by Amelia Autin
“What about the renewed protests? Shouldn’t I cover that?” The initial protests had died down as the shooting had quickly faded from media coverage. But now they were flaring up again.
“The network’s sending Rafe Coburn out of New York to cover it.”
She didn’t like it, but she’d learned to pick her battles. This wasn’t one she could win, not when the network brass had already made the call.
After lunch Carly filmed the lead-in and the wrap-up, as well as two teasers that would run during the nightly news and the early-evening programming. At three she and J.C. watched the entire segment twice with a slew of staff members, taking feedback and making tiny tweaks here and there. By five they were done.
“Go home, Carly,” J.C. told her as everyone filed out of the room, leaving only J.C. and her.
“What about—”
“Go home. Nothing more you can do here.” His voice softened. “You did a good job on those interviews, by the way.”
“Thanks.” She stashed her notebook in her purse, then looked up again. “I just hope something comes of this.”
A cynical expression crossed J.C.’s face. “Keep dreaming.”
She didn’t know why she did it, but something made her argue. “There has to be a better way, J.C. There just has to be.”
J.C. smiled, not unkindly. “Go home, Carly.”
Carly headed for her office once she left the conference room. She needed her coat and the travel mug Shane had given her this morning, but she was operating on autopilot, because she couldn’t stop thinking about J.C.’s cynical statement—Keep dreaming. As if things could never change.
All at once she desperately wanted Shane. Wanted his reassuring arms around her. Wanted him to convince her J.C. was wrong, that things could change for the better...if you fought hard enough to change them. Shane, who tilted at windmills. Who fought for what he believed in, no matter how impossible the odds.
That’s when she realized she hadn’t called or texted Shane all day. She’d been so busy she’d—well, not forgotten him, because she’d thought of him several times throughout the day. But she hadn’t taken the time to let him know she was thinking of him. And he hadn’t called or texted her, either. She grabbed her smartphone from her purse and double-checked to be sure it was on. It was, but there were no messages, no missed calls and no texts.
Fear clutched at her heart. What if something had happened to Shane, and she hadn’t contacted him? She’d done this to Jack, too, let herself get so caught up in other things—a story, their wedding plans—that she’d neglected the man she loved.
The man she loved?
“Oh no. No,” she whispered, not wanting to believe it. “You didn’t, Carly. You didn’t.”
Only...she had. She’d fallen in love with Shane. Two days ago she’d insisted they maintain an emotional distance. And now...now her heart was telling her what her head didn’t want to acknowledge—she loved Shane so much she was suddenly frantic with worry merely because she hadn’t heard from him all day.
She hurriedly checked the time, remembering she’d told Shane to pick her up at five, and it was now almost half past the hour. She fumbled with her phone, intending to text him, but before she could, the device buzzed and vibrated. When she looked at the touch screen, she saw it was from him.
Waiting downstairs, if you’re ready. If not, just let me know. Don’t rush. Take your time.
Shane was waiting for her downstairs. Had been waiting patiently for almost thirty minutes. That’s all she could think about. She shrugged on her coat, grabbed the empty travel mug and crammed it into her purse, then flew out the door, heading for the elevator.
She rushed out, hitting the circular glass door with such force it was still going round when she was already on the sidewalk outside. Cars lined both sides of the street in front of the building, but none of them was Shane’s, although she looked twice just to be sure. She didn’t despair, though. He’d told her he was here, waiting, and he would be. She just had to be patient and—
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a car coming down the street. She heaved a sigh of relief when she recognized Shane’s Mustang, and she was at the curb waiting by the time he pulled up. He made as if to hop out, probably to hold the door for her like the gentleman he was, but she jumped in before he could.
“Hi,” she said breathlessly, buckling herself in. “Sorry I made you wait.”
“No problem.” His smile went right through her, and she sighed softly. “Busy day, I take it?” he asked as he pulled into traffic.
“Kind of.” But she didn’t really want to talk about her day. Maybe later. For now, all she wanted to know was what kind of day he’d had. “You?”
“So-so. Nothing happening on the floor of the Senate, but Cody called me.”
“Your brother-in-law? Has the agency found out something already?”
“Not exactly. But he talked with his boss here in DC, and they sent a couple of local agents to interview me this morning.”
“And?”
“And nothing. They’ll let me know when and if they learn anything. In the meantime, they gave me some advice.”
“Which is?”
“Watch my back.” He chuckled softly. “As if I wasn’t already.”
She shook her head at him. “I don’t know how you can laugh at something as serious as this.”
He didn’t answer right away. Just glanced at her, then back at the road. “I was a US Marine for a lot of years, Carly,” he finally explained. “You don’t get—I guess complacent is the word—you don’t get complacent about death, but you can’t stress over it, either. You have to laugh whenever you can, ’cause otherwise you’d be a basket case. Gallows humor, maybe. But you have to see the humor in everything to stay sane and sharp. You should know—you were an embedded reporter in Afghanistan.”
