Ryan Calvert, the lost Callahan brother, had been adopted by a family in Boston while his older brothers were in the military. He hadn’t found the family forced to give him up until well after his brothers’ deaths. But he’d been there in time to save the nephews he hadn’t known he’d had.
“I doubt it,” Rafe told Crowe, sipping at his coffee as he rose from the chair again and paced to the kitchen window.
“What the fuck are you looking for, Rafe?” Logan finally burst out. “You did that half the night, until we went to bed, and now you’re starting that shit again. Are you on speed or something?”
Hell if Rafe knew what was wrong with him.
He kept expecting … something. Someone.
Cami. And the thought of Cami had a chill tearing up his spine. Son of a bitch, he couldn’t figure out what the hell was wrong.
Rafe stared down the road again, his brows drawn into a frown as he tried to put together the pieces of what was making him so crazy.
Not that the nerve-wracking emotions made sense, but he’d learned a long time ago not to expect anything in Corbin County to actually make sense. Because it wasn’t going to happen.
And nothing concerning Cami ever made sense.
One thing was for sure, though; he had to see her. Just as fast as he could get there, he suddenly thought. Back door, front door, slipping through the basement window, it didn’t fucking matter. He should have gone last night. He should have turned around the second this feeling had hit him like a punch in the gut.
Hell, he should have never returned to the ranch last night. What he should have done was headed straight to her house, slipped in, crawled into that big bed beside her, and fucked her until they were both exhausted. Maybe then he could have slept. One thing was for damned certain, he wasn’t sleeping now. And he wouldn’t sleep until he got to her. Until he assured himself she was okay.
It was that thought. That feeling that suddenly had adrenaline surging through him and his body tensing to rush to dress and leave.
As he started to turn from the window he glimpsed a flash of black and orange amid the newly budding trees and paused until the vehicle came into view.
What the hell was going on? Why was Archer Tobias arriving in his official SUV. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be a good thing. It never had been before when the sheriff had shown up. Though, Rafe had to admit, Archer was a damned sight better sheriff than his father had ever even considered being.
“Sheriff’s here,” he told his cousins quietly as that feeling of panicked need, that urge to hurry and get to Cami intensified.
Immediately Logan and Crowe were up and moving.
They didn’t bother racing to their rooms to dress. They snagged the jeans, T-shirts, socks, boots, and jackets they kept in the boot room just for such times. Those times when they were too lazy to dress and could have regretted it.
By time Archer Tobias pulled into the drive and parked, they were dressed and ready for whatever the world, karma, or fate decided to throw at them. They were also waiting at the end of the drive for him.
The cameras were on and recording, audio was functioning, and everything set to record anything that might or might not affect the final outcome if Archer had arrived in any official capacity.
They were stepping through the gate as Archer stepped from the vehicle, his expression heavy enough that Rafe felt that first tight clench of his chest.
Moving from the vehicle, Archer faced the three of them, though his gaze was clearly focused on Rafe.
There was something in Archer’s eyes that had a small, shadowed corner of Rafer’s soul clenching in terror.
For the first time in his life, Rafe refused to allow the impulsive intuition he sometimes carried free.
“What are you doing here, Arch?” Rafe growled.
“I’m sorry about this, Rafe.” Archer shook his head as he breathed out wearily. “I need to know where you were last night after you left the dance.”
Rafe felt his jaw lock. Every damned time there was a robbery, an attempted rape, a stolen car, whatever, it seemed the sheriff headed to the ranch if they were in town.
First it had been Archer’s father, and now it was Archer. The fucking past kept repeating itself, and each time it did so, it just pissed Rafe the hell off more.
He was damned sick of it too.
“We came back here, Archer,” Crowe informed him when Rafe refused to answer.
“Did anyone see you?” Archer glanced above their heads to one of the few cameras that could possibly be detected. If a person was knowledgeable enough to know what to look for. “Do you have a time stamp on the recording the camera would have made?”
“I have a stamp,” Crowe said. Rafe felt his lip curling in disgust that Archer was even here for the Corbin bastards.
And hell yes, Rafe’s cameras were time-stamped. The cousins had learned early to protect themselves, and they’d learned to make damned sure to watch every step they made where this was concerned.
They didn’t take chances. They’d learned young to watch their backs against circumstantial evidence.
Archer tilted his hat back and propped his hands on his hips as he stared back at them. “I just asked, Crowe.” He turned back to Rafe.
“And I just answered you definitively,” Crowe informed him. “That way, there’s no misunderstanding.”
“I didn’t expect we would have a misunderstanding.” Archer’s gaze connected with Rafe’s. “Would anyone know how to mess with your system? How to make certain your arrival wasn’t recorded?”
Rafe glanced at his cousins as they shook their heads, their gazes sharpening on Archer’s now. “We don’t spread our business around, Arch,” Rafe told him. “But to answer your question, no, no one should know anything about the system or even that it exists.”
They had friends now, where they hadn’t had before, security specialists who had assisted in the installation and programming of a security and surveillance system that would be almost impossible to crack.
But the questions Archer was asking had that cold, tight fist to Rafe’s chest clenching again. He could feel it; something wasn’t right. Something had happened.
Something had happened that Archer was hesitating to tell him.
That meant something that could potentially force Rafe or all three Callahan cousins to lose the control they had kept such a firm grip on in the past months.
There were few things that could or would threaten that control.
For Rafe, there was only danger or harm to his cousins or to—
Rafe felt his body tense.
The truth was there in Archer’s eyes, in the somber cast of his expression. And there was only one connection they had that would put that look in the sheriff’s eyes.
“Ah God,” Rafe whispered, feeling as though he were choking, ready to gag from the implications of that look. “Fuck, is she okay?”
He could feel the world suddenly threatening to crash down on him. Not Cami. Ah God, please, please not his Cami.
Logan and Crowe jerked toward Rafe as Archer’s hands dropped from his waist, one hand on his weapon.
Cami. Sweet God in heaven. Ah God, something had happened to Cami.