Alive at 5 (Entangled Ignite)

by Linda Bond

  “So, Jackson went alone.”

  “Yes.”

  This time, when she reached for his hand, he didn’t pull away. His fingers found hers and they entwined, his grip fierce. “And you think if you had gone with your uncle, you could have prevented his death?”

  “I wouldn’t have let Jackson go off alone on that dive.”

  “Zack. Stop.”

  He looked up, and his need to be rid of his guilt poured over her.

  A strong wave of yearning swept through her. She longed to be the one to make him whole again. “You have to forgive yourself.” She lifted a hand to his cheek. “Your uncle would have never wanted you to blame yourself for his death.”

  In slow motion, he reached out and returned the gesture, touching her face and brushing a strand of hair away from her eyes. A twist of emotion went through her, the feeling so intense it held her breath hostage in her lungs. But honestly, part of her was still afraid to get too close, still sure that he’d hurt her. Even though she now understood what was driving him, he was still a runner. And she couldn’t handle someone else abandoning her because she wasn’t good enough.

  He moved his hand to the back of her neck, his fingers caressing her hairline. “I give in.”

  “What?” Her nerves felt on fire.

  “I want you to help me.”

  “Of course I will.”

  She could feel his warm breath on her lips.

  “I don’t want to do this alone.” As his mouth found hers, she closed her eyes. His lips pressed down on hers with fierce longing. His kiss was not gentle. He opened her lips with his tongue, and she tasted him.

  She hesitated, a thought pulsating in the back of her mind. Oh, hell.

  He forced her mouth to move under his. His other hand pressed her backside forward, urging her to move closer. He ran his hands under her shirt, his fingers leaving a burning trail up her side.

  She wanted to touch him, feel the hardness under his shirt, ease the ache building in her center, but she held back.

  He must have sensed her hesitation. His lips stilled and he pulled away just enough to look into her eyes. “Samantha?”

  “I’m sorry.” And truth be told, she was. Sorry for so much. Sorry she’d even attempted to do a live shot after Maxwell’s death. Sorry she’d lied to get permission to be on this adventure vacation. Sorry she’d ever doubted Zack. Sorry she’d chosen work over her mother. Sorry for so damn much. “I—I can’t. I have to go home.” She choked on the last words. “Today.”

  …

  “What?” Zack pulled back, holding her by both shoulders. He couldn’t have heard her right. She was leaving? What the hell?

  “I’m sorry,” she repeated, looking devastated.

  He couldn’t stop himself from digging his fingers into her flesh. He didn’t know which was worse, the ringing in his ears or the throbbing in his groin. Jesus. Please don’t do this. “What’s wrong?”

  He knew it. He should never have opened up to her.

  She seemed to recoil from him. “I shouldn’t have promised to help. I really have to leave. This morning.” She dropped her gaze.

  Was she repulsed that he wasn’t perfect, but damaged, forever fucked-up goods?

  He sat back, surprised at himself. He should be happy about this. A few days ago, he had wanted her out of his way so he could do his job.

  A lot had changed in forty-eight hours.

  “Is this because I left last night?” He hoped that was it. He couldn’t blame her for losing faith in him after that. But something inside him had cracked. Watching his uncle die and decoding the message his uncle had recorded as he slowly ran out of air had broken him.

  He still needed justice for his uncle, but he no longer wanted to do this alone. Besides, Samantha and her photographer were very good at their jobs. Samantha had uncovered the most crucial piece of evidence yet. Together, they could actually succeed.

  Then there was the physical attraction—the raw chemistry that heated up whenever he got near her. That kiss they’d shared… Her lips were so soft. It had been a long time since anything in his life had been as pleasurable as that kiss.

  She moved out of his reach. “No. I was upset, but hell, nothing compared to what you must have been feeling.” She shook her head. “It’s… I have to go home and take care of my family.”

  He frowned. “Is everyone okay?”

  “After you left last night, I got a call from my sister.”

