Page 5
“One hundred thousand.”
The room dies.
Even Wyatt stops smiling.
I turn.
The voice came from the back.
A man stands against the wall near the exit.
Black thermal stretched across a massive chest. Dark jeans. Heavy boots. Tattooed forearms crossed over each other.
Six-four, maybe more.
Dark beard.
Dark hair.
No smile.
Dane Miller.
My stomach drops.
Everyone in Devil’s Peak knows Dane.
Or they know the stories.
He owns Miller Timber and enough mountain property to make him one of the wealthiest men in the county. He lives alone somewhere beyond the north ridge. Rarely comes into town.
Doesn’t socialize.
Doesn’t date.
Doesn’t seem to like people enough to bother hating them.
At thirty-five, he’s become the kind of man mothers warn daughters about and drunk men suddenly remember they have somewhere else to be when he walks into a bar.
His eyes find mine.
My pulse jumps but not because I’m afraid of him.
Wyatt clears his throat. “Did you say one hundred thousand?”
Dane doesn’t look away from me.
“Yeah.”
Hank lowers his whiskey.
Ellie whispers, “Holy shit.”
I agree.
Wyatt looks at me.
Then Dane.
