by Debra Webb
The sound of a broken twig snapping in two twisted him to the right. He took aim as branches of a fir tree swayed with the fresh breeze. Tension tightened every muscle down his spine. Three seconds. Four. A shadow slipped into his peripheral vision off to the left, and he spun, too late.
Thick dried bark scraped across the exposed skin of his arm a split second before he ducked out of the way of the massive branch she’d swung at him. He lunged as she widened her stance for another round, hiking her over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. A sharp jab of her knee knocked the air from his lungs. A growl rumbled through his chest as they hit the forest floor. He pinned her beneath him, all that lean muscle and soft skin. “You’re making this harder on yourself.”
Raleigh hooked her foot under his shin and shoved, trying to roll him onto his back. Wouldn’t work. Struggling for purchase, she bucked her hips up to dislodge his advantage. Fire ignited the subtle hints of gold around the edges of her eyes.
He secured her wrists between his hands and pulled her to her feet. “You’re under arrest.”
* * *
HEARTS WERE WILD CREATURES. Traitorous, deceitful creatures who didn’t know the difference between the US marshal who intended on bringing her in and the man she’d envisioned spending the rest of her life with up until a few months ago.
Raleigh Wilde focused on where her boots landed along the trail and not on the fact she’d actually been happy to see him. Those coastal-blue eyes, his thick dark hair she used to tangle her fingers through or his beard that would tickle her throat when he kissed her. Not to mention every ridge and valley of muscle she’d memorized from the first day they’d met all those years ago.
It’d been four months since the last time they’d stood face-to-face, and this was how it was going to end? Beckett would bring her into the Marshals’ district office, turn her over to the FBI, and whoever’d framed her for taking that donation money would enjoy their freedom while she served time for a crime she didn’t commit. Because, of all the things she hadn’t been able to depend on in this world, Beckett and his unbreakable sense of duty was something she could count on.
She sucked in a lungful of clean Oregon air. Dried needles crunched beneath her feet, red, orange and yellow foliage clinging to the thick line of trees around her aunt’s small property. It’d been a long time since she’d had the guts to come back out here. Not since her brother’s death. Pressing her cuffed wrists against her lower abdomen, she shook her head. She should’ve known Beckett Foster would be assigned her case. He was the one who knew her best, after all. The only one she’d trusted with pieces of herself. He’d known she’d come here. But she wasn’t a criminal. No matter what he believed about her or what the evidence said. She hadn’t stolen a dime from the foundation she and Calvin had built together, and she’d prove it. She’d clear her name and get her life back. She slid the edge of her thumb over the growing baby bump she kept hidden. Get her future back. “I never meant for you to get involved in any of this.”
“Don’t talk to me like we’re friends.” His heavy steps echoed loud behind her. The sun had gone down behind the mountains, making the dangerous tone in his voice that much more terrifying. The slide of steel against her spine kept her moving. Twenty feet, maybe less, until they left the safety of the trees. “My head is still bleeding.”
She was out of time. She couldn’t go to prison. She could run again, but he was so much stronger than she was, faster, bigger. Raleigh slowed. His dark, rich scent still lodged in her lungs. Outdoors and man. She hadn’t realized how much she’d missed that comforting smell until just now. She dug her nails into her palms against the truth. She hadn’t realized how much she’d missed him. They were nearing the edge of the tree line. He’d parked his truck straight ahead. The second he put her in that vehicle, it was over. She had to tell him the truth. She had to make him believe her. “Beckett, there’s something I have to tell—”
A gunshot exploded from the trailhead, echoing off the mountains at their back.
Fire burned along the edge of her neck as strong hands ripped her off the trail and into the trees. In the span of a single breath, Beckett shoved them behind a large fir. Protecting her? Raleigh clamped a hand over the wound as he drew his weapon.
Beckett released the magazine from the gun, checked it, then slammed it back into place. Just as he’d taught her when he’d insisted she needed to learn how to handle a weapon. He spun, facing her. Rough calluses tugged at her skin as he forced her hand out of the way and studied her wound. “How bad is it?”
Her heart jerked behind her rib cage as his fingers brushed against the oversensitized skin of her throat. That almost sounded like concern in his voice. But she knew better. He’d protect her because she was a fugitive whose file had come across his desk. He’d get her back into federal custody, even if he had to shoot his way out of here to do it. She was a job. Nothing more. Anything they had together had been destroyed the moment he’d turned his back on her after her arrest. Bright blue eyes locked on her, and her blood heated in an instant. She hissed as the salt in his skin aggravated the bullet’s burn on her neck and pulled back. “It’s a graze. I’m fine.”
“Good.” Beckett turned his back to her, all that concern that’d warmed her from the inside turning to ice. “Then you know the drill. Stay behind me, and don’t even think about running again.”
“Exactly where am I supposed to go?” she asked.
A short burst of laughter shook his shoulders. “Didn’t stop you from trying a few minutes ago.”
Another bullet ripped through the tree at her right, and she flinched away as fear took control. Her fingers tightened in his shirt, the cuffs cutting into the soft tissue of her inner wrists. They had to get out of here. Raleigh patted him on the shoulder. “Where are your handcuff keys?”
“US Marshals Service! Put your weapon down, get on your knees and put your hands behind your head!” Beckett pulled the trigger. Once. Twice. The shadow disappeared from the edge of the trees, but Raleigh wasn’t naive enough to believe the shooter had suddenly grown a conscience and backed down. Calvin’s disappearance couldn’t be coincidence, and neither was the fact someone had come for her minutes after Beckett showed up. He’d been followed. And he’d led a killer straight to her. “The cuffs stay on. You’re not getting away from me again.”
