by Cynthia Eden
Because he’d attacked her. Because she knew this was a delicate situation, and with the news of her pregnancy, she had to do everything possible to protect her baby. “I’ve called and talked with Mercer and the doctors.”
“But you don’t want to talk to him, not anymore?”
She clenched her hands into fists so she wouldn’t touch her stomach again. “Things have changed for me. And I already told Slade, a future for the two of us just won’t be happening.” It would be impossible.
“So that’s it...you’re walking away?” Confusion deepened the faint lines near his eyes. “I thought you were going to marry him.”
Gunner actually sounded angry. Her own anger bloomed, but she choked it back. Anger couldn’t be good for the baby. And the baby was what mattered. “Two years ago, I agreed to marry him.” Even when she’d had her doubts. “We weren’t perfect then, you know. Or maybe you don’t.” Her laugh held little humor. “I’ll help him transition back to life here, I’ll do what I can, but he attacked me. I can’t be around anyone who will be a physical threat to me right now.”
Even if it hadn’t been the drugs, there was no future for them. She was in love with Gunner, not Slade. She was having Gunner’s baby.
Gunner stood just a few feet away, and she so badly wanted to tell him how she felt, but he seemed so wooden. Sydney found herself asking him, “Why did you want to be with me?”
His eyelashes flickered, a tiny movement. “Because you’ve been an obsession for me.”
Obsession wasn’t the same thing as love—wasn’t even close.
She gathered her resolve and asked another painful question. He was here, talking to her, so she might as well take the chance while she could. “What do you want, Gunner? You came here to talk about Slade, I get that, but what do you want?”
“I can’t have what I want.”
Helpless, she stepped toward him. “How do you know?” Her voice softened because this was the chink she’d wanted to see in his armor. “How do you know you can’t have it?”
She ached to touch him.
He retreated off that bottom step, moving away from her. “You’re the only thing that matters to Slade. I think you’re the only thing keeping him going.”
She shook her head. Why did he continue making everything about Slade? “I’m talking about you. About me. Not him.”
“But he’s there.”
She could feel him, standing between them. Would Slade always be there?
“He’s getting his sanity back, and I can’t take away what he wants most.”
“You can’t take it away?” Now her spine straightened. “I’m not some kind of prize to be given or taken away. I’m a person, and I choose my own path in this world.” A path she’d wanted to take with him. “Tell your brother that I’m glad he’s better, but there isn’t going to be any marriage.”
Not to either brother.
She’d already made arrangements to return Slade’s ring, the ring she had locked away for so long. She couldn’t keep it, because there was no future for them.
Sydney turned on her heel and marched back inside her house.
* * *
THE SUN HAD SET. Night had crept over the area, sealing everything in darkness.
Sydney’s house sat at the end of the lane, lights still blazing in a few of her windows.
Gunner was helpless to look away from that sight.
“What the hell am I doing here?” he muttered in disgust, sitting in the shadows, watching her house.
He just hadn’t been able to leave her. He’d tried. He’d driven nearly all the way back to D.C.; then he’d turned around and come back.
There had been pain in her eyes. Pain that he knew he’d caused because he wasn’t giving her what she needed.
He opened the door of his truck just as her upstairs lights switched off.
Should he still go to her? Knock on the door—and do what?
Ask his brother’s fiancée to be with him? Slade had just gotten back on his feet. He’d apologized for his accusations and behavior. Thin, pale, looking shaken, Slade had told him that he would get better.
Slade was out of the treatment facility. Mercer hadn’t wanted to let him out yet, but the doctors had said that with continued rehab and counseling—therapy that he could receive as an outpatient—Slade would keep progressing. As a precaution—because Mercer was a man who believed in precautions—a guard was stationed at Slade’s new apartment.
And Gunner was standing in front of Sydney’s house. Like some kind of lovesick fool. She was sleeping. They could talk later. He didn’t have to—
He could smell smoke. Gunner stiffened even as he inhaled—and yes, that was the scent of fire.
The scent was coming from Sydney’s house. As he turned his horrified gaze on her house, he saw the flash of flames on the bottom floor. Flames...
“Sydney!” He ran for her house, rushing up the steps and kicking in the front door. The old lock gave way easily, and he saw the flames inside, growing fast, as they raced around her living room and toward the stairs.
Toward Sydney.
“Sydney!” he yelled again even as he leaped forward. The flames were trying to lash out at him, but he jumped over them and took those stairs as fast as he could. How had the fire started? Why was it spreading so rapidly?
Where was—“Sydney!”
Her door swung open. She stood there, wearing a small pair of shorts and a T-shirt. She was coughing and trying to cover her mouth. “Gun...ner?”
He grabbed her. He hurried toward her bed, snatched up her covers and wrapped them around her. Then he turned back for the door.
The fire was already climbing up the stairs. Gunner hesitated. He wasn’t sure if he would be fast enough to get her through the flames. They were burning so bright and hot.
He backed into her room. Slammed the door shut with his booted heel and whirled to face the window.
Sydney struggled in his arms. “Gunner, I can...” She coughed. “I can help...”
