Run from Fear

by Jami Alden

  This morning Danny wanted his opinion on the best way to ferret out a spy in a case of suspected industrial espionage at a local biotech company. Before he hung up, Danny said, “You’re coming Saturday, right?”

  Jack’s mind drew a blank. He usually had no problem committing his schedule to memory, but lately his close proximity to Talia was scrambling his brain so much he was going to have to work harder to keep his shit together.

  “Jesus, I know you’re walking around with most of your blood in your dick, but don’t tell me you forgot my father’s engagement party?”

  Right. Now he remembered. After years of living like a monk as he searched the world for his missing wife, Joe Taggart and his sons had finally discovered that Anna Taggart had been dead for nearly two decades. Finally able to move on, Joe had found love again in the arms of a woman who had worked with Gemini to find her missing daughter.

  Jack squeezed his eyes shut. “I don’t think so, Danny. Talia works Saturdays and I can’t leave her alone—”

  “Bring her. Tell her to take the night off.”

  “I don’t know if it’s such a good idea—”

  “Goddamn it, Jack, you’re one of my best friends and you’ve known my dad for years. You’re really going to let us down for some damaged goods who’s never going to fuck you—”

  “Don’t you fucking talk about her like that,” Jack shouted. If Danny had been in front of him, Jack would have had his hands around his throat. “I know we go way back, and you’re worried about me getting pulled into another bad situation. But I care about Talia and I don’t want to see her hurt, especially by my so-called friends.”

  He cringed at Danny’s satisfied chuckle. Danny loved nothing better than to find a person’s weak spot and give it a good poke. “Bring her Saturday. Let her prove to me she’s worth the trouble. I promise I’ll be nice.”

  “I swear to God if you so much as look at her sideways, I’ll put your ass in a sling.”

  “You are such a goner.”

  Jack hung up, a lump of dread in his stomach as he realized his friend was probably right. He was a goner, and the last few days had only rammed the truth home.

  Why the hell did he do this to himself? Why couldn’t he just find some nice, normal girl who didn’t need saving? Or at least someone capable of overcoming her dysfunction enough to have a semi-normal relationship?

  Although, Jack reflected, given his history, he didn’t know if he’d recognize a normal relationship if it came up and bit him in the ass.

  So yeah, here he was again, charging in like a superhero for a woman who wouldn’t or couldn’t give him what he wanted. And it was getting worse the more time he spent with her.

  Yeah, his physical reaction to her after seeing her for the first time in nearly two years had hit him like a sucker punch. But the more time he spent with her, the more he realized he really liked being around her.

  Even now, though it was bordering on torture to have to be so close to her and not lay a finger on her, he was anticipating the moment when she’d emerge from her room and walk down the stairs.

  A door opened and closed upstairs and his heart gave an extra hard thud against his ribs. As he heard her footsteps on the stairs, he poured her a cup of coffee and added milk. She walked into the kitchen and accepted the cup with a smile.

  “You’re spoiling me,” she said, and took a long drink. “I could really get used to having you around.”

  So could I, Jack thought with a funny twist in his chest. Take away the creep who was forcing Talia to relive her past trauma, and they were like any other couple. It was way too easy for him to imagine days like the last few—wake up to chat over a cup of coffee, go work out, run errands, work, followed by a good-natured squabble over whether to watch a documentary on the History Channel or another episode of Top Chef before heading off to bed—stretching endlessly into the future.

  Okay, to be fair, if he had his way, he’d skip the TV and go straight to bed. With Talia. Where they could argue over who got to be on top before he had her until they were both too weak to move.

  But yeah, that wasn’t happening. “So far Cole has no leads on how the recording got leaked, so you’re stuck with me for now.”

  Talia didn’t say anything, but her full lips curved into a little smile that hit him square in the gut. The smile was gone in an instant and she once again turned serious. “It has to be someone from David’s organization. No one else could possibly know about the necklace or the flowers. Someone who would have had access to Nate’s computer files…” She shuddered a little.

