As his right arm went up and to the side, he instinctively curved inward and covered his groin with his left hand. She’d give credit where it was due. Her plan had been to kick him in the groin as hard as she could.
But, as he said, plans change. She grabbed the back of his bent head, wrapping her fingers in his hair, and brought his chin down to meet her knee.
He reached up blindly and raked his fingers through her eyes. Tears immediately streamed from both eyes, making it difficult to see. The pain made it hard to concentrate.
She had no idea where Merriman was or what he was doing, but she fervently hoped the cavalry had been called. And that Merriman had had the good sense to retrieve the knife.
Linghold got his left leg behind her right knee and was forcing her to bend backward. In another moment, she’d be on the ground.
No. No ground fighting, she told herself. Disable him.
Bona fide fear, objective under the circumstances, she reminded herself.
She pulled her left elbow back and up as he yanked her down and to the right. Going with the momentum he created, as she turned, she whipped her elbow forward and crushed it into his throat. He rasped and started to collapse backward.
She wriggled free from him and gave him a solid push toward the cinderblock wall behind him. He bashed the back of his head on his way down and slid the rest of the way. Before he hit the ground, the sound of heavy shoes pounding up the stairs echoed through the garage. The stairwell door burst open and a swarm of uniformed officers rushed out, shouting commands.
A familiar six-foot-something, dark-haired, gray-eyed wall of muscle in street clothes beelined toward her. She sagged into Connelly’s arms.
“Are you hurt?”
She shook her head. “Just scratches. Where’s Merriman?”
“In the back of a squad car, demanding his lawyer.”
“How’d you end up here?”
“Hank pulled Merriman’s phone records and compared them to Dutch Price’s. They both had calls from the same cell phone, which had been purchased with cash in a grocery store in New Orleans. He got the tech gurus to triangulate the calls and voila.”
“You mean to tell me the all-powerful Knitter brought his cell phone with him? Pretty rookie mistake.”
“No, he didn’t. His cell phone is Downtown in his hotel room. But we traced all his calls, and the Uber driver he called this morning was more than happy to tell us where he dropped him off. Does that answer all your questions?” Connelly asked as a fiery female officer who had to be Minet herded a handcuffed, bloodied Linghold toward the stairs.
No, it didn’t. She had about a thousand more questions. But they could all wait.
41
Two weeks later
Sasha watched the twins closely. They were splashing in the zero-entry kiddie area of the pool, seemingly oblivious to the foul-mouthed college boys who had just run past and back-flipped into the deep end in a chorus of F-bombs. She was glad Finn and Fiona hadn’t noticed, but the behavior was still out of bounds.
No, she told herself. Leave it alone.
She glanced at the row of moms in the lounge chairs with their heads bent over their paperbacks and cell phones. Nobody looked up. Across the pool, slightly further into the shallow end, a sweet-looking blonde mom with a big smile caught her eye. Her kids were older than Finn and Fiona, jumping into the two-foot area and chasing after a set of dive sticks amid a flurry of squeals. She’d seen the other woman around the pool but didn’t know her name. Now, she gave Sasha a worried, wide-eyed look.
This is not your problem, she reminded herself. She had just closed the chapter on her last Good Samaritan experience. The district attorney’s office sprang her early from her anger management class and rescinded her probation after Steve Harold and Charles Merriman gave full statements about Linghold and the plan to set her up in exchange for their respective deals. She didn’t need to wade into another situation. Not now; maybe not ever.
The college boys vaulted out of the pool and flung themselves on the chaise lounges closest to the kiddie pool.
“Dude, did you see that the hot lifeguard’s working?” A blond, spiky-haired guy said to the darker haired kid next to him.
“You know it.” They fist-bumped, and their two friends erupted with laughter followed by another round of F-bombs.
The sweet mom’s face went pale and her eyes cut to her two kids who were now watching the teenagers with naked interest.
Ah, crap.
Fiona glanced up at the boys, fascinated. Finn followed her gaze to see where her attention had gone.
Sasha contemplated tossing their swim gear and her bag of sunscreen and snacks into the red wagon, loading up the kids, and pulling them home. But the thought of being chased out of the neighborhood pool by a handful of foul-mouthed teenaged boys didn’t sit well with her. She glanced around the pool to see if anyone else—maybe a dad or the pool manager—was going to step in. The rest of the adults were still pretending nothing was happening.
Just then, Connelly came out of nowhere and cannonballed into the pool, splashing up a huge wave to the kids’ delight. He cut through the water with perfect form and emerged beside her.
“Hi.” He shook his hair, sending droplets of water flying in every direction.
“Hi, yourself. I thought you said you were going to skip the pool and mow the lawn.”
“I did say that. But Ken’s kid across the street’s trying to earn money for a semester abroad. So I paid him twenty bucks to do it instead. Besides, I knew you’d miss my cannonballs.”
She smiled. But before she could say anything else, the teenaged boys started hooting and wolf-whistling as the lifeguards rotated stations.
Connelly whipped his head around and gave the teens a death glare. They appeared to be oblivious. Finn was staring at his dad.
“Look,” Sasha said in a high voice to draw Finn’s attention.
She cranked the handle on the bright orange plastic mill, which made a waterfall of pool water cascade over the side. She had to admit it was pretty cool.
