When a Man Loves a Weapon: A Bobbie Faye Novel [Mass Market Paperback]

“Stephanie Plum [fans] will be thrilled to meet Bobbie Faye.”—Library Journal (starred review)

Living single in her trailer was great for a time. But now Bobbie Faye’s officially engaged to, and has purchased a home with, the hottest FBI agent on the beat: Trevor Cormier. Even though she still has no idea what he really does on the job, Bobbie Faye has never been happier…until Trevor gets called away on an urgent assignment and leaves her in the care of body-guard slash babysitter Riley.  

As it turns out, Bobbie Faye could use a little extra security. The man she helped put in behind bars, the murderous Sean MacGreggor, has escaped from prison…and is dead-set on revenge. With still no word from Trevor—who was only supposed to be gone for three days—Bobbie Faye finds herself reluctantly turning to her detective ex-boyfriend Cam for help. He’s willing to do whatever it takes to protect Bobbie Faye…so long as Trevor stays out of the picture. For good.

Gun shot wounds, double crosses, sparring, S&M, and good ol’ fashioned Southern romance abound in the latest adventure starring everybody’s favorite “hurricane-force heroine” (The Tampa Tribune) Bobbie Faye.

 “Bobbie Faye is an outrageous hoot.”—The New Orleans Times-Picayune

Living single in her trailer was great for a time. But now Bobbie Faye’s officially engaged to, and has purchased a home with, the hottest FBI agent on the beat: Trevor Cormier. Even though she still has no idea what he really does on the job, Bobbie Faye has never been happier…until Trevor gets called away on an urgent assignment and leaves her in the care of body-guard slash babysitter Riley.  

 “A wise-cracking gal with a knack for getting in trouble… [Bobbie Faye] is one you won’t want to miss.”—Romantic Times BOOKreviews

As it turns out, Bobbie Faye could use a little extra security. The man she helped put in behind bars, the murderous Sean MacGreggor, has escaped from prison…and is dead-set on revenge. With still no word from Trevor—who was only supposed to be gone for three days—Bobbie Faye finds herself reluctantly turning to her detective ex-boyfriend Cam for help. He’s willing to do whatever it takes to protect Bobbie Faye…so long as Trevor stays out of the picture. For good.

“Fast, feisty, and ferociously funny.”—Booklist on Girls Just Wanna Have Guns

One

Bobbie Faye Sumrall lay flat on her back on the thick blue mat in the sparring ring, and if she weren’t so exhausted, she’d kill him. If she could just roll over and push her rancid sweaty self up, she’d crawl out of the room, pride be damned, and find the gun. It might take days to load because she’d probably have to load it with her teeth, her arms were so tired, and then she’d probably have to prop the damned thing up on something and ask Trevor to please move within range because she was too worn out to aim properly. And then she’d shoot him, assuming she had the strength left to pull the trigger.

If she thought hard enough, maybe she could come up with a good argument that "lying in a slobbering heap" was the same thing as "being prepared for the next disaster." There had to be some rationalization somewhere she could use, dammit. Because Trevor seemed to believe that another disaster was imminent and that she needed to be all prepared and shit.

He leaned over her and the light from the rafters of the old converted barn gave him a halo. He grinned, white teeth against tan skin, biceps bulging and forearms cording as he crossed his arms against his tight black t-shirt, and his wavy brown shoulder-length hair fell into his Satan-blue eyes. The least he could have done was broken a sweat.

"You’re improving," he said. "You almost managed to land a kick that time."

"I hate you."

His grin went from merely smug to completely obnoxious. "You did not hate me before breakfast. Which reminds me, we need to add strawberry jam to the shopping list."

Her eyesight fuzzed for a moment as her brain just skipped right on away from the subject of how much of a pain he was being, making her work out for hours every day, and frolicked over to exactly what he’d done with that strawberry jam. Now her favorite food on the planet. She hadn’t even known you could do that with a topping, and she had a friend who ran an S&M magazine.

"We could have stayed in bed all day," she pointed out. "I’m on vacation. You’re on leave. Allllll weeeeeek."

"And you," he said, squatting next to her, "are still hesitating. You’re not firing as fast, you’re not hitting as fast, and you’re thinking too damned much."

"I don’t think anyone’s ever actually accused me of thinking too damned much."

He glowered at her.

He was right. What was worse was that he knew that she knew that he was right. She really really hated that.

She needed a temporary amnesia potion.

Of course, she did not dare tell that to her boss, Ce Ce, who had a little voodoo side business to her Cajun Outfitter and Feng Shui Emporium where Bobbie Faye manned the gun counter. Ce Ce’s potions often had unexpected side effects. With Bobbie Faye’s luck, a "temporary amnesia potion" would probably erase way more than just the stuff she wanted to forget. She studied the man waiting next to her, his blue eyes heated like someone had turned on a blaze as his gaze roved over her body, and there were just some things she was not willing to sacrifice, no matter how much sleep amnesia might give her.

"C’mon, slacker. Up. You have at least thirty more minutes of sparring, and then we’re going to run."

"Did you have to pinky-swear you’d be a relentless, impossible hard-ass when you joined the FBI?"

"No," he said, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he stood up, smiling. "Pinky-swearing was all the rage back in Spec Ops. The Feds are big on promise rings." He offered her a hand to help her up. "You can do this."

