by Paula Graves
For that matter, she thought as she pasted on her best go-getter smile and opened the door to the meeting room, she barely knew the staff in her own office, including Marcus, her right-hand man. They rarely had time for chitchat and she wasn’t one to socialize with her coworkers off the clock. Or anyone else, for that matter.
She couldn’t afford friends.
Four men awaited her in the meeting room, Ken Dailey with hotel security and three others. They stood in a cluster near the large picture window that offered a spectacular view of the mist-shrouded Smoky Mountains to the east.
She looked with envy at their cups of coffee but knew she didn’t have time to get a cup of her own. They had business to discuss, and she was running out of daylight.
“Gentlemen, sorry I’m late,” she said, even though she knew full well she was at least five minutes early to the meeting. “We have a lot to cover, so shall we get to work?”
* * *
HUNTER BRAGG STOPPED at the end of the hallway and turned back toward the meeting rooms clustered in the center of this wing of the hotel. The door closed shut behind her, and he started to relax, shoving his hair out of his face and straightening his back.
She hadn’t recognized him from the news reports. He hadn’t really feared she would, given how different he looked from the clean-cut Army sergeant whose abduction had been a weeklong sensation until something new came along to take over the news cycle.
Of course, he’d recognized her easily from the photo Billy Dawson had shown him and the men he’d selected for the job a few days earlier. “Her name is Susannah Marsh. She’s in our way. Y’all are gonna take her out.”
In that photograph, taken by a telephoto lens from the woods that hemmed in the resort’s employee parking lot, Susannah Marsh had given off a definite aura of money and sophistication. Her well-tailored suit, the shimmery green of a mallard’s head, and shiny black high heels had offered an intoxicating blend of power and sexuality that had sent the other militia members privy to the plan into flights of lustful fancy.
All Hunter had been able to think about was the fact that Billy and the others—men he’d spent the last three months befriending—wanted him to take part in killing a woman just because she was in the way of their plans.
They seemed so ordinary on the outside. Billy Dawson fixed cars out of his garage for a living. Morris Bell drove a Ridge County school bus. Delbert Yarnell worked at the hardware store in Barrowville. They had wives and kids.
And a festering hatred of authority.
Down the hall, the elevator dinged and the doors swished open. A well-dressed man in a silk suit and shiny wingtips stepped out and started to turn away from the end of the hall where Hunter stood, but his gaze snapped back in his direction and he changed course, his long strides eating up the distance between them.
“What are you doing up here?” he asked, frowning.
The question caught Hunter by surprise. He didn’t know this man, though he looked vaguely familiar. They’d probably passed each other in the halls at some point in the last week.
But why was this man challenging him?
The other man’s nostrils flared. “You can’t afford to make her suspicious of you.”
Hunter blinked. This man was part of Dawson’s crew, too?
“Don’t worry,” he assured the other man aloud. “She sees me as part of the wallpaper.”
“We’re making our move tonight.”
Hunter’s gut clenched. Tonight? Nothing was supposed to go down until tomorrow. What had happened? And why hadn’t Billy Dawson warned him of the change in plans?
“I know,” he bluffed. “What’s the plan?”
The other man narrowed his eyes. “Billy didn’t tell me to share it with you.”
“I thought we were on the same side.”
“Are we?”
Hunter returned the other man’s skeptical gaze with a cold, hard stare of his own. “Think I’d be cleaning toilets in this place if we weren’t?”
The other man straightened his tie, a nervous habit, obviously, since his tie was already immaculately straight. “Just don’t screw this up.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
Without another word, the man in the suit turned and strode away from Hunter as quickly as he’d approached.
Releasing tension in a quiet sigh, Hunter turned the corner and headed for the stairs. Once he was safely out of sight, he pulled his phone from his pocket and hit “one” on his speed dial.
When the voice on the other end answered, he said, “They’re moving up the hit.”
“To when?”
“Tonight, as soon as she leaves the office.” Muscles in Hunter’s gut quivered as he tried not to panic. “It’s too soon.”
There was a brief moment of thick silence before the other man asked, “Any idea when she’ll leave the office?”
“Going by her usual schedule, no earlier than six. Probably closer to seven.”
“Any idea what they’re planning to do?”
“No. I didn’t quite make it into the inner circle before this all went down. I’ve been trying to piece things together, but—” He bit back a frustrated sigh. “I don’t know what they’re planning. Or where.”
“I can try to get some backup into place for you by tonight, but I’m not sure I can swing it before then. I’ll see how many people I can move into place by tonight, but you know we’re stretched pretty thin at the moment, until I can bring in more new hires.”
“I know,” Hunter answered tersely. He knew exactly how understaffed The Gates was, if Quinn had resorted to hiring an ex-soldier with a bum leg and anger-management issues.
“You may have to handle this alone for a little while.” Another brief pause, then, “Can you?”
“I guess I’ll have to, won’t I?” Hunter answered, unable to conceal a touch of bitterness in his voice.
* * *
SHE NEEDED A PET, Susannah decided as she crossed the darkened employee parking lot. A pet would give her an excuse to leave the office at a reasonable hour instead of finding just one more thing to take care of before she locked the door for the day.