  Jack leaned one hip on the kitchen counter and watched her move about the kitchen preparing her customary preworkout smoothie. She grabbed a container of yogurt from the refrigerator and looked at him with a raised eyebrow. At his nod, she grabbed another and set about making smoothies for two.

  Suddenly his brain flashed back to the afternoon, roughly two and a half years ago, when he’d showed up at Club One for his first day of work as the new head of security. The first time he’d ever laid eyes on Talia Vega. She’d been dressed in black, a dress that covered her from neck to knee yet did nothing to hide a siren’s body that would have tempted the pope to sin.

  She’d raked him up and down with her dark, heavily made-up eyes, her red, painted lips curled into a parody of a smile. “So you’re the one they sent over to keep an eye on things? Let’s hope your brain is bigger than your biceps.”

  If someone had told him then that he’d be standing in a kitchen with that same woman while she made him a smoothie, Jack would have thought it portended the coming of the apocalypse.

  “That makes the most sense, but it will be tough. After Nate was killed, Maxwell nuked any and all records of anyone associated with him. It will be difficult to track everyone down. I’m trying to find the guy who hooked me up with the security company that got me the gig at Club One, to see if he knows what any of the rest of the crew are doing, but he’s dropped off the map.”

  Talia filled two glasses with the yogurt and fruit-protein-powder concoction and handed him one. “How did you ever end up with that bunch of losers anyway? It’s obvious you had connections—wasn’t Danny’s company established by then? If you were going to go into security, why sign on with a bunch of criminals?”

  There were a lot of reasons, but the last thing he wanted to do was start unloading his tragic baggage on what had started out as not a terrible morning.

  “I mean, I know how I ended up there,” Talia continued, “because I was stupid enough to fall for Maxwell and think he was going to give me a shiny new life in the suburbs, but I would think that you’d be a hell of a lot smarter than me.”

  Jack’s jaw tightened. At the time, smart had nothing to do with it. He hadn’t given a shit about the work, himself, or much of anything else. However, he’d had the good sense to realize if he’d taken Danny up on his offer of a spot at Gemini Securities, he probably would have fucked it up in the state he was in. In which case he would have been out a job and, more importantly, minus a friend.

  “It seemed like a good fit at the time,” he said.

  She looked at him, one slim dark eyebrow cocked in a look that was reminiscent of the Talia he’d met at the club, a look that said he was full of shit and wasn’t fooling her for a second.

  Realizing she wasn’t getting any answers out of him today, she shrugged and finished her drink. “What about Margaret? All of this started when she got out.”

  Jack nodded. “You’d think she’d want to keep her nose clean. But—”

  “She’s a stone-cold bitch and I wouldn’t put it past her,” Talia interjected. “Do you know she used to send me brochures about the group home Rosie would go to if I lost custody? As if I needed to be reminded what was at stake if I tried to screw them over.” She set her empty glass down, the glass rattling on the countertop, and looked at him. Her eyes dark and troubled. “What if she hurts Rosie? She knows that’s the best way to get to me—” />
  Jack wanted to pull her into his arms and reassure her, but he settled for taking her hands in his. Her hands were cold. Jack brushed his thumbs over the backs of them. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. So far, everything is targeted at you, and we don’t even know if Margaret’s behind the threats. But it’s a good theory, which is why I’m having Toni take a look at Margaret’s financial activity and see if we can connect her with anyone who might have been on David’s payroll in the past.”

  Jack had assured her that Toni, Ethan’s wife, and Gemini’s resident computer whiz, would be able to follow any cybertrail Margaret might have left. “Did you find anything?” Talia asked.

  “Not yet,” Jack said, reluctantly dropping his hands before they found their way up her bare, silky forearms and up over her shoulders to drag her against him. “It’s a lot of data to sift through, so it might take a while. In the meantime, I can ask someone at Gemini to keep an eye on her.”

