The Southern Comfort Series Box Set

by Clark O'Neill, Lisa

Sam’s anger ran out in a whoosh when she realized he just wanted to protect her.

  But whatever his motivations, the fact remained that she wasn’t his to protect.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “WHERE is she?” Anger pulsed through Josh’s veins like a second heartbeat as he stared into the frightened yet belligerent face of the firefighter who’d taken Sam.

  Luck had been on their side, because the captain at the station in question had no qualms about telling what he knew. The truck they were inquiring about was supposed to be undergoing repairs, over at Jernigan’s Automotive on Highway Seventeen. The proprietor, Norman Jernigan, was the brother of one of their own volunteer firemen, Danny.

  The captain believed both brothers could be found at their weekly poker game, in the little apartment they maintained over the garage.

  Josh, Kathleen and Mac had indeed found them, along with a handful of miscellaneous friends, hunkered over a big, scarred table amidst a haze of smoke, beer bottles and processed snack foods.

  Danny Jernigan had distinguished himself from the others right away by attempting to break and run.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he tried bluffing, pathetically ineffective since he was sweating bullets. He was pressed against the back of the chair Mac had muscled him into, nervous brown eyes showing white around the edges. They fixed on Kathleen, and he tried a smile, obviously in some vain hope to charm her into believing him.

  She slapped him back with a “Get real.”

  Skimming over Mac, who anyone in their right mind wouldn’t turn to for sympathy, and Josh, who was clearly homicidal, he finally fixed panicked eyes on his brother. The other guests had either faded into the woodwork or outright bolted when things got sticky. The older Jernigan crossed thick arms over an oil-stained shirt and shook his dark head at his brother in disgust.

  “Christ, Danny. What kind of bullshit have you gotten yourself into this time?”

  “How about arson,” Josh suggested, getting all up in the younger man’s grille. “Felony kidnapping. Murder.”

  “Hey, I didn’t kill anybody!”

  Josh stepped back, because he had him.

  Danny slumped, but tried to rally. “And I didn’t do any of that other stuff either. You must have the wrong guy.”

  Josh pulled out the photos he’d made from the video footage and pushed them under Jernigan’s nose. “You want to try that again?”

  Looking over his brother’s shoulder with narrowed eyes, Norman made a noise of disgust. “You kidnapped that woman, Danny? What’s the hell’s wrong with you?!”

  “They said they’d kill me!” Danny admitted in a panicked burst. “And you, too!” He gestured wildly at his brother.

  “Who?” Kathleen cut through the bullshit.

  “I…” he looked up at her with his own death in his eyes. “I can’t tell you. They’ll kill me if I talk.”

  “Yeah, well I might just kill you if you don’t,” Josh chimed in “so you’ve got yourself a catch twenty-two.”

  “Hey,” Norman tossed in on behalf of his brother.

  “You can’t say that,” Danny hedged, obviously buoyed by the support. “You’re a cop.”

  “Which means I have really good aim.”

  Danny stared, realized Josh wasn’t quite bluffing, and folded. “You’ll have to protect me,” he pleaded. “If I tell you, you have to protect me.”

  “You tell me where I can find her and you have my word I’ll do everything I can.”

  “Who threatened you, Danny?” Kathleen asked.

  “I… I don’t know who it was, specifically. I’d, uh, I’d run into a little trouble with some bets that I made. Put some money on a game one night, just for the hell of it. Tripled my money, so I was stoked. It was a lot easier than playing with these guys,” he jerked a thumb at his brother. “I never win.”

  “Could we get to the point anytime soon?”

  Jernigan frowned at Josh but acquiesced. “Long story short, I got in over my head, owed a hell of a lot more than I could pay, and one night some guy jumped me outside my apartment. He worked me over but good, then told me his boss was willing to work out a deal. He had an old warehouse he wanted to burn down to get the insurance. Being a firefighter, I knew how to do it. So I did it and that was supposed to be the end of it.”

  “But it wasn’t?” Kathleen prompted.

