Justice for a Ranger

He gestured toward the bartender, and she took advantage of the moment to assess him in more detail. Even his hands were large, broad. His blunt, strong fingers were sprinkled with dark hair that made her wonder what they would feel like on her. Touching her. Stroking her sensitive skin.

A jagged scar jutted out from the neckline of his black T-shirt, and she imagined the rest of his body beneath. A chest sprinkled with the same dark hair, another scar maybe. And a tattoo or two hidden somewhere on his bronzed skin.

What was she doing? He wasn’t her type. She liked sophisticated, educated men. Men with jobs. Men who shaved and bathed regularly.

“What’ll you have, sugar?” he drawled.

You. She gaped at his mouth, then realized that she was acting like a fool. And Joey Hendricks, professional investigator for the governor, was not a fool. Never had been. Not over a man.

She’d taken notes from her parents’ disastrous divorce and her father’s infidelities, and decided relationships just weren’t worth the trouble. Although a one-nighter, especially with a hunk like this guy, might be fun. A stress release. Maybe even mind-altering. Certainly hotter than any night she’d experienced in years.

Then she remembered her reason for coming to Justice and vetoed the idea.

The drink would have to suffice. “A shot of tequila.”

He arched a thick brow, and she raised her own in challenge. “What? You don’t think I can handle it?”

“Honey, I think you can handle anything that comes your way.”

With one flick of his hand, he waved the waitress over—a twentysomething girl who turned eyes of adoration toward him—then ordered Joey a shot and a Stella for himself.

He would order a beer with a woman’s name. “You don’t like tequila?” she asked.

He leaned back against the booth edge, stretched his long legs out so one of them brushed hers beneath the table. “On the contrary. José and I have been best friends for years.”

She couldn’t help herself. She grinned at his statement. He looked like a tequila-drinking hellion straight from a biker’s fest. She imagined him stuffing dollars into the bras of women as they bared their chests for him, and her senses hummed with awareness.

What was wrong with her?

For all she knew he might be a freeloader who had women in ten different cities, and kids to go with each one. Kids he’d never claimed.

Or he could be a criminal.

He turned his dark eyes on her just as the waitress delivered their drinks.

“Thanks.” He grabbed the beer and moved the shot in front of Joey.

The girl stood beside him for a moment as if waiting for him to address her again. Annoyed when he didn’t pay her more attention, she gave Joey a decidedly unfriendly stare as if they were schoolkids fighting over the only boy in town.

Pickings must be slim in Justice. She should warn the waitress to steer clear of men like him—untrustworthy men in titillating packages that screamed with sex appeal—then decided to heed the warning herself.

She didn’t intend to be in Justice long. Then again, she’d have to stay until this case was solved.

And deal with her parents…

What if one of them was arrested? What if they were guilty?

Her lungs tightened at the thought, and she sprinkled salt on her hand, licked it, tossed down the shot, sucked the lime, then dropped the shot glass onto the table with a smile. As she swiped her hand across her mouth, an intense, hungry look flared in his deep-set eyes.

“You want another one, Joey?”

Her breath caught. How did he know her name?

The newscast…he must have seen it.

“In a minute. But I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage.” She straightened, reminding herself that her image counted. Especially if she intended to counteract the negative one she’d been saddled with thanks to her mother and father’s tawdry actions. “You know who I am, but you haven’t introduced yourself.”

His cocky smile faltered slightly. As if stalling, he took a long pull of his beer, set it down and scraped his hair off his forehead. Then finally he leaned forward, his dark eyes trained on her. “Sergeant Cole McKinney, Texas Ranger.”

Joey licked her lips in stunned silence.

This hot-as-all-get-out biker bad boy was Cole McKinney? The Cole McKinney, illegitimate child of Jim McKinney? The boy who’d been shunned by the McKinney family?

And he was a Texas Ranger? A law enforcement agent?

Not a freeloading biker or a criminal.

“I see the wheels turning in your head, Joey Hendricks.” His husky voice skated over her raw nerve endings. “And yeah, I’m that Cole McKinney, a sum of all those rotten things you were thinking. And a few more you don’t even know about.”

“I…what are you doing here?” she whispered.

A bitter laugh followed, husky and filled with emotions she was certain he hadn’t meant to reveal. Then quiet acceptance registered in his intense eyes as if he expected skepticism. Even disdain.

And he probably did. He’d been an outcast from the town all his life.

“Believe it nor not,” he said quietly, “the Texas Rangers requested my services as a tracker to help find Sarah Wallace’s killer.”

Suddenly at a loss for words, she didn’t protest when Cole raised his hand and ordered her another shot. Instead she accepted it graciously, then studied him with a different eye. If the Texas Rangers had requested his assistance, he must be damn good at his job.

What did he know about the investigation? Something the Rangers hadn’t revealed to the press?

Her hand trembled as she turned up the second shot glass.

Was he here to arrest one or both of her parents?

COLE TOOK ANOTHER long pull of the beer, hoping the cold liquid would chill the fire burning his body. A heat caused both from his temper at her reaction to his name and his body reacting with lust to her every movement.

“So, Cole, how did you get to be a Ranger?”

A smile quirked his mouth. If he didn’t know better, he’d think he’d just made the woman nervous.

Then again, knowing what he did about her family, he figured the Rangers were probably the last people she wanted to see.

And his brothers probably would resent her interference, as well. Since the Rangers were part of the state agency, they’d think the governor sent her to spy on them. Hell, he probably had.

“I joined the Army at seventeen,” he said with a shrug. Unlike Zane, who’d gone to college, earned a degree in criminal justice and worked in criminal investigation. Or Sloan, who had been sheriff of Justice.

“Then I spent some time in the Middle East, got into military security.” Sniper training to be exact, but he didn’t have to spill his guts. Like how many kills he had under his belt. “When I got out, I joined the DPS and became a motorcycle state trooper for a couple of years.”