Last Shot at Justice (A Thomas Family Novel Book 1)

by Kristi Cramer

  Winston had to stop himself from smiling. “Yes,” he said gravely. “My officers have been authorized to use whatever means necessary to subdue and neutralize the threat posed by these dangerous fugitives.” That answer produced another burst of questions, but Winston held up his hands and spoke over them.

  “Sergeant Murray will see to it that you all get a still from the security cameras for your news updates. Thank you.”

  ⋘⋆⋙

  Mitzi shifted again, finding it hard to get comfortable. Her head rested on the car seat, while she leaned her body as far forward as she could to maintain some distance between her body and Blue’s. They had been hiding for less than thirty minutes, and she’d already had to catch herself from falling forward off the seat at least ten times.

  “Just lean back and relax,” Blue said at last. “Scoot up here and use my arm for a pillow.”

  Without waiting for her acquiescence, he used the arm he had draped across her to pull her back bodily until she could do as he suggested. She struggled briefly, feeling what it must be like to be a child’s rag doll, but he clamped his arm tight. “Relax, I said.”

  “I just don’t want to put you out,” she protested.

  “You already said that. And I already told you it’s too late.”

  “But that was when you still thought helping me was just.... What were you thinking when you offered to help me?”

  He paused for a moment, and she wished she could see his face.

  “Well, remember what I said earlier about fate?” he asked quietly, and she nodded. “I wasn’t going to come to Denver, originally. I thought I’d have better luck in Wichita, but Momma reminded me of something.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It was a while ago, after she had been coming here for treatment. I don’t remember the words specifically, just that she looked me in the eye and told me that she’d had a dream or a vision. More likely it was a hallucination from the drugs they shot into her spine for the surgery. It was crazy talk. But last month when I told her I was leaving to find work, she reminded me of her vision and insisted that I come to Denver.”

  “Blue, I didn’t know your mom was sick. I’m so sorry to hear that.”

  “Well, she had the cancer in her colon. They operated and got it all out, and she’s been free of it for almost two years. But that cancer is expensive, and we just haven’t recovered financially. Daddy had some insurance, but it got wiped out. Now, I didn’t tell you this to get your pity. I just wanted to make a point. See, I wasn’t going to be here, but somehow here I am. And I was right where you needed me to be. So when I offered to help, I was—”

  He stopped, and Mitzi craned her neck to try to look at him.

  Blue cleared his throat, then continued. “I was thinking that maybe you were the reason I came to Denver instead of Wichita.”

  “But things haven’t exactly worked out, since thanks to me, you are basically a fugitive from the law now.”

  He sighed and lifted his arm, and Mitzi imagined him rubbing the back of his neck. “I reckon I should have asked before I offered to help.” He fell silent for another moment. “But if I’m honest, I have to say I probably would have done the same thing anyway. Unless you’ve been lying through your teeth, and I don’t think you have, then I would never be able to live with knowing you were in need and I walked away.”

  Mitzi closed her eyes and reached for the hand he had returned to her waist. “Like I have to live with knowing what I have done to your life. If I don’t...if we don’t solve this thing, it means running for the rest of our lives, or going to prison. How do I live with that?”

  Blue squeezed her hand in silent answer, then she felt him shifting until suddenly he lifted her clear up off the seat. He adjusted his position until he was lying on his back, then he set her back down on top of him.

  “Blue,” she said, a little breathless to find herself face to face with him, mere inches between them.

  “Hmm?” he murmured, giving her that slow, sexy smile that made her heart thump faster.

  “It’s very disconcerting to have you just manhandle me like that,” she said, trying to catch back some dignity.

  “What, the little bit that is you? Easy peasy.”

  She snorted in derision. “I haven’t been referred to as small since I was in junior high. Short, yes. Small....” She tried to sit up to put some distance between them and realized she was elbowing him in the sternum. “Sorry. If I’m such a little thing, don’t you worry about breaking me?”

