Page 52 of The Wrong Ride Home (Wildflower Canyon #1)

elena

I ’d been shot, yes . I was alive, also, yes . But you’d think Duke was preparing me for burial the way he was acting.

"Elena, sit the hell down," he barked as I tried to push off the couch.

I glared up at him from where I was half-buried under a mountain of blankets. "Duke, I got hit in my shoulder, not my spine."

"Don’t care." He crossed his arms, all hard lines and stubbornness. "You're staying put."

I huffed, willing patience into my bones. He was being impossible.

"Let me make this real clear." I slowly peeled a blanket off my lap. "If you don’t let me move, I swear to God, I will?—"

He leaned down, hands braced on either side of me, eyes dark and dangerous. "You will what, Elena?"

I narrowed my eyes. "I’ll make your life a living hell."

Duke smirked. "Too late. You’re already doing that."

The smug bastard.

I scowled as he pulled the blanket back up, tucking it around me like I was a fragile thing. "You need to rest. The doctor said?—"

I huffed. "The doctor also said light movement is fine."

"That doesn’t mean wandering around doing ranch work."

“I was going to the damn kitchen, Duke.”

“Nope.”

“Duke, I?—”

“Nope.”

I threw up my good hand. “You’re suffocating me.”

“You’ll live.” He was completely unfazed by my frustration.

I gritted my teeth. "You're enjoying this."

He looked at me somberly. “You think I’m enjoying this? That you got shot? That you almost died? That I had to carry you bleeding? You think this is something I get pleasure out of?”

I blinked at the hurt in his voice. “I…I’m…I’m so sorry, Duke, I?—”

“I’m kinda enjoying it,” the asshole admitted and winked at me.

I was going to kill him.

But I knew he wasn’t wrong that I needed rest because I kept falling asleep at the drop of a hat. I knew it was the painkillers, but without them, I thought I’d pass out because of the pain .

I’d been hurt plenty. I worked on a ranch, and you had to deal with the occasional bruised ribs from an ornery horse throwing a fit, cracked or broken fingers from roping cattle wrong, sprained wrists from being yanked by a lead rope, cuts and scrapes from barbed wire and fence repairs, bruised tailbone from landing wrong after a rough ride, horn bruises from working too close to cattle…

I could go on and on. Aches and pains were part of the job.

You didn’t complain—you just worked through it.

But getting shot was the motherfucking worst.

Four days after I was shot, Duke and Itzel (because she was on his side) allowed me to walk around the house a little, as in, I could go to the kitchen and get something to drink, and Duke didn’t carry me to the bathroom, waiting for me to do my business, ignoring my embarrassment, saying, “ I have had my mouth on your pussy, stop with all this being shy nonsense .”

On the fifth day, the sheriff showed up, or rather, was allowed to do so because Duke had made it clear to everyone that I wasn’t to be disturbed in any way.

“If I’d known that I could get a week off work by getting shot, I would’ve gotten a bullet into me a long time ago,” I muttered as I sat on a kitchen chair, shrugging Duke’s help off.

“Don’t even joke about that,” Duke admonished. He sat next to me, his arm around my chair, his stance proprietary, his whole body coiled tight like a spring.

Sheriff Hugh Dillon was a no-nonsense man, so it was creepy as hell to see him amused by us.

He was in his late fifties and ran the sheriff’s office with an iron fist. He was clean-shaven and had forgone the traditional uniform for jeans, cowboy boots, a button-down shirt, and a Stetson.

His sheriff’s badge gleamed on his belt.

Sheriff Dillon gave me a rundown of what had happened.

I gaped at him. "You’re saying this was a professional hit?" I looked from him to Duke. "On me?"

Duke put a hand on my shoulder, the one that wasn’t shot, and rubbed gently.

"The shooter was positioned high, likely using a long-range rifle. Whoever it was knew what they were doing—steady hand, clean shot. No hesitation.”

A chill ran down my spine. The man was using terms I’d never heard in my life like, sniper’s perch . What the fuck was that?

My stomach turned as what he said sank in. I looked at Duke. “Someone was watching us,” I whispered.

He continued to stroke my shoulder. “Yeah, baby.”

My skin crawled at the thought. Somewhere up there, hidden in the trees or behind a rocky outcrop, someone had been lying in wait, eyes locked on us, finger resting on the trigger while we made love.

I could picture the nest—trampled grass, the smell of gun oil lingering in the air, maybe a spent casing left behind in the dirt. The shooter had been still, patient, waiting for the right moment. Not an amateur. Not a panicked, last-second decision. He waited until we were done, dressed… God!

And then it got worse .

