by Helen Brenna
He marked the time, moved down the hall and glanced downstairs. It was as he’d expected, but the sight of Missy gagged and bound to a chair in the middle of the living room still sent a rush of rage through him like nothing he’d ever felt. Missy spotted him at the top of the stairs. Her eyes widened for an instant, but she covered her reaction well.
Good girl. Now where are they?
As if reading his thoughts, she signaled with her eyes toward the kitchen. That meant he’d have cover for only a few feet in his descent to the first floor. Carefully, he eased his weight onto the first step, then the second and down as far as he could go without making a sound or becoming visible to Stein.
Glancing around the corner, he found Stein, gun in hand, pacing in the kitchen, close enough to the steps that Jonas could get to him. The man might be management, but he was still in tip-top shape. Not wanting to risk Missy getting caught in the cross fire, Jonas would have to take Stein without his weapon.
“Webster, you clear?” Stein whispered into his earpiece and waited for the response. “Good.”
Webster—ex-Special Agent Webster—had gotten fired some years back after a federal witness under his protection had managed to get killed a little too easily. Taylor was going to have his hands full outside.
Jonas glanced at his watch. Thirty more seconds. He waited. Waited, some more. He glanced into Missy’s eyes and every second felt like a lifetime. She was crying. Tears streamed across her cheek as she watched him. A short shake of her head.
Don’t come down here. Don’t do this.
“It’ll be okay,” he mouthed. “Shh.”
God, how he wanted to hold her. Reassure her. Make this all go away. If he could, he would simply walk away from everything, including his job and the Bureau, and disappear with Missy. He couldn’t believe it had taken him this long to see it, that it’d taken her being tied up and gagged for the truth to sink into his thick skull and even thicker-skinned heart. She was the only thing that mattered anymore in his life. He loved her, had always loved her. Without Missy life meant nothing, and that was the real reason he’d taken that undercover job years ago.
“I love you,” he mouthed, causing an answering flood of tears in her eyes. I’m going to spend the rest of my life proving it.
A gunshot sounded outside, snapping Jonas back. The short burst of sound was enough to get Stein distracted and looking out the window. “Is he here?” he yelled into his mike. “Talk to me! Did you nail him?”
Jonas jumped the remaining steps and barreled full throttle into Stein, dislodging his earpiece and sending them both flying into the wall. Everything else happened in seconds. Jonas gripped Stein’s wrist and knocked the gun out of his hand. Stein twisted away and went on the offensive. Jonas took a couple jabs to his gut, and then turned and punched Stein a couple of times. He grabbed him and flipped him onto the ground. Kneed him and twisted his arms behind his back.
“You’re done!” he shouted, cuffing him. He would’ve loved nothing better in that moment than to put a bullet between Stein’s eyes. Not tonight. There was someone more important. Jonas quickly went to Missy and worked off the gag.
“Outside!” she said. “They’re outside, too.”
“I know.” Though he didn’t have the time to tell her everything that was going through his mind, he tried to tell her with his eyes, the touch of his hand. “Are you okay?”
She nodded. The moment he untied her from the chair, she flew into his arms. “Let’s finish this.” He gave his handgun to Missy. “Shoot the bastard if he moves.” Then he went to the window and cautiously glanced toward the tree line.
Taylor was walking toward the house, using a handcuffed and limping Webster as cover. Jonas flung open the back door, grabbed Webster and pushed him down next to Stein.
“Jonas, that’s not all,” Missy said, frantic. “There are three of them.”
“What?”
“Matthews is outside.”
“Missy, Brent Matthews is dead.”
“No,” Missy cried. “I saw him. I know it was him.”
“Drop it, Jonas,” came the sound of a man’s very familiar voice behind them.
Jonas spun around to find Matthews, his undercover partner, standing in the doorway, his gun drawn and pointing at Jonas’s head. “I saw you take two bullets,” Jonas said. “Back in Chicago.”
“Ain’t Kevlar amazing? You should know better than believing everything you see.”
Taylor made a slow, easy movement toward the kitchen counter.
