by Elle James
“Hey, watch the amenities,” April said with a stern look that turned into a smile. “I hope you enjoy your time off, Mars. You guys work hard. You deserve some peace and relaxation.”
“Yeah,” Zig said. “And maybe you’ll find a woman up there in the Crazy Mountains who likes to fish and play with bears.”
The others laughed.
“Seriously, don’t do anything to get yourself killed or maimed. We need you on the team,” Bear said. “What with Lucky and Pops already gone to civilian life and new guys coming on board, we need experienced SEALs to bring those new guys up to speed.”
“You’re not getting rid of me that easily,” Jack said. “I’ll be back in two weeks. But right now, I need to get back to my place for some Zs. Tomorrow is an early wake-up for me.” He waved at Wolf. “Thanks for the grub. It was great, as usual.”
Wolf gave him a chin lift. “Don’t lose your shirt in Vegas, or your skin in the mountains.”
Jack left Wolf’s place, climbed into his truck and headed back to his apartment, a grin stretching across his face.
He was officially on vacation, and he couldn’t wait to hit the road.
By himself. Alone.
Though he loved his SEAL brothers, after months of deployment with them, it would be nice to sit back, relax and enjoy some uninterrupted peace and quiet.
Chapter 2
“Hi, you must be the tenant in the apartment across the hall from me,” a voice called out behind her.
Deirdre Anne Tyler turned, her eyes narrowing at the woman coming toward her at the end of the hallway. She didn’t want to engage in conversation, but she also didn’t want to be rude. She nodded and stuck the key in the doorknob. The woman kept coming.
“Hi, I’m Brittany.” The cute brunette stuck her hand out. “I’m in apartment 2A across the hall from you. You moved in a few weeks ago, didn’t you?”
Anne nodded. “Yes, last week. I’m…Anne…Smith.” Anne hesitated over the name, though she’d been using it for the past three weeks. She’d never been a good liar, but she was getting better out of necessity.
“You must just be starting out. I didn’t see many boxes or furniture coming in when you moved in.”
Anne nodded. “That’s right.” Again, she didn’t want to share too much information. The less she talked with people, the less they noticed her, and the better chance she had of flying under the radar. She just needed to remember her name was Anne Smith, not Deirdre Anne Tyler. Deirdre Anne Tyler was as good as dead, or she’d be as good as dead if he found her.
“Well, nice to meet you,” she said and started to push the door open. “Hey, would you like to come over for a drink or maybe some crackers and cheese?” The young woman gave her a crooked smile. “That’s probably all I have in my refrigerator. You know, so we can get to know each other better since we’re going to be neighbors.”
In any other circumstance, Anne would have welcomed the idea, but she couldn’t. Any risk she took wasn’t just a danger to herself. Her hand rested on her belly, still flat but not for much longer. She gave Brittany a tight smile. “Thank you for the invite, but I’ve been up since early this morning and I’m really tired.”
Brittany shrugged. “I understand. Maybe we can do it another time.”
Anne nodded. “That would be nice.”
The truth was, she had no intention of getting to know anyone, and she didn’t want anyone to get to know her. She’d barely gotten away from her ex-boyfriend. Never in her life had she pictured herself prying bars over windows loose enough from exterior stucco to allow her to shimmy out onto a roof and drop over the edge of the eaves to the ground ten feet away. She lived in the US, not a third world country.
Once she’d gotten free, she’d worn sunglasses to hide the bruises around her eyes and long sleeves and pants to hide the rest. She’d used Derek’s ATM card that she’d swiped from his wallet to take the maximum amount of money she could get from his account to add to the small stash of cash she’d managed to squirrel away when she’d been working and hadn’t been locked inside his house. She’d hidden it in the well behind the toilet roll holder in the bathroom. It was tip money she’d earned from being a waitress.
