by Janie Crouch
Dylan grabbed the clothes Angi had brought for Shelby from on top of the dresser by the door. He was just helping her stand and make her way into the bathroom so she could change when he heard his brother Sawyer from the door.
“Looks like I missed quite a party.”
Chapter Sixteen
Dylan had never felt so relieved to see someone in his entire life. He walked over to hug his brother. “I’m glad you’re here, man.”
“What the hell happened, Dylan? Some sheriff guy just flew down those stairs like he’d heard the donut shop was about to close or something.”
“Somebody attacked Shelby, was going to kill her.”
They both looked over at Shelby who was still standing outside the bathroom door, wrapped in her sheet, staring at them. Sawyer walked around Dylan and sauntered over to stand right in front of her. Dylan watched as his baby brother, the flirt of the family, wrapped his arms around Shelby, picked her all the way off her feet and kissed her smack on the mouth.
Sawyer had been kissing girls on the mouth since he was three years old. And as he’d gotten older, he’d continued to love them, and kiss them. Sawyer had kissed all his brothers’ girlfriends in that friendly manner. Hell, Sawyer had even kissed Fiona on the lips the day Dylan and Fiona got married.
Sawyer’s kisses had never bothered Dylan before. But the sight of his brother’s lips on Shelby’s triggered an ugly jealousy inside Dylan. He managed to tamp it down, but only barely. His jaw ached from gritting his teeth.
Sawyer lowered Shelby back to the ground. “Hi, I’m Sawyer. Meg has told me so much about you. I’m glad you’re okay.”
Shelby was just looking at Sawyer with that stunned look women always got when looking at Sawyer. “Hi,” she finally whispered.
Dylan rolled his eyes and crossed over to stand right next to Shelby, putting his arm around her shoulders. “Why don’t you stop molesting your wife’s friend and let her get dressed.”
Sawyer put a hand up to his chest in mock woundedness. “Shelby is Megan’s friend, which makes her like a sister to me.” He winked down at Shelby. “A very hot sister.”
“I am so telling Megan on you,” Dylan said.
“Megan’s used to my crazy antics.” Sawyer shrugged. “Plus, she knows I am a one-woman man now.”
“A tragedy,” Shelby said, grinning.
Dylan had had enough. “You—” he pointed at Shelby, spinning her around “—go get dressed. Call me if you need help.”
“Or me.” Sawyer raised his hand and wiggled his fingers in a flirty wave.
Shelby just smiled and went into the bathroom.
“You leave her alone,” Dylan told Sawyer the moment the door was closed. The words poured out of his mouth almost of their own accord. “I’m not kidding about this, Sawyer. You stay away from Shelby.”
Sawyer’s face immediately changed from friendly to viciously serious. “You know what, Dyl? I’m going to let that slide because you’ve been through a lot in the past day and a half. And obviously you have some sort of head injury, because you just insinuated that I might be interested in cheating on my pregnant wife with one of her good friends.”
Dylan rubbed his hand across his forehead. Sawyer was right. Dylan knew Sawyer loved Megan to distraction. He would never cheat on her or hurt her in any way.
“You’re right. I’m sorry. It’s been a long night and day and night again.”
Sawyer was not one to hold a grudge. He slapped Dylan on the back. “No problem. So what the hell happened in here?”
Dylan told the whole story of Shelby’s attack and the guy jumping out the window to kill himself.
“Do you think he traced our call?” Sawyer asked. “Is that why he was able to get here so quickly?”
“No. He was just following emergency services for this area. This is a small town and Shelby and I were a pretty big deal when we showed up alive.”
“We’re up against someone pretty serious if the guy was willing to off himself rather than be taken in,” Sawyer murmured, looking around the room.
“My thoughts exactly. Definitely DS-13.”
“I noticed our friend Shelby didn’t seem to have any clothes on under that sheet. Please tell me the perp didn’t rip them off her or something sick like that. Or worse.”
