Promise to Defend

by Diana Gardin

  The woman closes the door behind us, and when we turn to face her she approaches and extends her hand. “It’s nice to meet you, neighbors. I’m Lindy Hodges.”

  Ronin shakes her hand. When she offers it to me, I only hesitate for a second before shaking it firmly. When I glance at Ronin, the look in his eyes is reassuring. I can almost hear him telling me he’ll explain this to me later.

  “Can I get you all something to drink? I have…hmm.” She walks into the kitchen and opens the refrigerator. With a chagrined chuckle, she turns to us. “Milk and water. I’m sorry; I wasn’t expecting company.”

  I brush her apology aside with a hand. “Don’t worry about it. We’re fine.”

  She nods, approaching slowly. “So, you moved in downstairs? I didn’t know the Framptons moved out.”

  I smile. “We didn’t know the people who lived there before us. But yes, we just arrived today.”

  Lindy studies me a moment. “So do you want to see the satellite, then?”

  I offer her a smooth smile. If Ronin wants to talk to her about his wife’s murder, then I’m going to help him as best as I can. I ignore the stab of jealousy that pierces me when I think of Ronin’s wife. He’s still so obviously in pain about what happened to her. Why does that bother me so much?

  “Actually, can I just use your restroom? I’ll join you two in just a moment. I’m sorry, Lindy. It was a long drive here. We moved from Georgia.”

  Well, hell, Olive. The lies just roll right off your tongue, don’t they?

  Lindy gestures toward the hall. “Of course. First door on your left.”

  I shoot her a grateful smile, then give one to Ronin, before I venture down the hall. I hear him asking her about her satellite company as I disappear down the hallway, and I wait until I hear the sound of the sliding glass door opening and closing before slinking back down the hall to the living room.

  Scanning the room, I head over to a bookcase with cubes for units. There are various knickknacks hidden in the squares, from squat, colorful vases to an assortment of picture frames. Picking up one of the photos, I stare down at a picture of Lindy and a woman who looks exactly like her. The hair on the other woman is lighter, more of a platinum than a honey, but their features, including the clear blue eyes, are identical. There’s no doubt that this is the sister Ronin was referring to.

  Putting the photo back down and turning when the sliding glass door opens, I put on a bright smile as Lindy and Ronin walk back inside from the balcony. “So will it work, babe?”

  His eyes flare at the fake endearment, his intent stare holding me captive from across the room. “Sure will.”

  Seeing me beside the bookcase, Lindy comes over. “You and your sister are such beauties.”

  Her smile drops, her expression going sad. “Yeah. She was.”

  Stepping up beside me, Ronin places an arm around me and pulls me close to him. I like the feeling of being pressed against his body way too much; the desire to settle in and get comfortable is strong.

  Lindy stares at the picture, a faraway look on her face. “My twin sister died a few days ago.”

  Even though I already knew this to be true, the absolution of her statement sends a jolt of pain through me for her. What must it be like to lose the person you considered to be your other half?

  “I’m so sorry, Lindy.” Reaching out to touch the other woman’s shoulder, I attempt to send consoling vibes from my hand to her. I turn and see Ronin clearing struggling with something.

  “Lindy…I have to be honest with you now, I’m sorry we lied to you. And you’ll figure out soon enough that we’re not actually your neighbors.” Ronin’s tone is apologetic, but determined. “Seven years ago, I lost my wife, Elle Shaw, in the exact same way that your sister was killed. I’m here to ask you about the murder.”

  Stiffening, Lindy takes a step back from us and folds her arm across her chest. “Who are you?”

  Letting me go, Ronin holds both hands out in front of him as if to show Lindy he means no harm. “I’m just someone who wants to find out who did this to my wife, and to your sister.”

  Her expression is doubtful, wary. “The cops already talked to me about this. They’re looking for the murderer. Are you a cop?”

  “I used to be. But I was a soldier on deployment when my wife was killed.” The stark pain in Ronin’s voice slices cleanly through me. “They never found her killer. I don’t want that to happen to you and your sister. Now I work for a company with the means to find things the police will have a much harder time finding. We have security clearances the WPD can only dream about, and I’m highly trained. Please let me help.”

