by Cindy Skaggs
When her best friend offered to introduce her to tall, blond, and quiet, she should have said no. The man in question was a Nordic type—she didn’t have any trouble picturing him as a pillaging Viking—yet for all of his intimidating presence, he was a medic, a man of healing. His face was wide, with a square jaw that looked like it could take a solid hit. In fact, he’d taken a few in the past week. He had a black eye, fading to yellow, and a scratch on his face that was scabbed, and somehow those markings made him more ruggedly handsome.
If the Vikings had a religion, she’d convert, because his body was toned and tight and worthy of praise, but he’d also only said one word to her in the last fifty-seven minutes, which stretched her already taut nerves, but since she was breaking into an office and stealing evidence, Rose was definitely the man she wanted at her side. He didn’t speak much, but when he did, his low voice crashed over her like a tidal wave, covering her in his strong masculine energy. In the past few days, she’d pretty much used that energy as a blanket to ward off an attack.
The farther they moved from the science building, the easier she breathed. She trusted the tough soldier beside her to protect her from bullets, but there were worse things that could come at her here. She could have said no when he suggested the mission, but they needed to know what Ryder had been given. Plus, it occurred to her a little too late; she and Lauren needed to know what drug had incapacitated them a few days ago. Rose wouldn’t let her go alone, not after what happened at the bank, he had said, as if his rule was law. She’d made a half-hearted attempt at arguing, especially when the morning wore on and they still hadn’t left the no-tell motel, but she’d had too many bad things happen in the last week. When she wasn’t dealing with a panic attack, she was a relatively sane individual. If Rose wanted to be her bodyguard, he had her blessing.
A few steps up and through a door that Rose held open, Debi entered the administration building. The halls echoed with painful silence, so she couldn’t avoid the coffee kiosk in the corner under the stairs. The brunette barista with her hair in a messy bun raced around to intercept Debi before they disappeared into the bowels of the building.
Rose stepped between them.
“Wait, you’re Professor Ryder’s friend, right? From the other night? I’m Beth, one of her students. Is she okay?”
Debi didn’t want to have this conversation. The girl had unknowingly helped the bad guys incapacitate Debi and Lauren. Beth thought she was saving her favorite professor from an abusive husband, but she’d really stepped in the middle of a war. Debi pushed around Rose. “She’s fine, no thanks to you.”
“Why didn’t she come back to class?”
Debi stretched her neck, but the tension knotting her muscles wouldn’t ease. “She’s finishing her dissertation long distance, and you’re lucky we aren’t pressing charges. You knocked us out. Let strange men cart us off campus. That’s accessory to a felony, sweetheart.” It bugged her to use Rose’s word, but in Texas, sweetheart could be an insult as well as an endearment. “And you stepped into the middle of something you don’t understand.” She bit her tongue to keep from spewing more anger at the girl whose face turned whiter with each word. Debi had to remember that a psycho had manipulated the girl.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to—” Beth cut herself off. She twisted her hands together in agitation. “What happened to Joe?”
Baby Face Joe was dead by Ryder’s hand, the only way to save Lauren, but it was better for Beth to think Joe had used her than that he was dead. “Find a new boyfriend, one who doesn’t use you to get to someone else.”
Rose grabbed her arm. Shut up, he mouthed. “We need to go.”
“Yeah, yeah.” It was probably best Debi didn’t destroy the poor girl. For all Beth knew, the cute soldier she’d started dating was a real sweet guy with all the best intentions. Debi made it several steps at Rose’s side before she stopped. Blaming Beth wasn’t fair. She had been a pawn, used by a man much the way Debi had been not that long ago. Manipulated. Duped. She’d been a fool, just like the coffee girl. “Beth, I know Lauren doesn’t blame you. She’d want you to forget it and move on.”
A tear dripped from her expressive eyes. “Tell her I’m sorry.”
Debi released a hard breath. “She knows.”
Debi grabbed Rose’s hand to pull him down the hall and away from the barista. The heat of his big hand burned, so she dropped it as she led the way down the wide hall toward Lauren’s office. “The place seems harmless enough,” she said to hide her nerves.
“Not safe. This is where you got kidnapped.”
Leave it to him to crash the illusion of safety. “You’re a cheery man to have around, Rosie.”
“The name is Rose or Sergeant.”
“I am aware.” But the big, bad soldier was fun to rattle. He was often blunt to a fault, but she was glad he was there, walking with her through the treacherous halls of academia.
“Hold up.” Rose broke the silence that so often defined him. He placed an arm between them and scooted her behind. “Let me go first.”
“Have at it, Rosie.” She was all for letting the soldier take the first hit. He was probably bulletproof. He unlocked the door with the key Lauren had given them. The cramped space was filled with a desk, two office chairs, and a sofa other professors had handed down like old clothes. There were no intruders. No guns. She released a breath. “It’s almost a letdown.”
“Could be a trap.” His deep voice rumbled low, causing a corresponding tremor in her abdomen. “Get what we need and get out.”
“What does it take to get you to loosen up?”
