Summer's Indiscretion(Divine Creek Ranch 7)(33)

Summer felt like the fortunate one as he kissed her knuckles again.

“I don’t mean for you to feel like you have to make a declaration of some kind, Ace. I needed to make sure you knew where I was coming from. I just need something…sane right now. I need to feel safe.”

“We want that for you, too,” Ace replied as he stroked her calf and her ankle. “Especially in light of everything else you’re experiencing right now. You’ll be safe with us tonight.”

Kemp padded barefoot into the room, dressed in dark-green, baggy, knit pajama bottoms. Summer’s eyes were riveted to his broad, muscular chest and taut abdomen.

Ace chuckled softly and said, “I’m going to take a quick shower, kitten. I’m sure Kemp would like to cuddle and talk with you, too.”

Pulling her eyes from Kemp’s glorious physique, Summer smiled at Ace as he gave her a quick, soft kiss and then rose from her side.

Kemp stood by the bed for a few seconds, gazing down at her. Maybe she should’ve felt nervous, but she didn’t. She felt safe. Her mind flashed back to that morning the weekend before, when he and Ace had stood outside his Escalade while she tried to figure out how to unlock the door.

He joined her on the bed, taking Ace’s place, as she heard the shower come on in the bathroom again.

“You look beautiful in that color,” he murmured as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “How’s the rash?”

“I should be good as new by next weekend. Did Ace tell you I can’t make love with you tonight? I’m not healed up enough yet.”

The guilty look on Kemp’s face spoke volumes. “Yes. I still feel terrible about that. But, darlin’, there wouldn’t be any pressure on you even if that hadn’t happened. I’m happy you’re spending the evening with us. Though, it may be an equal part of torture with you looking so beautiful in this,” he said, indicating her ensemble. “I missed you and I’m glad to have some quiet time with you.”

“It was lonesome at my house. I thought about you and Ace a lot. I also made progress with getting ready to move. I’d accumulated a lot of stuff in the years I’ve lived in that house.”

Kemp nodded and replied, “I know. I saw you going back and forth to your Dumpster several times this week. You were a busy little bee.”

Summer was surprised by his comment. “You were watching over me, too? I thought you and Ace were trading off watching the shop. When did you sleep?”

“The three of us, me, Ace, and Duke, rotated keeping watch. We talked about it and none of us was comfortable with you staying by yourself. We’ve got another friend coming from San Angelo to help out as well. He’ll be watching over Margot and making sure all the girls are getting home safely.”

That was going to go over like a lead balloon with her sister. Summer giggled. “Does Margot know about this?”

“Not yet. We don’t like to be stretched so thin, and it will allow us more flexibility to bring another guy in.”

“This is getting to be a big, expensive-sounding undertaking.”

Kemp lifted a lock of hair from her shoulder and rubbed it between his fingers. “Summer, it’s become a personal endeavor for us. We were concerned when we heard about the blog. Then Grace got harassed while driving. Rachel and Maya had that trouble with the arsonist. Then Maya got hurt. Even though her situation was separate from what you all are going through, it still reinforced our desire to get to the bottom of these attacks. It’s on multiple fronts, too, which makes it harder, because we needed more manpower than we had. We think we found a link to that blog, but we want to approach it carefully because there is an innocent woman involved.”

“Really?”

“Yes, one of the commenters to this week’s blog. She seems sympathetic to you girls and indicated that she also knows the writer personally. We have to approach her carefully since it doesn’t sound like she’s directly connected to the attacks.”

“What are you going to do once you pinpoint who is writing the blog?”

“Dig real deep and find a reason to convince them to stop. That’s what we specialize in.”

Summer grinned and said, “Sort of ‘make them an offer they can’t refuse?’”

A chuckle rumbled in Kemp’s throat. “Something like that, without the gangster connotation. Everyone has secrets they’d like to keep hidden. We plan to motivate the people behind these attacks with undeniable leverage.”

“I talked to Rachel on the phone this week and she told me what you did for her.” Duct tape underwear was the very least that sick person had deserved for abusing Rachel.