by Cynthia Eden
“The senator facilitated deals between Guerrero and foreign officials,” Jasper said with his eyes narrowed on her. “Your father would find the people who needed the weapons, those desperate for power, those ready to overthrow weak governments...”
Her father had made so many connections over the years. He’d been on dozens of committees, and he’d told her once that he’d been working hard to make the world a better place.
Better? Not from the sound of things. Just more bloody, more dangerous.
“We’re talking about billions of dollars’ worth of weapons,” Jasper continued. “From what we can tell, your father took a nice little finder’s fee for every deal he made.”
She swallowed and forced her hands to unclench. “You’re saying my father took a commission from Guerrero? That every time weapons were sold—” every time people died when those weapons were used “—he got a slice of the pie.”
Jasper nodded grimly.
“He was a good man,” she had to say it. Someone did. He wasn’t even cold in the ground. “Once.” She could remember it, couldn’t she? If she tried hard enough, the memories were there. “Before my mother died. He went to Congress to make the world better.”
Only, he’d wound up working to destroy it.
Was that why he’d put the gun to his own head? Because he couldn’t live with what he’d done?
You left me behind to deal with everything, all on my own.
Sometimes it seemed as if he’d left her that hot summer night when her mother died in the car accident on a lonely stretch of Mississippi road.
“He wanted to save you,” Logan said, the words deep and rumbling. His hand took hers. Almost helplessly, her gaze found his. “He agreed to trade every bit of evidence he had on Guerrero in order to get you home alive.”
“So that’s why you—your team came for me.” In that hell. “Because my father paid you with his evidence.”
“He didn’t exactly make the payment....” Gunner muttered as he ran an agitated hand through his hair. “He put a bullet in his head instead.”
Juliana flinched.
Logan surged to his feet. His chair fell to the floor behind him with a clatter. Logan lunged for the other man. “Gunner...”
Gunner just shrugged, but he hurriedly backed up a few feet. “Payment was due at delivery, right? As soon as you were brought back safe and sound, Senator James was going to give us the intel we needed. Only, instead of delivering, he chose to...renegotiate.”
Juliana could only shake her head. This...this was the last thing she’d expected when Logan had brought her in to meet with the other agents. “I buried him today.”
“And because of Guerrero’s deals, hundreds of people are buried every single day,” Sydney said, her voice soft and lacking the leashed fury that seemed to vibrate beneath Gunner’s words. “We have to stop him. You have to help us.”
“How? I saw Guerrero, but...” But she’d already told them that. She’d sketched out half a dozen pictures. Done everything that she could. “Now he wants me dead.”
Logan shoved Gunner into the nearest wall. “You aren’t dying.” He tossed that back without glancing her way. His focused fury was on the other man.
Sydney cleared her throat. “Your father...indicated that you had the evidence we need.”
Her words had Juliana blinking in surprise. “I don’t. I didn’t even know about Guerrero until—I just thought I was being held with a man named John Gonzales, until Logan told me the truth! John said that he’d been kidnapped just like me. When those men put me in the room, John was already there. I didn’t know he was Guerrero, and I don’t know anything about his weapons.” She wished that she could help them. She wanted to make this nightmare end, but she just didn’t have any evidence.
“Your father left a suicide note.”
She didn’t want to hear any more. Juliana pushed to her feet, found Logan by her side. For someone so big, he could sure move fast. She stared up at him. “I wasn’t told about a note.” He hadn’t told her.
He glanced back at Sydney. Glared. “We didn’t...want that part leaking to the media.”
Rage boiled within her. He was so close. In that instant, she wanted to strike out at him. To hurt him, as she was being torn apart. “I’m not the media! I’m his daughter!”
“Exactly.” From Jasper, drawling Jasper. Cold Jasper. “In his note, he said you had all the evidence. We kept that bit from the media, but Guerrero would have put a spy in your father’s life, someone who could keep close tabs on him. That someone...we believe he told Guerrero about the evidence.”
