“And you’re just in time to watch her die!” The bastard tightened his elbow, squeezing off her words. “Drop your guns! All of you!”
He thought he was in charge? No one dropped a thing. Little did this asshat know that an alpha killer now had the back of his head lined up in his crosshairs. Tripp didn’t have a clear shot, not as twitchy as this guy was. Neither would Alex, the way the photographer kept bobbing behind Ashley, unintentionally keeping her head within the same crosshairs. Alex had better be a gawddamned good shot.
Looked like this jerk had been in one helluva fight, though. His nose was a bloody mess, and he was breathing hard. Despite the silly paper towel plugs he’d stuffed up his nostrils, blood dripped steadily down his lips, chin, and neck, onto his trench coat. One eye was swollen nearly shut. But he was the guy with the milky gray eyes Ashley had described. Guess he’d gotten more than he’d bargained for this time around.
“How you doing, babe?” Tripp asked her, trying to exert calmness, even as acid poured into his gut at how frightened she looked.
Ashley stood there trapped, with too much skin showing and shaking like a leaf, her bare back and almost bare ass to the creep’s front. She was barefooted, too, but she hadn’t stepped on the broken window glass yet. Her feet weren’t bleeding. Both hands clenched the guy’s forearm, her elbows pointed out. She was fighting his stranglehold. “I hit him, Tripp,” she wheezed through the pressure on her throat. “Like you told me to do. I wasn’t going to let him—”
“She thinks she’s a tougher bitch than the others, but she isn’t!” The photographer’s arm clamped tighter around her neck, cutting off her words. “Never will be! Won’t live long enough to do more than go splat!”
“I’m tougher than you’ll ever be,” she ground out, her knuckles white against his coat sleeve. “You’re a coward. That’s why you hurt girls.” Lifting one knee, she angled her foot and kicked his shin with her heel.
The jerk winced.
“Shhhhh, Ashley. Not now,” Tripp ordered gently. He’s already crazy. Don’t make him throw you out that window.
“Shut the fuck up!” APD’s cameraman snarled, spitting blood out the side of his mouth. One of those nasty paper towel plugs plopped to the floor, making him look just plain pathetic. “Don’t you idiots get it? They’re all mean, greedy bitches, willing to step on anyone who gets in their way. They don’t know a thing about the game of love! Enough about them! It’s my turn to play!”
Still keeping Ashley in a stranglehold, he fisted his knife at a hard, right angle under her jaw, the tip pointed up. At this rate, that blade would pierce her tongue and palate on its way to her brain. She’d be dead in seconds. The killer cast a quick glance at the tattered sheer curtain flapping in the breeze behind them. He was over-the-top agitated, unpredictable as fuck. A thin line of blood ran down the blade to the handle. He’d already cut her!
Tripp knew what he had to do. Rein it in. Tone it down. For Ashley’s sake. Before he forced this maniac into action. Fighting for composure, he showed the killer his pistol, held it up and sideways to prove he meant what he was saying. “How about we talk? Just you and me. Let the lady go. This is me bargaining in good faith. See? I’m putting my weapon down. Guys, everyone get out of here except—”
“How ’bout we see how good this bitch flies?!” the photographer screeched over Tripp. His eyes were drug-addict bright, more black than ghostly gray. He was definitely hurt, breathing hard, and favoring his right foot. But in two shorts steps, he could still throw Ashley out the window. “Wanna see if you’re quick enough to save this one like you saved that other bitch? Huh, do ya?”
“What other bitch?” It dawned on Tripp then. The bastard was talking about Trish. Tripp’s pistol never reached the floor. It flashed back on target. It was time to end this one-sided negotiation with a man who didn’t deserve to live. Alex had better be ready. “Drop, Ashley! Now!” Tripp bellowed. “Hit the floor! Get out of my way!”
She obeyed, just closed her eyes, and turned into limp deadweight. The photographer couldn’t hang onto her. He fumbled his knife trying to keep a grip. The second her head slipped down past his chest—
PEW! From a place he never saw, came a sound this bastard never heard. Alex’s round hit true. At the same time, Tripp fired, tearing a hole in the photographer’s throat. Then—
BOOM! A fucking cannon roared over Tripp’s shoulder. Right next to his ear. Could only be Jameson’s .44 Magnum following through.
