Wild Montana

Have a former FBI agent and a park ranger met their match in the wilds of Montana?

With a mysterious death to solve in Glacier National Park, Customs and Border Patrol agent Casper Lawrence must come up with motive, means, opportunity—and a killer. If he doesn’t crack this case by the book, the former FBI agent on strike two will be out. Teamed with a beautiful park ranger, the cowboy agent with the gritty past has to trust sexy lone wolf Alexis Finch. But as their investigation takes them through dangerous terrain and an outlaw motorcycle club’s turf, Casper will do anything to keep Alexis—and what they’ve ignited—alive.

“What’s going on, Casper?” Alexis asked.

“Nothing,” Casper said, but his eyes were dark.

“Don’t lie to me. What’s wrong?”

He glanced over at her and took off his cowboy hat, then set it on the dashboard. He ran his hands over his face and through his hair in exasperation. “I just think it’s going to be better if you get away from all this—this investigation.”

“What happened?” she asked, trying to stop the hurt from leaking out into her voice.

All she had been trying to do for the past two days was solve this so they both could get their jobs done. Now, after a strange meeting with the Canadian Mounties, she was on the outs. It didn’t make sense.

“You didn’t do anything, Lex. I promise.”

She tried to remind herself they were only friends, and maybe barely that. Sure, they had shared the kiss in the woods, but ever since they had gotten caught he had barely been able to look at her.

“Is this because of what happened…you know, back there?” She motioned in the direction they’d come from.

But she was sure he knew exactly what she was talking about.

Wild Montana

Danica Winters

www.millsandboon.co.uk

DANICA WINTERS is a multiple award-winning, bestselling author who writes books that grip readers with their ability to drive emotion through suspense and occasionally a touch of magic. When she’s not working, she can be found in the wilds of Montana, testing her patience while she tries to hone her skills at various crafts—quilting, pottery and painting are not her areas of expertise. She believes the cup is neither half-full nor half-empty, but it better be filled with wine. Visit her website at www.danicawinters.net.

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To Lane—

You work miracles.

Acknowledgments

This book wouldn’t have been possible without the help of

my fans. Thank you for taking a moment out of your lives to

leave a review, come to book signings and send me notes,

cookies and even the occasional bottle of vodka. You inspire

me to keep writing when the going gets tough. Thank you.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Extract

Extract

Copyright

Prologue

Seven. Most people thought the number was lucky. He’d even thought it had been lucky. This was supposed to be his seventh trip, the last run of the season, the last cleanup before he could head to Mexico and lie on the beach for the winter. Señoritas, sunshine, cervezas...everything he needed to be happy.

Yet now as he stared down the predator, he could have sworn seven was a curse.

The grizzly hopped on its front legs like a dog ready to play, but from what little he knew about bears, it wasn’t an action that meant fun and games...no, that was an action that meant danger.

He eased back a step as he held the bear’s gaze. Its beady black eyes bore into him, sizing him up.

Not for the first time in his life, he wished he were eight feet tall.

“Good bear,” he said, putting his hands up. “Good bear.” He turned to look over his shoulder, but the man he’d been sent there to meet was gone. “Damn him.”

Without warning, the bear charged. The fur on its shoulders rippled, its gold tips harsh against the white snow. He screamed, the sound echoing through the high mountain valley.

The beast didn’t slow down.

He turned to run, but it was too late. The griz hit him like no force he had ever experienced. Its putrid, hot breath seared the back of his neck as he fell to the ground. Heat and pain spread through his body as the predator’s teeth met bone.

He closed his eyes, pain burning through him as the gunshot rang out.

The world, the pain, the fear—everything stopped.

Chapter One

Alexis Finch forced her body up the steep trail and toward the location the hikers had described. Ravens swooped through the air above her, calling out secrets to their comrades as they flew west. Even though she hiked nearly every day through the backcountry of Glacier National Park, each step was torturous. The altitude made her breath come faster, but she focused her attention on the thick pines that surrounded them, and she ignored the pain that shot up from her tired calves.

“Ranger Finch,” the Customs and Border Protection agent called from behind her.

She was thankful as she stopped and turned back, taking the moment to catch her breath and shift the straps of her backpack, as they had started to cut into her shoulders. “Hmm?”

Casper Lawrence stopped beside her, his cheeks pink and a sheen of sweat covering his tanned face. She found comfort in the fact that after more than three miles of this uphill battle, the handsome agent was hurting just as badly as she was. “According to the GPS, this should be the spot.” He motioned around them.

