Where Loyalties Lie: A Standalone Romantic Suspense

by Jill Ramsower

  He threw his head back and laughed deep from his flat, chiseled belly. “No,” he said when he finally calmed down. “She’s married to another man; it’s his baby she’s carrying. I’m just her trainer and longtime friend.”

  Oh. Well, at least I could take homewrecker off my updated resume. That was good to hear. “She’s amazing to watch. I assume she’s been training for a long time?”

  “I’ve been training her since she was fifteen, but she started five years before that.”

  “You two must be really close.”

  “Until recently, I didn’t think anyone would ever be close to Maria. Things change; we mature. Now, she’s married and finally settling down.”

  “How old is she? Twenty-five?”

  “Twenty-six, I believe.”

  “The same age as me,” I murmured.

  Tamir’s jaw flexed. Was that why he thought of me as a child? Because I was the same age as the woman he’d known for so long and still viewed as a little girl? He sure hadn’t been thinking of me that way in the parking lot a couple of hours earlier. Maybe that was why he hadn’t acted on the desire that he’d so clearly felt.

  Whatever. That was on him. If he couldn’t see me as the adult I was, that was his problem, and it was probably for the best.

  I crossed my arms and stared out the passenger window, no longer interested in conversation. As signs for Columbus came into view, I pulled up the address on my phone and acted as navigator. He followed my instructions for a bit, then pulled off into a Walmart parking lot before we got too far into the city.

  “I have a few things with me but could still use some supplies.” He gestured to a duffel bag sitting on the floorboards of the back seat. “I assume you’re in the same boat?”

  “You thought to pack a bag?” I gaped at him.

  “You’re not the only one who likes to be prepared.” He raised an eyebrow poignantly at my own duffel I’d retrieved from the post office.

  “Yeah, but I’m on the run for my life. What’s your excuse?”

  “Special Forces, remember? That kind of training sticks with you. Now stop looking at me like I’m Jeffrey Dahmer and let’s get this over with. I hate these places.” He slipped from the car soundlessly, leaving me speechless, mouth agape, and mind blank.

  At some point, I was going to have to set aside any expectations I had for this man and just roll with the punches, because everything he said and did surprised me. If I didn’t have any preconceived notions about how he should behave, maybe he wouldn’t seem quite so mysterious. Possibly. But it was equally as probable that intrigue was in his blood, and nothing I could do would diminish its mystifying effects.

  Tamir insisted we stayed together once we were inside. The trust factor in our budding partnership was clearly lacking. I insisted on buying a few snacks to have on the road, then we both grabbed an assortment of toiletries and a change of clothes. Tamir picked up a package of boxer briefs, conjuring a mental image I couldn’t shake.

  Once we were back in the car, we selected a Motel 6 not far from the address I’d been given, grabbed another round of takeout for dinner, then made our way to the motel. I was ready to get a room, shower, and call it a day.

  The motel was your standard double-decker affair with a pockmarked parking lot and bad fluorescent lighting. However, for the one low price of only sixty dollars a night, we had a roof over our heads, a bed, and a moderately clean bathroom. That was the full extent of the amenities, but it was enough.

  “I don’t suppose you’ll agree to separate rooms,” I commented to Tamir as we approached the front lobby.

  “With your tendency to disappear in the night, not a chance.”

  It was what I’d expected, although it didn’t make sense to me. Why did he care whether I disappeared? Most people would have been glad to be rid of me, wouldn’t they? Maybe it was just my old friend, paranoia, paying me a visit, but I felt it was odd that he’d gone so far to help me. Instead of being relieved to have company, I couldn’t shake the feeling of unease at how invested Tamir had become in my plight.

  “Two doubles, please,” I told the clerk.

  “I’m down to a single king room.” The woman was somewhere between the ages of fifty and eighty—it was entirely too hard to narrow down any further. Her voice indicated she smoked at least a pack a day, and her leathery skin piled with caked-on makeup could indicate a young woman with a tanning addiction or an older woman, trying to reclaim her youth. Either was equally possible.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Afraid not. The Blue Jackets got a game tonight, and the rink is under a mile from here. You’re lucky there’s a room left at all. No one in a five-mile radius will have any vacancies.”

