by DiAnn Mills
Truth is seen in what it does and whom it seeks.
* * *
In less than ten minutes, Miles’s players would rush the field to play the fourth game of the season. A mixture of excitement and nervousness crackled in the air. He took the time to capture each boy’s attention, to silently let him know that his coach valued and cared for him far beyond his skills on the field.
“Remember to respect each other and the opposing team members, to abide by the rules, and to be safe.” Miles anchored his hands on his hips. “I’m so proud of you that I could shout it out for the whole town on the courthouse steps. Who wants to join me?”
Cheers rose from Split Creek’s varsity football team. Five minutes later, the team burst onto the field through a banner of blue and gold with the cheerleaders turning cartwheels and the team’s Bobcat mascot dancing alongside the girls. The crowd rose to its feet and cheered. The band saluted the team with raised instruments and a blaring fight song. Even the stars seemed to twinkle a little brighter as if to welcome the best football team the town had seen in ten years. What a grand night for football.
The Bobcats and the Eagles held each other scoreless the first quarter. Miles paced up and down the sidelines. His players were assuming too much. Although the Eagles had a record of zero and three, it didn’t mean they were pushovers.
“What are you doing out there, Walt? Get your head back in the game. Chris was wide open.” Miles sensed his ulcer kicking the pit of his stomach. They weren’t hitting on all cylinders. Walt was missing too many passes, and Chris seemed to be two steps behind the Eagles’ linebacker. The defense was playing like girls. The offense looked like ballet dancers.
Miles knew exactly where Paige sat in the stands—third row, fifth seat. From the fifty-yard line, he could swivel on his heels and see her face. She’d been a bit preoccupied since she had her cast removed, as though something had snatched up her attention. Tonight he needed to see an encouraging face before he lost his temper. Some of the comments from the crowd weren’t worth repeating.
Ty Dalton trotted up beside him. “Put Chris where he belongs. Now.”
Miles fought the urge to ask him where he was living. “When I want your advice, I’ll ask for it.”
“Too bad about your barn.”
Now Miles wanted to lay a fist alongside his jaw.
With twenty seconds left in the half, the Eagles’ quarterback ran for a second TD—0–13. The clock buzzed, and Miles pointed his team toward the field house. He refused to blow his stack like an irrational jerk who thought the whole game was all about him. Besides that, he didn’t want to make a spectacle of himself. Miles felt sorry for the team, but sympathy never instilled confidence.
“Some of you thought we had this game wrapped up,” Miles said. “That’s a cocky attitude. That’s not the attitude of winners, and you are winners.”
“We look like fools out there,” Walt said. “I let that ball slip right through my fingers too many times.”
A couple of the other players bemoaned their mistakes.
Miles held up his hand for them to stop. “Hey, guys, what’s in your heart? Play this game for what it means to you. Not for mommies and daddies and girlfriends watching your every move through binoculars. How you play tonight is a reflection of how you play life—one yard gain at a time. Believe in what you can achieve.”
Once the halftime show had ended and both bands had marched into the stands, Chris and Walt led the team back onto the field with shouts that sounded more like war cries. Miles saw in the players’ eyes what he hadn’t seen before—determination. The third quarter started slow, or maybe it only seemed that way to Miles, who was anxious to get some yardage.
Four minutes into the third quarter, Walt broke free. Good timing gave him a race down the field. He sailed over the goal line for a TD, and the crowd roared. Miles started to call his players in before attempting to score another point but changed his mind. His boys could do it. The kicker backed up. He raced toward the ball. It soared over the goalpost.
The fans cheered louder. Miles’s squeaky team had responded to the halftime tune-up. When the clock ran out at the end of the fourth quarter, the scoreboard flashed 20–13. The Bobcats had finished with another win.
Chapter 36
Paige searched the blackness around her house and garage as Miles pulled his truck into her gravel driveway and turned off the ignition. Darkness could be a friend or foe, depending on who held the edge—as the shooting at the library had proved. Her weapons lay inside the house, where they did her no good. Some women had a favorite necklace or ring, and leaving home without their jewelry made them feel naked. Paige felt the same about her preferred gun, but the scanners at the football field protested against firearms.
Miles’s face reminded her of a little boy who had gotten a pony for Christmas. And who could blame him? With the team’s 4 and 0 stats, the Bobcats were on their way to the play-offs and the state championship. The celebration tonight had lasted long after everyone’s curfew, but no one had wanted the excitement to end.
“Is that grin permanently etched on your face?” Paige asked.
He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. “Set in stone. I shouldn’t be surprised at how the team pulled things together. I mean, they started off tonight badly, but they rallied at the half. Paige, I’m really proud of those boys. They’ve worked their butts off this season. Walt and Chris are actually getting along.”
Paige stared into the face of the man she should discourage and whose company she should avoid. But she couldn’t.
“Paige is smitten,” Miss Eleanor at Shear Perfection had said.
“He’s crazy about you,” Voleta had said on more than one occasion.
So where did this lead? To her living a double life forever? To pretending her life with the CIA wasn’t back in the swing of things? No point in debating the truth of where it all would end. She also had Nathan to think about.