When she’d moved in with Derek, he’d made her hand over all of her money every time she came home from work and gave her just enough for bus fare to get her there and back. He told her he needed it for her expenses living with him, although he had plenty of money, and he was making more doing some kind of computer work. Anne was convinced he was hacking, either stealing money from people’s accounts or loading ransomware onto people’s computer systems and demanding that they pay huge sums of money for him to remove the destructive software from their systems.
When she’d discovered that she’d been right, she’d called him out on it. That’s when her world had shut down, and he’d locked her in the house. Situated on a dead-end street, with only boarded up or condemned houses around it, no one heard her cries or screams. She’d just about given up hope when she’d woken up one morning sick to her stomach, realizing she’d skipped her period for two weeks. The next morning when she’d been sick again, she’d known with a sinking feeling that she was pregnant, and she had to get out of the situation, if not for herself, then for her baby. Because no matter what, the baby had not chosen who his parents would be.
Anne had waited by the door one day hoping to push past Derek as he came into the house. Perhaps if she knocked him on his ass, it would give her time to make her escape. She had to make it good, otherwise there would be consequences. He’d beaten her before. One time, he’d beaten her so badly, she’d thought she might die, and he’d refused to take her to the emergency room when she’d coughed up blood.
That day, she’d attempted an escape through the front door. She’d watched through the window as he’d walked up the front steps, placed his key in the lock and turned it. She’d hurried to her position, took up a stance like a football player and waited for that door to open. As it swung inward, she’d launched herself at him, hitting him at his middle with her shoulder.
Derek had fallen backward, rolled down the steps and came to a stop at the bottom.
Anne had vaulted over the porch rail and hit the ground running. Derek had gotten to his feet just as soon as he’d hit the ground and chased after her. She hadn’t even gotten past the empty houses to the next street, where there were people living, before she’d been hit from behind.
She’d gone down hard, hitting her head on the ground, which had temporarily stunned her. He’d flipped her over and punched her face again and again. At that point, Anne had just wanted to die. When he’d finally gotten off her, she’d lain still, unable to move.
Derek had yanked her up by her arm.
She’d staggered, and would have fallen, but he’d punched her again, this time in the gut.
Anne had cried out, “No, don’t hit me there. You’ll hurt the baby.”
That had only stopped him for a second as he’d looked at her in stunned disbelief. “You damn bitch. I ain’t having no stinkin’ kid in my house.”
She’d covered her belly with her hands. “Then let me go.”
“No way. You’re mine, and I don’t give up what’s mine, but you ain’t having no kid.” He’d punched her in the gut again and again until she’d fallen to her knees and curled into a fetal position, every part of her body burning, especially her heart.
She had no idea what she’d seen in him in the first place. She regretted every day of her life since he’d insisted on her moving in with him. Derek had been kind and considerate while they’d been dating. It wasn’t until she’d moved in that he’d shown his true colors.
He’d forced her to give up everything—her friends, her connections and her independence. And that’s when the beatings had begun.
Her need to be loved and her inexperience with abuse had made her a fool. That and Derek’s accusations blaming her for any small infraction. She’d thought she’d done some
thing wrong, and that his treatment of her was entirely her fault. If she was just a little faster, a little nicer, a little prettier, he wouldn’t hit her. But nothing she did was right. After he’d beaten her and left her on the ground, he’d walked a few steps away, almost giving Anne enough hope that she could crawl away from him…if he’d just go back into his house and leave her alone.
Then his cellphone had rung. He’d looked down at the screen and then raised it to his ear. After a minute or so he’d cursed, ended the call, and turned back to her. “Time to move, sweetheart.” Then he’d walked over to her, grabbed her arm and dragged her all the way back to the house. She hadn’t had the strength to get up and walk. Instead, she’d hung limply as he’d scraped her body across the pavement.
When he’d reached the driveway, he left her there, unlocked the trunk of his car, tossed her in, and closed the trunk. Thankfully, she’d tucked what little money she had into her bra. She’d felt for it, relieved it was still there. Wherever he took her next, she’d have to make sure she found a good place to hide it. If she got another opportunity to escape, she’d need money to start over.