"Ugh. Just shoot me now." She saw him shift, and she might as well have slapped his face, the way his relaxed stance stiffened, and she felt her own body tense in response. The tightening of the muscle in his jaw was infinitesimally small; most anyone else wouldn’t have noticed it, but she did and she knew what fury fiashed through him when that little muscle quirked. Fury on her behalf.

Four months ago. Three shots. Meant for him.

Bobbie Faye had jumped in the way.

They didn’t talk about it. At all. Every single morning, he kissed the scars, and every single night he held her, his long, lean fingers splayed out over that area as if he could ward them off, shove away the memory.

"Hey," she coaxed, tugging his hand, trying to dispel the mood, "he’s a metric buttload of miles away."

"MacGreggor escaped." He bit the words out with the same harsh disgust as the first time he’d told her. He’d damned near gone feral, his protective instincts kicking into full gear those first few weeks, and she’d had to fight him to keep him from putting them into complete lockdown mode. He’d have put armed guards on her if she’d have let him, and he’d vetoed traveling to meet his family and his family traveling to meet her. Hell, he’d have vetoed going to the grocery store and Ce Ce’s and ever seeing the sunlight again if she’d have listened to him. Good thing she’d patented "titanium-level stubborn" years earlier.

"He escaped three months ago." She was going to put a happy spin on it, if it fucking killed her. "And he’s heading toward Canada. We know that from the tips and witnesses calling in." There was a BOLO out on Sean on every continent—a "be on the lookout for" notice that went out internationally, at all levels of law enforcement. "He’s trying to get home." To Ireland, she hoped. Well, she hoped for Hell, because Ireland had never done anything to deserve Sean MacGreggor, either.

She watched Trevor tamp down his fury, that ice-cold hatred he had for Sean MacGreggor, the man Trevor had shot. The man who’d promised to come back and "claim" Bobbie Faye.

She’d been studiously ignoring that little nugget of information. Trying to be normal, what ever the hell that was. She’d actually slept a whole night. Well, sort of a whole night. Okay, four hours without waking up ready to fight someone and accidentally smacking the crap out of Trevor.

Still, she’d been working her ass off to convince him she was okay. "Hey," she said when he didn’t answer, "everything is back to normal . . . in fact, better than normal, all flowers and sunshine and fluffy clouds. I have set a whole new record of no one trying to kill me. I think I should get a trophy."

"C’mon." He reached for her again, not smiling at her attempt, his perfect poker face back in place. For an absolutely hot man . . . her Hormones took their own little detour at that moment to wander over his muscled thighs, nearly derailing her entire brain with an Ode to Man . . . he could go granite cold, a veneer he carefully adopted whenever he was undercover. It had become something of a personal goal to make him forget how to use that mask, particularly with her.

He pulled her to her feet, his sparring gloves smooth against her arms, and they stood face-to-face—er, eyes to chin, technically, since he was nearly six inches taller at six foot. She gave him a big grin, which inspired his suspicious appraisal.

"You realize," she poked him playfully in the ribs, "that as soon as we get me in prime fighting form, I’ll get flat-tened by a bus instead."

And just as he started to retort, she landed a punch and didn’t take the time to revel in his surprised expression, though he did manage to block her next flurry of moves. Damn freaking man. Two steps later, she nailed his thigh with a kick and they were suddenly game on, sparring, and she came very very close a few times to almost landing another one. Close enough to make Trevor’s eyes narrow, and he had to concentrate and not merely bat her away. Ha. Girl power.

She maneuvered him the way he’d taught her and, in one sweet move, the angels sang and the Universe was distracted from bringing on her total abject humiliation and she managed to take him down. They slammed against the padded floor mat, and if he hadn’t immediately rolled and pinned her beneath him, she’d have danced around the ring like a winning prizefighter.

Instead, she kissed him. Which made him relax. Whereupon she flipped him over and straddled him.

She’d have paid big money to have a photo of his expression—half shock, half pride. She wriggled on top of him and leaned down, kissing the corner of his mouth.

"You need to focus," he said, the words grinding out against her lips.

"I am focused." She smiled and kissed him again, and reminded herself that she was getting to marry this man.

"You planning on using this technique on everyone you take down? Because that’s a lot of guys I’ll have to kill."

"I’m not sure whether to be annoyed that you’re obsessing again, Mr. FBI, or happy that you think I’m capable of taking down multiple men. I landed a punch and a kick and a takedown. I think we need to celebrate." She grinned, running her fingers through his hair and wiggled just enough for him to be absolutely certain that sparring practice was over.

"Let’s go with happy."

He yanked off his shirt as he rolled over onto her, his hard body pressed along her own, his skin against hers delicious and warm against the cool air in the barn, like safety somehow sheathed in danger. Her body hummed as he braced on one arm and slid the other hand over her, a knuckle rasping just beneath her breast while he kissed her, possessing, dominating. She liked that he could be bossy and strong and rough and gentle at the same time and she wasn’t quite sure how he managed it, this treating her like an equal, but still his. Then she quit thinking completely as she burned beneath the fire of his kisses trailing down the line of her throat. She wasn’t entirely sure when he’d unhooked her workout bra, but she shivered beneath the scratch of his days-old stubble against her breast as he raked his teeth across he...