by Cynthia Eden
He glanced at her. Jasmine’s hands were curled around her stomach and his—his were fisted at his sides. “His sister?”
She nodded.
“Noah’s fucking sister?” Then he squeezed his eyes shut. “What have I done?” Then softer, “Again.”
“You haven’t done anything.” Nervously, she edged toward him. The floor creaked beneath her feet.
He threw up a hand, halting her. “Do not touch me right now.”
She was so lost.
“When you touch me, I want to strip you. I want to take you. I want to make you scream my name.”
Oh, well, in that case…Jasmine took another step.
“You’re his sister!” He backed away from her. “All Noah has ever wanted was to find out about his real family. He used to talk about them for hours out in the field…”
“He was better off not knowing.” No… “He is better off not knowing.” Noah had a wife, a home. He didn’t need the mess of the past.
He stared at her with both rage and pain in his eyes. “You’re what he’s wanted. You were right in front of him, and he didn’t even know it.”
This wasn’t good. “You can’t tell him.”
“Bullshit. I have to tell him.”
“No!” Then she leapt across the room and grabbed tightly to his arms. “You really want to tell him that his mom was a drugged out prostitute? That she couldn’t remember his father’s name? That his sister…” The breath she expelled burned her lungs. “Trace will tell you that I have a criminal history. I’ve been hacking for years. I’ve got enemies…so many. You don’t want to put this at his doorstep. You don’t want to put me there.”
“Noah can handle enemies.”
“I don’t want him to know. Please, Drake. There’s no point in it.”
“He’ll want you in his life.”
“But I can’t be a part of his life.” That ripped her up. She’d realize that truth, though, long ago. “So let it go.” Her hands slid up his chest. Curled around his shoulders.
He was so stiff in her embrace. “I fucked you.”
Did the man have some moral opposition to “making love”? Because she didn’t.
“Noah’s sister.” His eyes closed. “Knew you were trouble. From the first glance.”
“I knew you were, too.” And she hadn’t cared. She rose onto her toes. Pressed her lips to his.
He immediately jerked away.
“Drake?”
His eyes were open. Blazing. “I won’t betray a friend again.”
“You aren’t betraying anyone.” But he was hurting her when he pulled away.
He yanked out his phone. Turned his back on her.
“Drake?”
He took a few more steps away. That phone was to his ear and he said, “Trace, what’s the status? Do you have things contained?”
A faint growling sound reached Jasmine’s ears. She crept toward the window on the right.
Still talking into his phone, Drake said, “Yeah, well, we have another problem.”
Her shoulders tightened as she peered out the window. She couldn’t see anyone outside, and that growling had stopped.
“How fast do you think we could get a DNA test?”
No. Jasmine whirled around.
“Right. A DNA test. Comparing Jasmine and—”
She flew across the room and yanked that phone out of his hand. She hung up on Trace. “What are you doing? You can’t tell them!”
“If you’re really his sister, then Noah deserves to know.”
He couldn’t do this. “No, Drake. No.”
His phone was ringing again. He tried to reach for it. She put it behind her back.
One blond brow rose. “Seriously, Jasmine?”
“Yeah, seriously, Drake.” She hurried away from him. “This is my life we’re talking about.”
“Noah is filthy rich.” Drake said those words bluntly. “If you’re his sister, he’s going to want to take care of you.”
“And when I was fifteen and stealing food to survive—”
He flinched.
She didn’t. “I would have appreciated his money. I don’t now. I don’t want him knowing.” Jasmine wanted to toss that phone. To shatter it. “Trace isn’t going to forget this.” Now he’d start probing. “Dammit, why did you have to say anything? Why—”
That growling was back. Only this time, she wasn’t the only one who heard the sound. Drake’s head jerked toward the window. In two fast steps, he was there, peering outside, then swearing when he saw the lights that hit the cabin.
“Motorcycles,” Jasmine whispered. She counted at least three. And was that an SUV rushing in behind them?
It was.
She answered the ringing phone. “Trace, I think you need to get your ass over to Drake’s old cabin…cause we’ve got company.”
Drake had already whirled away from the window. He marched to a closet and started pulling out—weapons?
A gun. A knife.
“What kind of company?” Trace barked in her ear.
“The kind that isn’t friendly.” She was backing away from the window. How had they been found?
Drake was back. He grabbed the phone from her. “My grandfather’s place. Get here as fast as you can…because this party isn’t going to wait.” He shoved the phone into his pocket as his eyes glittered down at Jasmine. “Do you know how to shoot a gun?”
She did. That didn’t mean she’d want to. Or had he missed that whole no-bullets-in-the-gun scene before with her?
He put the gun in her hands. She realized he had a second handgun tucked in the waistband of his jeans. “Aim and fire, princess.”