Sawyer’s voice was tight. Their family was intimately familiar with the trauma of aggravated assault and rape. Their sister, Juliet, had only just recently begun to fully recuperate from an attack while posing undercover a couple of years ago.
The Branson family took attacks on women very seriously.
Dylan cleared his throat. “No, um, Shelby’s clothes were already off before he got in here.”
Sawyer looked over at him, one eyebrow cocked. “I see. So your stupid comment before had nothing to do with protectiveness toward Megan and everything to do with why Miss Keelan was naked.”
“Shut up, Sawyer.” Dylan loved his brother, but Sawyer knew how to push his buttons.
Shelby came out of the bathroom now dressed in Angi’s pale blue sweater and jeans. She’d pulled her long red hair into a loose braid that fell down her back. And while Dylan appreciated that Angi’s junior-size jeans were fascinatingly tight on Shelby’s grown-woman-with-grown-curves body, he could tell right away that she was in pain from her leg. She tried to hide her limp, but Dylan noticed it immediately.
“I’m not sure these jeans are exactly legal on me.” Shelby’s laugh held an embarrassed tinge.
Dylan crossed to her and helped her sit down on the bed.
“Trust me, you look better in those jeans than any teenager ever could,” Dylan said just loudly enough for Shelby to hear. She actually flushed.
Dylan shouldn’t be surprised, given her skin coloring, that she was easily able to blush. But he was surprised at the crimson, given what had occurred between them this evening. Shelby wasn’t used to compliments. Dylan might have to become better at giving them.
He bent down next to her to help her get her shoes and socks on so she wouldn’t have to put undue weight on her leg. After he was finished, he gently touched the outside of her thigh where he knew it hurt the most.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Dylan asked, standing and helping her to stand. “We can still go to a doctor if you think we need to have it x-rayed.”
“No, it’ll be fine. Maybe just some aspirin or something once we get on the road.”
“I’m going to go clear us out with the sheriff,” Sawyer called from the door. He tossed a set of keys to Dylan. “I’ll meet you guys in the car.”
Sawyer and Shelby were both right. They needed to get going. DS-13 surely had more henchmen at their disposal to send once they figured out this one was dead. The next might already be on their way.
Dylan needed to get Shelby out of here.
They gathered the rest of their items, not that there was much. Just the contents of Dylan’s backpack. Dylan helped Shelby down the outdoor stairs. He could tell she was in pain, although she didn’t complain. He touched her bruised face gently once they reached the bottom, wincing.
“You have some bruises, too, you know, where that guy got in a few good punches,” she told him.
Dylan could feel them. Between everything they’d been through over the past day and a half, Dylan’s whole body felt bruised and sore. And he didn’t even want to think about all the paperwork and mental energy he would have to spend dealing with the insurance issues surrounding his Cessna’s crash. That would be dealt with later.
Right now he’d stay and make sure Shelby was safe. It wasn’t as if he had any job to rush back to now anyway.
Dylan was helping Shelby into the car when Mrs. Morgan walked over to them. She had a bag in her hand.
“Here’s Shelby’s clothes, Dylan. I’m sorry yo
u didn’t get a chance to dry them.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Morgan. Sorry our arrival has brought such chaos to your store. I’m sure Agent Branson will be giving Sheriff Fossen his card if you need anything further.”
“Don’t worry about that.” Mrs. Morgan touched Dylan on his uninjured arm. “All this hoopla will bring in more people to the shop tomorrow than in decades. Angi is out taking pictures of the whole thing.”
“You might want to consider getting her a real camera with her proclivity toward picture taking,” Dylan said.
“I tried that. But part of the appeal for her is being able to put the pictures up on all her websites as quickly as possible.” Mrs. Morgan shrugged then drew in a ragged breath. “I was so scared when that man put his gun to Angi’s head.” Mrs. Morgan leaned down so she could see Shelby more clearly in the car. “I’m sorry I told him where you were, honey. I just didn’t know what to do.”
