CARRIE'S PROTECTOR

by Rebecca York

  “I’m all right. What are you planning?”

  “I’m thinking,” she answered, picturing the scene at the top of the drive. Wyatt was in the woods. There was a huge brush pile in the front yard next to Patrick’s car. And beyond that a circle of blacktop at the end of the driveway.

  Opening the glove compartment, she rummaged inside. When she found a box of matches, her hand closed around them.

  “I’ve got an idea,” she told her father. When she told him what it was, his breath caught, but he didn’t try to talk her out of it.

  She turned on the engine and checked the gas gauge. Plenty of fuel.

  After cutting the engine, she climbed out and pulled off her slacks, then removed the cap from the gas tank. Using a stick, she stuffed one pant leg down into the tank. When she pulled it free, she saw it had acted like a wick, soaking up gasoline.

  Next, she walked along the shoulder of the road for several yards and found a rock about the size of a baseball. Being careful not to touch the soaked part of the pant leg, she tied the rock into the garment. When she’d finished her preparations, she turned the car around and started up the driveway toward the house. The tricky part came next, but it seemed like her only option.

  As the car came into view on the access road, the men inside the house started shooting, and she ducked low, clenching her hands on the wheel. But it seemed that Bruce, Sid and the other guy were too far away for accuracy. If they got her, it would be with a lucky shot.

  Staying low, she pulled up on the far side of Patrick’s car, using it and the brush pile for a shield as she climbed out.

  Screened by the car and the heap of sticks and dried foliage, she lit a match and touched it to the end of the gas-soaked pant leg, rearing back as it flamed up with unexpected fury. As the heat leaped toward her, she heaved the garment toward the brush pile. The rock she’d tied inside the pants carried it forward, and it landed in a nest of dried vegetation and weathered wood that caught fire almost instantly.

  Carrie crawled back the way she’d come, gravel digging into her hands and knees. As she climbed back into the car, a heavier volley of gunfire erupted from the terrorists, and she heard Wyatt returning fire from the woods, keeping the men in the house.

  She waited with her heart pounding, willing the smoke to billow up enough for her to risk driving close enough for Wyatt to jump in.

  It seemed to take forever, but finally she thought she had created enough of a smoke screen.

  Ducking low, she took off, heading for the patch of woods where Wyatt had made his stand, and she saw him lean out from behind the tree and shoot toward the house, giving her cover.

  When she drew close, he dashed through the smoke and leaped into the passenger seat. Even through the fire and smoke, shots followed her as she sped backward down the drive, then turned around and kept going. Some of the bullets hit the vehicle.

  “Is everyone okay?” she shouted.

  “Yes,” her father and Wyatt both answered.

  “I told you to get out of here,” Wyatt growled.

  “I wasn’t going to leave you.”

  The gunfire faded behind Carrie as she sped down the drive. She had done it. They had gotten away.

  Then her eyes widened as she reached the end of the access road, which was now blocked by a large black SUV.

  Chapter Twenty

  Men leaped from the SUV, and Carrie saw that they were wearing vests that said FBI. She also saw that they were aiming weapons at them.

  “FBI! Come out with your hands up!” a tall man shouted.

  “We’d better do it,” Wyatt said between clenched teeth as he set his weapons down.

  In the backseat, Douglas sat up.

  As Carrie climbed out, she wished she was wearing more than a shirt and panties.

  “I’m Wyatt Hawk and these are Carrie and Douglas Mitchell. Three of the armed terrorists are still up the hill in the house,” Wyatt said as soon as he was out of the vehicle. “Patrick Harrison is also up there. They shot him.”

  While he was speaking, other agents circled around him and looked into the car. One of them reached under the dash and opened the trunk, then walked to the back of the vehicle.

  “There’s an assault weapon in here,” he reported.

  “Captured from the terrorists,” Carrie answered.

  She held her breath, then sighed in relief as the Federal agents conferred, then lowered their weapons.

  “I’m Agent Fitzgerald,” the man who’d been speaking said. “What’s on fire up there?”

  “I started a fire in a pile of brush in the driveway so I could get Wyatt out of there,” Carrie answered as she lowered her hands.

  Wyatt and her father did the same.

  “How did you get here?” Wyatt asked.

  “The maid, Inez, got your license number when you were at the estate,” Fitzgerald answered. “You got away from the Mitchell house just as we arrived in the gardener’s van.”

  “If that was you, who was shooting?”

  “The terrorists had gotten there ahead of us. They took some shots at us, then got the hell out of there.”

  Carrie caught her breath. “And Inez is okay?”

  “Yes.” The man addressed Wyatt. “We had your make and model, but we didn’t pick you up on a traffic camera until a half hour ago. We saw you’d altered the plates.”

  Carrie sucked in a breath. “Inez was helping you?”

  “Yes. She was reluctant to work with us, but we persuaded her to cooperate. She put a tracker on your car.” He gave Wyatt a wry look. “But you found it and got rid of it.”

