Книга - Saviour in the Saddle

Saviour in the Saddle
Delores Fossen


Willa Marks is pregnant. Afraid. And can't remember anything beyond two months ago.What she does know is that she can't trust the police to keep her safe. So when two men—cops—appear at her door, all she can think about is escape. But instinct tells her to trust one of them…. Brandon Ruiz is ex-military. Sheriff of a small town in Texas. And Willa's ex-boyfriend. Or so he claims.Now that they've found her, he's determined to keep Willa safe from her would-be assassin. But to do that he has to stay distanced. He can't let her touch, her scent, reach him. Can't let her kisses inflame him. He thinks if she remembers, she'll be safe. But he's wrong….










Saviour In The Saddle

Delores Fossen






www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




About the Author


Imagine a family tree that includes Texas cowboys, Choctaw and Cherokee Indians, a Louisiana pirate and a Scottish rebel who battled side by side with William Wallace. With ancestors like that, it’s easy to understand why Texas author and former air force captain DELORES FOSSEN feels as if she were genetically predisposed to writing romances. Along the way to fulfilling her DNA destiny, Delores married an air force top gun who just happens to be of Viking descent. With all those romantic bases covered, she doesn’t have to look too far for inspiration.


To my daughter, Beth




Chapter One


Austin, Texas

They had found her.

Willa Marks saw the proof of that when the man stepped from the black four-door Ford that had just pulled into her driveway.

He had a badge clipped to his belt.

She pressed her fingers to her mouth to silence the gasp that nearly escaped from her throat and she eased down the blinds that she’d lifted a fraction so she could peek out.

Oh, God.

This couldn’t be happening.

Willa hurried away from the window and to the wall next to the door. Her shoulder brushed against the trio of yellow sticky notes that she’d left there, and one of them fluttered to the floor.

Don’t Trust the Cops, the note said.

She no longer needed the reminder. At least, Willa didn’t think she did. But she’d left it there just in case. It was too important for her to forget something like that again.

“It’ll be okay,” she whispered to her unborn child, hoping she wasn’t lying to the baby and herself.

She slid her hand over her pregnant belly, but she knew her hand wouldn’t be much protection if this turned out to be the start of another round in the nightmare that just would not end.

The doorbell rang, the sound knifing through the room, and this time she wasn’t able to muffle her gasp. Of course, she’d known they would ring the bell. And they wouldn’t stop until she let them inside.

They had found her.

Well, by God, they weren’t taking her back into their so-called protective custody. Look where that had gotten her the last two times.

She and her baby had nearly been killed.

There were ten notes around the house to remind her of that, and just in case that wasn’t enough, the warning scrolled across the screen saver of her laptop: Don’t Trust the Cops.

The doorbell rang again, and it was followed by a heavy knock. “Ms. Marks, I’m Lieutenant Bo Duggan from San Antonio P.D. I know you’re in there.”

Maybe he had seen her car in the garage. Or perhaps he’d even spotted her when she’d made a quick trip just a half hour earlier to the grocery store.

But how exactly had they found her?

She’d been so careful—using an alias, paying only with cash, leaving no paper trail. She hadn’t wanted to dye her hair because of the chemicals, but she hadn’t cut it in months and, with it pulled back from her face, she didn’t resemble the photos that had been snapped of her four months earlier and splattered all over the news.

Apparently all those safety measures hadn’t been enough.

“Lieutenant Bo Duggan,” she repeated under her breath, and Willa hurried to grab her PDA from her desk next to the sofa.

There was another knock, and another, but Willa ignored them and scrolled through the pictures and names she’d assembled in case her memory failed her again. She found him. Bo Duggan’s photo was there, and she’d added a caption: I Think I Can Trust Him.

It was the word think that kicked up her heartbeat an extra notch. But then, in the past four months, there was no one that she trusted completely.

Not even herself.

“We need to talk to you,” Lieutenant Duggan said from the other side of the door. “We know you’re scared, but there are things we have to ask you—important things.”

Willa carried the PDA back to the window and peeked out again. The lieutenant’s face matched the picture she had, but he wasn’t alone.

There was another man with him.

The second man was tall and lanky. He wore jeans and a crisp, white shirt topped with a buckskin jacket, and he held a saddle-brown Stetson in his left hand. His dress was casual, unlike the lieutenant who had on a dark blue suit.

It was the second man that Willa focused on. Did she know him?

His face wasn’t familiar.

He had thick black hair that was slightly long and rumpled, no doubt from the cold December wind that was assaulting them. With that Stetson, jeans and jacket, he looked like a cowboy from the Texas Monthly magazine she had on her coffee table.

His skin was deeply tanned, but she shook her head, rethinking that. The skin tone was probably natural. Those high cheekbones and features were Native American.

She frantically scrolled through the pictures again, but she didn’t expect to find him. With those unique looks, Willa thought he might be someone she would remember without the prompts, pictures and captions.

“Ms. Marks,” the lieutenant tried again. “Please, open the door.”

The knocks got harder, and each blow against the thick wood sent her pulse racing out of control. She couldn’t call the local cops. There were plenty of notes telling her not to trust them. So maybe she could wait out these two. Eventually Lieutenant Duggan and his Native American partner would get tired of knocking and leave.

She hoped.

Then she could gather her things and go on the run again.

The baby inside her kicked hard, as if protesting that. “Well, I’m not too happy about it, either,” Willa mumbled.

She’d lived here at this suburban Austin rental house for two months now, and that was a month longer than the extended-stay hotel where she’d stayed in Houston. Two months hadn’t been long enough for her to settle in or to stop being afraid, but she had started to believe she might be able to remain here until after the baby was born. Or at least until Christmas, which was only three days away.

So much for her short-term dreams.

They were as fleeting as her short-term memory had been just weeks ago.

“Willa?” someone called out.

Not the lieutenant. Another look out the blinds, and she realized it was the other man who’d spoken. The man whose picture wasn’t in her PDA. But he had said her name as if he knew her.

No, it was more than that.

He said her name as if he knew her intimately.

“Willa, it’s me, Brandon. Look, I know you’re probably still mad at me—I don’t blame you. But I’ve been searching for you all this time so I could tell you how sorry I am about the argument we had.”

“Brandon?” She repeated it several times, but it jogged no memory.

Who was he? What did he want? And what argument had they had? Better yet, just how badly did she need to know the answers to those questions?

Willa made sure all four locks on the front door were engaged, though she already knew they were. That was routine these days. The lights were green on the security panel box, meaning it was armed and ready to sound if tripped. Also routine. As were the window locks, gun and the multiple cans of pepper spray she had stashed around the house.

The lieutenant and his partner couldn’t get in. Well, not unless they broke down the door or smashed a window, but that could happen if she spoke to them or not.

“Do I know you?” she called out. And Willa prayed that merely asking the question wouldn’t turn out to be a deadly mistake.

She watched through the blinds, and she saw the men whispering to each other. Both of them also fired glances all around the yard and street. Not ordinary glances, either. The kind that cops made when they were worried they might be ambushed.

