Читать книгу Bodyguard With A Badge - Elizabeth Heiter - Страница 10

Chapter Two

He’d found her. After all this time, she’d finally started to feel safe again, as if she didn’t have to constantly look over her shoulder. But somehow, he’d found her and sent his goons after her.

These stupefied thoughts ran through Juliette Lawson’s mind as she put one foot in front of the other. Her body had gone numb, but she could still feel the exact spot where the cold metal of a gun barrel pressed against her head.

The thug walking behind her had grabbed her just when she’d thought she was going to escape. She’d been in the bathroom when she’d heard screaming that morning. She’d peeked out in time to see three men enter, holding pictures of her. She’d never seen any of them before, but she knew why they’d come.

Initially, she’d darted back into the bathroom, hoping to hide, praying they wouldn’t find her, that they’d just leave. But it soon became clear hiding wouldn’t work, so she’d tried to slip down the back stairs. Just as she’d been reaching for the door to the exit, this one had come up behind her and put a gun to her head. He’d led her out the back door, out of sight of the police officers gathered in the distance and farther away from help.

She’d considered screaming, but fear had trapped it in her throat and then she’d realized if she did yell for help, he’d probably shoot.

Now, the gunman jabbed her with his weapon every few steps, pressuring her to move faster up the little dirt trail through the woods. But they were moving uphill at a steep angle, and she was wearing heels. If she picked up her pace any more, she was going to stumble. And the faster she walked, the less chance she had of figuring out a way to escape before he reached the next step of his plan.

Juliette knew the next step of his plan was to do one of two things: either get her somewhere secluded and kill her, or take her back to Dylan. It was like comparing a death sentence to life behind bars. She wasn’t sure which was worse.

But she did know that if Dylan had hired him, this guy had training. Even if by some miracle, she managed to wrestle the gun away from him, he’d be able to take her down. If she ran, he’d probably shoot. And he wouldn’t miss.

She tried to push aside all the regrets she felt, to focus on survival, but one regret kept surfacing. If only she’d never met Dylan Keane. Then maybe she’d still be back in Pennsylvania, still trying to sell the paintings she loved in galleries, instead of trying to be invisible as a graphic designer and spending her days buried in a cubicle.

Now there was a very good chance she wouldn’t even be buried in a shallow grave. There was a good chance she was about to bleed out in the woods, and those cops who’d surrounded the office would eventually find her body. She prayed she’d be the only casualty, and the other gunmen wouldn’t hurt her colleagues.

They had no idea who she really was, no idea what danger they were in just being near her. She’d never thought she’d been putting them in harm’s way, because she’d never expected Dylan would send goons to her work. She’d always figured that if he tracked her down, he’d simply grab her out of her apartment one day and drag her back. Force her to live in that house again, like a prisoner. Or just kill her right there and leave her dead in her apartment until one of her neighbors noticed the smell.

Stop it, Juliette told herself. Morose thoughts weren’t going to get her out of this. She needed a plan. And even though running was pointless, it was probably her best chance.

Up ahead, the trail curved. That was the spot. She’d pretend to stumble, ditch the heels. She’d be able to run faster barefoot.

Her heart started pounding so hard she could hear the blood pumping in her ears. It seemed to block out the other noises off in the distance—the birds chirping, the FBI agent in the parking lot yelling over a loudspeaker at the gunmen, even the big, furious guy behind her insisting she pick up her pace.

The curve got closer and closer, until she knew it was time. Her heart felt out of control as she let out a squeak and pretended to trip on a protruding branch, going down on her knees and sliding out of her heels as though they’d come off in the fall. The guy’s hand closed around her arm, but the gun came down. It was no longer pointed at her head.

This was her chance.

She readied herself to shove upward, to knock him down and run as fast as she could, zigging and zagging the way Dylan had taught her, back before he realized he might not want her to escape a bullet. But she never had the chance to try.

A figure flew out of a tree, crashing past her and onto her attacker in a tangled blur of arms and legs and guns.

