Lawless. HelenKay Dimon

he cut himself and didn’t tell me?” She was willing to believe anything at this point, so long as the man was healthy and fine.

      “What about this gun?” Joel asked.

      The question shot out of nowhere and slammed into her with the force of a body blow. They could add the weapon to the list of things suddenly gone missing.

      Dread washed over her and she would have sat down hard on the floor, but Joel reached over and settled a hand on her elbow. Technically, he wasn’t holding her up, but inside she felt as if he were holding her together.

      She tried to explain over the knot of anxiety wedged in her throat. “Unbeknownst to me, he brought it along. He waved it around at dinner, acting like a big shot.”

      “Guy sounds like a jerk,” Cam said.

      She felt obligated to defend him on some level. “He was showing off, but my rules are clear. No weapons.”

      Joel shrugged. “I’m armed.”

      “So am I,” Cam agreed.

      They acted as if they were the only ones concerned with safety. “Yeah, well, that makes three of us.”

      Cam smiled. “Really?”

      “We all know the most dangerous person in a situation like this is the nervous novice with the gun.” Joel nodded and she took that as approval and kept going. “I can’t have people out here with weapons, or sooner or later one of them will shoot off a hand by accident.”

      He looked around the room. Even opened the bathroom door. “So where is it?”

      “What?”

      “The gun.”

      “I have it.” She remembered the fight and what she did. “It’s in a small lockbox in my cabin.” But somehow deep down, she knew it was gone.

      Joel stopped in the middle of the room and fixed her with a serious glare. “A hundred bucks says it’s missing.”

      Just went to show how alike they were. She knew, he knew. Heck, maybe even Cam knew.

      Still, she had to ask. “Why would you say that?”

      Joel didn’t hesitate. “Experience.”