Of course, it was also the kind of glances that criminals made to make sure they weren’t being watched.

“You know me,” the man, Brandon, assured her. He said it with complete confidence, but there was also a tinge of frustration in his voice. “Willa, open the door. I want to see you.”

Willa didn’t budge. “How do you know me?”

He hesitated. It wasn’t just a pause. But definitely a hesitation. She’d lost so much after everything she’d been through, but she’d gained something, too. Willa had gotten very good at reading people.

Brandon was on edge.

“They told me you had memory loss from a fall you took at the hospital, and that you were in a coma for a while,” Brandon finally said. “You still don’t remember me after all this time? “

No, but she didn’t intend to tell him that.

Truth was, she had no memories—none—before the nightmare that had happened four months earlier when she and about three dozen other pregnant women and medical staff had been held hostage at gunpoint for hours on the fourth floor at the San Antonio Maternity Hospital. Questioned. Verbally abused. And worse.

People had died that day, and those who had survived did not come out unscathed.

She was proof of that.

The gunmen had even forced her to help them retrieve some computer files in the lab. Or so she’d been told because part of the hostage standoff had been captured on a hospital surveillance camera.

Willa had no recollection of that, either.

No memories before that fall she’d supposedly taken when one of the gunmen had pushed her down during her attempted escape. No memories before or immediately following the coma she’d supposedly been in when her brain had swollen from a deep concussion.

And what she had remembered since was spotty in too many areas.

The head injury had given her both amnesia and short-term memory loss. That was the last diagnosis she’d received anyway. She hadn’t seen a neurologist in nearly a month.

She had made some progress with the short-term memory issues but none with the amnesia itself. She could have indeed met this Brandon, but she knew so few details of her life that anything was possible.

For all practical purposes, Willa’s life had begun two months ago when her short-term memory had started to stabilize.

She knew the basics. She was Willa Diane Marks, a computer software designer from San Antonio. Both parents were dead. No living relatives. She wasn’t rich, but she’d had more than enough money to decide at the age of thirty-three that she wanted to reduce her hours at the business she’d started and have a child. Since she hadn’t been involved in a relationship at the time, she’d used artificial insemination, which had been done at the very hospital where, three months later, she’d been held hostage.

Willa could thank a nurse at the San Antonio Maternity Hospital for filling her in on those few details. And just so she would remember them, Willa had put them in notes in a computer file. Notes she read daily in case she forgot. Heck, there was even a note to remind herself to read the file.

“Well?” Lieutenant Duggan prompted. “Are you going to let us in? Because I have a warrant and I can break down the door if necessary. I don’t want to do that, and I don’t think you do either. Am I right?”

She dodged the questions. “Brandon, how do you know me?” Willa countered.

More hesitation. More whispered conversation between the men. Finally, Brandon angled his eyes to the window. Right where she was. As if he’d known all along that she was there.

Brandon’s gaze met hers. “Willa, I’m your ex-boyfriend.”

Whatever she had expected him to say, that wasn’t it.

Her heart went to her knees.

The baby stopped kicking and went still. So did Willa. Her breath lodged somewhere between her lungs and her throat, and she forced herself to exhale so she wouldn’t get light-headed. She had enough things against her already without adding that.

“My ex-boyfriend?” she challenged. She had been involved with this man, but there was no photo of him in her PDA? No yellow sticky note with his name on her wall? And he darn sure wasn’t in her memory. “Prove it.”

“Open the door, and I will.” It wasn’t exactly a promise, but it was close.

Close enough for Willa to put her PDA aside and grab the .38 handgun she kept on top of the foyer table. Before she could change her mind, she undid the locks, paused the security system and opened the front door. There was still a locked screen door between the men and her, but even through the gray mesh, she could see their faces clearly.

Brandon’s eyes were a dark earthy brown.

And much to Willa’s surprise, she reacted to him. Or rather her body did. There was deep pull within her.

Attraction, she realized.

She was physically attracted to him. Strange, because it was a new sensation for her. She was certain at one time or another she had been attracted to a man, but she didn’t remember this feeling.

“What proof do you have?” Willa immediately asked.

Those rich brown eyes combed over her face, but she couldn’t tell what was going through his mind. His gaze dropped to her stomach. Since she was seven months pregnant and huge, it would have been hard not to miss her baby bulge. Then, his attention landed on the .38 Smith & Wesson she had gripped in her hand at her side.

“There’s no need for that,” Brandon said, his voice mostly calm. There was still that edge to it. “Neither of us will hurt you.”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” she fired back.

“You have reason not to trust us,” Lieutenant Duggan volunteered. “We didn’t do a good job of protecting you while you were in the hospital recovering from your head injury.”

She nearly laughed. “No. You didn’t. A gunman got into my room just two days after the hostages were rescued, and he tried to shoot and kill me.”

Willa didn’t exactly have memories of that incident, either. Thank God. The memory loss was good for some things, and she didn’t need that particular nightmare in her head. But she’d read the reports, over and over, and every time she would forget, she would reread them. She needed to remember that the cops hadn’t protected her then. Or now.

The lieutenant nodded. “That gunman was caught. His name was Danny Monroe, and later that same morning when he tried to kill a police captain and another hostage, he was shot. He died in surgery. You don’t have to worry about him now.”

“Maybe not him. But that wasn’t the only attempt made on my life,” Willa reminded the lieutenant. “Someone tried to break into the safe house where you had me staying after I got out of the hospital.”

“You remember that?” Duggan asked.

“No,” Willa reluctantly admitted. “But I haven’t had any short-term memory problems for the last two months. I remember everything that’s happened during that time, and I remember all the notes I’ve read about the incident.”

And that was the truth. Almost.

“We’re not sure who tried to get into the safe house,” the lieutenant admitted, “but it’s still under investigation.”

“Well, the investigation can continue without my help.” She looked at Brandon who was staring at her. “You said you have proof that you’re my ex-boyfriend?”

He nodded and shifted his head against the wind when another cold gust slammed into them. “Can we come in, and I’ll show you?”

“You can show me what you have from out there. And you’d better have more than a going-steady ring or a picture from our high school prom.”

Even though there was something that made her want to trust, and believe, the man. Willa groaned. Hadn’t the last four months taught her anything?

Brandon mumbled something she didn’t catch, and he reached into his pocket, prompting her to bring up her gun. Lieutenant Duggan’s hand went to the butt of his own weapon that was tucked in a shoulder holster inside his jacket.

Brandon held up his hands in a calm-down gesture. “I’m not going for a gun.”

But he had one. Willa saw it then. It was in a cowboy-style waist holster that rested low on his hips.

She also spotted the badge clipped to his holster, and she backed up a step.

“You’re a cop?” she accused.

Brandon nodded. “Not SAPD though. I’m the sheriff of a small town, Crockett Creek. It’s about a half hour from San Antonio.”

He was still a lawman. The very people her notes warned her not to trust.