Not a dog. Dogs needed room to run and someone home to let them out for potty breaks. A cat, maybe. Cats were independent. She’d always liked cats. She’d cried for weeks when she’d had to leave her marmalade tabby Poco behind when she left Boneyard Ridge.
She’d left a lot of things behind in Boneyard Ridge. Things she’d never get back again.
She’d parked at the far end of the parking lot when she’d arrived at work that morning, on the premise that the long walk across the blacktop to her office would be almost as good as working out.
Almost. Pulling out her phone, she hit the record button. “Look into joining a gym.”
“You don’t look like you need one.”
The masculine drawl came out of the darkness, sending her bones rattling with surprise. The lamp at this end of the parking lot was out, she realized as she turned in a circle, trying to spot the speaker.
A darker shadow loomed out of the gloom surrounding her car. She instantly regretted not shelling out a few more bucks to get an alarm system with a remote. She peered toward the approaching figure, taking a couple of defensive steps backward.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” the man’s voice assured her.
She didn’t believe him.
Sliding her hand into the pocket of her purse, she closed her fingers around the small canister of pepper spray she made a point of carrying.
“Don’t do that,” the man warned, a hint of steel in his deep voice. “We don’t have time.”
Even as the words rumbled from the gathering gloom, Susannah heard the growl of a car engine starting nearby. She saw the shadowy figure shift attention toward the sound, and she took the opening, kicking off her high heels and running toward the lights of the hotel behind her.
She didn’t get three steps before he grabbed her from behind, wrapping
her upper body in a firm grip and lifting her off her feet so quickly she didn’t even have time to scream before his hand clapped over her mouth.
She tried to pull the pepper spray from her purse, but his hold on her was unshakable. She could barely flex her fingers.
The roar of the engine grew closer, and she started kicking backward against her captor’s legs. Her only reward was pain in her own heels as they slammed against what felt like solid rock.
“For God’s sake, stop fighting me!” He was running with her, ignoring her attempts to get away as he loped across the parking lot toward the woods beyond. “I’m on your side.”
The sheer audacity of his growling assurance spurred her fury, and she clamped down on his hand with her teeth.
A stream of curses rewarded her effort, but the man didn’t let her go. He just kept running, an oddly hitching stride that tugged at her memory until she realized where she’d heard that low, cavernous voice before.
The sad-sack maintenance man.
It’s always the quiet ones....
Suddenly, a loud stuttering sound seemed to fill the air around them, and her captor shoved her to the ground and threw himself over her body, pinning her in place. Her purse went flying, pepper spray and all.
The least of her worries, she realized as her rattled mind finally identified the sound. Gunfire. Her pulse started whooshing like thunder in her ears as she held her breath for the sound of more shots.
The engine noise she’d heard before faded, followed by the unmistakable squeal of tire on pavement. They were turning around and coming back for another go, she realized, her breath freezing in her lungs.
The man on top of her pushed himself off her, giving her a brief chance to flee his grasp. But she was too paralyzed with shock to make a move, and then the moment had passed. He grabbed her arm, dragging her to her feet, and started running.
As she stumbled behind him, she realized she had only two stark options—run with him or put up a fight that would give whoever had just tried to gun her down another chance to finish the job.
Her heart hammering wildly in her chest, she ran.
Chapter Two
Night had leached all the warmth from the hills, leaving behind a bitter, damp cold that bit all the way to the marrow. The collection of bone fragments, steel plates and screws holding his left leg together joined forces in a cacophony of pain, but Hunter ignored the aches and kept moving.
He wasn’t sure what the men with the guns would do once they realized he’d spirited their target away, but he knew whatever punishment they chose would be brutal and deadly.
Not getting caught was the only option.
A hiss of pain escaped Susannah’s lips, but he couldn’t let her stop running. Not yet. He could hear the sound of pursuers crashing through the woods behind them, a stark reminder of the consequences of being captured.
“Please,” she groaned, tugging at his hand until he slowed the pace, sparing a second to look at her.
In the faint moon glow slanting through the canopy of trees overhead, Susannah’s dark eyes gazed up at him in pain and fear. “My feet,” she whispered.
He looked down and saw she was barefoot. Blood stained her toes, and he thought about the hard, rocky trail they’d just crossed.
Damn it.
Scanning the woods around them, he spotted a rocky outcropping due east. “Get on my back,” he said.
She stared back at him, her mouth trembling open. “What?”
“You either run on those feet or you get on my back. Or you stay here and let those guys back there catch up with you.”
Her jaw squared. “Who are they? Who are you?”
He tried not to lose his patience, even though the sound of the chasers behind them seemed closer than ever. “They’re the people shooting at you. I’m the guy who’s offering to be your damn mule if you’ll just shut up and get on my back.”
Her mouth flattened to a thin line of anger, but she limped toward him as he bent at the knees, grimacing at the strain on his bad leg, and let her climb onto his back. He grabbed her thighs to hold her in place, surprised and annoyed at how the feel of her firm flesh beneath his fingers sent a sharp, undeniable arrow of lust straight to his groin,
Not the time, Bragg. Really not the time.