“Where are you?” Miles asked.
“Thinking that it’s one thirty and past bedtime, but I’m as wound up as you are. Would you like to come inside for a cup of coffee and a slice of apple crumb pie?”
“I’m wide awake.” He relaxed against the truck seat while holding her gaze. His body language had nothing to do with pie.
A pleasant shiver coursed through her, accompanied by a carnal ache that she forced back down into the part of her that she must resist. “Do not say what you’re thinking, or you might get your face slapped. Your victory tonight ended on the field. One cup of decaf and a piece of pie, then I’m chasing you home.”
“How do you manage to read people so well? Special training in library science?”
She reached for the door handle. “Years of practice.”
“I could use that technique when I’m on the field. Reading the opposing coaches sounds good. What about reading lips? Can you manage that feat too?”
“If I confessed to reading lips, then I’d lose all of my fun.”
The two made their way across the yard to the porch. She rubbed her arms to ward off the night’s chill. The falling temperatures might bring a frost by morning. The familiar complaint of the second step and the warm glow of the porch light had come to symbolize everything she’d grown to cherish: the squeaking rockers, the patriotic milk can that still gave her hope for her country, the ivy that trailed off the end of the porch and rooted in the flower bed beneath it. This was her haven, and Miles had come to fit into the whole idyllic picture. He meant much more than a cowboy or a coach or a knight on a Harley. Perhaps her time had come. Perhaps God had something else planned for her life other than hiding out in small-town USA and attempting to fight Daniel Keary, and He walked beside her. If only there was an answer to the inner turmoil about Miles and Nathan.
“Hey.” Miles took her hand. “We have another reason to stretch out this party. We haven’t officially celebrated the removal of your cast.”
“Hallelujah. Let’s raise the flag an
d climb the pole.”
“I’m glad for you.” He squeezed her hand. “Remember the evenin’ when I rescued you on my Harley?”
“Maybe. Why?”
“If you will recall, that evening you let me kiss you.”
“I don’t remember it happening in quite the same way.” She allowed her vulnerability to take over. “I kissed you.”
“I kissed you back.”
Her heart thumped like a cornered rabbit, overpowering all the reasons why kissing Miles was asking for trouble. “I remember needing a diversion from a two-legged pest.”
Miles’s shoulders lifted. “Are you sure there wasn’t more to it?”
“Sure enough not to resist a second time.” Paige should have stopped right there. Should have stopped any more thoughts of what was racing through her mind. Should have left Miles sitting in the truck. But she’d been more in control back when she ran from camouflaged soldiers with AK-47s slung over their shoulders.
Miles wrapped his arms around her waist and drew her to him. She’d noticed the muscles in his massive arms at the museum, even imagined being held by them. This place reminded her of something she didn’t feel she deserved . . . and yet desperately wanted.
His head lowered, and his lips brushed across hers, hesitant. He paused as though he savored every moment. She certainly did. Tomorrow I’ll hate myself for this. But right now, I want this moment never to end.
The kiss deepened. She circled her arms around his neck while her senses melted into oblivion. The clean scent lingering after his shower, the embrace of the man she loved, the taste of his lips upon hers, and the chorus of insects singing along with the rhythm of her heart told her it was right. Suspended in time, her heart confirmed what her mind wanted to deny.
When the moment was over, he held her even tighter. She didn’t dare mouth the words. Perhaps she never could.
“Paige, I . . .” Miles’s deep-throated voice cracked.
The sound of his voice snatched her back to reality. She’d broken her own code, cracked the wall of her resolve. “I know. You want a cup of coffee and a slice of pie.”
She separated herself from the moment and blinked before staring into his deep pools of brown with their flecks of gold. She’d always prided herself on being in control of her emotions—for control was power, and power kept her alive. But this was different. He’d touched the part of her that had nothing to do with national security.
“Actually, pie and coffee were the farthest things from my mind. But filling my stomach might keep my hands busy.”
“Can you behave yourself?”
His features softened, and his finger traced the side of her face. “We must. There is no other option.”
And she knew exactly what he meant. For above all things, Miles was a man of integrity. Paige slipped her hand into her bag and drew out the house key. Willing her heightened senses to still, she unlocked the door and snapped on the light. Her gaze swept around the room, taking in the pen on the corner of the desk, the mail, the exact position of the sofa pillows. Satisfied, she walked into the kitchen and turned on the lights there. The kitchen curtain was slanted to the left.
Someone had been in her house.
* * *
From the moment Paige strode into the kitchen, Miles could tell something about her had changed. She stiffened. Her face hardened. Wariness replaced the passion he’d experienced moments before. Did she have second thoughts about their kiss, or did she regret asking him inside?
He’d never been able to read her very well until tonight on the porch. There she’d been open, sensual, and for the first time Miles had seen in her eyes what he wanted to believe nestled in her heart. He was a man, for heaven’s sake. What had happened?
“Paige, what’s wrong?”
She motioned for him to stay in the living room. “Someone has been here. May still be.”