Shelby reached out a comforting hand toward the older woman. “You did the right thing. A mother should always protect her child, no matter what.”
“But those bruises on your face! I wish I had thought to tell him you were somewhere else.”
“Mrs. Morgan, not to be gruesome, but that man was a trained killer. You’re very lucky to be alive.”
Mrs. Morgan’s eyes got wider.
“He left you alive in that storage room for a reason—to check and see if you were telling the truth about where Shelby and I were,” Dylan continued. “If you hadn’t been, he probably would’ve come back and done a lot more damage.”
Dylan decided it was probably best not to mention that the man would’ve almost definitely been coming back to finish off both Angi and Mrs. Morgan once he had taken care of business upstairs. One of DS-13’s hired professionals would not have left loose ends.
“But thank you for coming up there with your shotgun, Mrs. Morgan,” Shelby told her. “That was very brave.”
Mrs. Morgan nodded. “You two be careful. Whatever’s going on with you seems pretty dangerous.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Dylan nodded. “We’ll be getting to a safer place soon.”
“I better go make sure Angi is staying out of trouble.”
They watched as the older woman walked back toward her shop, now surrounded by a number of flashing police cars and multiple bystanders, despite the late hour.
It wasn’t long before Sawyer joined them back at the car. “Evidently this county doesn’t have a lot of suicidal would-be killers. Go figure. Some of those deputies are just about giddy dealing with the crime scene.”
“Do they need us?” Dylan really didn’t want to stick around here to answer questions.
“No, since the guy jumped while being taken into custody and because the sheriff was right there to witness the whole thing, it’s pretty straightforward. I told Sheriff Fossen I was taking you guys and how to get in touch.”
“Were you able to get a good look at Shelby’s attacker? He wasn’t familiar to me at all.”
Sawyer shook his head. “I saw him, but he wasn’t familiar to me either. Didn’t seem to have any identifying marks or tattoos on him. How long did you guys fight?”
“Over five minutes.”
Sawyer’s eyebrows shot up. “Any particular reason for that?”
“Well, I had been in a plane crash a few hours earlier. And I’m no longer active, Sawyer.”
“So?”
Dylan knew what his brother meant. Dylan was particularly skilled at hand-to-hand combat. He’d been well known during his time at Omega for finishing skirmishes in under a minute.
“I was a little distracted by Shelby, but yeah, the guy was highly skilled. Definitely not a thug hired off the street.”
Dylan and Sawyer both knew that was particularly bad news. Smart, skilled, hired muscle tended to speak of much smarter, more skilled people working behind them. In this case, someone very high up in DS-13, and perhaps even the mole in Omega.
They had no proof who was behind all this, they just knew it was someone connected and dangerous.
A lethal combination.
Chapter Seventeen
Shelby awoke in a bed, not sure exactly where she was. Definitely not at her own house. Light was coming through the window, so it was daytime, midmorning by the looks of it. Maybe she was in Sawyer and Megan’s home. That would make sense. She moved quickly to get up, but a sharp pain in her outer thigh caused her to slow.
The last thing Shelby remembered was getting in the car with Dylan and Sawyer. They’d both sat in the front seat so Shelby could stretch out her hurt leg in the backseat. She’d been about to fall asleep when they had stopped at a drugstore for supplies for Dylan’s wounded arm and painkillers for Shelby. And a couple of prepaid disposable cell phones to replace the ones they’d lost.
Evidently a respite from the pain had been all Shelby needed to fall asleep, because she didn’t remember anything else about the drive into DC. She didn’t remember the car stopping or getting into this bed or sleeping all night. But evidently all those things had taken place.
She was still dressed in Angi’s jeans and sweater. She needed to go to the restroom and she was starving. Shelby took care of the first need then headed down the hallway to where she heard voices. Dylan and a woman. And the woman definitely wasn’t Megan.
