by Lisa Childs
He touched Nikki’s shoulder to shake her awake, but when he glanced down, he found her eyes open and staring up at him. They moved like they’d choreographed the routine—dressing, grabbing their weapons…
His friends wouldn’t have come back yet and not in silence again. They would have knocked. They’d seen that something was going on between him and Nikki, and they wouldn’t have wanted to interrupt.
Cooper might have.
But he knew it wasn’t Cooper.
He knew it was danger—even before the shooting began. He’d put Nikki in danger.
He reached out and pulled her back, shoving her behind him. He might not have been able to protect Emilia. But he would protect Nikki—even if he died trying.
*
Nick was on his way home when he heard the police call. Even though he was still in charge, he could have ignored it. Units were already en route. They would probably beat him there. But for some reason—that sick feeling in the pit of his stomach—he knew he needed to go, too.
He didn’t even have to look for the address that had come along with the call of shots fired. He only had to follow all the flashing lights.
An ambulance was parked in the street with the back doors open. But nobody was inside it, working on the body lying beneath the bloodied sheet.
It was too late.
He glanced toward the house with all the lights blazing and saw a couple paramedics carrying out another gurney. They struggled with the weight of the big body, but there was no urgency in their step, no rush to get this patient to the hospital.
They hadn’t been able to help that victim, either.
Nick moved past the ambulance and froze. Parked between it and the curb was a black coupe. It looked like a dozen other cars except for the furry dice dangling from the rearview mirror.
Those dice…
He knew whose car that was. Panic squeezed his heart. “Nikki…”
Cooper had been so worried that something bad was going to happen to her. Nick should have heeded his brother’s instincts. He should have done something. He should have helped Cooper protect her.
But he’d thought it was time to let Nikki prove to the others that she could take care of herself. So he hadn’t wanted to intervene.
Shaking with fear, Nick turned around and headed back toward the ambulance. It wasn’t her body on the gurney; that one was too big.
But the one in the ambulance was smaller, the one lying beneath the bloody sheet.
He had to know…
Had he been too late?
Chapter 15
Pain radiated from Nikki’s heart throughout her body. She’d never felt anything quite like this. It was nearly as unbearable as her desire—her need—for Lars had been. She didn’t need him anymore. She was furious with him.
What the hell had he been thinking to try to protect her? To shove her behind him?
He’d nearly gotten his head shot off, probably would have if Nikki hadn’t dropped him with a kick to the back of his knee. Then she’d taken down the man who’d stepped through the bedroom door firing.
She squeezed her eyes shut, and images jumbled together in her mind—not just of this shooting but of every other shooting in which she’d been involved.
That number was growing. Unfortunately.
She couldn’t remember how many had died—not just tonight but in total. Her body began to shake almost of its own volition. Lars had been shot.
Hadn’t he…?
But the image behind her closed lids was of Woodrow lying on the floor, blood pooling beneath him. Then she saw a woman—the one she’d killed—the one who’d nearly killed Woodrow.
“Andrea…”
“Why are you bringing her up?” a soft voice asked. “Are you okay?”
Nikki blinked her eyes open and met her mother’s concerned gaze. Usually she would bluff that she was fine, nothing was wrong. But instead she held open her arms for her mother’s reassuring hug.
Mom always said everything was fine even when it wasn’t. When Nikki’s father had died, she’d claimed that she was fine, that they would all be fine. And when Nikki had found out about her father cheating on Penny, she’d claimed then that it was okay—that she had forgiven him years ago.
Nikki didn’t care if Penny had. She hadn’t. And she wouldn’t be able to forgive Lars, either. Not just for using her to try to kidnap his nephew but for protecting her tonight. He hadn’t trusted her to protect herself.
But still she couldn’t help but ask, “Is he all right?”
Her mother didn’t ask who. She just knew like she knew so many other things. “Yes, yes,” she replied.
But was this like all those other times? Was she claiming everything was all right even when it wasn’t?
So many shots had been fired…
At least one of them had to have hit him. There had been so much blood. Nikki glanced down at the streak that had run down her arm from where a bullet had grazed her shoulder. The trail was dry now, the blood hard.
“What about you?” Penny asked, and her voice quavered slightly as she followed where Nikki had glanced as she saw the blood. “Are you okay?”
Nikki drew in a deep breath and rallied. “Yes, yes,” she replied. And for the first time she realized she might be more like her mother than just in appearance because she was claiming everything was all right even when it wasn’t.
Even when she knew it would never be all right again. She had done it, the one thing she’d promised herself she would never do. She had let herself get involved with someone. If that wasn’t bad enough, the person she cared about had already lied to her, had already used her.
Yes, she was far more like her mother than she’d ever realized—because the first man she was falling for was certain to break her heart.
*
“Are you trying to get my sister killed, too?” Cooper asked as he pulled the emergency room curtain aside.
Lars looked up from the bandage he’d been studying on his leg. Blood had begun to seep through the gauze. Maybe he shouldn’t have refused stitches. But the bullet had just grazed his thigh. He didn’t need stitches. He needed his damn jeans and his gun so he could leave.
