Marie Ferrarella - The Coltons - Nick, Clay & Jericho

But she wasn’t that little girl anymore. Even back then, she’d had a tendency to resist Clay’s protective ways because to be taken care of carried a price tag. It meant surrendering her independence, and independence meant everything in the world to her. Hers had been hard won and it was a trophy she would fight to retain to her dying breath.

So rather than throw herself into her brother’s arms, she stood where she was, holding herself in check as she smiled and greeted him warmly.

“Hi, Clay.”

“Hi, yourself.” Clay nodded at her. His sister had never been the easiest woman to deal with. She only accepted help under loud protest. That was why he’d been surprised when she’d called, saying she needed to see him. This was more like her. “Nice to see you back, rodeo queen. You home for good now?”

Nick noted that Georgie seemed to bristle at the nickname. Or maybe it was the question and the unspoken implication behind it—that her brother didn’t want her out there, competing—that had her stiffening.

The laugh that passed her lips was short and rueful. “I was going to be.”

Clay’s dark eyes slanted toward the man with his sister before he asked, “But?”

Georgie blew out a breath. She was still struggling to get a grip, to stop feeling as if she’d been physically and emotionally violated. “There’ve been some nasty developments.”

Clay’s frown deepened. Again he looked at the man who’d gotten out of the driver’s side of a dark four-door sedan. His brother radar had gone up the second he saw that. “Like?” he asked.

She did her best to sound removed from what she was saying. The words came tumbling out with no preface, no preamble. “Somebody stole all my money, Clay. And broke into my place while I was gone. Whoever did was sending threatening e-mails to Joe Colton—on my computer.”

At the mention of the Senator’s name, Clay murmured an ambiguous sounding “Oh.”

There was a world of meaning hidden behind the single word, Nick thought. Something was going on here that he wasn’t getting—and he didn’t like it.

Never one to mince words, Clay figured he’d held his peace long enough. He nodded toward the stranger. “What’s he got to do with it?”

“I work for the Senator,” Nick told him before Georgie could say anything. “And I came to bring in the person sending those threatening e-mails.”

Reading between the lines wasn’t difficult. “It’s not Georgie, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Clay informed him. There wasn’t so much as an inch of room left for an argument. That settled, Clay shifted his attention back to his sister. “Who stole your money?” he inquired.

It was obvious that whoever it was, the man or woman was going to be in a hell of a lot of trouble once Clay tracked him or her down. Clay did not take kindly to anyone messing with his family. And since he’d washed his hands of Ryder when his younger brother had been sent to prison for sneaking illegal aliens over the border, that left only Georgie—and Emmie.

“I don’t know,” Georgie answered, doing her best not to let the distress show in her voice. She glanced at Nick as she spoke. “But they think it’s me. On both counts.”

“You?” he retorted incredulously. “You been traipsing around, following that damn rodeo for the last five months, living out of your trailer like some gypsy.” He looked over at the stranger to make sure he’d gotten all that. “Just when the hell were you supposed to have done all this?”

Georgie looked at Nick again. “You have the dates the e-mails were sent, right?”

The petite, incredibly feisty woman had succeeded in doing what no one else had in recent memory. She’d made him feel foolish even though he was just doing his job.

“On every one of the e-mails,” he replied without a shred of emotion.

“My sister doesn’t have the time for that kind of stupid nonsense,” Clay told him tersely. “I don’t think she even knows how to send an e-mail. For the last five months she was too busy trying to win trophies.”

“Prize money, Clay,” Georgie corrected, annoyed.

How many times did she have to tell him she didn’t care about the accolades, the glory part? There was a very practical reason why she’d done what she had. Because competing in rodeo events was all she knew. She’d been put on a horse before she could walk and both her grandfather and her mother had been rodeo legends in their time. Rodeoing was in her genes.

Besides, it was the fastest way she knew to make money. Hell, it was the only way she knew how to make money.

“I was trying to win prize money so that Emmie and I could stay put here and she could go to school like a regular little girl come the fall.” She glanced down fondly at her daughter.

“I’m not a regular little girl,” Emmie interjected with protest, wrinkling her nose with disdain. Fisting her hands, she dug them into her hips the way she’d seen her mother do countless times.

“I know that, sweetie,” Georgie told her, kissing the top of her daughter’s head, “but we don’t want the other kids to hear that. They’ll be jealous.”

Emmie nodded, understanding. Georgie bit her tongue to not laugh.

“You could have done that without risking breaking every bone in your body,” Clay told her. He’d been after her to quit the moment she’d told him she was going to compete. A lot of things could happen to a woman on the road with only a kid. “I would have been happy to give you the money.”

They’d been through all this before. More than once. “I don’t want to take your money, Clay.”

Clay threw up his hands in frustration. “A loan, then. Damn it all, Georgie, what’s my money good for if I can’t do what I want with it?” he demanded.

Georgie patted him on the shoulder, the way she used to when she’d tried to calm him down and keep his sun-tanned complexion from turning a bright red.

“I’m sure that you’ll find something else to do with it, big brother,” she answered. And then she eyed him squarely, her lighter tone changing. “I don’t want to be beholden to anyone, Clay, not even you. I’m my own person. If I take money from you, that changes everything.”

He didn’t see how. Damn it all, Georgie could still frustrate him the way no other woman could. “I’m not buying you, Georgie. I’m not even renting you. I just want to help.”

“You can help by coming to Emmie’s birthday party next week,” she told him brightly, winking at her daughter.

Finding an in, Emmie was quick to try to further her own agenda. “You can buy me a pony, Uncle Clay. I won’t give it back.”

Again he laughed, this time the sound was softer. “Nice to know one of the women in the family has some sense,” Clay told the little girl with affection. His eyes shifted toward Nick and the warmth abruptly evaporated. Clay looked the man up and down. “You some kind of government man?” he inquired.

“He’s a Secret Service agent,” Emmie was quick to inform him, enunciating the occupation carefully so as not to get it wrong.

Clay’s eyes swept over the other man again. He would have pegged him for a member of the FBI or CIA instead. “Oh. You’re a long way from home, Secret Service agent. Aren’t you supposed to be guarding the President or something?”

“During an election year, we’re assigned to the presidential candidates,” Nick explained patiently, even though it was against his nature to explain himself at all. But being a stranger and alone here, he began to think he needed all the support he could get. “And someone’s been sending threatening letters from your sister’s house to the Senator.” How many times was he going to have to repeat that story before he could finally leave? he wondered in frustration.