A Promise to Protect

by Liz Johnson

  Matt pushed himself to his full height and stabbed his fingers through his hair. “You screamed because of a mouse?”

  “That is not a mouse. It’s the size of a Volkswagen.” She scooted farther away, trying to disappear into the shelves.

  The rat shot toward a hole under one of the shelves, and Matt let it go, certain that Ashley would breathe easier once it was out of sight. “Why are you on the floor?”

  “It scared me, and I fell backward.”

  He squatted down in front of her, thankful that his elbow stung more than his leg for the moment. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  “No.” Her breathing seemed easier, her shoulders rising and falling in quick succession. “I’m all right. Just startled me.”

  “Then we’re even.” He grabbed her hands and pulled her to her feet right beside him. When he’d slapped the dust off her black sweater, he wrapped an arm around her shoulders and tugged her into his side. Her heart raced against him, matching the jarring rhythm of his own.

  There couldn’t be anything wrong with this, could there?

  He was just offering her an older-brother-type hug, just trying to calm her down.

  Not at all focusing on the way her arm snaked around his waist or her head rested against his shoulder.

  “Thank you.” She sighed before putting two feet between them, her features a mixture of confusion and anxiety. “I can handle anything but rats.”

  Putting another step between them, he tilted his head toward the door. “You ready to look around?”

  She nodded and followed him to the door leading to the main bar room. He cracked it open but could see next to nothing in the almost complete darkness. “Stay on my six,” he whispered as he stepped out next to the bar top that spanned the entire length of the room.

  Refusing to break the silence—and keeping an eye out for any of the rat’s friends—he slid a hand along the wall until he found the knob for the front door. As he’d suspected, the lock was new and sturdy, but it yielded easily enough from the inside. Once the door was open, there was enough light to pierce the darkness and illuminate the emptiness.

  The wooden floorboards creaked with each step, matching the echo set off by each footfall.

  “Do you see anything?”

  Ashley squinted at him, still having a hard time seeing in the semidarkness. “What are we supposed to be looking for?”

  “I don’t suppose someone left a picture of Joy with his name and address on the back.”

  Without any furniture to hamper them, the search only took fifteen minutes.

  And left them empty-handed.

  “I don’t know what I’m looking for.” Ashley sighed as she spun in a slow circle. “There’s nothing here except cobwebs and dust.” She slapped her hands on the thighs of her jeans and looked at her palms like they belonged to someone else.

  He knew the feeling. It was the same one growing in his gut. This was a dead end with echoing floorboards.

  “Why would Miranda send us on a wild-goose chase?” Ashley walked into the storage room and unlocked the back door. The afternoon clouds were not able to stop the sunlight from sneaking all the way into the main room.

  “I don’t know. But she did.” He followed the illuminated dust particles dancing in the breeze to Ashley’s side. The steps that must have once led up to the door had disappeared, leaving only the wooden bases and a four-foot drop.

  “Should we head back to the house?” She flipped her hand toward the street. “I want to make sure nothing’s happened and call my contact at the house that Joy went to again. I haven’t heard back from her yet.”

  “Is that unusual?”

  She looked up at the sky and pressed her hands to her hips. “Not really. Some days I can be so busy that I don’t even have time to eat, let alone check my messages. I’m sure she’s the same way.”

  “All right. Let’s go back.”

  “But there are no steps.” Her eyebrows lifted. Her pursed lips asked the question behind her words.

  “It’s this or the rotted-through front entrance.” He slipped past her and jumped to the ground. The ache in his injured leg wasn’t much more than a twinge when he landed, so he smiled as he turned around and held out his arms.

  She had other ideas. Pushing his hands to the side, she jumped on her own, her knees perfectly absorbing the impact. Where had she learned to do that?

  Apparently she could read his mind. “Gymnastics until I was twelve.”

  “Why’d you give it up?”

  “I couldn’t handle the pressure of it all after my dad died.”

  He was such an idiot. Of course her dad died more than twelve years before—he knew the whole story from Tristan. “I’m so sorry, Ash. I wasn’t thinking.”

  “It’s okay. Long time ago.”

  Her voice was steady, but her eyes focused on a point down the street instead of meeting his gaze.

  It’s just what he did. The minute he started getting close to any woman, he fumbled it. He just had so little experience with normal, healthy relationships between a man and a woman that he never quite knew what to say or do.

  Tristan, on the other hand, had always had a way with the ladies, smooth and easy, he’d sweep them off their feet before they even knew he was there. Like a Chinook chopper flying under the radar, Tristan would swoop in.

  He was pretty much the opposite.

  Good thing he wasn’t trying to get closer to Ashley.

  Good thing he wasn’t looking for any kind of relationship with anyone. He wasn’t the marrying kind. There were just too many skeletons in his closet. Too many broken bones and beatings. Too many angry foster dads.

  He wasn’t going to let that define him. And he wasn’t going to perpetuate it either.

  “You folks looking to buy this place?”

