One Tough Marine

by Paula Graves

  “I regret it,” he murmured, pressing his forehead to hers. “I regret the danger…” He nipped at the tendons of her neck, making her gasp aloud. “I regret—”

  She silenced him, her mouth claiming his. Right now, she didn’t care about regrets or consequences, not with Luke’s body pressing hers into the wall, fiery-hot and demanding. He twined his fingers with hers and pinned her hands back against the rough clapboard, taking ruthless control of the kiss.

  His tongue brushed over hers, lightly at first, then with relentless determination, until she was clinging to the last shredded edge of her control. He groaned against her lips, a feral growl of a sound that set off a rumbling sensation low in her belly.

  With a sudden groan of frustration, Luke rolled away from her, coming to rest with his back pressed against the porch wall. “Stevie,” he breathed, and that one word sent a cold shudder racing down Abby’s spine, dropping her back into sober reality with a jarring thud.

  “Stevie,” she echoed, her stomach knotting with anxiety. How had she allowed herself to forget, even for a second, the threat Luke posed to her son by his mere presence? Stevie was her priority. He was Luke’s priority. Keeping him safe was everything—the only thing—that mattered.

  Luke reached over and touched her hand, a light brush of his fingertips against her knuckles. He dropped his hand back to his side and released a deep sigh. “You should go back inside now. I need a couple more minutes. I should touch base with Sam before we settle down for the night. He may have some ideas about where we should go next.”

  Abby nodded, even though the last thing she wanted to do was to go inside and face the Langstons at the moment. Surely the evidence of the searing kiss she and Luke had just shared was written all over her face, as if Luke had branded her irrevocably with his desire. She felt as if she were sixteen years old all over again, coming home from the junior prom, shaken and certain that her parents would see that she let Ross Langston get all the way to second base this time.

  Maybe being back home in Texarkana wasn’t as good for her as she’d thought. As much as she didn’t like the woman she’d become in San Diego while living a lie of a marriage for six long years, she didn’t want to revert to the scared little Texas girl who’d headed west for college with a head full of foolish dreams and naive notions about life that time and experience had knocked out of her one painful blow at a time.

  “Go on,” Luke said softly. “Stevie needs you.”

  She nodded. Stevie did need her. And she might be all he ever had, thanks to Eladio Cordero’s vendetta.

  She pushed away from the wall, waiting a second to see if her shaking legs would hold her before she took a faltering step toward the door. She stopped, turning back to look at Luke. “Can no one stop Cordero?”

  “At least three different governments are trying,” he answered in a dry, dark voice. “No luck so far.”

  Too many places to hide in the mountains and jungles of Sanselmo, she supposed, especially if you were filthy rich with drug money and surrounded by thugs whose lives you controlled.

  She raked her fingers through her hair, trying to fix the mess Luke’s hands had made. She supposed there wasn’t much to do about the beard scratches on her throat and jaw, however.

  “You look beautiful,” he murmured.

  She smiled, suddenly self-conscious. “I’m a mess. But thanks.”

  As she reached for the kitchen door, it flew open and Ross Langston stepped out onto the porch, almost running into her. He skidded to a stop, his eyes widening a bit as he took in their disheveled appearances. Even an idiot could have been able to figure out what had been going on between them seconds before. And Ross was no idiot.

  But despite the slight flush of red that rose up his neck, his expression remained deadly serious. “I just got a call from the station. Someone called in a tip about your RV being at the dealership.”

  All the warmth that Luke’s caresses had generated fled Abby’s body. “How?” She’d been depending on at least a little lead time before they had to start worrying again. “Nobody even saw us. How could someone have found it so fast?”

  “There are people looking for you. Apparently they’re relentless,” Ross answered. He looked at Luke. “Some detectives will be here soon. I’ve tried to stall them by asking to meet them at the dealership before they come over here to talk to Daddy about it. But the people who called in the tip may have been using the situation to find out where you’d go next. It won’t be hard to figure out you came here.”

