by Lisa Childs
“He’s armed,” one of the Paynes warned her. Probably Cooper. He hadn’t been as convinced as Nikki that Emilia should do this. Or maybe he’d just been trying to be loyal to Lars. Or he honestly thought she would get herself killed. “He has a gun under that coat over his arm, and he has a knife strapped to his belt.”
She shuddered as she remembered what he’d done with a knife—both to her and to poor Bradley. But she forced herself to close the distance between her and that mismatched couple.
While the man looked rich and powerful in a dark suit and red power tie with the overcoat tossed over his arm, the woman looked like she’d just woken up. Her blond hair hadn’t been brushed, and she wore no makeup. She had an overcoat wrapped around her, but Emilia wouldn’t have been surprised if she had on pajamas or a nightgown underneath it.
“Emilia,” the man greeted her. He wasn’t surprised that she’d come. Then again he looked like the kind of guy who always got what he wanted.
But for Blue...
He’d wanted Blue and had been denied. Was that what had driven him to such desperation? To madness?
The woman reached up to clutch his arm, and her coat sleeve slid away from her wrist, revealing a jagged scar.
Emilia held in her gasp of shock.
Had he done that to her? Or had she done it to herself, after their son had died?
“Reginald, Cynthia,” she greeted them.
The man tensed and lifted his hand beneath the jacket over his arm. She had no doubt the gun barrel was pointing directly at her now.
“How—how do you know our names?” he asked.
“You don’t think I would figure it out?” she scoffed. “You don’t think everyone will?”
He shrugged then. “I don’t care what anyone thinks.”
Maybe he didn’t care anymore, but he was the kind of man who once had, who drove expensive cars and lived in a mansion just so that he could impress others. Was that what Blue would do for him? Impress others? Or replace the son they lost?
“I want the baby,” Cynthia murmured.
Reginald turned toward her, as if surprised that she’d spoken.
Emilia tightened her arms around the blanket-swaddled doll and it emitted a little cry. They’d found the very lifelike doll in the nursery in Parker Payne’s office.
Cynthia whirled toward Emilia, her dark eyes wide. And wild...
Reginald had not acted alone in trying to steal Blue. Or at least he hadn’t acted entirely for himself.
“You can’t have the baby,” Emilia said. “Not until I see Dane Sutton.”
Reginald snorted. “You thought I would bring him here?”
“No.” But she refused to think he was already dead. She wouldn’t believe it. “You need to let me talk to him, to know that he’s being released.”
“Then we get the baby?” Cynthia asked hopefully.
Reginald sighed. “I could call,” he said, “and let you talk to him—one last time.”
“One last time?”
“But I’m not even sure those gang kids I hired waited until we left the warehouse to kill him,” he said. “They nearly had earlier, out of spite for all their friends he and your brother killed.”
Emilia’s pulse quickened. “Dane’s strong,” she said. “He can survive anything.”
Reginald shook his head. “Not a bullet to the brain.”
“I—I need to talk to him,” she said.
“No, you need to hand that baby over to my wife,” he said. “You’re not going to change your mind again.”
Fear rushed through Emilia’s blood, pounding in her pulse, so that she couldn’t focus on the commands coming from the earpiece. Were they commands, though? It sounded as if everyone was shouting over everyone else.
She’d counted on them to protect her. But she had no idea where they were. She couldn’t see them. She could see only Reginald Montgomery and his crazy wife.
She stepped back. Reginald lifted his arm straight out. The coat dropped away, revealing the gun they’d all suspected he’d been holding. The barrel was pointed right at her heart.
“Don’t shoot!” the woman cried. “You’ll hit the baby!”
But Reginald shook his head. It was clear he’d figured it out. “There’s no baby,” he said. “Dane Sutton was right. She had no intention of making the exchange.”
Dane had known.
Her own brother had doubted her. But Dane had known. Was that because he didn’t think she cared enough about him? Or because he knew how much she loved her son?
As she stared down that barrel, she worried that she would never get to see Blue again. But if Dane was dead, as Reginald claimed, then she might see him again.
Soon.
* * *
She was just standing there. Waiting to die...
Or maybe she was frozen with fear.
Everyone else seemed to be frozen, too—suspended in motion. Or inaction.
So Dane ran toward her. Lifting the gun he had taken off one of the gangbangers, he fired at Montgomery. Or as the gangbangers had called him, Moneybags Montgomery.
He couldn’t be certain his bullet would take out Reginald, though. He couldn’t be certain he would kill the guy before Montgomery managed to get off a shot and hit Emilia. So he threw himself against her, knocking her to the ground, protecting her with his body.
A woman screamed. It wasn’t Emilia. She was curiously quiet. Maybe too quiet.
Mrs. Montgomery screamed. “The baby! The baby!”
The doll was the only thing that made a sound beneath him. Letting out a cry as he pressed down on it—and Emilia. He tried to lever his weight off her to see if she was all right.
But then he saw the glint of metal as Reginald lifted a knife. Blood spread from the guy’s shoulder. Dane had hit him with a bullet, but it hadn’t done enough damage.
