Forbidden (Southern Comfort)

by O'Neill, Lisa Clark

  “Yes, well, I still need to close out.”

  “I’ll wait.”

  Truly, his gall was amazing. “Look, I have responsibilities to attend to, and you’ve no claim on my time. If you’re looking for a little vacation fling, you’ll have to try someone else.” She motioned expansively toward the crowd. “Take your pick.”

  “Well, since you offered…”

  Clay left her gaping as he strode over to the bar.

  She watched him carry on a brief but animated conversation with her uncle – which also consisted of several glances from both parties directed her way – concluded by Uncle Patrick writing something on a piece of paper. Then he clapped Clay on the back like a long lost friend. Pulling out his cell phone, Clay consulted the paper, tucking a finger into his free ear.

  Moments later he was by her side again, retrieving the tray she still held under her arm.

  “I pick you,” he informed her casually, setting the tray aside. “Your uncle says you’re good to go, and your mom says Max has been asleep for hours, since he wore himself out at the beach. She told me to tell you not to worry about anything, and to have a good time.” He grinned wickedly and Tate felt the jolt of it all the way to her toes. “It just so happens that Good Time is my middle name.”

  Because he’d already drug her to his friend’s table by the time she’d gathered her wits, Tate declined to cause an unnecessary scene. But for someone who was supposedly schooled in the workings of the human mind, he had an awfully strange way of winning friends and influencing people.

  “Justin, Mandy – this is Tate. Tate, meet Justin and Mandy.” Cursory introductions complete, Clay informed his friend that he was leaving. He said not to worry about the ride, he’d find his own way home.

  Uncle Patrick waved at her as she was hauled out the front door.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “I have no earthly idea.”

  “Great plan.” She swam through the sticky night air in his wake. “Are you really so desperate that you have to kidnap a woman to get a date?”

  “You’re disparaging yourself when you say that, sugar. If I’m so desperate, then what does that say about you? What I am is selective. I could have made a move on any number of those women in there tonight, but I prefer to wait for the cream to rise to the top.” He pulled their joined hands to his lips, and to her surprise, kissed her fingers.

  Because her legs felt a little like Jello, her tone was purposefully bored. “You have a real obsession with cream, don’t you? You must have been a cat in a former life.”

  Clay merely chuckled. “Given the other barnyard animals I’ve been compared to, I can hardly take offense.”

  “Barnyard animals?” Tate said as he gently propelled her forward again. “Let me guess. The last woman you abducted called you a –”

  Alarm was a nasty surprise when he cut her off midstream, jerking her hard against him and covering her mouth with his big hand. Then he shoved her into an alcove. The bite of the doorknob he pressed her against had her struggling like a wild thing.

  “Shhh.” Breathing shallow and quick, every muscle in his body tensed, Clay molded his fingers against her lips, his attention focused behind him. Tate smelled the lingering traces of Old Bay and shellfish that clung to his skin, and tasted fear, acrid and bitter.

  But when she jerked her head away from his hand she realized the threat didn’t come from him.

  The man who emerged from the nearby alley was all angles: jutting cheekbones, blades of dirty hair. He muttered to himself as he flipped through a wallet, pulling out the ready cash. Tate watched in horror as he tossed it aside, wiping something on the leg of his threadbare jeans. And couldn’t stop the small squeal that emerged when she realized it was a bloody knife.

  Hearing the noise, wild eyes whipping their way, the precariousness of the man’s mental state became apparent. Instead of running, he chose to attack.

  “Shit,” Clay muttered.

  Then in a series of rapid moves, he shoved Tate out of the way, blocked the assailant’s forward momentum with his arm, and rammed two knuckles into the man’s throat with enough force to send him staggering. But immune as he was to the realities of physical pain, the junkie regained his footing, charging Clay with renewed vigor.

  “Run!” Clay ordered, and the moment’s inattention caused him to catch an elbow in the gut. “Go back to the bar and call the police!”