  “We have to go,” Luke said quietly.

  Ross nodded. “Mama and Daddy are inside packing you up for the drive. You’re going to take Daddy’s SUV and get out of here as soon as possible.”

  Abby’s heart sank. She was tired, she was scared and the thought of getting into one more vehicle for one more overnight run for her life was enough to make her want to sit down right there on the porch and cry.

  Ross caught her hand. “I’m sorry, Abby. I have to go.”

  She watched him leave, tears burning her eyes. When she looked at Luke, his eyes were dark with regret.

  She couldn’t stand there another moment or she’d root herself to the spot. No matter what her heart was whispering about home and safety, the only place she’d really be safe was with Luke.

  They had to go.

  Inside, she found Wanda in the kitchen, digging through the pantry for supplies to put into a large canvas bag. The look she gave Abby was full of love and fear, but Abby didn’t have time to stop and reassure her that everything would be okay.

  She needed to see her son.

  She hurried down the hall to the bedroom and found Stevie still asleep, oblivious to the heightened tension in the house. He was beautiful in the sliver of light shining into the bedroom from the hallway, his eyes tightening a little as the light fell onto his face. He flopped his head over to block out the light and fell quickly into a deep sleep once more.

  Tears burned her eyes, and she turned away, flattening her back against the hallway wall. Despair seeped into her bones, down to the marrow. As much as she’d needed to know the whole truth about why Luke had walked out on her three years ago, knowledge only increased her troubles tenfold. Now she knew she had two powerful, ruthless enemies who were willing to use her son’s life as a bartering chip. And they were already here in Texas.

  How was she going to keep Stevie safe now?

  Chapter Twelve

  “Someone tipped off the Texarkana police,” Luke said urgently into the disposable phone as he took the bags Billy handed him and shoved them into the hatch of the Dodge Nitro.

  “This soon?” Sam asked, alarmed.

  “We knew they’d be looking for us on the interstate routes. I guess they decided to branch out to the main arteries.”

  “You’ve got to get out of there.”

  “We’re packing as we speak.” He looked at Billy Langston, trying to convey his gratitude with his eyes. “I need to ditch these wheels soon. I’m going to need help from home.”

  “You’ve got it. I’ll meet you halfway—”

  “Shouldn’t be you. They may be watching all the immediate family. Maybe Kristen?” Sam’s wife, Kristen, was a cop. They could use the extra firepower, as well.

  There was a brief pause while Sam murmured something to someone else—Kristen, apparently. Luke heard her quiet assent, then Sam said, “She’s on her way. I’m giving her the spare disposable phone I bought the other day.” He gave Luke the number. Luke dug in his jacket pocket for a pen and wrote the number on the back of his hand.

  “Got it.”

  “Where do you want her to meet you?”

  He looked at Billy, not willing to say in front of the other man. Billy read the reluctance in Luke’s eyes and walked away, leaving Luke to pack the hatch by himself. “There’s not a lot of point in subterfuge at this point,” Luke said quietly. “I’ve been wondering why they tipped off the cops instead of coming here themselves. You can
’t tell me they don’t know who the Langstons are to Abby. They had to know she might be here. I think they’re herding us. Keeping us on the move.”

  “But they went after you in Yuma.”

  “Maybe Los Tiburones spooked them, so they’re just tracking us, for now, to see if we’ve figured out where Matt hid whatever it was he took from them.”

  “You still have no idea what they’re looking for?”

  “I’m assuming he took incriminating files,” Luke replied, glancing over his shoulder toward the Langstons’ house. Where were Abby and Stevie? “There’s something else you should know,” he added quietly. “I told Abby the truth about Cordero.”

  Sam was silent for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was wary. “But you don’t want to tell the rest of your family?”

  Sam was right. It was time to trust his family to be able to take care of themselves. “Tell them,” Luke said aloud. “Everything about Cordero. God willing, we’ll be there in the next two days. They need to know what’s coming their way.”

  “Are you sure?” Luke could hear the hope in Sam’s voice.

