can see your doubts.”
Like her, they blamed Logan for their father’s death. He hadn’t put the shiv in him, but he had made certain that he stayed in prison long enough that someone else had. Her brothers had even suggested that Logan might have hired the other inmate to commit the murder. She didn’t believe that; she knew Logan hadn’t wanted her father dead. He’d just wanted him to suffer. And he hadn’t cared that she’d suffered, too. Her brothers had cared, though—maybe too much.
But in reply to Mrs. Payne’s remark, Stacy shook her head again in denial. She would not betray her brothers. She owed them too much: her life.
“I don’t expect you to admit it,” Mrs. Payne said. “You’re too loyal for that—too protective of them.”
She wasn’t nearly as protective of them as her brothers were of her. They had sacrificed so much to keep her safe. She would do the same.
“And you’re protective of your son,” Stacy said. She’d seen how shaken the woman had been that there had been attempts on his life. “Is that why you’re here?”
“I’m here for you,” Mrs. Payne insisted. “But if Logan is right...” She shuddered. “I can’t lose him like I lost his father.” She reached out again and took Stacy’s hand in hers. “And I don’t want you to lose your brothers, either.”
Tears of frustration stung Stacy’s eyes. “I can’t...”
But as Mrs. Payne had seen, she already doubted them. Even if they weren’t the ones attempting to kill him, they could be picked up on suspicion because they’d been so angry and so vocal about their hatred of Logan. She swallowed a lump of emotion. “I’ll talk to them, make sure that they’re not behind the shootings.”
Mrs. Payne sighed. “It’s too bad you have to have that conversation—that you have to show them you doubt them, that you think they could be responsible, that you think they could be killers.”
After all they’d done for her, she didn’t want to hurt them any more than they were already hurting. They had lost their father, too. “Then what do I do?”
Mrs. Payne squeezed her hand. “You marry him.”
“What?” She couldn’t have heard her right. It was like the words her father had uttered on his dying breath— incomprehensible.
“Your brothers would never do anything to hurt you,” Mrs. Payne said. “So if they believe you’re in love with Logan, they won’t hurt him.”
“I—I can’t convince them of such a blatant lie...”
“You can if you marry him...”
Marry the man she despised more than any other? It just wasn’t conceivable. She wasn’t the only one shocked and appalled at such a terrible union.
A deep gasp drew her attention away from Mrs. Payne to her son. Logan stood near a monument behind her. His blue eyes were wide with shock and horror at his mother’s outrageous suggestion. Then his lips began to move. But no words were uttered, or if they were, the shots drowned out his voice.
Gunshots reverberated throughout the cemetery, echoing around the monuments and trees. The sudden loud noise sent the birds flying from the tree limbs to form a dark cloud in the sky above them.
Not only had Logan Payne intruded on her father’s funeral but so had his killer. Mrs. Payne’s plan was never going to happen, because Stacy would probably wind up burying him before she could ever marry him.
Chapter Three
Pain gripped Logan’s shoulder, but he ignored the hot streak down his arm as he reached for his holster and drew his weapon. “Get down!” he shouted.
His mother had instinctively ducked behind a cement monument. But Stacy stood still at her father’s freshly dug grave, so when he knocked her down, she hit soft ground. Her breath left her lips in a gasp of warm air that caressed his neck.
And her soft curves cushioned his fall. She always acted so strong that he had expected her to be hard and cold. But she was soft and warm. She was also smaller than her big personality and more fragile than her tough attitude.
“Are you okay?” he asked as the shots continued to ring out, knocking leaves and twigs from the trees so they rained down on them like debris during a hurricane. For some reason he felt as though he were in the middle of a storm and not just of gunfire but of emotion.
Had his mother really suggested what he’d thought he heard? No. He must have misconstrued her words. Not even she was a big enough matchmaker to consider a marriage between him and Stacy Kozminski at all possible.
Stacy stared up at him through gray eyes wide with shock but hopefully not pain.
“Were you hit?” he asked. “Are you hurt?”
Eyes still wide, she finally moved as she shook her head.
“Mom?” he called out. “Mom?”
“I—I’m okay,” she replied, but her voice cracked with fear. As usual, it wasn’t for herself as she anxiously asked, “Are you and Stacy okay?”
“Yeah...” He shifted, moving to roll off Stacy and return fire now that he knew she and his mother were safe. But Stacy gripped his shoulder, and he flinched in pain.
“You’ve been shot,” she said, her voice breaking with urgency and concern. For him?
He shrugged his shoulders, but there was a twinge of pain. Maybe more than a twinge. He grimaced and lied, “I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding,” she said. Her palm smeared with his blood, she lifted it toward his face as if presenting him with evidence.
He didn’t need to see it; he could feel it, sticking his sleeve to his skin. He glanced down then and noted the tear in the shoulder of his tuxedo jacket. Oh, Mom was going to be annoyed that he’d ruined another one...
“Are—are you hurt?” his mother asked, and unconcerned about her own safety, she began to rise from behind the monument.
“Stay down,” he warned her.
“The shooting stopped,” she pointed out.
But that didn’t mean that the shooter was gone. He could have just been biding his time until he got a clear shot. And if someone really wanted to hurt Logan, he or she could do that most effectively by hurting his mother.
“Stay down,” he told her again. “Don’t move until we get backup.” Maybe he shouldn’t have convinced Parker and Nikki and Candace that he didn’t need their protection. Maybe he should have let them stay with him like they’d wanted. Knowing them, they might have ignored his wishes—like his mother usually did.
Sirens wailed as police cars approached, lights flashing through the tree branches.
Stacy stiffened beneath him. Apparently, she had inherited her family’s aversion to law enforcement. “Your backup has arrived.”
To