  “No. They kept coming back, asking me for more favors. But then earlier today, this guy calls, tells me I’m gonna have to kidnap some woman. Tells me exactly how to go about it, and if I do this they’ll leave me alone. I said, no way I’m kidnapping anybody, and then the guy starts describing what Norman’s doing just then. He was obviously sitting outside the shop, watching. I didn’t know what else to do.” He looked up at his brother plaintively.

  Josh was pretty sure that if they hadn’t tracked Jernigan down, he would have been a smear on the pavement in the near future. “Where did you do your gambling?” he asked, even though he already knew the answer.

  “A little dive called the Roadhouse, over on the other side of the city.”

  Collective breaths were released all around. “And where did you take the woman?”

  Jernigan swallowed, then looked Josh in the eye. “The City Marina,” he admitted reluctantly. “I put her on a boat at the marina.”

  “THANKS,” Sam said as Dane handed her the tumbler of rum and Coke. She eyed him cautiously while he mixed his own, having set the bottle on a shelf which also housed a small TV. He turned to watch her, swirling his drink as he leaned back, so she took a small sip and made the appropriate grimace.

  “Too strong?” he asked, ever considerate.

  “It’s fine,” she lied, because she used to drink them a lot stronger. The Coke was so sweet it ruined the delicious bite of the rum.

  She was still sitting in the chair he’d left her in, legs tucked a bit awkwardly beside her bottom. The comforter that she’d wound around herself had settled loosely in the vicinity of her hips. When she slanted another glance at Dane, she couldn’t help but notice that his gaze had shifted lower.

  Nostrils flaring slightly, he slammed his drink and looked away.

  Sam did a cursory examination of the state of her T-shirt, the thin material stretched taut over her breasts. She squeezed her eyes shut, feeling absolutely disgusted over what she must do, but she couldn’t afford to wait around for someone to come riding to her rescue. Poor Josh would have no way of knowing that she was heading out to sea, and before that yacht hit the open water of the ocean she was determined to no longer be on it.

  The idea of those sharks Alan Wilcox threatened her with almost made her question her ability to follow through, but when she considered spending the rest of her life in the company of Dane’s crazy father, she decided ocean dwelling predators weren’t so bad.

  It was the land sharks you had to watch out for.

  So she took another drink for fortitude and eased her feet to the floor.

  Dane’s gaze swung back toward her.

  She returned it with trepidation, and just the tiniest bit of heat.

  Sensing a change in the atmosphere, Dane continued to hold the eye contact. A whole flurry of emotions flitted across his face, finally settling on lust. It was sex that was driving him now. Knowing it, knowing that it was the easiest way to distract him, Sam allowed the tip of her tongue to gently wet her lips.

  Dane made a small noise in his throat. Then being more of a gentleman than she’d ever have given him credit for, he turned it into a cough.

  Apparently, she had to be forceful. Little subtleties wouldn’t work on this man.

  Silently asking for forgiveness from both Dane and Josh, Sam gingerly pushed the comforter away. Her bare legs gleamed pale in the lamplight, and drew his eyes like moth to flame. Tamping down on any lingering fear or revulsion, she took a breath and slowly stood up.

  Dane stared at her, almost helpless.

  Sam edged a hesitant step forward.
“Thank you,” she said, softly, and the words truly came from the heart. “For all you’ve done to help both me and Donnie. For being our friend when you didn’t have to be.” She had no doubt he was the one who’d managed to keep Donnie’s insurance going, probably would have done more if he thought she would let him.

  “You’re… real people,” he told her, voice thick with emotion. “Probably the first real people I’ve ever known. And both you and your brother are certainly the only people who didn’t give a shit that I was Dane Wilcox. Your brother and I could talk baseball, or books, or drink beer with our elbows on the table. And you – you’re the first woman I’ve ever known who was turned off by my status. Do you have any idea how… refreshing that was?”

  “No.” But she could guess. And her heart ached a little because she could. Hurting Dane was going to be one of the hardest things she’d ever done, but she didn’t see that there was an alternative. She stepped closer, faltering. Slick seductions just weren’t her style.

