GROOM UNDER FIRE

by Lisa Childs

  He shrugged. “I don’t know what to think.” Or maybe he was afraid to think it. But a lot of years had passed since that graduation picture. He wasn’t the same person he’d been back then. Probably neither was Tanya or Stephen…

  “You’re not going to find any answers here,” Parker said, tucking the laptop under his arm. “We need to get you to that safe house before Logan loses it.” His cell phone started to play music. “Speak of the devil…”

  Cooper laughed since Parker’s ringtone for his twin was “Sympathy for the Devil.” He pulled the door closed and followed Parker down the hall to the elevator.

  “We’ll be there in a little while,” he assured his twin. “We stopped back at Stephen’s. No, we didn’t really think he’d show up there…” He rolled his eyes at Cooper as the argument continued.

  Apparently, the years hadn’t changed Logan or Parker, they still fought like the teenage girls Cooper had once accused them of being. He was still grinning over that memory when they stepped off the elevator and crossed the foyer to the outside doors.

  A strange sensation chased up and down Cooper’s spine and he hesitated before pushing open the doors. But Parker, perhaps distracted with his call, didn’t notice Cooper’s hesitation, and he continued through them into the dimly lit parking lot.

  Cooper had learned long ago to heed his instincts, so he reached for his gun. But before he could draw it from its holster, shots rang out.

  Chapter Six

  Tanya jerked awake to darkness. But she was not alone. She heard a voice—a deep voice murmuring quietly as the speaker was probably trying not to wake her.

  But then the voice rose to a panicked shout. “What the hell’s happening? Parker? Cooper?”

  She jumped up from the bed and scrambled toward the voice. But she couldn’t find the door. She slid her palms along the wall until finally she found the doorknob and turned it.

  “What’s going on?” she asked as she burst into the hotel suite’s sitting room where Logan Payne paced and shouted his brothers’ names into his cell phone.

  He turned to her in surprise, as if he’d forgotten she had been sleeping in one of the bedrooms of the suite. His eyes were wild with fear and frustration. His brothers needed him, but he had been stuck protecting her. She saw all that on his face—his handsome face that was so like Cooper’s.

  “What’s going on!” she demanded.

  He lifted his broad shoulders in a tense shrug. “I don’t know.” And it was obviously killing him.

  “Why are you so worried about them?”

  He hesitated, his jaw clenched the way Cooper so often clenched his, before he finally answered her, “I heard gunshots.”

  Again. Someone had been shooting at Cooper again. “I thought you sent them to a safe house, too.” Apparently that house hadn’t been as safe as the one to which Logan had brought her.

  “They didn’t make it there yet,” Logan said. “They stopped at Stephen’s condo.”

  If Stephen had gone back home, he would have called her before now. Even if he had changed his mind about marrying her, he would have called her. Wherever Stephen was, he didn’t have access to a phone.

  “Why did they go there?” she asked.

  “Cooper wanted to search it himself for clues…” Anger flashed in Logan’s eyes. “On the job one day and thinks he’s a detective…”

  “We need to make sure they’re all right,” she said. And she was grateful now that she’d slept in her clothes instead of changing into something from her suitcase. She actually hadn’t meant to, but she’d been too exhausted to change when Logan had brought her to this strange “safe house,” which was actually a very small hotel suite in a very obscure hotel.

  Logan shook his head. “Not we. You’re staying here.”

  “Cooper’s getting shot at because of me,” she reminded his eldest brother.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “He’s only been home a couple of days after years of being gone,” she said. “There’s no reason for anyone else to be shooting at him.”

  “We don’t know that the shots I overheard were being fired at them.”

  “Stephen’s condo isn’t exactly in the bad part of town,” she argued. “It’s safe there.” Safer than where she lived and definitely more affluent.

  “We don’t know what happened,” Logan said. “So you’re going to stay here while I find out.”

