Saving Joe (U.S. Marshals, Born And Bred Book 1)

by Laura Marie Altom

  “My point exactly.” Despite his own heavy emotional losses, Joe couldn’t help cracking a smile. “It’s not your fault that nothing remotely exciting in the way of gunplay has happened since you got here? That bad guys aren’t hiding behind every rock? Rappelling down every cliff?”

  “Stop.” She smacked his chest.

  He took her hand in his, giving it the squeeze he wanted to give her whole body.

  “This is serious to me, Joe. It’s my job to protect you. Yet…” Gillian gazed up into his face. Into the hard planes softened by shadows. What had she been on the verge of admitting? All she wanted to do was kiss him, then kiss him again? That more than wanting to protect him, she wanted him to protect her? And love her and make sure her allergy drops actually went into her eyes, before reading to her while she fell asleep? And to cover her cold toes with his warm socks and to call her during endless days at work spent filing and filling out paperwork?

  “We should get some sleep.” She put her silver star back on the nightstand, then covered her face with her hands. “Tomorrow I need to brief you a little more on what to expect at the trial.”

  “I know what to expect,” he said, his hands on her shoulder. “In case you’ve forgotten, I’ve kind of been through it before.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Lie down.”

  “What?” She gasped when he scooped her up, only to set her sideways on the bed.

  “For once in your life, Gil, loosen up. Let someone else take care of you. Who knows? You might end up liking it.” He lay down beside her, tugging her close.

  “I can’t like it, Joe.” She wriggled, attempting to escape. “In case you’ve forgotten, it’s not only against my work rules, but every rule I’ve established for myself since, like, the fourth grade. I’m a strong, capable woman. I don’t need some guy around to—”

  “Kiss?” Rolling atop her, he cradled her cheek with his hand, pressing his lips to hers in such a way that it wasn’t smothering or controlling, just thrilling and exhilarating, like all things forbidden tend to be. Only just when it really started getting good, just when her belly tingled and nipples hardened and ached, he stopped, rolling off her to once again settle behind her, his hand curved around her stomach, his nose tucked in her hair. “You smell good,” he said. “Like normalcy. I don’t know about you, but I could use a big dose of that.”

  Easing her hand over his, she nodded, closed her eyes and succumbed to sleep.

  SOMETIME IN THE MIDDLE of the night, Gillian bolted upright. “Bud?”

  The dog growled.

  It wasn’t his playful bark and growl-at-tidal-pool-crabs routine, but a serious, throaty, get-the-hell-out-of-my-cabin growl.

  While Joe slept soundly beside her, she slipped her legs out from under the sheet and thick quilts.

  The fire had gone out, and the room’s only light was a faint stream of moonlight spilling through the part in the breakfast nook curtains.

  Bud growled again, and she tiptoed by memory to the pine wardrobe where she’d stashed her gun. When the door creaked open, she spilled a hundred silent curses.

  Gun in hand, she cursed again, wishing she hadn’t considered night-vision goggles as supply overkill.

  The cabin’s air was cold.

  Thin.

  Deathly quiet.

  Then Bud growled yet again, his nails click-clacking on the back hall’s hardwood floor.

  Gillian’s throat tightened. Nostrils flared. Stomach clenched. Pulse hammered in her ears.

  Had she only imagined the faint click of the back door opening, the faintest lowering of temperature, change in smell?

  “I’ve got a gun,” she said to the darkness. “I’m not afraid to use it.”

  Another click?

  The door closing?

  Never had she wished more for a nice, convenient electric light. Joe kept a flashlight in the drawer to the right of the stove, so she crept that way, finding it more by feel than sight.

  With the light in one hand, her piece in the other, she cocked the trigger, then flicked on the light and jumped.

  Bud stared up at her and whined.

  Flashlight hand to her chest, she breathed for the first time in the past two minutes.

  A quick scan of the open living-sleeping-kitchen area showed it was empty. With her back to the wall adjacent to the hall, she held her arms out straight in front of her, crossing them at the wrists, light on top, weapon on the bottom.

