A Very Daddy Christmas (Lucky Lady Reverse Harems)

Chapter 17

17

Riggs

I t’s all I ever wanted.

Waking up to Cora’s hair tickling my face. The smell of her skin getting me drunk as my eyes peel open and I look around, worried it might’ve only been a dream. It wasn’t. It was real. She sleeps soundly in my arms while Waylan rolls over, gingerly getting out of bed so as not to disturb her.

Sebastian comes out of the shower, a thick black towel wrapped around his waist. “I’ll order us some breakfast,” he says in a low voice.

It feels good, lying here like this, without a care in the world. I know reality awaits back in Madison, but for now, I plan on making the most of this entire trip. When Sebastian first suggested it, I wasn’t sure it would work with Cora’s preference for simpler, smaller outings. But she has accepted the resort because of their strict privacy policy.

“What should we do later?” I ask.

“How about we take some snowmobiles out?” Sebastian suggests.

“Yeah, the trails should be perfect today,” Waylan adds.

Until then, we wait for our sleeping beauty to awaken.

The trails are perfect, just as I had anticipated. Above us, a clear blue sky stretches, seemingly forever, a few tufts of clouds scattered here and there. The sun shining on the pure white snow is damn near blinding; luckily, we’ve got reflective snow sunglasses on.

Waylan and Sebastian come around on their snowmobiles while I get mine started and position myself beside Cora’s. I look at her and ask, “Ready to go?”

“Give me a second,” Cora replies. “I need to prepare for this.”

“The trails are groomed, babe. You’re going to be fine,” Sebastian says, his gaze warm as he looks her up and down. “Green suits you, by the way.”

“Wow, you’re good,” she shoots back, then turns the key in the ignition. Her snowmobile rumbles to life, joining ours in a roaring quartet. “Throw a compliment in with every sentence, and I won’t even realize you’re sending me off to my doom.”

Sebastian laughs. “The snow machine does everything for you. Just go easy on the speed and keep a hand ready for the brakes at all times. Don’t rush into it.”

“Rest assured, I have no intention of crashing into the trees!”

“As long as you pump the brakes slowly and in advance, you won’t,” Sebastian replies with a broad smile.

“Just be mindful of your speed, babe,” I reiterate. “And remember the signal if you get scared or need to stop.”

Glancing around, I see other resort patrons enjoying this beautiful day. I can spot the slopes from here, noting some are excellent skiers, while others are gliding disasters. There are a few snowboarders out there, as well. I wouldn’t mind trying to snowboard at some point. For now, however, we’re sticking to snowmobiling.

The lodge is busy, its terrace overflowing with mulled wine aficionados. Granted, they’re using a rare vintage for their signature hot drink, and I’m looking forward to trying it once we’re done with the snowmobiles. Rule number one for our crew—never ride drunk. It doesn’t end well.

“Yeah, yeah, raise my right arm. I’m hungry,” Cora grumbles, glancing back at the resort. “I’ll bet they have grilled sandwiches on their menu. The fancy kind, for sure.”

“You’re hungry? Again? You just ate,” Waylan comments.

“I’m doing all this physical exercise,” she says, half-smiling. “Plus, the heavy-duty training from last night. It’s taking its toll.”

Although I wouldn’t call snowmobiling exercise, we laugh lightly anyway. I didn’t miss the subtle nuance in her voice, however. I don’t know what to make of it. Fear. Shyness. Something else bubbling beneath the surface. Whatever it is, I’ve learned to give Cora her space. She needs to breathe and process things, one day at a time; otherwise, she gets overwhelmed and is prone to drawing tough lines in the wrong places purely for self-preservation.

“You call that heavy duty?” I quip. “You haven’t seen heavy duty yet.”

She stares at me for a moment, her eyes blank. “And now I’m curious.”

“Sebastian, lead the way!” I shout before flipping down the face shield on my helmet.

He slowly goes ahead, swerving left and right with great ease to get his snowmobile warmed up, while Waylan and I stay close behind Cora. She seems to quickly become comfortable with her steering, getting bolder as she speeds up, the snowmobile giving her one hell of a ride.

At least she’s having heaps of fun. Lord knows she deserves it.

After a few miles, a strange feeling begins to tickle the back of my neck. I sense it. Danger.

I glance over my shoulder and spot four other snowmobiles, the riders dressed in white and gray camouflage, quickly coming up on us from behind. They’re moving fast and way too close for comfort. Large, reflective sunglasses sit atop their faces behind their shields. I can’t tell who they are, but I know they’re here to cause us harm.

Waylan has also spotted them and pulls ahead, trying to get Sebastian’s attention.

