by Lisa Childs
He’d found a beautiful beach house on a nearly deserted island. There were some other inhabitants, but she hadn’t noticed them. She wasn’t aware of anyone but her handsome groom. He was so tall. So fit. With short graying hair and kind, blue eyes. Not a bright blue like the Paynes’, but a deep, soulful blue.
Woodrow had stepped outside for a few minutes. To give her time to get ready for their wedding night... But probably also to make a call. He wouldn’t be able to stop himself from checking in with Nicholas Payne, from making sure his friend and former employee was managing the River City Police Department in the new chief’s absence.
Penny had no desire to make calls. She had no desire for anyone but Woodrow. In the mirror, she could see how her face was flushed, her eyes bright.
Maybe that was embarrassment, though. She wore white now, a thin silk gown that skimmed her curves while leaving her shoulders bare. Would Woodrow find it sexy or ridiculous?
Because she knew her groom well, she smiled. She had no worries about how he would react when he saw her. But she was gripped by a sudden fear that chilled her skin despite that warm breeze. As she watched her reflection in the mirror, all the color drained from her face.
The door opened, but she didn’t tense. She knew she wasn’t the one in danger.
“Damn,” a deep male voice remarked as a whistle hissed out with his breath. “I am a lucky man.”
She was the lucky one.
He stepped closer—probably close enough to see her face—because then he dropped to his knees next to the chair at the vanity table.
“What is it?” Woodrow asked. “Who’s in danger?” His handsome face had turned pale, as well. “One of our kids?”
They weren’t his kids or her kids. They were theirs, even the ones who weren’t related at all to either of them. The orphans, the agents, the bodyguards...
They both loved and worried about them all.
She reached out and gripped his hand, and their matching wedding bands glinted in the light from the vanity table. She hadn’t wanted diamonds, just simple gold. Stacy had designed a beautiful infinity pattern in yellow gold to represent their endless love.
But everything wasn’t endless. Penny knew that too well.
“Who?” Woodrow asked again anxiously.
“Emilia...”
It was more than a feeling that she was in danger, though. It was a feeling that something bad had already happened. That no matter who they called to rescue her, that person would be too late to save her.
That person might be in danger, too—grave danger.
Chapter 5
Emilia had made a dangerous mistake. Instead of trying to get outside when she’d heard the front door open, she had grabbed Blue and headed up to the attic. This meant that she was trapped. She had no way out except past the intruder.
Then she’d called Dane, which had probably been another misstep. What if the intruder had heard her?
What if he knew where she was hiding now?
Fortunately her son was quiet, sleeping soundly in her trembling arms. He hadn’t given away their presence.
But she might have.
Why had she called Dane?
Sure, she hadn’t wanted to interrupt Nikki and Lars on the night they had just gotten engaged.
But why Dane?
She had the numbers of all Lars’s friends. He’d given her Cooper Payne’s before he’d left for his last deployment. Cooper hadn’t re-enlisted like the rest of his unit. He’d been home and able to help her.
If only she’d gone to Cooper instead of that sleazy lawyer.
She couldn’t change the past, though. And Lars had made certain she had more than one man to call for help now. He’d given her the numbers of all his friends.
So why had she called only one man? Why had she trusted Dane, a man his own best friend had admitted he didn’t really know?
Sure, he’d claimed he was on his way. But where was he coming from? How far away was he?
And why hadn’t she just called 911?
Because she hadn’t wanted it on record if there was no intruder—if that creak had only been in her head—like the crying.
What if she was losing her mind?
Why would she trust Dane Sutton to keep her secret? She couldn’t even trust that he was really coming. There hadn’t been just that one creak. After she’d heard the door open, she’d heard other noises—footsteps on the stairs, heading up to the second floor, to her bedroom and Blue’s.
Was someone after her son?
She fumbled around in the darkness of the attic space, trying to find the cell phone she’d dropped. She hadn’t imagined all that, the creak of the door and on the steps. She needed to call the police. She couldn’t wait for Dane any longer.
But then she noticed the silence. It was eerily quiet. There were no sounds, not from the house or anything outside. Usually one of the branches of the trees hanging over the house brushed across the roof. But not now. Not even a cricket chirped.
Had she imagined it all? Was there no one inside? Of course that didn’t mean that no one had been inside, just that he’d left. Maybe he hadn’t been looking for Blue or her at all. Maybe he’d only been searching for her phone to make more of the late-night calls.
She expelled a shaky breath of relief. She and her son were alone. She could bring him downstairs and settle him back in his bed. But then a door creaked—the attic door. As it opened, a light flashed, the beam shining straight into her eyes.
Nearly blinded, she squinted and tried to peer around the beam. A hulking shadow loomed behind the light. But that wasn’t what frightened her the most; it was the fact that the flashlight from which that beam came wasn’t held in a hand. It was mounted to the barrel of a gun that was pointed directly at her.