  Torn between not wanting to leave him alone with a knife-wielding maniac and knowing that he was right, Tate hesitated for only a second before shooting from the protective cover of the doorway. He’d dragged her out of the pub so fast that she didn’t have either her purse or her cell phone. A scream for help clawed its way from her throat as she flew toward the safety of the crowd.

  Glancing back over her shoulder, she saw Clay execute a well-placed kick that brought the junkie to his knees, just as she stumbled into the bar.

  Her cousin Rogan was already at the door.

  “What happened?”

  “There was a man… with a knife.” Terror had robbed her of breath. She sucked it in, pointing in the right direction. “Clay’s fighting him. We need to call the police; I think the man killed someone.”

  By that time, a small crowd had gathered to hear what she had to say. Several people whipped out their cell phones to dial 911 while Rogan shot out the door. Clay’s friend Justin, who’d heard the end of her statement, followed on Rogan’s heels.

  Shaking off the well-meaning hand of a concerned stranger, Tate chased after the men, pushing through the crowd that had formed on the sidewalk in order to head back toward Clay.

  She could only pray that he was alright.

  The rapid approach of sirens cleaved the thick night air, and by the time she made it back the first patrol car arrived on the scene. Relief mixed with concern as she saw Clay, battered and bloodied, but basically in one piece.

  Glancing at Tate as she approached – a silent acknowledgement that all was well – he straddled the unconscious junkie’s back until an officer stepped in to cuff the man.

  From the bowels of the alley, Justin’s voice rang out the cry for an ambulance. Apparently the man who’d fallen victim to the mugging was still alive.

  Rogan stepped close enough to sling a supporting arm around her shoulders, and Tate leaned into his familiar warmth. Despite the heat, she found herself shivering.

  More police cruisers arrived on the scene in a deluge of wailing sirens and blinking lights. An officer began to question Clay.

  Somewhat reluctantly, Clay pulled a wallet from his pocket, offering his identification.

  Surprise flickered over the cop’s dark features, and then he handed the ID back to Clay.

  “What do you know?” the cop called to his partner, tone bordering on irritation. “Our Good Samaritan here works for the FBI.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Bentonville, South Carolina

  “WHAT the hell are you looking at?”

  JR Walker looked up from his plate in reaction to the question, which his companion obviously hadn’t directed at him. An unruly trio of teenage boys huddled at the all-night diner’s bar, snickering and casting furtive glances toward JR’s table.

  JR sighed over the all too familiar altercation. Unless disguised, his cousin’s astounding size and stark albino coloring tended to draw attention.

  And attention was something they didn’t need.

  “Simmer down, Billy Wayne,” JR hissed between his teeth. “You start a fight, and it’s going to draw heat. You know how small town cops operate – they’ve got nothing better to do, so a brawl at the local diner would be the high point of their evening. Unless you want to land your white ass in the county jail, ignore the snot-nosed brats and finish your food.”

  Billy Wayne’s near colorless eyes slid back toward JR’s, discharging hostility like a live electrical current.

  “Don’t look at me like that. If it weren’t for you, we wouldn’t be
worrying about heat, now would we?” JR picked up his glass of sweet tea and stared over the rim, knowing that his cool rebuke annoyed the hell out of Billy Wayne. But it wasn’t like the man didn’t deserve it. He’d crossed the line back in Atlanta a few months ago, killing one of the girls they went to so much trouble to acquire.

  “It wasn’t that girl’s fault you couldn’t perform. I’ve been telling you for years that those ‘roids were going to catch up with you one day.”

  Billy Wayne’s thick fist closed around his fork as he stabbed a piece of sausage. “I don’t need any of your lectures.” He shoved the meat into his mouth, taking pains to be extra crude.

  JR’s chuckle had less to do with amusement than condescension. “Just try to keep yourself in check for a while. At least until we get the lay of the new land.” Like their hometown of Atlanta, Charleston and its environs were undergoing a rapid population explosion, which meant that police departments and child welfare services were having a difficult time keeping up.

  All the better for him and Billy Wayne to sweep up the sweet young things who fell through the societal cracks.