“Don’t try anything stupid, cop,” Matthews said, “or Jonas is dead. You’ll be next.”
Taylor froze.
“Get over here by your friends.”
Garrett moved toward Jonas and Missy.
“Get these cuffs off!” Stein yelled.
“I don’t think so.” Matthews chuckled. “I got a couple million, yours and mine, in an offshore account that says you look mighty fine just the way you are.”
“You’re a dead man, Matthews,” Stein muttered.
“Promises, promises.” Matthews kicked Stein in the gut. “Now where’s that memory stick, Jonas?”
“It’s too late, Brent. Kensington’s got everything.”
“I figured as much.” He shrugged. “But Delgado doesn’t know that yet.”
Jonas had no illusions about this situation. The moment Matthews had what he wanted, they’d all be dead. “Why are you doing this?” he asked, stalling. Think. Think. There’s got to be a way out.
“Isn’t it always about the money?”
“So that’s it? You took this assignment to finagle out some hush money?”
“Didn’t start out that way.” He shook his head. “Stein here was the one always looking for a bribe. But funny things happen when a man’s undercover for a long time. When he’s lost connection to the real world.”
Jonas understood, probably too well. If it hadn’t been for Missy, there was no telling what might’ve happened to him.
“I stopped giving a shit,” Matthews went on. “So when Stein realized he needed help to make this thing happen, I didn’t hesitate. We’d have brought you in, too, Jonas, if I’d have thought for a second you’d consider it, but you and I both know you’re a company man all the way.”
Not anymore. Now all Jonas wanted was out. Legitimately. While a life with Missy might be too much to ask, he couldn’t let anything happen to her. He had to stop this, right here. Right now. For Missy’s sake.
“All right,” Jonas said. “Let’s get this over and done with.” He glanced at Missy. One last look. If he was lucky he’d have time enough to put one shot in Matthews. “I love you,” he said.
A new rush of tears flowed down her cheeks as if she knew exactly what he had planned. “I know,” she whispered.
Jonas bolted for the gun on the kitchen counter, redirecting the weapons fire away from Taylor and Missy.
Matthews aimed.
“No!” Missy propelled herself into action and flew through the air as Matthews fired at Jonas.
Then everything was a blur.
Missy on the ground. Blood all over. Taylor kicked the gun out of Matthews’s hand. “You came to the wrong island, asshole!” he yelled before pummeling Matthews.
Jonas flew to Missy’s side. “Missy!” Matthews had hit an artery in her leg. She was bleeding out. “Oh, God. Oh, God. Please.” He couldn’t lose her. Could never, ever live without her again. “Don’t move, Miss. It’s going to be all right.”
Quickly grabbing the scarf Stein had used to gag her, Jonas wrapped it around her leg and tightened it as best he could. Then he picked her up. Already, she was pale.
“I got this!” Taylor called out as he cuffed Matthews. “Get her to the doc’s house down the street!” He relayed the house number. “I’ll send the ambulance there and call for the medical response helicopter from the mainland.”
Carrying Missy in his arms, Jonas raced outside, praying like hell Sean was home.
&
nbsp; “The baby,” she whispered. “Our baby.”
“Shh. Everything’s going to be fine.”
“I love you, Jonas,” she murmured before her eyes closed and her head lolled back lifelessly.
“You’re not going to die!” he called, running as fast as he could. “You can’t die!”
S IRENS . L IGHTS FLASHING . Jostling motion. Making her nauseous. Loud sounds. Cold. So, so cold. Scared. Jonas, where are you? Jonas!
“I’m here, Miss.” His warm breath in her ear. “Hold on, honey.”
So tired.
“She’s lost a lot of blood,” someone said. Sean?
Whispers. Distant. Quiet. Real? Imagined?
“She’s pregnant.”
“I know…possible…kind of trauma…can cause hemorrhagic shock.”
No. No, no, no.
Our baby, she wanted to cry. Save our baby, Jonas.