Just like the gang members had figured out the bullet that had torn through Dane’s shoulder hadn’t done enough damage. It hurt like hell, but it hadn’t weakened him. Once he’d snapped the zip ties on his wrists and the one on his ankles, he’d overpowered them.
Now he needed to overpower Reginald. He caught his wrist, squeezing it. The guy was stronger than he looked. Or maybe Dane had grown weaker than he’d realized. He struggled to hold the blade away from him and away from Emilia, who lay still beneath him.
She had to be all right.
He had to make sure she was all right.
He squeezed harder, hoping to snap the bones in Reginald’s wrist. The guy let out a growl of madness and rallied his strength, pushing that blade closer to Dane’s chest. To his heart...
If Emilia was dead, if Montgomery had killed her, then he’d already ripped out Dane’s heart.
And thinking of that, of the pain this man had put her through, Dane squeezed hard enough that the knife began to fall free of his grasp. But then Reginald fell, too, his suddenly lifeless body dropping onto Dane.
If Dane’s weight alone hadn’t crushed Emilia, their combined weight might. So Dane shoved him off.
The guy dropped back onto the sidewalk, his eyes open in shock. His wife didn’t even spare him a glance. She just kept screaming, “The baby! The baby!”
Dane felt sorry for her, but he didn’t quite trust her, either. So he kicked away the knife and the gun her husband had brought with them before he rolled off Emilia’s soft body.
The doll let out another cry.
And Mrs. Montgomery rushed forward, grabbing the doll before Dane could stop her. She clutched it in her arms and murmured, “Daniel, it’s okay. Momma has you now. Momma has you...”
Dane turned from her to stare down in Emilia’s beautiful face. Tears trailed away from her pale blue eyes.
“What’s wrong?” he ask
ed. “Are you hurt?” He glanced down her body, looking for blood.
It was smeared across her dress. But he figured that was his, from where he’d hit her with his wounded shoulder. He could see no rips in the fabric—no obvious injuries. But he could have broken her ribs or struck her head against the sidewalk when he’d knocked her down.
“Emilia!” he shouted her name as he touched his fingers to her tear-dampened face. Maybe she was just in shock. “Emilia! What’s wrong?”
“You’re crushing her, you idiot,” Lars said as he leaned on a pair of crutches and reached down a hand toward Dane.
Instead of taking his hand, Dane surged up with his fist and plowed it into Lars’s jaw. Pain radiated from his knuckles to his wounded shoulder, and he cursed. He’d forgotten his friend’s jaw was like granite.
Lars staggered back a little and dropped his crutches. He’d probably just been off balance to begin with. Dane doubted he would have moved him otherwise.
Or maybe he had been angry enough to do it. “Damn you! Why would you let her do this? Why would you put her in danger like this?”
“I’ll tell you why...” Lars’s usually booming voice grew faint.
But Dane realized it wasn’t his friend who was weakening—when his vision blurred then turned black. The last thing he knew was the concrete rushing up to meet him as he fell. Hard. Just like he’d fallen for Emilia Ecklund...
* * *
Lars stroked a hand over his swollen jaw. It throbbed like his leg. Maybe he should take the painkillers he’d been prescribed. But he hadn’t even filled the bottle. After how he’d been acting, he knew he deserved to feel a little pain.
He’d be lucky if Nikki didn’t break their engagement. But she stood behind him as he sat in the chair next to Dane’s hospital bed. And she squeezed his shoulder.
“He’s going to be all right,” she reminded him of what the doctor had said. The doctor hadn’t wanted to tell him anything, though. There were privacy laws. And they weren’t related to him. Dane had no family, though.
The doctor had finally spoken to him because on the medical directives and legal forms the Marines had made him fill out, Dane had listed Lars as his next of kin. Since boot camp, they had been like brothers.
“Will we be all right?” Lars asked.
“You and Dane?” Nikki laughed. “Of course you will. I don’t know how many times I’ve watched my brothers pummel each other only to hug it out moments later.”
“That was probably because Penny made them do it,” Lars said. She was warm and affectionate, so of course she would make her children hug each other.
Nikki laughed. “Yeah, it was.”
“She’s still on her honeymoon,” Lars reminded her. But that was only because Nikki insisted she not come home. Her mother loved Emilia like she was her daughter, too. And she had been so worried about her. Penny didn’t have to worry anymore, though.
Emilia would be safe now.
But was she okay?
He’d been surprised when she hadn’t wanted to come to the hospital. They should have made her, just so she could get checked out at least. But she hadn’t been hit with a bullet. Only Dane’s broken body had shielded her as he’d used the last of his strength to knock her out of harm’s way. Lars touched his jaw again. Well, not the last of his strength. But instead of wanting to go to the hospital with Dane, Emilia had wanted to go home to Blue.
“Since Penny isn’t here,” Lars said, “I don’t expect Dane and I to hug anything out.”
“You better not try to hug me,” Dane murmured from the bed.
“You should get so lucky,” Lars teased as relief flooded him. His friend was going to be all right.
But would they be all right? Would they ever regain the friendship they’d once had?
Dane glared at him. “Why did you let her do it? Why did you let her put herself in danger like that?”