But first he needed to find Nikki and make sure she was all right. The wound on her shoulder hadn’t been more than a shallow scratch. It was the look on her face that had scared him more. She’d looked like she was going into shock.
“Is she okay?” he anxiously asked. “I tried to protect her.”
Cooper flinched. “No wonder she looked so pissed when she left with our mom.”
“She left?” And she hadn’t checked on him? Hadn’t she cared?
But if she hadn’t cared, why would she have dropped him with that kick? Why would she have made sure he couldn’t take a bullet for her?
He’d only gotten hit as the man had gone down as Nikki had taken him down. Lars had shot the next one who’d hit her as he’d gone down. He’d already explained that to the officers at the scene, though. Nikki had talked to another man at the scene, one who’d looked very much like Cooper.
It must have been Nick. He’d never come over to speak to Lars, though. He’d only glared at him the way Cooper was glaring at him now.
“Why didn’t you tell me about any of this?” he asked. Nikki must have filled in Cooper. Or maybe she’d told Nick and he had. “I am so sorry about your sister.”
“Nikki doesn’t think Emilia is dead.” Lars wished he could believe that, too. But if she hadn’t been dead, she probably was now. Those gunmen had been guards from Webber’s estate. He was definitely onto him and tying up loose ends.
Cooper slugged him. Hard. On the shoulder. Fortunately the bullet hadn’t grazed him where it had Nikki. “Why the hell did you bring my sister into this mess and not me?” he demanded to know.
“I wanted to give you credible deniability,” Lars explained.
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to get my nephew back.” And
his sister—if by some miracle she was still alive. He would find Emilia. But he didn’t want Nikki helping him. She’d nearly been killed back at his place.
If anything had happened to her…
“You’re sure Nikki is all right?” Lars asked again. Even if she was pissed at him, he wished she would have stopped in to talk to him even if just to tell him to go to hell.
Didn’t she realize why he’d tried to protect her? Because he cared? Because he was falling for her…
But maybe it was better that she not know that. Because Webber was already trying to get rid of him. If he didn’t survive, it was better that Nikki not care about him. It would make it easier for her to forget him.
*
The door creaked open, spilling faint light across the mattress on which Emilia lay shivering. She tried to rally her strength to fight. This was it.
She’d already heard them talking, so she knew. They had come to get rid of her. But when she turned toward the door, her eyes widened in surprise.
She hadn’t expected Myron Webber would return to do his own dirty work. “Don’t you want to know why I’m here?” he asked as she stared up at him.
“To kill me…”
He chuckled but didn’t correct her. “I found a family for your son.”
Son. She’d had a son. She would have named him Lars if she’d had the chance to see him. To hold him…
But she could remember none of that or anything but this room. She did remember how he’d felt inside her, moving and kicking. He was strong. He’d survived.
He was like his uncle.
Lars had to be okay.
But the lawyer chuckled again. “It’s all over now,” he mused. “I tracked down your brother and eliminated him.”
Emilia gasped as pain shot through her. “You had him killed?”
“He killed himself—looking for you—trying to steal your son.”
Lars had found out about the baby. Guilt racked her. He should have found out from her. She should have told him before he’d deployed. But she’d been so worried about disappointing him…
Or distracting him while he’d been gone.
She hadn’t wanted his worrying about her to keep him from staying focused on survival.
He had survived war. Only to be killed because of her…
“Is he really dead?” she asked, her voice cracking with the emotions churning through her.
Webber nodded. “The news reported no survivors. No witnesses.”
He was smug. So damn smug that he wouldn’t be caught. That he would never be punished for his crimes.
Anger coursed through Emilia, and for a moment she felt strong. But when she tried to lift her arm to slap him, her muscles were too weak. She could barely raise her hand from the mattress. Tears of frustration and loss burned her eyes, but she was too dehydrated to shed them.
She couldn’t even cry for her brother.
Or for herself…
Now that the lawyer had found a family for her son, he didn’t need her anymore, either. Just as she’d suspected, he had come back to eliminate her—just as he had eliminated her brother.
Chapter 16
Nikki shoved open the door to the conference room of the original Payne Protection Agency and stalked to the head of the table.
“I don’t give a damn who the boss is,” she told Logan and Cooper who stood over the chair like they’d been haggling for position. “I called this meeting and I am damn well going to lead it.”
She grabbed the chair, but instead of sitting in it, she spun it away from the table. She couldn’t sit, not with the urgency coursing through her body. And not with Lars staring at her like he was, as if he had been starving for the sight of her.
She drew in a deep breath and worked at ignoring him as she focused on the others. They were arguing amongst themselves. She could hear Logan and Cooper clearly. They hadn’t been arguing over that damn chair. They’d been arguing over her.
“How could you have put her in danger like that?” Logan asked.
“I didn’t know that I was,” Cooper said.