  Human trafficking was a dirty business, but somebody had to do it.

  Bored of poking at his cousin, he turned his own gaze toward the teenagers. Like overgrown sticks with hair, the lot of them. And they’d been just young enough, just stupid enough to disregard Billy Wayne’s size.

  He singled out the most obnoxious of the teens, and stared until the kid grew uncomfortable and turned back around.

  Lucky for them he’d been there to talk sense into Billy Wayne.

  The Inn at Calhoun, Charleston

  “OUCH!”

  Clay complained as Tate dabbed the antiseptic against his busted lip. He sat on the closed toilet lid in her bathroom – shirtless, bloody, and grumpy – while she straddled his legs and went about the tricky business of protecting his wounds from the threat of germs.

  Tricky because every time she went near him with something medicinal, he snarled like a wounded animal. “Guess that barnyard comparison wasn’t too far off.”

  “What?”

  “You’re growling.”

  “You’d growl too if someone poured liquid fire in your open wound.”

  Tate bit her own lip as she resisted the urge to laugh. Not that his injuries were amusing, but the fact that he’d so completely lost his unflappable arrogance pleased her greatly. He was acting like a petulant little boy, and that put them on more even footing. She was much more adept at warding off temper tantrums than slick seductions. “Hush. You’ll wake up Max.”

  Clay merely scowled at her when she smiled.

  Tate doubted that his various bumps and bruises hurt that badly. No, she suspected his bad mood was due more to the beating his plans for the night had taken.

  It was tough to woo a woman when you were ignobly perched on her toilet.

  “I thought Charleston was supposed to be a safe city,” he complained, battered face giving him the look of a boxer who’d gone one too many rounds.

  “You know, for an FBI agent, you’re an awfully big whiner.”

  The glance he shot her was filled with chagrin. “I was wondering when you would get around to mentioning that. I hope you don’t think I was yanking your chain earlier. I really am a psychologist. I just happen to be an agent, also.”

  Tate stopped dabbing the cotton swab against his lip and considered. He clearly hadn’t wanted to divulge what he did for a living, and she couldn’t help but wonder why. “Are you undercover or something?”

  “Nothing that exciting.” He leaned back, wincing as if his bruised ribs objected to the movement. “I’m just a guy on vacation trying to pretend that his real life doesn’t exist.”

  Unsure whether the aggrieved tone of his voice was from embarrassment or discomfort, Tate furrowed her brow in concern. Maybe he was hurt worse than she thought. “Are you sure you don’t want to go to the emergency room? I can handle a busted lip, but I don’t know anything about bones. You might have cracked one of your ribs or something.”

  “I’m fine,” he assured her. “Justin looked me over and said that nothing appeared to be broken. I’ll just be sore for a couple of days.” He shook his head, then turned a mocking look her way, voice lowered to a sexy murmur. “I know you had big plans, sugar, but the kinky stuff will just have to wait.”

  “And here I’d been looking forward to pitting your handcuffs against my whip.”

  She realized her miscalculation when his eyes turned hot, raking down her body with obvious intent. His gaze climbed slowly, leaving a trail of gooseflesh behind, and she crossed her arms over her chest.

  “I was kidding.”

  “You sure?” He leaned back, cocky as hell again. “You’d look awfully good in my cuffs.”

  Tate pushed that image right out of her head. “Be that as it may, I think you’ve been beaten enough for one night.”

  Instead of putting him in his place, the words merely bounced off his ego. His eyes finished their lazy perusal, heavy-lidded as they met hers.

  The walls of the bathroom suddenly seemed too close, or maybe he seemed too large. Too masculine. Too…

  Hers to do what she wanted with for the night.

  Irritated with herself, Tate tossed the used swab in the trash.

  She could feel his gaze burning her skin, but was afraid to let her own get drawn back to his. Because the truth was she was sorely tempted. And that in itself was enough to make her wary. She didn’t do one night stands, and she sure didn’t do them with both her mother and her son just down the hall. So instead, she crossed her arms again, and after a few moments, heard him sigh.

