by Dawn Ryder
“Okay, so it was nothing you couldn’t handle.”
Ginger settled back against the edge of the tile countertop, staring at the glitter in his eyes. More of his personality was on display, and she felt privileged to see it. She chose her tone carefully because she didn’t want to spook him. She had the feeling Saxon Hale didn’t share his private persona very often. “But beyond the rush, it’s a damned dangerous game.”
He offered her a single nod. “They were shooting at you. I just stepped into the line of fire.”
“But you were there.” Now that she was taking time to think about it, she recalled the look on his face when she’d explained how she made it past the doorman.
“I solved something for you,” she said. “By seeing Marc Grog.”
Her comment sobered him. He stepped into the kitchen, making her feel like it had shrunk. It was just ridiculous the way she was in tune with him. Awareness was rippling through her as he moved closer. He racked her from head to toe, considering her.
“I wish you hadn’t.”
Something flashed in his eyes that looked like pity and that stirred her temper.
“Don’t think about me that way.” She really should have kept her mouth shut but didn’t.
His eyebrow rose.
“Like you feel sorry for me,” Ginger clarified. “Don’t.”
“You’d prefer I was a real hard ass who didn’t recognize how your life has been smashed to bits?”
“I’m not going to let life get me down.” She looked straight into his eyes as she spoke and made damned sure he knew how serious she was. For the first time, she felt her confidence holding steady under his direct gaze. “Plenty of people have to deal with crap flying at them. I’ll deal with my share. Life isn’t fair. I’m not planning on crying about it.”
Something flickered in those blue orbs, a concession that soothed her wounded pride. It was an unspoken thing, and for a moment, she felt like her breath was lodged in her throat because he was contemplating her so intently. She thought she noticed his gaze settle on her mouth, but he recoiled, backing away from her.
“Enjoy your scouting. We’re going to be here for a while.”
He disappeared through the doorway, and she heard conversation start up in the outer room again. But she didn’t move. She was too busy feeling like she’d missed out on his kiss.
Oh man, she was so going to hell …
* * *
The kid was good.
Tyler watched him work with a laptop while guzzling a soda. His tie was a knotted mess and his shirt half untucked from his pants because he was all of seventeen. But what he lacked in experience with dress clothing, he sure made up for in cyber hacking skills.
“See…” The kid realized Tyler was watching and launched into an explanation. “Even burner phones have to connect with cell towers. Sure, there are zillions of prepaid phones out there, and it all just ends up as a mass of numbers, but when you embed a photo into a text, that cuts down on the number of records to shift through. When you have a tracer on the photo, it’s like looking for a glow stick at midnight.”
The kid was typing harder, peering intently at the screen as his excitement grew. There was a slam as he hit the keyboard and shouted with victory. “Got it!”
Tyler looked past him at the screen. “Can you track that phone now?”
“Sure,” the kid assured him with pride. “Just as soon as the sucker uses it, his ass is mine.”
Tyler nodded. “Good.” He walked away caught between a mixture of pride and frustration. Saxon hadn’t taken the bait. It was impressive to see his previous trainee proving his worth by thinking outside of the box. Frustrating because he needed to wrap up the operation.
Still, Tyler found himself smiling for the first time in a long time because there was one thing that Saxon and Vitus Hale had always provided him with.
And that was entertainment.
He didn’t give a rat’s ass over anyone’s bleeding heart reaction to that either. Saxon and Vitus had known what they were signing up for. To play with the big dogs. Saxon was every bit as much of a killer as Tyler was. The only difference was how they took their pay.
* * *
Ginger woke up before dawn and grumbled at the ceiling. The bed was a tangled mess, and so was her hair. She flounced into the bathroom and jerked a brush through the mess on her head as she tried to understand why she couldn’t get Saxon out of her thoughts.
No one else seemed up, but there was the soft sound of a television. She moved toward it and discovered Agent Dare Servant watching a movie. He saw her before she made it into the living room, his attention jerking over to her. He nodded as he recognized her and looked back at the screen.
“You’re an early riser,” he offered. Dare had black hair. She found it sort of fascinating because not many people actually had midnight-colored hair. She realized she was staring at it and felt a nip of shame because she doubted he missed it.
“Got a lot on my mind. Seems stupid to lay in bed when I’m not sleeping,” she answered as she caught sight of the computer sitting on a desk against the wall. There was a dust cover on it, but she could see a little blue light shining through the hazy plastic of the cover, telling her the system was active. She plucked the cover off and laid it aside.
“You can’t check your email. Or use the Internet since the house is supposed to be vacant.”
Dare was on his feet, the relaxed man she’d just spoken to gone. As in, he’d transformed into an Agent who was ready to muscle her if she didn’t give him a response he approved of.
“There is no personal space in safety…”
Saxon’s words rose from her memory and she realized it was some sort of code among them all. One that she actually discovered herself grateful for.
“Sorry,” she offered.
“New territory for you,” Dare said as he watched her put the dust cover back on the computer. He gave her a nod.