  But Dane took up the slack from his end. “I’m sorry about… your engagement,” he said, sitting his glass down beside the rum bottle. Sam eyed it with sick hope. “At least, I assume you accepted the proposal. I couldn’t help noticing you’re not wearing a ring.”

  “I did,” she admitted, faintly. “It wasn’t… planned. I imagine the ring would have been coming along later.” Glancing up, she saw his face tighten.

  “You love him?” he asked, although he had to know the answer. Sam wavered with the need to tell the truth. She loved Josh with every beat of her heart, but that admission wouldn’t serve her purposes.

  “I… I think I do,” she hedged, radiating confusion. “It’s been quite an emotional time lately, and it… felt good having a shoulder to finally lean on. It’s not something I usually do.”

  “Tell me about it,” he said wryly. “I practically had to kick your feet from beneath you to get you to lean.”

  She eyed him cautiously, feeling unsure. “I’m leaning now,” she told him in the barest of whispers. “I was… so scared until you got here.”

  At least that was the truth.

  Dane’s whole posture crumbled and he took a step toward her. He gathered her tight against his lean body. “I’ll never let him hurt you.” His voice both fierce and tender. “I swear to God, I’ll never let him hurt you.”

  With that he bent his head and captured her lips with his own, and Sam thought of Josh so that she wouldn’t fight him. Josh’s arms around her. Josh’s lips curved so perfectly against her own.

  She kissed him back, parted her lips when he demanded it, allowing his tongue to sweep into her mouth. The taste wasn’t right, but she refused to think about it, just stroked tentatively at his tongue with her own.

  “God,” he breathed, pressing his hardening body against her and Sam cringed before she could stop herself. “I’m sorry,” he said, drawing back. “It’s too much, too soon, I know.”

  But because she couldn’t allow him to move away from her, Sam steeled herself to do what she had to.

  “No,” she whispered, running a tentative hand along his cheek. “It’s not.”

  With that, he devoured her anew. Kissing him automatically, making what she hoped were convincing noises, Sam pushed him gently as she could toward that bottle. Running her left hand up his back and fumbling with the right to locate her weapon, Sam’s fingers closed around it just as he lifted her against the wall. Twining her legs about his waist gave her even better leverage, and she brought the bottle down on his head.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry,” she cried, tears coursing down her cheeks as he staggered. She jumped clear as he collapsed at her feet, blood matting the hair along his split scalp. “I’m sorry,” she whispered again, kneeling down to check his pulse.

  He was alive, and for that she was eminently grateful.

  She hadn’t really thought she could swing hard enough to accidentally kill him, but she hadn’t held back at all because she had to make sure to knock him unconscious. With one last stroke over that dear cheek, she scrambled to her feet and stumbled toward the door.

  Sick with guilt, numb with fear, and feeling hideously exposed wearing only the T-shirt, Sam forced the wobbling gelatin of her legs to move quickly into the hallway. The only benefit of the stark terror was that none of her previous injuries seemed to be impairing her – adrenaline had overruled the pain. The only problem was that her heart pounded so loudly that she had trouble hearing the roar of the engine.

  But they surely were still in motion. Dane’s dad would have to navigate fairly slowly out of the marina until he hit the open ocean, and she prayed that job would keep him well occupied so that he wouldn’t notice her going overboard.

  She knew he was doing the navigating – or whatever was the correct term – as he’d made a point of informing her that the three of them were alone on the boat. The image of him turning the boat around and mowing her down loomed horrifically in her mind. When he figured out that she’d defied him, left his only son bleeding on the carpet, she had no doubt that he’d follow through with his threats. He was a man both desperate and ruthless, and she had to get away quickly if she wanted to live.

  And God, how she wanted to live.

  How she wanted to spend that life with Josh.

  Thinking of that, of marrying Josh and building a life with him, was the push she needed to marshal her willpower. Ignoring the way her stomach seemed to rise and fall as dangerously as the waves, Sam crept down the hall, keeping one hand on the paneled wall to help maintain her unsteady balance. Every sense remained alert for the slightest sign she’d been discovered.