  “I should have told everyone a long time ago. They have a right to make their own choices about how to deal with it.”

  “Including Abby?”

  Good question. What if he’d stayed there in her bed that morning and told her everything? She might have been willing to take her chances to be with him, but would he have let her risk it? Especially once Stevie was in the picture?

  He had a feeling they’d have ended up in the exact same place they were now, even if he’d told her the truth.

  “I don’t think it would have made a difference. Neither one of us is willing to put Stevie into more danger. We can’t let anyone know he’s my son.”

  “Not even the family?”

  “Just you. And Kristen—I won’t ask you to lie to her.”

  “Are you sure?”

  An image of Stevie’s mischievous grin flashed through Luke’s mind, and his heart contracted. “I’m sure. Nobody else can know. I know they’d never let it slip intentionally, but—”

  “I get it.” Sam’s voice softened a little on the other end of the line. “Does Stevie look like you?”

  “Not obviously—he still looks more like Abby than anything. But, yeah. There’s a resemblance.” He heard the porch door creak open behind him and turned to see Abby coming, Stevie on one hip and his diaper bag in her other hand. Billy and Wanda were behind her, Billy carrying a large canvas tote brimming with groceries. “Sam, I’ve got to go. I’m heading west on Highway 82, toward Mississippi.”

  “Got it. Kristen will call with directions where to go next,” Sam answered. “I love you, Luke.”

  Hot tears pricked Luke’s eyes. “Love you, too, Sam.” He rang off and turned to meet Abby’s quizzical look. “Sam,” he said, and turned toward the car, putting the last bag in the hatch to distract himself from the knot of emotion choking him.

  While Abby buckled Stevie into the car seat Billy had already attached to the middle bench of the Dodge SUV, Billy gave Luke’s arm a tug. Luke didn’t like the stubborn set of the man’s jaw.

  “I don’t think you should be taking her and her little boy tearin’ across the country, runnin’ from the police,” Billy said when they were out of earshot.

  “I can’t leave her here.”

  “You’re not just Abby’s friend, are you?”

  Luke glanced back at the car and found Abby watching him, a troubled look on her face. “It’s complicated.”

  “She’s going to get hurt, isn’t she?”

  He could lie to Billy, say everything would work out. But Billy wouldn’t buy it. He’d respect the truth more. “I don’t think there’ll be any winners when this is all over, no.”

  “She should stay here with us, then.”

  Luke shot him a considering look. “You own, what? A shotgun? Maybe a crossbow for hunting?”

  Billy gave him a black look. “And a bowie knife.”

  “Any military training?”

  “Two years in the Texas Air National Guard.” Billy sounded defensive. “Vietnam was over by then.”

  “What about Ross? Police-academy training doesn’t count.”

  Billy pressed his lips into a tight line. “We’re not the only ones willing to protect her. A lot of folks around here loved that girl and her family.”

  “You think Ross can convince the rest of the Texarkana Police Department to look the other way on the APB? And even if he can, are they going to lie to the state troopers? The Feds?”

  Billy looked away.

  “I’ve got five cops just in my immediate family,” Luke said gently. “Two of my brothers are former military officers. So’s my dad. We’ll take good care of them both. I promise.”

  “For now, you mean.”

  “For as long as it takes to make them safe.”

  Billy looked over at Abby, his expression bleak. “Safe isn’t the same thing as happy,” he murmured.

  No, it wasn’t, Luke thought. But it was a hell of a lot better than dead.

  THE GULFSTREAM V could hold as many as fourteen passengers, but only six men occupied the seats in the small jet, and of those, only Damon and Tris remained awake. The orders had come through three hours ago—rendezvous at the San Diego airport. Beckett, their team leader, would be waiting with instructions.

  Beckett was one of the six passengers, a burly ex-drill sergeant with a weakness for cards and the ladies. Definitely not officer material in a conventional unit, which had annoyed more than one team member at the beginning of a career working for Barton Reid’s personal army.