  “Nope. See, I’m used to handling all manner of livestock, from baby cows to yearlings. Shifting you is a Sunday picnic.”

  She did push herself up this time, ignoring the wince he gave as her elbow dug in his ribs this time. “You realize you’re comparing me to livestock.”

  Blue tipped his head back to laugh, but she put her hand over his lips to remind him to keep quiet. She saw the wicked gleam in his eye just before he bit down gently on her forefinger. The intimate touch of his mouth against her hand flustered her, so she pulled her hand away to let him speak.

  “I say the darnedest things when you’re around,” he commented. “I only meant that you, with all your lovely curves to grip, are much smaller and easier to handle than most of the critters I pick up.”

  She started to protest, but he grasped her shoulders and pulled her up until her face was directly above his. “And this is something I never do to the other critters I pick up,” he said, bringing her unresisting into a tender kiss.

  The touch of his lips was soft and gentle, sweet and undemanding, and she closed her eyes to savor the moment. All sense of where they were and why vanished in that kiss. She felt her fingers plucking at his chest in a vain attempt to somehow draw him closer, even though his grip already had her pinned against him.

  When he broke the kiss by pushing her slightly away from him, she slowly opened her eyes to see him gazing at her, his small smile reflecting in his eyes. She was dimly aware that she had an opportunity to make some smart comment questioning the predilection for kissing farm animals where he came from, but no words would come.

  “I’ve silenced you at last,” he said, lifting one hand to stroke a lock of hair from her face. Her whole body quivered at that touch, and she couldn’t help closing her eyes with a sigh.

  “Blue,” she began, but when she opened her eyes, whatever she had been about to say left her. She dipped her head so she could kiss him, wriggling until her hands were free and she could take his head between her hands, deepening the kiss. She nipped at those delicious lips and teased them open with her tongue.

  Returning her kiss with eager abandon, he slid his hands down to her waist. Then one hand moved to cradle her torso closer while the other slid down to grasp her bottom, pressing the full length of her against him.

  Mitzi broke the kiss to search his gaze. Mischief twinkled in his brown eyes. “Told you I wasn’t gay,” he said.

  “You’re not the only one who says the darnedest things,” she observed, and bent to kiss him again. She let her hands run across his muscular neck and shoulders, reveling in the sensation of his strength. She could scarcely imagine what it would feel like to touch the heat of his bare skin, to let that power wrap her up and carry her away in passion. As he tugged the hem of her sweatshirt up so he could caress her back with his calloused hand, his touch sent lightning heat throughout her body.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Kissing Mitzi was like fanning the flames of a bonfire, and Blue felt himself diving into those flames with complete disregard for the danger to himself or his heart. He had thought he was over his attraction to her, but he had only been lying to himself. He didn’t care.

  She said his name against his lips, as breathless as he felt, and he reached for her, tugging the hem of her shirt upward, wanting to touch more of her, to burn his skin with her heat. He met her gaze and didn’t flinch at the passion he saw smoldering there.

  He wouldn’t have thought it p
ossible that the outside world could intrude on them in that moment, but they both froze at the sound of laughter outside the car. A few transfixed moments passed before he realized the sounds of footsteps and voices were moving away from them.

  Mitzi slowly raised her head to look out the window, and he saw her glance toward the passenger side mirror. “We’re okay,” she said. “Looks like they were just coming out of the elevator.”

  Her body went slack on top of his for a moment before she lifted her head again to meet his gaze. This time he saw much more than passion in those troubled brown eyes; disappointment warred with fear there.

  Reality came hurtling back with the sound of a car starting up and driving past them on the way down to the street. Without saying a word, Blue tugged Mitzi’s sweatshirt back down over her waist. He simply wrapped his arms around her, cradling her head to his chest.

  He wanted to promise her that everything would work out okay, but he really didn’t know. And he wasn’t willing to make a promise he couldn’t guarantee. The one guarantee he could make—that he would die trying to keep her safe—was one he wasn’t sure she’d appreciate hearing.

