Danger and Desire: A Romantic Suspense Anthology

by Kimberly Kincaid

  “Your job and employer,” Spiker amended.

  “I am my own employer.” Roxana tipped her chin up with a low but growing dose of defiance. “And my job is what I want it to be.”

  “Explain,” he barked.

  “I pick and choose what contracts to take.”

  “Then you’re an analyst?” Vanka asked.

  “I’m whatever I feel like being.” An unsatisfied grunt rumbled from Spiker’s direction, and she added, “I have a way with words.”

  “Meaning what,” he growled.

  Roxana’s gaze dropped to his gun again. What could they possibly glean from the time she spent writing marketing and sales copy? “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

  “Walk us through your typical contract,” Vanka prompted.

  Roxana studied Vanka for an extra second in case she offered the smallest clue of relevance. “Well…” No clues came. “Generally, I review a project summary and a few bullet points.” She had their complete attention; God only knew why. “Most want me to spin a few facts and figures into something more persuasive.”

  “Talking points?” Vanka asked.

  Roxana shrugged. “Whatever. Depends on the audience.”

  Spiker paced to the far wall and back. “Where does our Watcher come in to play?”

  Her eyebrow arched. “What?”

  “The Watcher you stole.”

  Had she worked with a client called Watcher? “If I gave you a copy of my client list, would you leave?”

  Spiker sharpened his gaze. “That would go a long way to wrapping this up.”

  “All right then. I’ll get it.” Roxana stood but quickly retook her seat when Spiker leveled his gun toward her midsection. “Or you can.”

  “Where do you keep your client list?”

  Roxana couldn’t look away from the gun’s barrel.

  “Where,” he demanded.

  “Could you point that somewhere else?” Roxana managed to sound somewhat assertive.

  “Ditto,” Vanka added.

  Spiker ignored their request and waited.

  “My phone,” Roxana said.

  “Where’s that?”

  “In the office nook next to the kitchen.”

  Spiker nudged his head, and Vanka sprang onto her high heels, returning a moment later with Roxana’s phone in her hand.

  “Passcode?” Vanka asked.

  Roxana bit her lip.

  “Give me a break,” Spiker groused. “What’s the damn code?”

  “One, two, three, four.”

  Their disbelief made her feel like the odd one out in kindergarten.

  Defensively, Roxana shrugged off their expressions. “It’s not a like a fancy passcode would’ve helped with a gun in my face.”

  “She has a point.” Vanka entered the code. “Voila. It worked.”

  “Every time,” Roxana muttered.

  Spiker pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “Where’s the client list?”

  “Click on the box in the top corner,” Roxana directed. “Those apps access the work platforms, but I really only use the first one. It’s green.”

  Confusion lingered in Vanka’s expression, but her thumb pressed the screen. She and Spiker leaned in for a closer look before she added, “I don’t understand.”

  “The interface sucks,” Roxana admitted when they didn’t look away.

  Spiker’s jaw gnashed

  This was a little ridiculous, but she continued. “Don’t click on the menu but the little wheel in the upper right-hand corner.”

  Vanka side-eyed Spiker and glanced to Roxana again, and waited.

  What was this? A help desk? Roxana bit her tongue. Sarcasm had its place, and that wasn’t when obtuse home invaders had a gun. “Tap where it says Client Roster.”

  After an uncomfortable moment, Vanka tapped and scrolled, eyes widening as if Roxana had the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge listed before Steve Carell.

  Spiker holstered his gun and snatched the phone from Vanka. His nostrils flattened and flared the more he scrolled. “What is this shit?”

  Roxana didn’t know what more they wanted. “What you asked for…”

  He swiped and tapped, fuming. “Enough. This guy is more important.” Spiker held the phone so close to Roxana’s face that her eyes wouldn’t focus, but she didn’t have to see the picture taken in front of the fireplace. Jason had one arm around her, the other outstretched to snap the selfie in the green flannel pajamas that Amanda’s mother had sent for Christmas. “Explain.”