“You didn’t remember that Brandon Ruiz is a sheriff?” Lieutenant Duggan asked.

“No,” she snapped. “And I think there’s a reason for that. You’re trying to trick me. You figured if you could convince me that this man, this stranger, is my ex-boyfriend that I would let you in so you could talk me into doing whatever it is that brought you here.”

Duggan and Brandon exchanged glances, and it was Brandon who continued. “It’s true. We do have things to tell you. Things that could affect your safety—and the baby’s.” He paused, his gaze heading back in that direction again.

He swallowed hard. And looked away.

So, he couldn’t even look her in the eye. Or the belly. He was lying.

“Get off my porch,” Willa demanded. “And stay away from me.”

“I can’t,” Brandon said. “I have the proof you want.” He took a piece of paper from his pocket.

Willa already had her hand on the door, ready to slam it shut, but that stopped her. “What is that?”

“It’s a medical report.” Brandon took his time continuing that explanation. “You had an amniocentesis done after the hostage incident.”

She had. There were notes about it on her computer. The doctors had been concerned that her injury might have affected the baby, so she’d had the test done to examine the amniotic fluid to make sure all was well.

“What does that have to do with anything?” Willa asked.

Brandon’s mouth tightened a little. “We, uh, were able to compare the baby’s DNA we got from the amniocentesis results that were on file at the hospital.”

Now it was Willa who held up her hand. “Wait just a darn minute. Why were you comparing DNA? I had artificial insemination, and I used an anonymous donor.”

“No,” Lieutenant Duggan disagreed.

And that one-word denial was all he said for several heart-stopping moments.

“We had the nurse tell you that,” the lieutenant explained, “because you were so upset—you were hysterical. The doctors couldn’t sedate you because you were in the first trimester of your pregnancy, and they thought you might lose the baby if we couldn’t calm you down.”

“So, they lied,” Brandon added.

Willa moved her hand to her heart to try to steady it. “Lied about what exactly?”

Brandon’s gaze came to hers. “There was no artificial insemination, Willa. And that baby you’re carrying is mine.”




Chapter Two


Brandon waited for Willa Marks to grasp what he’d just told her.

It didn’t take long. Within seconds, her eyes widened. She went pale, and she inched back farther away from the screen door, no doubt to put some distance between her and them.

She stood there, looking scared, lost and vulnerable in her maternity jeans and dove-gray sweater that seemed to swallow her. She was petite, barely five-three. Hardly big enough to be fighting off bad guys, but she’d had to do too much of that in the past four months.

From the corner of his eye, Brandon saw the lieutenant make another sweeping glance around the yard and street. Brandon did the same. Because it might not be safe for Willa or for them to be standing out here in the open like this.

“You’re my baby’s father?” Willa questioned. Despite her obvious surprise, there was still a Texas-size dose of suspicion in her expression and her tone.

Her memory might not be in full working gear, but her instincts sure were.

She had a reason to be suspicious.

But Brandon didn’t want her suspicions to get her and the baby killed.

“We need to come in,” Brandon insisted, and he tried not to make it sound like a question.

He immediately saw the debate in her wide blue eyes. She volleyed glances between Bo Duggan and him before she mumbled something under her breath. She went to the screen door, unlocked it and then stepped back.

She held on to the gun, and Brandon hoped like the devil that he didn’t have to wrestle it away from her.

Brandon walked in first, and Bo was right behind him. Bo closed the door, and Brandon immediately felt the warmth from the central heating. But not from their guest.

Willa was glaring at them.

He glanced around. Old habits. He’d been a peace officer for eight years. That was eight years too long to let down his guard. Willa had given no indication that someone was inside holding her hostage, but he needed to make sure that wasn’t the case.

The place was small so he didn’t have to look too far to take it all in. They were in a living-dining combination area, and there was a modest kitchen through the double doorway near the dining table. In the center of the table was a potted plant that had been decorated with tiny foil Christmas ornaments. No wrapped gifts, and judging from Willa’s situation, there probably wouldn’t be any.

On the other side of the house, he could see directly into the two bedrooms and the bathroom, with all the doors wide open. Apparently, Willa was trying to minimize the chance that anyone could sneak in through one of the windows without her hearing them.

The place was neat as a pin except for the yellow sticky notes all over the walls and surfaces of the furniture. He spotted one on the hardwood floor and reached down to pick it up.

“Don’t trust the cops,” he read and passed it to Bo.

Bo glanced at it as well and then looked at her. “I thought you weren’t having any more short-term memory loss.”

“I’m not. The notes are leftovers from a time when I was having problems. I just haven’t gotten around to removing them.” Her chin came up, causing her long blondish-brown ponytail to swish. It brushed against her shoulder and settled on the top of her left breast.

Brandon quickly got his attention off that.

Should he go to her, he wondered? Should he try to hug or kiss her? That was something Bo and he hadn’t discussed on the ride over, but Brandon wished they had. He knew what he had to say to Willa, what he had to do about her safety situation, but he hadn’t given much thought to the personal aspect of this.

Willa held out her hand. “Let me see that DNA report,” she insisted.

Brandon walked closer, halving the distance between them and gave it to her.

He watched her read through the report, and with each line her gaze skirted across, her forehead bunched up even more.

“It could be a lie,” she concluded, handing it back to him.

“Why would we lie about that?” Bo questioned.

Willa opened her mouth. Then, closed it. She shook her head. “I don’t know, but you just admitted you lied four months ago when you had a nurse tell me I was artificially inseminated.”

“We did that only because we didn’t want you to lose the baby. It worked,” Bo insisted. “You settled down, quit asking for Brandon, and you started to heal.”

“I asked for him?” She immediately wanted to know.

Brandon let Bo answer. “You did. You wanted to see him because he’s your baby’s father.”

Her accusing gaze came back to Brandon. “Then why weren’t you there at the hospital that day, when I was scheduled for my first ultrasound along with some other lab tests?”

“I didn’t know about it,” Brandon answered.

“SAPD thinks the ultrasound and lab tests were a ploy to get to you the hospital that afternoon because the appointment wasn’t on the schedule,” Bo explained. “We believe the gunmen called you with the bogus appointments because they’d researched the records of several of the pregnant women, and they knew you were a whiz with computers. They thought you could help them access some files.”

“I know all of that,” she snapped. “It’s in my notes.” She pointed to Brandon. “That doesn’t explain why you weren’t there.”

Brandon lifted his shoulder, trying to shrug. “We’d had an argument about a month earlier, and you told me to get out, that it was over between us. I was out of the state at the time, and I didn’t know you’d been taken hostage until two days after it ended. By then, you were in protective custody at a secret location.”

“He asked for your location,” Bo continued. “But there had already been an attempt on your life, and we thought it best if no one knew where you were.”

And then there had been another breach of security. Another intruder. That had caused Willa to go on the run, leaving the safe house and not telling anyone where she was. It’d taken SAPD all this time to find her.

