He was sure she didn’t. “That’s not my problem.” It was her father’s and, Tyce’s boss, Parker Payne’s problem. His job was just to get her there.
“And I can’t possibly leave this event yet,” she said, her voice full of condescension as if he was the airhead.
He snorted. “You can skip out early on a party,” he said. “Especially when your life is at stake.”
She sighed. “Now you’re overreacting.”
He shook his head. “Not me...” He knew Luther Mills too well to underestimate him. Everybody involved in the drug dealer’s murder trial definitely needed protection. Tyce just wished he hadn’t been assigned to protect this particular person. He didn’t want to deal with a spoiled party girl who had no idea what the real world was like, that there were bad people out there who would have no problem hurting her.
Who wanted to hurt her.
The thought had his arm tightening around her a little more. He kept that arm around her waist as he turned her toward the entrance and he used that arm to nearly carry her along with him.
“Let me go,” she said, the words emanating from between her gritted teeth. And her lips, painted a deep red, were curved into a superficial smile directed at all those people who watched them both now.
He shook his head.
“I’ll scream,” she threatened.
And he chuckled. “You obviously don’t want to make a scene. I have no such problem. I’ll swing you over my shoulder and carry you out of here if you make me.”
“Try it,” she said. “Security will stop you and then the police will come and arrest you.”
He stared down at her, trying to gauge if she was bluffing or not. He couldn’t take the chance that she might not be. If security stopped him until the police arrived, they wouldn’t just be late for the meeting. They would risk tipping off Luther Mills’s informant in the police department that his plan had gotten out. That was why they were meeting at the agency office, so Luther wouldn’t find out about their new protection detail.
He uttered a ragged sigh. “Call your father,” he said. “He’s probably already at the Payne Protection Agency, which is where we’re supposed to be.” He reached beneath his jacket and pulled out his cell. Her father’s number was the last one on his caller’s list.
She must have noticed that because her lips parted as her eyes widened. “Daddy called you directly? He personally hired you?”
He grimaced at a grown woman calling her father “Daddy.” He’d had no idea how spoiled she actually was, but he was beginning to understand, which only confirmed his belief that he’d gotten the worst of the damn assignments for this detail. He punched the contact number and handed her the cell.
She stared at it for a moment before pressing it to her ear, as if even his phone wasn’t good enough for her. This was going to be a damn difficult assignment.
* * *
Across the ballroom another call was placed.
“Yes?” Luther Mills answered on the first ring.
The caller remembered that the drug dealer was sitting in jail; he had nothing else to do for now. He had sworn that he would be out soon, though. He was putting a plan in motion to get his charges thrown out, which was why he’d enlisted help to spy on Bella Holmes.
“Did you send someone after her here?” the caller asked, incredulous at Luther Mills’s audacity. But then Luther was known for his boldness; it was also what had finally gotten him arrested, though, when he’d shot someone right in front of a witness.
“Where’s ‘here’?” Luther asked.
“The River City Grand Plaza.”
Luther chuckled as if the idea amused him. He replied, “No. I just want her watched for now.”
He was waiting to see if his case actually went to trial before deciding whether or not he needed to use Bella Holmes.
“That’s what I’m paying you for,” Luther said. “You are watching her.”
Always, but not just because Luther had ordered it. “Yes. That’s why I’m calling. This guy—” who looked more like one of Luther’s crew than the caller did “—is obviously not a guest.”
“Is he a cop?” Luther asked.
The dealer’s spy chuckled at the thought of this ruffian being a police officer. “No.”
“Hmm...boyfriend?”
The caller laughed harder. Luther did not know Bella Holmes at all. She was such a snob. She’d never even dated a man who wore jeans around the house let alone to a black-tie event. “Absolutely not.”
“Then you better find out who the hell he is,” Luther ordered. “And make sure he won’t be a problem when we need to act on those threats we’ve been sending to the judge.”
We?
Luther wouldn’t be able to act—not from jail. That duty would fall to the caller. But hurting Bella Holmes would not be a problem; it would be a pleasure. In fact, the caller wasn’t certain it would be possible to wait until Mills gave the order to kill her.
Bella Holmes deserved to die. Now.
Copyright © 2020 by Lisa Childs
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ISBN: 9781488064012
Snowbound Targets
Copyright © 2020 by Karen Whiddon
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Snowbound Targets (HQR Romantic Suspense) Page 24