She gulped. “H-how did they find us?”
The growls died away.
Drake put a finger to his lips, then he killed all the lights in the cabin.
Then…
“There’s nowhere to run, Archer! This is the end for you.”
That voice…she knew it. Saxon. Her heartbeat quickened. Jasmine opened her mouth to call out a fierce reply, but Drake’s hand clamped over her lips.
“We know Jazz is in there,” Saxon shouted. “So you both need to come out, now.”
Drake’s hand fell away. He took up a position near the window. Drew his weapon.
Jasmine didn’t want him to get caught in the middle of a firefight. And if Saxon were out there…
I can’t let this happen.
“It wasn’t just fucking,” she heard herself say because she knew the end was near for her.
Drake fired. The bullet blasted into the night. “Stay the hell back!” he roared.
“It wasn’t just fucking,” she said again, her voice louder even as her body trembled.
Drake’s head jerked toward her. “This isn’t the time—”
“It might have just been for you, but it was more for me.” Tell him. “I thought I was making love with you.”
Gunfire hit the side of the house.
“I’ve never been in love, Drake, but I think…I really think I came close with you.”
“Jasmine…” Her name was a growl. “We’re gonna talk about this later. When bastards aren’t shooting at us.”
But she knew there wasn’t going to be a later. “I recognize that guy’s voice. It’s Saxon—he’s…he’s good at his job.”
“And I’m good at mine.” He fired again, and she heard a man cry out.
The gun was heavy in her grasp.
“Burn them out!” That bellow reached her ears and sent ice through her veins.
“Oh, the hell, no, they aren’t,” Drake snarled right back. Then he was firing, again and again.
Jasmine peeked through the window. Saw the men getting hit by Drake’s bullets—saw the guns being aimed back at her and Drake.
And she saw the flash of flame. What in the hell were they doing?
Then some of those flames started flying toward the cabin. Something crashed through the window. Exploded.
Molotov cockt
ail. Flames licked against the floor. Talk about coming dangerously prepared!
“No!” Jasmine ran toward the flames and tried to stomp them out.
Drake tackled her and sent her flying back away from the fire. “Are you crazy?” he demanded. “Dammit, princess, you have to be careful—”
“It’s your cabin,” she whispered. “Your grandfather’s cabin…”
And another Molotov cocktail splintered inside.
“And you’re worth more to me,” Drake said, voice fierce, as he rose with her. His gaze locked on a door to the right. “Come on. We’re getting out of here.”
But Saxon and his men would just be waiting outside.
“Stay close,” Drake told her. “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
And she didn’t plan to let anyone hurt him.
Drake rushed toward that door. She followed as closely as she could, still holding tightly to that gun he’d given her. A few more feet, then they were bursting through the cabin’s rear door. The light was bright and hard and men were waiting for them. Drake shoved her to the side just as a bullet blasted right where her head had had been five seconds before.
Then Drake was firing. Firing and hauling her toward the swamp. Drake hit with deadly accuracy. She’d never seen anything like him. Men cried out and fell in his wake, and Drake was easily getting them toward the thick safety of the swamp that waited.
Then he ran out of bullets. She saw a man rising, smiling, as he aimed at Drake.
She fired.
She also screamed.
And she hit her target. As the man fell back, Jasmine and Drake rushed into the swamp. She didn’t know where they were going. Didn’t care if they were headed straight into snake central. They were getting away from Maxwell’s goons when she’d been so sure that it was over for her and—
“Hello, Jazz.”
A hand grabbed her. A strong, callused hand. Saxon yanked her against his body and took her gun in an instant.
At the man’s voice, Drake spun back around. His eyes locked on Jasmine.
“Run,” she told him, desperate. “Go!”
But he didn’t. He smiled, a smile that chilled, and took a step toward her.
Jasmine felt a gun press against her temple. “I don’t have orders to kill Jazz here,” Saxon said. “But if you take another step, I will.”
Drake stopped advancing.
“Go,” Jasmine shouted at Drake. “Get out of here!” Why wasn’t he hauling ass?
“Kill her, and you’ll be dead five seconds later,” Drake promised Saxon.
She could hear the thunder of footsteps. The men who could still move were giving chase—hunting them in the swamp.
Saxon has just been one step ahead of the others. He usually was. He’d known they would flee out of the back door. He’d been ready.
She knew exactly how deadly Saxon could be. Once upon a time, he’d been her only friend. She knew him so well…
Well enough to know how this would end.
The sunlight flickered through the top of the trees and fell on Drake, turning his hair a shade brighter.
“Another time,” Jasmine whispered as she stared into Drake’s eyes, “another place, and things could have been so different.” She wished they had been different.