Her head was about to erupt. The throbbing in her temples just wouldn’t stop. “I have no evidence.” Could she say it any plainer? “I can’t give you anything!”
“Guerrero thinks you can. And he’s just going to keep coming for you...” Jasper didn’t have to finish. She knew what the guy had been about to say....
Until you’re dead.
“So you see now why you must have protection,” Sydney said with a firm nod. “Until we can recover the information we need, you’ve got a target on your back.”
A giant one. Yes, she got that. “And what happens to my life?”
“With Guerrero out there, you don’t have a life.” Blunt. Cold. Sydney could have an edge just as hard as Gunner’s—or Jasper’s.
“We’re going to get him,” Logan promised her.
She wanted to believe him. But then, she’d gone for his lies before. Juliana wet her lips. Lifted her chin. “This protection...what does it mean?”
Sydney cast a quick look at Logan before her attention returned to Juliana, then she explained, “It means an EOD agent is assigned to stay with you 24/7. You’ll be watched, monitored and kept alive,” Sydney told her. “What more could you want?”
Now Juliana’s eyes were on Logan. He seemed even bigger to her in that moment. More dangerous. So far removed from the boy she’d known. Maybe she’d never really known him at all. “Which agent?”
The faint lines around Logan’s eyes deepened.
“Which agent?” Juliana demanded again.
A beat of silence, then Sydney said, “Given your...history with Logan...”
Did everyone know that she’d given the man her virginity? Had the team been briefed about that? Her breath heaved in her chest, but Juliana managed to speak from between her clenched teeth. “There’s a thing about history. It’s in the past.”
Logan’s expression didn’t change.
“If I’m giving up my life...” For how long? Until they caught Guerrero? Until the magical evidence turned up? “Then I want a say on my guard choice.”
But Logan was already shaking his head. “No, it’s—”
Not wanting anyone else to overhear, she closed in on him. “We’re done, Logan.” A whisper that she knew he’d heard, but hopefully the others hadn’t. Juliana turned away from him. Pointed to the man that Logan had shoved up against the wall moments before. Gunner. Then, raising her voice once more, she said, “I’ll take him.”
“Hell.” Gunner’s shoulders dropped. “I knew this wouldn’t be easy.”
Juliana stepped toward him. “Actually, all things considered, I think I’m being pretty agreeable.” Another step. “If this is going to work, then—”
Logan’s hand wrapped around her shoulder, stilling her. “We’re not done.”
She saw Gunner’s gaze dart from Logan’s hand back to her face. Juliana wondered just what he saw, because Gunner gave a little whistle.
“No, I don’t think you are,” Gunner said.
But then Logan was spinning her back around. He leaned in close, and she could feel the force of his fury surrounding her. “Time to get some things clear.”
Oh, what, now was the time for that?
“I’m lead on this team.” Each word was bitten off.
“That’s why he’s Alpha One,” Gunner said from behind her. The guy was so not very helpful.
“You don
’t give the orders,” Logan snapped at her. “I do. When it comes to keeping you alive, I’m the one in charge. I’m the one who is going to stand between you and whatever hell might come.” His gaze searched hers. “You might not like me. Hell, you might hate me, but too bad. This isn’t about emotion. It’s about getting a job done.”
Her chest hurt. Juliana forced herself to breathe. “And nobody else here can—”
“I’m your guard. Day and night. Get used to it.”
Her jaw clenched. She didn’t want to get used to any of this, and Logan was stripping away all of her choices.
“Unless you don’t think you can...trust yourself around me...” This line Logan spoke with a slow, sexy grin.
It took a stunned instant for his words to register with Juliana. “What?” She almost had to pick her jaw off the floor. There was no way he’d just said that.
“Maybe the old feelings are still there.” Now he was barely whispering, talking for her alone. Closing in on her just as she’d done with him moments ago. “Is that what scares you? That when we’re alone, you might want...more?”
