* * *
“That was a quick trip back,” Luther remarked as he walked into the small conference room to meet with his lawyer. He watched the other door, but it didn’t open. “Just you and me?” he asked as he took a seat at the table.
His lawyer nodded, but not a slicked-back hair on his head moved.
Luther rubbed his hands together, feeling that fortunes were at last turning back in his favor. That ADA must have finally successfully gotten rid of Jocelyn Gerber.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Your trial,” the lawyer replied.
He nodded. “Yeah, in a couple weeks,” he said.
The lawyer shook his head now. “No. A couple of days. Judge Holmes cleared his docket and got it moved up.”
Was that the judge’s way of getting back at him for messing with his daughter? Not that he could prove Luther had anything to do with that.
Nobody could. The only person alive who could testify to his involvement was too smart to risk it. Not only would it implicate himself, but it would end his life.
Luther’s heart began to race, and not with the good kind of excitement. “No. That’s too soon. We haven’t found the witness or gotten rid of the evidence yet.”
The lawyer shrugged.
“Why the hell did you let that happen?” Luther demanded to know. “I pay you the big bucks to help me.” But he’d done damn little of that so far.
“I had no argument to use against the judge moving up the date,” the lawyer replied. “I thought you’d be eager to get out of here.”
“To go to court?” Luther asked. He shook his head. “I want to get out of here for good.” Not just to be brought back at the end of each day of the trial.
Another plan was already taking shape in his mind, though. He wasn’t giving up yet. And if Jocelyn Gerber was to suddenly turn up dead, the trial would have to be postponed while another assistant district attorney was brought up to speed on the case. That would give him a little more time to perfect his new plan, so it wouldn’t fail as badly as his previous one—to take out everyone associated with his trial—had failed.
That would have been ideal, would have gotten the charges against him dropped. But since that wouldn’t work, he would have to adapt.
The lawyer looked at him uneasily. He probably knew that Luther was coming up with something. But he didn’t ask what it was, because of that plausible deniability thing he kept talking about. He was going to have to forget about that, though, and finally earn all the money Luther was paying him.
Because this new plan could not fail. Luther was not going to prison for the rest of his life. Hell, once he got out of jail, he intended to never return. Luther Mills was not going down for the crimes he’d already committed or for the ones he was about to commit.
* * *
Jocelyn loved Landon so damn much. That was why she’d stopped him from saying whatever he’d been about to say. If he’d been about to declare his feelings for her, she hadn’t wanted to hear them. If he felt the same way about her...
Then she might not be able to follow through with what she needed to do. She needed to prosecute Luther Mills. And she would be doing that sooner than expected per the call she’d just taken from Judge Holmes.
She couldn’t give that her full attention if she knew that Landon was in danger because of her. And if he continued to be her bodyguard during the trial, he would be in danger.
She wouldn’t be able to get him removed from the assignment, though. After she’d been so wrong about Tyce Jackson, she doubted that Parker Payne would listen to her. Like the rest of his team, he didn’t even like her. Those people were Landon’s friends. Even if she survived the trial, she knew that she and Landon could never have a relationship.
The people who mattered most to him couldn’t stand her. They would never support their being together. So it wasn’t as if she had the hope of a future with Landon anyway. But she wanted him to have a future.
So she had to get him to quit his job. She had to make him mad enough to no longer want to protect her. She wasn’t sure what that might take since being protective was such a part of his nature.
She reached for the bathroom door and drew in a deep breath, bracing herself for what she had to do. She’d pulled on the robe she’d left hanging on the back of the door and had tied it tightly around herself, as if it might hold her together when she felt like falling apart.
She didn’t want to lose Landon. But it was better to lose him as a lover than for him to lose his life. Just as she’d struggled after her grandparents’ murders, she would struggle after Landon’s—struggle with living in a world without him. He might hate her, but she wouldn’t care as long as he was safe.
She pulled open the door and stepped out.
“Who was that?” Landon asked. He’d pulled on his jeans but left them unbuttoned and riding low on his lean hips. He was so damn good-looking it wasn’t fair—not to Jocelyn’s furiously pounding heart.
She wanted him again. But she loved him too much to keep putting him in danger. She replied, “Judge Holmes.”
“Is Tyce okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yes. He and Bella are going out of the country, so nobody can get to her during the trial. The judge has also managed to move up the trial date.”
Landon gasped. “Why would he do that?”
She suspected that it was for the same reason she was happy that he had. “So all this will be over soon.”
“It’s too dangerous,” Landon said, as he had just a short time ago.
She agreed, but instead, she shook her head. “It’s smart. We need to get Luther convicted and sentenced to a high-security prison with guards who will hopefully do him no special favors.”
She hadn’t figured out yet which ones were helping him, but she and the chief would. Woodrow Lynch was as determined to stop Luther as she was.
“You don’t need to have any part in this,” Landon said. “You can let someone else do this.”
“The only person I would trust to try Luther besides me is off on maternity leave,” she reminded him. “I have to do this.”