  My eyes drifted shut, and I sucked in a deep, cleansing breath. I debated going in search of another hotel with two beds, but what would that have said about my maturity? He already indicated he thought of me as a child, which shouldn’t matter, but it did. I wanted us on equal ground. Wanted to be an adult who would be unfazed by sharing a bed in a less than ideal situation with another adult. Besides, if he was going to do something awful to me, would it make a difference whether we were in one bed or two? Separate beds wouldn’t exactly be an obstacle to a rapist. Surely, there would be a sofa or chair one of us could sleep in, making my entire inner debate pointless.

  “All right. One king bed, please, for two nights.”

  She took a puff of her lipstick-stained cigarette and flashed a grin of preternaturally white teeth that likely glowed in the dark.

  The good news was, there wasn’t carpet in the room. There was nothing more disgusting than motel mystery-stain carpet. The bad news? No sofa. Not even a chair, aside from the mall cafeteria-style two-seater table and metal chairs. There wasn’t even a dresser or a nightstand. The room was one step up from a prison cell—unwelcome roommate and all.

  “I don’t suppose you’d agree to sleep on the floor,” I muttered as I claimed the side closest to the door.

  “You couldn’t pay me enough.” The jerk was smirking.

  “You getting some perverse sense of satisfaction out of this? You could sleep in the car, you know.”

  “Do you want to sleep in the car in this neighborhood?” He sifted through the Walmart bag and pulled out his toiletry purchases.

  “I’m not even sure I like the car being left out in this neighborhood.”

  “Me either,” he grumbled. “I’m jumping in the shower. Do I need to tie you up to make sure you’re still here when I get out?”

  “No.” I threw myself onto the bed and stared up at the blotchy water stains on the ceiling.

  “Just to be sure, I’ll take this with me, along with the keys.” He shook my wallet in his hand, shot me a wolfish grin, and disappeared into the bathroom.

  “How the…?” I sat up and stared at my bags, completely dumbstruck at how he’d pilfered my wallet from me. He’d either taken it when I was asleep in the car, or he was magic. It was all a great mystery, as was everything else about the man.

  If I thought he’d rendered me speechless with his little snatch and grab trick, it was nothing compared to my response when he exited the shower shirtless minutes later.

  His dark brown waves clumped heavily with water that dripped in fat droplets down his taut chest, over the ridges of his sculpted six-pack, and soaked into the low-slung waistband of his joggers. I could almost feel his smooth skin against my tongue as I collected beads of water like a game of connect the dots.

  I’d never been so thirsty in my entire life.

  I was two seconds from sexually assaulting him when I noticed two patches of marred skin—one at the top of his left pectoral and the other slashing across his right side. Scars. Gnarly, painful-looking scars.

  It was the reminder I needed that this man was an unknown. A predator in his own right. He claimed to be on my side, for now, but would that always be the case?

  He would be the worst kind of enemy. Intell
igent. Unpredictable. Deadly.

  I didn’t have much choice but to stay on my guard and hope for the best.

  Chapter 11

  Tamir

  Emily took her turn in the bathroom, but only after I agreed to hand over the keys and give back her wallet. The minute the door was closed, I slipped outside the room to make a call to an old friend. Some days, I considered him my closest friend. Others, I swore I’d never speak to him again.

  Uri and I went way back. We’d gone to school together before we were ever in the service together, and our years of active duty only brought us closer. He was far more proficient with computers than I was, so I had asked him to help dig for information on Emily.

  “Tam, you sort out your little runaway?” Uri answered after a single ring.

  “Not even a little. To make matters more complicated, she ran again.”

  “No shit,” he huffed. “You chasing her down?”

  “Even better, I’m running with her.”