Yes. “No,” Juliana denied immediately.
His gaze called her a liar, but he just said, “Then we’re set. I’m point. I’ll be with you, making sure you’re safe. We’ll keep you alive.”
Promises, promises...
* * *
JULIANA STOOD IN THE HALLWAY while Logan and Gunner huddled over a computer screen. They’d called their boss, some guy named Mercer, then they’d gotten busy with their plans.
Plans about her life.
“You’re going to be all right.”
She jumped a little bit at Sydney’s voice. She hadn’t even heard the other woman approach, but Sydney was there, watching her with a light green stare.
“Logan’s good at his job,” Sydney continued, giving a nod toward the men. “The best I’ve ever seen in the field.”
She didn’t doubt that.
“He’s always cool under fire,” Sydney said as she crept closer. “The only time I’ve ever saw his control crack...it was when we were in Mexico, waiting to get you out.” A faint smile curved her lips. “The man wanted to race in, guns blazing, when he knew that wasn’t protocol.”
Juliana’s back was pressed to the wall. Her gaze swept over the other woman. She wasn’t sure what to make of Sydney. On the outside, Sydney looked petite, almost breakable, but...but then Juliana looked into her eyes, and she could see the power there.
Sydney was a woman who’d seen dark things, done dark things. It was all there, the memories, the pain, in her eyes.
“I thought he did come in with guns blazing,” Juliana said, forcing herself to speak. She remembered him rushing into that room, nearly ripping the door away. Clad in the black ski mask with the big gun in his hands, he’d looked so deadly.
She hadn’t known who she should fear more. The man with the knife at her throat or the masked man who promised hell.
“Does he scare you?”
Juliana’s lashes flickered. She’d have to remember just how observant Sydney could be. Nothing seemed to slip past the woman. “No.” And it was the truth, mostly. No matter how deadly Logan was, she never thought he would physically hurt her.
But she did fear the way he could make her feel. He stirred too much lust in her. Made her want things she couldn’t have.
Sometimes he scares me.
But the full truth was...sometimes I scare myself.
“Good.” Sydney’s gaze darted back to the men. “And Gunner?”
Yes. He made her nervous. So did Jasper.
Her silence must have been answer enough because Sydney gave a little shrug that seemed to say she understood. “Gunner has a special grudge against Guerrero. We were...we were in South America about two years ago. Came on a village that was supposed to be a safe haven for us and for the hostage we’d rescued.”
“You do that a lot?” Juliana asked. “Rescue people?”
“We do what needs to be done.” Sydney rubbed her palm over her heart in an almost unconscious motion. “The village... I was the one doing intel. I thought it was safe. I didn’t realize Guerrero had made a deal with a rebel leader in the area. The gunfire started. It was a bloodbath.”
Juliana glanced at Sydney’s hand. “You were shot.”
Sydney’s hand dropped. “Gunner was the one who took four bullets, but he still kept fighting. He and I—we were the extraction team. He got me out, too.”
“And the hostage?”
Sydney gave a small shake of her head. “Gunner’s brother didn’t make it out.”
Oh, hell.
“So you can see why he might seem...determined...to get Guerrero.”
The men were finished talking. They were heading back toward them. Juliana glanced at Gunner’s eyes. Still dark. Still cold. But...she could have sworn she now saw the echo of pain in his gaze.
“It wasn’t a sanctioned mission.” Now Sydney was whispering. “We went in, just the two of us, because we had to get him out.”
There was something there in Sydney’s voice. Something... “Who was the hostage to you?” Juliana asked. Gunner’s brother, but maybe more.
Sydney just gave her a sad smile. “We all want Guerrero stopped.”
Juliana nodded.
“Don’t give up,” Sydney told her. “Whatever happens, keep fighting, keep working with us. Help us take him out.”
Staring into Sydney’s gaze and seeing the struggle on her face, Juliana realized that walking away from the EOD wasn’t an option. “I will.” She’d do her part. Guerrero was a monster, one who was destroying lives left and right.
