The Witness

by Nichole Severn

  No. This was a routine assignment from Chief Deputy Remington Barton. He was the marshal assigned to protect this witness until her attacker’s trial date. Nothing more. He didn’t have feelings for her, didn’t love her. Because that meant the admiration he felt for her over the past few days was more than a stress-induced consequence of adrenaline and danger, as he’d convinced himself when they’d fallen into bed together. They’d survived a killer determined to do whatever it took to prove himself to a veteran psychopath, and they’d both desperately needed that release. That was all. That didn’t mean there was anything more than mutual attraction. Didn’t mean there was a real connection between them outside of this investigation. Once the Carver was back behind bars, she’d move on with her life, and Finn would move on with his. Just as he had with every other witness he’d been assigned to protect. “I think it’s best if I ask my chief deputy to reassign me from your protection detail.”

  He didn’t love Camille. Couldn’t. He’d lost the only person he’d ever cared about—loved—at the age of ten, and he’d sworn then he’d never feel that loss and that emptiness again. The hole left behind once they were gone wasn’t worth the risk. And neither was she. Camille had her own life, a career she would want to get back to once this investigation was over. He’d still be here chasing fugitives, protecting other witnesses, and he didn’t intend to stop. That left him only one option.

  “What?” Camille lifted her uninjured hand toward her damaged shoulder as though attempting to keep herself upright, but the liquid exhaustion pooling in her aquamarine gaze gave away the effort. Jutting her chin out slightly, she stood her ground. “So I tell you I’m falling in love with you, and you say you want to be reassigned from my case? Why?”

  “I can’t be the one to protect you anymore. I have a check-in scheduled with Jonah Watson in fifteen minutes to go over the medical examiner’s findings on Dr. Gruner’s remains. I’m going to ask him to take over this detail.” Finn brushed the back of his hand under his nose as a distraction from the watery gleam filling her eyes. He reached for his duffel bag, packed with his gear, clothing and sleeping bag. “Watson’s a good marshal. He’s a former bomb-disposal technician for the FBI, and he’ll have a better perspective on this assignment than I do.” He hauled his duffel bag strap over his shoulder, locking his jaw against the pain in his side from the stab wound, and headed for the safe house door. “He’ll keep you safe. I promise.”

  The hollowness that’d set in a few days after his mother had been shot right in front of him expanded to the point that he couldn’t take his next breath. His rib cage felt too tight, his heart threatening to beat straight out of his chest. He had to keep walking. Had to get to the door. He couldn’t lose her, and damn it, if he let his emotions get in the way of his job, that was exactly what would happen. Anyone he’d ever cared about had been taken from him. His mom, his grandparents, the men and women he’d worked beside in Afghanistan. He couldn’t let her become one more name on a long list of people who’d been ripped from his life. Walking away from her now might make him a coward, but he couldn’t take that pain, the loneliness of losing one more person he cared about. Not again.

  “I’ve heard a lot of promises over the past year, Marshal Reed,” she said. “From a lot of different people.”

  Marshal Reed. Not Finn. He slowed, the agony of that small change splitting the dark cavern behind his sternum wider.

  “From Jeff Burnes before he attacked me, from the police who found me covered in my own blood in that apartment, from the FBI agents promising me there was no way the Carver could find me once I was put in witness protection. Am I supposed to take your word for it that this new marshal will keep me safe, too?” Her voice carried across the safe house, echoing down the hallway. “You promised me we were going to do this together, but you’re the one walking out the door right now. Don’t I deserve to know why?”

  The sooner he cut ties, the easier this would be on them both, and there was only one way to end this, to make her see the truth.

  “You’ve pushed for this connection to be there between us from the beginning, Camille, but like I told you, I’m the marshal assigned to protect you. Nothing more. We’re not friends. It’s not my job to know what to say to make you feel better, and I don’t have to explain myself. I was tasked to keep you alive, and I think it’s better for both of us if I move off this detail. Before you misinterpret anything else.” Tension knotted between his shoulder blades as the lie slipped from his mouth easily enough. He stared at the front door, his hand clamped around the duffel bag strap.

