by Paige Tyler
Noah would have thought the men who’d tried to kidnap Peyton were smarter than that. Knowing about her book and how valuable it would be on the black market implied they weren’t the run-of-the-mill smash-and-grab types. Hell, having the connections to sell her manuscript once they’d gotten it should have put those guys in a different stratosphere.
“I thought you might want to be there when we talk to the guy, so you can reassure Peyton this thing is really over,” Dwayne said, interrupting Noah’s mental ramblings. “I got the feeling she’d believe it more coming from you than me and the SDPD.”
Noah almost asked if his relationship with Peyton was that obvious, but decided the question wasn’t necessary. He already knew what Dwayne would say.
“Actually, yeah, I would. Thanks.” He glanced at the time on the DVR clock below his TV. “With traffic at this time of the morning, it will probably take me thirty of forty minutes to get to your part of town. Will that still work?”
“No problem,” Dwayne said. “It will take at least that long to process him and get him into an interrogation room. Longer if he asks for a lawyer.”
Noah got the directions for where he needed to go once he got to the Central Division station and then hung up, heading back to the bedroom.
Peyton was awake, one hand resting on the pillow behind her head, the position doing all kinds of amazing things to her already amazing breasts, which, as it turns out, weren’t covered by the blanket. Like she’d been planning to seduce him or something.
“I’m guessing that was Detective Harrison?” she asked, casually stretching in the morning sun streaming through the window like a cat. If he thought her breasts had looked entrancing before, it was nothing compared to now. And yes, his cock certainly noticed. Which reminded him of the fact that he wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing.
The slight smile that tilted up the corners of her lips made him think Peyton had noticed him looking.
“Yeah, that was Dwayne.”
He’d intended to head over to the dresser for his clothes, but instead found himself climbing into bed with her. Peyton shoved the sheets and blankets aside, making room for him and baring her entire body. Even after all the time he’d spent gazing at her last night, it was still impossible not to stare again.
“They caught the driver of the van from last night,” he added. “Dwayne offered to let me be a fly on the wall while they questioned him.”
“When do you need to leave?” she asked, trailing her hands across his chest, her nails lightly grazing the muscles of his pecs.
“Pretty much now,” he admitted, hating the disappointed look that crossed her face. “I want to be there when they start talking to this guy and traffic is gonna be painful.”
She sighed. “I’d go with you, but unfortunately, I still have a lot more writing to get done today.”
Noah cursed himself for not including her in the trip down to the police station, assuming she wouldn’t be interested. Something to check himself about in the future. Make no assumptions.
“I wouldn’t even think about leaving you here alone if I thought you were in any danger,” he said, not sure if he was trying to reassure himself or her. “For one thing, no one knows you’re staying here, and for another, the people who were trying to get the book from you are now locked up. You’ll be fine here until I get back.”
Peyton seemed to accept that, but Noah still found himself curling the ends of her hair around his index finger. He was about to say something profound about always keeping her safe when Peyton leaned over and kissed him hard. Noah pulled her close, his hand finding its way deeper into her hair as he dragged his mouth away.
“I should go,” he rasped out in between her kisses. “Dwayne is waiting for me.”
She playfully nipped his lower lip, slowly wiggling her body on top of his. He was already hard before she even fully straddled him. “You’ll only be a few minutes late. I promise it will be worth it.”
He groaned, rolling her onto her back and kissed her again. “Did I ever tell you I like the way you think?”
* * * * *
“Okay, it’s official,” Peyton said into her phone as she sat on Noah’s comfy couch. “I’m falling seriously hard for your brother. And no, you aren’t getting any details about last night.”
Laurissa laughed. “Trust me, I have no desire to hear them.”
But just because Laurissa didn’t want to discuss the private aspects of last night’s adventures, that didn’t mean she didn’t want to hear everything else. So, while Peyton probably should have kept writing, she instead spent the next fifteen minutes telling her best friend everything that happened at his place after they got there, followed by a word-for-word recap of how she convinced Noah that they could have something real between them.
Laurissa practically swooned. “Man, if there was ever any doubt that you write romance for a living, it’s gone now. Because that stuff you just told me was romantic gold. Please tell me it’s going to find its way into one of your books soon, pretty please?”
Peyton was still laughing when the doorbell rang.
Startled, she stood up to move tentatively across the living room, wondering if she should simply ignore whoever it was. Then she remembered that Gwen was supposed to stop by.
“Someone’s at the door,” she said, interrupting her friend’s ongoing monologue on Noah’s habit of eating all the Oreo cookies when they were kids. “Hold on while I take a peek.”
Fully expecting to see Gwen, she was a little surprised when she looked through the peephole and instead saw Scott standing there looking sweaty and uncomfortable as hell in his normal 5th Avenue wool suit. Not surprising since the temperature outside was probably already in the mid-90’s.
“My editor is here,” she said into the phone. “I’m going to have to call you back later.”
“No worries,” Laurissa said. “Tell my brother I said hi.”