  Talia looked up at him as though he were crazy. “I know that for whatever reason, you’ve picked up some sort of superhero complex where you’re willing to drop everything to hang with me twenty-four-seven, but I doubt anyone else at Gemini is going to make do with a twenty-dollar-a-day stipend out of the pure goodness of his heart.”

  True, Jack knew. But he knew it would be easy enough for him to hire someone himself—maybe one of the newer guys they’d just hired who weren’t as busy yet—and pay them on the side while he let Talia think they were willing to accept charity wages.

  “And that being the case, there’s no way in hell I can afford them and tuition too.”

  Jack could. In fact, he could afford to pay for round-the-clock security for Rosie, her undergraduate and graduate degree from Stanford if she wanted it, and still have plenty of money to retire in luxury tomorrow if he wanted to.

  He’d barely touched a dime of the trust he’d inherited from his grandfather—not for himself, anyway. He didn’t want to touch a penny from the mean old bastard who’d in turn created the mean bastard who had been Jack’s father. But he hadn’t hesitated to use it to help Talia, and others, over the years.

  A fact he sensed she wouldn’t appreciate if she knew. Just to test the waters, he said, “I get paid well, and I’ve saved up a fair chunk of my paychecks the past few years. I could—”

  “No, absolutely not,” Talia said, her cheeks flushed, mouth tight. “I can take care of us now, financially anyway. If it comes down to it, I’ll pull Rosie out of school and use the money to pay for security, but right now I’m not going to mess up her life just because some asshole wants to mess with me.”

  With that, she strode past him and trotted upstairs, then trotted back down a few seconds later with her gym bag in tow. “You ready to go? I need to hit the grocery store before I go to the restaurant tonight.”

  Jack grabbed his own bag and followed her through the door that connected her kitchen to her garage. “Speaking of work,” he said, “you need to ask Susie if you can take Saturday night off.”

  Talia froze, her hand halfway to her door. “I do? Why?”

  “Because Joe Taggart’s engagement party is that night, and I promised Danny I’d be there.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t want to go to a party.”

  “Well, I need to be there, and since I’m not leaving you alone, unless we catch the asshole who sent you that stuff before Saturday, you’re going too.”

  She shook her head again, the expression on her face making her almost look scared. “I don’t think it’s such a good idea.”

  Jack’s temper flared. “Danny’s one of my best friends, and I’ve known his family for over fifteen years. You can’t take one night off?”

  He saw her wince and immediately regretted his harsh tone. “I’m sorry—”

  She held up her hand, cutting him off. “No, I’m sorry. You’re right. After everything you’ve done for me and Rosie, it shouldn’t be a big deal for me to switch my work schedule around.”

  “Thanks,” he said as they settled into the car. “But will you promise to try to look a little happier when we go?”

  Her eyes flicked to him. “I promise.” She was silent as he opened the garage door and backed her Honda out of the garage. “It’s just—”

  “What?” he asked when she cut herself off. He glanced over and saw that she was biting on her lower lip in a way that made him want to drag his tongue across the plump, pink surface.

  She shook her head. “I don’t think Danny likes me. And I’ll feel weird, being there with you, knowing he doesn’t want me there.”

  How to put this politely. “No offense, but Danny doesn’t care if you’re there as long as I’m there. And I made him promise he’d be nice.”

  Talia gave a soft chuckle. “I’ll believe that when I see it.” She was silent a few more blocks, then said softly, “I don’t want to be an imposition to anyone.”

  Jack shook his head. “It won’t be an imposition. In fact, you’ll be doing me a favor, keeping the wives from trying to hook me up with every single friend they have.”

  “Glad I can be somewhat useful,” she muttered. He half listened as she pulled out her phone and called Jennie, another one of the bartenders, to trade her Saturday shift for Jennie’s regular Tuesday slot. “Okay, we’re cool,” she said as she hung up. “What am I supposed to wear?”

  He shrugged. “Clothes?”

  She let out a frustrated sigh. “Did Danny say like, casual, cocktail, black tie?”