A scream tore from her throat.
“Hey, hey!” a deep voice shouted. And the beam shifted, shining on the chiseled features of the man who held the gun. “It’s me,” he said. “Dane.”
Instead of slowing, her heart raced faster. She could feel Blue’s heart beating fast, too, as he cried. Her scream had startled him. He wasn’t easily soothed. It was hard to comfort her son when she was still so scared.
Her hand trembled as she ran it up and down his back. “It’s okay...” But she wasn’t sure about that.
Something snapped, then light from an overhead bulb illuminated the rafters and wood of the unfinished attic space. “Are you really okay?” Dane asked as he holstered his weapon. “You’re shaking.”
As if afraid that she might drop her son, he reached out and took the crying child from her.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
Lars had remarked more than once that Dane Sutton couldn’t stand kids. Why was he cradling hers so gently in those huge hands of his?
“You called me, remember?” Dane asked. “You said someone had broken into your house...” His voice trailed off and he stared at her oddly.
“What?” she asked. “Didn’t you see anyone?”
He shook his head. “No. And the door jamb wasn’t broken.”
“No. They didn’t break in,” she murmured. “I just heard the door open.”
He kept staring at her. She’d known his eyes were brown but she saw now, with the light glinting in them, that they were more golden than dark. “You didn’t lock it?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No. No. Of course it was locked. I made sure that it was.”
Hadn’t she?
She reached out for her son, but her hands were still shaking. Not with fear now but with nerves.
His intense stare unnerved her.
“You can give him back to me,” she said.
Blue had stopped crying, practically the moment Dane had taken him awa
y from her. And he stared, too, up at the man holding him. His pale eyes were wide with awe. He should have been used to big men with his uncle being nearly the size of a giant. But maybe it wasn’t Dane’s size that awed him. It was his aura.
She felt it, too. She’d felt it the very first time she’d met him. He was a man of power and control. A man who let little get to him or get in his way.
“I have him,” he said, as if he didn’t trust her with her own son. He turned and headed toward the stairs. “These steps are steep and narrow,” he said.
“I know.” She’d climbed them in such haste and fear that she’d nearly tripped up every one of them. She’d been carrying her sleeping son, so she’d been careful with him. “I brought Blue up here and never woke him,” she said.
Dane ignored her and easily descended the narrow stairs. For such a big man, he moved silently, almost gracefully. He wasn’t the one she’d heard walking around the house earlier. Heck, she’d thought she was alone when the door had opened, and he’d shone his light and his gun in her face.
“Which room is his?” he asked. He didn’t wait for her answer before carrying her son right into the nursery.
She started to regret calling him. For one, he still didn’t hand her son back to her. He cradled the baby in his palms. But maybe he forgot he held him since he wasn’t looking at the child.
He kept looking at her. And that was the other reason she thought she shouldn’t have called him. He kept staring at her so oddly, his caramel eyes darkening with his intensity.
She shivered and said, “Stop looking at me like that...”
“Like what?” he asked.
“Like I’m losing my mind.” Because if he kept looking at her like that, she might start believing that she was. “And I’m not,” she insisted, but her voice cracked on a note that sounded curiously close to hysteria.
Blue tensed and his little face screwed up as if he were about to cry again. But Dane rocked him a little and murmured, “Shhh, little guy, it’s all right.”
Emilia shook her head and said, “It’s not all right. Nothing’s all right.”
Dane’s eyes darkened even more with anger. And finally he put down her son, laying him in his crib. Then he turned toward her and, despite the anger in his eyes, gently brushed his knuckles over the bruise on her shoulder.
“What’s going on?” he asked. “Who’s hurting you?”
She shivered even though his touch heated her skin and her blood. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know who’s hurting you?” he asked skeptically, like he thought she was lying to protect someone. And she realized his anger was for that someone. “You don’t know who did this to you?” He skimmed his fingertips gently over her shoulder again.
“No, no,” she said as she realized what he was thinking. “Nobody bruised me.” Again. She’d had her share of them from being held hostage back when she’d actually had the energy to fight. But then she’d gotten so sick.
If Lars and Nikki hadn’t rescued her when they had...
She wouldn’t have survived.
“You really ran into a door?” he asked, his deep voice full of doubt now.
She knew what it sounded like. But she wasn’t involved with anyone. She might never be brave enough to trust anyone ever again.
“Yes,” she said. “But it was because I heard crying—”
“Blue,” he said and glanced down at the quiet baby.
She shook her head. “It wasn’t Blue. I keep hearing this crying...” Tears stung her eyes. “But it’s not Blue.”
“A bad dream?” he asked.
“I’m awake,” she said. “I feel like I’m always awake now.”
A look passed through his eyes. It wasn’t judgment. It was recognition. Did he also have trouble sleeping?