  “You’re leaving me alone?” she asked, doubting that either his mother or Cooper would approve of that.

  “I know you’re afraid,” Logan said.

  She was afraid. For Cooper and Parker—far more than herself.

  “So take me with you,” she said, desperate to find out if Cooper was okay. She wasn’t about to lose another prospective groom.

  “No.” Logan shook his head. “You’re staying here. And you’re staying safe.” He lifted his gun from the holster under his arm and held it out to her.

  She stared at the weapon and shook her head. “You’re going to need that.”

  “I have another one in the car,” he said. “But by the time I get to Stephen’s complex, I’m sure the shooting will be all over.”

  Cooper could be all over. After more than a decade away from his family, he could have been killed days after returning home. Pain clutched her heart at the loss—the tragic loss—that would be. And now she wished she had kissed him…if only just to see if it still felt as magical and sensual as she’d remembered all these years.

  “So hang on to this,” he said as he pressed the gun into her hands.

  The metal was cold and heavy and uncomfortable to grasp. She hadn’t been deployed like Cooper, but as a social worker she’d seen more than her share of tragedies—many of them caused by guns. She wanted to shove it back onto Logan. But she didn’t want to keep him from checking on Cooper and Parker. So she held on to it despite her revulsion.

  “And lock yourself in the bedroom,” Logan ordered her. “If anyone tries coming through the door without identifying himself, squeeze the trigger and keep shooting until you run out of bullets.”

  What then?

  She would have asked if she hadn’t already known the answer. If she used all the bullets and not a single one struck her target, even though she’d tried hard not to break Mrs. Payne’s superstitions, she was still out of luck.

  *

  “WHAT THE HELL was that?” Parker griped as he lay sprawled across the asphalt of the complex parking lot. “You knocked my phone out of my hand and probably destroyed Stephen’s computer.”

  “You’re welcome,” Cooper replied.

  Parker cursed him as he stretched his arm under a car, grappling for his phone. He cursed again as his fingertips brushed against it and pushed it farther from his reach.

  “What’s a phone when I just saved your life?”

  Parker scoffed, “Sure, you saved my life.”

  “Someone was firing real bullets at us,” Cooper reminded him. And might fire some more if they lifted their heads above the car they crouched behind for cover. “If you think they were blanks, maybe I should have let one hit you.”

  “You really expect me to thank you?” Parker asked in astonishment.

  “That’s the usual custom when someone saves another person’s life,” Cooper said. Maybe he hadn’t been gone that long, since he was easily falling back into the old pattern of bantering with his family. “In some countries, that would make you my indentured servant. You would have to wait on me hand and foot in reward for my heroism.”

  But even as he teased Parker, he listened for more gunshots, for the sound of a car’s engine or tires, or a person’s footsteps…

  “All those damn medals and commendations went straight to your head,” Parker griped. “You wouldn’t have had to save me if you hadn’t put me in danger in the first place.”

  Cooper sputtered, “How is any of this my fault?”

  Parker jammed his shoulder against the rocker panel of the ca
r and stretched his arm farther toward the phone. “You wanted to come here—”

  “You came here earlier tonight,” he reminded his brother, “and nobody shot at you.”

  “Yeah, because I’m not getting married tomorrow.” He shuddered as if the mere thought of marriage horrified him, and inadvertently pushed the phone farther to the other side of the car.

  If they were certain that the shooter was gone, they could have gotten up and walked around to the other side. But maybe that was what the assailant was waiting for…a clear shot.

  Cooper had knocked Parker down so quickly and dropped to the ground himself that the shooter had only managed a couple of shots.

  Had no one else heard them? No sirens wailed—not even in the distance. Parker needed that phone to call 911 since Cooper had left his in the car with the battery pulled out of it so that nobody could track it. Their car was parked on the other side of the lot.

  Struggling to keep his face straight as he uttered the lie, he said, “I thought those shots were meant for you.”

  “Me?” Parker was all astonished sounding again.