He put her on her feet. Only long enough to shove open her bedroom window and stare down below. A one-story drop. Maybe a broken leg, depending on how he landed. Could be much worse, though, if he—
“I can’t go through that window.” Sydney had backed away. “I can’t jump!”
He caught her arms and pulled her right back against him. “You can’t go down those stairs, baby. You wouldn’t make it.” Not without receiving burns all over her body.
There were tears in her eyes. “I can’t take that drop, I—” Then her eyes widened. Her hands twisted in his grasp, and her short nails dug into his skin. “The storage room down the hall. There’s a lattice leading down from the window there. We can go on that!”
If the lattice held them.
Sydney scrambled and jerked on a pair of sneakers
Giving a grim nod, he grabbed for the blanket and bundled her up once more.
“Gunner, stop, I can—”
He had her in his arms. If the fire was coming, it would get him first.
He rushed down the hallway, holding her tight. The rising smoke was so thick now that every step burned his lungs. He coughed hard, trying to clear his throat and chest. Not working.
Then he was at the other door. Inside that storage room. Carefully, he put her down on her feet. The window didn’t want to open, as if it had been sealed shut, so Gunner just used his fist to break the glass. The glass rained down on the ground, his fingers bled, but he didn’t care. He could see the lattice, just to the side. It looked old and shaky, and he sure didn’t have a whole lot of faith in it.
It wasn’t going to hold them both at the same time, that was for sure. But he’d already planned to get her out first.
She’d dropped the cover. It was smoldering, smoking. Sydney’s glance locked on his.
“Go,” he told her. “Get to safety, and I’ll be right behind you.”
She nodded and then she—kissed him.
He hadn’
t expected the move and it was all too brief. A frantic brush of her lips against his, and then Sydney was climbing through the window holding tight to that lattice.
As she climbed down, Gunner realized that he was holding his breath.
Then the lattice started to crack. He heard the wood groaning.
Hurry, Syd. Hurry.
Her feet touched down on the ground. “Come on, Gunner!”
He was already out the window. He grabbed the lattice and double-timed it, and when the wood snapped, when the lattice broke in two, he leaped the rest of the way to the ground.
No broken bones. No burns. They were both damn lucky.
He caught Sydney’s hand, and they rushed away from the fire, heading toward Gunner’s truck. The hungry blaze was destroying that house, burning higher and higher with every moment that passed.
If he hadn’t come back, would Sydney have been able to get out on her own? He hadn’t heard any alarms sounding in her house. If she’d been sleeping...
She might never have wakened.
He pulled her into his arms, held her close against his chest. His heart was racing, and fear had sent adrenaline spiking in his blood.
Too close.
He never wanted Sydney that close to death again.
* * *
THE FLAMES WERE sputtering out. Sydney stared at the charred remains of her home. Gutted. The firefighters were still using their hoses, and the scent of ash filled the air.
Sydney stood by Gunner’s truck, her shoulders hunched. The blaze had spread quickly. She’d been in bed, drifting off to sleep, when she’d heard Gunner shouting her name.
Her eyes had flown open. She’d run to her bedroom door, and only then had she felt the heat of the flames and smelled the smoke.
“You’re sure that you had fresh batteries in your smoke detector?” The question came from Logan. As soon as he’d heard about the fire, he’d raced out to the scene. Good thing he’d still been in D.C. Logan and his new wife, Juliana, divided their time between D.C. and Juliana’s beach home in Biloxi.
“Yes, I’m sure.” She’d checked it a week ago. The smoke detector had been working fine then.
It had just failed her tonight.
“Good thing Gunner was here,” Logan murmured. “I think he saved your life.”
Again.
She nodded.
“Uh...just why was Gunner here?”
Her gaze slid to the right. To Gunner. He was talking to some of the firefighters and looking pretty angry.
“Sydney?”
She snapped her attention back to Logan. “He was... He came out earlier to tell me that Slade was doing better, that he was doing outpatient rehab and counseling now.”
Logan nodded. “He is. I saw him at EOD headquarters just yesterday. Seems like a different man...” His words trailed away. He tilted his head to the right. “So...Gunner came out and just...decided to stay with you?”
Why was he asking her all of these questions? “No, he left. I didn’t even realize he was back until—until I heard him yelling my name.” Her gaze slid back to Gunner.
He was staring at her. He started to make his way toward her.
“You can ask Gunner if he saw anything or anyone before the fire started. I sure didn’t see anything. I thought I was alone.”
“Yet Gunner was here.”
Yes, he had been. Why? It wasn’t as if she’d stopped to ask him when they were rushing out of the burning house.
“The chief says it looks like arson. The way the burn marks are sliding across the rooms...” Gunner drew closer as he spoke. “An arson investigator will be out tomorrow to start the investigation.”
“Arson?” Her hand was on her stomach. She dropped it. “Why would someone torch my house?”
“With you in it?” Gunner growled.
She flinched.
“You know the EOD has plenty of enemies.” This came from Logan.
Sydney nodded. Yes, she knew that.
“You’re thinking someone is targeting us again?” Gunner demanded as his stare turned to the other man.