Derek had cut her off from her old friends. Even if he hadn’t, she couldn’t go back to them because that would be the first place he’d look. As she’d lain in the darkness of the trunk, pain screaming through every part of her body, she’d made a vow. As soon as she was able to, she would get away from him. In the meantime, she’d let him think that he’d beaten the child out of her. At that point, every inch of her body throbbing with pain, she thought maybe he had.
It wasn’t until three weeks later in a hovel of a house he’d brought her to in Los Angeles in a very sketchy neighborhood, she’d discovered that the bars on the windows were loose. Every time he’d left the house, she’d worked on those bars until she got the bottom ones free, and she could push the grill out enough where she could fit through the window and under the bars onto the roof.
She’d had to wait until just after he’d left to make her move. The second he had, she’d crawled out onto the roof and dropped to the ground. Unfortunately, as she’d landed, she’d twisted her ankle just slightly. She hadn’t cared how much pain she was in, it had been less than what he had inflicted on her when he’d beaten her. She’d half-run half-limped her way off that street and kept running in the dark through the night until she’d reached a truck stop, slipped into the cab of a truck into the sleeping quarters in the back and burrowed beneath the blankets. The truck driver had been on a roll and hadn’t stopped that night. He’d taken her all the way from Los Angeles to San Diego.
Early the next morning, the truck driver had pulled up at a loading dock and gotten out to talk to the guy in receiving.
Anne had taken the opportunity to slip out of the truck cab and slipped away without the truck driver knowing she’d ever been there.
And that’s how she’d started her new life and became Anne Smith.
The money she’d gotten out of the ATM in LA, plus the money she had hidden away from tips, had been enough to pay a month’s rent on a one-bedroom apartment. She’d made the excuse that she’d lost her driver’s license and that she would bring a copy of it as soon as she got it renewed, and she’d signed everything in the name of Anne Smith. She’d found a job in a restaurant. When the owner had asked for her social security number, she’d promised him she’d work strictly for tips. She’d told him that her social security card and driver’s license had been in a house fire, and she couldn’t remember the numbers. Since she’d worked for tips only, he hadn’t needed to report to the IRS.
He’d agreed because he’d needed the help at the time.
Anne had ended up working the breakfast hours, coming into work at five-thirty in the morning, working through the lunch crowd and getting off at four o’clock in the afternoon when the evening shift arrived.
Her first purchase for her apartment had been a foam mattress that she’d laid on the floor and vitamins for the baby. That had been three weeks ago, and so far, so good. As she’d earned a little bit more money, she’d added items to her wardrobe, not many because she hadn’t been sure how long she’d be able to stay—a new pair of jeans, a couple of shirts, and some tennis shoes to work in. She’d purchased them all through a thrift store, saving as much money as she could, knowing she would have to pay rent again. She didn’t have enough money in her stash to waste it all on other things.
She’d also picked up a couple of items for the kitchen, including a skillet, pot, plate, bowl and a couple of spoons, forks and knives. Again, all from a thrift store, keeping her costs at a bare minimum.
Because she hadn’t been earning a wage where she’d worked, they had allowed her to eat there, but that had only been during the day. She’d managed to buy a few groceries for the evenings. She had to eat to feed the baby. If she’d only had to worry about herself, she could have gone without food for a while.
Over the three-week period since her escape, she’d constantly looked over her shoulder. Although she’d thought, surely, he couldn’t find her. She didn’t have a cellphone he could track. She’d ditched his ATM card that she’d used while still in LA. He couldn’t track her with that because she’d thrown it in the trash after she’d withdrawn the money. She hadn’t used her real name, driver’s license or social security number anywhere.
Three weeks had passed without any sign of Derek. Three weeks without beatings. Three weeks where she had been able to move around on her own, even if she had been looking over her shoulder the entire time.