  “He didn’t say anything about clothes. It’s a barbecue in their backyard, so I doubt it’s fancy. And it’s California. It’s like Seattle. No one dresses up.”

  “Yeah, but doesn’t Danny’s dad live in Atherton?”

  “So?” He didn’t see what the location had to do with it.

  “Guys are so lame,” Talia huffed. “I haven’t hung around that many crazy wealthy people, and I’m sure you haven’t either…”

  Don’t be so sure of that.

  “But,” she continued, unaware she was sitting next to someone who came from a fortune that totaled well into the nine digits, “from what I’ve seen, there will be women there carrying purses that cost more than my car.”

  “Wait, how did we get from purses to cars?”

  “You know what I mean,” she said.

  He really didn’t. Still, he tried to think back to when his parents used to host backyard pool parties when he was a kid. Soirees his mother used to call them, whatever the hell that meant. All he knew was that while fifty or so people were milling around the pool deck eating weird things off crackers and sipping drinks, his father would be on his best behavior. He’d put on a big show of being the loving family man, hugging his wife, bragging to anyone who would listen about how well Jack was doing in football and how Lizzy was taking advanced algebra as a seventh grader.

  Of course, later, after the last guest had departed, his father, fueled by single malt, would go to town on all of them, racking up the list of the ways they’d all embarrassed him in front of his friends and colleagues.

  Jack had learned early that the party was never over until one of them had a black eye or a cracked rib.

  He shook off the ugly memories and tried to remember what his mother and the other women had worn at those “casual” backyard get-togethers.

  “How about a sundress or something?” Come to think of it, he wouldn’t mind seeing Talia’s legs on display.

  Talia rolled her eyes. “You’re useless. I’ll ask Susie.”

  The rest of the day was business as usual, a rough workout followed by food and errands. They ran into Susie at Gus’s gym, and Talia got her wardrobe consultation and called Rosie to go shopping with them the following afternoon.

  Jack reminded Susie they would be at the restaurant a couple hours before they opened for dinner so he could install the upgrades to the security system. They still weren’t sure if whoever had slipped the DVD into Talia’s purse had done it at the restaurant, but Jack wasn’t taking
any chances.

  If the sick fuck who was messing with her tried anything at Suzette’s, he would catch it on video.

  Jack was mounting a tiny surveillance camera in a light fixture outside the kitchen door when Talia came over, clutching her phone in her hand, her face pale.

  “What?” he asked as he climbed off the stepladder.

  “I just got a call from Detective Nolan of the Redwood City PD. He wants to talk to me about the DVD of my attack.”

  Jack’s brows knit together at the bridge of his nose. “You’re out of his jurisdiction.”

  Talia nodded and tried to swallow back the anxious knot that had settled at the base of her throat. “He thinks it may be relevant to a case he’s working on. He wouldn’t give me any more details than that, but he’ll be here in fifteen minutes, so I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”

  Talia left Jack to his work and went back to the bar, where she was using the extra time to do a thorough check of all the stock and make sure everything was set for Jennie to cover her shift on Saturday.

  Her mind was spinning with questions. Her attacker was dead, shot three times, the last one a head shot, by Cole Williams. What could her near rape and murder at the hands of Nate Brewster have to do with anything? Distracted, she nearly cut off the tip of her index finger when she was prepping the lemons.

  She was stacking the glasses behind the bar when she caught a shadow of movement in the corner of her eye. She turned around to see a tall man a couple years older than her with chiseled features and light brown hair cut in a short, no-nonsense style. He wore a dark suit that wasn’t overly expensive but that fit his rangy, broad-shouldered frame nicely.

  “Talia Vega?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “I’m Detective Nolan.” He flashed his badge and offered his hand to shake. He smiled slightly, showing white teeth and making his dark eyes crinkle at the corners. He was good-looking, Talia decided, though the touch of his calloused palm against hers didn’t make her stomach do any back handsprings. “Thanks for taking the time to talk to me.”