Promising she would, Peyton unlocked the door and opened it, stunned to see an older man in an expensive suit with Scott. He must have been standing off to the side for Peyton not to have seen him through the peephole. That worried her. These days, she didn’t deal well with people she didn’t know.
“Hope we didn’t interrupt your writing,” Scott said with a familiar smile that went a long way to calming her nerves. Scott was as much of a friend as an editor. If he brought someone with him, there was no reason not to trust the man. “Gwen would have come herself, but she got busy on some contract negotiations and asked me to come in her place,” he added as Peyton stepped aside to let them in. “She also wanted me to introduce you to Daris Markovic. He’s a prospective investor.”
Peyton groaned silently. She knew very little about the business side of publishing but was fully aware that it took a lot of money. As one of the publisher’s most well-known authors, she was always being paraded in front of people with fat bank accounts in the hopes of luring some money out of them.
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Markovic,” she said, stepping forward to shake the dark-haired man’s hand.
“Please, call me Daris,” the man said with a warm smile. “Truthfully, my entire reason for approaching your publisher with an offer of investment was so I’d get a chance to meet you. I hope I don’t embarrass you by admitting that I’m your biggest fan.”
Peyton laughed. Impressing potential investors might not be her thing, but this she could handle. Daris was a fan. He simply had more money than most. And maybe he was a little outside the normal demographic, but that was okay, too.
She was about to ask if they wanted coffee, but the moment they sat down on the couch, Daris immediately peppered her with questions about her books. They spent the next few minutes talking about her series and the most recent book. Daris shocked her by admitting he’d already read every book in the series twice. Crap, he really was a fan!
Scott made a comment or two about the book, but she could tell he wasn’t as into the conversation as Daris was. Peyton
tried to ignore her editor’s uncomfortable silence, but after a while that became impossible.
“Is everything okay, Scott?” she finally asked. “You seem quiet this morning.”
Scott seemed to be caught off guard by the question. He flushed and dropped his gaze to stare down at the floor. She thought for a moment that he wasn’t going to answer, but when he finally looked at her again, the expression of contrition on his face was hard to miss.
“I wanted to tell you how sorry I am about what I said last night,” he said, giving her a sheepish look. “When I asked about the book before even checking to see if you were okay. I mean, I didn’t intend to make it seem like I was more interested in your book than your safety.”
She waved her hand, a little surprised Scott was fixated on something like that. “Don’t worry about it. Things got a little crazy last night. But I’m fine, the book is fine, and the cops caught the jerks who tried to get it. I certainly don’t hold your concern for the book against you. It’s your job. So please, it isn’t a big deal.”
Scott let out a sigh, relaxing as if a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. “Thanks. I appreciate that. Speaking of the book, I guess I should ask how it’s coming. It’s why Gwen sent me over in the first place.”
“It’s almost finished,” she said, almost laughing at the look of surprise on Scott’s face. “The only thing I have left to do is wrap up the ending, but I can’t quite seem to get it the way I want it. It’s lacking a certain punch, if you know what I mean? I’m trying to get the intensity to match the end of the previous books and it isn’t quite there yet.”
“Do you want me to take a peek?” Scott asked. “Maybe I could help you out.”
“Sure,” she said. He’d been pretty good at making suggestions when they’d worked together on the previous books. “I was about to get some coffee. Do you two want some?”
Scott looked over at Daris, who nodded. “That’d be great. Thanks.”
“Cream and sugar?”
“That’s good for me,” Scott said while Daris asked for milk in his.
She pointed at the computer sitting on the coffee table with a smile. “The last page of the story is already up for you. I was working it when you knocked. Have a look and see what you think. You can take a look too, Daris. Just keep in mind that this is the rough draft and is likely to change a little in the final version.”
She almost laughed at how fast Daris moved to grab a seat on the couch beside Scott, his excitement obvious. She watched the two men reading for a moment before heading to the kitchen, where she made fresh coffee and poured it into three mugs, adding cream, sugar, and milk as the men had asked. She wasted a few seconds looking for something she could use as a serving tray before giving up and picking up all three mugs at once to carry them back out to the living room. When she stepped out of the kitchen, she froze in the doorway.
While Daris was over by the shelves, looking at Noah’s pictures, Scott was still by her computer, standing there with a flash drive in his hand and a guilty expression on his face, looking almost as shocked as she was.
“What the hell are you doing?” she demanded, already knowing the answer.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Daris wasn’t even looking at them, but it wasn’t like she cared.
Scott flushed. “This isn’t what it looks like.”
She tightened her grip on the mugs. “Really? Because it looks like you’re trying to steal my book.”
Scott didn’t say anything.
“That is what you were trying to do, isn’t it?” she insisted. “Why would you do something like that?”
When he still didn’t answer, Peyton thought maybe she was wrong. But then Scott’s face twisted, looking angrier than she’d ever imagined it could be.