Nikki snorted. “Do you really think he let her do that?” she asked.
Lars glanced over his shoulder at his beautiful fiancée. “No,” he said. “You let her. Hell, you practically encouraged her.” He should have been furious with her. But he loved her too much.
“Why the hell would you do that?” Dane asked, and he glanced at Nikki’s hand as if checking to see if she still wore Lars’s engagement ring.
“For you, you idiot,” Nikki said. “That’s why we all agreed with her plan. To buy us some time to find you.”
He had found them instead.
“Of course you couldn’t wait for us to rescue you,” Lars said, feigning disgust. “You had to be a damn show-off as usual—rushing in to save the day.”
Dane snorted now. “Somebody had to do something. You all were standing around with your hands in your pockets, going to let Emilia get shot.”
Nikki had had to hold Lars down from rushing in himself. “Manny had the shot,” she said just as she’d convinced Lars at the time.
Manny had sniper training.
“Then you messed it up by running in like a rookie, blowing the whole stakeout,” Lars said.
“What the hell were you waiting for?”
“We didn’t want to take a kill shot,” Nikki said. “Because then we didn’t know if we’d be able to find you in time.”
Dane looked from Lars to Nikki and narrowed his eyes. “You really did all this for me?” His doubt was evident.
“Why is that so hard for you to believe?” Nikki asked.
But Lars knew. Dane never talked much about himself, but when he had, Lars had listened. His past—being given up for adoption, his adoptive parents being cold sons of bitches—had convinced Dane that nobody cared about him, that nobody could.
“You’ve had some tough breaks,” Lars said.
Dane shrugged then flinched as he moved his wounded shoulder. “We all have.”
“But you think you’re unlovable,” Lars said.
Dane snorted, but his face flushed with embarrassment. As hokey as it sounded, it was what he believed.
“And you’re wrong,” Lars said. “The guys all love you. They’d lay down their lives for you.” He blinked hard and cleared his throat. Must have been some dust in the room. Damn allergies...
“And I love you,” he said.
“Even when he’s trying to kill you,” Nikki added for him as she squeezed his shoulder. She knew he had no allergies.
Dane shook his head.
Why wouldn’t he believe them?
But then he added, “You made your choice. You’re marrying Nikki. Not me. So stop with the sweet talk.”
Lars laughed.
“You’re both idiots,” Nikki said. But she wasn’t surprised—not with all the brothers she had. She pressed a kiss to Lars’s cheek then leaned over and pressed one to Dane’s before stepping out of the room.
Maybe she was checking on something. Maybe she was just giving them some privacy.
“Don’t be an idiot like I’ve been,” Lars warned his friend. “The person who took the biggest risk for you today was Emilia.”
Dane sucked in a breath, and his eyes darkened again. “You shouldn’t have let her.”
“There was no stopping her,” Lars said, and pride filled him. “My sister is so much stronger than I ever realized.”
“She is,” Dane agreed.
“She’s stubborn, too,” Lars added.
“Can’t imagine where she’d get that,” Dane remarked as his lips curved into a slight grin.
“You know why she did that today?”
Dane started to shrug then stilled his shoulders. “Gratitude,” he said. “Kindness...”
“Love,” Lars said. “She loves you most of all.”
“No...”
Dane might have accepted that he wasn’t unlovabl
e, that his friends genuinely cared for him. But would he be able to accept that Emilia could?
“Don’t be an idiot,” Lars warned him as he struggled out of the chair. “Don’t blow the best thing that’s ever happened to you.”
“She is the best,” Dane agreed. “And she deserves better. She and Blue both do. I’m not husband material. And I’m certainly not father material. You were right to threaten to kill me when I got involved with her. I had no business going anywhere near her.”
Lars shook his head with disgust. “I used to think you were the bravest man I’d ever met,” he said. “But I see now that you’re just a coward.”
“I’m doing this for her,” Dane said. “Because I...”
“You love her,” Lars finished for him. “And that’s all that matters. You can learn how to be a husband and a father—as long as you want to. As long as you’re brave enough to try...”
All those years he’d known Dane he’d thought his friend had had no fear. Until now...
Would his love for Emilia be enough for him to overcome that fear?
Chapter 28
The crying echoed softly in Emilia’s head just as it had so many times before. She knew whose crying it was now. Daniel. The Montgomerys must have recorded it, so they would have a reminder of their loss.
But that loss had driven them out of their minds. She pressed the button on her cell phone and shut off the recording. Because the SIM cards matched, she had everything on her phone that they had on theirs. So the recording had been there the entire time. None of it had been in her head.
She hadn’t been losing her mind. And she hadn’t lost her son. Her arms tightened around her sleeping boy. She should probably put him in his crib, but she continued to rock him in the chair in his nursery.
She wasn’t trying to soothe him. She was trying to soothe herself.
She hadn’t lost her mind. Or her son.
But she had lost her heart.
To Dane Sutton.
He didn’t want it, though.
Sure, he’d rescued her at the park. That was who he was, what he did. He had been a war hero even before he’d become a bodyguard. He willingly put his life on the line all the time.
