Addison Fox - The Colton Sheriff

How does a small-town sheriff track a serial killer?

With the help of his fake fiancée!

Running for reelection, Sheriff Trey Colton needs a bride-to-be by his side. Who better than his best friend, psychologist Aisha Allen? But as they start to play house, a serial killer terrorizes their beloved town—and targets Trey. The fight for survival brings an eye-opening truth for these “pretend” lovers—that love is precious...but death is only a heartbeat away.

ADDISON FOXis a lifelong romance reader, addicted to happy-ever-afters. After discovering she found as much joy writing about romance as she did reading it, she’s never looked back. Addison lives in New York with an apartment full of books, a laptop that’s rarely out of sight and a wily beagle who keeps her running. You can ind her at her home on the web at www.addisonfox.comor on Facebook ( Facebook.com/addisonfoxauthor) and Twitter ( @addisonfox)

Also by Addison Fox

The Cowboy’s Deadly Mission

Special Ops Cowboy

Colton’s Deadly Engagement

Cold Case Colton

Colton’s Surprise Heir

Silken Threats

Tempting Target

The Professional

The Royal Spy’s Redemption

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk

The Colton Sheriff

Addison Fox

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-09422-1

THE COLTON SHERIFF

© 2019 Harlequin Books S.A.

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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www.millsandboon.co.uk

Version: 2020-03-02

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For Allie Burton, Tracy Garrett & Lorraine Heath.

My best memories of Colorado

include the three of you.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Epilogue

About the Publisher

Aisha Allen took a slice of piping-hot pizza, folded it in half and bit in. Warm, gooey cheese blended with the tangy bite of tomato sauce, all wrapped up in a doughy pocket that was the very essence of life.

Which made it the perfect antidote to the increasingly gruesome pictures of the dead she’d stared at for the past three hours.

Six bodies. Or seven if you counted the body of Lucy Reese, aka Bianca Rouge, a Vegas prostitute inconveniently called to Roaring Springs, Colorado, the prior January to entertain a high-end client.

And Aisha was counting.

Technically, she didn’t have a right to the photos or the background details already collected by law enforcement. Her credentials as a psychologist extended only to the projects she was actually invited to consult on. But Trey needed help and since she was in a position to give it, she wasn’t going to back down.

Besides, it gave her an additional opportunity to keep an eye on him. He was her best friend and they hadn’t spent many days since the age of eight without talking. Even in the years she spent up in New York getting her “fancy Ivy League degree,” as he loved to tease her about, they’d remained close.

And if she’d like to be closer, well, that was on her. The man had his mind on other things, not his moony-eyed best friend. Their current sheriff and all-around most honorable citizen, Trey Colton, was the heartbeat of Bradford County. And he was in the fight of his life:

A serial killer on the loose dubbed by the press as the “Avalanche Killer.”

A battle brewing for reelection in November that was going to be horribly tight and already fraught with contention.

And an extended family that was...challenging on the very best of days.

No one would ever accuse the Colton family of being quiet, unobtrusive or unnoticeable. They collectively lived life large, and that would have been true in Roaring Springs even without the family legacy of a former US president who bore the Colton surname.

Having a legendary politician in the family only made the spotlight that much brighter.

Aisha knew Trey wasn’t above using the Colton name when he had to, but he hated depending on it. Just like he hated what was going on in his town right now.

Patting her lips with a napkin, she wiped lingering flour dust from her fingers and spread out several of the images. Six bodies, all in various stages of decomposition, from the more recent to practically nothing but bones. The two oldest bodies had also been discovered the farthest down in the shallow grave. Enough depth to hide them and protect them from the elements, but close enough to the surface that they’d been discovered with the impact of a late-spring avalanche.

Although all the victims would need to be identified and ultimately processed as individual crimes, the more recent bodies held Aisha’s focus. Especially the characteristics that appeared common. Eerily so, she thought as she pulled one of the photos closer. Sabrina Gilford, twenty-two, was identified as the most recent victim, her long, dyed dark hair and eyes two of her most distinctive features.