Jack had anticipated that would be the first of his brother’s questions. “She claims she doesn’t know.”
Jack figured the skepticism in his wording was going to piss her off, and it did. But he didn’t care. She’d lied to him. And while her lie might not be responsible for the car following them, if he’d known the facts—all of them—he might have been able to pick up Kingston before it even came to this.
Even without having the details spelled out for him, it obviously riled Kellan, too, because he cursed. “Where are you? You need backup?”
“Yes to the backup.” Jack gave Kellan his location. “I’m heading to your office, so meet me.”
Jack didn’t wait for his brother’s assurance that he would do just that. No need. Kellan would get there as fast as he could. Maybe it would be fast enough, but Jack didn’t like the bad feeling that was slithering its way down his back. That turn with the straighter, wider road was coming up fast.
“You know how I feel involving your brothers in this,” Caroline snapped the moment he was off the phone with Kellan. “They could trust fellow cops who are dirty.”
“Lesser of two evils,” Jack reminded her, and just to prove his point, he slowed down. The sedan kept pace.
She made a sound to indicate she was considering what he’d said, but she didn’t argue. Caroline twisted back around to keep watch.
Jack considered just flooring the accelerator and trying to outrace this moron. But that was risky. Curvy roads could lead to accidents, which would in turn make them sitting ducks. Plus, the sedan engine might be souped-up enough that it wouldn’t have any trouble catching up with them. Jack wanted to delay the showdown until Kellan was closer.
“Who’s Marshal Zeller?” Lucille asked. Her voice was a little shaky. So was she. But she was holding her own and didn’t look ready to panic. “Why didn’t you want him for backup?”
“Because he could be dirty,” Caroline grumbled before Jack could say anything.
As answers went, it was a pretty good one. In her mind, Zeller could indeed be dirty. The jury was still out on that for Jack, but if there’d been any red flags to find, Jack figured he would have found them by now. That was because he’d dug and dug deep. Not just on Zeller but on any-and everyone connected to his father’s investigations.
“Zeller headed a sex-trafficking case that popped a little over a year ago,” Jack told Lucille. Like the women, he still had his eyes on the sedan. “One that involved some college students. One of those students, Nicola Gunderson, was abducted from a diner in Longview Ridge, and then she turned up dead. That’s how my dad got involved. My brother Kellan too, since he was a deputy at the time.”
“Oh, yes. I remember.” Lucille’s voice was a little tight, but Jack knew that wasn’t because she had something to hide or even any personal knowledge of the case. However, she did have plenty of knowledge about sex offenses since she’d been a victim of a violent rape fifteen years earlier.
Zeller wasn’t the only person Jack had vetted all the way down to ground zero.
Jack hadn’t considered Lucille’s past a concern, but rather he saw how she responded to it by cultivating her current assets. She’d learned to protect herself and continued her nursing career, and Jack figured that was a bonus skill set when it came to choosing who would be staying with Caroline. Right now, he appreciated that skill set very much, but he hoped he didn’t need Lucille to play backup.
“You’re taking me to the sheriff’s office,” Caroline concluded.
Jack couldn’t figure out a way to sugarcoat it. “I am.”
She sat there, obviously weighing her options as he’d done earlier. She was smart. Smart enough to keep her mouth shut about regaining her memory because she didn’t know the snakes from the good guys. And that meant she’d soon figure out that the only choice she had was to go with him to the sheriff’s office. That didn’t mean she’d like it, though.
Jack had to slow down as he approached the last turn that would take him to town. They were about six miles out now.
Not far.
With Kellan no doubt already en route, it meant he had only a couple more minutes before he could do something about this tail. He wanted to question whoever was behind that wheel. If it was Kingston, he would question him even harder, because maybe he, too, had been at the abandoned hotel the night Jack’s father was murdered.
Jack took the turn on the road, and while his attention hadn’t strayed from the sedan, he watched it even closer now. Though he soon figured out there was no need for watching, because the driver immediately sped up.