The hillside was covered with thick, frost-bitten grasses, timber and patches of snow that hid in the shadows. No evidence of a struggle. No blood. No fresh tracks.

“Look,” she said, pointing toward the ravens overhead. “No matter what the GPS says, we follow the birds. Listen to nature. It’ll give us all the information we need.” She cringed as she realized how much she sounded like a bumper sticker, but as she spoke the words she knew they were true, especially when it came to finding a body.

If she’d learned anything in working as a law enforcement park ranger in the park for the last five years, it was that the only thing she could trust was Mother Nature’s fickle attitude. She did as she pleased, and danger could be found in the moments that a person underestimated her power. It was easy to identify the people who had misjudged her; they were usually the ones Alexis and the other rangers were sent into the backcountry to find—or the ones whose bodies they were sent in to recover.

“I like nature, but don’t you get tired of being stuck out here?” Casper looked up, taking off his Stetson and wiping away the thin line of sweat that it had collected. His slightly-too-long chestnut hair hung down over his caramel-colored eyes, obviously blinding him from the beauty that surrounded them.

He gazed toward the birds and slipped the hat back on his head.

“Stuck? Out here?” She laughed. It was hard to imagine being stuck in a place like this, where there was only open sky and rugged earth. “I’d much rather be out here than in some tiny apartment. I had enough of that kind of thing in college.” She glanced over at Casper and his tan-colored hat. The wide brim cast his face in shadows, accentuating his firm, masculine jaw.

“Your girlfriend give you that?” she asked, motioning toward his hat.

He looked at her like he was trying to get a read on her. “I bought it in Kalispell a few years back.” He took it off again, spinning the brim of it in his hands like he was talking about an old friend.

“Cowboy hats are a lost art,” she said as she started to move up the trail.

A lot could be learned about a man by the hat he wore, whether he was a rancher or a weekend cowboy. Each style meant something different, but from the dents, the line of the crown and the sweat marks, it was clear he wanted to look like a cattleman.

“You grow up on a ranch?” she asked, excited that maybe they had some common footing.

He gave her that look again, like he just couldn’t make heads or tails of her, but rather than making her feel uncomfortable, she liked the feeling of keeping him guessing. Maybe she spent too much time alone, but being an enigma to this too-handsome cowboy made heat rise from her core.

“No, my family comes from Butte.”

“Ah,” she said, forcing herself to look away from the agent. “A Butte boy... So you’re Irish?”

He sent her a sexy half grin that made her nearly trip over her own feet. “Yep.”

“You visit a lot?”

“Last time I was there was for my brother’s funeral,” he said, his tone hard.

“I’m so sorry.”

Casper shrugged. “Robert had a lot of problems.”

From his tone she could tell he didn’t want to talk about it, so she dropped it and let the sounds of their footfalls fill the space between them. It made sense that he, the man who seemed to constantly be looking at her as if he was digging for something, came from a family of secrets in the rough and tumble mining town.

They crested the hill that led to Kootenai Lake. The crystal-clear water mirrored the snowcapped, jagged outcrops of Citadel Peak; it was an almost perfect picture, like one of the many postcards they sold at their visitor center. A raven cawed, pulling her attention away from the breathtaking view.

The bird sat in an old snag and picked at a bit of meat that it held in its grip.

“I think we’re in the right place,” she said, motioning toward the feasting bird. “Where did the hikers say they spotted the body?”

“When they stopped at the border crossing to report their findings, they said there wasn’t much of a body to speak of. All they said they found was a boot. Apparently, they marked the area.” As he spoke, an icy breeze blew off the lake. Near the west bank a piece of pink plastic duct tape fluttered on the bough of a tree, catching his attention. “There,” he said, pointing in its direction.

She hurried over to the tape, the weariness she had been feeling suddenly dispelled by a surge of adrenaline.

Hopefully the hikers had been wrong. Hopefully this was nothing more than some tourist’s castoff and not what they had assumed. If it was, she and Casper would have a mess on their hands and that, at the end of the main season, was the last thing that either one of them needed.

She pinched the tape as if it would give her the answers she needed, yet the plastic remained silent.

There was nothing at the base of the tree except needles and pinecones. No doubt that since the hikers had left this morning, the birds and other scavengers had been at work.

Alexis dropped the heavy pack she’d been carrying and started searching the ground around the pine. The grass had been mashed, and there was a faint trail of broken stems that led into the forest. She followed the game trail away from the lake and deeper into the timber.

“Ranger Finch?” Agent Lawrence called out, with a hint of panic in his voice.