She couldn’t let him find her. She’d die rather than go back to him. And she couldn’t die because she had a baby who was depending on her because, despite the beatings she’d taken, she hadn’t started her period, she hadn’t bled out with a miscarriage, and she was still feeling nauseated in the mornings.
As she entered her apartment, she dropped her purse on the kitchen counter and trudged to the bathroom where she stripped and showered the smells of French fries, hamburgers, and fried chicken off her body.
Exhausted from work and the effects of the pregnancy on her body, she dressed in jeans and a T-shirt and trudged to the kitchen, determined to eat something for the baby’s sake.
Anne managed to scramble a couple of eggs and microwaved her last of a can of green beans, figuring she was getting something green and protein to help the baby grow.
When she finished the last bite, she dropped down on her foam mattress and closed her eyes with the intention of taking a short nap.
She wasn’t sure how much later it was when a noise woke her from a dead sleep. At first, she thought maybe it was somebody in another apartment, the AC kicking on, a bowl sliding in the sink… At first, she ignored it and closed her eyes again.
Then she heard it again. It was closer than a neighboring apartment. She rolled out of her bed and onto her feet. She tiptoed out of her room, her gaze shooting to the door to the apartment.
The handle jiggled.
Moving as quietly as she could, she hurried to the door and glanced through the peephole. Her heart leapt to her throat. The dark-haired man standing outside was her worst nightmare. How had he found her? Almost paralyzed with fear, for a moment, she stood frozen. Then she moved as quickly and as quietly as she could, grabbing shoes and the wad of money she’d been hoarding. She ran to the sliding door of her second-story balcony and slid it open as quietly as she could, just enough that she could squeeze through the opening. Once on the balcony, she slid the glass closed.
When she’d first looked at this apartment, she’d made sure there was an escape route. Even though her place was on the second floor, she’d had to have a way out. However, she was too high above the ground to jump down, but not too far to get onto the next balcony, if she really stretched.
Before she could lose her nerve, she tossed her shoes to the next balcony, tucked her money in her bra and climbed over the metal rail. Then holding onto the railing, she stretched out her leg until her toes touched the balcony
floor on the apartment beside hers. When she had her foot there, she reached out with one of her hands, holding on with the other and dangled above the two stories. If she fell, she’d land on the concrete sidewalk and possibly break something. She couldn’t afford that. She had to make it across to the other balcony and hope that Derek didn’t think to look out on the balcony at all.
Her hands found purchase on the other railing. Quickly, she made the transfer of her other foot, slung her leg over the top of the rail and fell to the balcony. Once there, she gathered her shoes and ran to the sliding door on her neighbor’s apartment and prayed that the renter hadn’t locked it.
Anne grabbed the handle and tugged gently. At first, the door didn’t move. She put a little more strength into her efforts and tugged harder.
The door slid open. Anne stepped through, softly slid the door closed and locked it. A loud thud shook the wall between the two apartments. Derek had made it past her lock and must have slammed the door open. Then she drew the curtains closed, blocking out all light from the streetlights outside the apartment complex. She ran to the door, pressed her fingers to the paneling and her eye to the peephole, and counted the seconds. When Derek left her apartment, he’d have to pass her neighbor’s apartment to get out of the apartment building.
She stood there shaking, her breath lodged in her lungs, her pulse pounding so loudly in her ears she couldn’t hear anything else.
Chapter 3
A minute passed, and then two. After what seemed like a lifetime, Derek moved past the apartment door and down the hallway. She let out a little bit of the breath she was holding, relieved she’d escaped capture…this time.
Only she wasn’t free. He’d be waiting for her to leave, and he’d be watching. She’d thought about going to the police, but the bruises he’d inflicted had faded. It would be her word against his, and she’d still have to start over somewhere else. Derek would not give up easily; he’d find her again. This time, she’d have to escape to someplace much farther away.