Hell.
Kellan was still nowhere in sight, but Jack got a glimpse of something he sure as heck didn’t want to see. The driver’s-side window of the sedan lowered. A hand came out. One holding a gun.
“Get down!” Jack shouted to Caroline and Lucille.
Not a second too soon. Because the shot slammed into the truck.
Chapter Four
Caroline ducked down and grabbed on to Lucille to make sure she did the same just as a bullet blasted through the truck’s back window. The safety glass shattered, but the pieces that pummeled them had a plastic coating to keep them from being lethal or cutting them to shreds.
The second shot could fall into the lethal category, though.
It slammed into the driver’s side of the glass, missing Jack’s head by what appeared to be a fraction of an inch.
Fear roared through her, but so did anger. Whoever was doing his—Kingston, maybe—was putting Jack and Lucille in danger, all so he could get to her.
Of course, the flashbacks came. Nightmarish memories of the other attack, the gunfire the night Jack’s father had been murdered. Jack was no doubt reliving some bad stuff, as well.
“I can hold the steering wheel so you can return fire,” Caroline offered.
With narrowed eyes, he spared her a glance, looking at her as if she’d lost her mind. “You’re staying down.” And he caught onto her neck to push her lower. “I have no intention of confronting this jerk with Lucille and you in the vehicle. I’ll do that later when it’s just me and him.”
Jack didn’t leave any room for argument on that, and he hit the accelerator again just as the shooter sent a third bullet their way. Since Lucille was shaking and mumbling a prayer, Caroline put her arm around the woman to try to comfort her.
Mixed in with the sound of a fourth shot, Caroline heard something else. The howl of a police siren. It gave her a jolt of relief. Then, a wave of more fear. Because this was probably Kellan.
The shots stopped instantly, and behind them was the screech of brakes. When Jack cursed, she risked lifting her head to see what was going on. The shooter had stopped and was turning his car around.
No doubt so he could get away.
Jack pulled to the side of the road, and that was when Caroline looked out of the front of the truck and spotted not one but two cruisers. Two deputies were in one, and they sped past them, heading in pursuit of the gunman. Kellan was driving the second cruiser, and he pulled up next to Jack.
“Is anyone hurt?” Kellan immediately asked, glancing up at the shot-out glass, then his brother. Then, at Caroline. Kellan was probably good at poker, because she couldn’t tell what he was thinking other than the obvious concern for his brother and them.
Jack made a quick check of her and Lucille, but his attention didn’t stray far from his rearview mirror. Keeping watch for the sedan that had sped away from them.
“We’re okay,” Jack assured his brother. “I need to get them to the sheriff’s office.”
Kellan gave a quick nod. “I would have all of you get in the cruiser with me, but the guy might return, and I don’t want you out in the open. I’ll follow you back and send out another crew of deputies to assist in chasing down that car.”
Jack matched his brother’s nod and too
k off. “It’ll only take us a couple of minutes to get there,” Jack told Lucille and her.
Minutes. Not long before she could be walking into a lion’s den. But then, as Jack had said, for her it was the lesser of two evils. She definitely didn’t want to hang around, waiting for a gunman.
Those couple of minutes crawled by, and it didn’t help that Caroline had broken glass all over her. A reminder of the attack. God, when was this going to end? For over a year she had been fighting for her life, and now she’d apparently brought that fight straight to Jack.
Jack didn’t slow down until his truck screeched to a stop in front of the sheriff’s office. Kellan must have already called ahead, because another of Jack’s brothers, Deputy Owen Slater, was in the open doorway, and he had his gun drawn. As soon as Kellan arrived he took Owen’s place, and Owen drove off in the cruiser. No doubt in pursuit of the shooter.
“I called a medic,” Kellan said as they all hurried inside. “He’ll be here soon.” Another of the deputies, Gunnar Pullam, immediately took hold of Lucille’s arm. Caroline knew him, and had never gotten any criminal vibes from him, but she still kept her distance.
