by Alicia Scott
“It doesn’t matter,” she found herself saying, the words whispery. “You don’t have to follow me anymore. I violated the program, Mitch. I’m no longer your responsibility.”
His eyes narrowed, searching her face intensely. If she even knew the worry she’d caused him. He’d had to risk a call to an old friend in the Bureau’s Tech Services Division to find her. The Division had enough wire taps and surveillance on Les and his men to supply every movement. Most of their movements made sense, too, except the two men who were waiting for a “package” at the Ohio Women’s Correctional Institute. Mitch had taken the gamble and driven like a banshee to get here. Now, here, was the long-lost Ice Angel, and every time he looked at her the exhaustion wreaked havoc on his mind. He wanted to sweep her up into his arms and kiss her savagely until she swore she would never run from him again. Until she broke down and told him all the secrets she still locked so tightly in her chest.
“What do you mean, you’re no longer my responsibility?” he demanded instead, not trusting himself enough to even move.
She faltered for a moment. She had to tell him about her mother; then the FBI would no longer be obligated to look out for her. This man could go away and never be hurt because of her. He could walk away strong and vital, and she would never see him again.
For some reason, it physically hurt her to say the words.
“I saw my mother. I violated the agreement.”
Mitch couldn’t quite stop the surprise that slashed through him. He hadn’t understood why the Correctional Institute, but he’d never imagined that the Jessica Gavornée, who had no surviving relatives, had a mother in prison.
“Any more surprises I should be aware of?” he drawled finally.
Jess shook her head, but then her eyes widened abruptly.
“Oh, no,” she breathed.
Mitch’s body went on instant alert, his sharp gaze sweeping around as she spoke. Then he saw them, too. Two gray-suited men walking toward the prison doors. And as they moved, their jackets flapped back in the wind to reveal the unmistakable black shape of guns.
Mitch had found the Ice Angel, all right. But he wasn’t the only one.
Chapter 13
Mitch looked down sharply, his face pure business.
“Listen up,” he said, low and deep. “They know who I am, but I don’t believe they know the ‘new’ you yet. So I’m going to walk away from here, very casual, very quick. And you’re going to get into your car as if you’re just another visitor about to leave. If they look over at you, if they see you, remember everything we practiced. I’ll keep an eye on you, and if anything goes wrong, I’ll jump in. Otherwise you simply drive away from here, heading toward I-80. I’ll follow you in my truck. Got it?”
Wordlessly she nodded, her gaze still riveted to the entrance through which the two men had disappeared. She’d seen one of them before. Vitola? Victorola? Something like that.
Mitch moved back a step, and she forced her shoulders to relax. This was just like they had practiced. Taking another reassuring breath, she slipped her key into the lock.
Mitch’s hand on her shoulder momentarily stopped her. She turned enough to see him watching her with fathomless eyes. “And, Jess,” he said softly, “don’t even think about disappearing again. I don’t make the same mistake twice.”
Slowly she shook her head in agreement. And wasn’t surprised at all that neither of them believed her.
Mitch glanced at the empty entranceway; then his gaze swiveled back to her for one dark, unreadable moment. Just as abruptly, his hand slipped off her shoulder, and he turned away without so much as a backward glance. She watched him go, realizing for the first time how much she’d lost. She’d betrayed him, and the grinning Mitch was gone. This was the agent, and he would always be on the alert around her.
Her throat tightened once more, but she forcefully ignored it. Life was full of choices, and she’d made hers. He would never understand all the reasons, but that didn’t matter. She knew she would always walk away, always run to be alone, and that was all that counted. She slid her key in the ignition and turned.
The engine had just roared to life when the entryway doors came swinging open again. She did her best to appear unconcerned, sliding the car into Reverse. But she returned her gaze to the front in time to see the one man stopping and pointing straight at her. Over the buzz of the engine she heard a faint shout, and then both men began to run. She didn’t hesitate anymore. The adrenaline took over and she slammed her foot on the gas. Too late she looked in the rearview mirror and saw the approaching car.