Logan shrugged. “We never found out the identity of the man who sent out the hits before. Just that he was based in South America. We’ve got agents in the EOD who are digging for more intel on him even now.” He paused, glanced toward the charred structure that had been Sydney’s house. “This isn’t random chance, we all know that. I’m going to send out word that all of our agents need to be on alert until we can learn more.”
Sydney was sure that the EOD’s own investigators would be joining the arson crew tomorrow.
“In the meantime, Sydney, do you want to stay with me and Juliana?” Logan asked her.
“I—”
“She can stay with me,” Gunner said instantly.
That sounded like a very bad idea to her. Sydney shook her head. “Thanks, both of you, but I’m perfectly capable of getting a hotel room. Or maybe even going back to Baton Rouge—”
“No.” Gunner was adamant. “If you leave the area, you’ll be on your own.”
In the EOD, you were never supposed to be on your own. The other agents were there to always have your back.
The way Gunner had protected her tonight. He’d fought the flames to get her out.
Tell him. She had to tell him about the baby. Gunner had a right to know that he would be a father.
“I’ve got an extra room,” he told her, voice stilted. “You’ll have plenty of privacy.”
Logan just looked between them.
She thought of her baby. She thought of the night someone had tried to shoot her on the beach in Peru. She thought of the flames that she could still feel against her skin.
If someone was after her, and it sure was starting to look that way, she wanted protection.
Gunner was the best agent she knew. “I’ll stay with you,” she said softly.
In the moonlight, she could see the expression of relief flicker across his face.
Just what expression would he show when she told him about the baby?
When they were alone again, she’d find out.
* * *
HE WATCHED THEM from the woods. The firefighters were still running around the scene like ants, spraying everything down with their hoses.
But no one had started to search the area.
They were too busy working on the fire.
His jaw ached, and he realized that he’d been clenching his teeth. Gunner shouldn’t have been there. He’d watched Gunner drive away before. Had followed Gunner out there, then waited until he had left.
It had been easy enough to sneak into Sydney’s house. She’d been in the shower. She hadn’t even heard him.
Not when he’d poured the gasoline all over the ground floor of her home.
Not when he’d lit the matches and started that blaze.
He’d escaped, running to his shelter in the woods to watch the flames, but then he’d seen Gunner running into the house.
Always playing the hero.
Always screwing up his plans.
So Sydney was safe now. Or so she thought. But this wasn’t the end. Not even close.
He watched them. Her and Gunner. Their bodies brushed against each other as Gunner led Sydney around the truck and opened the passenger door for her.
Where would Gunner take her? Back to his place?
Bastard.
But he was going to make Gunner pay. By hurting Sydney, he’d be striking blows against Gunner.
He knew Gunner’s weakness, and he was ready to use that weakness against him.
He slipped deeper into the woods. He would attack again, and the next time Gunner wouldn’t be in time to ride to the rescue.
* * *
“DON’T WORRY,” GUNNER told Sydney as he unlocked the door to his third-floor condo. “The EOD will find out what happened at your place.”
She brushed by him as she headed inside. She was still wearing just her shorts, T-shirt and sneakers. There was ash on he
r cheek. Her hair was tousled. Her eyes were huge.
She was so beautiful that he ached.
Gunner squared his shoulders, then shut and bolted the door. “You’ll be safe here. I promise.”
“Are any of us ever really safe?” The quiet question caught him off guard. “You know as well as I do that this world is a very dangerous place.” She turned away from him and paced toward the large glass window that overlooked D.C. “Safety is what we make of it.”
He stared at her back, at a loss. He knew he’d do anything possible to keep Sydney safe, but—
“Why did you come back?”
He took a cautious step toward her. “Because there was more to say between us.”
“More?” She wasn’t looking at him. “Yes, you’re right, there is more.” Then she turned to face him. “There’s something that I need to tell you.”
He braced himself. There’s something that I need to tell you...usually didn’t foreshadow anything good.
What was she going to say? He hoped she hadn’t changed her mind and decided to go back to Baton Rouge. He knew Mercer had been pressuring her to remain in the area.
Gunner needed to stay close and keep an eye on Slade, but he couldn’t just let Sydney go off on her own when someone as threatening her.
“I’m pregnant.”
He hadn’t heard her right. Gunner shook his head.
Sydney’s lips tightened. “Don’t look at me like I’m crazy. We both know you just heard what I said.” She spun away. “Jerk.”
He rushed toward her and spun her right back around. His hands were wrapped around her shoulders, but he kept that grip as careful as he could. “Say that again.”
“Jerk?”
“Sydney—”
Her breath blew out. “I’m pregnant.” Her gaze held his.
Right then, he finally understood what people meant when they said the world seemed to stop for them.
His eyes dropped to her stomach. Flat, smooth. He shook his head.
“Tina says I’m in the first trimester, and if I go back and count to when we were together in Baton Rouge—”
“I didn’t use any protection.” He’d been so desperate for her.
And...he knew everything about Sydney. Just as she knew everything about him. They had blood work run all the time for the EOD. They’d both been all clear in terms of health, and he’d been desperate, so desperate, that he hadn’t held back long enough to protect her. “I’m sorry, I—”