He drew in a deep breath. “Okay, then I’ll do everything in my power to keep you safe.”
That was her greatest fear. She shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said.
His brow furrowed. “What?”
“Your protecting me,” she said.
“Why not?”
She gestured at the bed with the sheets tangled from their lovemaking. “We crossed a line, Landon.”
“We did more than that,” he said, and he moved closer, his arms outstretched for her.
But she stepped back. He could not touch her. If he did, she might not stick with her plan. “No.” She shook her head. “We didn’t.”
“What are you saying?”
“That being with you was a good distraction from worrying about the case,” she said. “But that’s all it was. And now I can’t afford any distractions.”
He snorted. “Just a distraction...”
Maybe he knew her better than she’d realized now. Maybe he already knew how she felt about him, that she loved him.
She turned away from him, so he wouldn’t see the longing on her face. And hopefully he would think she was dismissing him and what they’d shared. She opened her closet door and peered inside, but she couldn’t see any of the clothes hanging from the rods because tears were blurring her vision.
She kept her voice clear and sharp, though, when she replied, “Yes. You must know you and I have no future together.” And they wouldn’t, if he died. But she forced herself to sound haughty and snobbish and added, “My parents would never approve of my involvement with a bodyguard.”
She silently apologized for misrepresenting the people who’d raised her. They were not snobs. Th
ey didn’t care what anyone did for a living as long as they were a good person. And they didn’t come any better than Landon.
Her parents would love him...just like she loved him.
He sucked in a breath, though. “I didn’t realize I wasn’t good enough for you.”
He was too good; that was why she had to let him go. She forced herself to turn back to him and look down her nose at him. “Come on, Landon. You see where I live.” She gestured at the massive master bedroom. “You see how hard I work. I have big aspirations.”
For law and order—nothing else.
“I don’t have room in my life for someone like you,” she continued coldly.
A muscle twitched in his cheek just above his rigidly clenched jaw. “No,” he agreed. “You don’t.”
That was what she’d wanted—to make him angry, to hurt him, so that he would give up his assignment. But she felt a twinge of pain for causing him pain.
She loved him so much...that she hated hurting him. But it was better than getting him killed.
“Good,” she said. “Then you agree that I need to have another bodyguard for the duration of the trial.”
He nodded. “We agree,” he said. “You don’t need me.” He walked out of the bedroom with a finality that had panic flashing through her.
Would she see him again? Was he leaving now? Without even really saying goodbye...
But then, she’d already said it all—cruelly. And she knew that he would probably never forgive her.
CHAPTER 22
She was never going to forgive him. But she’d left Landon no choice. He needed to save her life, and since she didn’t want him as her bodyguard, that left him only one option: to make sure she was not able to prosecute Luther Mills.
If she wasn’t threatening his freedom, then Luther would have no reason to want her dead. She would be safe.
Safe but furious.
Did it matter, though? If he believed what she’d just told him, then he had no chance of a future with her anyway. But he wasn’t entirely sure that he believed what she’d told him...or if she’d only been trying to make him mad enough to quit his assignment.
Something she almost confirmed when she descended the stairs and remarked, “I’m surprised you’re still here.”
She’d expected him to run off in anger. Maybe she’d been counting on it.
“I wouldn’t leave you unprotected,” he said. He was too well aware of what had happened the last time she’d taken off alone. Even though she’d looped a scarf around her neck, he could still see a bit of the bruise from her nearly being strangled to death.
How had she not learned how vulnerable she was from that experience?
She moved her hand to the bright-patterned scarf, pulling it up enough that it covered the bruise. “Is Parker sending over someone else?” she asked, and she sounded impatient, as if she couldn’t wait for him to be gone.
Before he could answer, the doorbell rang. And she breathed a sigh of relief, probably thinking his replacement had arrived. She would not be happy when she saw whom he’d called and figured out why.
But he would do anything to protect her, even if she hated him for the rest of their lives over what he’d done.
“It’s Dubridge,” a deep voice called through the door as Landon walked toward it.
“Are you and Keeli switching assignments?” Jocelyn asked almost hopefully.
Keeli was a damn good bodyguard, but Landon didn’t trust her to protect Jocelyn any more than he trusted himself right now. Luther was entirely too dangerous. The only way the bodyguards had been able to protect their principals from harm had been to take them away where Luther would not be able to find them.
But Jocelyn refused to leave River City. She refused to give up the case. So Luther would know right where to find her: the courthouse.
Or her office as she prepared for the trial. He had no doubt that was where she was heading now. But she wouldn’t get there. He unlocked and opened the door, stepping back to let Dubridge and Keeli walk past him.
They both looked at him as they passed. Dubridge appeared skeptical. Keeli looked triumphant and sympathetic at the same time. She reached out and squeezed Landon’s hand as she passed him. And both Jocelyn and Dubridge noticed and narrowed their eyes as if jealous.