  “And sleeping with me?” she asked. “Was that always part of your plan before you passed me off to some other marshal and ensured you’d never have to see me again, or did you just want to test how long I’d let you take advantage of me?”

  His stomach rippled with sickness. He twisted his head over his shoulder but couldn’t face her fully. “Arm the alarm after I’m gone. Don’t open this door for anyone unless they knock twice.”

  “You made me believe I was important to you,” she said. “Now I know it was all a lie.”

  Finn forced one foot in front of the other, wrenched the door open harder than needed and closed it behind him without looking back. If she’d still had any fantasies about him being some kind of hero, he’d finally succeeded in convincing her otherwise.

  * * *

  NO. HE DIDN’T just get to walk away. He didn’t get to push her off onto another marshal after everything they’d been through together. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe.

  Camille clawed at the collar of her shirt for something to hold on to, grazing the edges of tape and gauze covering the gouges carved into her chest. She stared at the door. Waiting. He couldn’t leave her here. She couldn’t lose the only person she trusted. The walls suddenly seemed as if they were closing in, and there was nowhere for her to escape. She couldn’t leave the safe house. Not with a killer masterminding every twist of this investigation. It didn’t matter how much she wanted to follow him, to demand answers—she wouldn’t put her life at risk. Marching toward the front door, she hit the arm button on the alarm as he’d instructed. Tears burned in her eyes as defeat swirled hot and angry in her chest.

  Finn had promised her he wouldn’t leave. What had changed?

  Well, he’d given her an answer, hadn’t he? Through the pounding of blood behind her ears, he’d told her exactly why nothing could ever happen between them beyond the conclusion of the investigation, and she hadn’t listened.

  You’ve pushed for this connection to be there between us from the beginning, Camille... Suffocating heaviness settled on her damaged shoulder and under her bruised, bloodied fingers. He was right. She’d done this. She’d put him in an impossible position nobody could live up to, but that didn’t make her any less deserving of wanting to feel significant, to feel loved. Important. She’d prodded at his boundaries in an effort to latch onto something—someone—real and warm and reassuring, to make up for the past, but she’d pushed too hard. Until the only escape he’d seen had been to leave altogether. She’d just been so...starved for genuine human interaction, for someone to laugh with, someone who’d support her rather than ruin her, and Finn fit the shape of the invisible hole the Carver had created when he’d stolen her life perfectly.

  Nausea washed into her stomach and spread to the far corners of her body. She didn’t know how long she’d been standing there, watching the door, counting her inhales and exhales for the off chance the marshal she’d come to rely on would walk back into the safe house. She felt as though she was on a knife edge. The vulnerable, self-conscious woman she’d been since the attack in Chicago on one side, and the survivor Finn had convinced her she’d become on the other.

  Had it really all been a lie?

  Camille retraced her steps to her side of the bed and collected her camera from the nightstand. Instant calm buzzed in her veins with th
e added weight, despite the pull on her shoulder. Smoothing her thumb over the ridges in the lens cap, she closed her eyes. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t be that woman who’d let her passion be ripped right from her hands, who’d broken because a man hadn’t lived up to the promises that’d fallen from his lips. The woman who’d been overly aware of every look in her direction, listened for whispers spoken behind her back and looked for ulterior motives in the people around her.

  But Finn’s confidence in her, combined with his admiration, had made her feel stronger than all of that. Had made her believe that perfect fantasy version of herself could be more than a daydream, that she could be the woman she’d built up in her head.

  She’d known this had been a possibility before falling into bed with him, that he wouldn’t feel the same bond between them she’d felt since he’d taken the protection assignment, but that hadn’t stopped her from taking the risk. She’d lived with a self-induced numbness for so long, even the possibility of heartbreak had drawn her to give in. But she’d been wrong about him, just as she’d been wrong about Jeff Burnes. Only unlike her former fiancé, Finn had tried to warn her. He’d never been the hero she’d defended him to be.