  It hadn’t taken long, however, to realize that despite his peccadilloes, Salvatore Beckett knew how to get things done, on time and under budget. And he didn’t ask many questions, the virtue that perhaps appealed to Barton Reid the most.

  “Cooper hasn’t been home in ten years,” Tris murmured to Damon across the narrow space between their seats, which faced each other near the back of the Gulfstream. They had managed to get seats away from the others, all men from the East Coast office of MacLear Enterprises who’d traveled west a couple of days earlier to help in the search for Abby Chandler. “What makes the boss think he’s heading there now?”

  “He’s heading somewhere. Home seems as good a bet as any.” Damon tried not to look interested. Like all the members of MacLear’s Special Services Unit, Damon had won his job by his personal vulnerabilities as well as his special skills. The vulnerabilities gave MacLear ammunition to use against him. His skills made his vulnerabilities an acceptable risk.

  The fatal flaw that had put Damon in MacLear’s crosshairs had been a very public taste for the finer things in life, far beyond his ability to pay for them. His personal debt had reached six figures when he was recruited eight months ago, trading one debt for another.

  Tris’s gaze settled on the four men sitting closer to the front of the jet. He didn’t trust them. Neither did Damon. Lack of trust was one of the downsides of the Special Services Unit. Camaraderie was limited to the handful of men you worked with day in and day out. The sort of service-wide pride and honor typical of military units was missing entirely.

  A shame, really. All the men in the Special Services Unit were talented, intelligent operatives. If not for their personal flaws, they could have made a damn fine unit for a company working aboveboard.

  On the surface, MacLear was a legitimate global security firm, with offices located in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Miami, plus foreign offices in London, Berlin, Tel Aviv and Jakarta. They specialized in corporate security and threat risk assessment and training for businessmen working in foreign cities. Their CEO, Jackson Melville, was one of the cable news networks’ go-to guys for security analysis when anything went wrong anywhere in the world.

  He was also bought and paid for by Barton Reid, the number-three man in the State Department. When Reid needed something done quietly and ruthlessly, he turned to MacLear.


  Neither Damon nor his fellow operatives could have proven the connection in a court of law. Reid had made sure of that. But it was an open secret that Barton Reid was involved in the company up to his neatly shaped eyebrows.

  “Cooper knows we’ll have his home covered,” Tris said.

  Damon had a feeling Cooper didn’t care. The man had five brothers—one a sheriff’s deputy, two auxiliary deputies, another who was a former Marine and his eldest a retired Navy lieutenant. His sister was married to another deputy, and his father had been a Marine sharpshooter in Vietnam. Maybe Cooper figured he’d be safer holed up with his well-armed family than wandering around alone with a woman and a baby in tow.

  “I knew we were going to have trouble as soon as Mrs. Chandler went to Cooper’s place,” Tris added softly. “I could tell by looking at him that he’d be wicked trouble.”

  “Do you think he has what we’re looking for?”

  “Hell if I know,” Tris answered.

  Damon leaned back in the seat, closing his eyes and feigning sleep. He was tired of listening to Tris’s complaints. The man had sold his soul to MacLear and Barton Reid willingly enough. Like all of them in the Special Services Unit, he could have chosen a harder but more honorable way out of his troubles.

  Damon had no idea what was waiting in Alabama or how ugly the situation would get before it was all over. He hadn’t even had a chance to think about what going back to his own home state for the first time in years would feel like.

  Right now, he didn’t have the luxury of caring. He had a job to do. If he failed, a lot of people would suffer for it.

  He couldn’t afford to let that happen.

  ABBY HAD EXPECTED STEVIE to sleep for most of the night, as he had for the past two nights of driving. But he woke around 10:00 p.m. crying. Fortunately, Luke had taken the wheel for the first leg of the drive, which freed Abby to deal with her cranky son. She’d had the forethought to sit on the bench seat beside Stevie instead of up front in the passenger seat, putting her in a better position from which to cajole him into a happier mood.