Fatal Deception

by April Hunt

  Isa lost her battle with tears. Inside her hood, her mask fogged, but it didn’t obscure her hearing. With every word, Roman’s voice lessened until it was a faint whisper and, finally, he fell asleep.

  Still holding on to his hand, she hooked her boot onto the nearby chair and dragged it closer to Roman’s bedside…and then she sat. “I’m doing my best to make sure that happens, too.”

  And then she waited for a miracle.

  Chapter

  Twenty-Nine

  Roman was in a time warp…or what he imagined that to feel like. As he struggled to open his eyes, bits and pieces of the last few hours—or longer—flickered through his memory like a movie reel. He didn’t even know if any of it had actually happened or if it was the effect of whatever drugs they’d been giving him.

  He half-recalled hearing the hiss of the room’s door lock, which was almost immediately followed by someone in a yellow hazmat suit. There were drugs and blood draws, so many he didn’t know how he hadn’t been drained dry.

  He briefly recalled a snippet of a tear-stained Isabel as she stood over his bed—and his IV port—and said a prayer as she pushed a hot, burning liquid into his veins.

  Now, after the passing of who knows how much time, Roman groaned at the effort it took to open his eyes. It’s like they’d been glued shut, but when they finally obeyed, white light sent a stabbing pain through his head.

  Fuck, had he been abducted by aliens?

  He blinked, forcing his eyes to adjust, and slowly tilted his head to get a good look around the room. Tru Tech’s stark white walls slowly came into focus. Multiple sets of tubes and wires, all with different tinted fluids, went from the machines hanging on the IV pole and disappeared beneath his paper-thin gown.

  He glanced out into the observation room beyond the wide window wall and saw everyone, all asleep in varying positions. Knox sat on a couch, Zoey nestled in his lap, and Cade and Grace looked to be in very much the same position on the other end. King sat propped against the wall with Nat’s head resting on his shoulder, while Ryder served as a pillow for both their mother and Cade and Zoey’s. And at some point while he’d been out of it, Jaz and Tank had returned from Texas.

  His entire family…almost.

  The last member sat in the same chair she’d fallen into who knows how long ago.

  Roman didn’t need to see through the top of the yellow hood to know the Minion-esque form alongside his bed was Isabel.

  A thick black-gloved hand rested above his knee, as if she’d fallen asleep while touching him and had passed out cold. He covered her fingers with his bare hand, and Isabel startled as if he’d touched skin.

  “Roman.” Her gaze whipped to the monitors on the wall and back to him. She jumped up, sending her chair into the wall with a loud crash. “Oh my God! You’re awake! How are you feeling?”

  Forgetting about her bulky gear, she wrapped her arms around him and crashed her massive hood into his head.

  His groan morphed into a low, rusty-sounding chuckle. “Well, I was feeling okay, but now I have a bit of a headache.”

  “I am so sorry.” She tried stepping back, but he wouldn’t hear of it.

  Latching onto her glove, he pulled her back to his side. “Nuh-uh. You stay right here where you belong.”

  Her pretty brown eyes roamed all over his face as if not knowing where to look, and he felt the same. He couldn’t keep his eyes, or his hands, off her, even after hearing the slow awakening rumblings of his family.

  Knox called out first, followed by his mother. Soon, everyone who’d previously been fast asleep now had their faces smashed against the thick window.

  “Roman!” His mother cried, held by an equally weeping Gretchen.

  “About damn time,” Knox grumbled out his relief.

  “I don’t want to ever hear again I’m the lazy Steele who sits behind a computer,” Liam teased with a relieved grin. “Because, dude, you laid on your ass forever.”

  Their mother smacked her youngest in the shoulder. “You leave your brother alone…at least until the IVs come out.”

  Roman chuckled as each of his family and friends made their sentiments known. All the while, he held tightly onto Isabel’s hand.

  “I’m guessing you figured it out.” Roman squeezed her fingers, smiling proudly.