She looked up from the nearly invisible game trail and turned. Agent Lawrence was nowhere in sight. “Yep,” she called. “I’m over here.”

There was the sound of breaking twigs and his cussing as he bulled through the timber. He may have been an agent, but he was clearly no ninja. He broke through the grips of the trees and came into view. There was a scratch across his cheek, complete with a speckle of blood.

“Don’t run off. I don’t need two bodies to recover.”

She chuckled. Based on his trail-breaking skills, she was more likely to make it out of the underbrush long before he would.

“Don’t worry, city boy, I won’t leave you again if you’re scared,” she teased.

He wiped at his cheek. “All right, I had that coming, but seriously...”

She waved him off as she started moving. “Got it, Agent Lawrence.”

“And quit calling me Agent. Only tourists call me that. I’d like to think that since you let me tag along on this one, we’re at least kind of friends.”

Kind of friends... She smiled at the thought.

In truth, she had been glad when he’d called and, due to the proximity to the International Border, they had decided to work this case together. For the first time since she had started working here, she had been looking forward to the end of the main season so she could find a little more distance from the tension between her and her ex. Until then, this cowboy and their kinda friendship could be her perfect distraction.

There was a scurry of movement as a small brown animal sprinted through the underbrush. Her body tensed as she stopped and tried to see the animal, but it had disappeared through a line of bushes. It could have been a pine marten or any number of other small mammals, but the unexpected movement made her even more wary than she had been before.

There had to be a body around here somewhere if the smaller animals were scavenging. No doubt bears, mountain lions and wolves were in the area. The scent of death would have brought every hungry mouth from miles around. She turned to warn Casper but stopped. He had a gun in his hand; it was half-raised.

“Little jumpy, eh? You can put the gun away, Casper,” she said. “If that had been a bear, it wouldn’t have done you much good anyway.”

“Hey now, I’m a good shot,” he said, sheepishly dropping the gun back into its holster.

“I doubt that,” she said, thinking back to the days she had spent plinking cans off the tops of fence rails at her family’s ranch. Back at home in the Bitterroot Valley, everyone knew her family—and her history. It was nice to meet someone who couldn’t judge her for her faults.

She moved toward the brush where the animal had first appeared. There, tucked under the branches, was a man’s REI hiking boot. Its sole was worn where the ball of the foot would have been.

“I got it,” she called.

Casper stepped carefully, avoiding the dried twigs that littered the ground in what she had to assume was his attempt to be quiet. He stopped beside her. “What is it?”

“See for yourself.” She lifted the branch so he could see the man’s boot.

“Do you think someone just left it behind?” he asked. “Maybe it dropped out of their pack or something.”

“No one just leaves behind their hiking boots, not here. Not when they still have a few miles to get back to the nearest trailhead.”

She took a few pictures to document the scene and then gingerly pulled the shoe out by its well-worn laces. The boot’s leather had dark brown stains over the toe and around the ankle to the heel. She flipped it up.

Her breath hitched in her throat.

Inside the shoe was the mucky white color of bone and dried dark red strings of chewed tendons and eviscerated flesh.

Whoever had put this shoe on was still wearing it.

She let go of the laces and stepped back from the gruesome object. She’d seen plenty of dead bodies, but nothing quite like this. It was so deformed and mutilated that, if it hadn’t been in a shoe, she almost wouldn’t have believed it had once belonged to a person.

“What do you think happened to this guy?” she whispered, out of some instinctual response to being around the dead.

“I have no idea,” Casper said, shaking his head. “But we have a place to start finding out.”

“How’s that?” she asked, looking up at him.

“We know the guy didn’t hike out.” Casper ran his hand over the stubble that riddled his jaw. “Now we just have to find the rest of his body.”

Chapter Two

The Flathead Emergency Aviation Resources, or FEAR, helicopter touched down near the lake, its blades chopping at the air and making white caps on the crystal-blue water. Casper always hated this moment, the instant when the chain of command shifted and their team lost some of its control. Most times, he could find his best evidence and the most answers before a mess of officers showed up. Yet this time, he had to admit it was different. This was a death in which the only witnesses were the animals who had feasted on the remains and the two wayward hikers who had found the body. With an incident like this, they needed extra hands on deck—no matter how badly he wished it could just be him...and Alexis Finch.

It had been nice following her up that trail, her tight green pants stretching over hips and her full, round curves. It had made the brutal hike a little more bearable—and he’d found a new love for standard-issue forest service pants.