  Eyes darting, breathing in shallow gasps, Sam climbed two small steps and entered what she guessed was the great room. Or whatever the hell you called it on a yacht. Ahead was another short hall, past which she had no idea what might be contained, and a set of stairs that would probably take her to the bridge.

  Not where she wanted to go.

  Shivering in violent waves, Sam felt the rising gorge of panic, and looked for another way out. There was only one light on, a tiny little pool of luminescence that shone from beneath one of the cabinets in the galley, and with the curtains drawn tightly over the windows it was difficult to see. Finally, Sam caught the faint outline of a door in the wall near the dining area. Her legs propelled her toward it seemingly of their own will. Battling the nausea that roiled dangerously, Sam fumbled for the handle with sweat-dampened fingers. Her hand slipped – once, twice – but at last she managed to ease it open.

  The night wind off the water hit her with the force of a frigid gale, stinging her eyes as it whipped droplets of salt spray up and around in its fury. A storm seemed to be brewing, the darkened sky leaden, and before she could stop it the door blew back against its hinges.

  “No, no, no!” she whispered frantically, praying that the bang which had seemed like a sonic boom to her hadn’t been heard over the wind and waves.

  Shivering in the blustering air, Sam’s already chilled skin prickled with goose bumps. She wrapped her arms tightly around herself in an effort to conserve some heat. She peered over the edge of the railing – which was solid and waist-high – her throat constricting at the precipitous drop. Despite the fact that they were moving fairly slowly, the toss of the sea would make the jump itself dangerous, likely to toss her back against the boat’s hull.

  But it was a chance she would have to take. She glanced toward the direction they’d come from, noting that the marina was thankfully still visible. If it was this rough in the relative safety of Charleston Harbor she shuddered to think about what it would be like at sea.

  Sam glanced toward the night-blackened water again, muscles balking at what she willed them to do. Climbing over that railing and pitching herself to the waves’ mercy was more difficult than she’d imagined. If she just had a lifejacket, or some kind of flotation device to cling to, her plan wouldn’t seem so rash. With the way the weather was shaping up the chances of ano
ther boat coming upon her were slim, so she might just have to swim for it to make it to safety.

  Given the turbulence of the waves and her own current physical limitations she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t simply drown.

  The image of Josh identifying her dead, bloated body had her casting her frantic gaze about.

  To her left – the vessel’s front – was another dead end in the form of a wall. To her right was the sun deck, which was almost sure to have life jackets and preservers or at least some random cushions lying about on benches. Sam hurried along the covered walkway. The deck was wet, slippery from the splash of angry waves, and when the boat hit a bit of a rough spot she lost her footing and fell on her side.

  The pain which had been kept at bay through sheer numbing terror came back with blinding intensity.

  Gasping at the pain, squeezing her eyes shut against the rush of tears, Sam hauled herself unsteadily to her feet. Currents of agony kept her hunched to the side, but she fought the debilitation until she made it to the deck.

  Wasting no time in assessing her surroundings, Sam went to the first bench and yanked the cushion.

  Which didn’t budge.

  It was attached and wouldn’t give even when she put her foot against the base and pushed, so she gave up and opened the bench instead. It was empty save for an old discarded beer can.

  Moving on to the next bench, Sam opened it immediately rather than wasting time. To her profound relief and gratitude, several life vests winked back in day-glo orange.

  Holding her breath against the knife-like jolt of pain, Sam bent herself into an unbearably difficult position. Grasping blindly with her fingers because her eyes were squeezed tight, she lifted her trophy with a thankful cry.

  “Almost there,” she whispered fervently. Her battle was nearly over.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  Sam jerked violently at the unexpected voice, whirling in terror and dropping the lifejacket. Alan Wilcox stood maybe ten feet behind her, at the bottom of a staircase she hadn’t noticed. His blue eyes flashed malevolence over the barrel of his gun.