Without moving her gaze from Brandon’s, she walked closer, her steps slow and deliberate. Until she was very close. So close he could take in her scent. There was some kind of floral fragrance in her hair. Roses, maybe.

She reached out and caught onto his arm. Brandon wasn’t sure what she had in mind, but he didn’t think she was about to launch herself against him for a welcome-home kiss.

No. Her suspicions were getting stronger.

She took his hand and placed it on her stomach. On the baby.

Brandon pulled in his breath before he could stop himself, but he did manage to hold his ground and not move away. He also kept eye contact with her, which was probably stupid.

Willa didn’t say a word. She just stared at him.

The moments crawled by and because Brandon didn’t know what the hell else to do he just stood there.

“Let me guess,” Willa said, her words as slow and deliberate as her steps had been. “We argued about the baby. That’s why we broke up. Because you weren’t ready to be a father.”

Brandon settled for a nod.

“What was I to you—your one-night stand?” she asked. No more of that slow and deliberate tone. She was riled now.

“No,” he answered truthfully. “Willa, you weren’t a one-night stand.”

She studied his eyes. Then she studied him. Her gaze eased down the length of his body. Back up. And then she groaned, turned and sank down on the sofa. She put the gun on the coffee table, something that probably pleased Bo as much as it did him.

They’d made it past step one.

But they had a hell of a long way to go.

“I’ll give you two some time alone,” Bo said, hitching his thumb to the door. “I’ll be in the car. But just don’t take too long.”

And Brandon knew why. This was not going to be a lengthy romantic welcome-home chat. They were in a hurry.

Bo opened the door, and the wind cut through the room again. The notes on the walls stirred, and two of them went flying through the air. One of them landed near Brandon’s boots.

“Take prenatal vitamins,” he read aloud and handed her the note. He eased down into the chair across from her. “Just how bad is your memory?”

“Just how much didn’t you want this baby?” Willa countered.

So, her memory wasn’t up for discussion. He wished she’d taken the baby talk off the table as well.

Brandon knew they had to discuss it, eventually. That was all part of the plan, but he hadn’t counted on having the emotional reaction of touching Willa. And he sure as hell hadn’t counted on this gut need to protect her. He’d planned on doing what SAPD wanted and then walking away.

Especially walking away.

He was good at that.

But he’d been in the room with Willa for less than fifteen minutes, and he was already having doubts about this plan. She deserved the truth.

The whole truth about why he was there.

“Tell me who you are,” she insisted. “Not just your name. I want to know who you really are.”

Brandon nodded and gathered his thoughts. “My full name is Brandon Michael Ruiz. Like you, I was born in San Antonio. I’m thirty-six. Never been married. I spent some time in the army before I came back to Texas and made it my home again.”

She motioned for him to continue.

“I’ve been sheriff of Crockett Creek for eight years.”

“And your bloodline? “

“My dad was—is,” he corrected, “Comanche. My mother was part Irish, part Italian, part German. Guess that makes me a real American, huh? “

Willa ignored his attempt to lighten up the conversation. “How did we meet?”

Thankfully, he didn’t have to pause to collect his thoughts. “At a restaurant on the Riverwalk in San Antonio. The place was crowded, and we shared a table.”

She stared at him again. “I think you’re probably lying about that. I don’t know why.” She waved him off before he could try to convince her otherwise. “It doesn’t matter. It’s obvious you don’t want to be here so that means the lieutenant brought you to convince me to do something.”

Well, he hadn’t expected her to give him that kind of opening.

“But first, you’re supposed to regain my trust,” she continued. “And SAPD’s theory is the reason I’ll trust you again is that we have a child in common.” She moved closer to the edge of the sofa. “But you and I both know how things really are, don’t we, Brandon?”

Yeah, he thought, maybe they did, so Brandon stuck with the truth. “I gave up the idea of being a father not long after I got out of the military. Let’s just say I didn’t think my gene pool was worth passing along to an innocent baby.”

She made a sound to indicate she was thinking about that. And he could see the doubt creep back into her eyes. “That probably has something to do with the was versus the is when you described your father’s bloodline, but I don’t believe you want to share that secret with me so I won’t push.”

Surprised, Brandon angled his head to the side and studied her. “Have you been taking deception-training classes since you’ve been in hiding?”

The corner of her mouth lifted, but the smile didn’t make it to her eyes. “When I couldn’t remember anything for more than ten minutes, I started relying on other things. Eye contact. Facial signals. My gut instincts,” she added in a mumble.

Brandon tried his hand at it. “The way you said the last part—my gut instincts—does that mean you don’t like what your gut instincts are telling you about me? “

Her glare returned. “Stand up,” she said abruptly. “Excuse me?”

“Stand up. Please.” That last word was clearly an afterthought.

Brandon did stand, all the while wondering where this would lead. And Willa stood up as well. She went to him, hesitating just a second, before she reached up and caught on to the back of his neck. She pulled him down and touched her mouth to his.

It was a peck, hardly qualifying as a kiss, but it lit a very bad fire inside him that shouldn’t be lit. A fire below the belt.

She pulled back and drew her tongue over her bottom lip. Yet something to stoke that blaze that he had to put out.

“Yes,” she said, “I think I remember kissing you.” Willa shook her head, stared up at him.

Brandon decided to do something to convince her to reconsider that I think part. His hand went to her back, and he hauled her to him.

And he kissed her.

Yeah, it was probably stupid, but he didn’t keep it a peck or at some wimp level to be merely a test. No. He wanted this to be a kiss she’d remember. So, he pressed his lips against hers, moving over her mouth. Taking in her taste, along with that incredible scent. He got an even better sample of her when his tongue touched hers.

She jerked away from him and stepped back. Way back. Her breath was gusting now. Brandon realized his was, too. And she propped her hands on her hips and stared at him.

“I’m attracted to you,” she said in the same tone as if confessing to premeditated murder.

The woman certainly knew how to keep him on his toes. “I’m attracted to you,” he echoed.

Her stare turned to another glare. “I hate that I just told you that because it gives you leverage over me. But don’t be fooled.” Willa walked to the foyer table and grabbed her PDA. “I will never put anything I feel for you over the safety of my baby. That means I’m not going to let you talk me into doing anything I could regret.”

Oh, man. Since they kept going back to that, Brandon figured it was time to move on to step two.

At least step two didn’t involve kissing her.

“The baby is my priority, too,” he clarified. “Yeah, I know. I said I’d dismissed fatherhood, but now that I know a baby’s on the way—”

“It’s a girl,” Willa interrupted. “I’m having a daughter.”

It took everything inside him not to react. He nodded. “A daughter,” he repeated.

Brandon eased that information aside and got back to work.

Yes, he still wanted to protect Willa. He was sorry for what she’d been through. But the groundwork had been laid. She’d bought the story, and it was time to move on. However, before he could do that, Willa lifted the PDA and a second later, there was a small burst of light.

She took his picture.

She typed in something. Paused. And added something else. Notes about him no doubt.