“Shit,” I mutter, realizing that Cora is moving over to the right and speeding up, probably to play with Sebastian a bit.

She’s opening herself up for an attack.

One of the riders bolts past us and tries to ram into Sebastian but fails to give him more than a nudge. Sebastian gets the upper hand and steers into him. The guy ends up surpassing Sebastian altogether, and it’s all the ammunition my friend needs to speed up and race after him.

The other three are still coming for us.

“Waylan, watch out!” I say to myself, my voice trapped within the confines of my helmet, my heart stopping when a second attacker blitzes him from the left side.

I manage to get past them without joining the collision, then briefly glance back to see both men tumbling down the slope, their snowmobiles stripped of their drivers and sliding on their sides across the slippery trail.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

The third one comes at me, but I sit up in my seat and kick his front fender with my boot, hard enough to cause him to lose control and crash. He ends up underneath the snowmobile. Judging by the way he’s writhing on the ground and holding his leg, he’s broken something, for sure.

I know the fourth guy is going after Cora, determined to succeed. It’s my turn to go faster and prepare for the worst. Cora doesn’t have time to respond, unaware of what’s happening.

The goon misses her by barely an inch, but he still manages to kick the side of her snowmobile with his boot. Her body tenses as she slows down, glancing over her shoulder at me as she struggles to steer. She’s going too far to the right and will end up in the woods if I don’t stop her.

“Fucking hell,” I snarl and rush after her.

I spot Sebastian ahead. His assailant is trying to flee, but my friend is faster and more experienced on his snowmobile.

No time to worry about him or Waylan.

I can’t see anything except Cora and the asshole trying to harm her.

I need to reach her.

I speed up, getting on the left of her attacker. I pull ahead of him just a smidge then turn my right ski ever so slightly. It causes him to lose control of his steering, and he drives off the trail and into the woods.

I manage to get in front of her, then hit the brakes. She bumps into me, and I grip the handles tightly, squeezing the brakes and slowly bringing us both to a safe halt, just ahead of a slippery curve.

“Riggs!” Cora shouts once we’re both stopped.

I jump off my machine and tear off my helmet as I rush to take her in my arms, holding her tightly. My whole body quivers from the adrenaline, but we’re okay.

“Fucker,” I growl as I look back to see Cora’s attacker circling around.

Thankfully, I also see Waylan quickly approaching on his snowmobile, which fortunately still works after its tumble. He rams into the guy, knocking himself and the attacker off the machines, the goon’s body flying upward before landing hard on the snow-covered trail. Both snowmobiles are done for, plastic parts flying as black smoke swirls up from the engines, the snow putting out any would be sparks.

Waylan is entangled in a fight with the assailant. I yearn to help him, but I don’t want to let go of Cora. I need to keep her safe. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter. The attacker squirms out of Waylan’s grasp and runs off into the woods.

“Oh, God,” I hear Cora mumble as security agents rush up on snowmobiles, desperate to get to us. I doubt they know what’s happening, but their camera alerts must’ve triggered their system, not to mention the trackers on the crashed machines.

“Waylan!” I shout.

He gets up with a crooked smile. “Look at the motherfucker go,” Waylan laughs. I’d laugh, too, if we weren’t dealing with another attempt on Cora’s safety.

“Are you okay?” I ask her.

She’s panting and red-faced, but she seems alright. She gives me a slight nod. “Yeah, I’m okay.”

“Does anything hurt?”

“No.”

“Are you sure, Cora?” She nods again, and I hold her tight, putting everything I feel into this simple but meaningful embrace.

“What the hell just happened?” she asks.

It was so fast. Unexpected and deliberate.

I glance ahead and furiously realize that all four of them got away. They must’ve grabbed their injured accomplice and scampered off the trail before Sebastian or the security guys could reach them, leaving what’s left of their snowmobiles behind. They’re off into the woods, so we’ll only have a few tree-mounted cameras to work with. Son of a bitch! Gone.

Whoever those men were, we were definitely their targets. It was intentional terror, and it was pure fucking evil. Cora could’ve gotten hurt. Or worse, killed.

“I think somebody we know put out a hit on us. You, specifically,” I mutter, giving her a frown.

“Riggs, who’d want to kill me? Oh…” Her voice trails off as she puts two and two together.

We regroup at the bottom of the slope and go through the details of the incident with the head of the resort’s security. Naturally, he and his team are pissed off about it.

“They could’ve harmed innocent people by trying to get to you,” the former Navy Seal lieutenant says, his brow furrowed as he keeps looking around, perhaps hoping he might see the fuckers again. “My team are already out there, combing the woods. But the main road leading into the nearest city isn’t that far away.”

