Prologue
Early parole.
Goodbehavior.
Lucky.
Dan Evans had always wanted to win big. For one shining moment on his twenty-first birthday, Lady Luck had smiled on him. He'd won five grand at a casino blackjacktable.
And then he'd turned around and lost it all. In twenty minutes. But thehigh...
For a kid whose mom had walked out and left him with his grandpops, the high been addictive, because it had made a lot of dark memories fade, just alittle.
He'd been seeking Lady Luck's elusive smile eversince.
There was nothing lucky about three years of good behavior or his early parole. While in prison, he'd worked his butt off, kept his nose clean, sucked up to the guards so much he'd begun to hate himself. When he’d waited in county for sentencing, he’d had nightmares about what prison would be like, terrible visions of what awaited him. The reality had been muchworse.
Today, he was going... somewhere. He was getting out. Taking a bus that the prison had arranged to a halfway house, which they’d also arranged. They'd even lined him up a job. Probably sacking groceries or working construction. Whatever it was, he'd doit.
He couldn't court Lady Luck any more. He'd learned his lesson. He wasn't one of the lucky ones. Wasn't meant to be awinner.
No highs were high enough to make up for this. The only good thing in his life had been his job on the Triple H ranch. The other ranch hands had been like brothers. And when Dan had gotten in too deep, stolen ten grand, he'd lost the only people who'd ever cared abouthim.
Midmorning, the guard escorted him to the intake room, where a uniformed guard handed him a paper bag with hisbelongings.
He'd worn the orange jumpsuit for three years. His jeans and T-shirt felt foreign. His boots fit like they always had—but how could that be, when he wasn't the same mananymore?
He left behind the cold, cement-block walls and iron bars. The cocky, arrogant man he’d been when he entered prison had long sincedisappeared.
Outside, Dan squinted in the sunlight, not for the first time wishing for his Stetson to shade hiseyes.
His boots clicked on the pavement. His heart thumped hard in hischest.
There was a cold chill in the late October air that cut through his T-shirt. He'd been convicted on a smoldering day in the middle ofsummer.
He stopped on the sidewalk. Stood there, unmoving. Because he could. Because no one shouted for him to keep moving or get back inline.
He was out. Free—sort of. He still had to meet with his parole officer and make arrangements for continuingmeetings.
He'd toe the line, and he'd never forget what he owed to the TripleH.
He looked for the big bus he'd been told would meethim.
But what he saw was two cowboys exit their truck and stand on the sidewalk with their feet spread wide and their armscrossed.
Gideon and Matt Hale. Two of the owners of the Triple Hranch.
The men he'd stolen ten grandfrom.
He didn't shirk from what was coming. He walked right up to them, bracing for a punch. Ortwo.
He deserved it, afterall.
Would it be Matt? He had the hotter temper of the two. But Gideon had been the one to discover Dan'stheft.
He would never forget the look of betrayal on Gideon's face that morning years ago. What was he doing here now? Shouldn’t he be in Europe with his wife? He'd come a long way for his revenge,apparently.
Both men were ex-military. This was going tohurt.