  The look on her face told him it wasn’t a good call. “And?”

  “The nursing home is kicking my mom out on Friday if I don’t pay the three thousand dollars for next month up front.” Her shoulders fell.

  He blinked. “That’s criminal. Surely, they can’t just kick her out.”

  “Surely they can. It’s a private facility. And I don’t have three thousand dollars sitting in the bank.” Her cheeks turned a pale shade of pink. “What am I going to do with my mother if I have to take her home? She’s in a coma. She needs nursing care 24-7. I can’t work and take care of her, too. Her insurance won’t cover the cost of daily care at this facility.” Samantha’s gaze darted from her hands, to him, back to her hands.

  “Take a deep breath,” he said. “Why are they doing this now?”

  Samantha bit her lip. “Maxwell’s foundation paid part of her bill every month. He dated my mother for a couple of years, between marriages. They didn’t work out, but he was always fond of us, and helped us out whenever there was a crisis.” Her heart lurched thinking about her mother. “Now that he’s dead, those contributions have stopped. There’s apparently some kind of estate glitch, or he didn’t remember my mom in his will. I’m waiting for it all to be settled.”

  “I see.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face. He knew he should let her go. She had a family emergency. Besides, she’d be a lot safer at home. God knew he’d almost led her cameraman into a death trap yesterday. Wanting to keep her around was just plain selfish. But she’d gotten under his skin.

  She stared into the pool despondently.

  He’d learned his lesson, too. Working together was better than going it alone. Without her and George’s help, he’d still be searching for the truth. Now he had proof someone had tampered with his uncle’s tanks, and it changed everything.

  If he told her what he’d learned on the DVD, what his uncle had signed to the camera, she’d stay. He knew she would. But could he ask it of her?

  “I can help you with the money. So you can stay and continue investigating.” The words tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them.

  She shook her head sadly. “Thanks, but I need to figure out how to make this work on my own.” Both hands lifted, as if in surrender. “You can’t lend me money every month.” Her lips thinned. “And I can’t keep chasing a story that isn’t really there.”

  His throat tightened up. “Let me at least make one phone call on your behalf.”

  “That’s just one of my problems.” Her hand shook as she wiped her forehead. “Try fixing this one. My eighteen-year-old sister just told me she’s pregnant by her twenty-one-year-old, spoon-fed, so-called boyfriend. She’s in total denial, but he’s never going to marry her. She doesn’t have the right pedigree.”

  Zack’s gut clenched on her behalf. “Shit.”

  Her shoulders dropped. “Yeah. Shit.”

  Her despair hit him like an unexpected blow. “How can I help?” He needed to help her. Somehow. “Tell me.”

  “Oh, God.” She reached out to him, wrapping her small hands around his. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to take my frustration out on you.”

  “We have unfinished business here.” He was referring to their investigation, but what he really wanted to do was kiss her again. Hold her in his arms and take away all the pain he saw in her eyes. Let her take away the pain in his heart…

  She smiled, but slowly shook her head. “There’s really nothing left for me to investigate.”

  He stared at he
r incredulously. “What about Wentworth’s death?”

  She pulled her hands away and reached for a stack of papers on the table next to her lounge chair. She handed them to him. “This is the autopsy report. Maxwell died from the impact of a hard opening. The jolt ripped his aorta away from his heart and severed his spine.” She shivered at the thought. “His death was ruled accidental. The ME found no signs of foul play.”

  He wanted to reach out and pull her into his embrace. But something in the rigid set of her body stopped him.

  “Jesus, I don’t know why you crazy men think jumping out of planes is fun.”

  He glanced down at the report cover. Very official. “This ruling doesn’t mean a thing. Someone set him up for the fall. The medical examiner wouldn’t know if his parachute had been tampered with.”

  “The police haven’t found any evidence of that,” she told him.

  He ground his teeth to keep from saying the FAA would determine that, not the local police. He didn’t want to upset her.