He had to be stopped.
Logan’s arm brushed hers.
We’ll stop him.
* * *
JULIANA WASN’T GOING to like this walk down memory lane. Logan knew it even before the woman’s body tensed up, boardlike, in the seat beside his.
“Why the hell are we here?”
The here in question would be in the middle of nowhere—or rather, in the middle of the woods in Mississippi. Pulling in front of an old cabin that had seen so many better days, long ago.
A familiar cabin.
He pulled the SUV around back. Made sure that it was hidden. There was only one dirt road that led to this cabin. So when the men hunting Juliana came calling, his team would know.
Logan climbed from the vehicle, swept his gaze past the trees. Jasper and Gunner would be setting up watch points out there, securing the perimeter.
The location was the perfect trap. And Juliana...
“Logan, why here?”
She was the perfect bait.
He forced a careless grin to his face. “Because the cabin’s secluded. It’s secure. And no one in Guerrero’s team would think to look for you here.”
True enough. They wouldn’t think to look for her there, not until they were hand-fed the info.
Sorry, Juliana. And he was. He didn’t like lying to her, setting her up. But no matter what else happened, he would keep her safe.
That part hadn’t been a lie.
She was already out of the SUV, heading up the old wooden steps that led to the front of the cabin. The steps creaked beneath her feet.
Logan followed her. When she paused on the slightly sagging porch, he opened the door for her with a sweep of his hand, and he remembered the past.
No one’s here, Julie. Come inside.
Logan, are you sure?
The cabin’s mine. No one will find us here. It’s just you...and me.
For an instant, he could feel her mouth beneath his. The memory was so strong. Her lips had been soft, silken. Her body had been a perfect temptation under his.
Here. It had all happened here.
Locking his jaw, Logan slammed the door shut behind him and secured the lock. Because the team had been planning this move in advance—for days, actually, even before the hit in the cemetery—the cabin was already wired. Cameras had been set up to sca
n the cabin’s exterior. Alarms and sensors were strategically placed outside.
The feed would all go back to Sydney, since she was their tech queen. But Logan had a few monitors set up inside the cabin, too. He liked to keep his eyes open. Being blind in the field had never suited him.
He turned and found Juliana’s dark eyes on him. There were smudges beneath her eyes. Exhaustion. She looked so fragile, so very breakable, that his body tensed.
Go to her, every instinct he had screamed at him, but he knew Juliana didn’t want his comfort. The stiff lines of her body said she didn’t want him at all.
The kiss in Mexico had been a fluke. She hadn’t come looking for seconds, and she’d been very clear when she told him they were done.
Not yet.
So he’d just hold on to his fantasies. They’d gotten him through plenty of long nights, and he could keep his hands off her. He’d try to keep them off, anyway.
“You can take the room at the top of the stairs,” he said. It was the only bedroom there and—
Her gaze darted to the staircase. “I’d, um, rather not.”
The memories were hitting her, too. He’d pushed her back at the EOD meeting. The idea of her being so close to one of the other agents—hell, no. He didn’t want her spending any nights alone with Gunner or Jasper. So he’d pushed to see what she’d do.
And maybe because he hoped that deep down she still wanted him. He was on fire for her.
Only, Juliana was turning away. “I’ll take the couch.”
“Take the bed.” He’d gotten a new bed for her. New sheets. New covers. She could rest, take it easy and—
“I’m not getting into your bed,” she snapped. Her temper was back. Probably the wrong time to mention he’d always found her sexy when temper spiked her blood and heated her voice. “I might have to stay with you, but I don’t have to—”
“You kissed me in Mexico.” His words stopped her, but he regretted them the minute they left his mouth. He didn’t want to make her mad. He just wanted...
Juliana heaved out a long sigh. “I was half-awake. I didn’t know what I was doing.” No emotion in her words. “Don’t worry, I won’t make that mistake again.”