Don’t Trust Brandon Ruiz maybe.

Well, she would have to learn to trust him. At least temporarily.

“You’re going to have to leave this place and come with me,” he told her. Willa started to object, but Brandon talked right over her. “You don’t have a choice. The baby’s safety is at stake, and I won’t let you endanger my child.”

There. That was the gauntlet.

“Your child?” she said, mocking him.

“Oh, no, we’re not going back to that part about my ambivalence toward fatherhood. We’ll do what’s best for this baby. And what’s best is for you not to be here.”

Willa didn’t say a word, not even to demand more information. She was no doubt trying to figure out how she could escape. That attempt would probably come when she tried to excuse herself to go to the bathroom. Or to get something from the kitchen.

But that wasn’t going to happen.

“We’ve received an intelligence report that there’s going to be another hostage situation,” Brandon stated as clearly as he could.

Her bottom lip started to tremble. “Where?” Her voice was all breath.

“We don’t know that. Or when. Or who will be involved. All we have is that it’ll take place at an undisclosed hospital and that the person responsible has hired two computer techs to break into some files.”

She caught her bottom lip between her teeth to stop the trembling. From what he’d been told, Willa didn’t have any actual memories of the hostage situation she’d endured, but she had read reports. Heck, she’d probably memorized them and knew she didn’t want any other person to go through what she had.

“You could put guards at all the hospitals,” Willa suggested.

He shook his head. “Too many of them. We can put them on alert, of course, and warn them of the potential danger, but we’re not even sure this attack will happen at a hospital in the state. It could happen anywhere.”

She waited a moment. Mumbled something. “How can I help?” she finally asked.

Brandon took a deep breath. Even though he still had to be mindful of her attempted escape, step two had been a success. Now, it was time for the grand finale.

Well, part of it anyway.

The last step wouldn’t happen until SAPD was sure this new hostage threat had been squelched.

“We think someone masterminded the situation with the maternity hostages,” he continued.

“But you caught the two gunmen and the man who hired them. I read about it.”

“Yes, his name was Gavin Cunningham, and last week he committed suicide in prison. In his suicide note he indicated he hadn’t worked alone, that someone had helped him set up the entire maternity hostage situation.”

The breath rushed from her mouth. “Who helped him?”

“We’re not sure. That’s where we’re hoping you can fill us in.”

“I get it,” she said almost immediately. “You want me to resume my therapy so I can remember if the gunman who held me said anything about the identity of his boss.”

“Yeah.”

Among other things.

“But I might not remember,” she pointed out. “Or maybe the gunman didn’t say anything to me at all. I could be putting myself out there for no reason.”

“You wouldn’t be just putting yourself out there, Willa.” Brandon tried to keep his voice level and calm. “I’d be with you. You’d be in my protective custody.”

She rolled her eyes. “Let me guess—that wasn’t your idea. It was Lieutenant Duggan’s.”

Brandon evaded that. “Bo Duggan lost his wife during that hostage situation. She died after giving birth to their twins. He’s, well, eager to solve this case once and for all.”

She stayed quiet a moment. Then, she said, “No.”

“No?” Brandon challenged. Well, there went his calm and level voice.

“No,” she insisted. “I won’t go with you into protective custody. And I won’t work directly with Lieutenant Duggan, SAPD or even you.”

She pointed to her laptop. Don’t Trust the Cops was scrolling across the screen in bold white letters on black background.

She had a reason not to trust cops, or anyone else for that matter. But he had to get her past that because she had no choice. Willa had to trust him.

Even if he didn’t deserve that trust.

“I’ll restart my therapy on my own,” she continued.

“I can’t take any memory-activating drugs because they might harm the baby, but maybe hypnosis will work if I try it again. I can do the hypnosis sessions here.”

Brandon shook his head. “No, you can’t.”

That got her back on her feet. “Now, just a darn minute. You might be my baby’s biological father and my former boyfriend, but that doesn’t give you any say in my life.”

He got to his feet as well. “This badge does.”

She pulled back her shoulders and looked as if he slapped her. “You’re pulling rank on me?”

“I don’t have a choice, Willa.” He’d practiced this on the drive over, but he didn’t think practice would make it sound any better than it had when he’d first said it. “We didn’t just get intel about another hostage situation. We learned from a deep-cover agent that an assassin has been hired.”

Her shoulders went back even further. “An assassin?”

He nodded and relied on the words he’d rehearsed. “An assassin hired to come after you.”

Oh, man. She didn’t just pale, every drop of color drained from her face. Willa slipped her PDA into the pocket of her sweater, sank back onto the sofa and buried her face in her hands.

Brandon went in for the kill. He had to tell her the final part of this covert briefing. The detail that would put her back in police custody.

And maybe right back in danger.

“That’s how we knew where to find you,” Brandon said, hating the sound of his own voice and the words coming out of his mouth.

Words that were unfortunately true.

“We got your address from the intelligence report that the Justice Department agent had intercepted from the assassin.” Brandon checked his watch, though he already knew time was running out. “If the intel is right, and we think it is, he plans to kill you tonight.”




Chapter Three


Willa was glad she was sitting down.

She didn’t speak—she couldn’t—and she didn’t look at Brandon. Instead, she forced herself to focus on what he’d just told her.

An assassin would come tonight to kill her.

Maybe.

The warning on her screen saver flashed in her head, and it was the reminder she needed to put this in perspective.

“Is it true?” she asked, with her eyes still turned away from Brandon. She wanted to listen for the inflection in his voice.

“It’s true, an assassin plans to kill you. We think because his boss doesn’t want to risk your memory recovering so you can tell the authorities his identity. But I’m going to protect you,” Brandon quickly added. “Because you’ll gather your things and come with me. I’ve already arranged a place for you.”

Her emotions were like a whirlwind inside her, but she thought he might be telling the truth about the assassin. There was some kind of danger anyway. Brandon definitely wasn’t lying about that.

Willa wasn’t naive enough to believe she’d be able to keep out a professional killer. All the security precautions she had already taken wouldn’t be enough, and the last thing she wanted was to go gun to gun with an assassin. The three-hour handgun course was her only training with a firearm, and she was betting the man coming after her would know how to kill with one shot.

She nodded, stood and rubbed her hands on the sides of her jeans. “Give me a minute, please. I need some time to gather my thoughts.”

And her things.

She had an emergency bag already packed and stashed beneath her bed, and she’d practiced climbing out the window. She could cut through the backyard and walk to the train station, which was only four blocks away. That’s one of the reasons she’d chosen this particular house to rent.

Willa headed for her bedroom, but she didn’t get far. Brandon was right behind her. She whirled around, not realizing he was so close, and she knocked right into him. The contact was a reminder of that kiss, and the fact that he was going to be a hard man to shake.

“I can’t let you escape,” he told her.

“Who said I’m trying to escape?” Willa tossed right back.

He gave her a flat look to indicate he knew what she had in mind. Probably did, too. He was a cop, after all.