Juliette yelped and scurried free. The new man was armed too, a Glock strapped to his hip, and a whole slew of other equipment attached to his body that suggested he was in the military. He was all motion, just smooth brown skin and bulging muscles and full of confidence as he drew back a fist and sent it crashing into the gunman’s jaw.

The gunman took the hit with a growl and tried to flip the new guy, but Juliette didn’t wait around to see who’d come out on top or how long the fight would last. She caught a glimpse of intense, dark brown eyes on her rescuer and decided he was some kind of Special Operations soldier. She had no idea what he was doing in the woods, but she said a silent thank you and stumbled to her feet, darting off the trail.

She was pretty sure the soldier was going to prevail in the fight happening behind her, but even if he wasn’t with the law enforcement surrounding the office complex, he’d surely turn her over to them.

And then there was no question what would happen next: she’d be headed straight back to Dylan, straight back to the life she thought she’d finally escaped.

* * *

“WHAT DO YOU think you’re doing?”

A strong hand closed around her arm, bringing Juliette to a stop. Her bare feet almost slid out from underneath her on the trail, which was slippery from the leaves that had begun falling off the trees a week ago. Before she could go down, her rescuer dropped his hand from her arm to her waist, catching her.

“It’s over,” he said, his voice reassuring. His fingers pressed into the top of her hip, keeping her from making another run for it, away from everyone. “The guy’s in handcuffs. You’re safe.”

Juliette stared up at him. He probably had four inches on her height of five foot six, just enough so she had to tip her head back to look him in the eyes. They were deep brown, almost hypnotizing the way they were locked onto hers as though he didn’t see anything else in the world right now.

She knew it was only because he was trying to convince her everything was going to be okay, but that didn’t stop a shiver of awareness from working its way up from her toes.

Thank goodness he misunderstood the reason. He told her, “I’m Andre Diaz, with the FBI. I promise you, you’re safe with me, okay? And we’re going to get your colleagues out of there. But right now, I need you to come with me.”

Instead of letting go of her waist, he led her back down the trail toward the parking lot, guiding her like she was in shock. Which maybe she was, because she couldn’t believe any of this was happening.

She’d been on the run for three years. She’d managed to hide, to somehow stay one step ahead of Dylan all that time. And now it was over.

Those first few months, heck, that entire first year, she’d jumped at every noise and slept with the lights on most nights. But lately, she’d found herself relaxing. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d looked over her shoulder or run to her car clutching her mace in one hand, certain one of Dylan’s lackeys was on her trail.

She’d let her guard down, created a new life for herself. It hadn’t been a full life, but it had been hers. And now it was over.

Glancing at Andre as he helped her down the trail, carefully avoiding any sharp sticks or rocks on the trail because of her bare feet, tears blurred her vision. Not out of fear, but because someone cared enough to bother helping her. She blinked them away.

Now wasn’t the time to get emotional because some guy was doing his job, because apparently some members of law enforcement really were on the side of the victims. And now really wasn’t the time to fixate on the feel of his strong hand grasping the top of her hip as he led her to all those blinking red and blue lights in front of her office building. But she couldn’t help but be hyperaware of the pure masculine scent of him beside her, the ridiculously hard bicep pressing into her back.

She dragged her feet as they hit the concrete, glancing up at the third floor where all her colleagues were, terrified because of her. And she realized Andre had carefully led her to a vehicle on a path that kept her completely out of view of the windows up on the third floor.

“Hop in here,” he told her, holding open the back of an SUV with tinted windows. When she hesitated, he added, “It’s my boss’s vehicle. You’ll be okay. It’s surrounded by my team, and there’s no way anyone’s getting past them. When this is over, we’ll get you home safely.”

She hesitated once more, because she could never go home again. Not to any of the places she’d ever called home over the years.

Then, the tat, tat, tat of a semiautomatic boomed, followed by two more shots in quick succession, and someone let out a piercing scream.

Juliette spun toward the sound, dreading what she was going to see—who had gotten hurt because of her. But she never found out, because Andre shoved her into the SUV and dove on top of her.

