by Lisa Childs
Megan raised the weapon she held, the one she’d knocked out of the woman’s hands. She hadn’t been certain before that she could fire it to protect herself. But now she wasn’t protecting just herself.
She had to protect Mrs. Payne, too.
Before she could fire, she heard another trigger cock as a cold barrel pressed hard against the side of her head.
No, their plan was not going to work.
Chapter 11
As the music wound down, fear clutched Gage’s heart. The plan wasn’t going to work. They’d known that once Woodrow pulled back Nikki’s veil, the gig was up. So the plan had actually been just to buy enough time for Megan and Penny to get to safety and call Nick and the rest of Payne Protection to rush to the rescue.
But as Gage scanned the chapel, he realized they hadn’t bought themselves any time. They hadn’t fooled anyone. The armed man he’d spoken to, the one Woodrow had caught outside the bride’s dressing room, wasn’t present, but he had representation. There was a guy in the back and another near the front who were fidgety, their hands sliding too frequently beneath their jackets as if to assure themselves that their weapons were ready. Gage hadn’t noticed them earlier, so they must have recently sneaked into the chapel.
Something had definitely been planned to go down during the ceremony. So why would the smug guy, who’d looked like the ringleader, be missing? Unless he’d already figured out the bait and switch, which meant Megan and Penny were in danger.
Gage began to cough, as if he was choking. Everyone turned toward him, but he waved off the attention and rasped, “Water.” Then he headed quickly for the back of the church.
His ruse must have worked because no one followed him. Of course they were all focused on the bride whom the father had yet to give away. Her veil hadn’t been lifted; the gig wasn’t up yet.
Once it was, Nikki and Woodrow would be in danger. But Gage knew Nikki could take care of herself. He was more worried about Megan.
And Penny, too, of course.
He hurried toward the stairwell leading to the basement. He had to get to Megan and Penny before the smug gunman found them. He just hoped like hell he wasn’t too late to save them.
* * *
Megan held her breath, afraid to move even a fraction of an inch with the cocked gun pressed to her temple. The weapon she held was snapped from her hand.
“This is Andrea’s gun,” the man said. “How the hell did you get this?”
Still holding her breath, Megan had no air to answer him.
The barrel moved from her head as the guy jerked her around to face him, pulling her father’s jacket from her shoulders. It dropped onto the concrete floor. “Did you kill her?”
With the barrel gone, Megan shook her head. “N-no...”
“That’s crap,” the waiter said. “The only way someone would get Andrea’s gun away from her is if she’s dead.”
“I knocked her out,” Megan explained.
The guy narrowed his eyes and looked her up and down as if he doubted her claim. “What the hell really happened?”
“I knocked her into a table—” she swallowed the nerves choking her in order to continue “—when I stabbed her with a pair of scissors.”
The guy sucked in a breath.
“She hit her head. Hard,” Megan said.
And then the man hit her hard, so hard that Megan’s head snapped back and she tasted blood inside her mouth. She must have bitten her tongue or the inside of her cheek.
“Don’t!” Mrs. Payne exclaimed as she tried to step between the man and Megan. She wasn’t a bodyguard like her children, but she had the tendencies.
Nobody could protect Megan from being too honest, though. How had she managed to lie so easily to Gage that once? Because she’d been trying to protect herself. She needed to do that again.
“You bitch!” the man yelled at her. “You stabbed her? You really stabbed her?”
“Yes,” she admitted. Now she had a reason for being so forthcoming.
The man reached for her again, but Penny caught his arm. He lifted his other hand—with the gun—to swing toward the older woman.
“No!” Megan yelled. “Your friend needs your help. She’s wounded, but she’s alive. For now.”
He drew back his arm. “Where is she?”
“In the bride’s dressing room,” Megan replied. “You need to get her medical attention.” Gage had taped her wound to stop the bleeding. But she was probably in pain, especially if she’d continued her struggles to free herself.
The guy glanced at the waiter. “Shoot them if they move.” Then he turned to leave.
But Megan called out to him. “No!”
He turned back, his eyes narrowed again and hard with anger. “What?”
“Unless you’re going to call 911, you’re not going to be able to get her the help she needs alone.”
“Now you want to help her?” the man scoffed. “You’ve left her bleeding while you’re playing a runaway bride.” He peered around the hallway. “Where the hell were you running?”
She shook her head. “Not running. Hiding.”
“If she’s not alive,” he began, his voice cracking.
“She won’t be if you keep wasting time,” she warned him, surprised that she’d finally managed to refrain from being honest. “But if you want to help her, you’re going to need your friend. One of you will need to carry her, the other drive...” Or hold a gun.
The guy smirked. “So the two of us should just leave you alone?”
“No,” Megan said. “Have him tie us up, so we can’t get away.”
The smirk widened. “You’re pretty sure that’ll buy you time for someone to rush to your rescue, huh? The big blond guy with the chip on his shoulder? The gray-haired guy who looks like a retired Marine?” He chuckled. “They won’t get out of that chapel alive. No one will.”
Panic clutched Megan’s heart. Thinking Gage was dead had been like living a nightmare, but this was worse. She was going to lose him all over again and her dad, too. Probably her own life as well.
