Hilly had hit the jackpot.

According to Lisha, Bailey was a bitch and a tease. A number of the counselors had noticed her leading Lance on, only to shoot him down later, taunting him with racial slurs and jibes at him being a geek.

Cisco didn’t get it. What was Bailey’s game? He’d seen his share of bullying in his life, but he’d never understood it. He’d always assumed it was the bully’s way of compensating for their own insecurities, but as far as he could tell, Bailey was pretty and smart. So, what was her problem with Lance? Could it be, like they’d mused, the girl’s odd way of showing her interest?

From what Cisco could see, Lance was a great kid. Was he a bodybuilder? No. Was he movie-star handsome? Again, not quite. But not many people were. What Lance was, was a cheerful guy, and from what Cisco had seen, the kid went out of his way to make everyone feel special.

Cisco shook his head. His forte was not to understand the mind of today’s teenagers, just to keep them safe.

He set thoughts of Lance aside, and went back to Welker’s question.

“When we went for our run after the camp had been put to bed, she was giving me a slew of ‘step back’ vibes I couldn’t miss. Something about the whole bullying aspect over Lance and Bailey’s situation really bothered her.” Cisco sat up. “I know that’s what Hilly’s camp is all about; keeping kids safe from intimidation, but she seems to take this incident extremely personally.”

“Do you think Hilly was bullied when she was younger?” Welk asked astutely.

It had been on Cisco’s mind.

“Yeah. I do,” Cisco confirmed. “First, she runs this specialized camp. Second, she won’t tell me anything about her past. And three, if I had to guess, she’s been skittish about starting something with me because she fears I’m going to hurt her in some way; maybe get some physical perks off her, then dump her.”

“Which is about as far from the truth as it gets,” Welker rejoindered accurately. “I’ve never seen you sidle up to a female for more than a drink and a spin in the sack. Hilly’s got you dancing way outside your normal two-step, buddy.”

“Don’t I know it,” Cisco admitted, grabbing a towel out of his bag to mop at the curls on top of his head. “You think I’m doing the right thing, backing off?” He’d pretty much kept things strictly in the friend zone when he’d gone on the night-run with Hilly. The only time he’d touched her was to catch her when she’d skidded on some mud. He’d let go almost immediately, despite wanting, viscerally, to keep his hands glued to her soft skin.

Welker shook his head. “You’re asking the wrong guy. I don’t have a clue what women want these days. At least not the nice ones.” He grimaced, smacking the sneakers he’d just removed, onto the hardwood floor.

Cisco wondered again if Welker’s sourness had anything to do with the lovely sheriff on their SWAT team who gave Welk shit all the time. Cisco couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but he’d say his footloose and fancy-free buddy was a little smitten with the pretty deputy.

“Maybe you should ask Everlee?” Welker eventually suggested, coming out of his momentary snit. “She’s discreet, and always has good answers.”

Cisco had thought about it, but Ever was Mason’s wife, and Mason was Ellen’s son, and Ellen was employed by Hilly. If somehow his inquiry made it back through the grapevine, he might as well call it a day. Hilly would take any probing like that as a breach of trust, and she’d likely tear a verbal strip off him before requesting a new self-defense instructor from the chief.

“Nah. I’m going to go with my gut,” Cisco decided. If he was wrong, and Hilly took his backing-off on their touchy-feely moments as a rejection of some sort, he’d find a way to let her know she was still a person of interest to him—fascinating and adorable—without encroaching on her personal space.

He jumped to his feet.

Enough dissection of what might or might not be his future love life. He needed to talk about something else.

“Alvi called after my shift today,” Cisco let Welker know with a chuckle. “He’s been at camp all of eight hours, and he’s already like a cat in a yarn store; into everything. He’s been part of a canoe race, made a gimp lanyard for his keys, and started construction on a new obstacle for Hilly’s ropes course. Can you believe that shit?”

Welker grinned and stood, doing some cool-down stretches. “Should we tell Mason he might lose his team medic if he doesn’t put crafts on SWAT’s agenda?”

Cisco snorted. “Nah. I think Alvi will eventually get tired of camp life. You know he likes trolling the bars too much to be out of circulation for too long.”