She focused on the slight bulge beneath his lower pant leg. Screw the cuffs. She wasn’t going to die out here. She had too much to lose. Hiking up Beckett’s pant leg, she unholstered the small revolver he kept strapped to his ankle and fired three shots toward the shooter.
Beckett twisted around. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Giving us a fighting chance.” She left the cover of trees along the trail, positioning herself as a smaller target, and backed farther into the woods. They’d have to find another way out. Whoever’d shot at them had them pinned down, and they knew it. If Beckett wanted to get her into federal custody, he’d have to do things her way. “I know these woods better than anyone. If you want to get out of here alive, you’ll do exactly as I say. Unless your oversize ego won’t let me save your life.”
He stepped out from behind the massive fir he’d shoved her behind when the bullets had started flying, gun raised at the entrance to the trail. “I don’t trust criminals.”
Air lodged in her lungs. Was that what this was all about? Why he hadn’t come to see her in county lockup. Why he hadn’t returned her dozens of calls once she’d been arrested. She’d taken a risk revealing the pieces of her past she’d shared with him, her need to have someone to rely on when so many others—family, friends—had up and disappeared from her life. She’d trusted him, believed the promise he’d made to stick by her side, no matter what happened. But, in the end, he’d been exactly like the rest of them. Unreliable. Self-righteous.
Her heart thundered in her chest as she studied his broad shoulders. She di
dn’t have to see those light eyes to sense the disgust surging through him, and her stomach twisted with nausea. He’d spent over a decade chasing fugitives for the Marshals Service, experiencing firsthand how evil people could be. She sucked in a shaky breath. Was that how he saw her now? As one of the bad guys?
Four more rounds exploded through the trees and hurled her back into the moment. Raleigh returned fire until the gun clicked empty. She tossed his backup weapon. Wouldn’t do them a damn bit of good in these woods. She’d stashed go bags all over this mountainside, including the one she’d hidden a few yards away. Except there was no extra ammunition for Beckett’s revolver. She drowned the hurt that’d been bottling inside for the hundredth time and pulled him deeper off the trail. “I don’t think you have a choice.”
Needles and leaves scratched at her skin as they ran into the trees. Another gunshot rang loud in her ears but arced wide. The sun had set behind the mountain. There was no way their attacker could spot them now, but hiking through the woods in the middle of the night brought on its own set of problems. She had to get to the first supply bag she’d buried before the shooter caught up with them.
No pressure.
Beckett’s strong grip wrapped around her arm and pulled her into his chest. She planted the sides of her hands above his heart for balance, and heat surged into her neck and face at the contact. Hard muscle shifted beneath her fingers, his breath light on her skin, and suddenly the weeks—months—since she’d last touched him disappeared. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“I’m sorry—I thought we were concerned about the gunman shooting at us.” Only the outline of his shadow and the feel of his heartbeat beneath her palm registered in the darkness. Too close. Too real. Too painful. The small life growing inside her fluttered, and it took every ounce of strength she had not to smooth her palm over her stomach in assurance. Raleigh pressed away and wrenched out of his grip. “We need to keep moving.”
A small click preceded the beam of a flashlight from behind, but she kept pushing one foot in front of the other. He’d come prepared with a flashlight. Always the Boy Scout. “Whatever you’re planning, it won’t work.”
She slowed, the weight of his attention, even in the dark, a physical pressure along her spine. Insects quieted, a light breeze rustling the dead foliage at her feet. Temperatures had already started to drop, but the emotional pain she’d ignored earlier bubbled to the surface. “All I’m planning to do, Beckett, is survive.” She faced him, raising her hands against the brightness of the flashlight. “Because in case you’ve forgotten, the only person I told about the missing donation funds is presumably dead, and someone just tried to shoot us.”
“I’m supposed to believe those two situations are linked? Hell, for all I know, that could’ve been an accomplice getting even when you took off with the money.” He lowered the flashlight to his side, his weapon still unholstered. Would he shoot her? After everything they’d been through, had her arrest really brought her so low in his eyes? “You’re one of the most intelligent women I’ve come across, Raleigh. You could’ve set up this entire charade to insert yourself back in my life, planning to get a US marshal on your side of things, but it won’t work. You and I are done. Pretending you’re in danger isn’t going to change that.”
Guess that answered her question. He’d made up his mind about their future the moment Portland Police Bureau had put the cuffs on her, and there was nothing she could do to change it. Fine. Raleigh swallowed the rejection charging up her throat and leveled her chin with the ground. He wanted the truth? She’d give him more truth than he could handle. “I’m pregnant, Beckett. With your baby.”
“What?” The flashlight beam shook in his hand, his voice barely audible over the breeze sweeping through the woods.
“You can accuse me of whatever you want. Embezzlement, orchestrating Calvin’s death, planning some elaborate scenario in which I play the damsel in distress to get your protection. I don’t care.” Lie. What they’d had... It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Raleigh rolled her shoulders back, then closed in on him, the fury tearing through her uncontrollable. “The only thing that matters to me is clearing my name so I can give this baby the life they deserve.”
He didn’t answer. Didn’t even move.
She turned her back on him, forcing herself deeper into the forest. “And I’m not going to let you stop me.”
Copyright © 2020 by Natascha Jaffa
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ISBN-13: 9780369703774
Secrets She Kept
Copyright © 2021 by Harlequin Books S.A.
The Safest Lies
First published in 2019. This edition published in 2021.
Copyright © 2019 by Debra Webb
Undercover Accomplice
First published in 2019. This edition published in 2021.
Copyright © 2019 by Carol Ericson
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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