“Your friend certainly won’t,” Megan said. “With every minute you waste here threatening us, she loses more blood. And she’s in more pain.”
He flinched as if she’d struck him. Then he gestured at his friend. “Tie them up and stash them in a closet or office where no one will find them. Then meet me upstairs.” He pointed one gun at Penny and the other at Megan. “Don’t make me regret letting you live.”
As soon as he disappeared down the hall, the waiter expelled a shaky breath. He was nearly as afraid as they had been.
“He’s not going to let us live, is he?” Penny asked, her voice tremulous, as if she were overcome with fear.
Maybe she was. Megan wouldn’t blame her. She was scared, too. But she wasn’t ready to give up yet.
The guy’s face flushed. “D’s a dangerous dude. I heard he tortured and killed his best friend.”
“Why would you work with him, then?” Penny asked. “Why would you trust that he won’t do the same to you?”
The guy shuddered. “I don’t trust him. But I don’t work for him,” he said. “I work for Andrea. She controls him.”
And apparently everyone one else, as well.
Penny sighed. “But if Andrea dies...”
“You better go,” Megan urged him. “You need to make sure he gets her help.”
The guy shook his head. “I have to tie you up.”
Megan glanced around the hall. It had widened after passing the office and now doubled as storage space. Boxes lined one stone wall. Ribbon dangled from one of them.
“Let me tie us up,” she offered. “That way you won’t have to juggle the gun.”
The guy studied her face, his skeptical as if he worried that she was tricking him. But he was probably more worried about how D would react if they got away.
“You’ll check,” she said. “You’ll make sure we’re tied tightly.”
“You can’t ti
e up each other,” he said.
“Of course not,” she agreed. “I’ll tie up Mrs. Payne.” She unwound some of the ribbon and tied Penny’s delicate wrists and ankles together as she’d been taught. Then she handed the ribbon to him.
“Now you tie me up,” she said. When the ribbon cut into her wrists and ankles, she almost regretted the offer. But the discomfort would be worth it—if her ploy worked.
He glanced around for a hiding place. “I need to put you out of sight.”
Megan tried to move, but with her ankles bound, she stumbled forward and fell to her knees. The thick gown should have cushioned her fall, but one of the sparkling rhinestones ground through the fabric, scratching her skin. She cursed. God, she hated this damn dress.
“We can’t walk,” she needlessly pointed out.
“This is just a storage area, for things I probably should have thrown out years ago, at the end of this hall,” Penny said. “Nobody will come back here.”
The waiter snorted. “Unless you yell for help...”
“We won’t,” Megan said.
The guy glanced around the space again. Then he walked around them to inspect the boxes.
Penny sucked in a breath as if afraid that he might find something—probably the opening to that secret passage. If he knew it was there...
He would never leave them.
He pulled a few cloth napkins from one of the boxes. “Now you won’t,” he said as he shoved one of the cloths in Penny’s mouth and then another in Megan’s.
“Don’t screw me over,” he threatened. “Or you won’t need to worry about D. I’ll kill you myself.”
Megan knew then that there was no use appealing to the better nature of any of the gunmen. None of them had a conscience. None of them would hesitate to take a life—any life.
* * *
Penny’s throat dried of any moisture, and she struggled not to gag on the cloth shoved so deeply in her mouth it nearly choked her. She had only to wait until the fake waiter disappeared down the hallway before the cloth was gone.
After spitting out her cloth, Megan had twisted around and used her teeth to pull out Penny’s. “You can untie yourself now,” the younger woman told her.
Penny lifted her hands, which Megan had tied in front of her, unlike how the man had tied Megan’s behind her back. “How?”
“Pull on the end of your ribbon with your teeth,” Megan directed her.
Following instructions, Penny leaned forward, and with one tug, the ribbon easily unwound from around her wrists. Using her newly freed hands, she tugged loose the ribbon around her ankles. “How did you do that?”
“My dad taught me and my sister when we were little,” Megan replied as if it was a perfectly normal part of childhood to learn how to tie slipknots.
“Didn’t that scare you?” Penny asked, worried about how that single dad had raised his little girls. Not only had he been a single parent, but he was also a lawman.
“He made a game of it,” Megan said nostalgically. She smiled then added, “Kind of like hide-and-seek on steroids.”
Penny laughed. “Nikki would have loved that.”
“Yes, she would have,” Megan agreed.
So Penny hadn’t been the only one who’d raised her kids in fear that something horrible could happen to them. Woodrow had been out there, fighting criminals despite knowing his work could make his family a target for revenge. So he’d obviously done his best to provide them with the skills to protect themselves.
“Unfortunately, the waiter didn’t tie me up the same way I tied you,” Megan said.
Penny inspected the ribbon binding Megan’s wrists and ankles. The fake waiter had bound her so tightly that the edges of the ribbon were cutting through her skin. Penny sucked in a breath, unable to bear the thought of a bride—but especially this bride—being in pain.