“Yeah, well, at least you don’t look as bad as the time it was the two of us in the airplane hangar.”
Dylan groaned and laughed at the same time. “Woman, that night just about killed me. Don’t bring it up.”
The woman chuckled in a knowing, intimate past-history way. Had Dylan brought Shelby to an ex-girlfriend’s house?
Not a current girlfriend. Shelby didn’t believe Dylan was the kind of man who would cheat on a lover. And especially wouldn’t be stupid enough to bring the woman he was cheating with to his girlfriend’s house.
But they were obviously close to each other. The familiarity between them was immediately apparent as Shelby entered the living room in which they sat.
Sat together, on a cozy love seat, in front of the fireplace.
It was the woman—a gorgeous brunette with blond highlights—who saw Shelby first, to Shelby’s continued chagrin.
“You’re awake, good! Although I’m sure sleep was the best thing for your poor body.” The woman stood and walked over to Shelby. She seemed unsure of whether to hug Shelby or offer her a hand to shake.
Evidently Shelby’s facial expression wasn’t real friendly-like because the woman ended up doing neither.
“Um, I’m Sophia Branson. This is my house. Well, mine and my husband’s. I’m married to Dylan’s brother Cameron.”
This gorgeous woman was married to Dylan’s brother. Thank goodness. But that didn’t mean she and Dylan didn’t have a history.
“Cameron? But you spent the night with Dylan in an airplane hangar?” Shelby could easily imagine just how well Dylan could get around in an airplane hangar with a woman. And he’d laughed and said it had almost killed him. The thought made Shelby a little sick. Dylan would know exactly what equipment could hold the weight of two peop—
The woman laughed, cutting off Shelby’s thoughts of airplane-hangar antics. “Well, yeah. When a group of terrorists had me in their clutches. They used poor Dylan here as a human punching bag.”
Both Dylan and Sophia winced.
Well, that wasn’t what Shelby had thought at all. She shouldn’t even have brought it up. Shelby stuck her hand out for Sophia to shake. “It’s very nice to meet you. I’m Shelby Keelan. Thanks for letting us crash here.”
Dylan came over to stand by his sister-in-law. “Sophia is the only member of our family who doesn’t work at Omega. We thought it would be better for everyone else to go to work as usual. That will make it look like you and I aren’t around this area
at all, hopefully. After all, if we were here, we’d go straight to family, right?”
Shelby nodded. That definitely made sense.
“Plus, they’re working on all the details for their grand plan to sneak you into Omega,” Dylan continued.
“Do you really think the mole is someone inside Omega?” Sophia asked Dylan while she took Shelby’s arm and began leading her into the kitchen.
“I don’t know how it could be anyone else. It’s either someone pretty high up inside Omega or someone with access to info he or she shouldn’t have. That might be even worse.”
Shelby agreed with Dylan’s assessment, knowing how electronic leaks could be deadly to both companies and law enforcement. “Yeah, one mole would be better than having an unknown information leak. Something like that could be coming from hundreds of different electronic areas and would be nearly impossible to find.”
“You have to be hungry,” Sophia told Shelby as they entered the kitchen. “It’s after eleven o’clock.”
Shelby turned to Dylan. “How long have I been asleep?”
“Including your sleeping in the car? Almost fourteen hours.”
No wonder she felt so groggy. And hungry. “Wow. Wait, what about the countdown I spotted in the coding?” Shelby instantly did the math in her head. “We have less than twenty hours left before whatever is counting down gets to zero.”
Dylan slipped an arm around her shoulder. “I know. But you needed the time to rest. Plus, there wasn’t anything you could do until we figured out how to get you into Omega.”
Shelby was still feeling pretty anxious. As if there was something more she should be doing. But it didn’t seem as though there was, so what could she do?
“Coffee?” Sophia walked over from the cabinet, carafe and mug in hand.
Shelby couldn’t do anything else, but she could drink coffee. “Oh, please, yes. Thank you, please, yes.”