Parker had sent over a whole basket of clever toys from Recreation Group—certified fun and CPSIA-compliant, according to the note she’d included—after she’d heard Sasha had removed everything from the playroom. Sasha and Connelly were slowly introducing select toys back into their routine, here and there. But the twins didn’t seem to miss them, so they saw no reason to bombard them with playthings.
Now, though, Finn clapped with obvious glee.
“Again!” Fiona demanded.
“Here. You do it.” She handed the toy to Fiona and demonstrated turning the crank.
Fiona created a cascade. Finn clapped again. Then he reached out his arms. “My turn.”
Fiona scooted across the pool and handed her brother the toy without complaint. She watched with close interest as he turned the handle.
Sasha relaxed almost enough to forget about the teens. She leaned back on her elbows against the pool wall and stretched out her legs in the cool water. Then she heard “look at the rack on that.”
She turned in time to see the high-school-aged lifeguard skitter by, her eyes fixed on the ground in front of her.
The other mom started trying to herd her kids out of the pool.
Enough.
“I’m going to set those punks straight,” Connelly muttered under his breath.
Yes, let him handle it, she told herself. Then she glanced at Fiona, who was waving bye-bye to the blonde mom’s kids. Was she really going to sit here and model passivity for her daughter—or her son? Like hell she was.
She put a hand on Connelly’s chest. “No. Let me.”
He squinted at her face, shielding his eyes from the sun. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
She exited the pool and wrapped her towel around her waist as if it were a sarong. Then she pushed her sunglasses up to the top of her head and strode toward the four college-aged boys.
They wer
e deeply engaged in an animated conversation about some video of a race car crash that had gone viral on the internet. She walked between their chairs so she was in the middle, with two on either side of her. Water dripped from her legs.
Ignoring her hammering heart, she cleared her throat. “Excuse me.”
The guy to her left lifted his head. “What’s up?”
“You need to watch your language. There are little kids in the pool.”
His buddy elbowed him. “We didn’t say anything to any kids.”
“No, you didn’t. But there’s not a sonic wall around you.”
A kid from the right leaned in with a sneer. “They can’t hear us.”
She arched an eyebrow. “They’re kids; they’re not deaf.”
The original speaker bobbed his head. “Yes, ma’am.”
The last of them, the one who hadn’t yet said a word, followed in a hurry. “We’re sorry, ma’am.’’
She looked from one face to the next, each on the cusp of manhood, each still showing a hint of boy. Then she said, “I appreciate the apology. Now what you need to do is tell that lifeguard you’re sorry for what you said about her.”
“We’re just having fun,” the one with the sneer protested.
“She’s not here for your entertainment—or to be graded on her appearance. She’s here to watch the pool and make sure the swimmers are safe.”
Spiky hair rolled his eyes, but all four rose to their feet, grumbling under their breath. They weaved a path around her and trooped over to the lifeguard chair.
She stood, hand on hip, and watched as they offered their apologies with downcast eyes. Only when they trudged back to their chairs, did she return to the shallow end of the pool, shaking with adrenaline.
“Thank you,” the blonde mom mouthed.
Sasha nodded; she didn’t trust herself to speak just yet.
An older woman marked her page in her book with a finger and gave Sasha an approving nod. “Good for you,” she called from her chair in the shade.
Sasha waved at her and sank into the pool between the twins. Connelly wrapped his arm around her shoulder and grinned at her.
The other mom looked over her shoulder and called to her kids, “You guys can have fifteen more minutes.”
They whooped with joy and jumped into the pool with big splashes.
The teenagers returned to their chairs and sat for several moments in sullen silence, almost as if they didn’t want to let Sasha think she’d run them out. Then they grabbed their towels and headed toward the community game room on the other side of the bathrooms.
“See you later, Pool Mom,” the dark-haired one said as they walked by.
“Bye-bye,” Finn called to their backs.
“Pool Mom,” Connelly mused. “I think it suits you.” He leaned down and covered her mouth with a kiss.
Pool Mom. She smiled to herself as she kissed him back. It did suit her. After all, she thought, what kind of world would it be without Pool Moms and Bar Moms and Worried About Mercury in the Toys Moms?
<<<<>>>>
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Acknowledgments
Many thanks to everyone involved in the production of this book, in particular, my phenomenal editing and design team.
About the Author
USA Today bestselling author Melissa F. Miller was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Although life and love led her to Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and, ultimately, South Central Pennsylvania, she secretly still considers Pittsburgh home.
In college, she majored in English literature with concentrations in creative writing poetry and medieval literature and was STUNNED, upon graduation, to learn that there's not exactly a job market for such a degree. After working as an editor for several years, she returned to school to earn a law degree. She was that annoying girl who loved class and always raised her hand. She practiced law for fifteen years, including a stint as a clerk for a federal judge, nearly a decade as an attorney at major international law firms, and several years running a two-person law firm with her lawyer husband.
Now, powered by coffee, she writes legal thrillers and homeschools her three children. When she's not writing, and sometimes when she is, Melissa travels around the country in an RV with her husband, her kids, and her cat.
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Imminent Peril (Sasha McCandless Legal Thriller Book 10) Page 20