  Camille moved her camera to her injured hand and threaded her fingers through her hair with the other. Her fantasy self wouldn’t cry, wouldn’t beg for him to stay, and neither would she. She switched the device on, the high-pitched whirl more comforting than ever before. She queued the last photo she’d taken, the one of him pretending to be asleep on the bed, and slid her thumb over the menu button to select Delete. He’d left to meet with the other marshal, who’d take over Finn’s assignment as soon they were finished with their briefing, and there was nothing she could do about it. As long as the Carver was still out there, still waiting for trial, she’d be stuck here until Deputy US Marshal Watson said otherwise, but that didn’t mean—

  Something in the image caught her eye, a glare from Finn’s nightstand she hadn’t given much thought to until now. What was that? Bringing the cracked LCD monitor closer, she moved across the safe house until she’d positioned herself in the exact spot from where she’d taken the photo. She lifted her gaze beyond the camera, searching for the same glare, but it wasn’t there. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  She maneuvered between the bed and the wall and set her camera on the mattress. She pulled Finn’s digital alarm clock to the edge of the nightstand. It was heavier than she’d imagined, and there was a second power cord crudely installed in the back. Why would a store-bought alarm clock need two power cords? One should’ve been enough. And even if the first cord had started malfunctioning, these types of clocks didn’t cost much to replace. Why bother? Unless...

  A thin needle of cold went through her. Camille rolled the shiny black clock in her hand. A section of the red digital numbers flickered wildly before becoming solid again, and she stilled. Gripping the entry point of the second power cord, she ripped the setup free.

  And stared straight into a small reflective lens of a camera.

  She dropped the clock, the plastic cracking as it hit the corner of the nightstand, and put as much space between her and the hidden surveillance device as she could. A terrible awareness slithered like a poison through her entire nervous system. Finn wouldn’t have installed a hidden camera in his own safe house. He’d have no reason. Her gut instincts said he’d want less evidence of his witnesses under his protection. Not more. Which meant someone else had come inside. Someone else had installed the camera.

  Had been watching them. Watching her.

  Every second, every hour, every day since Finn had brought her here, they’d been surveilled without their knowledge. Her stomach soured. Even when they’d made love. Bile worked up her throat. She covered her mouth with the back of her hand as a weak distraction, but she wasn’t sure anything could get rid of the emotional violation taking control. She had to focus. Turning her back to the nightstand, the small camera still in her hand, she scanned the rest of the safe house inch by inch. One camera wouldn’t be enough to keep tabs on an intended target. There had to be others.

  The weight of being watched made her dizzy, but she couldn’t let it get to her. Not yet. As a photographer, she had to know the best angles to take the next shot and the one after that. The device in her hand didn’t have a swivel feature. It’d been fixed in place inside the alarm clock and pointed directly toward the kitchen. If she needed to shoot the other side of the room, an angle in this camera’s blind spot, she’d need a device positioned in that direction. Camille tilted back her head and centered on a possible source.

  The small green light beside the smoke detector’s test button had gone dark. Swallowing the tightness in her throat, she crossed to the kitchen counter and dragged a bar stool directly underneath the appliance. She climbed onto the stool, using the wall for balance, and twisted off the detector lid. Her hands quivered. The dark pinhole for the LED light wasn’t a light at all but was another camera nearly invisible to the naked eye.

  Two cameras. There were a million possibilities as to why they were here and who could’ve gotten access inside the safe house to install them.

  She detached the power from the second device, presumably cutting off all recording, but not even severing the connection eased the tension building inside. “Finn.”

  She had to tell him. Marshals made enemies throughout their careers. There was a chance she hadn’t been the target of this surveillance at all. Camille climbed down from the bar stool and tossed the hidden devices beside her camera on the bed. Working her injured arm into her coat, she slipped on her shoes and headed for the front door.