She was too tired to open her eyes, hadn’t the strength to make a sound. Then there was no sound at all, only the feeling of Jonas’s hand gripping hers as if he’d never let go.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“YOU CALLED IT,” LOUIS Reynolds said. “Delgado, full complement of henchmen, took his yacht out this morning.”
“That’s where it’s going to happen.” Jonas sighed, glad to put this assignment to rest. By the end of the day, Delgado would be in jail along with Matthews and Stein, but he had his doubts the two FBI agent traitors would even make it to trial alive.
“All the warrants have been issued,” Louis added. “We’re moving on this today, the moment the deal takes place. Kensington wants you in on the operation. He’s sending a chopper for you.”
Jonas stood in the hospital hallway tightly gripping his cell phone. He glanced inside the room and studied Missy’s unconscious face. Though she’d spent several hours in surgery and all had gone well, she still hadn’t opened her eyes. Her skin was as pale as the ashy paint on the wall, and it could possibly take days for her to regain any amount of energy. The doctors had told him he could head off to Chicago and most likely be back before she’d be coherent enough to notice he was gone.
Like that was ever going to happen.
“Tell Kensington I appreciate the consideration,” Jonas said. “You guys have to do this without me.”
“Man, this case took the last four years of your life. You telling me you’re not going to be there to wrap it up?”
Four years of living and breathing one assignment, planning day and night how to put those assholes away. Now the day was here. “Yeah, that’s what I’m telling you, Louis. I won’t be there.”
“Staying with Missy?”
“Yep.” He couldn’t take his eyes off her face.
“I don’t get it. She’s okay, isn’t she?”
“Yeah, she’ll be fine.” Physically. She’d lost a lot of blood, but thanks to Sean for quickly stabilizing her she was going to walk away from this mess no worse for the wear. For the most part.
“Then what’s the—”
“I need to…no, make that… want to be here, Louis, when she wakes up.” Even now, ten feet from her seemed too far away. He wanted her hand in his so he could feel her warm skin. He needed to hear the blip of her slow, steady heartbeat on the monitor to reassure him he wasn’t going to lose her.
“This is going to piss off Kensington,” Louis said.
“Like I give a shit?” Jonas could think of a million worse things than getting fired from the Bureau.
“I take it this means you and Missy won’t be divorcing.”
“Not if I have anything to say about it.”
“I envy you, man. A life is a good thing to have.”
“Round ’em up, Louis.”
“Will do.”
Jonas shut off his phone and slowly walked back into Missy’s room. Ron and Jan Setterberg sat in chairs on one side of Missy’s bed. He gave them both an encouraging pat on the shoulder and threw a blanket over Sarah’s prone form. She’d finally fallen asleep on a cot the hospital staff had provided for Jonas. Then he sat in his chair on the other side of the bed, took Missy’s hand and pressed his lips to her palm.
Much to his surprise, Jan stood and rounded the bed to come behind him. She put her hands on his shoulders, rubbed them good and hard, and then leaned over to whisper in his ear. “You’re a good man, Jonas Abel.”
He reached up and squeezed Jan’s fingers. Everything was finally so damned clear to him. There was no place he needed to be, nothing more important, than right here, right now.
Missy was everything, and he would never doubt that again.
M ISSY SLOWLY ROUSED TO the sound of raised voices in the hall.
“You are not coming in this room,” Jonas said.
“Who do you think you’re talking to?” She had no clue who belonged to that masculine voice. Then again…
She cracked open her eyes to find herself in a dark hospital room, catheters in her arms, a heart monitor on her finger, bags of unidentified fluids hanging over her head. Her tongue felt thick, her mouth as dry as a dust ball.
“I’m talking to a man who puts his pants on one leg at a time. Just like me,” Jonas said. Her dad. Go for it, Jonas. “She doesn’t want you here. She’s made that perfectly clear.”
Immediately, her thoughts flew to the baby. Had she lost this one, too? Please God, no. “Jonas?” she rasped, her voice scratchy with dryness.
Like a dream, he materialized by her side. “Hey, there,” he whispered. Looking as if he hadn’t shaved, let alone slept for days, he reached for her hand. “You’re going to be all right.” He smoothed back the hair from her face. “Want some water?”