She wasn’t a featherweight, but running with a heavy load on his back wasn’t exactly a new thing to Hunter after two tours of duty in the Army. He’d been looking for a test of his reconstructed leg, hadn’t he? Here it was.
It was lucky the rock outcropping was only a half mile distant, he reflected once they reached it and he put her down to rest for a few seconds while he searched the granite wall for any sign of a nook or alcove in the rock face. He found it seconds before he decided to give up and started back toward where he’d left Susannah, only to find that she was a few feet behind, her eyes wide and haunted.
“What are we doing?” she asked in a hushed tone.
“Hiding,” he answered succinctly, sweeping her up into his arms.
She made a soft hiss of surprise but didn’t resist as he carried her through the dark opening into a cold, black abyss.
* * *
NO LIGHT. No sound but that of air flowing in and out of their lungs, fast and harsh in the deep, endless void. After a few seconds, even that sound settled into the faintest of whispers, easily eclipsed by the roar of Susannah’s pulse in her ears.
A sliver of deep gray relieved the darkness after a few moments, as her eyes adjusted. The narrow mouth of the cavern, she realized. The only way out. Or in.
If she weren’t so bloody terrified, she might find a spot of bleak humor in the idea of being curled up in the hard-muscled arms of a man she knew only as “the sad-sack maintenance man,” her bare feet bruised and bleeding, while they hid in a cave from unidentified gunmen.
It was like one of those movies her grandmother liked to watch on cable, the ones where the women were all beautiful, noble victims who inexplicably spent years being treated like garbage by the men in their lives before they finally found their backbones and fought back.
To hell with being a victim, she thought. “What’s your name?” she whispered. Because he clearly wasn’t the sad sack she’d thought. And if he was just a maintenance man, she was the Queen of England.
“Hunter,” he answered after a moment.
“Susannah,” she whispered back. “I guess you know that already, though.”
“Yeah.” His grip on her tightened convulsively, as if he was about to drop her. She grabbed his shoulders in reaction, her fingers digging into an impressive set of muscles.
“Sorry,” he whispered.
“You can put me down.”
He eased her down until she stood upright, her sore feet flattening on the cold rock floor of the cave. “What happened to your shoes?”
“I kicked them off to run from you. I thought I’d be crossing nice flat concrete, not rocky soil.”
“Sorry,” he repeated.
He sounded as if he really was sorry, she realized. Of course, maybe that’s what he wanted her to think. Maybe he was trying to lull her into being a docile captive.
But two could play that game. If he thought she had decided to go along agreeably, he might drop his guard sooner, giving her a chance to make a break for it.
“You really don’t know who those people out there are?” she asked, not believing it for a second.
He didn’t answer. Now that she was on her feet, he’d moved slightly away, although she could still feel the furnacelike heat of his body close by, helping cut the biting cold of the cave.
A few seconds later, when it became clear he had no intention of answering her previous question, she asked, “How long before they give up?”
“They don’t,” he replied.
She’d been afraid of that. “Then how do we get out of here?”
He didn’t answer right away, and she felt more than saw him move toward the cave entrance.
&nbs
p; She followed, noting with some dismay that while the pain in her feet had lessened, it was mainly because the cold had begun to render them numb. He edged over, giving her an opening to look outside with him, and she slid into the narrow space, her arm brushing his. He really was very muscular, she thought as she peered into the misty gloom.
Scudding clouds gathered overhead, blotting out most of the moonlight filtering through the trees. The darkness outside loomed like a physical entity, threatening and impenetrable.
“Rain’s comin’,” Hunter whispered, his drawl pronounced. Definitely a mountain native, she thought.
“Is that good or bad?” she asked.
He gave a little shrug, his shoulder sliding against hers. Heat slithered down her arm into her fingertips, catching her off guard.
Good God, woman, she scolded herself silently, inching her arm away from his. He’s your captor. And not in a good way.
“I don’t see anyone out there,” he whispered after a few minutes. “I think if we go a little deeper into this cave, we might risk a light.”
“A light?”
“Flashlight,” he said softly, tugging her with him away from the cave entrance. She stepped gingerly after him, less from pain than from the fear that her numb feet wouldn’t know it even if she were walking across a field of broken glass.
A few seconds later, a beam of light slanted across the damp cave walls, illuminating the tight space they occupied. The cave was narrow but surprisingly long, twisting out of sight into the rock wall. Hunter swept the light across the visible space, as if reassuring himself they were alone.
“No bears?” she whispered, quelling a shudder.
“Not at the moment.” He flashed an unexpected smile, baring straight white teeth and a surprising pair of dimples high on each cheek. A flutter of raw female awareness vibrated low in her belly, and she jerked her gaze away, appalled by her reaction.
His hand brushed lightly down one arm, scattering goose bumps where he touched her. He closed his fingers around her wrist, his grip solid but gentle. “Let’s take a quick look at your feet.” He tugged her with him toward a shelflike slab of rock jutting out from the cave wall. “Sit.”