“What the hell were you thinking to hire guys like this—guys you couldn’t trust?” Logan persisted, disparagingly.
“That’s ironic, coming from you,” Parker tossed in with a chuckle. He enjoyed needling his twin. “You hired the two ex-cons.”
His brothers-in-law had gone to prison for a crime they hadn’t committed. Of course there had been some that they had.
“I can trust Garek and Milek with my life,” Logan said. “Cooper can’t trust his team.”
“That’s my fault.” Lars jumped in to defend his friend. “I didn’t want to bring him into this mess.”
“You shouldn’t have,” Logan interjected. “And you damn well shouldn’t have brought our sister into it, either.”
“He was worried about his sister,” Dane said. “And with good reason.”
The volume rose—more individual arguments breaking out around the table. She put her fingers in her mouth, ready to execute a sharp whistle to draw attention back to the meeting and the person running it.
But someone beat her with the whistle. And Cooper stepped up to her side. “Stop the fighting,” he yelled.
All arguing had already ceased. They all stared up at him now.
“Everyone in this room is family,” he said with a pointed look at their brother Logan.
A few people were missing. Candace was still working her shift to protect Blue with Milek Kozminski and Gage Huxton as her backup on the estate. Nick, Mom and Woodrow weren’t present, either. But Nikki hadn’t wanted any of them there, not when what they had to do was illegal.
“We are bound either by blood or by loyalty,” Cooper continued. “I don’t question the loyalty of my unit. And I won’t tolerate anyone else questioning it, either. They did what they did to protect me. But I’m not the one who needs protecting.”
He’d left no doubt who was in charge now. But then he stepped back and turned the meeting over to her. “Listen to Nikki. She called this meeting.”
She braced her palms on the edge of the table and leaned forward. Raising her voice so everyone could hear it, she said, “The person who most needs our protection is only a few weeks old.”
She had their attention. So she told them the rest of the story, everything she’d learned from Lars. She could have let him tell it, but she hadn’t wanted to put him through the emotions that visibly overwhelmed him every time he talked of Emilia and how he felt like he’d let her down. She couldn’t comfort him anymore.
“That’s why I called everyone here,” she said, “because we need to work together to get that baby away from Myron Webber.”
“Kidnap him?” Parker asked, his blue eyes widening in surprise. He’d once been a police officer like Logan. Breaking a law would go against all he believed.
“How do we know that baby’s really his nephew?” Garek asked the question. A former criminal himself, he was suspicious of everyone. He’d also promised his sister when he’d gone to prison years ago that he would never commit another crime.
“Nick had the FBI lab rush the DNA I took,” she said. In addition to what she’d collected in the nursery, Lars had given a sample at the hospital. “It’s a familial match between Lars and the baby.” She drew in a breath and focused on him now. He hadn’t believed her about Emilia. She knew why: he’d been afraid to hope. “And there was a familial match between the baby and the DNA in the breast milk.”
A gasp slipped through Lars’s lips. “Oh, my God. She is really alive?”
She had been. Nikki had no such confidence that she still was.
“That’s why we have to move quickly,” she said. “We need to go over all that footage to see if we can pinpoint the go-between for the breast milk and the estate. And we need to check all of the properties Webber owns.”
Heads bobbed all around the table; everyone was in agreement with her now. She slapped her hands together. “Let’s save t
hat baby and find his mama!” She only hoped for Emilia’s sake and Blue’s and even Lars’s—damn him—that they found her alive.
*
Lars no longer had any doubts. He still had them about Emilia. She may have been alive and supplying her baby with breast milk, but that didn’t mean she was still alive. What he no longer had any doubts about were his feelings for Nikki. He had definitely fallen in love with her.
She was so damn amazing. It didn’t matter that she was smaller and younger than everyone in that room. She commanded their respect.
And his love…
But she wouldn’t even look at him. To drive her points home, she’d made eye contact with everyone except him. But then she didn’t need to convince him to work with the others. He’d already tried going rogue and failed.
Thanks to her.
And he’d nearly gotten them both killed the night before. He knew he needed help.
More important, he knew he needed her.
But she was clearly furious with him. Was she still angry that he’d set her up as Blue’s bodyguard only to try to overpower her? Or that she’d made love or—per her words—had sex with him after that.
Should he have tried to resist her?
It would have been the honorable thing to do. But he’d been past honor at that point. He’d been past common sense or any rational thought at all. He had been desperate with need.
And making love with her had done nothing to lessen that need. Maybe that was why she was mad. Her plan hadn’t worked. Maybe she still wanted him as much as he wanted her.
But when he touched her, as she moved to pass him, she tensed. Then she glanced down at his hand like she wanted to burn his touch off her skin.
But he couldn’t let her go. Not without saying, “Thank you.”
She arched a reddish-brown brow.
“For telling everyone about Emilia.” He wouldn’t have been able to do it, not like she had. Not without enduring a whole hell of a lot of pain.
She nodded.
And his heart swelled with hope that she’d done it at least partially for him, to spare him some of that pain.
