Bear Claw Conspiracy

The SUV cruised in going too fast and kicked up dust, suggesting that Cassie, too, knew they were racing the sun. Grit hazed things as the door swung open and she got out, hauling a heavy-looking tackle box with her.

He headed over, extending a hand. “Let me grab that for …” He trailed off, stopping dead as his gut fisted on a surge of heat mixed with dismay.

The woman coming toward him wasn’t the businesslike blonde he’d been expecting.

Not even close.

A sizzle shot through him at the sight of a sharp, triangular face beneath a crooked cap of shiny dark hair. He told himself the sensation was dismay, because he sure as hell shouldn’t be feeling anything else toward a woman like Gigi Lynd.

Gigi. It sounded like it should come with a French label and an import tariff. And from her trendy haircut and unbalanced ear piercings—one on the right, three on the left—to the silver-gilded tips of her gleaming lizard-skin boots—black today rather than the purple she had been wearing before, but equally as impractical—she didn’t belong anywhere near the backcountry. Or him.

His pulse raced. He was going to kill Tucker.

Her white button-down was open just low enough to show a hint of cleavage, and the black belt that rode below her narrow waist had a gleam of silver that drew the eye.

“No,” he said without preamble as she squared off opposite him. “I want one of the others.”

Her smoky gray eyes narrowed. “You made that clear when you trashed me to McDermott.”

“I didn’t—” He broke off, guilt stinging because he hadn’t exactly trashed her, but he’d made it clear he didn’t think she had the backcountry experience or analytical chops to handle the case. “Look, it’s nothing personal.”

“Bull. You took one look at me and decided that I was incompetent based on, what? Some eyeliner and a little bling?” She flicked the more heavily pierced of her earlobes. “Fine, whatever, that’s your problem not mine. But you’re one-hundred percent right that this shouldn’t be personal. You don’t have to like me. Just get out of my way and let me do my job.”

The guilt twisted harder because she was right. He’d snap judged her, hard, which was so far from his usual style it was practically alien.

That didn’t mean she was the right analyst for the job, though.

He glanced up the trail. “Look, I’m sorry about the attitude. It’s just … Believe it or not, I don’t doubt your competence—McDermott wouldn’t have leaned on his contacts in Denver to get you if you weren’t the best crime scene analyst available. But you’re a long way from home, and the backcountry isn’t anything like the city. Alyssa, Cassie and Maya have all worked scenes out here before. You haven’t.”

She pierced him with a cool look. “Yet they sent me, even after you told Tucker not to. Want to take a guess as to why?”

“I don’t want to … Damn it.” He jammed both hands in his pockets, knowing he was beaten. And what was more, he was dead wrong. She hadn’t done a damn thing to deserve his suspicion. It wasn’t her fault that she was the first woman in a long time to make him want to stop and take a second, longer look. Maybe a taste.

And that so wasn’t happening.

He didn’t know what she saw in his face, but her expression softened. “I’m sorry about what happened to Tanya. And under the circumstances, I’m even sorry that my being here bothers you. But back in Denver I was the analyst of choice for badly contaminated scenes. Right before I left, I worked a murder scene at the edge of an eroded riverbank the day after a downpour. And yes, we got the guy.” She paused. “You want to get the two men who hurt your ranger? Then take me to your scene … and make it fast, because we’re burning daylight.”

Matt wasn’t sure which was worse: having been so thoroughly set down … or knowing that he was going to have to stick right with her. Because he’d be damned if anyone else got hurt on his watch.

“Okay,” he said. “Okay, yeah.” Mind already skimming ahead to what he was going to need out of the Jeep, he whipped off his shirt and held it out. “You’re going to want this.”

It wasn’t until she gave a strangled gasp, eyes going wide, that he realized he was standing there bare-chested, and she had no clue why he’d just stripped down.

Heat washed through him. Oh, hell. That was so not cool.

“There’s evidence in the front pocket,” he said quickly. “A feather Tanya was holding when I got to her. Williams said you would want the shirt, too, for transfer.” He started to apologize, would have except for one thing:

She was staring at his chest.

He stilled, watching a faint flush climb her throat and work its way to her face as she swallowed. Then she jerked her eyes to his, and the blush hit hard.

Electricity raced over his skin, tightening his body as they stared at each other for a three count.

She recovered first, with a gulp and a small shiver that he felt deep in his gut. “Um,” she said, voice huskier than it had been a moment earlier, “hold that thought.”

When she put down the tackle box that contained her field kit, he thought … hell, he didn’t know what he thought. His brain was gone, melted by whatever had just telegraphed between them. So when she rummaged and came up with a large evidence bag, he just stared at it for a second.

Then reality returned and his brain reassembled itself.

Tanya. Evidence. The crime scene.

What the hell was he doing?

Without a word, he folded the shirt and tucked it into the bag, watched her seal it and scrawl her name on the first line of the evidence chain. Then he turned away and headed for his Jeep, saying over his shoulder, “Let me grab my jacket and we can hit the trail.”

And as he led her up to Candle Rock, he worked like hell to get his head screwed back on straight. Because he couldn’t afford to let himself get distracted in a crisis situation. Bad things happened when he did.

Chapter Three

Wow. That was all Gigi’s brain could formulate as she followed Blackthorn along a narrow game trail that led up a sharply rocky incline.

Wow, he had a seriously fine body beneath that drab, tan-and-green park service uniform. His sleek bronze skin covered sculpted muscles, its perfection marred by two scars, one high on his shoulder, the other wrapping around his waistline.

Wow, that had been the hottest stand-and-stare moment of her life. Her blood was still humming, her coordination slightly off as her body focused inward.

And wow, this was way outside her comfort zone.

It had been a while since she had made the time or effort, but she’d had her share of relationships, all based on affection, attraction, and the freedom to move on when the time came.

Those relationships had been fun. Satisfying. And not once, not even in the bedroom, had any of those guys lit her up the way she had just ignited from nothing more than seeing Blackthorn’s chest.

Even now, as she scanned the rocks and scrub for scuff marks, the image of his naked torso seemed burned onto her retinas.

Temporary insanity. That was all it was. They’d both had their tempers up, and his adrenaline had probably been pumping for hours. More, she had been disarmed by the way he had backed down, owning his bad behavior when she called him on it.

In her experience, that wasn’t the way real jerks operated. Which meant … well, it didn’t matter what it meant. Her gut said he was complicated, and she didn’t have any room in her life for personal complications. She was there to do her job … which was about evidence, not ogling.

Deliberately, she forced her mind back on track.

The bagged shirt was tucked in the bottom of her field kit. She would process the feather back in the lab, where she could keep absolute track of the environment. But she already knew some of the assessments she would need to make: Was it real or fake? Where had it come from? Why had Tanya been clutching it?

The last question wasn’t really part of an analyst’s job—it was up to the cops and attorneys to turn the data into a story.

But then again, she lived outside the box.

When Blackthorn hit the top of the high ridge, he paused and turned back to her. Surprise flickered when he saw that she was only a few paces behind him and not even breathing particularly hard.

She grinned. “When I was in my early teens, my parents went on a survivalist kick and decided all four of us kids needed to know how to take care of ourselves, no matter what. Our family vacations turned into something out of Survivor for a few years. Yosemite, the Sonoran Desert, Alaska … Some of it seemed like torture at the time, but looking back, it wasn’t. It’s just the way my family operates.” “As survivalists?”