  Giving Lindy a sympathetic, sincere smile when she glances my way, I nod. “He’s telling you the truth. My brother-in-law works for the same company, and they’re seriously badass. I’m not his girlfriend, but I do care about him and I know he can help you.”

  Lindy’s eyes flip back and forth between us. “Let me see some I.D., if you work for this security company.”

  Without a word, Ronin slips his wallet from his pocket and pull out a card. Handing it to Lindy, he waits while she inspects it.

  With a deep sigh, Lindy heads for the couch and drops down. Ronin tracks her with his eyes and then takes her silence as compliance, and he pulls me to the love seat adjacent to her.

  “Did your sister have any known enemies? Anyone you think might have wanted to hurt her?” Getting straight to the point, Ronin waits patiently for Lindy’s response.

  Lindy shakes her head “My sister was a nursing student. All she ever wanted to do was help people.”

  “Was she dating anyone?”

  The question from Ronin sounds strained. I want to ask him why, but now isn’t the time.

  Lindy hesitates before answering. “Kind of, maybe? I mean, there was a guy. I never got to meet him, though. Actually, I don’t even remember her mentioning his name, now that I think about it.”

  Ronin presses on. “Was that unusual? For you not to meet someone she was dating, I mean?”

  Lindy barks out a laugh. “It was unusual for her to be dating anyone. Grace kept to herself where men were concerned. She got burned once in high school, and after that she never wanted to give a guy the time of day.”

  I shift. I understand that sentiment.

  “Lindy…Grace was your twin. You had to have known her better than anyone else. Did she seem happy with this guy?” Even though Ronin’s voice is calm, there’s an edge to it. I can see that not answering him isn’t usually an option for most people.

  Lindy watches him, clearly thinking hard. She finally glances away. “She seemed…different. I can’t say she was happy. But if I asked her about it she would withdraw. She didn’t want to discuss her relationship, and I didn’t want to pressure her. I had no idea that I wouldn’t…” Lindy chokes on the words. “That I wouldn’t have the time to press her on it.”

  I nod with sympathy, trying to imagine what it would be like to lose my sister. The thought makes my heart clench tight. “That’s understandable, Lindy. There’s no way you could have known.”

  Lindy breaks down then. It’s like my kind words were a trigger for her sadness, and she covers her face with her hands as she cries. I wrap my arms around her, and she cries into my shoulder. When her sobs subside, she wipes her face with her hands and glances up at me. “I’m sorry.”

  Shaking my head, I pull back. “Please, don’t be.”

  Ronin reaches into his pocket and withdraws a card. Handing it to Lindy, he rises from the couch. “If you think of anything else, even if you don’t think it can help, give me a call.”

  I stand up with him as Lindy reads the card. “Night Eagle Security?” she asks with a raised brow.

  Ronin gives a curt nod. “Keep in touch.”

  When we’re back in the truck, I let out a breath. “I’m sorry she didn’t know anything.”

  Ronin stares out the windshield, his mind clearly running through the conversation we’d just had.
“She knows more than she’s letting on.”

  My eyebrows shoot skyward in surprise. “How do you know that?”

  Ronin glances at me, and the expression in his eyes is akin to the ferocity of a dog with a bone. “She hesitated before answering a question. It wasn’t because she didn’t know the answer, it was because she was trying to decide how much she should say. Which means there’s something she didn’t.”

  Impressed, I think back to the talk with Lindy. Her reluctance to answer whether or not her sister had been seeing anyone comes to mind, and I nod. “You’re right.”

  But frustration pours off of Ronin. “If I had her at NES, if she was a hostile witness…I could have gotten the answers I needed. But this is a different situation. I had to cut off the questioning there. I’m not an official part of this case. Walking out of there was hard, Red.”

  He starts the truck’s big engine and touches the phone image on the dash screen. Pulling up his contacts, he presses SAYWARD.