Ginger looked at the closed drapes and fought back a wave of pity. It hadn’t been that long since she’d seen sunlight. There was no reason to get her panties in a twist. She and Karen had been sitting at a breakfast table and sharing inside jokes just the day before. Actually, a little less, so there was no reason for throwing a pity party.
Except there is a hitman trying to kill you …
The scene from the airport rose from her memory like a cloud of smoke. It enveloped her, choking her with its fumes. She wanted to shove it aside, but it didn’t have anything solid for her to brace her hands against. There was just the replay of the way the guy had gotten out of the black SUV and the look of relief on Kitten’s face as she ran toward him, clearly believing him to be her rescuer.
Saxon’s face came through her thoughts on the heels of that idea. He was hard and sharp edged and exactly what she’d needed. He really had saved her life. A chill touched her nape as she absorbed just how real her circumstances were. Yesterday, it had just all been a haze of surreal events. Now, everything seemed to be settling inside her, a full night’s rest bringing her a new perspective on it all.
If possible, she was more horrified now than she had been when the bullets were flying. The unshakable reality of Agent Dare Servant sitting a few feet away and the securely closed blinds was tunneling into her like termites. She was going to end up being eaten.
Her stomach was knotting, her insides feeling like they were twisting as she actually began to feel like she was going to throw up again.
Except Saxon’s face was still there in her memory, the look he had leveled at her more than once staring at her from her recollections.
Yeah, the expression he gave her when she rose to the occasion. She wasn’t going to lose it now and blow the idea of knowing she’d impressed him. Even a little.
It was thin reasoning, but it worked well enough. Okay, it felt a lot like she was poised on a surfboard, but she would just have to adjust to the pitch and roll of the wave her life had suddenly been hit by. Surfin
g was better than being rolled.
It would end at some point, and Saxon Hale would move on to something else. That was a trifle sad, and she avoided thinking about why she thought so.
Because you were wishing he’d kissed you yesterday …
There wasn’t any point in denying it. She’d spent the night hot and bothered by the idea of having a taste of the guy.
So … going … to … hell …
Yup, more than likely. Only, she couldn’t help but feel a sort of comradery with him. Loneliness sucked, and it seemed like he embraced it as part of his duty. That was sad because the guy deserved better for his level of dedication.
Now you’re trying to justify getting your hands on him as some sort of favor to him …
Pathetic.
However, still undeniably true.
Life sucked.
* * *
Waiting was an art.
It was a skill that often separated the living from the dead in the world of shadow operations. Tyler Martin considered the blinking link on his phone. He took a moment to enjoy seeing it before he tapped on it to see just where Saxon had snagged a cyber space trip line.
Maybe electronic wires didn’t have as immediate an effect as ones laid out in a war zone, but that didn’t make them ineffective. In this case, it would mean the difference between bringing in what Carl Davis wanted and having to suffer failure. The Raven wasn’t really someone Tyler considered very important. His value was wrapped up in Carl Davis’s opinion of him. Tyler had his eye on the ball he wanted to keep in play and that was being part of Carl Davis’s personal security team when the man became President of the United States.
Gaining a position like that would take very specialized skills, one he was about to demonstrate in spades. Personal security meant handling details, personal ones, which could often be translated into dangerous opportunities for people to get at elected officials.
And Saxon wanted to take Marc Grog down. That meant he needed Kagan to set up a testimony hearing. Tyler waited for the trace-back link he had on the line to deliver his location. Every second was one too long because he knew Saxon wouldn’t keep the line open long. Tyler tapped his finger against the side of his phone, intent on the screen. It flickered and displayed an address.
The mouse had just crossed into the open.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Any news you can share with me?”
Saxon had come back inside from the backyard after making several calls. He was still tucking the phone into his pocket when she asked her question.
“Knowing things can be dangerous,” was all he offered.
Ginger choked on a snicker and winked at him. “Right.”
It was three in the afternoon, but Saxon reached for the coffee pot and poured himself a double cup. Bram Magnus had taken over for Dave Servant in the early morning, making her think that Saxon had been up most of the night. His silent stare was making her nervous. He knew something, a something he didn’t think she’d like.
So she turned and pulled a pan from the back burner. It was a heavy cast-iron one, the kind her mother favored because it was truly impossible to wear them out.
A pang of homesickness went through her, making her sigh, but she was determined to not spend her day in the pity pool.
“How do you like your eggs?” She asked.
Her offer gained a response. His lips twisted into a sarcastic grin as he set the mug down. “I’m not here for you to practice your homemaking skills on.”
“You know something,” she turned back to face him. “I make a mean glass of lemonade. Now, you can enjoy my attempts to make the best of things, or I can drown you in my lemonade.”
He snorted at her reprimand. Ginger enjoyed the way his eyes glittered like there was nothing he’d enjoy more than testing her threat.
“You are such a man-child.” It was another one of those personal comments. It came sailing across her lips, common sense kicking in after the fact to slap her with how inappropriate it had been. “Sorry, that was way personal.”
She turned her back on him, determined to keep her attention on the pan. She felt exposed. It was her own damned fault, too. She didn’t have any right to feel like he shouldn’t leave her twisting in the wind.
It seemed she was way too dependent on him saving her.