“Move away from the windows,” Jack snapped.
Caroline didn’t need a reminder of the danger or another slam of adrenaline, but Jack’s words gave her both anyway.
Jack turned to Gunnar. “Do you want to take Lucille to the break room to wait for the medic?” he suggested.
“And after she gets checked out, take her statement,” Kellan added.
When Kellan looked at Caroline this time, his face wasn’t so poker ready. His mouth was tight, maybe because she hadn’t remembered his father’s killer. Or perhaps he just thought she hadn’t wanted to tell him.
Caroline was certain there was some tightness in her mouth, too. Was she looking into the eyes of a killer? Maybe not. But it was possible that Kellan was covering for one.
With his hand still on her arm, Jack led her across the squad room that was jammed with desks and equipment and took her inside Kellan’s office.
“Stay here,” he told her and immediately went back out into the squad room, where Kellan waited.
The brothers were only about ten feet away from her, but Jack didn’t exactly broadcast what he was saying, keeping his voice barely louder than a whisper. Still, Caroline caught a word here and there. Three days ago, she said. Dirty cop. You. Yeah, she thinks that.
The last one caused Kellan to huff and then scowl, but when he glanced over Jack’s shoulder at her, the scowl disappeared. The look he gave her riled her to the core. Because it was pity. Kellan thought she was too damaged to think straight. He was dismissing her concerns that a lawman had been the one to help Eric in the attack a year ago.
Jack also glanced back at her, frowned and then mumbled something else to Kellan. She didn’t catch a single word of that, but Jack started toward her. Not hurrying, but with every step he took, he kept his eyes on her.
When he reached her, she was about to blast him for spilling all to Kellan, but Jack stopped her with a touch. He pushed her hair from her face, examining her. Or so she thought until he extracted a blob of the safety glass, then another, from the top of her head.
Dragging in a weary breath, he closed the door, and in the same motion, he turned her to check the back of her hair. “Shake your clothes,” he instructed. “Even safety glass can cut if you sit or lean back on it.”
Her mouth got tighter, but she shook the dress and glass bits pinged to the tile floor. “You told your brother that I don’t trust him,” she snapped, “that I think he’s a dirty cop involved in his father’s murder.”
Jack continued to pick off glass bits. “He would have figured it out. He’s a lot better at body language than I am.”
“You’re fine with body language,” she grumbled, but Caroline wished she’d kept that to herself.
She whirled around just in time to see him smile that damnable smile, and she wasn’t sure if she wanted to throttle him or kiss him. Caroline didn’t do either, but it did cause her to freeze.
His next breath wasn’t so much one of weariness as it was of relief. The long, lingering look he gave her made her think he was about to touch her again. He didn’t. Instead, Jack crammed his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
“If you need to fall apart or cry, go ahead and do it,” he offered. “You’re shaking,” he pointed out before she could insist she didn’t intend to do either. She didn’t know what she was stewing over more—Jack telling his brother her deep, dark fears or Kellan brushing it off as Jack had done to the glass.
But she was indeed trembling.
Her hands, her mouth. Heck, her legs. She was probably a breath away from both falling apart and crying.
“I nearly got Lucille and you killed,” she said, and Caroline cursed her own voice. It was shaking, too.
Jack lifted an eyebrow. “Funny, I thought it was the shooter who nearly killed us.”
“The shooter wouldn’t have been firing those bullets if it hadn’t been for me.” She expected him to give her some sugarcoated answer, but she’d obviously forgotten this was Jack.
“That’s true.” With that hanging in the air, he waited a heartbeat. “And since I’d rather not have any more attempted murders, that means you’re going to have to let me help you.”
“You mean I’m going to have to trust Kellan,” Caroline blurted out. She was feeling a lot less shaky now.