  He huffed. “I suppose that’s one way to keep an eye on the mark.”

  “You able to find anything more about her?” I wasn’t interested in his input about my methods.

  “No, she’s a ghost. I’ll keep digging, but it’s not looking promising. You going to tell me what the hell this is all about? You’ve never once put this much effort into the front end of a job. If the waters are murky, you walk away. This? This isn’t like you.”

  “Why don’t you just say whatever the fuck it is you want to say?” My fist clenched around the phone, wishing it were his neck.

  Silence.

  “I want to know if this is still a job or if it’s becoming personal.”

  “Not that it’s any of your fucking business, but it’s a job. She’s a payout, like any other; I just need to get the facts before I decide if I’m taking her in or walking away. That clear enough for you?”

  He grunted, and I took that as the cue that our conversation was over. I hung up and took a second to lean against the railing, watching cars come and go on the access road.

  I understood why Uri was concerned about my actions. Wives and children didn’t exactly fit into our type of lifestyle. Quitting was always an option, but I didn’t want to quit. I loved what I did, and I was good at it. I liked to think I helped balance the scales of good and evil, one payday at a time. No messy red tape. No long, drawn-out legal proceedings. Just me, my mark, and a mountain of sins.

  That was the way it had been for years, and that was the way it would stay.

  ***

  We turned the lights out as soon as Emily finished her shower. She curled up on the far edge of her side of the bed after building a pillow blockade between us. It was actually more of a pillow speedbump. Had we been at a quality hotel that provided a full array of pillows, she would have had more to work with.

  I had no plans to attack her during the night, so her efforts were wasted. Even if I had, I wasn’t sure what she thought the pillows were going to accomplish. It was kind of adorable, which annoyed me to no end. I didn’t want to find her adorable or attractive or any of the things that stirred when I looked at her. She was a job, exactly as I’d told Uri, and nothing more.

  Fortunately, I didn’t have to dwell on it long. The military had taught me to be a light sleeper, but it had also taught me to sleep in any conditions. I was out in a matter of minutes.

  Something stirring in the room woke me early the next morning. The sun wasn’t even up, but Emily had insisted on leaving the bathroom light on with the door cracked so there was light in the room.

  She had annihilated her own pillow blockade and crossed over into enemy territory. She was fast asleep, curled up against my side. I rolled gently to face her, listening to the cadence of her breathing and appreciating the soft lines of her face in sleep. Most of her body was under the covers. Only her face, top shoulder, and her arms were visible. She wore her watch on her bottom wrist, and in the dim light, I was able to see the hint of a tattoo peeking out beneath the metal clasp.

  I lifted my hand and gently slid the watch aside with the delicacy of defusing a bomb by hand. In pale script was the letter Z. The scrolling ink was faded enough that I guessed she was in the process of having it removed. Could that have been her ex-boyfriend’s initial? As desperately as she tried to hide it, I doubted she’d want to discuss it.

  It was intriguing—as if there was anything about the woman that wasn’t intriguing. People had tattoos they regretted all the time, so it wasn’t like a Z was particularly telling. I’d seen any number of tattoos that were far more regrettable than hers. So why had she hidden the mark like she was ashamed of it?

  Everything I learned just produced more questions, like fighting my way out of a pit of quicksand. The more I struggled, the deeper I sank.

  Sometimes a target was tricky because the magnitude of his or her sins floundered on my line of judgment. Rarely did I encounter someone with so little background that I couldn’t even gauge their guilt. It was rare, but it had happened. In those cases, I simply passed on the job and left someone else to dole out the judgment.

  Not knowing the details of their past had never bothered me, but in Emily’s case, I didn’t want to walk away without an answer. I could say it was because of the money or that it was also a point of pride, but it was more than that. More than I was willing to admit. I felt an unrelenting need to lay my eyes on all of her coveted secrets, to learn the extent of her corruption and see how it compared to my own.

  If I didn’t get some concrete answers soon, I would have to force them from her, and neither of us was going to like that outcome.