Dead man standing. The bastard’s body stilled in a macabre flash of exsanguination. With both ears ringing, Tripp charged for Ashley before APD’s photographer could take her with him. Tripp had her in his arms by the time the killer’s lifeless body flopped backward through the empty window frame.
“Jesus H Christ!” Tucker Chase snarled from somewhere far away. “You guys think you got him?”
“Had to make sure Tripp didn’t miss,” Jameson countered easily, his voice just as muffled.
“Him miss? At this range?” Tucker scoffed, his voice as distant as Jameson’s. “Alex already wasted the prick. How the fuck do you even own a pistol, Tenney?”
“Easy. I qualify. Why didn’t you fire?”
Tripp was barely able to hear, but he couldn’t hold back a smile, listening to the Neanderthal FBI director argue with the inestimable Jameson Tenney, blind sniper extraordinaire. Jameson had only done what any decent soldier would’ve done. He’d simply covered his buddy’s ass and made damned sure the HVT was down for good.
Peeling out of his jacket, Tripp covered Ashley’s bare body. While she hiked her bra into place and shivered her arms into the too-long sleeves, he zipped the damned thing up all the way to her chin. No one needed to ogle his woman like he knew they were. Men! What a bunch of animals.
Once she was snug inside his jacket, her breasts covered and most of her long legs out of sight, he placed his hand on the knife wound under her chin.
“You need this?” Jameson came to Tripp’s rescue, a palm-sized bandage in his fingers. How the hell did he even know Ashley’d been cut?
“Yeah, man, thanks,” Tripp answered, taking the bandage. “Sure do.”
“Tripp,” Ashley breathed into his neck. She’d burrowed back under his chin, her fingers ice cold, and the rest of her a one hundred percent quivering female. “Don’t let me go. P-p-please, hold on tight to me.”
“Never. I’ve got you, kiddo. Just tip your head up a little, so I can take care of that cut,” he replied, his heart pounding like a mother at how close he’d come to losing her.
While Jameson crouched silently at his side like a bodyguard with his head up, sometimes tilted, sometimes not, Tripp peeled the sterile bandage open. “Battle scars,” he told Ashley. “You should be proud. You’re a bona-fide badass now.”
Despite his shaky fingers, Tripp managed to press the sticky bandage under her chin. The knife cut was small, not deep, thank God. Better yet, most of the blood and gore from the photographer’s head painted the wall behind her, instead of her.
But shit, damn, and son of a bitch. Enough was enough. Three fuckin’ times she’d been a target! What the bloody hell?!
“J-j-just like l-l-last time.” Hiccups racked Ashley’s slender shoulders when he had her snuggled back in his arms. “He just came right in. Only this time, he unlocked my deadbolt, Tripp. Can you believe that? I thought I was safe, but I never really was. I was in my kitchen, but then I heard Peewee squawking, and when I turned around, and I… and he…”
“You fought back,” Tripp said more calmly, needing her to settle down before she launched another panic attack. “That’s all that matters. Focus, babe. Breathe in, breathe out. You just realized you’re stronger than you thought.”
“I am!” The poor woman’s teeth chattered. She had enough adrenaline thrumming through her tiny body to power the entire state of Virginia.
Jameson landed a solid palm on her trembling shoulder, then squeezed. “You
got quite a few good licks in this time, girlfriend. Good for you. You hurt him. He was in trouble before we arrived. I could tell by his voice.”
Ashley snorted the most unladylike snort, as she peered around Tripp’s arm up at Jameson. “I-I had to. He was gonna kill me. I used Peewee’s new perch. He didn’t think I’d hit him, but I showed him.”
“Yes, you did,” Tripp purred, so proud of her that tears blurred his vision. “But why’d he drag you out of your place and into mine?”
“He didn’t think you’d look for me here,” she murmured, snuggling back under his chin. “I was so scared. He said he was gonna hurt your mom, too. But the first chance I got, I swung that perch, hard. Once I used it like it was a pool cue, then like it was a baseball bat. I hit him!”
“Homerun!” Jameson crowed. “Your fighting back like is what gave us enough time to get to you.”
