I don’t have a brother, either a real one or a foster,” he insisted. “And I sure as hell didn’t die in Mexico. I’m right here.” Blue reached for her, but she stepped back as if he’d tried to tase her.

Before Blue could get out of bed and do something to convince her that he wasn’t the bad guy here, the door flew open. Blue reached for his gun again. Cursed when it wasn’t where it belonged.

However, Rayanne pulled her Colt from her shoulder holster.

False alarm. It was Dr. Howland, but he wasn’t alone.

The sandy-haired, linebacker-sized guy who came through the door spared her and then her gun a glance as he flashed his badge and made a beeline for Blue. Thankfully, this man wasn’t a blurry memory.

It was Blue’s boss, Agent Caleb Wiggs, from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives—ATF.

At least, Caleb had been his boss five months ago. With everything else going on, Blue figured he could be wrong about that, too.

Rayanne seemed to know him, as well, and judging from her scowl, Caleb wasn’t on her list of friends, either. She reholstered the Colt as if she’d declared war on it, but she watched him with those cop’s eyes.

“You all right, Blue?” Caleb asked. He set a bag on the foot of the bed.

No way could Blue answer yes to that question. It might garner him a lightning bolt for such a big lie. “What’s going on?”

Caleb didn’t answer, but he looked at Rayanne and the doctor. “I need to talk to Agent McCurdy in private.”

“Agent McCurdy?” Rayanne questioned. She huffed. “Don’t you mean former agent?”

That got Blue’s complete attention. Great day in the morning. Along with his mind and gun, had he managed to lose his badge, too?

“I mean agent.” And Caleb didn’t sound any friendlier than Rayanne. “Blue still works for me.”

“Wait a minute,” Blue said, trying to figure this out. It didn’t help that his shoulder started clamoring for more pain meds. “What’s the date?”

“October 6,” the doctor provided. “And I hope everyone remembers that I just dug a bullet out of my patient here. He needs some peace and quiet so he can recover.”

“And he’ll get it,” Caleb insisted. “I’ve already made arrangements to have him moved.” He tipped his head to the bag. “Figured you could use a change of clothes for the drive to another hospital. One where I can make sure you have some security.”

“He’s not going anywhere, not until I get some answers first,” Rayanne insisted right back.

That started a staring match between his boss and the deputy he’d apparently crossed lines with. Big ones.

All four of them volleyed glances at each other. “I’ll give you a few more minutes,” the doctor finally said. “After that my patient will get some rest.”

Dr. Howland shot Caleb and Rayanne a warning glance that only an experienced doctor in charge could have managed, and he walked out.

Even with the doc’s latest exit, Caleb didn’t answer right away, and when he finally did open his mouth, he looked at Rayanne, not Blue.

“I can’t wrap all of this up in a neat little package for you,” Caleb started. “I honestly don’t know why Blue disappeared.”

“You said it was because he had ties to criminals,” Rayanne reminded him.

Oh, man. And Blue just kept mentally repeating that.

“He did have criminal ties.” Caleb’s gaze finally came to Blue’s. “If you’ve got an explanation about that, I’d like to hear it, because you didn’t just disappear five months ago. You walked away from your job at the Justice Department, and the only reason you’re still on payroll is because I’ve covered your butt and put you on a leave of absence.”

Hell. This just kept getting worse. Not the leave-of-absence part but the reason Caleb had been forced to do something like that for him.

Criminal ties?

No way. He didn’t need his memory to know that.

“The doc must have given me some meds that messed with my head.” A head that Blue now shook. “Because the last thing I remember was finishing up a case with Rayanne. After that, it’s just bits and pieces that don’t make sense. Why did I leave? And why did I come to the McKinnon ranch today with gunmen after me?”

“That’s what I’d like to know,” Rayanne mumbled, but then she waved off any answer he might give. “My brother Seth got IDs on the two dead guys. The bodies are being examined now, and there’s a CSI team searching the woods for evidence.”

Seth, an FBI agent. Blue had never met him, but he’d heard Rayanne mention him.

“The dead men’s names are Leland Chadwell and Brian Kipp,” Rayanne continued, and she watched his face. Maybe to see if there was any sign of recognition.

There wasn’t.

Blue had to shake his head again. “Who are they?”

“They’re hired thugs,” Caleb provided, “and, among other criminal sorts, they often work for Rex Gandy.”

Now, that was a name that rang bells the size of Texas.

Could this mess possibly get any crazier?

Gandy wasn’t just a thug—he was a rich one and had all kinds of nasty ties to gunrunners, money launderers and drug traffickers. As an ATF agent, Blue had dealt with Gandy on several occasions but always when he’d been undercover, and Blue had never been able to find evidence to arrest the piece of dirt.

“Gandy hired these men to come after me,” Blue said like gospel. “Why?”

Caleb gave him an odd look, as if the question had come out of left field. “You don’t know?”

Since it seemed the answer was clear to both Caleb and Rayanne, Blue went with the obvious answer. “Because Gandy’s riled that I keep investigating him.” But he investigated a lot of people, and that didn’t spur an attack to kill. “Why come after me now?”

Again, he got that look. Obviously, he was missing something here.

“I’ve arranged to have Gandy brought in for an interview,” Caleb added.

That was a good start, but Blue wanted a whole lot more. “You plan to answer my question about why Gandy would want me dead now?”

Caleb shrugged. “I figure it’s connected to whatever the heck you’ve been doing for the past five months, and I don’t have any details about that.” He mumbled something that Blue didn’t catch and scrubbed his hand over the back of his neck. “I need to talk to Dr. Howland and see how long this memory problem of yours is going to last.”

Caleb added some really bad profanity and made a swift exit. Only then did Blue see the cop outside his door. Local, no uniform, but he had a badge clipped to his belt and was wearing a sidearm.

That didn’t do much to ease the already twisted knot in Blue’s gut.

Of course, a cop-bodyguard was only partially responsible for that. The main reason for the knot was the woman standing beside his bed and glaring at him.

“All of this is true?” he came out and asked.