  Chapter 12

  Emily

  I lounged in bed for much longer than I was asleep, but that was primarily to avoid acknowledging the fact that I’d gravitated toward Tamir in the night. When he got out of bed, I woke up, realized I was on the wrong side of the bed, and promptly pretended to keep sleeping for the next hour. It gave me plenty of time to overthink my nonexistent plan until my stomach was a bundle of nerves.

  I had wanted to take breakfast back to the motel room and continue to hunker down until it was time. Tamir had other plans. He insisted I was safe for the moment and coerced me into going to a local café to eat. The food was delicious, and it was good to get out and do something normal. However, the minute we got back in the car, my nerves rallied for a second attack.

  “Where are you going? The motel is back that way.” I pointed behind us, but Tamir never altered his course. After he had proved he wasn’t going to take me back to New York, I’d given in to his insistence to drive. It was his car, after all.

  “If you keep rolling that necklace around in your fingers for the next three hours, there won’t be any etching left. I thought we could go somewhere to take your mind off everything.” He raised his hand when I started to argue. “No one followed us. This is Columbus, Ohio. No one here is after you, I promise. Now, please, try to trust me.”

  He wasn’t wrong. The chances that anyone knew I was there were slim to none. Of course, I was rightfully paranoid since I’d already been found once, but logically speaking, the odds of being caught again so quickly were right there next to winning the lottery.

  “Fine,” I muttered. “But if I die out there, it’s your fault.”

  He smirked. “Even if you’re hit by a train or fall into a well?”

  “Absolutely. Those scenarios would never have happened if I was tucked away at the motel, so yes.”

  “I’ll just have to make sure to keep you safe then.” He peered over at me, just as I snuck a glance at him. Our gazes locked, and through that connection, the tiniest tendrils of trust passed between us. It was brief, and the threads precariously delicate, but it was a start.

  A few minutes later, we pulled up at the Franklin Park Conservatory and Botanical Gardens. The entry sign boasted eighty-eight acres of landscaped grounds and breathtaking floral displays.

  “How on earth did you think of this?”

 
; “Google.” His wry response drew my eyes from the landscape to see he could barely contain a sarcastic smile.

  “Well, thank you, Google. This is absolutely perfect. It’s just too bad it’s fall. I’d love to see the place in the spring.”

  “I wasn’t sure if you’d be one of those women who enjoys nature or runs from it.”

  “I’ve never been camping or anything like that, but I’ve always loved being outside. Something about seeing the trees wave in the breeze and the birds floating in air reminds me the world will keep spinning and everything will be okay. It’s reassuring, especially when life feels overwhelming. My dad used to have a swing hanging from a tree out in the front of his house. I would sit in it for hours, just watching the world go by.”

  Tamir parked the car without responding. We both exited and rounded the car, walking silently toward the building entrance. I wasn’t sure why I suddenly felt so uncomfortable. As though I’d presented a tiny piece of myself, only to have it rejected with Tamir’s silence.

  “Maybe that’s just me,” I muttered.

  “I know exactly what you’re talking about.” He pulled ahead of me in three easy strides, his words drifting back to me like a warm summer breeze.

  We explored the different ecosystems and their vast array of plants in the greenhouse buildings. The sunlight poured inside, and I basked in its warm rays. My body and soul had desperately missed the heavy doses of vitamin D that I was used to receiving before I moved to the city. Concentrated stints in the sun were far less common in the concrete jungle, where towering skyscrapers cast the world below into shadow.

  I was so caught up in enjoying my surroundings that I was stunned when Tamir pointed out it was time for us to leave. Three hours flew by as if it was nothing, and for the first time in what felt like months, I wasn’t looking over my shoulder every ten minutes.

  Stephanie had set up our meet at a McDonald’s in downtown Columbus. We ordered food and selected a table by a window. Tamir began to eat, seemingly oblivious to the world around him, while I barely got down a french fry as I scrutinized every person who walked through the doors.