“Lieutenant Duggan is watching the back of the house, so you wouldn’t get far anyway,” Brandon added. “Now, get your things so we can leave.”

Willa considered arguing with him, but he looked as stubborn as she was. Not a good DNA legacy to pass on to their daughter. A double dose of bullheadedness.

If he was the baby’s father, that is.

She wasn’t convinced he’d told her the truth about that, either.

“I’ll get my things,” she agreed. But that was the only thing she was agreeing to do. She wasn’t going with them, and that meant she had to distract Brandon in some way so she could escape.

“What did you type about me on your PDA?” he asked, following her into the bedroom. There was barely enough space for one person, and she was quickly learning that Brandon had a way of monopolizing not just the room but all the air in it.

“Nothing,” she lied. And she grabbed the packed overnight bag, put it on the bed and tossed in the PDA. The bag already contained a change of clothes, toiletries, meds, cash, a fake ID that had cost her dearly and a flash drive with duplicate files that were on her computer.

She also had a gun in there.

Willa didn’t want to use it, but she would if it came down to protecting her baby.

Because she wanted to buy some time for that escape opportunity, Willa went through the dresser drawer and pretended to look for something to add to the bag. Maybe conversation would help, too. Besides, there was one thing she needed to verify, even though she wasn’t sure a chat with Brandon would give her that proof.

“Are you really my baby’s father?” she asked.

But he didn’t answer. He walked across the room and looked into the drawer to see what she was doing. He likely thought she had a gun and was maybe about to pull it on him. No gun. However, he took the tiny canister of pepper spray from the top of the dresser and cupped it in his hand.

Willa gave him a cynical smile. “You trust me about as much as I trust you. So answer my question. Are you really my baby’s father?”

He looked her straight in the eyes.

And nodded.

“The DNA test is real,” he said. “The child you’re carrying is mine.”

Everything inside her went still. Because that didn’t sound like a lie.

“We were in love?” she pressed.

“No,” he answered just as quickly.

That seemed to be the truth as well. Strange that he wouldn’t have said yes and then used that love confession to convince her to cooperate with him.

“All right.” For show, she took out several pairs of panties and shoved them into the bag. “So, we weren’t in love, and I wasn’t your one-night stand. What was I to you?”

“The same thing you are to me now.” He didn’t wait for her to respond to that puzzling answer. “Finish packing.”

She added a bra to the bag and stuffed in a flannel nightgown. Willa lifted the bag and put the strap over her like a messenger’s bag even though it was a tight fit over her belly. “I have to get some things from the bathroom. Prenatal vitamins,” she added, knowing he wouldn’t refuse to let her get those.

The bathroom window was small, but she knew she could squeeze through it. She’d have to hurry and hope that Lieutenant Duggan wasn’t keeping watch on that particular side of the house. All she needed was two minutes, and she could be out of there. Away from the assassin, and away from the cops—including, perhaps, her baby’s father.

And that gave her an idea.

With Brandon right on her heels, she went into the bathroom and took out a cotton swab from the medicine cabinet. It obviously wasn’t sterile, but she thought it would give her a clean enough sample. After all, labs got DNA from toothbrushes and baby bottles. Once she had his DNA extracted, she could have it compared to the baby’s amniotic fluid. Willa didn’t have the fluid itself, but she had her baby’s DNA profile in an online storage file that she could retrieve from any computer.

Of course, a comparison would take days. Maybe longer. Still, she would eventually know one way or another.

Her gut was already telling her the test was unnecessary, that Brandon was indeed her baby’s father. But her brain wanted to know why her gut trusted this man when it was clear that he wasn’t volunteering the whole truth.

“Open your mouth please.” She added the please hoping it would get him to cooperate.

He did. Brandon swabbed the inside of his left cheek and handed it back to her. “It’ll be a match,” he promised.

“We’ll see.”

He glanced at the swab. “You’ll want to put that in a plastic bag.” And he pulled a small evidence baggie from his jacket pocket.

Willa eyed him and the bag with suspicion, and instead of using his bag that might be contaminated with his DNA or something else, she headed to the kitchen and got a plastic sandwich bag. She sealed up the swab, put it in the overnight case and snapped her fingers.

“Prenatal vitamins,” she said as if remembering them. “I wouldn’t want to forget those.”

She took slow steps, trying to get the timing of this just right. She needed to get to the bathroom just ahead of Brandon so she could slam the door. Lock it.

And escape.

“I also have to use the bathroom,” she lied when she was a few steps away. “As in, actually use the bathroom. I don’t want an audience for that.”

She went inside and pushed the door so it would close.

Brandon caught it.

“I don’t want an audience,” she restated.

“And I don’t want you trying to escape. Don’t worry. I’ll close my eyes. But this door is staying partly open.”

Great. Just great. She hadn’t wanted to do this, but she was obviously going to have to give him a hit of the pepper spray. She reached into her bag to retrieve it, but he caught her wrist.

Then he grabbed the bag.

“I’ll hold this for you. It can’t be good for a pregnant woman to carry around this much weight.”

“It’s not that heavy.” Willa glared at him and kept a firm hold on her bag. “Why don’t you just back off?”

“Because I can’t. Forget about the personal connection we have because of the baby, forget about how you feel or don’t feel about me. Just remember, I’m a lawman, and I’m not going to stand by and let that assassin come after you.”

She had to tamp down her anger so she could try to reason with him. “The last two times I trusted a lawman, I was nearly killed. You know that. You’ve read the reports. I’ve done a lot better on my own.”

“But you’ve never come up against a hired gun like Martin Shore. He’s not someone you can get away from without help.”

For some reason having the name attached to the assassin made her heart pound even harder. “Martin Shore,” she repeated. “How did he even find me?”

“Apparently Shore’s boss has been trying to track you through neurologists all over the state. Nearly a dozen doctors have had their files hacked. Including Dr. Betterman, the OB you saw four weeks ago.”

She shook her head. “But I didn’t use my real name, and I paid him in cash.”

“You did, but in your hacked medical record, Dr. Betterman had written your diagnosis of post-traumatic amnesia and post-concussional neurosis resulting in short-term memory loss. He also listed your age, the date of the onset of the symptoms. And that you were in your third trimester of pregnancy and therefore couldn’t receive traditional medications.”

Oh, God.

There wouldn’t have been many patients who fit into all those categories.

Then, Willa remembered something. “I didn’t give the doctor my street address. He said he needed to mail me the results from my latest EEG, so I gave him the address of the rental box at a private mail facility all the way across town.”

Brandon nodded. “The clerk there was murdered about four hours ago. We’re pretty sure after he was tortured before he gave up your physical address to someone who wanted to find you. Because it was about an hour later when a deep-cover agent intercepted the intel about Shore being hired to kill you.”

Willa choked back another Oh, God, and the tears that threatened to follow. She wouldn’t cry. It would only waste time because she knew what she had to do.

“Just let me go,” she begged Brandon. “If this is really your child as you say, then please help me get away.”