  Mitzi didn’t speak either. He kissed the top of her head and just held her while the minutes ticked slowly by.

  ⋘⋆⋙

  Blue realized he had been saddle napping when Mitzi stirred against him. The sounds of cars starting and leaving the garage had been increasing, which seemed to indicate rush hour was approaching.

  “What do you think?” he asked quietly, shifting his grip around her and letting his hand slide down her back to rest on her waist.

  “It’s after five,” she said, her voice just as quiet. “We’ll give it a few more minutes, then I think we can risk it.”

  He nodded, ready to leave but also hating to let her go. For those next minutes, he tried simply to memorize the feel of her heart beating against him. At last she stirred again, and he knew it was time.

  A few awkward moments of rearranging and they were in their respective seats. Before he turned on the engine, Blue looked over at her and reached out to cup her chin in his hand briefly. The smile she gave him was tender, and she reached up and pressed his hand with hers.

  “Let’s go,” she said.

  ⋘⋆⋙

  It took nearly forty-five minutes in stop-and-go traffic to drive the ten miles between the parking garage and the job site in Englewood. Mitzi was tired and paranoid, worried that any one of the commuters might look over and recognize her.

  She blessed the city dweller’s reticence to look at the occupants of a nearby vehicle. Even though it was only a moderately warm day, they kept the windows up and ran the A/C. A side benefit of riding in the Continental was that anyone looking their way tended to look at the car, and not the nervous people inside.

  Even Blue, laid-back-country-boy Blue, was jumpy, gripping the steering wheel hard enough Mitzi thought he might bend it. By the time they turned off Highway 85 onto Oxford Ave, Mitzi was trying to think of anything to say that could cut the tension in the car.

  “I hope you like country living, Miss Mitzi,” Blue commented, completely off topic from anything going through her head.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, her gaze alternating between the map and street signs.

  “When this is all over, my honey, I’m going to show you what you have been missing all your life. You will never look at city living the same again.”

  Mitzi stared at him, feeling the first stirrings of a different kind of concern niggling at her. “My honey?” she repeated.

  “Yes?”

  She kept her tone flat. “That is possibly the oddest endearment I have ever heard. Turn right here, on Jason Street.”

  He did as he was told, and she glanced at him, taking note that the little smile he’d had on his face since the parking garage was gone. She felt bad about crushing whatever little fantasy he might have been entertaining of bringing her back to Kansas with him, and cursed herself for making another bad judgment. Not for the first time she asked herself what it was about this cowboy that stole her common sense away.

  One little make-out session in a car was not enough to send her into a packing frenzy. As much as she enjoyed kissing Blue, she held to no Victorian principle that demanded their engagement or something. The fact of the matter was there was no way she was leaving Denver for Kansas. Ever. Best to quash that notion before it had a chance to get out of hand.

  They quickly came across a park, and Blue’s comment came out sounding hard. “I know where we are now. I turn left here, then right on Huron.”

  He suited action to words, and soon they were cruising slowly past a construction site, peering out the windows into the evening sunlight, looking for signs of something, anything that seemed out of place.

  What would evidence of a kidnapper’s hideout look like? Mitzi asked herself, not for the first time. She studied the site carefully as they rolled by, but nothing jumped out at her as suspicious.

  “You say you saw her in a unit that was completed?” She asked. “Which building? Which unit? No. Keep moving, don’t stop.”

  “Back building, the unit farthest to the left. Top level. I was talking with the foreman over by that pile of scrap lumber.”

  “You’ve got good eyes to recognize someone from that distance,” she said. A good twenty-five yards spanned the distance between the scrap pile and the window, and the unit was on the third floor.

  “I can spot the difference between twin calves from that distance. Just gotta pay attention.”

  At the moment, the window in question looked the same as all the others in the complex: black.