“World peace.” The unexpected humor brought a laugh from her that broke some of the tension in the room. It was short lived as he turned and closed them inside. He dominated the room, filling the space with his innate intensity. “But how about we start with no one trying to kill me or mine.”
And there went the levity. The office looked much the way she’d left it the night she and Lauren were kidnapped. That night, Lauren was the bait and her husband the bear who nearly stepped into the big-assed trap. He’d been dosed with an unknown substance from a bottle of water he had gulped in this very room. He’d woken disoriented and confused.
Rose pulled Ziploc bags from his backpack. The paper teacup that had been laced with some sort of sedative was sitting where she left it a few nights before. She put it in the plastic bag, hoping she could identify the drug she’d been given. Nerves sizzled along her skin. She didn’t like knowing someone had drugged her. Experimental drugs were risky, something she knew firsthand.
Rose went to the fridge. “Ryder said he put the unused bottle of water in here.” The fridge was filled with close to a case of water Lauren typically kept in her office on campus.
“Bring it all.” They could test every bottle if they had too. Debi bent to pick up the empty from the floor where Ryder had dropped it. “It’s bone dry. Hard to get a good reading from, but I’ll swab it and see what I can find.” A part of her thrilled at the possibility of pulling out her lab supplies and getting back to the work she loved. The other part dreaded playing with things she didn’t understand. She straightened her shoulders and turned to watch Rose work.
It wasn’t exactly a hardship. The man was built, and his backside was a gift from Nordic gods. Firm, round cheeks were encased in denim. Mm-hmm. She turned to Lauren’s desk before he busted her checking out his ass.
Rose marked the water bottles from the front row of the fridge and the ones in the door with different symbols. “We’ll test this first and work our way to the bottles in the back.”
“You volunteering to be my lab assistant, Rosie?”
“Rose,” he corrected, pushing for her to call him by his name. “I want to know what they pumped into my veins.”
Rose and the rest of the men were angry for what had been done to them. They’d signed on to an elite team in the military, part of a larger experiment to eliminate the physiological respo
nse to fear. From a scientific viewpoint, the idea was inspired, but the men hadn’t been told of potential side effects, some they were still dealing with months after being kicked out of the Army. Months after stopping the medication. They were dealing with paranoia and anger and a host of side effects they had yet to document.
Rose packed the bottles while Debi flipped through the files, pulling everything related to Lauren’s dissertation so Lauren could work from the privacy of their hideout. They couldn’t come back to the campus until the bad guys were eliminated, if such a thing were possible. Lauren was a target because of Ryder. She was the weak link he’d die to protect. Debi couldn’t come back for reasons she didn’t want to ponder. Two of those reasons were walking free on this lousy campus. She wanted off campus without confronting either man, and she’d really like to avoid any more alone time with Rose. He upset her equilibrium. She slammed the file drawer closed. She really hated being in this place. “Ready?” She tried to keep the agitation from her voice. She’d obviously failed by the look Rose gave her.
“Got a hot date, sweetheart?”
“Sure, I’ve got a hot date with the pool boy at the lovely one-star motel we’re staying at.”
“Pool’s closed, if you hadn’t noticed.”
“Oh, I noticed.”
“Romeo will have to wait. And that one-star motel beats the hell out of getting kidnapped or killed.”
“Not by much,” she muttered. She woke every morning feeling like bed bugs were crawling on her skin. “Ready to go, Rosie?”
“Quit calling me that ridiculous nickname.”
The order twisted her up inside. There was something seriously wrong with her when his hard-ass orders got her all hot and bothered. When in doubt, brazen it out. “Am I getting to you, Rosie?” She hoped so, because so many days in the same tiny motel room with the big guy, and he was definitely under her skin.
She knew more about him than she did her last boyfriend. Some cruel god had bathed his golden skin with pheromones. She could pick out his scent from the half dozen others in their room. He spoke rarely, noticed everything, and kept a notebook with lists of things he knew, didn’t know, and needed to find out. Whether he knew it or not, he was a researcher trying to get to the bottom of the poison the Army had injected in their veins.
All that made him interesting, but what made him irresistible was the way he called all women sweetheart. He had a soft spot for women she never would have thought possible in a man so physically powerful. He opened the door for her, anticipated her needs, and even went the store to get her toiletries when it became obvious she couldn’t go home. At night, he stationed himself on guard duty, and while she hated the need for protection, she couldn’t ask for a bigger or scarier protector.
At night when she couldn’t sleep in the unfamiliar bed with possible bed bugs, she heard him toss and turn, nearly as sleepless. The soft snuffle he made when he dreamed made her want to slip into his bed and burrow close. After the maid came in and mixed up the bed linens, Debi could smell which pillow he’d slept on the night before. She was freaking toast unless she put some distance between the two of them. She took a step back until her thighs hit the desk. She knew one sure way to get him to back off. “Tell you what, Rosie. Give me your first name and I’ll lay off.”
He filled the distance. “Let it go.”
A grin popped out, tightening the muscles in her cheek. She busted out laughing. The big guy was trying to intimidate her, but all he was doing was forcing her claws in deeper. “Dwayne?”