  “With a lot of help from Maddy…but you did most of the heavy lifting. Your body was obviously not ready to let go any time soon.”

  “My heart, too.” Roman gently tugged her closer until her hood rested against his forehead. His eyes locked on hers, and he couldn’t go another moment without telling this woman how he felt all over again. “I love you, Isabel Santiago. If there were thoughts I was holding on to, they were the ones of you. It took me this long to find you, and I wasn’t about to let go without a fight.”

  Isabel sniffed. “Damn it, Roman. This suit doesn’t come equipped with windshield wipers.”

  He smirked. “We could patent them and live high on the hog.”

  Isabel was already shaking her head. “I don’t need to live high on the hog. Or have a white picket fence. Or a nine-to-five job with a steady retirement plan. All I need, Roman Wallace Steele, is you.” Isabel’s voice quivered. “If this whole ordeal has taught me one thing, it’s that love isn’t something that you should let pass you by. And I’m not letting you pass by. I love you too. So much.”

  In the observation room, their friends and family cheered, and there were a lot of about damn times. Roman relished the moment, and for the first time in longer than he could recall, he felt content.

  Happy.

  All he needed was his family and the woman in his arms…and he was complete.

  Epilogue

  In the days since Roman had finally taken that important turn for the better, Isa had never been busier. The inhibitor cocktail they’d given to Roman along with red blood cells from a healthy donor had worked with flying colors, and so she and Maddy had seen to its distribution in Beaver Ridge, where it had immediately been put into practice.

  Infected patients were now turning the corner…even Tony.

  There’d definitely be lasting effects, not limited to possible organ damage, but he’d live. And once he was back to his health, Nat was more than ready to put him in a jail cell near Blue Eyes, Connie, and the rest of their goon squad.

  Isa should have been able to let out a huge sigh of relief, but her stomach knotted, too nervous to let herself enjoy the moment she’d been anticipating for the last week. She paced in the Tru Tech waiting room, which was filled to the brim with members of the Steele Ops family. Nat and King had come out for the occasion, and even some of the Tru Tech employees who’d been involved in Roman’s post-FC-5 care had made an appearance. The only person not in attendance was Maddy, and that was because Roman had requested she be the one to officially spring him from quarantine.

  Isabel had wanted to argue, but she couldn’t.

  “Relax, cariño.” Her grandfather brushed her arm in an attempt to soothe her nerves. “Your wait will soon be over.”

  Jaz chuckled. “And then you can kiss him straight on the lips instead of through the hood…because I got to tell you that was beginning to make me uncomfortable.”

  Isabel stopped pacing and smiled. “I can’t thank you both enough for being here today.”

  Her grandfather brushed off the sentiment with a small wave. “You have no need to thank me for being here for you, or for the man who has stolen your heart.”

  And Roman had definitely stolen her heart…and she never wanted it back.

  The double doors swung open and everyone turned as Roman, with Maddy walking by his side, swaggered into the room. His clothes hung off his broad shoulders, a little looser since he had lost quite a bit of weight, but now that FC-5 was officially out of his system, he was free to get back his normally scheduled life.

  Roman’s family clapped and cheered, and someone—most likely Liam—set off a pair of confetti poppers with flying streamers
. The pink strands got caught in Ryder’s hair, making him grumble.

  But everyone hung back, not charging forward to wrap Roman in hugs like she expected, and it took a moment for her to realize why.

  His gaze fell on her like an anvil, but instead of settling on her like a weight, Isa could breathe easier for the first time since forever. Roman took a small step forward, making her do the same, and after the first shuffle, she flew the rest of the way.

  A foot apart, she launched herself into his arms, and he caught her easily.

  Isa ran her hands up his arms and into his hair. She kissed what she couldn’t easily touch, making him chuckle as he cupped her cheek and brought her lips back to his.

  Another round of applause broke out in the room, mixed in with a few catcalls.

  Isabel didn’t care. This was exactly where she was meant to be…and she wasn’t leaving anytime soon.

  Or ever.