Even as she slammed on her brakes and heard the unmistakable warning of a horn, she smashed into the vehicle, the impact jolting her forward. For a split instant, she was conscious of nothing. Then abruptly, angry words penetrated her shock.
“What the hell!”
“The lady’s very apologetic—here’s some money.”
“What the—”
Jess didn’t hear the rest. Her car door was thrown open, Mitch’s powerful arms reaching in and unfastening her seat belt while she looked at him with dazed eyes. Suddenly a cracking explosion ripped through the air and even as she was pushed down, the windshield in front of her exploded. Mitch swore low under his breath as tiny shards of glass drove into his skin, but there was no time for second glances.
He pulled Jess from the car onto the ground as a second shot penetrated the air.
“Keep down,” he barked to both Jess and the unfortunate driver of the second vehicle. Sirens were beginning to sound, mayhem erupting from the impact of gunshots in the parking lot. The situation was quickly deteriorating beyond Mitch’s wildest nightmare, and if he didn’t get them out quick, they were all in for a pack of trouble. His sharp gaze darted to his rental truck just ten feet away. The engine was still running and the door was open from when he’d jumped down after seeing the accident. If he could just get them that far without getting them killed.
“Do exactly as I say,” he whispered, sparing Jess a quick glance. Flattened against the pavement, she nodded at him with solemn brown eyes. Leave it to the Ice Angel not to become distressed by a few gunshots. He glanced back up, seeing the two men bearing down on them quite quickly now. Without a second thought, he rolled smoothly up, drawing the Chief’s Special from the small of his back as he did so. He fired quickly and efficiently, both hands aiming and pointing with long-practiced precision. The blast threatened to deafen them all, but the shots were effective. One man dropped immediately, his run coming to an unnatural halt. The second man ducked behind a car.
“Into the truck, now!” Mitch roared. He didn’t have to spare a glance; instead, he heard Jess scramble up and dart for the vehicle. He fired three more shots in the air, backing up as he did so. Then with quick urgency, he jumped into the truck, slamming the door shut even as another bullet cracked the air. “Head down,” he commanded, shoving the truck into Reverse and hitting the gas.
The tires squealed as the truck responded. Mitch straightened, peering over his shoulder as he deftly raced the vehicle backward through the parking lot. Dimly he heard another shot and the glass in his window exploded. He flattened his foot on the gas pedal.
At the end of the row he slammed on the brakes and cranked the wheel, throwing them into a nice 180-degree spin. Then he shifted to Drive, and plunged them forward, roaring out of the parking lot while shots and sirens and mayhem erupted from behind.
“Are you all right?” he asked curtly as he fired down the two-lane road. He whipped past a car, then another, finally risking a brief glance over. Her face was pale, and he could see a faint trickle of red blood where one of the shards of glass had nicked her. But she nodded, turning enough to meet his gaze.
“They know now,” she whispered softly. He nodded grimly, screaming past another car before slamming over into a side road.
“The one man can report back your new description,” he agreed.
“The one man?”
His jaw c
lenched, and he wondered if he should have said anything. But then his shoulders settled rigidly. She said she hated the violence, so she might as well know the results of her little escapade.
“I believe the other’s dead,” he said bluntly, not trying to ease the words at all. He glanced in the rearview mirror, seeing empty space behind them. Another turnoff presented itself, and he took it, slowing down at last. There were few houses here, mostly just miles and miles of fields. He had no idea anymore where they were, and no idea of where they were going. He was just driving, the adrenaline racing too fast to stop.
“Mitch,” Jess’s voice penetrated, soft and low. “Mitch, you need a doctor.”
Feeling almost dazed, he looked down at his left arm. The dark skin was so shredded and cut by glass, it looked like it had been through a blender. Shards of glass winked back at him, tiny and insidious as they lay embedded in his flesh. Judging by the abrupt sting in his cheek, his face suffered the same. He clenched his jaw in sudden anger, but it only made the pain worse.