  There wasn’t much to explain except for the screen-printed blocks, grouped in threes, that read Ho, Ho, Ho. As it turned out, Ho was an element from the periodic table, and now, Roxana would never be able to forget what Holmium was—her stomach dropped. Amanda’s mother was the former First Lady. If politics and terrorism had crashed her world again, she would lose her ever-loving mind. “Why don’t you explain for a change.”

  “Shut up and focus on your interaction with GSI’s Watcher.”

  Every conversation came back to Jason. “Why do you call him a watcher?”

  Spiker walked away as if her question gave him a headache. Roxana looked to Vanka, wondering if there was some woman-to-woman connection that she could muster. “What am I missing?”

  “When did you get engaged?” Vanka asked.

  Roxana glanced at her ring and wished she could return to those carefree moments. “Last night.”

  “As in yesterday?” Genuine confusion pursed in the woman’s expression. “Do you have feelings for him?”

  “What kind of question is that?”

  The dubious calculation in Vanka’s face softened. She inched forward until she’d replaced the post that Spiker had manned and lowered her voice. “Did you fall in love with him?”

  Roxana pressed her hand against her chest, protecting her heart against the whisper of quiet pity and vague empathy.

  The other woman closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Bloody fucking hell.”

  “What?” Spiker glared.

  Vanka’s slight head shake conceded her dawning acceptance. “She’s telling us the truth.”

  Spiker tried his hardest to discredit Vanka’s assessment. He peppered Roxana with questions like a cop might do on a television show, forcing her to recount mundane details about her social and work life, neighbors and enemies or lack thereof, and her brother.

  They knew more about Hagan and his work than she did, and her running list of questions grew each time Spiker and Vanka seemed to find an answer. Still, the two couldn’t agree.

  Spiker insisted that she was playing stupid, while Vanka clung to the claim Jason had used Roxana as an unknowing information siphon. If their argument hadn’t been about the very fabric of her life, Roxana would’ve enjoyed watching their hot-and-cold dynamic. If Spiker and Vanka fucked like they fought, both would walk away with bruises, refusing to admit their satisfaction.

  “Get your head out of your ass, Spiker.” Vanka inspected her manicure. “The woman’s teeter-tottering between heartbroken and homicidal.”

  “For God’s sake, woman, it’s an act.” Spiker huffed and gestured toward Roxana as if she were evidence on display. “She’s not crying. Hasn’t crapped her pants.”

  “She can hear you,” Roxana muttered under her breath.

  “Because you’re such a scary man,” Vanka tacked on, rolling her eyes. “Sooner you realize I’m right, the sooner we can go our separate ways.”

  Vanka and Spiker reached for their phones at the same moment. Roxana mentally crossed her fingers they’d received a text message from their office that read, whoops, there’s been a mistake.

  Whatever the text said, it shifted their mood. Spiker and Vanka moved across the room and whispered. They kept an eye on her, but without their complete attention for the first time in hours, Roxana could think without psychos breathing down her back. She recalled the conversation with her brother and relived his hesitation, the way he questioned their work an
d happiness, and ran through Spiker and Vanka’s determination to connect Hagan and Jason. Was she the only person who was in the dark…? If so, Jason wasn’t the only one she wanted to kill.

  What would’ve happened if Jason had been home? Anxiety pummeled Roxana’s chest. What would happen when Vanka convinced Spiker to leave? Her feet bounced in her Converse. Would they shoot her if she jumped the couch and made a break for the door?

  Roxana lifted her hand like the shy kid in school. “Can I ask a question?”

  They waited as if their silence was permission.

  “Great. Fantastic.” Her thoughts crashed together. “Are you going to kill me?” There were better ways to inquire, but hell if her rising nerves cared if she offended her intruders’ sensibilities. “I vote no.”

  The corners of Vanka’s lips twitched.

  Spiker rolled his bottom lip into his mouth. “I don’t think we have to kill you.”

  “Awesome.” Roxana let go of her breath, and for good measure, she tacked on, “Thank you.”

  “It’d be too messy, anyway,” Vanka added.

  “Excellent point.”

  Spiker cursed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Bet you kept Jason on his toes.”