The weight of him flattened all the air from her lungs, and the awareness she’d felt earlier when he’d simply had his hand on her waist multiplied, making her skin seem to buzz wherever it touched his. Even though he was simply protecting her, she was suddenly keenly aware of how long it had been since someone had held her.

She tried not to squirm and prayed she wasn’t flushed deep red as he spoke into some kind of communications device she realized went from his ear to a microphone at his neck. Then just as quickly, he was helping her up.

She felt dazed, still trying to catch her breath as he told her, “It’s over. All of your colleagues are okay.”

“What?” The word came out breathy and filled with disbelief. How could it possibly be over that fast? And how could everyone be unharmed?

He gave her a grin that made a dimple pop on one side and said, “We’re good at what we do.”

She stared back at him, taking in all the details she hadn’t noticed before: his cleanly shaved head, the cleft in his chin, the complete focus in his eyes. Beneath that, genuine warmth, as if he really cared what happened to her and it wasn’t just his job to keep her safe for the next few minutes.

Don’t fall for him, she chanted in her head. She’d just met him. She knew nothing about him, other than that he was willing to put his life on the line for others.

She’d fallen for Dylan that way: instantly. A sudden, ridiculous attraction that she’d mistakenly thought was love. She’d fallen for all the things she thought she’d seen in him that had turned out not to be true. And she was seeing all those qualities in Andre’s eyes right now: the goodness, the honesty, the protectiveness. Except she suspected with Andre, they were actually real.

His gaze seemed to bore into her and then she saw something else: a reciprocal glint of attraction. It made her want to lean closer and tell him the truth about what had happened today. To go through the process she knew they’d want: hours of questioning at some police station or maybe an FBI office, to learn why hired gunmen were after her. To trust that maybe this time someone would believe her story. That maybe this time things could really change. But she couldn’t take the chance.

He smiled at her and gave her a hand out of the vehicle.

One of the other agents, dressed as if he was going to war, slapped him on the back and said, “Why don’t you give her a ride back to Quantico? The locals are asking us to take the lead, since these gunmen might be professionals. We’re going to need a debrief.”

She could tell from Andre’s dimpled smile that when the questioning was over, he was going to ask her out. In another life, she would have said yes.

Too bad she’d never see him again after today.

* * *

“AREN’T YOU GOING to stick around and see if you can drive this woman home?” Scott teased, just as Andre thought he’d made a clean getaway.

Andre spun around in the Quantico parking lot, where they’d driven after the situation was contained. The gunman who’d fired in that office had been shot by one of HRT’s operators, but the other two had been brought in wearing handcuffs. They had both gone silent as soon as they were arrested, demanding lawyers, but the FBI had been able to ID them quickly anyway, because they had criminal records. Strangely, the woman Scott was talking about had gone just as silent as the gunmen. She claimed she didn’t know why they were after her, when clearly she did.

“Which woman?” Andre parried, even though he knew Scott wasn’t about to let him off the hook that easily.

“Juliette. Or was it Mya?”

That was the other problem. The woman he’d rescued on that hill had identified herself as Juliette Lawson. So had her colleagues. But the name scrawled next to her picture that the gunmen had all been carrying was Mya.

When they’d mentioned it to Juliette, she’d gone pale and made a beeline for the women’s bathroom, where she’d been for the past hour, either sick or just hiding out.

The fact was, Andre had planned to ask her out. From the second their eyes had met inside his boss’s SUV, he’d known he was in trouble. Sure, she was gorgeous, with those wide hazel eyes framed with insanely dark lashes, and all that long, golden-tinted brown hair that had come loose from her messy bun when he’d tackled her. The soft, womanly curves that had cushioned his fall were pretty tempting, too. But what had really done him in was the way she’d stared back at him, the look in her eyes equal parts vulnerable and strong.

He’d driven her back to Quantico, making small talk on the ride, trying to get to know her a little better. She’d seemed shy, shell-shocked, but definitely interested. He’d intended to wait around until the regular agents had finished questioning her, then ask if he could make a detour to dinner on the way back to her car. But that was when he’d thought she was a simple victim.