She needed to ignore him, and deal with her own emotions but she ended up losing the battle and looked over at him anyway.
He hid behind his coffee mug, considering her through the steam rising from it.
“So…” She offered him what she hoped was a look equal to his own. “I’ve never done this before. Are we supposed to ignore one another, since offering to cook is some sort of breach of protocol?”
He set the mug down and seemed to be considering his response. “It’s just best not to get personal.”
His tone was meant as a warning, but what she heard was lament.
You’re hearing what you want to … and thinking of pouring sugar all over him and licking it off was likely stepping over a line, too.
Just a smidge …
Her mom was going to have something to say about that one. Right after she got done laughing. Ginger bit her lip to keep from grinning.
“What?” he demanded when she sealed her lips.
“Oh, now who’s curious? Wouldn’t telling you be getting personal?” She replied in a tone that was far more husky than she recalled ever sounding before. “What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.”
He stood, sending a ripple of awareness across her skin. “Doesn’t mean I’ll take it from you.”
There was a dark promise in his tone, one that touched off something deep inside her. She was getting a glimpse at that personal part of him once more and she smiled with the knowledge. She wasn’t the only one fighting to maintain boundaries.
Playing with fire …
It was like he knew what she was thinking, his eyes narrowing as his lips thinned, tiny little motions that she noticed keenly. It was unsettling on an epic scale, knowing how in tune she was to him. Maybe it was the situation, but even if that was so, it didn’t change how she felt punched in the gut by the way he affected her. He was looking at her mouth again, and she really wanted to know what his kiss was like.
Oh … shit …
She was getting in way over her head. They’d just met. She knew next to nothing about him.
And all those facts somehow measured up short against her mounting fascination with him.
Ginger whirled around and grabbed the frying pan. She lifted it up and started to turn back toward him. “Never let it be said that I intimidate easily. Speak now or take what I dish out.”
She heard another snort from him, a sound she was beginning to associate with his personal nature and a victory on her part for touching it. Ginger brandished the pan in the air like a warning, but a second later, pain went shooting up her arm and into her shoulder with enough force to make her cuss. There was a loud “bing” that got mixed up in the sensation of being taken to the ground by Saxon Hale.
He’d knocked the breath right out of her, as well as flattening her beneath his much larger body.
“What … was that?” She flattened her hand on his shoulder, trying to push him up so that she could fill her lungs.
“A bullet,” he informed her in a deadly whisper, giving her not even a millimeter.
He actually sealed her mouth beneath his hand, the side of it going right between her lips. She felt her eyes bulge as she became aware of him. As in, every hard bit of him.
It would have stolen her breath if she had any.
“Listen to me.” His words were clipped, and there was no mistaking the urgency in his tone. “We’re dead if we stay here.”
He’d been looking over her head, toward the direction that the shot must have come from. Now he shifted, locking gazes with her.
“Stay on my side, and I mean right the fuck on my side.”
Ginger nodded beca
use he still had his hand in her mouth. The motion made her conscious of just how intense it felt to have his skin in contact with her lips. The timing was epically bad but that didn’t seem to matter a wit to her brain. Her nervous system seemed to be short circuited into some sort of weird reaction cluster of responses, all firing off like the grand finale of a fireworks show. She wasn’t in control of it, just the recipient.
In the next second, Saxon had her half off the floor and was pulling her toward the breakfast nook window. There was a round of gunfire, some of it behind them but more of it coming from the front room. She heard one of the other agents returning fire, and there was a discharge next to her head as Saxon aimed at the window and shot it out.
The glass shattered with a pop and slithered to the ground like sand running out of a broken hourglass. It horrified her because it felt like it was some sort of example of her own life, about to be smashed, her remaining years scattered onto the ground and wasted.
Saxon wasn’t in the mood to let it happen, at least not without a fight. He pulled her through the window, sweeping the blinds aside with one powerful motion of his arm. He tugged her to the ground on the other side, the glass crunching beneath their knees and feet but thankfully, it was safety glass and didn’t cut into her. It was still damned uncomfortable, but she huddled there next to him, sort of enjoying the stabbing feeling because it meant she was alive.
“We’re going to make a break for it.” He was right next to her. “Over the fence…”
There wasn’t time for more explanation. The neighbor’s door opened as a guy appeared in a pair of shorts. “What the fuck—”
Bram Magnus was suddenly vaulting up and onto the porch as he shoved the guy back into the house. “Get down!”
Ginger felt Saxon’s grip tighten a moment before he surged forward. She was ready, her heart pumping with the need to live. It was pulsing through her, taking control as she dug her feet into the ground and pushed herself faster. For a moment, she was lagging behind, Saxon’s grip on her wrist pulling her forward, but then her body was responding and she was sprinting alongside him, keeping pace. She caught a quick glance from him, but it was long enough for her to notice the approval on his face. He stopped next to the fence, intending to help her up but she jumped and caught the top edge of it, somehow vaulting over it in a tangle of limbs. It was a concrete wall that left scratches all over her but adrenaline was surging through her helping her ignore it. When she dropped onto the other side of it, she landed on her butt but didn’t stay there.