Which was funny since Jocelyn had said she cared only about her career and all Dubridge had done was give Keeli grief since she’d been assigned the job of his bodyguard.
“You have to be wrong,” Detective Dubridge told Landon.
“No, he’s right,” Jocelyn said. “I want a different bodyguard. It’s for the best.”
“Why?” Keeli asked. “Because he figured out what you’ve been up to?”
Jocelyn’s brow furrowed with confusion. “What?”
Landon quickly glanced away from her, though. He couldn’t look at her when he did this. So he focused on the detective. “The evidence is in the briefcase,” he said. Fortunately, she hadn’t had time to close it yet, so the phone and pill bottle were easily visible.
“You called him about that?” Jocelyn asked. “I was going to bring it to him.”
Landon shook his head. “No. You weren’t.” But he was talking to Dubridge instead of her. “If I hadn’t heard the text Luther sent her, I wouldn’t have found it.”
Keeli sucked in a breath. “Luther sent her a text?”
Landon nodded. “Thanking her for tipping him off about Tyce finding the judge’s daughter.”
Dubridge cursed.
But Keeli cursed louder and lunged toward Jocelyn. Landon stepped between them. He was trying to protect Jocelyn—not put her in more physical danger.
“How could you!” Keeli shouted. “He could have died.”
“I didn’t purposely tip him off,” Jocelyn defended herself.
But it was too late. Dubridge was inspecting the phone and the pill bottle. “She drugged the backup bodyguards,” he murmured. “But why...?”
“To get rid of Landon,” Keeli replied. “Just like she tried getting rid of Tyce. She’s trying to get us all killed—it’s part of her and Luther’s plan.”
Jocelyn gasped in outrage. “I am not working with Luther Mills.”
But Dubridge just shook his head and pulled his handcuffs off the clip on his belt. “I have to bring you in, Jocelyn.”
“This is ridiculous,” she insisted. “I can explain the phone and the pill bottle. Someone planted them in my filing cabinet in my office.”
“A locked office,” Landon said, and he shook his head as if he didn’t believe her. “And she only claimed that after I found the items in her briefcase.”
“You don’t believe her?” Dubridge asked, and he focused his dark gaze on Landon now.
He didn’t want to lie. But he had to—to keep her safe and alive. He shook his head. “No. I don’t.”
A cry slipped through her lips, as if he’d slapped her. And maybe he had—emotionally instead of physically. “I can’t believe you’re doing this,” she said. “I don’t understand.”
“I couldn’t let you get away with it,” he said.
She cursed him. “How could you! You know I hate Luther as much as you do. That I want to bring him to justice!”
Dubridge linked her arms behind her back and snapped the cuffs around her wrists.
And both she and Landon flinched. He didn’t want her hurt. He hadn’t thought Dubridge would actually lead her away in handcuffs. But that was the kind of cop he was: by the book. The kind of cop Landon had been.
Shame flashed through him that he’d caused her arrest when he knew the truth. But finding those items in her briefcase looked bad for her.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “You’re going to screw up the whole case against Luther. You’re going to delay the trial and get another ADA assigned to it.”
Then the color drained from her face, leaving her eyes wide and bright. “You’re the one working for him. You must be. You’re trying to get me taken off the case.”
He wasn’t working for Luther. He was working for her—to keep her safe. But just like he’d had his doubts about her when he’d first found those things in her briefcase, she clearly still had doubts about him.
No matter how much he cared about her—even loved her—he realized she was right. They could never have a relationship, and not just because she claimed he wasn’t good enough for her, but because they couldn’t completely trust each other.
And now, after what he’d done, he realized he’d destroyed that trust even more as well as what—if any—chance he’d had for a future with her.
But at least she would have a future—if she was taken off the case. Luther Mills would have no reason to kill her now.
Now Landon was the one in danger, though, because as Detective Dubridge led her away in handcuffs, Jocelyn looked as though she wanted to kill Landon.
* * *
She’s a lawyer, Landon had warned Dubridge before he closed the door and locked Jocelyn into the back of his department-issued sedan. She’s good at presenting arguments, so don’t let her get to you.
She’d glared at him then—like she glared at him now as he sat in on the meeting she’d convinced Dubridge to call with the chief and the district attorney and Parker Payne. Fortunately for her, the detective had listened.
“You let her get to you,” Landon remarked to Dubridge.
The detective shook his head. “I think you’re the one she got to.”
No. Landon had gotten to her, had gotten her to trust him. Then he’d betrayed her. He could have destroyed her had she not convinced the detective to take off the cuffs and hold off on booking her until he spoke to the others.
With the cuffs off, she was able to pull down her scarf. “If I’m working for Luther, why would he have tried so many times to have me killed?” she asked. She pointed to the bruise on her throat. “This happened just as I found that stuff—” she gestured toward where the bottle and phone sat on the chief’s desk “—in my filing cabinet. Someone had planted it there, and then they nearly killed me.”
Harlequin Romantic Suspense July 2021 Box Set Page 61
