Nathan had hurt Dani? Why hadn't she ever said anything? Lynn wondered as she frantically dialed her sister's number. She also wondered why she'd been foolish enough to ignore her own instincts and believe Nathan.
He'd said, She's my life, my world.
Not so far off from, She was the center of my universe...
The call went through to a recorded message. Lynn swore softly, then after the beep, said, “Dani, I'm home now. Call me the moment you hear this. I have to talk to you about Nathan.”
The phone went dead.
Whipping around toward the base, she saw the line dangling from a gloved hand.
“Now what was it you wanted to tell Dani about me?”
Nathan threw down the spare keys she usually kept at her computer desk and Lynn knew exactly how dangerous he really was.
Chapter Sixteen
Not knowing where Lynn was made Blade crazy with worry. She wasn't at home. Wasn't at the law office. He didn't even know where to go next.
He never should have told her about her sister. And if he hadn't made love to her, he wouldn't have had to do any explaining. She never would have found the clipping he'd been carrying in his pouch, the constant reminder of a wrong he'd had to right.
Now Lynn had taken the opportunity out of his hands.
Now she hated him, wanted nothing to do with him and there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it.
For the first time in his life, Blade wished he owned a cell phone. That way he could call around and ask about Lynn while driving to the next location. But what was next? He hadn't a clue, so when he saw an empty parking spot, he swung his Jeep into it and went in search of a pay phone.
First, he tried Stella's cell, but got her voice mail, so he left a message that Lynn had decided to shed her disguise and now he couldn't find her.
She had to be somewhere, he thought, dreading the obvious, that Cooper had gotten hold of her again.
He called Gideon next, thinking to alert him that this operation might come back to bite him. The club owner didn't sound worried, not about himself.
“Lynn's pretty resourceful, but just in case, I'll alert Logan. He and I can help you look for her, if that's what it takes.”
“Thanks. I would consider it a personal favor.”
“So the do-over backfired on you?”
“Blew up in my face.”
“Sorry to hear that, Blade. Everyone deserves a second chance.”
Gideon's motto, Blade thought, as he dialed Cass.
Upon picking up the phone, she said, “Blade,” as though she knew for sure he was on the other end. “Lynn already left, about a half hour ago.”
“She was with you?” Why hadn't he thought of that? “Where did she go?”
“Home.”
Blade cursed. “I must've just missed her!”
“Then get back there fast... and, Blade... be really, really careful.”
The last sent a chill up his spine. “You saw something?”
“It's bad, Blade. He means to kill her this time. Go!”
He was gone.
Tearing out of his parking space, he drove down the street like a madman and only by luck or by God's grace did he not run across a cop to stop him.
But when he got close to North Michigan Avenue, traffic did that for several minutes. Cursing, Blade was about to abandon the Jeep and run the rest of the way to her building on foot when he got a break. He jammed the accelerator and sped east through a yellow light.
Approaching Lynn's high rise calmed him down. That is, until he saw her leave the building with a strange man, whose arm was wrapped around her waist. He was tall and built like an athlete. Blond hair and sunglasses framed a deeply tanned face.
Throwing on the brakes, he stared. Was this some boyfriend she hadn't told him about?
Then he saw she didn't look at all relaxed and her body English was all wrong. Her hips were sticking out at a weird angle, like her companion was pressing something into the small of her back.
A gun...
The bastard had a gun on her, and they were heading straight for him!
As he pulled the Jeep to the curb, Blade realized this wasn't Timothy Cooper. Nor any of the suspects on her list. He left the vehicle and prayed Lynn wouldn't react to seeing him. As they passed him, he meant to get the bastard without getting her hurt.
Sweat broke out over his body in anticipation. He hadn't used his finely-honed skills since leaving the military. He couldn't afford to make even one mistake.
Then Lynn saw him, but she didn't react otherwise and he didn't think her abductor caught on. Noting the bastard's sunglasses were taped—he must have fixed them after she broke them during the original attack—Blade prepared himself mentally.
And then something shifted in the man's stance and the sunglasses turned to him. The next thing Blade knew, they'd veered off toward the river. Blade hurried to follow, but a group of teenagers came pouring out of a van, bouncing a basketball and blocking him.
“Out of my way!” Blade ordered.
“Hey, chill, man!” one of them said.
Another one purposely stepped in front of him and got in his face.
He shoved the kid over in time to see Lynn being pushed down a set of stairs by her abductor.
***
Lynn nearly fell once, but Nathan pressed her on, warning her that if she fell, he would shoot her right there. She believed him and cursed the fact that she had on a pair of spindly-heeled sandals. The stairs went down three levels below the street. They'd made it down two before she heard Blade's footsteps ringing above them.
“He'll catch up to us,” she warned Nathan.
“Then he's dead.”
“No! You can't kill him!” Abruptly, she changed her tune. “You're not a killer, Nathan,” she wheedled. “You simply need professional help.”
“I need Danielle, but you made sure I couldn't have her. If it wasn't for you, she would want to see me.”