“It is my child. And I can’t let you leave.”

“Swear it,” she said, sounding as desperate as she felt. “Swear on my life that the baby is yours.”

Brandon put his fingers beneath her chin and lifted it to make direct eye contact. “I swear on your life. On mine. On our baby’s life. The child you’re carrying is mine.”

He sounded so sincere. Looked it, too. Still, there was something, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on.

“If you’re lying to me—”

But Willa didn’t get a chance to finish that threat. There was no warning. No time to get down.

A bullet slammed through the bathroom window.




Chapter Four


Brandon latched on to Willa and pushed her out of the bathroom.

It wasn’t a second too soon because there was another shot ripping through what was left of the glass in the small window. He drew his gun and maneuvered her into the living room and then to the kitchen. He wanted her as far away from those shots as he could manage.

Hell.

He hadn’t expected the attack to come this soon. He’d hoped to have Willa tucked safely away before Martin Shore tried to kill her. Brandon obviously hadn’t succeeded, and Willa might pay the price for his miscalculation.

Brandon used his phone to call for backup from the Austin P.D. He couldn’t risk trying to ring Bo because his temporary partner might be trying to conceal his location from the shooter.

Willa grabbed a knife and a can of pepper spray from the counter and covered her pregnant belly with her hand. Neither her hand nor the items would provide the baby with much protection, so Brandon threw open the fridge and positioned her behind the door. That would give her an extra layer. He considered pulling out the fridge and placing her in the space behind it, but if Shore moved to that side of the house, the bullets might make it through the wall.

“You weren’t lying,” Willa mumbled.

Not about Shore, he wasn’t. But he had told her lies all right. Later, much later, he needed to fill her in on the whole truth.

There was another shot, not through the bathroom. There was the sound of more glass shattering, and it seemed to be coming from Willa’s bedroom.

Brandon waited. Listening.

Where the hell was Bo? And better yet, where had the lieutenant been when that first shot had been fired? Brandon hoped Shore hadn’t managed to injure Bo or worse.

Another sound, not a bullet this time, sent Brandon’s heart to his knees. Because this one had come from inside. From Willa’s bedroom. It was the sound of footsteps.

The assassin was in her house.

Brandon glanced at Willa. Her eyes were wide, and her breath was gusting. She’d obviously heard the footsteps, too, and she knew the danger was bearing down on them.

He couldn’t wait for word from Bo or for backup to arrive. Once Shore made it to the tiny kitchen, he would see them immediately. They would be sitting ducks, and that meant Brandon had to act fast to keep Willa alive.

“This way,” he mouthed.

Brandon kept his gun ready and aimed at the opening that led from the dining room and into the kitchen. No doubt that was where Shore was headed. He maneuvered Willa behind him so he could shield her with his body, and he started to back them out of the room. It wasn’t the best of plans because Shore could double back or even have an accomplice who could come from the other direction, but Brandon had no choice.

He had to get Willa out of there.

Each step seemed to take minutes, but he led them across the kitchen and toward the tiny mudroom and the back door. He wasn’t sure what was on the other side of that door, but hopefully it was a yard with some kind of cover. He needed to get Willa behind a tree or something to shelter her from the bullets that would come at them when Shore realized they were no longer inside.

They made it to the opening of the mudroom where they heard a plinking noise as if something metal had been dropped.

Brandon glanced back into the dining room and soon noticed something he didn’t want to see: the small, dark green oval object on the floor.

A grenade.

“Run!” Brandon shouted.

Willa reacted fast, thank God. With the knife and pepper spray in her left hand, she pushed her messenger’s bag out of the way, disengaged the locks and threw open the door. Brandon had one last look to make sure Shore wasn’t about to gun them down from inside the house, and changed places with Willa, so he could be in front of her. Either position was a risk because it was possible the grenade was a decoy to get them to run. If so, they were about to run directly into a professional assassin.

They hurried out onto a small porch and down the steps that led into a yard. No trees, something that made Brandon curse. But there was a small storage shed. He grabbed Willa’s arm and made a beeline for it.

There was no sign of Bo. No sign of backup, either, but then it’d only been a couple of minutes since he’d made the call requesting help. Bo had likely called, too.

Well, Bo would have if he wasn’t lying dead somewhere.

Shore could have managed to take out Bo before he started the attack on the house.

Brandon hated to force Willa to run, but he had no choice. He prayed this exertion wouldn’t hurt the baby. Of course, the stress couldn’t be good for the child, either. But Brandon also pushed that aside. Right now, he had to keep Willa alive because it was the only way to save the child.

He positioned Willa to the side of the small wooden shed.

Just as the explosion ripped through the yard.

Brandon had considered that the grenade might be a dummy, but it obviously wasn’t.

The debris from the blast came right at them.

Brandon tried to keep watch, to make certain Shore hadn’t come into the yard for another attack, but it was hard to see anything. The left side of the house was literally a fireball, and bits of wood, the roof and even wads of fire were raining down on them.

His instincts and training were to protect his fellow peace officer, but Brandon couldn’t risk taking Willa closer to the house. There could be a secondary explosion, and he needed to put some distance between the burning building and her.

Thankfully, she still had the bag draped across her body, and she used it to shelter her face from the dangerous falling debris.

“Is there a gate on the back fence?” he asked her.

She nodded, tried to speak, but no sound came out. Willa was obviously terrified, and there was nothing he could do to assure her that he could protect her. Shore could have orchestrated this entire attack just to get them out in the open.

And the open was where they’d have to go to get to the gate.

Brandon checked the strips of grass and shrubs that made up the side yards. No one was there that he could see. No one was on the porch, either, and it was too much to hope that Shore had blown up with that grenade. No. The man was out there, somewhere, waiting.

“Let’s go,” he told Willa.

As he’d done in the kitchen, Brandon kept in front of her and backed her toward the gate. The debris continued to fall, and he could hear neighbors shouting for help. What he couldn’t hear was Bo or the sound of sirens from backup. Until he had help, he had to do everything within his power to get Willa away from there.

Thick black smoke billowed out from the house, fanning out across the yard, and making it impossible for Brandon to see all the places where Shore could be hiding. He kept his gun aimed. Ready.

He saw the movement just at the edge of the smoke. It was a man. And it wasn’t Bo. Brandon recognized him from intelligence photos.

It was Martin Shore.

The killer was there, coming for them.

Behind him, Willa fumbled with the gate to open it. She’d obviously put some kind of lock on it, and that lock was now a trap.

Brandon protected Willa as best he could, but he couldn’t help with the locks. He kept his eyes and gun trained on Shore and was ready to push Willa to the ground if necessary. That wouldn’t take her out of the line of fire, but it might shield her long enough until backup arrived. By now, all the neighbors and anyone for blocks around had probably called for help or come out of their residences to see what was going on.

And what was going on was that Shore was about to try to kill them again.

The man kept walking but lifted his gun, aiming it at them.