“Yes, but...” She started to say it was different when someone you loved was in danger. Humor was the last thing on your mind then. But she stopped herself before she could say it, because she wasn’t ready to let him know he’d slipped under her defenses. She wasn’t her sister, Tahra—old-fashioned enough to think a man should speak first—but she wasn’t sure exactly what Shane was feeling. It was one thing for him to insist he didn’t do casual sex, that he had to care about a woman in order to make love to her. But that was a long way from love. And until she knew...she wasn’t going to put her heart out there. Not to mention she wasn’t going to put that burden on Shane, as if she was pressuring him to return her feelings by telling him how she felt.
She sighed again. At least she was with Shane. At least she could guard his back. She turned to look at him, and that’s when she realized something was wrong. Shane’s whole body language had changed.
“We’re being followed,” he told her quietly. “No! Don’t turn around. I don’t want him to know he’s been tagged. Not yet.”
Carly stopped herself from looking backward, but it was an effort. She tried to peer into the side mirror, to see if she could spot what Shane was seeing, but the angle was all wrong. “How do you know?” She was proud her voice didn’t waver.
“Trust me, I know. He’s two cars back at the moment, but now that I think of it, he’s been there since I left my office. He’s good. Really good. He doesn’t ride my tail, and he varies how many cars are between us. But he’s there.”
“Could it be the FBI?” she asked. “Or the agency?”
“Maybe.” Shane smiled grimly. “But I doubt it. It’s not a government car or a federal license plate number. But I’m going to find out for sure—one way or the other.” He fished his smartphone out of his pocket and hit one number for speed dial. Steering with his left hand and holding his phone with his right, which he also needed to shift gears, told Carly just how dangerous Shane thought their situation was. He sp
oke into the phone without identifying himself. “I need a huge favor. I need a Virginia plate number run on an older model white Chevy truck. XKF dash...” He reeled off three numbers, then said, “The last number could be either a three or an eight. It’s already dark, the plate was dirty and I only saw it for a second.” He laughed softly in response to something said on the phone, and agreed, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m losing my touch. My eyes aren’t what they used to be, my hearing is going and I’ve got one foot in the grave. Forget that crap and run that number, okay? If it’s who I think it is, the plate could be stolen, but on the off chance it’s not...” He nodded, even though his listener couldn’t see him. “Right.”
The person on the other end of the phone must have asked a question, because Shane said, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure my tail isn’t from the FBI or the agency. Or any other kind of law enforcement. I’m a minute away from ditching whoever’s back there, but it’d be nice to know for the future if the feds are following me. The FBI told me they couldn’t spare the manpower, which is why—right again. Call me when you know something.”
Shane disconnected, then dropped his phone into one of the empty cup holders between their seats, and replaced his hand on the gear shift. “Hang on tight,” he warned Carly. “I’m going to lose this tail.”
Afterward, Carly could only remember the next ten minutes as a hazy blur. The Mustang accelerated with a throaty roar as Shane worked the clutch and the gear shift with practiced ease, darting in and out of lanes of traffic with a seeming disregard for safe distances between cars. Twice he swerved around corners without stopping, right after the lights turned red but before cross traffic could start. And each time his eyes slid to the rearview mirror.
Knowing that whoever was following them had to know by now he’d been spotted, Carly swiveled her head around as much as she could without removing her seat belt—and there wasn’t a chance in hell she would do that the way Shane was driving. After a minute of watching anxiously over her shoulder she said, “There’s no white truck back there anymore.”
But Shane didn’t slow down. “Maybe not, but I want insurance.” So he continued driving like a lunatic for another four minutes, until he spotted a police car coming the other way. He braked abruptly, downshifted and the Mustang slowed to the speed limit.
She let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding when the police car rolled right on past them without turning on its red-and-blue lights and signaling for them to pull over. Then she laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Me,” she explained, still laughing, but softer now. “I just realized the only time I panicked in the last ten minutes was when I thought you were going to get a ticket.”
Shane grinned at her, and there was more than a touch of the unrepentant wild teenage boy he must have been at one time in his expression. “Would you believe I’ve never—not even once—gotten a ticket?”
She smiled and shook her head at him. “No, I don’t believe it.”
He raised his right hand from the gear shift and held it up as if he were taking an oath. “True as I sit here.” Then he amended, “Came close a couple of times. But both times I was stopped I was in uniform, and the cops let me off with just a warning.”
The laughter that pealed out of her this time wasn’t just for Shane’s narrow escape from the law all those years ago, but also for their escapes today—from the police and the man tailing them.
Shane sedately turned left onto the road that would take them to Niall’s condo. Curious, Carly asked, “How did you learn to drive like that?”
“I learned a few defensive driving tricks in the Corps. But to be honest, I already knew how to drive a muscle car to an inch. My dad...” He smiled to himself. “My dad had a candy-apple red sixty-nine Camaro he’d rebuilt practically from scratch. He rarely drove it—a man with a living to earn and a wife and five children to support doesn’t have a lot of free time for nonessentials—but he owned it. And the guys he worked with envied him that car. That was more important to him than actually driving it.”