  Yanked back to the present by the old man’s question, Matt bit down on his tongue as he appraised the man leaning against the liquor store next to the Infinity. “Just checking it out. Why do you ask?”

  “It could use a new owner.” Wrinkled hands shook as he lifted a brown paper bag to his face and sucked down whatever was inside. His nose shone like a fairytale reindeer; his eyes were watery and his skin paper-thin. He ran a hand over his white hair, apparently trying to bring some semblance of order to the greasy mess. “Nobody takes care of it.”

  “What do you mean?” Ashley leaned toward the man, despite the stench radiating from him. The toothless grin and waggling eyebrows were directed at Ashley, and Matt cringed at the attempted flirtation. Ashley put her hand on the old man’s shoulder and smiled at him.

  “Just what I said. Some big shot bought the bar last year and then closed it up, like we were nothing. Where’s a man to get a cold one when the only bar in this area closes up shop?” He frowned and took another swig. “It’s just plain wrong is what it is.”

  If the twitch of Ashley’s cheeks was any indication, she was having just as hard of a time as he was keeping a straight face in light of the man’s irony. Did the stranger not realize that he held a bottle in his hand and leaned against a store that sold beer and any other type of alcohol?

  Matt managed to get control of his humor first and prodded their informant. “Did you ever see this big shot?”

  “Who?”

  Ashley bit her lip and looked toward the clouds, which nearly sent him laughing, too. He swallowed a bubble of laughter and took a deep breath. “The man who bought this place.”

  The old man swore worse than some of the guys in the teams. “No way would he show his face in this neck of the woods. Too embarrassed, if you ask me. He knew he’d get a piece of our minds. Me and the other regulars. We’d have showed him what was what.”

  “Do you know what his name is? I mean, this isn’t a very big town. You must
have heard his name mentioned.”

  He swayed violently as he leaned away from the wall, scratching at the gray whiskers on his chin. “Nope.” He pursed his lips, eyes only on Ashley. “But maybe you and me could go get some dinner.”

  “You think that would help you remember who bought this place?”

  “Nope.” He moved the brown bag in a circle over his stomach. “But I sure do like the comp’ny of a perty girl when I get some grub.”

  At this Ashley had to turn away, her face breaking and shoulders shaking with silent laughter. Matt couldn’t look at her without joining in, so he kept his gaze on the old man. “I’m afraid we have other plans this evening. But is there anything else you can tell us about who might have bought this building?”

  “Nope.” He staggered back against the wall. The wrinkles on his forehead relaxed as though having the wall for support allowed him to think clearly. “Like I said, I never saw him—just the construction crews he sent.”

  “Construction crews?” Matt glanced dubiously back at the building. It looked like it hadn’t received any kind of regular maintenance in way too long. If construction crews had been around, what had they done?

  Below bushy eyebrows, brown eyes swept the still deserted street. “They brung in one of those earthmovers. Hauled out a bunch of dirt. Dug around for about a month or so.”

  “When was this?” Ashley had her game face back on.

  “Right after it closed, I guess. Prob’ly around the same time I started coming here.” He hitched a thumb over his shoulder.

  “Do you live around here, Mr....” Her voice trailed off, waiting for him to fill in his name.

  “Nope. ’Bout three blocks that way.” He pointed his bag toward the Infinity. “But I’m here most every day since they laid me off.”

  This guy looked old enough to have been retired. Twice. “The tire plant?” Matt asked.

  “Yup.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” And he really was. “Thanks for answering our questions.”

  “You gonna buy this place?”

  “Probably not today.” Ashley slipped a business card from her back pocket and held it out to him. “But if you ever need a hot meal, you can call this number. A friend of mine delivers good meals every day.”

  His eyes narrowed at them, a wall of injured pride suddenly stemming the flow of information. “I don’t need nobody’s charity.”

  She winked at him as she tucked the card into the chest pocket of his trench coat. “Everyone in town has had some rough times. So just in case.”

  * * *

  “You were pretty good with him.”

  Ashley latched her seat belt before offering Matt a smile. “I nearly lost it a few times. Was he really asking me on a date?”

  “I’m pretty sure that’s what he was thinking.”

  She chuckled again. “I couldn’t believe it. He was ridiculous. For a few minutes out there, I forgot that there’s a lunatic after one of my girls.” Determination swept over his face like an eclipse, blocking the humor that had made him look ten years younger. She was sorry to see it go. It felt good to laugh with a man. Although Matt hadn’t really laughed, had he? The amusement in his eyes had been louder than any belly laugh she’d ever heard from him. Actually, she’d never heard him all-out laugh. Strange that she’d never thought about it before.

  “I wish you wouldn’t say it like that.”

  “What?”

  He turned the wheel toward her home and didn’t take his eyes off the road as he responded. “You talk as though the guy who tried to run you over and showed up at your house a couple nights ago isn’t after you personally.”

  “Well, he’s not. Not really.”

  “But he’s not going to just go around you. If Joy is who he really wants, then he’ll go through you to get her. He has no other choice. No one else in town knows where she is.”