Willa cursed, but she must have finally gotten the locks to cooperate because she shoved open the gate. In the same motion Brandon pushed her through to the other side.

A bullet slammed into the fence.

The shot came so close to Brandon’s head that he swore he could feel it.

He jumped out of the way, staying low and lunged out of the yard to join Willa on the other side. They made it to a sidewalk that was rimmed with a street and then another row of pristine suburban houses. They could try to duck into one of them, but that wouldn’t stop Shore. He’d just fire into the place and possibly kill some innocent bystanders.

“We have to run,” Brandon told her. He didn’t wait for her to do that. He put his left hand on her shoulder to get her moving, away from the fence and away from her burning house.

Running might not even be possible for someone in the last trimester of pregnancy, but he had to get her to cover so he could try to make a stand against Shore.

Brandon headed up the sidewalk toward the cul de sac where a car was parked. That was their best bet.

Until he saw the kids.

There were three of them, all on skates, and probably no more than ten or eleven years old. If he went in that direction, so would Shore’s bullets.

“Get down!” Brandon shouted to the boys. Hopefully they and anyone else in the area would do as he’d ordered.

“This way,” Willa insisted, turning and leading him in the opposite direction.

She obviously realized the danger to the children, but she also had to know the danger of going past her house again. Shore had probably made it across the yard by now, and if he wasn’t already at the gate, he soon would be.

Brandon adjusted his gun, and aimed, and they hurried past Willa’s section of the fence. The smoke was thicker now, and the wind was carrying it right in their direction. Willa coughed, but she didn’t stop.

He didn’t want to think of the risk this might be causing the baby. Brandon only wanted to get her out of there. Their best option was the intersection just ahead. Cars were trickling past, but if he could get Willa to that point, he could position her on the side of the last stretch of fence and perhaps get her out of Shore’s line of sight.

Brandon heard the creak of the wooden gate and glanced over his shoulder just as it opened.

Shore came out, and he had his gun ready.

The assassin glanced around and spotted them. Brandon wanted to shoot him then and there, but he couldn’t risk a stray shot hitting the children.

Shore obviously didn’t feel the same. He reaimed, pointing the gun directly at Willa.

Brandon grabbed on to her waist and shoved her into the side of the fence.

A bullet flew past them.

God knew where it landed, and Brandon prayed it hadn’t gone into one of the houses or a car.

“We can’t stop,” he told Willa, though he could hear her breathing hard.

They headed up the street toward a parked car, but then Brandon spotted the city bus. It was only about two blocks away and was lumbering in their direction. If he could get Willa on that bus before Shore saw them, they might be able to escape before the man could figure out where to aim more of those deadly shots.

Brandon kept Willa positioned behind him, and he hurried toward the bus. He also pushed back his jacket to reveal his badge.

“Get back inside!” he shouted to an elderly woman who opened her door.

Still hurrying toward the bus, Brandon flagged down the driver and hoped like the devil the man would stop. He didn’t take his attention off the intersection where he knew Shore would soon appear.

The assassin wouldn’t just give up.

The bus inched closer, and with Willa in tow, Brandon raced toward the vehicle. The seconds clicked off in Brandon’s head. He wanted to make sure these seconds weren’t their last ones.

The driver slowed even more as he approached them. Probably because he was concerned about the gun Brandon was holding.

“Open up!” Brandon told the middle-aged Hispanic driver. And he flashed his badge again.

The door swung open.

Just as Brandon caught a glimpse of Shore.

The assassin was at the intersection, barely a block away. Willa was still in Shore’s kill zone.

Brandon pushed her onto the bus and was relieved that they were the sole passengers.

“I’m Sheriff Ruiz,” he said identifying himself. “Drive!” Brandon ordered the man behind the wheel.

He dragged Willa to the bus’s floor, praying that Shore hadn’t seen him.

But he obviously had.

Because a bullet came crashing through the bus window.




Chapter Five


Willa covered her head with the bag when the glass spewed across the bus.

The nightmare wasn’t over.

Shore was still after them, and if he managed to injure the driver, then the bus would almost certainly crash. The crash alone might not be fatal, but it would leave them wide open for another attack.

“Don’t stop,” Brandon warned the driver, “and stay low in the seat.”

The driver was cursing and praying at the same time. Brandon was mumbling something as well, but Willa didn’t think she had the breath to utter anything.

Her baby began to kick, hard, but Willa welcomed the movement. It meant her daughter was safe. For now. But they weren’t out of danger.

The next bullet proved that.

It came through the back window, tearing the glass apart, and it exited through the front. Thankfully, it didn’t come near them or the driver, and the driver slammed on the accelerator to get them out of there.

“Shore’s on foot,” Brandon reminded her. “He won’t be able to come after us for long.”

Willa held her breath, waiting and trying to brace herself for more bullets. But the shots didn’t continue.

Brandon lifted his head and looked out the window. “He’s gone,” he let her know.

Willa still didn’t move. She lay there and prayed the threat was truly over.

“Drive to the nearest police station,” Brandon told the driver, and he took out his phone.

While Brandon punched in some numbers, he helped her from the floor and moved her onto one of the seats. He dropped down onto the seat directly across from her.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

Willa nodded, but she doubted he believed her. For one thing, she was still breathing so fast that she was close to hyperventilating, and she was trembling from head to toe. It might be part of Brandon’s job to be on the business end of gunfire, but until the hostage situation at the maternity hospital, Willa had never known what it was like to face real danger.

Well, now she knew.

And it couldn’t continue.

Somehow, she had to find a safe place for her and her baby. If there was such a thing as a safe place. This was the third attack in four months. Four attacks if she counted being taken hostage at the hospital. Part of her was furious that time after time someone or something had endangered her precious baby. She wanted answers. She wanted justice.

But another part of her only wanted to run and hide.

Willa looked back at the broken glass and damage the bullets had done to the seats. She also looked out at the sidewalk that was zipping by. No sign of Shore, thank God. Maybe they had finally lost him.

She listened while Brandon gave an update to whomever he had called. He also asked about Lieutenant Bo Duggan, and then about Martin Shore. Brandon’s forehead bunched up when he apparently got a response.

“We’re on our way,” Brandon said to the person on the other end of the line, and he snapped his phone shut.

“They got Martin Shore?” she immediately asked.

He shook his head. “But they’re looking. Backup arrived, and there are officers fanning out all over the area.”

The hopeful tone was tinged with doubt. And Willa knew why. From what Brandon had told her, Martin Shore was a professional killer, and he probably knew how to evade the police. He was no doubt on the run so he could regroup.

And come after her again.

“Bo Duggan was shot,” Brandon added, his voice practically a whisper. He closed his eyes a moment but not before she saw the flash of anger mixed with pain. “He’s on the way to the hospital.”

“I’m sorry.” Not that it would probably help, but Willa reached out and touched his arm.

That touch brought his eyes open, and he met her gaze. “So am I. Sorry for the lieutenant and sorry that I didn’t get to you sooner so I could stop this attack.”





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