“We have some intel that says the hit was meant for Duke?—”

“Hugh, shut the fuck up,” Duke snapped. “I told you we weren’t going to?—”

“No, don’t shut the fuck up,” I raged. “I got shot because of you, you motherfucker, I deserve to know everything. So, tell me every fucking thing , Sheriff.”

He chuckled. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Elena—” Duke began.

“Why the hell is someone wanting you dead, Duke?” I cried out. “I mean…what the fuck?” Then I looked at the sheriff. “How do you know it was for him and not me?” But I already knew why. I was a nobody.

“You moved suddenly…according to Duke, and I think you got hit on the shoulder. If you hadn’t, Duke would’ve taken that bullet to the chest."

My stomach dropped. I had wanted to kiss him before getting on Whiskey. “What are you…like doing cartel business or something in Dallas?” I looked at Duke, incredulous.

Duke kissed my temple laughing softly. “No, baby, I’m not.”

“Then what?” I looked around.

“We think this may be connected to me not wanting to sell Wilder Ranch any longer,” Duke explained.

"You're telling me”—I let his words sink in—"that I got shot because someone wants to kill your ass because you won’t sell this fucking ranch?”

Duke arched an eyebrow. "Elena?—"

I stood, my chair scraping against the floor and winced. "I swear to God, Duke, if you don’t figure out who did this and fix it, I will personally kick your ass. And you, Sheriff, do you know how to handle somethin’ like this? It’s not like we shoot people around here.”

Sheriff Dillon cleared his throat, trying not to smile. "Yes, ma’am, we can handle this."

After the sheriff left, I went to our bedroom since Duke had moved me out of the bunkhouse.

Duke followed. “Baby?”

I swallowed and flopped down on the bed. “You can’t die.”

“I won’t.”

“I got shot…so, yeah, you can, too, die,” I retorted angrily. “Maybe just sell the ranch. It’s not worth your life.”

“I thought we decided not to run scared anymore.” He put an arm around me, and I rested my head on his shoulder.

“You think the universe is sending us a message? We had sex for the first time since that summer, and I got shot. What’s gonna happen next time? The house burns down?” I knew I was sounding dramatic, but I felt fucking awful.

“We’re going to work this out. I promise,” Duke assured me, but I had my doubts.

The next day Maverick Kincaid assured me of the same thing. “ Wildflower, this will be sorted .”

He had a lot of faith in the sheriff. Joy joined him, her enthusiasm loud enough to shake the rafters.

“Jesus, Elena.” Joy shook her head. “Only you could get shot and still manage to look better than the rest of us.”

“She’s always looked better than everyone else.” Duke wrapped his arm around me in that proprietary manner again.

“You know nothing happened ever between her and me?” Maverick said when he saw the gesture.

“Because she didn’t want it to.” Duke nodded. “But you did.”

“Well, yeah. I’m a red-blooded man, and your woman is fuckin’ fabulous.”

“ His woman is right here,” I quipped.

Joy settled back in the armchair across from Duke and me on the sofa. Maverick stood by the window, drinking the coffee Itzel had served.

“Men are so…primal, aren’t they?” Joy beat her chest and added gruffly, “My woman, hear me roar.”

We all laughed.

“She was never gonna get with me, Duke,” Maverick drawled softly. “I knew you had hurt her, Duke, and once you came back, I could also see you wanted her back. I’m glad you both finally figured it out.”

"Figured what out?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.

He gestured between me and Duke. "That you’re together."

I opened my mouth to argue just on principle, but Duke beat me to it. “We are! We’re getting married soon.”

I whipped my head around to glare at him. “Say what? ”

“I’m going to choose the dress,” Joy said with a whoop of delight.

Duke looked at me, face unreadable, but his eyes—God, his eyes, they spoke volumes. "Yeah, Elena, we’re getting married."

“You have to ask first, and I could say no.”

I’d say yes before he even finished asking, but he didn’t need me to spell it out, did he?

Still, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t hide the happiness his words stirred in me.

After a lifetime of feeling unimportant, I wasn’t, not to Duke.

The way he cared for me, the way he showed up, the way he…

yeah, loved me—without hesitation, without doubt—proved what I already knew. We were forever.

“I’m not goin’ to ask ‘cause then you may get the hair-brained idea that you have a choice in the matter,” Duke countered arrogantly.

"You can’t just decide that."

"Sure, I can," Duke shot back.

“We hardly know each other, Duke. We…come on.”

“Know all about each other that we need to know,” Duke asserted.

Joy laughed, shaking her head. "Oh, this is fun."

Maverick grinned. “Look, y’all can argue all you want, but we know the truth. Hell, I think you know it as well, Elena.”

"And what is that?" I challenged.

Maverick smiled wide. "You love each other. Everything else is just cosmetic nonsense that don’t mean a damn thing."