  “I can see why he chose her,” Vanka agreed. “You have a good backbone to boot.”

  “Thanks…” Roxana wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the qualification list and took advantage of their semi-friendly banter. “I have another question.”

  “Shoot,” Spiker said.

  His word choice left something to be desired, but now wasn’t the best time to show off her copy-writing skills. “Can we just call Jason? I promise,”—she crossed her heart—“I won’t breathe a word of our day together after you leave.”

  Spiker and Vanka stared as if Roxana had suggested black magic. Had they not considered something so boringly basic?

  Lines creased Spiker’s forehead. “A phone call?”

  “Maybe I should’ve suggested that a couple hours ago.”

  Vanka lifted her chin. “Call.”

  “You have my phone,” Roxana pointed out.

  Spiker handed Vanka the phone. She laid it on the coffee table and sat next to Roxana. “Call him.”

  Roxana glanced between the two. “Are you going to say hello, or do I just start talking and see what happens?”

  “He won’t answer.” Spiker shook his head. “He’s long gone.”

  Roxana’s stomach tightened. “He’ll answer.”

  She dialed Jason without a clue how to broach the conversation. Hi there. Don’t get upset, but your co-workers are here with guns and a super interesting list of questions… That wasn’t going to go over well for anyone.

  “Speaker phone,” Spiker chimed as she pressed the phone to her ear.

  “Should’ve known.” Roxana feigned an apologetic smile and switched the call output to speaker phone.

  Jason didn’t answer.

  “Is this when I say I told you so?” Spiker smirked.

  Vanka picked an invisible piece of lint from her thigh. “Exceedingly mature of you.”

  Roxana crossed her arms. “He’ll call back.”

  Their exchange of looks were interrupted by Jason’s incoming call. “Sometimes it takes a few minutes.”

  “Takes the high road,” Vanka pointed out. “When she easily could’ve volleyed ‘I told you so’ back down your throat.”

  Roxana ignored them and imagined Jason hunkered in the dank backroom of a conglomerate’s corporate headquarters, surrounded by row after row of metal filing cabinets. Jason wasn’t long gone. He only needed a minute to call back. She accepted the call via speakerphone.

  “Babe,” Jason said, calm and cool, as if it were any old day. “Sorry about that. I had to get to a better place to take the call.”

  The steadiness he could provide was almost too much for her heart to handle. Other than Spiker and Vanka, all was right in her world again. Jason was at work, paging through old paperwork under yellowing florescent lights. He’d explained how boring his job could be, but he liked the quiet detail work. She immediately understood that his job wouldn’t kill him or anyone she loved and wholeheartedly approved. “Hi.”

  Background noise garbled. “Everything okay?”

  Ha… “Where are you?”

  “Wal-Mart.” Jason paused. “Babe?”

  Roxana swallowed hard. “My anxiety’s off the charts today.”

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  An unfamiliar edge had grown in his voice. Roxana refused to look away from his image on the phone. She had to believe that Spiker and Vanka would realize they’d made a mistake and leave, and Roxana would spend the rest of the day drinking wine until both Jason and the cops arrived. “Two of your co-workers are here.”

  An extra beat of silence hung. “Who?”

  “Spiker,” she offered, “who I’d met before, and Vanka.”

  “We’re on speaker?”

  “Yup.” A thorny knot grew in her throat. “They’ve been here a while.”

  His brief pause seemed like hours.

  “Jason? Are you still there?”

  “I’m here, sweetie.”

  Sweetie made her spine stiffen. He’d used that nickname only once and never made the mistake again. Roxana glared at her phone and vividly recalled explaining that she wasn’t a piece of candy. He had laughed and told her she was a babe. The nickname had stuck until today.

  “You’re still at home with Spiker and Vanka?”

  Roxana rolled her shoulders and focused her attention. “Yeah.”

  “Good, sweets,” he said before changing his tone. “If you need to have a conversation with me, you have it with me. Let her walk out the front door. I give you my word that she won’t say a word to anyone.”

  “Can’t do it,” Spiker said. “We’ve got orders.”