  Pain shot through her temples, and her chin fell to her chest. Why did he insist on reminding her? She wasn’t ignorant about the threat. They’d talked about almost nothing else since he’d arrived.

  It didn’t mean they were any closer to figuring out who was behind it all.

  His voice was low and throaty when he finally spoke again. “I don’t mean to scare you. And I’ll do everything in my power to protect you. I promised your brother I would.” Over the rumbling engine of his truck, he let out a breath between tight lips. “I just want you to take this seriously.”

  “I do. I won’t let anything happen to one of my girls—”

  “Not for your girls. Take this seriously for yourself. You’re the target here.”

  She turned to his silhouette, highlighted against the setting sun. “I know that.”

  He pulled his truck up to the curb in front of Lil’s just as the sun disappeared for the night. Once he parked, he turned to look at her for the first time since getting back behind the wheel. “I know you want to take care of the families here, and I want that, too. But without you they’re all at risk. So let’s keep you safe.”

  They weren’t particularly poignant words, but for some reason the back of her eyes began to sting, and she had to look back down at her hands clasped together between her knees.

  People had said it before. Tristan had said it a hundred times. But for some reason when Matt said that her work was valuable, a band tightened around her chest. She wanted to be valuable. She wanted to help these women.

  Mostly she wanted no woman to ever go through what she’d endured.

  She unlocked the front door and let them both in. “Let me just check my messages to see if there’s any word on Joy.” Matt nodded as he wandered off toward the kitchen. She ducked into her study. Picking up her private line, she listened to the short message, which was from Cathy, the other house director. Ashley hadn’t included any specifics when she’d called the other day, not wanting to spook the other woman, so she’d just asked Cathy to get back to her as soon as she could.

  She punched in the number from memory.

  “This is Cathy.”

  “Hi, it’s Ashley.”

  The other woman had long ago passed retirement age, but her voice still rang with youthful joy. “Ashley, honey. How are you? Is everything all right?”

  “Yes. Of course. I was calling to check on you and Joy.”

  “Oh, we’re fit as fiddles.”

  “Has she said anything?” Ashley tapped her pen on her desk, aching for something, anything that would help them find answers.

  Cathy’s voice dropped to a whisper, and Ashley heard the sound of a door closing. “She hasn’t said much of anything really. She just keeps asking if she has to go back.”

  “Back where?”

  “She won’t say. Just back to wherever she came from.”

  Ashley sighed, the band around her chest tightening again. What if she wasn’t strong enough to protect Joy? She had to be. She just had to. “What did you tell her?”

  “That she’s safe and that she doesn’t have to go anywhere.”

  “Thank you, Cathy. Will you let me know if there’s any trouble?”

  “Absolutely.”

  After hanging up, she took several deep breaths.

  Joy was safe for now. And there wasn’t any reason to worry Cathy yet. No one else knew where Joy had been stashed.

  Her worries about Joy assuaged for a moment, Ashley walked to the kitchen and nearly burst out laughing for the second time that day.

  Two little girls in pigtails sat around the table, heads bent intently over princess coloring books. Their crayons moved in precise motions, staying inside the lines. And Matt was in the middle of it all.

  He hunched over his own page, the red marker in his hand setting a twirling skirt aflame.

  “But her dress is supposed to b
e blue.”

  Matt turned to Greta on his right, his face a mask of confusion. “Supposed to be?”

  Greta rolled her eyes and shook her head. “It’s Cinderella, silly. She wears a blue dress. That’s the one that her fairy godmother made her.”

  “Fairy godmother?”

  “Haven’t you ever seen the movie?”

  Matt shook his head, his motions slow and serious. “Maybe you should tell me about it. What happens?”

  Just as Greta launched into the story of the girl and her wicked stepmother, Matt glanced toward the doorway. A slow smile spread across his mouth, and he winked.

  Greta never talked if she didn’t have to, and there she was spilling every detail of the movie to a man at least three times her size. How had he done it? How could a highly trained warrior be gentle enough to befriend a spooked little girl? How’d he make her so at ease that she’d scrambled over every internal wall to tell him the tale of the little cinder girl?

  Ashley didn’t even feel that easy around him.

  But that probably had more to do with unwanted butterflies and a near—and definitely unwanted—kiss.

  “What’s for dinner, Miss Ashley?” One of the other girls looked up from her Belle and Jasmine picture long enough to ask the important question of the evening.

  “Well, Sara, I have no idea. Let’s see what we have.” In front of the open refrigerator, she called out their options. “We could make spaghetti. Or corn chowder. Or hot dogs and mac and cheese.”

  Sara scrunched up her face. “I hate hot dogs.”

  Matt leaned over and mock-whispered, “Me, too.”

  He winked at her again, and Ashley stuck her head back in the refrigerator. What was with all the winking? Had he developed a nervous tic since arriving in town?

  Grabbing the stuff to make spaghetti, she dumped everything on the counter and pulled pots and pans from their cabinets. Managing to keep her back to the table to avoid any more errant winks, she worked on preparing dinner.