While Penny didn’t carry a weapon like her children, she did always have a small knife on her person. She pulled it from the pocket of the silk jacket that matched her dress. The blade was narrow but sharp. Being careful of Megan’s skin, she sliced through the ribbon.
Megan expelled a shaky little sigh and rubbed her wrists. “Thank you.”
“Thank you,” Penny said as she hugged the young woman. “You were brilliant, the way you manipulated those men.”
This Megan was nothing like the miserable bride Penny had worked with on her wedding plans. But then the young woman had been grieving the love of her life. Now, knowing Gage was alive, Megan Lynch was once again the woman she must have always been, the one her father had raised her to be: strong and savvy.
Megan pulled back and humbly replied, “I just bought us some time. We need to get out of here before either or both of them return. Or worse yet, Andrea comes back with them.” She shuddered with fear.
Penny shuddered, too. When she’d gone back to the bride’s dressing room to help Megan downstairs to the secret passage, she’d seen the other woman lying on the floor. Andrea had radiated hatred and resentment. Penny had no doubt that she was probably the most dangerous of all the wedding crashers.
“Yes,” she heartily agreed. “We need to get out of here and get help.”
She was actually surprised that Nicholas hadn’t arrived yet. Even if Woodrow’s daughter Ellen hadn’t been able to reach him, he would have been on his way to the church anyway. He had been invited. And if the men outside the church had tried turning him away, he would have known something was wrong. He knew all Penny’s staff and Woodrow’s agents. He wouldn’t have been fooled.
Her stomach pitched as fear unsettled her. If Nick had been here, he wouldn’t have left without making sure they were all right. He would have put himself in danger for them. She hoped that he hadn’t. He had a baby due soon. Annalise and their unborn son needed him.
Annalise had loved the boy who’d grown up next door to her too long to lose him now, when he’d just finally admitted he’d always loved her, too.
But they needed Nick here, too. Hopefully, he had left without incident and called his brothers, her sons. Logan, Parker and Cooper would help them. But she had to make certain they knew what was going on, that they were all in danger but no one more than Nikki.
Penny headed toward the stack of boxes. They were only being stored at the end of the hallway in order to hide the door to the secret passage to the courtyard. When the fake waiter had rummaged through them earlier, Penny had been afraid that he might see the door.
There was no way he would have left them here if he had. But he’d been worried about Andrea. When they found her and discovered that her injury wasn’t serious, they would be back.
The same thing must have been on Megan’s mind, because she said, “We need to hurry.”
Before Penny could reach for the first box, a dark shadow dimmed the already faint light at the end of the hallway, making the glint off the metal object he held even more noticeable.
They hadn’t moved fast enough. One of the gunmen had found them.
Chapter 12
The minister spoke softly and slowly. “Who gives this woman in marriage?”
Just as slowly and softly, the father of the bride replied, “I do.”
Nikki hoped like hell she wouldn’t have to say those words herself. She had no intention of marrying anyone. Ever. Most especially not this guy. FBI bureau chief Woodrow Lynch pulled back her veil, leaned down and kissed her cheek. Something twisted inside Nikki, making her heart twinge. Her father would never be able to do that, never be able to give her away. She drew in a shaky breath. It wasn’t a big deal since she never intended to marry anyone.
And knowing now what she knew about her father, about his cheating, Nikki wasn’t sure she would have wanted him to give her away even if he had been alive. He’d been dead for nearly sixteen years, though. When she’d found out about his betrayal, it had been like losing him all over again.
Woodrow stared down at her, his eyes dark with concern. For her. He had wanted to protect his daugh
ter, but he’d made it clear, maybe more for her mother’s sake than Nikki’s, that he hadn’t wanted to sacrifice her in order to do that. She knew that. She’d convinced him and everyone else that this was the only way to buy enough time for Megan and her mom to get out of the church.
They must have had enough time to make it to safety now. They had to be out in the courtyard where they could get help for everyone else. She nodded at Woodrow and whispered, “Go.”
He had to make certain that they were safe. For some reason Gage must have thought they weren’t. Or he wouldn’t have staged that coughing spasm in order to slip out before she and Woodrow had even made it down the aisle to the front.
With a wink she turned away from Woodrow to focus on the front and her groom. It was the first time she had seen Richard Boersman, and disappointment washed over Nikki. But her disappointment was more with the woman she’d begun to consider a friend than with the man. How had a feisty woman like Megan ever considered marrying such a dweeb?
His face was pale, and he visibly trembled as he stood alone next to the minister. She doubted his best man would return from his coughing spasm. And now the father of the bride was slipping toward the back of the church, as well. That left her alone at the front.
Or relatively alone. The minister was secretly armed. He’d performed enough weddings at Penny’s chapel to understand the value of protection. But the groom was more likely to be a hindrance than a help.
“Act like I’m Megan,” she whispered to him.
But he didn’t look capable of acting anything except confused and scared. Not that anyone probably would have been fooled, even if he’d been capable of an award-winning performance. Murmurs were already moving through the pews as the guests realized Nikki was merely a substitute for the real bride.
She didn’t see any of the gunmen she’d spotted earlier, and yet there were replacements. A guy near the front reached beneath his jacket where she’d already noticed he had a bulge.