  “You’re the playboy.” He had been in high school, and according to the letters he received from Nikki while he was overseas, that hadn’t changed. “You must have pissed off a husband or boyfriend lately.”

  Parker shuddered again as if in remembrance. “Not lately.” He hesitated as if considering. “No, not lately.” He nudged Cooper’s shoulder. “Those shots were meant for you, little brother. You’re the one marrying the Grim Reaper bride.”

  “Hey!” He smacked his brother upside the head, like Logan so often had his twin and Cooper. “Don’t call her that!”

  Parker smacked him back. “I know she’s hot and you’ve always had this crush on her, but you need to remember that you’re not marrying her for real. And if that shooter has his way, you’re not going to marry her at all.”

  They paused in their scuffle to listen. Had a door opened and shut? Was someone here?

  “I was supposed to take you right to that safe house,” Parker said in a low grumble. “If that shooter doesn’t kill us, Logan will…”

  Something scraped against the asphalt, and Cooper peered under the car to see a pair of dark shoes advancing toward them. The man stopped on the other side of the car, then leaned down and picked up Parker’s phone.

  “Hey, Paula, Cathy—quit your bickering and stop cowering behind that car,” Logan said with a chuckle of amusement and relief.

  “We are not cowering,” Cooper informed his eldest brother. But his pride stung over how Logan had found them arguing behind a vehicle. He must have secured the scene first, though, so Cooper jumped up from the pavement. “We took cover.”

  “While I was on the phone with Parker, I heard the shots,” Logan said. “I take it you’re both okay.” He narrowed his eyes and studied Cooper then glanced down at his twin. “Neither of you got hit?”

  Parker stood up and rubbed his ear. “I wouldn’t say that. I took quite a hit from our little brother.”

  “Where’s Tanya?” Cooper asked. He didn’t have time for their teasing. He peered around the parking lot, looking for Logan’s vehicle. “You didn’t bring her along, did you?”

  Logan shook his head. “She’s at the safe house.”

  His pulse quickening with anxiety, he asked, “Alone? Did you leave her alone?”

  “There’s another guard on perimeter duty.”

  “Someone sitting in a car out front?” he asked. “Like he couldn’t be compromised…” His stomach lurched as a horrible realization dawned on him. “What if these shots were a diversion? A way to lure you away from her?”

  Logan shook his head. “Like the shooter would know I would be on the phone with Parker. Hell, he probably doesn’t even know Tanya was with me.”

  “He could have been watching back at her place.” From the threats Cooper had found packed away in that box, it looked like this person had been stalking her for years. “He could have seen who she left with and followed you.”

  Logan’s pride was obviously stung now. He lifted his chin. “I was not followed.”

  “Even you can’t be sure of that,” Cooper challenged him.

  Just the tiniest flicker of doubt flashed in Logan’s eyes. “Damn it. Damn you…”

  “Tell me where she is!” he demanded. The first light of dawn streaked across the dark sky. It was now his wedding day. His mother’s superstitions be damned, he had to check on his bride—to make sure that he hadn’t already lost her.

  *

  THE HOTEL SUITE had been eerily silent for so long that Tanya had become aware of noises she had never heard before—like the sound of her own blood rushing through her veins. The soft thump of her racing pulse. The whispery whoosh of her breaths coming in and out of her nose.

  How long had Logan been gone? Too long for Parker and Cooper to be all right. If they hadn’t been hurt, he would have come back by now.

  Unless the shots had been a trap to lure Logan away from her…

  She had known there would be another attempt on her life—another attempt to stop her from marrying and inheriting. She should have known that no place would be safe enough for her.

  Or Cooper…

  She never should have agreed with his becoming her groom. But she’d worried that she might need that money to pay a ransom for Stephen’s safe return. But there had been no call, no demand. She glanced at her phone and noticed that the screen had gone dark. Was it just in sleep mode?