  Heart pounding, she spun fast, aiming her light and gun down the hall, toward the back door.

  The closed and locked back door.

  She followed the same procedure for checking out the bathroom, but that room was clean, too.

  The dog looked up at her and cocked his head. “Was someone in here?” she whispered. “Tell me, Bud, did I just dream this whole thing? You growling? The click of the opening and closing door?”

  The dog infuriatingly kept his secrets, as did the tomb-quiet cabin.

  WESSON BROUGHT LOGUE’S dirty T-shirt to his nose and breathed deeply. Mmm. Nice. He might hate women, but not their smell. Those fragrant, man-teasing potions they rubbed all over their soft bellies and breasts, calves and inner thighs.

  Perched on his favorite outcropping of rocks high above the cabin, Wesson smiled, fingering the shirt’s soft, navy cotton.

  That’d been close, he thought with a giggle.

  For a minute there, he’d thought he just might have to gut that meddling dog. Not that he couldn’t have handled it. He was more of a cat man, himself. Still, now that he had a firm plan, he hated deviating from it.

  Amateurs killed just to kill. Or because they’d been caught off guard and had to. Wesson, on the other hand, had always fancied himself to be the consummate professional.

  And so he was now quite happy to allow Kavorski his extra days. Because what the old fart didn’t know was that he’d soon be dying, too.

  For suddenly just two deaths weren’t enough—oh, but then he’d already done his partner, poor Finch. How could he have forgotten that little bit of fun? But every dinner party needed an appetizer, and the handsome young stud had gallantly filled that role, his dying words full of sappy-ass love for his wife. Next came the main course. And then Kavorski would be a satisfying, pallet-cleansing dessert. A sherbet, or sorbet if you will.

  Not too filling or rich, but just right.

  The perfect end to the perfect little killing spree.

  “DAMN, GIRL. Those are some white-hot reflexes you got there.”

  Gillian had caught Joe as he fell down the front porch steps. “You okay?” she asked, trying not to notice how close they stood, trying not to remember how much closer they’d been all night—at least until…No. She wasn’t going to think about what she’d only thought had happened. The dark was naturally an unnerving place. Bud had been growling at a mouse.

  “I am now,” Joe said. “If you hadn’t been here, that might’ve been a nasty fall.”

  “Yeah, well…” She shrugged, shading her eyes from the bright morning sun. “We’d better get going. Looks like Bud’s got a head start.” The dog had already crossed the flower-strewn meadow beside the cabin and was loping into the forest, baying the whole way.

  Releasing Joe, Gillian headed after Bud.

  Until leaving the island for the trial, she figured it’d be best if they engaged in physical activities other than kissing, hugging or sharing Joe’s bed. Which was why, after she’d prepared them both a quick breakfast of oatmeal and canned pears, they were now headed across the island to explore an abandoned cabin Joe had told her about two nights earlier at dinner.

  “Slow down,” he said. “Want me to get a hernia?”

  Hands on her hips, she scanned the area before turning and shooting him a bright smile. “Point of fact. I’m pretty sure you can’t get a hernia by hiking.”

  “I might if I had to lift a log off the trail.”

  “You’re reaching.”

  He winked.

&
nbsp; They’d been on the trail a whole five minutes when Joe nearly poked his eye out with a low-hanging limb. Luckily, Gillian caught him before he’d run right into it.

  “Beautiful maiden saves my butt again. Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. Only it was your eye.”

  “Eye, butt. Close enough.”

  They made it a whole fifteen minutes farther down the trail before Joe met his next catastrophe—stepping too close to the edge of a steep drop-off. Yanking him back to safe ground as a flurry of pebbles skipped down the cliff, Gillian said, “What’s the matter with you? I’ve never seen you so careless. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you were…” She narrowed her eyes. “Are you purposely trying to hurt yourself?”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “To get out of testifying.”

  “But I want to testify.”

  “So why are you dead set on breaking a limb?”

  “I’m not.”

  “Did you know your left eyebrow twitches when you lie?”

  “And you know this how?”