“I j-j-just did what Tripp said.” She tipped back far enough to look up at him. “G-g-go in fast, hit h-h-hard. Never let him see me coming. And never give up. But he punched my chest, and he slapped me, and…” That explained her fat lip. Even as pumped as she was, Ashley was falling apart. Her cheeks were puffy and red, and tears spiked her eyelashes. She latched onto his biceps. “He was gonna kill me, Tripp. In your place. He was doing it to hurt you.”
That made no sense. “Why?”
“Because he said Trish had been out there for a reason the night he attacked her. That she led him to you, and you led him to me.”
“He admitted he hurt Tripp’s sister?” Jameson asked.
Ashley’s head bobbed. “Yes, and he said you made him look bad, Tripp.”
“Shit,” Jameson muttered. “That crowd did some hardcore taunting that night.”
Tripp shrugged. “So what? Someone called him a pussy. Told him to fight back.” Which APD’s photographer hadn’t been able to do with Ashley. Brutalizing women was bully work, best done in the dark, by weak men to weak women. It wasn’t fair fighting. The bastard could dish it out, but he couldn’t take it once his victim fought back.
Truthfully, Tripp had lost track of the guy once Jameson had knocked Tripp on his ass at his sister’s crime scene that night. After Alex had relieved him of his pistol. He’d had Trish to think about then, not some employee who should’ve been thoroughly vetted by Alexandria’s finest.
Ashley burrowed deeper into the folds of his jacket, hiding her face. He knew she was crying. “That guy hated you, Tripp,” she murmured sadly. “He saw you the night he hurt Trish. He wanted to kill you for loving her, and, I don’t know how, but he knew you loved your mom, too. He said there weren’t any rules in the game of love.”
“Crazy bastard,” Tripp muttered, as he dipped his chin to the top of Ashley’s sweaty forehead.
Peewee was finally quiet. Tripp had a feeling that Special Agent Tate Higgins was behind the silence since he was no longer in sight. Tucker Chase still roamed the entire apartment, searching for evidence, which was downright disconcerting. Tripp didn’t need Chase finding his face paint and jumping to conclusions about a certain vigilante.
“Director Chase?” he asked, hoping to distract the FBI director on the prowl. “Want to bet you’ll find photographic evidence inside this guy’s home that will tie him to every murder he’s ever committed? Maybe others we don’t know about?”
Tucker nodded. “Already got a man on it. The second Isaiah gets back to me, I’ll let you know what he found.”
“Do we have a name?” Jameson asked.
“Doug Driscoll. He was APD’s crime scene photographer, which gave him all the inside information he needed. Also helped him escape notice. Hold on. Here’s Isaiah now.” Tucker cocked his head the same way Jameson always did. Was Tuck listening to Isaiah? Sure looked like it. His eyes were unfocused, as if he were watching something far away. “Driscoll’s been with APD a little over two years. Lived in Atlanta before that. He’s got… shit! Do not enter until Tate arrives. I’m sending back up, Isaiah!”
What the hell?
Tucker broke whatever psychic connection he had with Isaiah, shook his head, then turned to Tripp and hissed, “Driscoll’s got a gawddamned shrine inside his place. Photos of dozens of victims, all female. But the largest is a blurry shot of Ashley in the center of what looks like an altar.”
“How do you even know that?” Tripp asked, pressing Ashley more firmly inside his jacket, wishing he could absorb her to be able to always keep her safe. “Isaiah couldn’t have gotten to Driscoll’s place already. He just went downstairs. It isn’t humanly possible.”
Tucker tapped his index finger to his temple, that far-off gaze back in place. “Oh, good to know. You’re right. Carry on.” Tuck turned to Tripp. “False alarm. Isaiah isn’t at Driscoll’s apartment. It’s in Arlington, but he’s still downstairs with the body. Isaiah doesn’t need to travel to investigate crimes like you and I would,” Tucker said, with something that sounded like pride in his tone. “Trust me. My guys are the best.”
“He can tell all that just by being with a dead body?” Un-fuckin’-believable.
“By reading that body, yes. Isaiah’s a Level Ten.” Tucker said that like being a Level Ten explained everything. “You’d be surprised what he can get out of a dead man’s mind if the death is recent.”
“So this is what psychics do,” Jameson murmured. “Interesting.”