  She tapped the screen, but it remained black. She had plugged the phone into the charger, but maybe the charger wasn’t plugged into a live outlet. Was it one of those that was connected to the wall switch?

  What if she’d missed the ransom call because her phone was dead?

  She wanted to flip on the switch by the door, but then the lights would come on, too. And she preferred sitting in the dark. That way, if someone got inside the suite, they might not check her room since there would be no light streaking beneath the door. They might think that she had left with Logan.

  She should have left with Logan. Then she wouldn’t be helplessly waiting for news about Cooper. She couldn’t lose Stephen and him in one night.

  Her heart was beating harder now, so loudly that it deafened her to the other noises she should have heard. The noises, like the door to the hall opening, like the footsteps that might have warned her that she was no longer alone in the safe house.

  But she had no clue she wasn’t alone anymore until the doorknob rattled. She’d locked it, but the lock was flimsy. Heck, so was the door. It wouldn’t take much for someone to force his way inside. Or shoot his way inside…

  But she had a gun now, too. She clasped it in hands that had gone clammy and numb from holding the heavy weapon. Could she uncurl her fingers enough to pull the trigger?

  Could she pull the trigger at all? And fire bullets into another human being?

  Suddenly, the door opened. And she squeezed…

  Chapter Seven

  “Damn it,” was the least offensive of Cooper’s curses as he ducked. The bullet tunneled into the woodwork near his shoulder.

  And Tanya screamed and dropped the gun.

  Instead of ducking again, Cooper launched himself at her—knocking her back onto the bed in case the gun fired another round when it hit the ground. But it only spun across the threadbare carpet like a bottle at a game of spin the bottle. It stopped with the barrel pointing at them.

  Cooper cursed again because he was tempted to kiss her—especially when she cupped his face in her hands and stared up at him as if she wanted his kiss, too.

  “You’re alive,” she murmured.

  “No thanks to you,” he reminded them both. “I guess Logan was right when he said I needed protecting from you.” He’d known she was lying when she said she wouldn’t hurt him. He’d had no doubt she would hurt him—just as she had when they were kids and she’d so readily agreed with him that they were just friends.
“I didn’t think you would shoot me, though.”

  Tears sprang to her eyes, brightening the already vivid green. Her hands dropped from his face to the bed where she grasped the sheets. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I thought you were someone else…”

  “My brother? I was tempted to shoot him myself when I realized he’d left you alone.” Since the guard Logan had stationed outside had fallen asleep in a car parked in the lot, he had essentially left her all alone.

  “I shouldn’t have fired the gun until I saw who it was,” she said. “But your brother told me to shoot anyone who came through the door without announcing himself.”

  “And announcing myself in Afghanistan would have gotten me killed for sure,” Cooper mused. “But I’m beginning to think I was safer there—I actually may have gotten shot at less.”

  She shuddered. “Logan was right? He heard shots on the phone?”

  Cooper nodded.

  “Outside Stephen’s condo?”

  Cooper nodded again. “Just as we were leaving the complex, someone started shooting. Neither of us got hit. They may have only been firing to scare us.”

  “To scare you,” she said, “so you won’t marry me.”

  “Don’t worry,” he assured her. “I don’t scare easily.”

  “That’s not good,” she said. “Because if he can’t scare you off, he’ll try to kill you.”

  The way he had her.

  “That’s why I have to call off the wedding—to keep you alive,” she said.

  “What about a ransom demand on Stephen? You won’t be able to meet it if you don’t marry.”

  Her hips arching into his, she wriggled beneath him until she slid out from under him. Then she grabbed up the phone and charger and plugged it into another outlet. “No missed calls,” she said with a sigh of relief. Then her brow furrowed. “No ransom call…”

  “We don’t know that there won’t be one,” Cooper pointed out.

  “Wouldn’t it have been made already?” she asked anxiously. “Why would they wait?”

  He shrugged. “To see if you actually can get the money together.”