  “I thought the bad guys had put it there,” Wyatt said.

  “Yeah, well, we weren’t coordinating very well—seeing as we didn’t know whether you were part of the plot.”

  Carrie’s voice rose in outrage. “Part of the plot? He’s the only reason my father and I are alive.”

  “You gotta admit, your activities looked suspicious,” Fitzgerald answered.

  “Because we didn’t know who we could trust. You do understand what’s been going on?” she prodded. “Patrick Harrison and Rita Madison hatched a very elaborate scheme to kill me and get money from my father.”

  Fitzgerald nodded. “We’re going to need more details from you. Like, for example, this started off looking like a terrorist plot against the government, but it appears to have been directed against the Mitchell family all along.”

  “Correct,” Wyatt said.

  “We’ll tell you everything we know,” Carrie said, then looked at Wyatt for confirmation.

  He nodded. “It seems the men at the house were hired help.”

  Several agents peeled off and started up the driveway on foot. Above them came the sound of a helicopter.

  “We’ll get the rest of them,” Fitzgerald said.

  “You have Rita Madison?” Wyatt asked.

  “We brought her in for questioning after intercepting a phone call she made to Harrison’s cell phone. But that’s not enough to arrest her. We have to prove that she’s part of the conspiracy.”

  “Patrick claims it was her idea,” Carrie said. “Maybe you can get them to rat out each other.”

  “Hopefully,” Fitzgerald answered.

  “And do you happen to have something I can wear?” Carrie asked.

  One of the men went back to the SUV and brought her a pair of trousers. They were too long, but she rolled up the legs.

  A siren told them another emergency vehicle was approaching. It turned out to be an ambulance.

  Wyatt looked at Carrie. “You go with your father to the hospital.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I have to show them where to find the bodies in the woods.”

  She sucked
in a sharp breath.

  “Bodies in the woods?” Fitzgerald inquired.

  “Yeah, two armed men came after me, and I defended myself.” Wyatt looked at Fitzgerald. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

  Carrie watched Wyatt and one of the agents disappear into the woods, wondering when she was going to see Wyatt again. Or if she was going to see him.

  He’d saved her life. Now he had the perfect opportunity to disappear.

  * * *

  AN FBI AGENT named Gleason followed the ambulance to the hospital. He stayed with Carrie while her father was treated.

  “He needs to go home and rest,” she told Agent Gleason when her father joined them in the waiting room.

  Gleason considered the request and turned to the elder Mitchell. “We can talk to you tomorrow.”

  “Thank you.”

  The agent looked at Carrie. “But I want you down at headquarters.”

  “Is Wyatt Hawk there?”

  “Yes, but you can’t see him now. We need to get your stories separately.”

  “To make sure we tell you the same thing?” she asked.

  “It’s the usual procedure.”

  She sighed, knowing there was no point in arguing. She ached to see Wyatt, but the sooner she got this over with, the better.

  Her father spoke up. “Carrie, I’m sorry you had to go through all this.”

  “I’m fine. Thanks to Wyatt Hawk.”

  “We both owe him a lot.”

  “Yes.”

  “And there’s a lot I want to apologize for. There’s nothing like thinking you’re going to die to make you realize what’s important.”

  She swallowed hard. “I found that out, too.”

  They hugged, and she waited with him until a cab picked him up.

  She spent the next three hours with the FBI, telling her story, confirming details and asking questions.

  “Did Rita have her husband killed?” she asked.

  “No, it was the mob. They wanted their money. It added up to more than forty thousand dollars. He’d stolen twenty thousand by forging his wife’s name on a check, but it wasn’t enough to pay them off. We assume he was planning to disappear.”

  “That’s the twenty thousand dollars he had in his safe and noted in his little book?”

  “What book?” Fitzgerald asked.

  “Before he died, he gave us the combination to his safe, and Wyatt found the book and the money. We thought he’d gotten a payment for telling the terrorists when I was going to be at the Federal Building.”

  “Yeah, that would have made sense, only it was Rita who told them. She probably got the information from his computer.”

  “We followed her and saw her go to her bank. She looked angry when she came out.”

  “She must have found out that the money was missing.”

  The phone rang, and the agent picked it up. After listening for a few minutes, he swung back to Carrie. “Patrick is under guard in the hospital, and he’s telling us everything he knows, trying to cut a deal.”

  “Good. Well, good that he’s talking. I don’t care what happens to him now.”

  They had more questions for her, but finally the session wound down, and she decided to take a bathroom break. On the way back, she stopped short when she saw Wyatt talking in the hall to one of the agents.

  He looked up, spotted her and went very still.

  She walked up to the two men and addressed the agent. “Mr. Hawk and I need to talk—privately.”

  “Of course.” He pointed toward a nearby door.