  Discover Your Next Great Read

  Get sneak peeks, book recommendations, and news about your favorite authors.

  Tap here to learn more.

  Someone is watching their every move.

  After a lifetime spent in and out of hospitals, Zoey Wright is tired of playing it safe. She’s ready to take charge of her own life and get out of her comfort zone, starting with a new job as a CSI agent. But when her childhood crush Knox Steele gets pulled onto her case, Zoey needs to put her feelings for him aside or more women will die at the hands of the serial killer preying on her hometown.

  Former Army Ranger Knox Steele is back in Washington to help his brothers open an elite private security firm. He never expected to stumble onto a crime scene, or see his best friend’s little sister working it. Zoey is all grown up now, and the attraction between them is electric, despite his best efforts to resist it. But all that changes for Knox when he realizes the victims have one thing in common…and Zoey might be next.

  Keep reading for an excerpt from the first book in the Steele Ops series,

  Deadly Obsession

  Available now

  Chapter

  One

  Chin up. Shoulders back. Breathe. Do not puke on the crime scene.

  At her last position running the Washington, DC, crime lab, Zoey Wright had never needed a peppy mantra. There wasn’t much that was nausea-inducing about Petri dishes and microfibers. But thirty minutes into her first on-site homicide and she’d already hit an even two dozen mental replays.

  Repetition wasn’t working.

  Lieutenant Mason side-eyed her as they shouldered their way through a thick crowd of onlookers. “You look like you’re going to blow any second, kid. If you need to go around the corner and puke, do it now. But you damn well better not contaminate my crime scene.”

  “I’m good.” Zoey breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth.

  The sixty-year-old police veteran lifted his bushy white eyebrows. “So good that you’re the exact shade of green my wife made me paint our kitchen last week? Don’t kid a kidder, Wright. If it gets too much for you, go take a breather. No one will think any less of you.”

  If she let an acute case of nerves derail years of hard work and her position as DC’s only civilian crime scene investigator, she’d think less of herself. Not to mention the ammunition it would provide her hotshot detective brother in his quest to get her to return to the lab—if she’d told Cade about her job switch-a-roo in the first place.

  She’d given herself until next week to break the news, but this assignment bumped the deadline up to tonight. As head of the Special Crimes Task Force Cade could—and would—turn the corner at any second.

  Zoey cursed the ill-timed bacon maple doughnut that she’d inhaled on the ride from the station to M Street and spotted her brother’s truck among the squad cars and unmarked police vehicles lining both sides of the street.

  At one in the morning, most family-run businesses had long since closed, which meant the gathering crowd had come from the dance club down the block. Anyone who lived, worked, or played in the District during the last six months knew a police turnout of this magnitude meant one thing.

  Another victim.

  “Do you have any words of wisdom to lay on me before we get there?” Zoey tugged their collection cart behind her, giving it a little extra oomph when it lodged into a crater-sized crack.

  “Yep. Don’t inhale food fifteen minutes before being called to a homicide.”

  Zoey’s glare fired off a small chuckle. She took the good-natured barb and followed the older man to the yellow police tape that cordoned off the alley from the rest of the world.

  “You make sure everyone stayed out of our scene, Reed?” Mason stopped in front of the officer stationed at the mouth of the alley.

  “Only ones who’ve been down that way besides your people is the guy who called it in. He’s giving his statement to Detective Wright now,” Officer Scott Reed mentioned her brother.

  Zoey swung her gaze around, expecting Cade to pop up at any second. When he didn’t show, she released a small sigh of relief…until Mason ducked beneath the rope, leaving her alone with Scott.

  She’d barely cleared the tape when Scott stepped into her path. His tall frame and wrestler’s build made him impossible to ignore, as did the gaze he skimmed over her body. It slid over her three times before his mouth lifted into a grin he probably thought sexy.

  She considered it creepy.

  Scott shifted a little closer. “You’re all over the place these days, aren’t you? I tried calling you a few times after our date. I even left a couple messages.”