Alexis stood beside him, lifting her hand to shield her eyes from the dust the chopper’s blades kicked up. She squinted as she glanced over at him. “Let the party start,” she said with a cynical smile that made his gut clench.

He forced himself to look away from her full lips and the way the fine lines collected around the corners of her eyes when she glanced over at him.

He had to focus on their case.

It was only out of sheer luck that the hikers had come to him and he’d convinced his boss that he was vital to the investigation. His boss had only let him go when he’d lied and told him that there was some evidence that the hiker may have crossed the border—which landed the case squarely in their lap. If they screwed this investigation up his boss had, in no uncertain terms, told him he would be out.

This was his last chance.

His next stop on the career line was a desk job at a DMV somewhere—if he was lucky. Then again, he’d already been sent to the Siberia of the contiguous United States: a tiny stand-alone border crossing station on the side of a lake only accessible by ferry or foot. It was the CBP’s equivalent of exile.

Things couldn’t get much worse.

The coroner bent down out of the rudder wash and hurried toward them. The man was pale, but when he straightened up as he neared them, Casper noticed the telltale spider veins and reddened nose of a major alcoholic.

“Where’re the remains?” the man yelled above the sound of the slowing motor.

Alexis motioned for him to follow her.

As they drew near, Casper stared at the blood-covered leather boot. It was strange, but it looked exactly like one he had bought at REI earlier that summer. He wondered if somewhere along the way the man who’d worn this one had stood beside him in the store, passing the boot from one hand to the other as he decided if it was really the right one for him—just as Casper had done.

He pushed the thought from his mind. He had to remain detached.

It was the moment when things became real that emotions came into play, and emotions had been what had gotten him into trouble with the FBI. They had wanted the Robo-Cop—the man who could run through the blood and muck and then stand there and eat a sandwich without thinking about the residue of life that stained his footprints and constantly filled his reality.

If only he was better at disconnecting his head from his heart—life and work would be so much easier.

“Nothing else?” the coroner asked, like he appreciated the fact that there was so little to transport back to the medical examiner.

Alexis shook her head. “No. As of this time, these are the only remains we’ve managed to locate.”

“We need to get a full canvass on the area.” The coroner stepped out of the timber and motioned toward the helicopter.

Two rangers stepped out of the chopper and rushed toward them. From the puckered look on Alexis’s face she must have known the men. She gave a begrudging grunt as the guys made their way over and stopped next to them. The dark-haired ranger kept looking over at her like he was trying to get her attention, but she gave him the cold shoulder.

“Where do you want us to start, Hal?” the dark-haired ranger asked.

Alexis turned to the man. “I have a place you can go, Travis—”

“Travis, you take the northern trail,” the coroner interrupted, giving them both a disapproving glance. He turned to the other ranger, a blond. “John, you take the south. We only have a couple of hours before nightfall. The pilot needs us out before he’s flying in the dark. Make it count.”

Though he couldn’t say the same of the two rangers, he liked the coroner. He’d always appreciated the type of people who cut the small talk—all business and no bull. Life would be so much easier if everything worked that way; no politics, no favorites, no strings.

“Alexis, you go east and Agent—”

“Lawrence,” Casper answered.

“Agent Lawrence, you go west,” Hal said, motioning to each of them in the respective directions. He pointed to his radio clipped to his waist. “If any of you find something, I’m on four.” He turned away and went to work, going over Alexis’s pictures and her notes about the scene and its presentation.

Travis and John moved away through the timber.

Casper started to move west. He didn’t make it far before Alexis grabbed his arm and pulled him to a stop. “Let’s work together.”

Her face was neutral, but he couldn’t help getting the feeling that she was frightened.

He looked in the direction of the coroner, but the man was busy with his work and didn’t seem to notice the break in his ranks. “Hal doesn’t seem like the type who likes rule breakers.” He nudged his chin in the man’s direction.

“First of all, this is my investigation. He had no business taking control of how I’m running this scene,” Alexis said, her voice flecked with anger. “Besides, he’ll be happy if we find something, and there’s a better chance to find something if we actually work together in canvassing the area.”

“You’re the boss,” Casper said, but in truth he was more than happy to be working with her. He liked being alone—he’d grown accustomed to it over the last year of working at the border crossing—but she made the constant hum inside him grow still and calm.

They walked a few arm lengths apart, moving through the timber and skirting around the lake. Every time she crawled over a bit of deadfall she would sigh, and after what must have been the hundredth tree he was certain that soft moan would be ingrained in his memory forever.