  Scanning the site, Mitzi noted there would be good cover for sneaking up to the unit. But she could also see that to reach their target they would have to go inside a stairwell of unknown configuration and up two flights to a landing, where an armed lookout more than likely guarded the door.

  “Let’s go down the street and wait for dark. Then we can walk up through the park and get a better look. If we see lights in that unit, then we call for backup.”

  Blue drove to the end of the park, made a three point u-turn and pulled up against the curb opposite the greenway. Then he shut off the car and sat in silence, both hands on the wheel, staring up the street toward the construction site.

  “Blue?” she started tentatively, studying his profile: strong chin, thin lips drawn into a rare frown, slightly flattened nose, straight brow under a rounded forehead. Taken objectively, he was one fine-looking man.

  “Hmm?” His response was absent-minded, as though his thoughts were far away.

  “What happened back at the garage,” she began, but faltered. How could she lie and tell him it hadn’t meant anything? It was perhaps the sexiest nonsexual experience she’d ever had. To just be held like that for hours on end, not speaking, and after those first moments of mutual passion, not getting poked or pawed, just held like she was the one thing he cherished most. Cherished. What a perfect word to describe the way she had felt. But she wasn’t convinced that feeling was the beginning of something more. Something permanent.

  When she didn’t continue he turned to look at her, and she searched his gaze, trying to figure out what he expected her to say. His breath puffed out in a soft snort, and he shook his head, turning back to look up the street.

  “I don’t know what you want from me,” she said at last.

  “How about one honest moment?” he growled. “One moment when you haven’t been hiding something from me, or seducing me so you can be sure to get what you want.”

  “Is that what you think happened?” she asked, incredulous. “The ego you have. As I recall, you kissed me first!”

  “Oh, you act hard to get, but you have been playing me from the moment we met. You tell me just enough of the truth to suck me in, make me think you should matter to me. Then when you think I’m getting too close, you run me into a prickly pear patch and leave me scratching my head as to how I ended up the
re.”

  Mitzi felt anger stirring. “Has it occurred to you that I have a little more on my plate than just whether or not a cowboy from Kansas feels like I’m treating him fairly? Has it occurred to you that I don’t know what I want beyond getting my life back to some semblance of normal?”

  He didn’t respond, and she pushed on. “You want honesty, Blue? How about this? I don’t know if we’re going to survive this to be free citizens. I don’t know if my desire for you is true, or just a selfish survival instinct. I do know that I feel safe with you, safety like I have never known in my life. I also know that moving to Kansas isn’t my idea of a bright future.”

  To her consternation, that made him laugh. “Who said anything about you moving to Kansas? I swear, you are the worst listener ever.”

  “But you said you hoped I liked country living,” she stammered. “You said....”

  “I said I would show you what you have been missing, meaning if you came to visit with me. I do hope you like it, of course, and that you enjoy a visit to God’s country. But a visit is not a commitment to anything other than a visit.”

  Staring at him across the car, she bit her lip and shook her head. “I’m an idiot,” she said, and it felt like admitting to the easiest truth of the day.

  Dropping his head with a chuckle aimed at his navel, he shook his head, too. “The pair of us,” he concluded.

  ⋘⋆⋙

  Yet another awkward silence fell. Unwilling to risk getting caught in a lie, Blue twisted the ignition key to the auxiliary position and turned on the radio. Without having to tune it at all, Newsradio 850 KOA came over the airwaves. He adjusted the volume to a reasonable level and half-listened as the weather reports, traffic reports, farm reports, and sports reports cycled through.

  He stared forward through the windshield and tried to put her out of his mind. But he was very aware of Mitzi leaning against the passenger door, her head resting on the palm of her right hand, her left hand fiddling with the snap of her purse.

  Mentioning Kansas had been a spur-of-the-moment thought, something he should never have mentioned out loud. Not yet. But like kissing her, it had seemed like a good idea in the moment.