  “Fuck your orders,” Jason growled. “Buck has a problem with me. That’s his problem. Not yours. Not HQ’s.”

  Spiker crossed his arms. “Doesn’t work like that, and you know it.”

  Jason cursed under his breath.

  She could’ve sworn he’d said something about a ‘drunk son of a bitch’ before a car door shut. Had he even made it to Tulsa? Hell, had he even gone to Oklahoma? “Jason—”

  “Listen, sweets.”

  Irritation popped under her skin. It would be piss poor timing to fight with her fiancé, but he needed to stop with the saccharine nicknames. “Don’t—”

  “I hear you, Roxana, and I’ll explain everything.”

  Bile sloshed in her stomach. The man you call Jason Green ricocheted in her thoughts. Numbly, she nodded and pressed her fingers into her temples.

  “She’s in good hands,” Spiker snickered.

  “Stay away from her,” Jason growled. “You don’t have to let her go until I get there but stay the fuck away.”

  “I gotta tell you, man,” Spiker said. “She’s entertaining.”

  Roxana ignored Spiker as a rogue tear slipped down her cheek. She didn’t care. The man she had planned to spend her life with had lied about everything. How had she been duped like this?

  “Shut up, Spiker,” Vanka snapped. “Jason, where do you want her?”

  Roxana wondered if the offer was supposed to be an olive branch or a dig at Spiker.

  “The basement,” Jason answered. “No windows. One door.”

  Roxana jerked back to the conversation. “No.”

  “Listen, sweetie—”

  “Are you insane?” Her older brother and father’s belongings had been boxed for donation, but Roxana wouldn’t let the belongings go. Hagan had finally moved them into the basement, and she hadn’t gone down there in years. “Absolutely not.”

  “Sweets—”

  “No!”

  “Babe,” Jason tried again. “I need you to understand what I’m saying.”

  She’d kill him. Spiker and Vanka wouldn’t get the chance before Roxana wrapped her hands around his lying neck and stran
gled him.

  “Think the situation through,” Jason coaxed.

  Oh, she had! She didn’t know who he was, what he did, why these people were really here, but sweetie and sweets were the final straw. He knew it too! He’d promised on his life never to call her sweetie again—unless the world was coming to an end.

  “Spiker and Vanka aren’t messing around,” Jason tried again. “Think it through, sweets. Do you understand?”

  The world was coming to an end. Fan-flippin-tastic. “Yeah, think so.”

  “Vanka,” Jason said, “check the basement out, and you’ll agree to hold Roxana there.”

  Spiker nodded for Vanka to inspect Roxana’s windowless prison. Dark and dank, it was nothing more than an old half-bath and storage. A minute later, the other woman confirmed the basement was a fantastic dungeon. Spiker agreed to the terms, separating Roxana in exchange for Jason’s arrival.

  Roxana didn’t have a chance to say goodbye to Jason, whoever he was, and Vanka pushed her toward the basement.

  “I don’t want to go down there.” Roxana couldn’t swallow against the razor blades of heartache cutting her throat.

  “No choice.” Vanka opened the door then scrutinized Roxana as she had when she first arrived. “Jason shouldn’t have done this to you. No one should be used as a cover if they aren’t game.” Then Vanka shut Roxana in the dark.

  Roxana waited until her sarcasm had a firm hold on her weepiness, and though she was alone, she said, “Thanks for your two cents,” then tried to recall where the lights were.

  Two minutes later, luck was the only reason she found the string connected to the hanging light bulb. Boxed took up a majority of the space, and if she stood and stared, her heart would ache for the past. She squared her shoulders and walked to the small washroom in the far corner, grateful for a secondary light source.

  Her reflection wasn’t pretty. She twisted the faucet. Nothing came out. “Of course not.”

  Then the pipes gurgled and sputtered. Dirty liquid coughed out of the unused spout until it became a steady stream of water and sediment. Years’ worth of sediment washed itself from the pipes as she stared into the gritty sink, questioning what she really knew about Jason. For all the worrying she’d taken to over the years, there wasn’t a moment with him that blipped on her radar—except last night.