“Drop it.”
“Melvin? Primrose?”
A film dropped over his eyes and his features smoothed. Quite a trick to shut off all emotion; one that sent goose bumps washing over her skin in trepidation. He was more like the guys from Echo than any of them wanted to believe.
“Move out.” He grabbed the bag of water bottles and the Ziploc with the empties, and stepped into the hall. Even in his pique, he still held the door open and motioned her in front of him. The rest of the trek through the administration building, he treated her to a silence that scraped her nerves. The halls packed with students on the way to or from lunch. This was why she’d wanted to get to campus early. She wanted to avoid the students, the teachers, and the coffee kiosk in the corner under the stairs.
Rose muttered what sounded like a curse under his breath. Tension corded his muscles, sending her heart racing.
“What is it?”
He pulled her out of the flow of traffic. “I think I saw someone I know.”
She snapped the hairband on her wrist to halt the fear, but it was too late. Her legs trembled beneath her. Anyone he knew was either fearless, crazy, or dead.
Chapter Three
The sight of a lost soldier set off explosions in Rose’s mind. He stationed Debi near the coffee shop with strict orders to stay put. The busy administration building was as safe as they could expect. He double-timed it through the hall after a man who looked suspiciously like their fearless leader. Captain freaking Johnson. The hair was longer and darker. He carried a backpack and fit into the student crowd as much as a man the size of an ox could blend, but he hadn’t hidden his precise movements. The economy of movement, the innate awareness had caught Rose’s attention as they passed each other.
If Captain Johnson was walking these halls, the university was a hot zone.
The crowd swirled like a rushing river, too fast to notice one woman barely hanging on through the churning mass of bodies. Skin brushed as the crowd flowed around her. Heat rose through her body as Debi cast a furious glance around the area, looking for Rose. Someone grabbed her from behind. Debi twisted to break free, turned, and found herself enveloped in a hug. The other woman held on like Debi would bolt, which she might, but there wasn’t the time or space.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” the woman said into her ear.
“Hannah?”
“You sound surprised to see me.” Hannah leaned back and tucked a stray hair behind her pierced ears. “Should be the other way around. I’m glad to see you, but surprised. I really thought you’d never step a foot here after...”
After her father had publicly rejected her. Debi swallowed the remnants of her pride. She lifted Lauren’s files like a shield. “I had to pick up Lauren’s dissertation. She’s—”
“I heard she quit.”
Bad news traveled fast. “Not exactly. Her husband got military orders, so Lauren’s finishing the program long distance.” The cover story sounded hollow.
Hannah didn’t take the bait. She glanced around like she’d rather be anywhere else. “I just left a budget meeting. The science people and the administration.”
Fabulous. Debi refused to wait around for Barry to publicly humiliate her. “I should probably let you go.”
The other woman stepped up on tiptoes to peer through the crowd. “I wanted to introduce you to my boyfriend. Jack’s supposed to meet me for lunch.”
“Another time.” The tight smile cracked her lips. “I need to get this in the mail to Lauren.”
“Wow, she’s already out of town?”
“I’ll let her know I ran into you.”
“Next time when she’s in town, we should all meet up at the bar.”
Ouch. The bar where Debi worked so she could serve everyone as a reminder of her diminished status. The mention of it was a direct hit. “Sounds good.” Sounded like hell.
“Shit.” Hannah turned and fully faced Debi for the first time. Her freckled face screwed up in a grimace. “That made me sound like such a bitch. I’m sorry. I’m distracted, but I’m not trying to rub your face in it. I just meant I’d like to see you outside of campus. You disappeared, but that doesn’t mean you lost your friends here.”
That’s exactly what it meant. Their worlds no longer connected. They weren’t even in the same solar system, but she smiled and promised Hannah she’d meet up later. Like in an alternate universe when people didn’t want to kill her and she wasn’t on
the campus where Barry or her father could humiliate her. The urge to flee became imperative, hammering against her rib cage with the need to escape.
They separated, and Debi headed for the nearest exit. The early morning snow had already melted. The smudge of the mud coated Debi’s soul, filling her with the desperate need to be quit of this place. She stepped down the stairs and around the corner where she landed in hell.
The thing that sent her running stood in the path to the staff parking lot.
“Barry.” The one word burned her throat. Of all that she feared when she and Rose started the day, the near skeletal frame in front of her was the most omnipresent. He’d lost weight, his long fingers like bones wrapped around the handle of an artfully aged messenger bag.
The sneer marking his thin lips revealed big teeth. “Debra. I’m surprised to see you here.”
She wasn’t the least bit surprised. It was like the last week had sent her barreling to this precise moment. She gripped the folders to her chest, choosing to ignore Barry. “Allyson.”
The mousey woman nodded a stiff hello. “It’s been too long.”
Debi wasn’t distracted by Allyson’s seeming kindness. She didn’t take her eyes off the thin man. “I was thinking not long enough.”
“I’m surprised to see you on campus.” Barry’s bushy eyebrow rose and a nasty glint lit his pale eyes. “In fact, I thought you were banned.”
So much for an easy in and out mission.