Jack shrugged, took his hand from his pocket so he could tap the badge on his belt. “Every lawman in Texas isn’t tainted, and if you dig beneath all the anger, fear and whatever else it is you’re feeling, you’ll remember that I’m the best shot you’ve got at keeping us both alive.”
He followed that too logical minilecture with a long stare. Jack was obviously waiting for her to come to the only conclusion that she had right now.
“I’m not going to trust your brother,” she insisted, but left the rest of it unspoken—that she would trust Jack. Again, it was the only choice she had.
He nodded as if they’d just hashed that out with a heated argument. “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe.” He paused. “Want me to take a bullet for you to prove it?”
Jack didn’t wink, but he might as well have, because he was obviously trying to lighten things up. Trying to bring her back down and ease some of the still raw adrenaline. It was working, sort of, since it was something he’d said to her in jest when they’d been lovers. A way of letting her know that he cared that much for her.
“No,” she said, drawing out the one-word answer to emphasize it. There was a lot more emotion in her voice than she wanted as she stared at him.
Thinking.
Remembering.
Yes, definitely remembering.
That helped more than his lame attempt at cop humor. His being there helped, too, and despite everything she’d been through—or maybe because of it—Caroline wanted to step right into his arms. Those strong arms with their toned muscles. She wanted to feel the heat, and the comfort that she’d gotten there before. Jack had tugged and pulled at her in a way that no man ever had before.
Or ever would again, she was forced to admit to herself.
Yes, it’d been great sex. The fire between them so hot. The feel of him touching her with those calloused hands. Him, being inside her. She’d felt that, too.
If it’d been just those things, only those, she could have pushed it all away. Could have distracted herself with the dark fear that was eating holes in her. But it had been more—way more—and she had to admit that to herself, too.
With those stormy gray eyes locked on hers, he reached up and touched his finger to the center of her forehead. Just a touch, maybe to her scar, the one that Eric had given her when he hit her. Or maybe Jack was trying to ease the tensed muscles there. And despite everything she’d just admitted
to herself, Caroline still hadn’t been prepared for that touch. For the way his warm breath fell on her. For the look of him.
That face. His eyes. His mouth that had fueled enough fantasies to last her a couple of lifetimes.
“Penny for your thoughts,” he drawled. “A dollar for them if you’re thinking about sex.” The corner of his mouth hitched. Because he knew her thoughts, knew everything she was feeling right now.
Since he was feeling the same thing, Caroline laid her hand on his chest. Over his heart, which she could feel beating to the rhythm of hers.
“Sex won’t help,” she said, her voice mostly breath.
His slight smile stayed in place. A smile that only he and Mona Lisa could have pulled off. “That depends on the sex.”
Jack made her laugh before she could stop herself or remember there was absolutely nothing to laugh about. He hooked his arm around the back of her neck in a casual, easy way, and lowering his head to her, took her laugh with his mouth.
Kissing her.
It was like hot silk sliding through her. Oh, it felt wonderful. That incredible taste. Those clever moves, with seemingly no effort. He made no demands, and yet, also seemed to make the biggest demand of all. Within seconds, he had turned the hot silk to blazing flames.
“It’s good to have you back,” he whispered against her mouth.
Is it? she wanted to say. She’d brought nothing but trouble with her. But there wasn’t time for her question because the door opened, and Kellan stepped in.
Jack moved away from her, but he took his time, which meant Kellan had no trouble seeing Jack’s arm around her and their mouths hovering over each other. It didn’t make Kellan a happy camper. He scowled at his brother.
“The medic’s here to check Caroline,” Kellan said, his attention nailed to Jack. “And I just spoke to Kingston on the phone, and he said he’d come in for questioning, to set some things straight. He’s on his way here right now.”
Chapter Five
Jack wanted to curse. Even though he probably should, he didn’t regret kissing Caroline. But now he was going to have to listen to Kellan tell him why a kissing regret should be at the top of his list.
His Brand of Justice (Longview Ridge Ranch Book 4) Page 4