“Chances are, they had a car waiting,” Waylan says. “This was well planned. Not well executed, but it’s probably because they don’t know enough about us.”

Cora is shaking, the adrenaline beginning to wear off. “I can’t believe it.”

“You could file a police report,” the head of security says.

“We will, rest assured,” Sebastian replies.

“And we will gladly cooperate and provide them with all the camera footage we can muster. I’ll send you copies as well. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to liaise with my boys and see if we can figure out how those assholes made it all the way up here undetected.”

I nod slowly. “You might want to have a look at your guestbooks, as well. You never know.”

The thought has crossed his mind, judging by his expression. He nods and walks back up the trail, radio in hand as he reaches out to his men. I can hear their voices garbling and fading, and I wonder if they found any trace of the assassins whatsoever.

A moment passes in heavy silence between the four of us.

Waylan and Sebastian try to work out a plan for what’s left of our trip. I’m distracted by the look on Cora’s face. The doubt. The fear. There are words left unspoken, and I can tell from the way she’s fidgeting that she’s trying to figure out how to say them.

“We already know the resort itself is heavily secured,” Waylan says. “And after what just happened, it’s only going to get tighter.”

“So, technically speaking, at this point, we’re safer staying in our suite than leaving,” Sebastian concludes with a soft nod. “It kind of makes sense. Doesn’t make me feel less uneasy about it, though.”

It’s not our safety we’re concerned with, of course. It’s Cora’s. And Dario’s. Waylan seems to have the same thought at the same time.

“I’m calling Sherry,” he announces.

Sebastian frowns as I tell Waylan to tell her to make sure the alarm system is activated at all times. He nods and makes the call.

I look at Cora and ask, “Something on your mind?”

“I’m just going back to what Orson St. James told me when we last spoke, in the back of his limo,” she mumbles. “Actually, he said it more than once. He’s not in control of the consequences to my stubbornness, so to speak. That I shouldn’t blame him if something happens. He made a promise, and now he can’t keep it because of me.”

“It’s got to be Denaro,” Waylan says, shaking his head. “Nobody else makes sense.”

“The Chicago mobster?” Cora gives him an inquisitive look.

I exhale sharply. “He’s got the goons and the firepower. But what worries me is why doesn’t Denaro simply outbid you on the escrow? I’m sure he’s got the financial means for something like that.”

“What if he doesn’t?” Sebastian chimes in, his eyes widening with a new realization. “That has to be it. Denaro wants the building, but he doesn’t have the cash to outbid Cora and her sister.”

“There are aspects to this supposition that still don’t make sense, though, if we’re to follow this theory. Why did St. James promise Denaro the building?” I ask.

“They’re up to something,” Waylan says. “They need that particular building. I have no clue as to why, but it’s worth refining our line of questioning. We clearly have a few more parameters to work with now.”

He sounds irritated. Then again, so am I. We’re missing important aspects from this picture. Answers that could lead us to evidence against St. James and Denaro. And where does George Hamilton fall into all of this?

“Hold on, Hamilton was supposed to buy the building,” I remind them. “But Hamilton doesn’t have five hundred grand, either.”

“Oh, there’s some food for thought,” Sebastian scoffs, bitterly amused.

“Food for thought aside, this is getting beyond dangerous,” Cora says, her voice filled with raw emotion, tears pricking her beautiful eyes. I hate to see her like this. “What if they go after Eva next time? The girls? Carl or Dario? They could be targeting all of us, for all we know.”

I pull her into my arms and press my lips against her forehead. “We won’t let anything bad happen to you or your family, Cora.”

“You’re not invincible, and those bastards are clearly determined,” she mutters, visibly struggling to relax in my embrace. I understand, more than she might think. Fear is a powerful thing. It warps one’s vision, and it opens the mind to faulty, self-sabotaging thoughts. “What if they catch you by surprise, and you get hurt?”

“Cora, we’ve got you,” I say softly. “Let’s go back to our suite. We’ll take a hot bath, clean our scratches, put some ice on any bruises, and then enjoy a nice meal in each other’s company. How does that sound?”

She softens a bit. “Well, I have to admit, a hot bath does sound amazing right now.”

Whatever St. James and Hamilton are up to, whatever Denaro’s role in all of this may be, I know we will not rest until the threat is gone. Until Cora and Eva have their building and their future secured. Today’s incident made everything all the more personal for Sebastian, Waylan, and me.

We promised we’d refrain from getting involved any deeper, but clearly we have no choice now.