by Lora Leigh
“Okay, let’s see what we can do to find your mother,” Pete said, grabbing a keyboard.
“We followed her cell movements, but as far as we’ve been able to track, her phone was last used at the pier at Daytona Beach over three weeks ago. No activity since, so the cell might have been tossed.”
Elena shook her head. “She’d never toss her cell phone. She’s always on the move and it’s our only way to stay in touch with each other. She might shun other modern conventions—like a regular job, computers, a permanent address and the like—but she does try to stay in touch with me via her cell because she knows I go crazy and worry about her if she doesn’t.”
“Ditto,” Grange said. “We have regular weekly check-ins and she doesn’t fail at those, which is why I was concerned when we had no contact. When I found the cell hadn’t moved from the pier, I knew she was in trouble.”
“You track her via GPS,” Elena said.
Grange nodded. “I had to for her own safety. Otherwise, I tried not to interfere in her life, or yours. Once I determined she was off the grid, I sent Jed in to cover you and I came in to try and locate her.”
“So you follow me via my phone, too?”
“Yes.”
At least he was honest. She wasn’t sure she liked that.
“No one follows you around, Elena. You just go about the business of your life. Your patterns are tracked, and as long as you don’t deviate from them, then I know you’re safe. But if someone took you, I had to know about it.”
There were all kinds of things wrong with violating her privacy, but she wasn’t going to get into it with him now. Her primary concern was finding her mother. “Your GPS tracking didn’t help keep my mother safe, did it?”
He didn’t flinch or look away. “No, it didn’t. But I’m going to find her.”
“How? She has one credit card she rarely uses. She likes to live by the cash rule.”
Grange grimaced. “I know. Not that it would matter. I don’t think she voluntarily tossed her phone in the trash and is out somewhere partying and shopping. I think someone took her.”
“So how do we find her?”
“We retrace her steps, figure out where she was, who were the last people to see her when she disappeared. If we can get a lead, we can maybe find out who took her. I can’t move on anyone until I know that.”
“Okay. How can I help?”
“You know her movements better than anyone. Where she goes, who she hangs out with, where she stays.”
“She has some friends who might be able to help.”
“I’ll need names and addresses,” Grange said.
“You’re going to go talk to them?”
“Yes.”
She laughed. “They won’t give you any information on my mom. They’ll talk to me, though.”
He shook his head. “You’re not leaving the island. It’s not safe for you.”
She shrugged. “Go ahead and try, but I’m telling you it’s a waste of your time.”
She wrote down the names and addresses of her mother’s friends, then handed them to Grange. “Why didn’t you just come to me right away? We could have done this a week ago.”
“It was important for me to keep my distance from you. At the time, I was chasing other leads on your mother, anyway. And we didn’t want to involve people she knew. The less people involved the better. Now that someone has targeted you, too, everything has changed, including how we approach looking for her.”
She nodded, knowing nothing about how one searched for someone who was missing. Or taken.
Her worry about her mother increased.
Grange and Pete prepped to leave. Pete changed into a pair of khaki pants and another flowered shirt. Grange stayed in his camo pants and beige shirt.
She laughed at him. “Now I’m sure they won’t talk to you, at least a couple of these people. If you go in there looking like a general, they’ll probably hide their bongs and think you’re DEA there to raid them.”
“She’s right, Grange. You need to look more like a local,” Jed said.
Grange frowned. “This is what I wear.”
“Think undercover,” Jed said, then motioned to Pete.
“You want me to dress like him?”
“Yes. That might at least get you near the front door,” Elena said.
“No fucking way am I going to wear a shirt like that.”
“Hey,” Pete said. “This shirt is comfortable.”
Grange crossed his arms, lifted his chin and glared at all of them. “This is ridiculous.”
“You want to find your sister, or you want to maintain military bearing?” Pete asked.
Finally, he sighed. “Fine.”
Grange trudged off behind Pete.
“Really? That’s all he ever wears?” Elena asked Jed.
“Those are the only clothes I’ve ever seen him dressed in.”
She went in the living room and sat on one of the plush couches, grabbing a pillow to her stomach. The sheik lived well. Or, she supposed, now Pete did.
When Grange and Pete came back out, she had to stifle a laugh. He and Pete could be brothers, both in khaki pants, sandals and wildly colored flowery print shirts.
Grange’s mouth was twisted as if he were in pain.
“You’ll definitely blend in now,” Jed said, doing his best to hide a smirk.
Grange shot Jed a death glare. “If you laugh, I’ll make it hurt later.”
Jed raised his hands. “I’m just saying you’re appropriately dressed, General.”
“This is the most uncomfortable thing I’ve ever worn,” Grange mumbled.
Pete rolled his eyes and cast a look toward Elena and Jed. “It lacks a sufficient amount of starch for his liking.”
Elena snickered.