More houses whizzed by, and for a moment the exhaustion almost overwhelmed him. Where the hell did they go now? How far to run, and just how many were at their heels? Grimly, he forced the thoughts down. He was Mitch Guiness, the best in his field. He’d gotten through worse situations, he was sure, even if none now came to mind.
It was all a matter of one step at a time.
“Pull out the map from the glove compartment,” he commanded softly, his face and arm feeling stiff and fiery now from the pain. He didn’t dare turn to watch, but heard the click as she opened the compartment.
“Find where we are,” he continued, “then find a small touristy-looking place. Someplace where we’ll find a bed and breakfast. It’s too easy for them to check out hotels.”
In the meantime, he came to a more significant-looking road, and turned onto it.
Jess nodded, going over the midwest map with a careful eye. It simply wasn’t detailed enough, however, to allow her to understand where they were. In the end, they simply continued to drive in tense silence.
Twenty minutes later, they came to a small pocket of civilization. Not giving it another thought, Mitch pulled into a gas station.
“Go get the key for the bathroom,” he said tightly, his jaw rigid with the pain. Jess didn’t dare question the command. She simply slid out of the truck and obeyed.
She came back with the key and Mitch took it from her for his own use. She waited only five seconds, then she followed. He hadn’t quite shut the door all the way, and she didn’t bother to knock. Instead, she strode straight in, her face blindly determined as she kicked the door shut behind her. The small room smelled of urine and sweat, the light dim and rusty from above. She refused to notice any of it.
“We should stop and get some hydrogen peroxide,” she said. Mitch’s gaze swept up to meet hers in the scratched glass that served as a mirror, his eyes dark and set. He had a fistful of wet paper towels in his hand and was doing the best he could to clean his arm.
“I’ll be fine,” he said through clenched teeth as his careless motions drove another shard of glass deeper into his skin. “They’re just scratches.”
Jess didn’t say anything; she didn’t quite trust herself to speak. His face and arm looked awful, and it was all because of her. He’d been keeping her safe. He’d been doing exactly what he’d promised.
She stepped forward and took the paper towels from his hand.
“Let me,” she said.
He didn’t stop her, though her actions placed her far closer to him than he would have liked. Now he could smell the faint remnants of peaches, see the shine of her brown hair in the badly lit room. Her hands were gentler than his own, and even as he watched, her careful fingernails sought out and removed the splinters from his arm.
“You weren’t going to tell me, were you?” he said grimly, his eyes focused blackly on the top of her head.
She didn’t have to ask to know he was talking about her mother. Instead, she simply shook her head without even glancing up.
“Was it worth all this?” he demanded harshly, the muscle jumping in his jaw filling him with more pain. “Was it?”
She glanced up. “I...I don’t understand what you mean.” She could feel the anger in him. This close it radiated out like a magnetic field.
“Like hell,” Mitch ground out, the words flat and furious as his eyes narrowed in on hers. “Les knew about your mother. He’s been staking the place out, just waiting for you to contact her so he could trace it back. How the hell did you think I found you?”
That answered one question, but somehow she’d never bothered to really wonder how he’d come to the prison. A part of her had always known he would find her. He was Mitch Guiness, the magician.
“But I didn’t contact my mother,” she replied coolly enough, focusing her attention on the matter at hand. She saw the open doubt in his eyes, and it struck her deeply. Her head bowed back down, her eyes and fingers returning to his injuries. “I swear, Mitch,” she said softly as she found and unearthed another sliver of glass, “I swear I did not contact my mother while under protection. I figured Les probably had some men stationed there. That’s why I waited for my new identity. And then I ran away on my own...” Her voice trailed off, then she forced herself to sound brisk. “That way...that way even if they did find me, at least it wouldn’t harm anyone else.”