  “What’s up, Swagger?”

  The nickname makes me smile. It’s so perfect for him, and I’m not even privy to the events that led to him earning it.

  “I need you to check phone records for two women: a Grace Hodges, deceased, and a Lindy Hodges. E-mail me the information for their records when you get it. Let’s go about a month back.”

  “This something you want done under the radar?” Sayward’s tone is businesslike.

  “For now.”

  She agrees and they end the call, Ronin still looking contemplative as he turns to me.

  “You were a good partner back in there, Red.”

  With a small smile, I cock an eyebrow at him. “You sound surprised.”

  A tiny, crooked smile curves his lips, and there’s a sparkle in his eyes that wasn’t there before. “I guess I shouldn’t be. You surprise me all the time, Olive.”

  When my name rolls off his tongue I can’t help the shiver that rocks me.

  Settling back into my seat, I grin. “Just call me Sidekick.”

  Ronin chuckles as he pulls out of Lindy Hodges’s apartment complex. “Okay, Sidekick. Now let me buy you lunch.”

  17

  Ronin

  Olive Alexander is still a mystery to me. A sexy, gorgeous, gift-wrapped mystery that’s been set in front of me, and I can’t help how much I want to unwrap it.

  When she told me about her uncle and what he did to her, it explained so much. It told me why she has such a hard outer shell, why she’s one of the most aloof people I’ve ever met. Why cool and unaffected is her go-to demeanor. And why she’s so goddamn tough.

  Finding out the connection she has with Mick Oakes makes me crazy. I want to go back in time, find the college-aged Olive, and shake her, or take her into my arms. I want to tell her that Oakes doesn’t have what she needs because…

  Because what? Because I do?

  That, I know, is impossible. I don’t have anything to give her. Not now. Not when I’m searching for my dead-wife’s killer. It’s the only thing I should be thinking about right now. Not to mention that Olive deserves better. I don’t have anything left. And after what she went through, Olive deserves the world.

  But I can’t help the fact that my eyes follow the curve of her body from top to bottom as my hand settles at the small of her back as I close the truck door behind her in the condo parking garage. And the feelings bubbling up inside me? They make me think there’s possibility…like maybe I can have a future with this woman. The kind of future I never thought I’d have again. Something warm spreads across my chest, mixing with the ache that’s lived there for years.

  Standing next to the vehicle, Olive leans against the shiny black exterior. She looks like hope. There’s a relaxed expression on her pretty-as-hell face and she’s more casual than I’ve ever seen her. Her ponytail isn’t so tight, her body is clad in jeans, and goddamn, she looks perfect. Her lips tilt upward in a small smile.

  “So,” I begin, not in a hurry to rush inside. “Was it the interview at Lindy Hodges today, the sushi lunch, or the afternoon working at my desk that put that pleased smile on your face?”

  My tone is teasing, but I really do want to know.

  She shrugs. “Why can’t it be a combination of all of the above?”

  The parking garage is quiet around us, and I naturally become completely in tune with our surroundings. It’s a habit that will never die. I continually scan the area around us with my eyes, looking for anything out of the ordinary. My ears practically prick at every little sound.

  “I think you feel like you have to do this alone,” Olive muses as she scans my face. “Like you’re the only one who can figure out what happened to your…wife.”

  Her words pack a punch, and I can feel them in my gut. “It’s not that. It’s just—”

  I stop, my head whipping around. I can’t put my finger on the sound I heard, but I know it doesn’t belong in this parking garage. I’ve lived in this building long enough to have familiarized myself with everything—and something here doesn’t belong.

  In my chosen field, I’ve learned more times than I can count that trusting my instincts is key. I have them, and they serve me well. At the sound of slow footsteps approaching, I’m already ready to act. There’s no one in sight yet, but I already know I don’t have time to hustle Olive to the elevator standing about forty feet away. And pulling her out into the open in order to make a run for it isn’t something I’m willing to do.

