Team Falco Book 2
Brotherhood Protectors Colorado

By
Leanne Tyler

Five brothers fighting for justice, fighting to save lives. After years of military service, can they overcome their deceased father’s shortcomings and become a family?

Firefighter Marcus Falco is efficient at his job, but is a disaster at keeping Charli Jackson safe. Her grandmother’s death in a helicopter crash lays heavy on his mind and Charli is still in danger.

Charli doesn’t believe she needs a Brotherhood Protector, even if it is hot, ex-Marine Marcus whom she’s had her eyes on ever since he rolled into town with his firefighter brothers and she began renovating their ranch.

Someone is out to harm her. She doesn’t know who but they are also hurting the people she loves. Can they stop him before he goes too far?

Team Falco is a five-book series in the Brotherhood Protector World and while they each standalone I think you get more out of them if read in order.

We met the Falco brothers in ‘Fighting for Esme’ that book was Troy’s story.

In the prologue of this book we meet Charli, Melanie and their grandmother as Marcus is sending out Maydays and trying to land the malfunctioning helicopter.

It’s a couple weeks later and Marcus still feels guilty that Charli’s grandmother died, and going over the helicopter with a fine-tooth comb to figure out what happened. He’s always kept it in prime condition and is truly baffled as to what happened. He’s been avoiding Charli. Not today though, she’s here to confront him with the fact her grandmother died prior to the crash and he’s not to blame.

This is a favorite scene.

Damn, but she had him dead to rights, and he felt even worse for not going to the funeral now. But it had just been too soon for him after burying his own dad. He still had flashbacks from his mother’s funeral from when he was a child.

“I figured I was the last person you’d want to see there, especially since I caused both you and Melanie to get injured when we went down, and I walked away without a scratch.”

“You assumed wrong.” Charli stepped away from her motorcycle and came toward him with one hand shoved in the front jean pocket. The gravel crunched under each step of her scuffed-up boots. She looked good in her snug fitting jeans, leather jacket, now hooked on two fingers over her shoulder and her long, dark hair pulled away from her face with a red bandana.

She smelled like cocoa butter as if she’d been sunbathing before she came out to see him. The closer she got to him the stronger the scent of her assaulted his nostrils. Damn, if she didn’t have him all tied up in knots whenever he saw her. It was all he could do to keep his mind on the present and not thinking about taking her off to his bed. He’d taken a few women to hotel beds, their beds, but he’d never felt the need to take a woman to his bed. He trampled down the thought because the last thing he wanted was to be like his father. He wasn’t a womanizer. And he definitely didn’t see Charli as a conquest the way he knew that Shawn Falco would have in his younger days. Instead, he’d prefer moving slower, getting to know her, but it wasn’t happening because he was having trouble making his move.

Troy snickered from the side of the shed where he pretended to be working on something, but Marcus knew his brother had only stuck around to see if he finally asked the woman out or not. But it was hard to do so when you felt responsible for the death of her grandmother.

And now she was calling him a coward and telling him how he wasn’t to blame.

In his book, this wasn’t exactly the best time to make that move.

“Well, aren’t you going to say anything?” Charli demanded.

He sucked in a breath and looked her in the eye. “I’m glad you don’t hold me responsible for her death. I’ve been all over my chopper, and I can’t find a reason for it to have gone down as it did. Troy and Trent have looked at it too.”

“Yeah. It’s a mystery,” Troy said, finally coming out of the shed. “All we found was a can of smoke, you know the kind that would have fogged up the windshield to make you believe there was engine problems, but even that would have had to have been triggered to go off in flight. It wouldn’t have caused the bird to go down the way it did.”

Charli furrowed her brow and frowned. “That sounds like someone was tampering with your helicopter.”

“It does, but we couldn’t find evidence of it,” Marcus said. “Besides, who would have gotten to it all the way out here? Or even knew I had it? It isn’t like I’ve flown it around town since I arrived. The trip to your place was my first flight.”

“Had you seen anyone suspicious around your place that day, Charli?” Troy asked.

She shook her head, but stopped. Then chuckled. “Depends on how you define suspicious. My cousin Bart dropped by that morning. We hadn’t seen him in years. Not since uncle Coy and aunt Sue moved their family to California when we were thirteen. His arrival shocked Gran to no end. Like she was scared he was there. I never saw her like that before, and it sure didn’t do her heart condition any good either, but he was long gone before Marcus arrived.”

“What did he want?” Marcus asked without thinking. He didn’t like what he was hearing, but too late he realized he had no right asking. “Sorry. Don’t mean to be nosy. But it sounds like this wasn’t a welcome visit from him.”

“It wasn’t. He was passing through Colorado and stopped by because he wanted me to draw up some plans for a new development he’s starting. It’s a renovation really. He’d heard I was an architect now and had taken over our grandfather’s business. I told him I’d think about it and get back to him. Then he left because he had to get back on the road, or he’d be late for an appointment down in Tucson.”