From his stance near the front door, he saw her reach high into a cabinet and pull out a Beretta, a heavy weapon for a lady. He held his breath. She wasn’t having any problems handling it.
“Whoa.” Startled, Miles watched her aim it with both hands at an invisible target down the hallway. This was the woman who used a bogus name and Social Security number. “Is that thing necessary?”
“I’ve had lessons.”
“Why not let me check out the house?”
“Hush, Miles.”
Her tone implied a command, not a request, so he obeyed. Perhaps his compliance came with a twinge of fear that she might turn the gun on him. Ridiculous, but true. Once she’d calmed down, he’d issue a heavy dose of caution about gun safety. But Paige stood before him composed and in control. Incredibly strange for a librarian—but maybe not for a librarian with a fake ID.
“I have a few things to do before I make coffee,” she said with her back to him. “Stay put unless I call for you.”
“I’m your backup.”
“I don’t need a Tonto.”
That toppled his ego. “Doesn’t matter.”
Paige blew out an exasperated sigh. “I’m in no mood to argue. Stay behind me.”
Miles followed her down the hall. She explored each room in the small, two-bedroom house, haphazardly dumping clothes from dresser drawers and pulling out items from the closets. She ripped the blankets and sheets from her bed and piled them in a heap on the floor. She lifted the mattress, refusing Miles’s help, and bent to her knees to search beneath the bed.
“Do you want me to move the dresser?”
“Nothing’s been touched there.”
How did she know that? Miles swallowed hard. She did watch all of those suspense movies about government security organizations and crime fighters. Could she be delusional? But she’d swept the rooms as though she knew exactly what she was doing.
He stood in the doorway of her bedroom and saw her shoulder bag—with a burnt hole. “I have questions. Beginning with why does it look like there’s a bullet hole in your leather bag.”
“I was ready for a change.” She shut a closet door and walked toward him, pointing the automatic at the ceiling. “Ask anything you want after I’m finished. But don’t expect any answers.” She motioned him out of her way and walked into the living room, peering into every corner. Snapping on a table lamp, she grasped it and peered up into the chimney. Next she flipped over the cushions on the sofa and chair. Her attention settled on a small desk by the front door and the landline phone there. A moment later, she took the phone apart. Seemingly satisfied with the manner in which it operated, she snapped the phone back together and examined the wall jack.
He might as well play along with her game. “Are you bugged?”
“Not here, anyway.” She righted the little box and snapped it back into place. “I need to check the garage.”
The quiet librarian had once again thrown him into a tailspin. Were there some mental issues involved with her living under an assumed name? “I’m going with you.”
She studied him. Not really seeing him, as though her thoughts had taken precedence over reality. “All right, but you have to follow my instructions. No questions. Understand?”
“Why all this secrecy? If your house has been broken into, then we need to call George. He’s trained to handle these kinds of things.”
Paige spun to face him. “I have the gun.”
He gasped. No one had ever threatened him with a weapon before.
“I need your word that you will never tell George or anyone else about this.”
“Why?”
“Promise me.” Her voice rose.
No point arguing with a determined woman. “Okay. Let’s go.”
With the Beretta in her left hand, she walked back into the kitchen and reached for the door leading to the garage.
“Do you know how to use that thing? I know you said you’d had lessons, but you’re making me nervous.” The hammering of his pulse cemented his gut reaction.
She flung open the door. “You’re in better hands with m
e than George.” The garage light clicked on. She appeared to inhale every detail. Miles stood in the doorway and watched her move from one corner to another, mesmerized by the transformation of the woman he thought he knew into someone who acted like a professional. Professional what?
“Don’t touch my car. In fact, I’d feel better if you cleared about one hundred feet from the house.”
“Not on your life.”
“It might be yours.”
“Surely you don’t think someone has been tampering with your car. You haven’t even proved anyone’s been in your house.”
“Yes, I have.” She tucked the Beretta inside the back of her jeans and lifted the car’s hood. She studied the engine.
“Need some help?”
She ignored him. Scars splayed from below the waist of her jeans up to the back of her knit top, beneath which the markings disappeared. “Jerks,” she said.
“Can we stop playing cops now?”
“Not until I deactivate this bomb.”
Miles caught his breath. “That isn’t funny.”
“Neither is getting blown to pieces.” For the first time since they entered the garage, she stared straight into his face. “For the last time, I’m asking you to step outside.”
He squared his shoulders. “Forget it. When this is over, I want an explanation.”
Ignoring him, she retrieved a pair of wire clippers from a toolbox. He stood over her, stubborn enough to call her bluff and curious enough to see if she spoke the truth. Paige pointed inside the hood to a small brick of yellowish claylike substance that held two wires running to a detonator cap. Duct tape held the brick in place.
His mouth went dry, and his heart seemed to pound in his throat. “It’s attached to the starter solenoid. Who would do this?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Don’t you think it’s time to call the authorities?”
She studied the brick. One of the wires was yellow, the other green. He’d watched enough movies to know the wire’s color supposedly meant something, like snipping the wrong one could activate the bomb.