“We’re out of here. We’ll report in when we have something,” Grange said. “Elena, there are clothes for you in the bedroom down the hall. Jed can show you. Take a shower, a nap, whatever you need to do to feel comfortable.”
“Good luck,” Elena said.
Within a few moments she heard the sound of the helicopter. Her stomach tightened and her lighthearted mood fled.
She was alone—she supposed she was alone, since she had yet to see anyone else wandering the house—with Jed now. She caught him out of the corner of her eye, leaning against one of the stone pillars in the oversized room.
“Hopefully they’ll find a lead.”
She nodded.
“Grange is the best at what he does. He’ll find your mom.”
She didn’t answer.
“Elena, I’m sorry I couldn’t have been honest with you. I was doing my job.”
She shot him a look. “So when you were doing me, you were doing your job?”
His brow furrowed. “You know it wasn’t like that.”
“Do I?”
She shot off the couch and started to walk away, then stopped, realizing she had no idea where to go. This wasn’t her house. So far she’d been outside and in the kitchen. She knew the path to the helipad. Other than that—clueless.
There was no place to run, but she’d be damned if she’d stay here like a trapped animal and make small talk with Jed or listen to his lies.
“Where’s my room?”
He lifted his arm and pointed. “Down that hallway. Third door on the left.”
She started in that direction.
“Elena.”
She paused. “What?”
“At some point you’re going to have to talk to me.”
Wanna bet? She did a quick-step down the hall, found her room and shut and locked the door.
The room was a
palace, just like the rest of the house. It was oversized, ostentatious, with floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the pool and gardens. She flung herself onto the bed, sinking into the creamy duvet that wrapped itself around her with a comforting caress.
Exhaustion took hold. She wanted to forget everything, to shut it all out like a bad nightmare. Maybe if she took a short nap, she’d feel better. She was bitchy and short-tempered, especially with Jed, who had only been doing his job.
She rolled over onto her back.
His job. Right. A job that hadn’t required him to sleep with her, to engage with her emotionally, to smile at her and make her—
Make her what? Start to think she was falling in love with him?
He hadn’t made her do anything. He hadn’t made her any promises. He’d been there, been available and hot and sexy, and she’d been all too eager to throw herself at him. It wasn’t like he’d forced himself on her. He’d done his job by staying close to her. What had happened between them had been mutual, but she sure as hell had been blaming him for everything, hadn’t she?
She threw her arm over her head to shut out the streaming light and closed her eyes.
ELEVEN
Jed held his breath and dove down to the bottom of the pool, skimming across from one end to the other. He pushed off the deep end and broke the surface, his lungs burning as he swallowed in oxygen. Then he turned, dove down and did it again, forcing himself to drive harder, to increase his speed, to push himself past the point of endurance.
When he came up for air the fourth time, he was breathless and wasted, and this time he hadn’t been thinking of Elena the entire time he was under.
He swam to the edge and hopped out, wiped his hands on the towel and checked his phone to make sure Grange hadn’t called or texted.
Nothing yet, but it had only been a few hours. He wouldn’t expect to hear from them for a while.
He turned, pushed off and plunged down again, forcing his body to remain submerged while he swam the bottom of the pool from end to end. When he surfaced this time, Elena stood at the edge, watching him.
He shook the water out of his eyes and stared at her. She was wearing an orange bikini. Nothing overly sexy, just a two-piece thing. Except anything she wore was sexy because of her curves.
And because it was Elena. She could have put a burlap sack on her body and he’d think she looked hot.
She cocked her head to the side. “You trying to drown yourself down there?”
“No. It’s an endurance exercise.”
She took a seat at the edge of the pool and dangled her legs in the water. “I was beginning to think I was going to have to jump in and rescue you. You were down there a long time.”
“I’m used to it.”
“Obviously.”
She was talking to him. Something had changed from two hours ago when she’d stormed off to the bedroom. Jed didn’t want to do anything to piss her off, so he turned and resumed swimming, this time doing regular laps. She stayed at the edge of the pool, watching him.
If that’s what she wanted to do, fine. It didn’t bother him at all.
Much.
Except when she leaned back on her hands, her body stretched out to the sun, reminding him of what it was like to make love to her. The water in the pool was heated, and so was he. He swam to the edge and climbed out, grabbed his towel and hoped for a cold breeze to chill him out.
Elena slipped into the water, sank in over her head, then popped out and swam. Her strokes were strong and confident as she did laps. He climbed into the chair and watched her body curl from side to side as she took a breath, then put her face back in.
Even at swimming she was elegant and beautiful.
And gave him a hard-on.
He thought about going inside but didn’t want to leave her alone out here, so he was just going to have to suck it up and suffer.
She finally stopped, came to the steps and walked out, water dripping off her body. His gaze caught on one line of water running between her breasts. It slid between the thin strip of fabric, down her ribs and over her belly, dipping into the front bottom of her swimsuit.