  She turned and walked toward the door, hoping she looked confident even though her chest was so tight that she could barely breathe.

  For a moment, she thought Wyatt wasn’t going to follow her, but he stepped inside a room that was furnished like a lounge with comfortable sofas and chairs and a couple of square table and chair sets.

  Turning, she faced him.

  “Were you going to leave without seeing me again?”

  “That might have been the best thing.”

  “Why? Because you’re a coward?”

  Anger flared in his eyes. “Of course not!”

  “But you thought it would be easier to just walk away from me.”

  “It would be better for you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m a former CIA operative who isn’t fit for polite society.”

  Her anger jolted up. “Don’t give me that old story. You think because your partner did something stupid in Greece, that you have to keep punishing yourself?”

  When he didn’t answer, she asked, “Do you love me?”

  He went absolutely still.

  “Are you afraid to tell me the truth?”

  She saw him drag in a breath and let it out. “No. I love you,” he said in a barely audible voice, then said it again more strongly.

  She closed the distance between them, throwing herself into his arms, and he caught her, clung to her.

  They held each other for long moments before she raised her head and he lowered his. Their lips met in a long, passionate kiss.

  Carrie reached behind him and locked the door.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Making sure nobody can come in here,” she answered as she reached for his belt buckle.

  “This is the J. Edgar Hoover Building. You can’t do that here.”

  “Watch me.”

  He swore under his breath, but he helped her free himself from his pants and helped her off with hers. They had been through hell together over the past few days, and she couldn’t be subtle about the emotions churning through her. She needed him, and she needed him now. And it looked as though he felt the same desperation. He kicked his pants away and kicked a chair aside so that he could set her on one of the tables.

  She spread her legs for him, guiding him to her, gasping as he entered her.

  He went still immediately, his face strained.

  “Carrie, did I hurt you?”

  “No.”

  She sealed the reassurance with a hard kiss, her hands clasping his shoulders then moving down his back to his butt as he began to move inside.

  They were both too emotionally charged for the lovemaking to last long. She felt her inner muscles contract, felt her whole body quicken as an all-consuming climax seized her. Moments later, he followed her into the maelstrom. They clung together for long moments before he eased away and picked up her borrowed pants, handing them to her.

  “In case they send an assault team to break in, you know,” he said as he found his own pants.

  When they were both dressed again, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her to the sofa. Sitting down, he cradled her in his lap, and she nestled against him.

  “Tell me you’re not going away,” she murmured.

  The long silence made her stomach knot.

  “Wyatt?”

  “You really want me to stay?”

  “Yes. I love you.”

  His breath caught. “You hardly know me.”

  “Maybe I don’t know a lot about your background, but I know exactly who you are. You showed me over and over when we were on the run.” She raised her head and looked at him. “You’re the bravest man I’ve ever met.”

  “But—”

  “No protests.”

  She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I’d never met a man I wanted to spend my life with. I thought I’d always be alone, so I focused on my work. When I first met you, I thought you were another overbearing male.”

  “I was trying to keep my distance.”

  “I figured that out. And I appreciate it. But everything changed when you risked your life to save mine.”

  “I
was doing my job.”

  “And more. So much more,” she murmured, raising her head to kiss him again.

  She knew they hadn’t settled everything. But he wasn’t going to walk away from her, and they had the time to work out the details. Maybe he’d even like the idea of coming with her on some photo shoots—to places she’d feel uncomfortable by herself.

  She was going to ask him about that when a loud knock sounded at the door.

  “You alive in there?” someone called out.

  “Yes,” Wyatt answered in a husky voice. “We were having a private debriefing.”

  She stifled a giggle.

  “Oh, yeah. Well, the two of you are free to go—and find a room,” the voice added. “But we’d like you to be available.”

  “We’ll be at my apartment in D.C.,” Carrie called out.

  Footsteps departed.

  “I hope they’re not waiting outside when we open the door,” she said.

  “They’re FBI agents. They’re discreet.”

  She grinned at him, and he grinned back. She’d never seen Wyatt Hawk so relaxed, and she liked it. They needed more of that and every other good thing. Together. For the rest of their lives.

  * * * * *

  Keep reading for an excerpt of Cardwell Ranch Tresspasser by B.J. Daniels!

  We hope you enjoyed this Harlequin Intrigue story.

  You crave excitement! Harlequin Intrigue stories deal in serious suspense, keeping you on the edge of your seat as resourceful, true-to-life women and strong, fearless men fight for survival.

  Enjoy six new stories from Harlequin Intrigue every month!

  Visit Harlequin.com to find your next great read.

  We like you—why not like us on Facebook: Facebook.com/HarlequinBooks

  Follow us on Twitter: Twitter.com/HarlequinBooks

  Read our blog for all the latest news on our authors and books: HarlequinBlog.com

  Subscribe to our newsletter for special offers, new releases, and more!

  Harlequin.com/newsletters

  Chapter One