  “The other night when I made garbage casserole out of stewed tomatoes, macaroni and cheese, and added a little leftover spaghetti?”

  “Yeah?” He looked queasy just thinking about it.

  “Remember when I asked if you liked it, and you just raved and raved about how good it was?”

  “Sure. It was, um, great.” He turned, but not fast enough for her to miss his poor little eyebrow twitching away.

  “Which must be why you fed it to Bud when I got up for a refill on iced tea?”

  “You caught that?”

  Hands on her hips, she rolled her eyes. “Give me some credit.”

  “Okay, so I’m busted on one count of feeding Bud your dinner, but why would I be lying right now?”

  “There,” she said, putting her finger over the telltale spot. Though instinct told her to snatch her finger back the instant it began tingling from Joe’s heat, she kept it there, on his eyebrow, smoothing it down his temple, cheek and jaw. “You’re doing it again. What you up to, Joe?”

  Sighing, he grabbed for her finger, kissing it before linking his hand with hers. “It was stupid.” He looked down. “Especially that last stunt. But what the hell…” He shrugged. “It worked. At least until my stupid eyebrow gave me away. Willow used to say the same thing. About that twitching.”

  “All of those close calls? Then they were on purpose?”

  “Sort of.”

  “What do you mean, sort of? Did you or did you not do all that stuff on purpose? And if so, why?”

  Though her hands were still on her hips, Joe slid his arms around her, tugging her against him. “Would you believe I did all that for you?”

  “But why?”

  “Because if only for a few minutes, it brought back your smile.” He traced her lips. “You seemed so sad last night about not needing to protect me, I figured what the hell? I’d give you a little more to do.”

  She grabbed his finger, which was still paused on her lower lip, and bit it.

  “Ouch. What was that for?”

  “Because I’m mad at you—furious. Geez, Joe, what you did was incredibly sweet, but at the same time, condescending. It’s exactly the kind of stunt my dad or brothers would pull.”

  “And why do you think they do those kinds of things? Did it ever occur to you that they might want to see you happy? Not out of some need to control you, but simply because they love you?”

  “Do you love me, Joe?” The question was out before she’d realized the implications of asking.

  Once she had, though, she took off at a dead run. Not caring about the brambles tearing at her bare arms or jeans. Not caring that Bud thought she was playing a game, and chased after her. She especially didn’t care that Joe wasn’t following.

  Oh no, because if she had, then that might imply another question. One infinitely more personal and borderline insane, considering how long Joe and she had been acquainted. One that she would never voice aloud, and wished she couldn’t even think.

  Do I love you, Joe? Is that why what you just did hurts?

  Out of breath, she stopped. Bud nudged his cold, wet nose into her palm.

  She connected with his deep brown eyes. “Wanna know something even worse than that question?” she whispered.

  The dog continued staring.

  “I think I fell for Joe the first time I saw the haunted look on his face at the last trial.”

  Bud licked her.

  “That your way of saying sorry that I—meaning me—did something so dumb?” She scratched the dog behind his big, lovable ears. “I’m sorry, too, sweetie.”

  “SORRY, SIR,” the kid said, binoculars held so close to his eyes they looked like a damn alien growth. “Can’t see either of them this morning.”

  “You’re not certain Mr. Morgan is in the cabin?” Kavorski asked.

  “No, sir. Logue took the dog out early this morning. Then Mr. Morgan followed. But I can’t be a hundred percent sure either of them has returned.”

  “Keep looking.” Kavorski bit into the bologna and American cheese sandwich he’d made for lunch.

  Geesh, he hated this food. Been eating it at least once a day for the past twenty years. Why? He snorted. Sure as hell not because it tasted good. More likely because it was cheap and filling. His doc said he needed to cut down his salt. Said that played a big part of his medical problems.

  When this was over, following doctors’ orders would be a whole lot easier. After a light morning workout with a Swedish, stacked personal trainer named Inga, he’d dine on lobster and Hooter’s hot wings. Buckets and buckets of the damn things. Surely there wasn’t much salt in those, was there?