“If he was worried about being late, why’d he come all the way into Fool’s Gold when he’d just have to make the forty-minute trek back into Colorado Springs to hit the interstate again?” Troy asked.

“Beats me.” Charli shrugged. “But it made it easy for him to show up for the funeral a few days later. And he sure stuck around for the reading of the will. Not that it did him much good.”

“Why’s that?” Marcus asked.

“Gran didn’t leave him a dime. He was so furious he stormed out of the lawyer’s office claiming we hadn’t heard the last of him.”

“Did you know ahead of time?” Troy asked.

“No. Neither Melanie nor I had a clue she’d left him out of her will. His parents weren’t too happy, either. She left them out as well. Said they’d taken up bad habits and turned their backs on their upbringing when they moved to California, and Bart was the result of it.” She paused and let out a little sigh. “And ended it with they got what they deserved.”

Troy whistled. “Tough cookie. I never imagined she was that rough on her family from meeting her.”

“Neither did I, and I lived with her,” Charli said. “Melanie and my parents tried to smooth things over with Coy and Sue, but they were inconsolable. Coy’s an attorney, so he’s threatened to challenge the will. We’ll see if he goes through with it. Of course, the executor has assured my father and Melanie’s dad that the will is ironclad. That our grandparents had it drawn up before my grandfather passed. I just hope he’s right. I’d hate to think this would tear our family apart.”

“I’m sure it will turn out just the way the executor said,” Marcus assured her. “Don’t worry yourself over the way Bart and his parents reacted. Just be glad you have an extended family as you do.”

“Marcus is right. We never had aunts and uncles growing up. Our granddad died in a house fire when Trent and I were small before Marcus was even born.”

“Even my mom died when I was young,” Marcus said.

“Don’t you all have different mothers?” Charli asked.

Troy nodded. “That’s right. My mom died in the housefire trying to get granddad out. Trent, Seth, and I were from the first marriage.”

“And I am from the second,” Marcus said.

“Then Heath?” Charli ran a hand up the nape of her neck, lifting her long dark hair off it, before letting it fall back in place.

“He’s our half-brother from another mother,” Marcus and Troy said in unison, then smiled at one another.

“I see. But isn’t he closer to Seth’s age?” she asked.

“True,” Heath said, joining them. “What’s going on?”

“We’re talking about my chopper going down and explaining to Charli our family lineage and how we have one another, but no cousins.”

“Oh yeah. That’s spot on,” Heath said. “And that wasn’t always a sure thing. I was the outsider at first, and the troubled one. But somehow the bloodline has won out, and we’re here for one another.”

“That’s good since you all have chosen to live here at Paradise together,” Charli said. “Melanie is the sister I never had, and she feels the same about me. Bart was like our brother until he moved away, and now he’s a stranger.”

“That must be tough,” Troy said.

“It was when he moved away. Now, not so much,” she replied.

“Trent sent me out to invite Charli into the house for some lemonade. He said it was too hot out here to be standing around talking without refreshment.” Heath waggled his brows. “And to see if you’d like to stay for lunch? We’re putting together some sandwiches, nothing fancy.”

Charli shook her head. “I’ve seen the way you boys eat. Those sandwiches are more like a feast in themselves.”

“Well they have to be to feed a bunch of growing boys like us,” Heath said. “We work hard and we play even harder.”

They laughed at his humor as the four of them started walking across the open yard to the house. They hadn’t gotten about ten feet when a loud cracking sound made them stop and look at one another.

“What the—” Marcus began to say when an explosion blew the shed to kingdom come, the impact wave from it knocking the four of them to the ground a few feet or so away from where they stood.
Tyler, Leanne; Protectors World, Brotherhood. Fighting for Charli: Brotherhood Protectors World. Kindle Locations (145-208). Twisted Page Press, LLC. Kindle Edition.

As you can see this book starts off with a bang and it jsut keeps getting better and better.

Too many accidents to be a coincidence, has Marcus not only investigating but also acting as Charli’s bodyguard. That role becomes even more difficult as the attraction between these two heats up the pages.

There is plenty of suspense and intrigue as this story unfolds. Not to mention the sizzle between Marcus and Charli.

I am going to have explore more of Leanne’s books.

5 Contented Purrs for Leanne!

Leanne Tyler

Award-winning author Leanne Tyler writes sweet and somewhat sensual romances whether historical, contemporary, or romantic suspense. Her newest series the Chicago Protection Task Force is part of the Elle James’ Brotherhood Protectors World. Other series includes her popular The Good Luck series–a collection of short contemporary romantic comedy romances set in East Tennessee. In addition to her contemporary novels, she writes American historical novels set prior to and during the Civil War.

Leanne lives in East Tennessee with her young-adult son and three-year-old Yorkie, Willie.

She invites readers to step into her world and enjoy the passion.