Free Their Ex's Redrock Dawn (Texas Alpha Biker) by Shirl Anders Page A

was so surprised she must have looked the part of stunned and devastated, because Justice hauled her up and into his arms. Whoa.
    If she’d not just been in the best embraces God ever created with Zeb, she might be interested in how good it felt to be hugged by the younger and clearly rip-muscled Justice. She so wished she could at least brag about it around town, because every woman in town would be flaming jealous. They all knew Justice had been a one-woman man so far, and since he’d lost that girl he’d not set his whiskey-colored eyes on another young woman.
    Carly was kind of overwhelmed, but she did remember Zeb telling her when in doubt to lie. She took a couple healthy sniffs of Justice’s unique evergreen scent, and maybe a tiny feel up his hard body with her softer one to remember when she was eighty, and then she disengaged gently from him and stepped back. With space, she realized that what Justice had revealed cut her deeply. How could she not know Rick was such a lowlife?
    But to Justice, as calmly as she could, she said, “I have a private investigator trying to catch him so he can’t weasel out of claiming he’s not cheating on me, and I need you to keep it quiet that you told me about this.”
    “So you know,” Justice uttered, then he looked deeper into her gaze as if he were pulling out information. “You’re hiding hurt, babe, and I get that. But you need backup, or just a beer with a man that appreciates your charms, you let me know.”
    Wow, he appreciated her charms? First she knew of that. She blushed a little, and smiled up at him, softly saying, “Thanks, Justice.”
    He lifted his chin to her. “Sweet as hell,” he muttered, then he stepped past her. “You got my number anytime you need anything, Carly.”
    Carly watched Justice’s broad shoulders and jean-clad ass stride away as she took a few moments to center her thoughts.
    “Damn bastard,” she muttered about her freaking husband screwing another woman, while he thought his wife was gone doing her job.
    It just made her skin crawl every time she thought about the fact that she’d taken Rick back. She knew she’d been reeling from Cabe hooking up with Rusty Harper. No one in town had seen that one coming. So maybe she’d had a little of the “why could Rusty get Cabe when she couldn’t” going on. Then to feel like less of a chump for pining after Cabe, she’d let Rick convince her to try their marriage again. To her it had been a big, blaring sign saying, “See, I can get a guy, everybody!”
    She’d done it for all the wrong reasons, so she wasn’t guiltless in her marriage woes. But she really hadn’t gotten married without believing it would work that first time. The second time ... not so much. Maybe she’d been curious to see what Rick would do, or likely it had been a way to have a man and not just be that dumped single gal. Either way, she hadn’t really been into it the second time around.
    In fact, just that weekend she had decided she needed to change that attitude, and she was trying to give her marriage a real effort. But Rick had shut her down and wouldn’t go out with her or notice how provocatively she had dressed.
    Carly got tears in her eyes and brushed at them angrily. “He wasn’t paying attention to me, because he was all tied up with Tula,” she muttered, saying Tula’s name like it was a nasty word. And it was .
    She was going to show them, though. She didn’t need Rick, and skanky Tula could have his rotten ass. In fact—
    “If this hadn’t happened and I had met Zeb while still thinking I was in a real marriage, I would have been in big trouble.”
    Carly started walking again, thinking the one thing she’d not realized her entire life, because it hadn’t happened before, which was when you met a man that was good for you—you just knew it. Right in your gut. No doubts. It was an amazing feeling, and she had it for Zeb.
    She was pretty sure Zeb had it for her. So people might