“Move the gun away from her head,” Drake snarled. His body was so tight with fury. She knew he was about to advance and attack Saxon.
And Saxon’s team wasn’t far behind.
“Put your hands up, hero,” Saxon ordered right back. “And get on your knees.”
“Let him go, Saxon,” she whispered. “Just take me, and let Drake go.”
Saxon laughed.
“Not happening.” Drake’s voice was lethal.
“Maxwell can’t get him,” she told Saxon. “He can’t.”
Then she spun in his hold. The gun was still at her head. She stared into her friend’s eyes. He won’t pull the trigger. “I want Drake safe,” she whispered to him. “Please, I’m begging you…”
But the others were there then. Surrounding them. And Jasmine found herself being forced to walk back toward the SUV. Two SUVs were there. A few scattered motorcycles.
Maxwell had sent a full force after them. And now…
Drake was pushed toward the second SUV.
Saxon hauled Jasmine toward the first one.
“You so much as bruise her,” Drake shouted, “and I’ll make you pay.”
Saxon tilted his head as he studied Drake. “Am I supposed to be scared?”
A gun was at Drake’s back. Another pointed at his head. He smiled. Smiled. “No, you’re supposed to know that I’m stating a fact.”
Saxon lifted Jasmine up and tossed her into the SUV. When another guy tried to climb inside, Saxon barked, “Watch the jerk. I’ve got her.”
The door slammed. She was in the passenger seat of that SUV. Saxon was in the driver’s seat. He had his gun on her.
“What in the fiery hell am I supposed to do now?” he whispered to her.
“Saxon…”
“There was a plan, Jazz. A plan. Now it’s all screwed.”
Because of her.
“There’s no way out. Not for you. Not for me.” His gaze slid toward Drake. “And not for him.”
“Please.”
Would begging even work?
Saxon cranked the vehicle. “Maxwell’s waiting on you, and sweetheart, what he’s got planned won’t be pretty.”
***
They were idiots. Fucking idiots. They didn’t cuff Drake’s hands. Didn’t tie him. Didn’t restrain him at all.
They loaded him into the backseat of that SUV. Idiot Number One sat beside him, with a gun shoved into Drake’s side. Idiot Number Two climbed into the front seat and cranked the engine.
“You got him?” Number Two called back.
The gun dug deeper into his side. “Hell, yeah.”
The SUV shot forward, sending mud flying in its wake.
The others were behind them. Still at the scene. Collecting the wounded. Watching the cabin burn.
Assholes. You’ll pay for that fire.
Jasmine was in the SUV in front of him. He didn’t want to be away from her. Drake needed to make sure she was safe.
“Hope that piece of ass was worth all the trouble…” Idiot Number One muttered. “Cause you’re gonna be in a world of hurt soon…”
Drake waited until they’d put some distance between the SUVs and the cabin. Was Trace on his way? Had to be. And since there was only one old dirt road that led to his cabin, his buddy might even be waiting for them up ahead.
“Always thought Jazz would make for a good screw,” Idiot Number One told him.
Slowly, very slowly, Drake turned his head to stare at the man. “She was more than good.”
The guy’s mouth dropped open, then he gave a surprised laugh. “Hell, yeah!” The gun slipped away from Drake’s side, just a few inches. “With that red hair, I knew—”
Drake slammed his head into the man’s face. Then he rammed his elbow into the jerk’s throat. The gun discharged, but Drake had already heaved up, and the bullet blazed past him, shattering the window. The man in the front seat was yelling, trying to turn and grab his own weapon.
Not going to happen. Drake surged toward the front seat even as the SUV started to careen toward the trees.
***
“What in the hell…?”
The sound of a crash had Jasmine jerking around in her seat. The second SUV had just plowed into a tree. “Drake!”
Saxon slammed on the brakes. His head snapped back as he glanced at the wreckage behind them.
And as they watched, Drake emerged from the vehicle. Only Drake.
He was armed.
“Interesting new boyfriend you have,” Saxon murmured. He started to lift his own weapon.
Jasmine’s fingers clamped around his wrist. “No, not him.”
Saxon’s gaze held hers.
“Let’s go,” she whispered. “It
ends now.”
“Jazz…”
“Not him.” She was pleading again.
“Give me Jasmine!” Drake yelled.
Saxon’s foot slammed down onto the gas pedal and they lurched forward.
She glanced back once more at Drake. He was running after them. Bleeding from a cut high on his cheek. This would be her last sight of him.
“Thank you,” she told Saxon.
“Don’t thank me.” His voice was hard. “Because you’re going to die.”
***
Drake ran after the SUV. “Give her back to me!”
The SUV was flying fast, and Jasmine was vanishing. “No!” Drake roared.
The SUV didn’t stop.