“Because I’m tired of being pissed on and told it’s raining. I’m the one who scooped your first book off the slush pile all those years ago. I was the one who fought to get it on the table for consideration. I’m the one who stood up for you and the series at the acquisition meetings when everyone kept saying that young adult print sales were dead and gone. I got your series published. And I was the one who edited the first two books in the series, not Gwen. Hell, she was one of the people who didn’t see any potential in the series. I was the one who put your books on the bestseller lists!”
Peyton frowned, stunned. Yes, she’d worked with him on her earlier books, but she had no idea he’d been the one who found it in the slush pile.
“But I thought you were getting promoted to full editor in the thriller market,” she said softly.
“I thought so too, but then Gwen decided she needed my help too much to let me leave.” He snorted. “I figured if I was going to do this much damn work on a book, I should at least get paid for it. Luckily, there are people like Daris around who recognize the true value I bring to the team. And what a book like yours can really be worth.”
Peyton’s stomach clenched as she put two and two together. She threw another quick glance toward Daris, to see that he was definitely interested in the conversation now. “You hired those guys to kidnap me?”
Scott shrugged. “I didn’t pay for them, of course. That was Daris. But I did pick them out and tell them what to do. And they would have pulled it off too, if it wasn’t for that stupid fucking Navy SEAL.”
“A miscalculation on your part,” Daris murmured from his place over by Noah’s bookshelf with the framed photos.
Scott’s lip curled. “How the hell was I supposed to know the publisher hired a damn Navy SEAL to be your bodyguard? And then you up and disappear after the signing at the hotel I thought for sure I’d never find you. I almost flipped when I overheard Gwen talking to the publisher about you staying with your bodyguard. Luckily, Daris had no problem finding the address.”
This was insane. All this time she’d thought it was nameless, faceless criminals looking to sell her book to the highest bidder. Discovering it was someone she trusted made the whole thing even worse.
“You didn’t think you could walk out of here with that flash drive without me knowing, did you?” she asked.
“Yeah, I did.” He slowly slipped the flash drive into his pocket. “And if you’d come out of the kitchen a few seconds later, you never would have realized I’d made a copy. Truthfully, I really wish you hadn’t caught me because now, I’m going to have to do something about it.”
Peyton’s blood ran cold. Crap. For the first time since she’d walked in here, she realized she might be in trouble.
Before she knew what she was even doing, Peyton threw the three mugs of hot coffee at Scott, turning to run for the door even as he let out a curse.
Daris caught her as she yanked the door open. She tried to fight him, but he grabbed her arm and spun her around. Her back slammed against the wall and her head hit with a thud. She was sure he was going to hit her, but before he got the chance, everything went black and she felt herself falling.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
NOAH COULDN’T REMEMBER having it so bad for a woman before, but after spending one amazing night with Peyton, he knew she was in his blood forever. He hadn’t been able to think about anything other than her the whole way to the police station. Hell, he was so preoccupied, he was damn lucky he hadn’t driven off the road. Even now, as he strode inside the building and headed upstairs to see Dwayne, he was still daydreaming about how much fun that quickie had been with her this morning.
He knew he was probably grinning like an idiot as he finally found his friend’s desk, but he didn’t care. Peyton was the kind of woman who made him not give a crap what people thought of him.
Dwayne was reading something intently on his computer screen when Noah walked up. “Finally. I was starting to think you weren’t going to make it.”
“Traffic was a nightmare,” Noah said, berating himself for staying for that quickie even though he would never really be able to regret it. “Hope I didn’t miss anything important.”
/> “Not yet.” Dwayne snorted. “As I suspected, the guy lawyered up immediately. But it looks like they’re ready to make a deal. I was about to go talk to them. You still want to listen in, right?”
“Definitely.”
Noah was interested in knowing what the asshole who tried to kidnap Peyton thought he might have to offer up for a deal, but he guessed he was about to find out.
“It goes without saying, but you were never officially here,” Dwayne murmured as he led the way down a long narrow hallway. “You’re here to observe only. Understood?”
“Hooyah,” Noah said.
Stopping, Dwayne motioned him into a dimly lit room with a two-way mirror that allowed him to see into the interrogation room. The man Noah had tangled with last night was already sitting at a table, along with a second man who must have been his partner in crime. In between them sat a gray-haired guy in a suit whom Noah assumed was their lawyer. All three men sat up a little straighter when Dwayne walked in and took a seat opposite them.
“I understand your clients have something they want to tell me, Mr. Carpenter,” Dwayne said to the gray-haired man.
Carpenter nodded. “In return for a deal, yes.”
“You know how this works,” Dwayne said. “Your clients talk and if I think the information is worth anything, the appropriate recommendations will be filed with the ADA. But it all depends on what they have to say.”
Carpenter hesitated, then nodded at the two men.
The one who’d grabbed Peyton and dragged her into the van took a deep breath. Without the ski mask, he didn’t look nearly as tough. “We were only trying to kidnap that writer because someone hired us to do it. We were never gonna hurt her. We were told to get an external hard drive from her, but she had a death grip on that frigging purse of hers.”
Noah tensed. If someone had hired these two idiots, that person was still out there and would almost certainly go after Peyton and her book again.
“Who hired you?” Dwayne asked.