  “And your uncle… It looked like he got tangled on a guideline and just couldn’t get back to the surface. An accident, too.”

  She pitied him with those big, dark, troubled eyes. But she had no idea what he’d seen. There was no way she could know.

  “God rest his soul.” She sighed again, and stood. “Unless you saw something in that DVD that I didn’t?”

  He hesitated.

  She froze and stared at him. “Zack. Did you see something?”

  He should tell her. It would make her stay. All he had to do was tell her how Jackson had used sign language to tell him who prepared his tanks before his dive. He had spelled the name Robert. If they found this Robert, whoever he was, they’d find the man who not only tampered with Jackson’s tank, but probably also Maxwell’s chute.

  “Oh my God.” Her hand flew to her mouth. “You did.”

  He stared at her, really seeing her for the first time this morning. Her hair, which had been so tightly secured earlier, now fell around her shoulders in a tumbled, unbrushed mess. Her skin, which had glowed when he’d seen her in the bar, now appeared ashen, with smudged flakes of black mascara on her cheeks. And she’d thrown on jeans and a shirt two sizes too big. Stress had beaten her down in a way she now wore all over her body.

  Hell. He had to let her go. Even though his heart twisted at the thought of it. At the thought of never seeing her again. Of losing her forever.

  He smiled. “Nothing really. Just a hunch.”

  Her lips rolled inward, and for a moment he thought she was going to burst into tears. But she didn’t. “Well, then…” she murmured hoarsely.

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s just, that I, well, I’ve always done whatever it took to get the story. But now I need to—I have to—put my family before work.” She stuttered out a breath. “Even if it gets me fired.”

  What he would have given for a mother or a sister who wanted to put him first, who would have loved him enough to face her worst fears in order to stand by him.

  “I’ll call you if I find out anything,” he promised. But he knew he wouldn’t call. Letting her go meant just that. The Lone Ranger would ride solo again.

  Whether he wanted to or not.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sam’s heart beat quickly as she walked across the steamy, black tarmac at Tampa’s MacDill Air Force Base. The X-Force Adventure Vacation Company had moved onto Tampa’s Central Command for the next leg of the thrill ride. The vacationers were flying in F-16s, courtesy of the United States Air Force Thunderbirds, who were using MacDill as their home base today in preparation for the base’s annual air show. The next adventure was about to begin, and she and George had somehow managed to make it in time.

  She hadn’t called Zack to give him the heads up that she’d be here today. She wanted to surprise him and thank him in person for making that one phone call on her behalf as he’d suggested the other night. That was all it had taken to get her mother’s facility to extend her contract and care for three more months. Zack had bought her time to figure that problem out. She’d be forever grateful.

  She didn’t call Monica either. Her reporter’s intuition told her to sneak up on the rest of the X-Force Adventure Vacation crew. The element of surprise always worked in a journalist’s favor.

  Heat blasted her in waves, rolling over her like invisible fingers leaving a moist track in their wake.

  She strode across the asphalt, her silver sling backs sinking a bit in the softening tar. She knew they were totally inappropriate shoes for an air show. She didn’t care. She wet her lips. Today, she wanted to look sexy.

  “Holy shit! Get a load of that.” George’s voice skyrocketed. Her cameraman moved past her, power walking across the airfield. She laughed aloud, knowing what had him smiling. George loved machines, and sitting outside a hangar near the longest runway at MacDill, the fleet of Air Force Thunderbirds gleamed in the high noon sun.

  She wasn’t a jet freak like George, but she had to admit there was a majestic and powerful aura around the line of white jets, with their cool blue stripes and red noses.

  “I feel the need for speed!” George yelled as he glanced back at her, pumping his fist in the air.

  “Top Gun!” she yelled back. His euphoria was contagious.

  “Top Gun’s the navy, but whatever. I dig ’em all!”

  As she caught up to George, he leaned over and planted a big, wet kiss on her cheek. “I love you for bringing us back. This shit rocks. Beats the hell out of covering court or traffic accidents.”