Cisco thought for a moment, then scowled to himself. Out of circulation? Should he be worried that Alvero would make a move toward Hilly?

Hell, yes, he should. The man was a player. He’d have to warn Alvi, right away, that Cisco’s woman was off limits.

His woman. Yeah. Cisco liked the way that sounded.

Hitting the showers, rebandaging his chest, then putting on civvies, he and Welker parted ways with Cisco wondering how he’d fill the rest of his evening.

Welker, the fucker, knowing Cisco had been bitten by the romance-bug, hadn’t even bothered to ask him about hitting up a club. Not that Tuesday night was big for score-time, and Welk probably had classes, but the man would prowl eventually, as if he needed to keep that testosterone-filled part of his mind busy.

The more Cisco thought about it, the more certain he became that Welker had a thing for the pretty sheriff, and was trying to keep the woman from gaining space in his head.

Good luck with that.

Cisco’s brain was currently and constantly swamped with all things Hilly. He thought about her almost every minute of the day. He’d see a red head on the street, aaand…Hilly. He’d notice the sway of a certain type of hip, and yup, it was Hilly’s strut. He’d catch a whiff of a heady vanilla scent, and, fuck him, he immediately wanted to bury his face in whoever it was coming from.

Cisco glanced at his watch. It was meal-time at camp. Was there any excuse he could think of that would sound reasonable if he showed up there to eat? Dare he…?

Nope.

And that sucked.

Sure, he was scheduled to be there tomorrow at 1:30 for his class, but he wanted to see Hilly now.

Dammit. This whole getting-to-know-someone shit without stepping in doo-doo was a drag.

Cisco made one more, slow pass through town on his motorcycle before finally pointing its nose, west. Now that the time was close, he wasn’t wasting another minute. Cisco wasn’t even going home to change out of his leathers and breeches. He’d packed his saddlebags that morning with sweats and sneakers, and the RedMan suit he felt well enough to don today was already stashed in the equipment box inside the pavilion.

Cisco grinned. So what if he was going to be half an hour early?

It had felt like the longest freaking morning of his life, with nothing more than a lost dog on a frayed leash to fill his time. And that episode had taken practically no brains at all. He’d quickly found the frantic owner via social media, then reconciled the two; happy to see a brand-new leash in the owner’s hand, and witness the exuberant, doggy-kiss reunion between the two.

Cisco commiserated. He wished he could jump all over Hilly when he saw her again, letting his tongue do the talking as he licked her from head to toe, but at best she’d probably smack him on the nose with a rolled-up magazine, and at worst…she’d have him neutered.

When he came to the outskirts of the large camp parking lot, his heart rate kicked up in anticipation, but the last thing he’d expected was to see some kind of contentious meeting just outside its perimeters. There was Hilly, her arms crossed protectively over her chest, speaking angrily to a man who looked somewhat familiar.

Was that…?

Hell, yes. It was the pushy developer who’d made enemies of all Orono’s citizens. The man had bought up—at a rock-bottom price—a five-acre spread on the river just outside of town, from an elderly widow whom he’d clearly bamboozled. He’d then plowed down the semi-historic home that had sat majestically on the knoll for over a century, somehow gaining the needed permits to put up more townhouses on the land than zoning allowed.

Ugly-ass townhouses.

To say the people in town had been angry was an understatement, but they’d all thought—Cisco included—that the man had finally disappeared with his arrogant tail between his legs once his ill-gotten gains were in his pocket and he’d been marked as a pariah.

Cisco hated being wrong, but for him to find the douchebag confronting Hilly? Well, it made him see red.

He made no bones about tearing into the lot at a higher rate of speed than he normally would have, but he wanted to make himself known right away. If the man’s pissy-assed face was anything to go by, he was winding up to take a verbal hunk out of Hilly.

Both pairs of eyes turned toward him as he came to a stop a few feet away in the cloud of dust he’d raised.

“Everything okay here, Hilly?” he asked, now glad he’d kept his uniform on. He shut down his bike, then swung his leg over the saddle, standing tall.

Hilly gave him a tight smile, but it was clear she was happy to see him.