He chuckled. “That car in the garage drove Niall and me crazy. We couldn’t understand leaving it to sit there in all its gleaming glory. So one day when our parents were out of town visiting relatives, taking Alec, Liam and Keira with them, Niall and I ‘borrowed’ the Camaro. We were just going to take it out for a quick spin, then put it back as if had never been touched.”
“Uh-oh.”
“Yeah. Uh-oh. Best laid plans and all of that. Do you remember the Porsche scene from Risky Business? The movie that made Tom Cruise a star?”
“Oh, no,” Carly said, dismayed. “I mean, yes, I remember, but please don’t tell me you drove your dad’s Camaro into a lake.”
“Not quite that bad. But we did end up in a ditch. Nobody injured, but one fender took a beating. We managed to drive the car home after Niall and I wrestled it back onto the road, but there was no hiding the damage.”
“How old were you?”
“Seventeen. And my brother was sixteen.”
“What happened?”
They’d arrived at Niall’s condo by this time. Shane pulled into the underground garage and parked the Mustang before turning to her and answering. “We ’fessed up, of course, when our dad got home. After he made it very clear we were paying for the damage—and it wasn’t cheap, by any means!—and after he tanned our hides, he took Niall and me out once the Camaro was repaired and taught us how to drive it.”
At first Carly smiled at the happy ending. Then she focused on the other thing Shane had said, and her brows drew together into a frown. “I don’t believe in corporal punishment.”
“Neither do I, as a general rule. But in this case restitution wasn’t enough. We stole a car, Carly,” he explained patiently. “The fact that it belonged to our dad only partially mitigated our crime. He couldn’t let us off scot-free. And he couldn’t just reward us by teaching us how to drive a car like a Camaro. Actions have to have consequences. Otherwise the whole fabric of our society will shred.”
“Yes, but—”
“Niall and I weren’t bad kids, but we’d stepped onto a slippery slope. My dad had to make sure we didn’t take that next step downward. It didn’t ‘damage our psyches,’ and it didn’t ‘scar us for life.’ A few minutes of pain taught us a lesson we’ve never forgotten.”
She considered this for a long time, then said, “I see your point, but I still don’t think it’s right.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on this one,” he told her. He was out of the car and holding the door for her before she gathered up her purse.
It wasn’t until they were walking into Niall’s condo that Carly realized with a sense of shock why Shane’s stance on this issue mattered so much to her—she was already envisioning him as the father of her children. The same way she had with Jack.
And she didn’t even know if Shane loved her.
Chapter 14
Under the cover of darkness, Marsh parked his truck down the street from a busy Virginia grocery store, took a screwdriver from the glove compartment, grabbed something from beneath his seat and got out. He set his little markers that would tell him if someone touched his truck while he was gone—the insurance was worth the time investment—then headed for the store’s side parking lot. He’d scoped out this place several months earlier, and at that time he’d learned it had no surveillance cameras except inside the store and in the far parking lots. He double-checked, and found it still held true—the store was counting on lights and foot traffic to keep the close parking lots safe.
He waited in the shadows until he saw a truck park in his target area and the driver get out and hurry inside. Then he moved. It took him less than a minute and a half to unscrew the back license plate and replace it with one of the ones he’d brought with him. Then he moved to the front.
He was almost done when he heard footsteps clicking on the pavement, heading his way, and his hand slid inside his jacket. But the footsteps continued on past him, and Marsh left the Ruger where it was.
He quickly finished with the last screw on the replacement license plate. He waited until the unknown driver turned on the engine and the lights and pulled out of the parking lot before tucking the two plates he’d just stolen inside his jacket.
Five minutes later he was driving away.
He always swapped out plates if he could. It was less likely a driver would notice his license plate number had changed—many people didn’t even know what their own plate numbers were—but most people would notice a missing plate and report it right away. It was a little thing, but something Marsh had learned years ago. One of the little tricks of the trade that kept him from prison.
He was almost home before his disposable cell phone rang, and Marsh knew his employer was calling for a status update. He didn’t answer. He wasn’t about to reveal his target had given him the slip. He wasn’t about to reveal he’d been outplayed.
He didn’t know how the senator had known Marsh was back there, but somehow he had, and once again his admiration for him rose. Never mind the frustration he felt at letting the senator slip through his fingers again. Never mind the postponement of the final payment for a job he should have accomplished a week ago. There was a thrill in knowing his target was a worthy one. It was a game of cat and mouse, and for once Marsh wasn’t sure which role was his. Which added a touch of spice to a profession that had grown somewhat stale over the years of nothing but success after success.
He would need to call upon all his skills for this one. Would need the cunning of a fox, the keen eye of a hawk and the nose of a bloodhound to win this game. But one thing was certain—Marsh had no intention of losing.