  George may have agreed to come back for the jets, but she was coming back to show Zack a picture she’d found researching online while waiting at her mother’s nursing home. As a cop, he should know already about Scott Fitzpatrick’s fifty-eight counts of alleged fraud. News clips galore popped up online, but Zack might not have dug deep enough into Google Images to find the one picture that had fired off a connection in Sam’s brain.

  Where was Zack? She couldn’t wait to show him. Her gaze landed on two jets set apart from the formation. The Air Force had two F-16 twin-seat trainers that could also take media and VIPs on rides. At each stop on their tour, a specially trained Thunderbird pilot took a handful of lucky individuals up during practice runs—one at a time, of course. It was good PR for the Air Force and a delight for the little people who only rode the wind in their dreams.

  Today, a few vacationers would get the chance to experience a Thunderbird from the inside. She’d heard stories of VIPs who had pulled 9 gs during their demonstration flight. The Mayor of Tampa had even admitted to throwing up and passing out last year.

  Her chest tightened. Thank God, Zack would be the one flying as a passenger today and not her. She would probably never get over her fear of flying. Just thinking about getting in one of these babies made her knees buckle.

  A handful of vacationers dressed in forest-green flight suits huddled together near the two-seater, and a handful of pilots dressed in crisp, blue uniforms mingled around the group.

  She strained to see, trying to pick out one of two faces. She hoped to find Zack first.

  Her heart skipped when he stepped out of the crowd. He looked her way and ripped off his aviator sunglasses. His hand flew up to shade his eyes.

  Her cheeks burned, embarrassed by the excitement boiling up inside her. Unable to squash her anticipation, she picked up her pace and waved. She was close enough now to see the look of surprise on his face. He broke out that Tom Cruise-like smile and waved back.

  She tried to calm the flutter in her chest, knowing she must be grinning like a fifteen-year-old on her first date. Ridiculous, but fun. Okay, she had to admit it. She liked this man. She was definitely glad to see him again. More than glad. And excited she had information that might help him.

  He strode toward her with that confident swagger of his. Now, this was the Zack Hunter she’d first met at Skydive Drop Zone. She laughed. God, he looked good in a flight suit. Hell, he looked good
in anything. She bet he looked even better in nothing at all…

  He walked faster, almost running now. Was he anxious to see her, too? She stopped, and balled up her hands to keep them from shaking.

  He didn’t say a word as he approached her. Instead, he pulled her into a bear hug and lifted her off her feet, swinging her around like a lover in a romantic movie.

  She laughed. Or tried to. “I can’t breathe.”

  “Good, that’s exactly how I like my women. Breathless.”

  Before, she would have rolled her eyes at such a player line, but now that she knew his history, she beamed up at him. He was definitely not the rich, spoiled, trust fund baby she had pegged him for a little more than a week ago. Okay, he was definitely rich, with enough money to take care of her little financial problem with one simple phone call, but she’d learned at the pool the other night that his cockiness was only a shield to protect his wary heart. She clutched him back, hoping he would allow himself to experience even half of the exhilaration coursing through her own body at seeing him. He had to feel her heart racing. Was his?

  “I’m glad you came back,” he whispered into her ear as he set her on her feet. His arms remained around her.

  “I wanted to thank you in person.”

  “You’re welcome.” His smile dimmed, only a bit. “I know you said you needed to take care of your mother’s bill yourself but—”

  “I’ll pay you back.”

  He brushed away a strand of hair that had fallen over her left eye. His gentle touch accelerated the fire in her belly.

  “The money came from my foundation, not me personally. We contribute to many different charities. You don’t have to pay the money back.”

  She dropped her gaze. “I do. I’m not a charity.”

  He lifted her chin up so she had to look at him again. “I know you’re not. Okay, we’ll work it out.”

  “After we find our killer.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “I thought you’d given up the idea of murder.”