Page 35 of The SEAL and the Sheriff

The horses were gone. Sarah’s gaze flicked toward where they’d disappeared.

“East of here, there’s an old avalanche gully,” she said. “No cover getting there, but the bank will break his line of sight once we’re inside it.”

Hudson followed her line of sight. “I see it.”

“It’s sixty yards. Maybe less. Can we reach it before he reacquires us?”

“If he already has our range? No. But that’s good.”

Sarah turned her head. “Good, Hudson?”

“If he wanted us dead, we’d probably already be dead.”

Even though snow had worked its way into her collar, her gun was ready in her hand, her eyes entirely unafraid. It should have reassured him. Instead, he wanted to move her somewhere bullets couldn’t reach.

“We need to move.”

“Okay.” She tensed underneath him.

Assessment burned through his brain. The shooter. Distance. No horses. Limited cover. Cold.

Sarah.

Whatever happened next, it wasn’t reaching her without going through him first.

14

Snow had worked its way down the back of Sarah’s collar.

She barely noticed.

Hudson was on top of her.

Every inch of him was controlled as he braced on his arms to keep his weight off her while still covering her. His breath brushed warm against her cheek in the freezing air, too close to ignore, while his heartbeat thudded steadily through the layers between them. Her brain cataloged every point of contact with the same ruthless precision it should have been applying to the ridge.

She wished it hadn’t.

His shoulder blocked her view, his head already turning past hers, searching for the threat.

For a fraction of a second, their eyes met. His smoky blue. Dark at the edges. She blinked, as if that might reset the distance.

“You okay?”

“Fine.” She shrugged against his body, firming her grip on her handgun, then twisted out from under him. She rolled and came up on her elbows, sightline clear, gun up. “He’s not shooting.”

Hudson’s eyes never left the tree line. “No.”

“He’s waiting for us to break cover.” She’d spent a career reading exactly this. “No third shot. He wants us to run somewhere he can see.”

“Or he’s already moving.” Hudson’s gaze swept the ridge once, twice. “Repositioning while we’re pinned down arguing about it.”

“We’re not arguing.”

“We’re about to.”

He wasn’t wrong. But an animal certainty had taken hold: the longer they stayed flat in the snow, the more ground whoever was up there gained. She started to push up onto her feet.

His hand closed around her sleeve. “Thirty seconds.”