He was delusional, Lynn thought, but she had to play into that. “You really do need help, Nathan. Counseling. Then Dani will agree to see you,” she lied.
“You're the problem. You just wouldn't stay put, but I found you anyway.”
“How?”
“I tried to get the Jacobek woman to talk, but she wasn't any more cooperative than you. What kind of woman holds back on her new boyfriend? I got my break the night you called your parents. Star sixty-nine is a very handy tool.”
Lynn remembered the club phone ringing right after she'd hung up. Blade had given directions to Nathan!
“I figured out how to get Danielle back,” he went on. “All I have to do is kill you.
Once you're dead, Dani will have to come home for the funeral. And I'll be there for her, all supportive and understanding. She'll be mine again, in no time.”
“Unless you get help, she won't be,” Lynn returned. “She's afraid of you.”
“She was afraid of you and your opinion of me,” Nathan countered. “That's why she left me.”
But this time Lynn knew the accusation was unfounded.
They hit the bottom level running and Nathan headed her straight into the dim reaches of the underground city auto pound. A couple of workers looked at them but immediately went back to their conversation, and a tow truck flew out the gates, the worker no doubt eager to deprive yet another motorist of his vehicle.
Glancing back over her shoulder, Lynn saw Blade come off the last set of stairs. He ran straight for them. She was torn between wanting his help and fearing for his life.
She had to do something... but what?
Emotionally distraught over Blade, exhausted to the bone, she hadn't been able to defend herself in the apartment. She hadn't fought Nathan when he'd forced her to leave. She'd gone docilely, resigned to her fate. But now she wasn't the only consideration.
Blade would take a bullet for you, Cass had told her.
If he did, it would be her fault. She'd made the mistake of overlook
ing Nathan as a suspect. She'd made another mistake coming home on her own. She'd led Blade right into a deadly trap.
I'd give my life for yours...
She believed he would.
He doesn't really die, does he?
That would be up to you...
Survival instincts for Blade as well as herself humming, Lynn bolted and ran through a row of cars, figuring Nathan would lunge for her and grab her up close as he had before. True to form, he quickly caught up to her and clutched an arm around her middle, then whipped her in a semi-circle so that she was facing Blade who was now on the other side of the row of cars.
Blade came to a sudden halt, his wary gaze shifting to her head.
That's when Lynn felt the gun pressed to her temple, when the roar of her pulse beat through her head.
With nothing to lose, she yelled a war-cry and mule-kicked and elbow-punched Nathan, and when he grunted with pain and loosened his hold, she jammed her high spiked heel down on the small bones of his foot.
He screamed in pain and let her go.
She ran straight for Blade and watched his expression change to one of horror. “Get out of the way!” she yelled. “Duck!”
“Get down!” he yelled in return, and she knew Nathan must be aiming the gun at her, but she kept running and so did Blade.
When she got close enough, Blade reached out a hand and grabbed her arm and spun her around so that he was between her and the villain, just as she knew he would. But she was ready for it. Lynn shoved Blade to the side even as Nathan fired. Blade lurched forward and blood exploded from him and splattered her.
“Oh, my God! No!” she screamed as he fell against her and slid downward, dark eyes wide and staring. “No! Oh, God, no! Blade!”
She tried grabbing him but the blood was slippery and coated her hands and he fell against one of the cars and then down to the pavement.
He doesn't really die, does he?
She'd tried to save him, but she'd failed.
“Hey, what's going on?” called one of the workers.
“Murder!” she screamed, knowing Nathan wasn't the only guilty one. “Someone call the cops!”
I would give my life for yours.
Lynn sobbed. Now he had.
Glaring at Nathan, she saw red and it was more than Blade's blood, which seemed to be everywhere.
“You won't get away with this!” she shouted.
“You won't stop me, bitch!” Nathan shrieked back.
Fury drove her forward to fight him and probably die. But he would have to kill her before she let him get away with this. His features set in a sick smile below the taped
sunglasses, he raised the gun.
But before Nathan could pull the trigger, his body arched backward and a strangled sound escaped him as blood spurted toward her once more. Nathan's hands went up to his throat and he stepped straight back into the aisle where a city truck towing a car came roaring straight at him. Slammed hard at contact, Nathan's body went flying, limbs dancing like a puppet on strings.
When he fell back to the ground, she saw the knife sticking out of his throat.
Blade's knife.
With a cry of joy, Lynn turned to find the man she loved wasn't dead, after all, just before he passed out cold.
***
“I've been doing some thinking and decided we're even,” Lynn told Blade that night, after bringing him up to date on their attacker's true identity.
“Because I took a bullet for you?”
Shuddering at how prophetic both he and Cass had been, Lynn said, “Not exactly.” Though it told her what an honorable man he was and said a whole lot about his feelings for her, as well. “I didn't mean for you to take that bullet any more than you meant to shoot an innocent woman.” She hated the fact that he was in a hospital bed because of her.
“My getting shot wasn't your fault.”
“The hell it wasn't. You said you would die for me and I didn't believe you.” And for an agonizing moment, she had thought he was dead. “My going off half-cocked set things in motion.”
