He shot a look at Wade, who had his arms around Erin.“Told you we should have waited another hour.”
Candace snorted and shoved him toward the nearest table.“Here.Start with this one.”
Twenty minutes later they had everything arranged and the staff began setting the tables, so Ryan went up to the room and grabbed a quick shower.When he came back downstairs, most of the guests had arrived, including Erin’s and Wade’s families.After he’d made the rounds to meet everyone with Candace, he left her at their table and went to the bar to get them a drink.
“There you are.”
He mentally cringed at the sound of that smoke-roughened voice behind him, and put on a smile before turning to face Ruby—who was technically now his grandma too, at least by marriage.A terrifying thought.“Hey.”
“Hear you met Poncho,” she said, stopping next to him and waving the bartender down.
He shot her a sharp look and yeah, that was definitely a smirk on her face.“I did, yes.”
“How did you boys make out?”
“Fine.Didn’t come across any game, but we did find some type of training site up there.”
“What kind of training site?”she asked, falling into step with him as he made his way back toward Candace with the drinks.For once, Ruby didn’t have one in her hand, apparently distracted by their conversation.
“Well, guess it could have been something else, but there were a shi—uh, crapload of spent casings on the ground and the trees were riddled with holes.That’s a whole hell of a lot of firepower to waste using trees for target practice.”He edged past an elderly couple he thought might be Erin’s grandparents and made it to the table where his wife waited with the rest of their gang.Safety.
“Whereabouts was this?”Ruby asked, taking Jackson’s chair just as he was about to slide into it.The PJ stood awkwardly to the side, between her and Maya, but didn’t say anything and Ruby didn’t seem to notice—or care—about her faux pas.
“West of here, in the foothills.”
“Yeah, but where?”she pressed, sounding exasperated.
Candace leaned forward, winding an arm around him, and he tucked her tight into his side.“What’s this about?”she asked.
She smelled so damn good.“I told her about the site we came across.”They’d mentioned it to the girls while they set up the tables.
Ruby was frowning.“Be more specific.”
Ryan eyed her.“You want like, coordinates or something?”
She raised an eyebrow at his dry tone, her green eyes locked on his like a laser range finder.“Yes.”
Seriously?
She whacked him on the shoulder.“Come on, humor an old woman.If something like that’s going on near my resort, I want to know about it.”
He paused and looked around the table.Everyone was watching him, and Cam seemed to be biting back a smile.“Okay then.”He pulled his phone from his pocket and pulled up the nav app he used, but Ruby made a disparaging noise and flapped a hand in annoyance.
“Not on that thing.I need a map.A real map, made of paper.”She turned in her chair and glanced around the crowded conservatory.“Anyone here got a map of the area with them?Anactualmap?”she called out.
Candace winced and reached across the table to set a hand on her wrist.“Grandma?—”
“It’s fine, dear.Anyone?”Ruby said, a little louder this time.
A man three tables over rose awkwardly and pulled a folded map from his back pocket.“I’ve got this,” he offered as he walked over and handed it to her.“Will that do?”
“Perfect, thanks.”She looked at Ryan.“Will it?”
Withholding a sigh because he wasn’t completely sure she wouldn’t slap him if he didn’t, he dutifully unfolded the map.Just a regular road map, the kind you got at a gas station.No good topography marks or anything like that.“Hang on a sec.”
He was aware of Cam and Jackson leaning closer to take a look, and Wade walking around the table to look over his shoulder while he pulled up his nav app and accessed the coordinates.“Here,” he told Ruby at last, tapping the exact spot on the map where the coordinates intersected.
She squinted and leaned farther over the map to study it.“Uh huh,” she murmured to herself.“And where are we now?”