Her hands trembled on his arm. She could still picture the shocked eyes of the unsuspecting driver when the shots had broken out. She was trying so hard to get away. Yet it seemed everything she did just sucked more people into the whirling darkness.
Mitch’s right hand came down and tucked under her chin. Before she could react, he’d tilted back her head until she was forced to meet his intense eyes.
“You mean to tell me that you never contacted your mother from New Hampshire?” he demanded to know. In the tight quarters, her body practically pressed against his own, the low intensity of his voice sent tremors down her spine.
Slowly she shook her head.
“What about before that?” he snapped in rapid fire, his eyes boring into hers. “Or from the hotel?”
“Not at all,” she replied, the words slightly breathless. “I just showed up.”
“You just...showed up,” he repeated. She nodded once more, and then inexplicably, Mitch swore. Before she had time to react, his right fist went flying immediately past her to slam into the wall. The rickety mirror trembled and Mitch winced instantly from the contact.
Jess couldn’t help herself—she shrank back toward the sink, her eyes open and wary.
“Don’t,” Mitch warned, low and tired. “I’m ticked off but I’m still not a man who hits women.”
“You’re angry at me,” she said, the words soft and hushed. She could no longer look at him, her gaze falling down to the bloody mess of his arm. The sight made her cringe, and the pain inside of herself was sharp and sudden.
Mitch stared down at her bowed head for a long minute, feeling the adrenaline finally slow in his system. At long last he raised her chin back up.
“Yeah,” he told her. “Yeah, I’m angry at you. I’m angry at this whole damn mess and the fact two good men are dead. I’m angry that Les seems to be one step ahead of me, and I still don’t know why. I thought maybe you’d tipped him off by calling your mother. But if you’re telling the truth, then he couldn’t have found out that way. There must be a leak. Or maybe you’re not telling the truth. How should I know? Seems to me you don’t trust me with a damn thing, let alone the truth.”
His words hurt, mostly because she couldn’t refute any of them. She could feel his eyes searching hers; they made her feel vulnerable and bare when she didn’t want to feel either. Slowly she raised her hand and began to work on his cheek. She saw him flinch from her first touch, and that hurt, as well.
“I didn’t want you to know,” she said at last, the words soft and emotionless as she dabbed at the blood. “I didn’t want anyo
ne to know.”
He looked at her with frustrated eyes. Her hand was so gentle on his cheek. He didn’t know whether he wanted to walk away from her in frustration or pull her into his arms and hold her so tight, the last of the dread would leave them both.
Once more he became aware of their surroundings, the stench of urine and sweat and dirt. He laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound. Slowly her brown eyes swept over to meet his, and he thought he saw his own soul in her gaze. His right hand came to her waist, his body suddenly tight with need.
“I want you,” he whispered hoarsely. “I want you naked and under me. I want to hear you cry my name, I want to watch the satisfaction darken your eyes, see the way you bite your lower lip as I plunge into you. I want your nails digging into my back, your teeth biting my shoulder. I want one hundred percent of you, all of you writhing and clinging and wanting me.”
Her breath quickened, the pulse on her throat pounding rapidly as her eyes darkened. One part of her understood the words. She’d hurt him, and he needed to reclaim her. He needed to feel that she trusted him in the most elemental way, since she denied him that trust in every other.
The other part of her didn’t care about logic or understanding at all. The other part of her could already taste him on her lips, feel him thrusting into her. The other part of her wanted him to reclaim her, because he could make the emptiness go away. In his arms she wasn’t Mary Morgan or Jessica Govern/Gavornée or Jess McMoran. In his arms she was simply a woman, needy and passionate and sensual.
He made her feel like no one else ever had.
Her gaze swept down to his lips, her tongue darting out unconsciously. She could feel the cold porcelain of the sink pressed against her hip, and it contrasted dramatically with the thick heat radiating from his body. She leaned slightly closer.
Mitch saw the movement, and the surge of satisfaction that shot through him was purely male. The heat in his loins became unbearable, and he forgot about the pain in his face and arm.