  Two knocks echoed down the hallway before she’d made it more than a few steps.

  She slowed. Finn’s parting words rushed to the front of her mind. The marshal taking over her protective detail would knock twice. Jonah Watson would be able to contact Finn and tell him about the cameras. The US Marshals Service could use the devices to trace the feed back to the source and take it from there. She’d ask to be relocated to another district, and Finn’s rejection would be behind her.

  Camille punched in the six-digit code to disarm the security system. Hauling the heavy door open, she faced off with an all-too-familiar face she’d never thought she’d see again.

  “Dr. Gruner.” Only it wasn’t him. Because according to the medical examiner who’d studied the remains Finn had recovered, the real Henry Gruner had been killed and left in the woods surrounding her house a year ago.

  “Hello, Camille.” Ear-length graying hair swooped down over a wrinkled forehead and the edge of the imposter’s framed glasses. A large nose bubbled out toward full cheeks with a dusting of red across the bridge. Salt-and-pepper facial hair hid the outline of his mouth and most of his chin. He stepped over the threshold, hiking her pulse into overdrive. Upon first meeting this Dr. Gruner, she’d estimated his age to be around sixty, maybe sixty-five, what with the limp in his right leg, an old injury he’d claimed had been the reason he’d been medically discharged from the navy, but now the man closing in on her moved like a much younger version of himself.

  The limp had disappeared. He stood tall, removing his glasses as she backed into the protective depths of the safe house. He let his glasses hit the floor and tugged at the edges of his mustache. Some kind of facial prosthesis peeled away from his nose before a gray wig slid from his scalp, revealing the killer she’d been running from for over a year.

  Jeff Burnes.

  The Carver.

  He locked steel-gray eyes on her as her heel caught on the bar stool she’d left in the middle of the floor. “Did you get my anniversary present?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Illinois marshals got their fugitive about an hour ago.” Deputy US Marshal Jonah Watson tapped Finn on the chest with the corner of a manila file folder. Iridescent blue eyes gleamed in clouded gray sunlight. The former FBI ordnance te
chnician crossed his arms over his massive chest, cording muscle along his arms and neck. At two inches taller than Finn, Jonah had worked as a unit chief for the FBI’s hazardous devices school as an instructor to support state and local bomb technicians before coming to serve as a deputy for the USMS. He’d worked for two years in Afghanistan for the bureau to analyze, investigate and re-create improvised explosive devices. His training made it nearly impossible for any detail to slip past the marshal’s notice, and Finn needed his help with this case more than ever. “Bastard nearly made it across state lines. He was good. He’s been laying low for the past week in an abandoned church as one of the homeless who sometimes stake out there at night, but someone noticed. Called in an anonymous tip right before he ran.”

  “That doesn’t make sense.” The Carver had escaped federal custody only to hang around Chicago for the past week? Finn took the file, his mind immediately jumping at the opportunity to focus on something other than the woman he’d left behind in the safe house. The pressure behind his rib cage still hadn’t lifted, but Camille was safe. That was all that mattered. He’d done his job in keeping her alive, but now that honor had to go to another marshal. One who wouldn’t make a mistake because he cared about the witness he’d been assigned to protect more than he wanted to admit.

  Throughout this entire investigation she’d stood as a beacon of strength and the epitome of everything he’d feared since he’d been ten years old. The past several days had physically and emotionally drained him more than any other assignment, and it had everything to do with her, the most brilliant, honest and passionate creature he’d never seen coming. Whatever this connection she’d forged between them was, it wasn’t simple. It didn’t just require minimal effort, as he’d grown used to in his relationships with his fellow marshals, former combat buddies and the women he’d hooked up with. Camille came with a long history of trauma, healing and emotional neediness, and he had no idea how to support her in that or help her through it. She deserved someone who could open up the way she needed, someone she could trust, have fun with and be there when the nightmares surfaced. Not him.