He shuddered, then lifted his gaze to her face. She’d stopped in front of him, grabbed the towel in the chair next to him and took a seat.
“What’s the deal between Grange and Pete?”
He arched a brow. “What do you mean?”
“I saw a moment between them. Something emotional about Grange being there for Pete during a rough time in his life.”
Jed shrugged. “Not my story to tell. You’ll have to ask Grange or Pete.”
She sighed. “More secrets. Great.”
“Pete lost his wife in the Beirut Embassy bombing in 1983.”
Elena put her hand on her heart. “Oh, no.”
Jed nodded. “Yeah. Pete and Grange were both Marines, both of them stationed in Beirut at the time of the bombing. Dina worked at the embassy. Grange was close to both of them, loved Pete’s wife like a sister. I think it hit him as hard as it did Pete.”
“I can’t even imagine how tragic that must have been for Pete.”
“Yeah. Grange said he questioned his own dedication to the military at that point, but Pete was determined. He was a strong sonofabitch, and he refused to let Dina’s loss cripple him. He served honorably and has dedicated his life to bringing down the bastards who preyed on his country and on the weak. When he left the military, he did some time with the CIA, then special ops work, tracking missing persons, mercenary jobs, anything that served his country in whatever capacity they needed him to. And through it all he and Grange have stayed in touch and remained friends. They’re like brothers.”
Elena leaned back. “Wow. It’s good that Pete had Grange to lean on. What a terrible loss for him. So he never remarried?”
“No. Grange said Pete always felt Dina was it for him, and no other woman could come close.”
Elena sucked in a breath and stared out over the water and the jungle beyond it before turning back to face him.
“Okay, Jed. Tell me who you really are.”
He swung his legs over the side of the chaise to face her.
“I grew up in Maryland. Went to Georgetown. Wasn’t the best student, but I got by. I liked to party and gave my parents a hard time. They were good to me, sacrificed a lot to give me a good education. I didn’t appreciate it. They died in a car accident when I was in my second year of college.”
She gasped, leaned over and grabbed his wrist. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry.”
He stared down at the water dripping on the ground between them, the memories thick as fog rising up to swallow him. “I don’t remember much about that time. I tried to bury it like I buried them. My dad had a distant cousin who tried to step in and help, but I didn’t want anyone. After my parents died, I lost it at school. I’d barely had the drive and ambition to start with. I dropped out of school and wandered aimlessly for a year, doing a lot of drinking and navel gazing. Then I pulled my head out of my ass and realized I wasn’t going to honor my parents by becoming an alcoholic. So I joined the Marines, did two tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. After that I joined the FBI.”
She squeezed his hand.
He lifted his head. Her eyes shimmered with tears. Sympathy, not pity. He knew the difference. Thank God. He couldn’t handle anyone feeling sorry for him, had had enough of it to last him a lifetime.
“The FBI was okay but boring. No challenge in it, no action. That’s when Grange found me and offered me a job with the Wild Riders.”
She arched a brow. “That’s what his organization is called?”
“Yeah.” He quirked a smile. “They’re a wild bunch, all right. But good people. Great agents. And I like the job so far. I’
m still new at it, but it gives me a taste of adventure and some action instead of desk jockeying or paper pushing.”
“You’re an adrenaline junkie.”
He shrugged. “Maybe a little. I just want to do something to serve my country. And maybe help people.”
She grazed her thumb over his hand. “Your parents would be proud of all you accomplished.”
Hearing her say that made his heart clench. “I’d like to think so.”
“Does it still hurt?”
“Not as raw now as it was in the beginning. I still miss them, wish I could pick up the phone and hear my mom’s voice or my dad’s laugh. I took it for granted that they’d always be there for me. You don’t appreciate what you’ve lost until you don’t have it anymore.”
She stood. He figured she was going inside.
“Sit back in the chair.”
He did, and she shocked the hell out of him by climbing in the chair with him. The chaises were oversized and could easily fit two, but God, he hadn’t expected this, hadn’t expected her to snuggle her body against his and lay her head on his chest.
He was afraid to touch her, but when she pulled his arm around her and she moved in even closer, he gave up trying to figure out what the hell was going on and just went with it. He tugged her in.
“Thank you,” she said. “I know that wasn’t easy for you to tell me, and I appreciate you sharing a little piece of who you are.”
“It’s okay.”
“Do you ever talk about it?”
“Not really. No one to talk to.”
She tilted her head back. “No other family, friends, girlfriends or anything?”
He smiled down at her. “No family. Guys don’t open up to each other about shit like that. And I don’t have girlfriends.”
She gave him a dubious look. “I’m sure you’ve had girlfriends before.”
“I’ve had women in my life before. No one I’d consider a girlfriend and no one I’d want to talk to about this. My lifestyle hasn’t been conducive to anything long term.”