She nodded, and he grabbed a plastic cup from the bed stand and bent the straw to her lips. After taking a long sip, she licked her cracking lips. He set the cup down, and she squeezed his hand with what little strength she possessed.
“Melissa?” The authoritative voice sounded from the direction of the door.
Glancing toward the sound, she found her father, looking so much older than she remembered, standing just inside the room. Years may have passed since she’d last seen him, but he’d lost none of his commanding presence.
Missy glanced past him to her mother. She’d changed so much. She’d stopped coloring her hair and had grown it out in a soft, shoulder-length bob. Gray was taking over, highlighting her once naturally blond hair.
“Why are you here?” she asked, more of her father than her mother.
“Angelica, don’t you think it’s best you wait in the hall?” her father suggested.
“No, Arthur.” Not bothering to look at her husband, Missy’s mother brushed past him. “It’s best for me to be where Melissa wants me to be.” Holding Missy’s gaze, she came to stand beside the bed. “I thought we’d lost you for good this time.” A tear slipped from her lower lashes.
Missy put herself in her mother’s shoes and imagined what it must have felt like for her to lose a child. With how Missy had been affected by a miscarriage, it was quite possible she’d cracked, if not broken, her mother’s heart. “Hi, Mom.”
“Oh, Melissa.” She sat in the chair next to the bed and reached for Missy’s hand.
Missy didn’t have the energy to pull away, even if she’d wanted to. “How have you been?”
“Never mind about me. We’ve missed you.”
Missy nodded. That at least was a start.
Another woman slowly appeared near the periphery of Missy’s vision. Dressed in a black suit and a crisp white blouse and with her hair coifed in an updated, but professional, chin-length cut, she looked as if she’d just stepped off Wall Street. “I came as soon as I heard,” she said.
“Marin?” Missy’s vision glazed with tears.
“Hey.” Her sister leaned down and kissed Missy’s cheek, brushed a piece of hair off her forehead. “Artie and Max are on their way. Is that okay?”
“Sure.” Missy nodded. It’d be good to see her two brothers again. “But I’m not making any
promises.”
“You don’t have to. They just want to see you.”
“Melissa?” her father said.
Her mother and Marin were one thing. Her father quite another. “I’m not ready for you, Dad.”
Jonas stepped in between her father and Missy’s bed. “Okay, that’s enough for now,” he said. “You guys need to leave.”
“But—”
“Leave.”
“Dad,” Marin said, grabbing his arm. “Let’s go.”
With a small smile and a last look filled with emotion, Missy’s mother stood. “Arthur, Marin’s right. Melissa needs to rest.”
“If she wants to see you when she’s feeling better, you can come back. Only if you promise to be nice…Senator Camden.” Jonas shut the door the moment they’d reached the hallway and came back to her bedside. “Ron, Jan and Sarah went to get something to eat. They’ll be back in a few minutes.”
She nodded. It would be good to see them.
“There’s someone else here who wants to see you.” He lifted a soft-sided carrier onto her bed. A tiny mew sounded from behind a mesh window.
“You brought Slim for me.” Her eyes misted as she poked her finger inside the bag and scratched the cat’s black furry forehead.
“He seemed lost without you.”
She glanced up at Jonas. “Shouldn’t you be with Louis Reynolds? Busting that big drug dealer?”
Settling the carrier beside her, so she could reach Slim whenever she wanted, he held her gaze. “They’ll manage without me.”
He didn’t want to leave her. As she looked into his solemn eyes, she knew the answer to the question that had been running through her mind. “Oh, God, no,” she cried, unable to stop a flood of tears.
He squeezed her hands. “There was nothing they could do, Miss.”
Again. Her throat closed as reality took hold. She’d miscarried again. She’d lost their baby.
He pulled her into his arms and let her cry. Once again, all hope for them seemed lost. She’d wanted this baby so much. For her. For him, too. When every tear seemed shed, he pulled back a bit and rested his forehead against hers. “I know you probably don’t want to hear this right now. There is a bright side.”