He should have known from the beginning there was more to it, because the crime itself was so strange. Why send three heavily armed men after one small woman in a third-floor office building?

In fact, why do it in such a high-profile way at all? Why not have one man grab her on the way to her car before she made it into the office?

She was involved in something. The fact was, she was probably guilty of something. And while a woman with a little mystery had always been a draw for him, a woman who would break the law he worked to uphold was of no interest.

Andre shrugged at his partner, who’d been his friend too long not to see exactly what Andre wasn’t saying. “I’m not sure I need that kind of drama.”

“There’s always Nadia,” Scott said.

Nadia Petrova was a fellow agent, who worked as a weapons training specialist at the FBI Academy, which was located at Quantico with HRT. She’d made no secret of her interest in Andre, and it was getting more and more difficult to sidestep her hints without hurting her feelings.

“I think I want to be the one in the relationship with the bigger guns,” Andre joked. The truth was, Nadia was nice enough, but there just wasn’t any spark.

Scott snorted and slapped him on the arm. “All right. Well, after these last couple of calls back-to-back, I’m heading home. Froggy says you can do the same if you want. The other team is up now.”

The HRT teams swapped off, so one was always on call if any emergencies came in from across the country while the other teams trained. After the week they’d had, with seemingly one crisis after the next, Andre was ready for some low-key exercises. Like rappelling out of helicopters and practicing with his MP5 for mock hostage situations inside one of the old 747-airplane hulls they kept on hand.

“See you tomorrow,” Andre said, digging around in his duffel for wherever he’d stuck his keys as Scott hopped in his SUV and sped away, leaving Andre alone in a lot full of cars but empty of people.

When he’d pulled into the lot a few hours ago, there had been nowhere left to park except at the very back, so he meandered that way now, still digging for his keys. It wasn’t until he was a few feet away from his sedan that his agent instincts went on high alert, warning him someone was close. Too close.

He lifted his hands into a defensive position even as his brain reminded him he was in a heavily guarded Marine base and FBI training area. Then he let out a breath and dropped his hands to his sides as he spotted Juliette—or Mya—coming around from the front of his car.

“What are you doing here?” Had she been waiting for him, crouched between the grill of his car and the big tree he’d parked underneath for a little shade? He frowned. Had she been hiding?

“Get in the car,” she said, her voice wobbly.

A smile threatened. “That’s what I was planning,” he said, starting to rethink his plan to ask her out to dinner. Except... “Shouldn’t you still be inside, talking to the case agents?”

The hand that had been wedged between her side and his car came out, pointing a Glock pistol at him. “Get in.” This time, her tone was apologetic.

He stared, dumbfounded. “Where’d you get that?” She certainly hadn’t come into Quantico with a weapon. Had she taken it off someone inside? If so, that meant she was a much bigger threat than she seemed.

“I’m sorry,” she said, and she actually looked it, with her big, teary eyes and her full, trembling lips. “But we need to go. I have to get out of here, which means you’re going to drive me off the base.”

He leaned against his car, eyeing the distance between them, gauging whether he could disarm her without the gun going off. “Why don’t you tell me what this is about? Let me help you.” He kept his voice calm. It was the same tone he’d used last night with the traumatized kid who’d come out of that fire clutching his mother, after watching a bullet come through the window and take out his father.

“No. Please.” Desperation entered her tone as she shifted her awkward, double-handed hold on the gun. “Just get in, okay, and I promise I’ll let you go as soon as you drop me off where I tell you.”

She wasn’t used to holding a weapon, Andre could tell. “You’re going to have a hard time firing that gun with the safety on.”

When she glanced down, he took one slow step forward, almost close enough to disarm her without a chance of her taking a shot. Just one more step and he could do it.

But then her eyes locked on his as she leveled the weapon at his center mass, something hard and determined in her gaze. “There’s no external safety on a Glock,” she replied, all the nerves gone from her voice. “Now get in. We’re going for a ride.”