  First, I watch. This part of the parking garage is only used for the units on my floor. There aren’t many, and it isn’t often that I run into someone else during the walk from my car to the elevator, or vice versa. So even though there’s a chance it could be someone who lives in the building, my gut tells me it isn’t.

  Pulling my gun from the holster at my ankle, I push Olive behind me. She goes quiet, her muscles tensing.

  “What?” Her question is barely a breath against my spine, and her fingers brush against my back as she reaches for me.

  Turning my head so she’ll hear me, I whisper, “Someone’s coming.”

  I don’t need to see her eyes to know that she’s scared. The way her fingers tighten their hold in my shirt is evidence enough.

  And suddenly, I’m pissed. Not because someone I don’t know is encroaching on my territory. But because whoever belongs to those footsteps is scaring her, and that right there is unacceptable. Olive Alexander has been through enough.

  The footsteps grow closer, and I hear Olive suck in a breath. She doesn’t let it out. My back teeth grind together, my gun held ready in my hand but lowered beside my thigh.

  Rounding the hood of a car only feet away from us, Mick Oakes strolls to a stop as soon as we’re spotted. He takes a casual stance, hands held loosely behind his back as a smirk rolls over his face.

  “Hey,” he says in a friendly tone. Not looking at me, he directs his greeting at Olive. “I missed you, baby.”

  She stiffens, and I shift to cover her more completely. “You don’t talk to her, Oakes. What the hell do you want? How did you get in here?”

  He shrugs, shifting on his feet. He looks like he has his shit together in a button-down and slacks, hair slicked back, but even when a snake sheds its skin, it’s still a snake underneath.

  His eyes flash with anger before he gets a handle on it and blinks, refocusing on me. “I didn’t come for you. This is between me and the lady there. So…”

  He actually gestures his head to the side, like he’s dismissing me.

  Laughing, when I really want to point my Sig at him and shoot, I work on getting his attention back on me. Olive, as hard as I know she’s trying to fight it, trembles at my back.

  “If you did enough research to discover my address, then you must know who I am by now, right? You think you can dismiss me with a head nod? Think again, prick. I asked you nicely once. That’s the only time you’ll get. Listen carefully: Olive doesn’t want to talk to you. Leave her alone.”

  Taking a step
closer, which has my trigger finger itching like crazy, he attempts to peer around me. I’m having none of it. “You hard of hearing?” The question comes out in a growl, because at this point I’m pretty sure Mick is stupid enough to have come here on his own. And if it comes to it, I’ll take his ass down.

  Mick raises his hands, spreading them wide. I’m not pacified, because even though he came here alone, he wouldn’t have come unarmed. I’m guessing his piece is in his waistband, and I can calculate the amount of time it’ll take him to draw it. Not faster than he’ll take a bullet between the eyes. But I’d rather it didn’t come to that.

  Not today.

  “Yeah. Know all about you, and guys like you. You think you have a say over what I do, just because you decided Olive should be the one keeping your dick warm this week?” He tosses the words at me like knives, and I can tell that that’s exactly the way they hit Olive.

  At the sound of her sharp intake of breath, my blood starts to burn. In any other circumstance, the asshole would have been flat on his back before he finished that sick-ass sentence, because disrespecting her like that? He needs to be taught some goddamn manners. But with Olive at my back, all I want to do is get Mick out of here so that I can make sure she’s okay.

  “What do you want?” My voice is deadly calm.

  He jabs a finger toward Olive. “I want you to stop keeping her away from me. And I want you to stay out of my business at the bar. What I have going on there doesn’t concern you. You might not know who I am, but you will. And if you keep showing up where I don’t want to see you…I’ll make sure you never show up anywhere again.”

  In the same calm voice, I ask for clarification. “That sounds like a threat. I don’t take too kindly to those.”

  Mick glances around me to where Olive stands, and then his mouth curls into a smirk that I want to punch right off of him. “It’s a promise. Don’t get in my way, Shaw.”

  I open my mouth to respond when he speaks sharply. “Olive. Come with me now. I just want to talk to you. And then this asshole won’t get hurt. You remember my uncle, don’t you, baby?”