  The plan to off Logue and the canary was so easy, sometimes Kavorski felt guilty actually taking so much cash to see it through. But generally the guilt didn’t last. Then he was back to planning how good life would be once the two lovebirds were gone.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “You’re awfully quiet,” Joe said, while Gillian stared at her bowl of canned chili.

  The supper had been uninspired. Kind of like the rest of that day.

  He should’ve gone after her, but when she’d asked that question—the one about love—he’d thought his heart might stop. But then it’d started up again, hammering so hard he’d worried he was having some kind of attack.

  Yeah, he knew full well the only reason he was attracted to Gillian had way more to do with chemistry than anything deeper—like the L word—so why was he still so uneasy? Because it was going to be a nightmare second only to losing Willow and Meggie when the trial ended and it was time for Gillian and him to say goodbye?

  “What’s there to talk about?” she said, swirling the tasteless, heartburn-inducing red glop.

  “For starters, why’d you run off today? Killer squirrels and bunnies might’ve ravaged me while you were on a leisurely jog.”

  She treated him to a cold glare. “Thanks for taking my job so seriously.”

  “Done playing with that?” he asked, eyeing her bowl.

  She shoved it his way. He used her spoon to eat the rest. “Eeuw.” Nose scrunched, she said, “How can you stand eating that stuff?”

  He shrugged. “Not much choice, seeing how nobody volunteered to make me anything else.”

  “Oh, like it’s part of my job description to cook for you?”

  Smirking, he said, “You were the one who first made me that French toast. If you’d never shown me what a great cook you are, then I now wouldn’t be craving more of your tasty concoctions—except for that garbage can stuff.” He made a face.

  “Let me get this straight. It’s my fault you’re a chauvinist?”

  “That hurts.” He clutched his chest. “More than chili heartburn.”

  “If the shoe fits…” she said with a sweet smile.

  “What can I do to redeem myself?”

  “Hmm…” Finger to her lips, she said, “Unless you have a deep-pan pizza
with Canadian bacon, black olives and pineapple, I’m afraid you’re pretty much out of luck.”

  “Okay, yeah, pizza’s out, but what about…” He left the table to rummage in a cabinet high above the stove. Seeing how Gillian couldn’t begin to reach it, she’d never even tried. “This.” He returned to the table brandishing a box of chocolate chip cookie mix.

  “Where’d you get that?” She snatched the box.

  “Carl—you know, the guy who stocks the cabin? His wife slipped it into my regular shipment when I was here around Christmas.”

  “Why haven’t you eaten it?”

  The truth? Joe hadn’t felt worthy. Hadn’t wanted to indulge himself in one of life’s little pleasures. He felt responsible for Willow’s death. For leaving Meggie without a mother or father. For putting her in continued danger just because of what he knew.

  Yes, he paid damn well to insure his daughter was under round-the-clock protection, but who was to say, as Gillian had so thoughtfully pointed out, that Tsun-Chung wouldn’t one day try kidnapping her? Using her as a bargaining chip to get to her dad? What Gil didn’t know was that Joe had already played that scenario in his head. If it came down to it, he’d give his life for his daughter’s in a heartbeat.

  “Joe?” Gillian shook the box. “These look delicious. Why haven’t you scarfed them down months ago?”

  “No need.”

  “This is about you shouldering blame, isn’t it?”

  “What if it is?”

  She rubbed her forehead. “You’ve gotta work past this.”

  “Oh, like you’ve gotten past what it was like living under the watchful eyes of your dad and brothers?”

  “That’s different.”

  “How?”

  “Because my issues with them aren’t unhealthy.”

  His once concerned features turned to stone. “I’m sick of talking about this. I’m out of here.”

  “The hell you are. We were talking about you. My father and brothers are all big boys. What about your little girl, Joe? My family doesn’t miss me in the least, but Meghan needs you.”

  “Unlike you? Who’ll never need anyone?”

  Joe couldn’t have hurt her more if he’d socked her in her gut. Whoever had coined that old adage the truth hurts had been a little too smart. Gillian squeezed the cookie box so hard the plastic bag inside popped. Fine white powder puffed from the top.