Tripp needed more than psychic babble. “And Eden and Ky? Where’d they go?”
Tucker stuck his big square chin at the shared wall between Tripp’s and Ashley’s apartments. “They’re next door with Tate. He’s our Doctor Doolittle. He’ll see to it Peewee’s taken care of for as long as you need, ma’am,” Tucker told Ashley. “These two apartments are now crime scenes. I’ll let you know when you can move back in.”
“Thank you,” Ashley replied. She’d wrapped both arms around Tripp’s waist. He could feel her fingers spread across his back. One cheek rested over his heart. And Tripp stopped worrying about what Tucker might find that could link him to the vigilante. Ashley was alive. That was all he cared about.
He dipped his nose into the silky depths of her hair and inhaled. Cherries and Ashley. His two favorite flavors. It had finally happened. He’d fallen, too. Into Ashley. Into love.
“You’re a damned fast learner, woman,” he murmured, a healthy load of adrenaline still working its way through his body. “I’m proud of how you handled that rat bastard.”
Tilting her chin, she looked up at him. “You saved me.” Tears of relief washed down her pretty face. Her lower lip quivered. “If you hadn’t gotten here when you did, if you hadn’t fired when you—”
“Uh-uh, that wasn’t me. That was Alex from the next building over. He fired the first shot. Jameson and I just followed up with double taps to make sure the bastard couldn’t hurt you again.”
“Alex? Your boss?” She turned to look over her shoulder. “Where’s—?”
“Here,” Alex replied gruffly from the doorway.
Man, he was a sight for sore eyes. Long, lean, and every bit the gunslinger his TEAM claimed he was. Alex shouldered past Director Chase, with a damned fine sniper rifle in his right hand. A Springfield, if Tripp wasn’t mistaken. Looked like one of those rare as hell, big-assed, Israeli, sniper rifles. If it was, it’d bear the Star of David behind its scope mount. That baby had to go for around four K. Sweet.
“Good job, guys. Ma’am.” Alex nodded respectfully to Ashley. Sirens screamed from the alley below. “Tripp, get your woman somewhere clean and quiet. She’s been through enough. Does she need a doctor?”
Ashley’s hands tightened around Tripp’s waist. “No. I just need Tripp.”
Alex never batted an eye, just sent him a silent signal to do whatever she asked.
“I’ll get a room close to the hospital,” Tripp told her. “If you change your mind, the ER’s just around the corner. You good with that?”
“You’ll stay with me?”
�
�Try and stop me.”
“Could we visit your mom, too?”
“You bet.”
Alex turned on Tucker. “You need anything more from my guys?”
“No need for you or them to stay. My team and I witnessed how everything went down. We’ll clean up here. Might be good if you paid me a visit in the next couple days, though. Details, you know.”
“I can do that,” Alex answered, shouldering his rifle, the strap as worn as the weapon.
Eden ducked into the apartment doorway with a cheery, “I’ll accompany you into your place so you can change clothes and pack an overnight bag, Ashley. Whatever’s in your crockpot, it smells divine.”
“I was making chicken and dumplings for your m-mom,” she told Tripp. “That’s what I was doing when he, when he—”
“Do you think it’s done?” he asked, trailing a finger down her cheek, needing to distract her.
“It should be. I just needed to make dumplings, and they’re easy.”
“Mom’ll understand if we don’t get to the hospital tonight.”
Something incredibly stubborn shimmered through Ashley’s soft blue eyes. “But she’ll be hungry, and she needs to see you.”
Yes, she probably was, and of course, she did. “But I need time with you.” Just you, damn it.
“Oh,” she said quietly. “I was kinda hoping you’d say that. Let me grab a change of clothes. I’ll be right back.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Ashley stayed snuggled inside Tripp’s warm jacket on the drive to the hotel. At least she’d been able to change into jeans, a gray Henley, and running shoes before Eden officially declared her entire apartment a crime scene and off limits. The afternoon had turned into evening, and for the first time in years, she wasn’t afraid of the dark. She felt lighter. Freer. The cool night air even smelled sweeter, and there was music in the song of Tripp’s truck’s tires on the street. The lights of businesses and homes passing by twinkled. Sparkled. And to think, this all began with her staying too late at work. Friday night seemed like a lifetime time ago.
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