  “I appreciate the help, but I think I’ve taken up enough of your evening.” He rose to his feet, closing some of the distance between them. The step Tate took back was instinctive, and Clay chuckled before leaning toward her ear. “You can relax now. I recognize a stop sign when I see it. Body language,” he explained, when she raised a brow. “You’re closed up tighter than a fifty-five gallon drum.”

  “I’m sorry,” Tate began, feeling the need to explain. “But I can’t –”

  He waved her excuses away. “Probably for the best. I’ll just call a cab to take me out to Justin’s house. From the way things looked, he’s going to be spending the night at the hospital.”

  Because, as she’d discovered, he was a doctor. Not a drunk. In retrospect, Tate guessed she’d misjudged both men pretty badly. But then, that was par for her particular course.

  “We have a room available downstairs,” she heard herself say, and cursed her tongue for having a mind of its own. She should simply let him call his cab. “A last minute cancellation,” she continued anyway. “If you’d like, you’re welcome to it.”

  He hesitated – just long enough to make her feel uncertain and foolish for having made the offer – but then a lopsided grin eased some of the tension from his face. “I’d appreciate it.”

  Tate opened the bathroom door. “Come on. I’ll see if I can dig up a T-shirt big enough for you to wear, and show you where you’ll be sleeping.”

  THE little boy called out to him for help. Clay could hear him crying in the background as he talked to the child’s father over the phone.

  “Please don’t shoot us, Daddy.”

  What kind of thing was that for a child to have to say?

  And what kind of man could look into the terrified faces of his wife and son and pull the trigger?

  Despite the fact that he was an expert on social deviants and their motivations, their sheer capacity for evil never ceased to disgust him.

  “Carl.” Clay called the man by his first name, establishing a rapport. “Why don’t you just let Liz and Bradley walk out that door?” Remind him of their names, remind him they were people, not possessions. This was the kind of man that if he was going down, would want to take everything he owned with him.

  “Because I’m not stupid. The second they’re out that door, I’m as good as
dead.”

  “No.” Clay gave his word. “I’ll see to it. My objective is to see that you get whatever it is that you need without anyone getting hurt. What do you need, Carl? Let me help you.” Keep it conversational, between you and Carl. If he’s talking, he’s not killing his family.

  The little boy cried out again, tears giving way to sobs. “What I need,” Carl hissed through his teeth. “Is some goddamn quiet! Shut him up, Liz!”

  Be quiet, Bradley, Clay silently pleaded with the child. Any threat to his father’s control at this point could have devastating consequences. Empathize, Clay reminded himself. Reassure.

  “Carl, I know it must be difficult to concentrate with Bradley crying. Why don’t you send him out here? You can do that, because you’re in control.”

  “Damn right I am! Liz, I told you to shut him up!”

  From there it went downhill at a breakneck pace. Carl dropped the phone, and turned his gun on his family. Before Clay could even signal the sharpshooters, that little boy was dead.

  His terrified voice still echoed in Clay’s head. He wondered if he’d ever again be able to sleep without hearing him… singing?

  Shooting up like a marionette on a string, Clay blinked his eyes at the dark-haired child sitting on the edge of his bed. He moved a bright yellow cement mixer back and forth as he sang in a charmingly off-key voice.

  “Sally the camel has tree stumps, Sally the camel has tree stumps, so ride Sally ride. Boom, boom, boom.”

  For a moment, Clay thought he’d taken a high dive into shallow waters, but as dream faded into reality he found himself grinning. Max’s off base lyrics were hysterical. He eyed his surprise visitor with a great deal of humor.

  “You go riding tree stumps and you’re bound to get splinters in your butt,” he advised.

  Max turned around to face Clay, covering his giggle behind a small hand. “You said butt,” he pointed out with glee.

  Well shit, Clay thought, scrubbing a hand through his mussed hair. What was the politically correct terminology these days? Bottom? Derriere? Hiney? “I meant to say ‘in your behind’.” He didn’t want the kid to go rat him out to his mother.