“I think maybe fate had a hand in those things.”
“That doesn't change the fact that you got shot and could have died trying to protect me.”
“But you saved me,” he said. “I owe my life to you.”
Thankfully, her shoving Blade at the last second probably had saved his life as she'd hoped it would. The bullet had gone through his side, missing vital organs. And then after Nathan had been hit by the truck, she'd returned to an unconscious Blade and had put pressure on his wound to make certain he didn't bleed to death until the paramedics arrived.
A couple of days in the hospital, and Blade would be free to go home. A couple of weeks of healing time and he would be as good as new.
If only fixing their relationship could be so simple.
“It's over,” he said, confirming it in her mind. “You don't have to worry about Nathan coming after you ever again.”
“And Dani can home.”
While the medical examiner couldn't be sure whether the knife or being hit by the truck had killed Nathan, he was dead. Stella assured her that no charges would be brought against Blade. Still, Lynn was inexplicably saddened for Nathan, because she knew that he hadn't been purely evil. But his love had been warped. Something in his past had twisted him. If he'd gotten the help he'd needed...
But it was too late for that now.
It was too late for a lot of things.
Lynn rose from her chair. “I should go now and let you get some rest.”
A hand flashed out from the bed and fastened around her wrist. “I would rest better if I knew where you were.”
Her pulse fluttered under the long, warm fingers that held her fast. “I'll be at home.”
“I mean personally. As in being with you.”
He wanted to be with her? The thought made her chest hurt and throat tight with a lump of emotion.
“You can't leave that bed yet,” she softly protested.
“Maybe not, but I could make room for you.” Without letting go of her, he did just that. “The question is... do you have room for me... in your life?”
What was he asking her? Lynn's heartbeat quickened.
“You really want me to be in your life after I was so awful to you?”
“You were in shock,” he said, “and you had a right to be furious with me for not telling you the truth sooner. But I love you, Lynn, and whether or not we're from two different worlds, I think we have a shot at being happy together. Now come over here.”
She arched her eyebrows at him. “Is that an order?”
“Consider it an urgent request. I'm feeling faint and may need to be resuscitated at
any moment.”
Slipping into bed alongside the man she loved and pulling his head toward hers, she softly said, “Then it's an order I can't ignore.”
Epilogue
Sitting at the bar after hours on Blade's first night back to work, Gideon watched the man who was so much more than a bartender finesse the cork until it popped and a trail of fizz rolled down the neck of the champagne bottle.
“Don't waste it!” Cass said, laughing as she held out a flute-shaped glass.
Blade filled her glass, then three others. Each of the men took one.
“To Team Undercover,” Blade said, his appreciative gaze touching Logan, then Cass and finally Gideon. “I thank you and my lovely fiancé thanks you for helping to save her life.”
“To do-overs!” Gideon added.
They all clinked glasses and sipped at the champagne and Gideon thought this was a very good year indeed.
Not the champagne, but the actual time in his life.
Just when he'd gotten restless and had been thinking of moving on and changing identities yet again, he'd found a better use for his club, a more selfless purpose to his life. He couldn't be more content.
“How are you and Elise doing?” he asked Logan, Elise Mitchell having been their first “
case.”
“We're taking it slow for the kid's sake,” Logan said about to Elise's young son Eric. “But we're committed, and we'll know when the time is right to let the world in on it.”
Gideon joked, “Two satisfied clients, two really satisfied men.” He lifted his glass to the others. “We ought to have business cards made up. Club Undercover: no cover charge, no identification required, secrecy guaranteed.”
“To our next case,” Cass toasted.
But then her smile dimmed and she got that look in her eyes that Gideon was starting to know all too well, making him wonder exactly what she saw for their future...
~*~
If you enjoyed VIP Protector, it would be awesome if you could leave a review on Amazon. Authors depend on reviews to reach new readers.
Here is a sneak peek at Velvet Ropes, the next book in the series
Excerpt from Velvet Ropes (Club Undercover Book 3)
Prologue
Tony Vargas slipped into the blackness of his room and leaned back against the door, hugging the laptop to him as if it could prevent his heart from exploding through his narrow chest.
Then a tic of nervous laughter spilled from him, and he flicked the switch next to the door. A small chandelier—proof that the halfway house on Chicago’s south side had been a posh residence a century ago—lit the barren room with its twin beds, scarred high-boy dressers and rickety chairs. Home, such as it was, if not for long. He’d done it—he’d stolen the sanctimonious psychotherapist’s computer practically from under his nose. Should be worth a couple of C-notes on the street, if not more for what he might find inside.
And more jail time if you get caught, a little voice in his head taunted him as he threw himself on the bed, opened the laptop and turned it on.
“I won’t get caught,” he muttered. “Not this time. This time I’m golden.”
This time everything was going his way. No more days in the kitchen because he was too scrawny for harder work, no more nights being someone’s date because he wasn’t strong enough or mean enough to defend himself. And soon he would be free of the halfway house with enough money to get him a decent place… a car… women…
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