  “Really? Huh.” Zoey pushed her glasses back onto her nose, a nervous habit she’d acquired in grade school. “I’ve been having problems with my phone holding voice mails hostage. I’m looking into another model.”

  And another phone number. That “date” had been the worst she’d ever been on—and thanks to a romance app and one too many blind setups, she’d been on a handful of doozies.

  “Maybe we can catch up tonight when this circus is all over. What do you say? You. Me. We can grab a bottle of wine and head back to my place…or yours. I’m not particular.” Scott flashed her a suggestive wink. “We can have fun at either place, I’m sure.”

  Zoey barely suppressed a disgusted grunt. “Sorry, but I’m going to be here for a while. You know how thorough Mason likes to be. It’s going to be a long night.”

  “Okay, sure. Maybe next time.”

  Unless they stepped into the Twilight Zone, there wouldn’t be a next time. Someone’s family member wouldn’t make it home for another dinner or pose for this year’s holiday card. One life ended meant dozens—and more—would never be the same, and he stood there, sensing an opportunity to fill a few empty hours—and her pants.

  Before Scott made another play, she hustled over to where the lieutenant waited.

  Mason chuckled as she approached. “Finalize your plans?”

  “Thanks for the save. You could’ve thrown me a life jacket, a T-bone, or something…but no, you practically fed me to the wolves…er, wolf.”

  “Figured you’d gotten yourself into that mess all alone and that you’d get yourself out. But I can’t deny being curious how the hell that happened. I always thought you were the smart Wright sibling.”

  “It happened because I hadn’t been on a date in far longer than I’m admitting aloud. It was one time, and I barely made it out of my apartment before I realized I’d made a mistake. Trust me, it’s not going to happen again. I’ve proclaimed a moratorium on romance. It’s career first from this point on.”

  “What did Romeo do to make you see the error of your ways?”

  “Ogled the rear end of my sixty-year-old neighbor before we’d even made it to the car. Then the waitress’s legs at the restaurant. And I don’t want to know what went through his mind when he stared at the boobs of the barely-legal ticket-taker at the movies.”

  “What an ass.” Mason snorted.

  “Not going to disagree w
ith you.”

  At five foot three, Zoey didn’t possess the lithe body of a runway model, and her B cup had more wiggle room than she’d like. Girl-next-door cute. That’s how one coworker had described her eclectic style to another. It wasn’t a term with which every twenty-seven-year-old woman wanted to be linked, but it didn’t bother her enough to give up her vintage Monkees T-shirts, either.

  Zoey fidgeted with her shirt collar. As it did whenever she contemplated wearing something more revealing than neck-high cotton, the healed scar over her breastbone itched.

  Those six inches of puckered skin definitely weren’t cute.

  Their debut appearance came with her first open-heart surgery when she was mere days old. A rerun surgery before her first birthday darkened them. Following a third operation at the age of seven, the scar widened, and then after she hit puberty, and underwent a fourth, it thickened.

  Last year’s emergent heart valve replacement brought her open-heart surgery grand total to a whopping five. Five times her chest had been cracked open. Five layers of gnarled, angry scar tissue loitered between her breasts, a physical reminder she’d skipped pajama parties and Spin the Bottle, and went straight to responsibility-laden adulthood.

  Number five had been her wake-up call because some born with Tetralogy of Fallot didn’t get a sixth chance.

  Shedding the crime lab’s cold isolation and joining scene investigation was the first step in redefining life on her own terms. Having lost his son a few years ago to a chronic illness, Mason got that, and had been a big reason why she’d stepped so far out of her comfort zone.

  But the calm, laid-back man who’d taken a chance on her wasn’t in that alley. The second they reached the site, he started barking orders. Crime scene techs bustled around the perimeter, not willing to incur his wrath for being too slow—or worse, sloppy.

  Within the hour, the small four-flapped tent set off to the left would be filled with detectives and forensic scientists, all members of the task force who couldn’t do their job until Zoey and Mason finished theirs.