Lars wouldn’t talk about his deployments—didn’t want to share what were probably terrifying details with her. But she could imagine that whatever he and the other members of his unit, like Dane, had seen might haunt them.
What was her excuse?
Sure, she had been through some trauma, but only for weeks. Not months like Dane and her brother had endured. She doubted Dane would be any more willing to talk about their deployments than Lars was.
So she continued, “And even though I’m awake, I keep hearing that crying, but I can’t figure out where it’s coming from.”
He was staring at her again like he suspected it was all in her head.
“Stop,” she implored him.
He lifted his shoulders. “Stop what?”
“Stop looking at me like that.” Tears stung her eyes. And now she knew where the crying was coming from, as a sob slipped through her lips. She was crying now.
And those big hands that had cradled her son so gently closed around her now, drawing her against his chest. “Shhh,” he murmured, like he had to her son. His strong hands moved over her back now, sliding up and down as if petting her.
She found herself instinctively burrowing closer, seeking his warmth and his strength. He was so big. So strong. She felt safe.
He made her feel other things—things that frightened her even more than the crying and the creak of that door opening.
“It’s okay,” he murmured.
Like she had before, she protested, “No, it’s not.” Her words were muffled in his shirt and the hard muscles of his chest. It wasn’t all right what she was feeling now—in his arms—the tingling, the heat, the desire.
She shivered, and his arms slid around her, holding her closer. Her heart pounded madly.
What she’d been thinking wasn’t all right, either. That she was going crazy. But maybe she was crazy to be attracted to this man, who might be incapable of feeling anything at all according to his best friend.
Or maybe she was just overwhelmed. She hadn’t dared share her problems with anyone yet. She hadn’t wanted to burden them or make them think that she was losing her mind. It was different with Dane. Maybe with her voice muffled and her face pressed against him, she could tell him everything. She could let it all pour out.
Everything that had happened. Finding windows open that she swore she had closed. Hearing that door creak open. Finding those calls in the log on her phone—calls she would have never placed.
And when she finally lifted her face from his chest, his shirt was soaked with her tears. And his face was unreadable. Did he believe her?
Or did he think she was crazy?
* * *
He was crazy. Dane should have left the minute he’d found her and the baby safe in the attic. Then he wouldn’t have held the baby.
Then he wouldn’t have held her.
The night breeze blew through his damp shirt, chilling his skin. But that was good. He’d gotten too hot holding her, too edgy. And her tears...
All those tears had done something to him. He’d felt like he was drowning in them, like he couldn’t get a breath in lungs that had felt so tight, so heavy.
He drew in a deep breath now. That pressure didn’t ease any. He had to go back in that house, had to see her again. The minute she’d finished pouring out her heart and her tears he’d hurried outside. He’d told her that he was going to check everything out and see if anyone had broken into her house.
But he already knew nobody had broken in. The lock of that open door had born no scratches or gouges from someone picking it. The jamb hadn’t been broken. Nobody had forced their way into the house. And yet she swore someone had been inside, that she’d heard footsteps on the stairs and the hardwood floors.
Was it possible?
When he’d followed her home earlier, he’d watched her go inside juggling the baby, a diaper bag and something that had looked more like a suitcase than a purse. A laptop bag? She’d had her hands full. She might
not have closed the door tightly behind them.
But he’d sat there long enough, watching her house, that if it hadn’t been shut tightly, it would have blown open then. Wouldn’t it?
And what about the crying she claimed to hear that wasn’t Blue’s?
He tilted his head and listened. Maybe a neighbor had a crying baby. But while Lars had been living in the little bungalow, Dane had met the closest neighbors. An older couple lived on one side and a single man on the other. He doubted either had a baby staying with them. He heard nothing now. Not even the sound of a TV despite the glare of one showing behind a window of the adjacent house.
Shining the flashlight on his gun barrel, he walked around the house. Like at the chapel, he found wood chips disturbed beneath some of the windows. Had someone been standing in them, looking inside? Watching her?
He shivered and it had nothing to do with his damp shirt. His blood was chilled now. He had that eerie sensation he’d had when he’d walked through the open door earlier into a dark house.
The house had been dark then.
But he’d watched her turn on every light before he’d driven away. She had had every light in the house shining as if she’d been checking to make sure no intruders lurked in any of the rooms. And she’d told him earlier, when she’d been sobbing against his chest, that the minute she’d heard the door open, she’d grabbed her son and headed up the attic steps. She’d had no time to turn off all those lights. Unless she’d done it earlier, after he’d left.
Somehow he suspected she hadn’t. As spooked as she was, she probably left the lights on all the time and locked the windows. When he’d walked through the house, he’d noticed that all the windows had been unlatched, like the door had been unlocked.
When she’d turned on those lights earlier, she’d checked the windows. That was one reason he’d driven off because it had looked as though she’d made certain her house was secure. So why would that door have been open and the windows now unlocked?
