Delta Force Daddy

by Carol Ericson

  As she reached into the inside pocket of her jacket, the door behind Asher opened and a nurse stepped onto the porch.

  “Damn.” Paige’s whisper stirred the leaves on the branch hanging next to her face.

  Were they watching him now? They must’ve been watching him yesterday to notice he’d left the porch and loped across the grass.

  Her jaw ached with tension and disappointment. She might just have to go through the front door and demand to see him.

  She refocused on Asher and the nurse and pressed her lips into a thin line. Was personal massage part of Asher’s recovery?

  The nurse, standing behind him, had her hands on his shoulders, massaging and rubbing him. Each time she reached forward, her hands slid beneath his jacket and moved against his chest.

  Either Asher liked it or he was too zoned out to care. Each time the nurse’s hands slid farther and farther down his chest, working toward the inevitable happy ending.

  Asher turned his head and said something, and she stopped. Had he gotten the feeling his fiancée was watching?

  When the nurse retreated inside, Paige grabbed the mirror and caught the weak sun. She tilted it back and forth, and Asher raised his head.

  He’d seen it.

  Paige’s soaring spirits crashed a minute later when Nurse Grabby-Hands returned to the scene, this time pushing a wheelchair ahead of her.

  Paige held her breath as the nurse helped Asher from the chair to the wheelchair. He listed to the side, and the large woman wrapped both of her arms around his body to right him. She kept her arms around him, putting her face close to his while talking to him.

  Paige growled. “Get out of his face.”

  The nurse tucked a blanket around his legs and aimed the chair down the ramp.

  If Asher needed a blanket on his lap, he’d be too weak to accompany her through the forest and down the hill. Squinting into the binoculars, Paige tracked their progress across the lawn. The nurse pushed the chair with one hand, her other resting on Asher’s shoulder.

  They made it about midway and stopped. Paige swore when she noticed Asher’s attire. He did have a jacket on against the cold, but he wore it over a hospital gown. No wonder he had a blanket draped over his lower extremities. He was in bigger trouble than Paige imagined and a sob burst from her chest. She’d never get him out of here like that...especially with Nurse Ratched hovering over him.

  Suddenly both of their heads jerked in unison. The nurse turned to face the building with the porch where Asher had been sitting.

  Paige swept her binoculars toward the building and zeroed in on a doctor standing and waving. Paige tracked back to Asher and the nurse on the grass. The nurse jumped to her feet and waved back.

  Leaning over Asher, the nurse smoothed the blanket across Asher’s lap and tucked it under his thighs. Then she ran her hands over his chest before pulling his jacket closed. Finally, she turned and scurried back to the building.

  Paige watched the doctor and nurse team go inside and shut the door behind them. She jerked the binoculars back to Asher and held the mirror up to the sun again, tilting it back and forth.

  But what could he do in a gown and a blanket? He didn’t even have shoes.

  Asher sat quietly for several moments, and then Paige’s heart slammed against her chest as he rose from the wheelchair. The blanket fell from his lap and he bunched it up and stuffed it into the chair. Then he shrugged out of the jacket and wrapped it around the blanket. From behind and from a distance, it might just look like someone slumped over in the chair.

  Without looking behind him once, Asher took off in a jog across the lawn.

  Paige stashed the binoculars in her backpack and scrambled down the tree. She hit the thick carpet of mulch just as she heard Asher crash through the trees.

  “Are you here? Are you here? Paige?”

  Her heart took flight. He remembered her. All he needed was to see her once.

  “Here! I’m here!”

  He emerged through the trees, the hospital gown flapping around his bare legs, a pair of socks the only barrier between his feet and the sharp needles and twigs that formed the forest floor.

  She rushed to him. “Asher. Oh my God, Asher.”

  He grabbed her hands and held her off from throwing herself in his arms.

  “You’ve gotta help me. You’ve gotta get me out of this place...whoever you are.”

  Chapter Three

  His words chipped off a piece of her heart, but she squared her shoulders and stepped back from him. “We have to go through these woods and down a steep hill. Can you make it dressed like that?”

  “I could make it naked with one arm tied behind my back to get out of here. Lead the way.”

  “Let’s go. You should’ve kept that jacket though.”

  “That jacket might buy me some time if someone happens to look out the window at the drugged-out invalid to make sure he’s still drooling in his chair.”

  “You’re not drugged?”

  “I’ve been spitting them out—and pretending.”

  She held a branch to the side for him. “They still didn’t trust you enough to give you clothes.”

  “They underestimated me.” He charged after her. “Don’t worry about clearing a path for me. Just go. I’ll follow you.”

  “Your physical health is okay?”

  “Strong as an ox.” He nudged her back. “Stop talking. You’re wasting energy.”

  She scrabbled and stumbled her way to the forest’s edge. When they reached the path down to the access road, she made a half turn. “You can make it down?”

  “I survived a tumble off a mountain in Afghanistan. I can traverse a wooded hill in Vermont.”

  He didn’t need her to show him the way anymore, and he barreled past her into the descent, reaching back with one hand. “Keep up now.”

  As his gown gaped open in the back, her eyebrows shot up. “You’re naked under that thing.”

  “Their way of keeping me tame. Like I said. They underestimated me.” He craned his head over his shoulder. “If you’re really my fiancée like you said, my bare backside shouldn’t shock you.”

  “I’m not shocked.” She twisted her fingers out of his grasp. “And stop dragging me or we’ll both end up in a freefall to the bottom of this hill.”

  They had no words left as they negotiated their way down. When they hit the access road, Asher peeled off his socks, now decorated with dirt, small pebbles and pine needles.

  He bunched them in his hand and stuffed them into the pack on her back. “I don’t want to leave any evidence.”

  He hung back as the access road spilled onto the main drag. “It’s too exposed here.”

  “The car’s less than half a mile away. Wait here and I’ll pick you up.”

  As she started to turn away, he grabbed her hand. “You’ll be back?”

  “I didn’t come all the way out here to leave you behind, Asher Knight...even if you don’t know who the hell I am.”

  Paige ran to the car, the pack jostling on her back. She wished she had some clothes in there for Asher. She never would’ve imagined she’d be rescuing him in a hospital gown and nothing else.

  When she reached the car, she lunged at the door and threw it open. She gunned the engine and swung into a wide U-turn.

  The empty road in front of the access entrance stretched before her, and a wave of panic washed through her body. When Asher stepped out from behind a bush, a sob escaped from Paige’s lips.

  “Get hold of yourself, girl.” She flipped a U-turn again and pulled over.

  Before she even stopped the car, Asher had yanked at the door and jumped inside. “Go!”

  She didn’t have to be told twice—or even once. Her foot punched the accelerator and the little rental roared in protest before switching gears and lurch
ing forward.

  The tires ate up the road, and Asher put a hand on her arm. “Slow down. We don’t want to get a ticket.”

  Glancing in the rearview mirror, she eased off the gas. “But if we do get pulled over, we can tell the police what’s going on. You’re not a prisoner. You haven’t been committed.”

  “Really?” He cocked an eyebrow at her. “I don’t know what the hell is going on right now. That’s the US Army, the United States government. They can tell the cops whatever they want and, I guarantee you, I’ll be back in their clutches.”

  Paige’s heart flip-flopped, and she tried to swallow her fear. She was the daughter of a police officer, had always trusted law enforcement, had always trusted authority. Now she had to rely on herself.

  Asher jerked his head toward her and braced his hands against the dashboard. “Unless that’s what you want? Where are you taking me?”

  Paige drew in her bottom lip. Great. Now she had to deal with Asher’s paranoia. Was it real or imagined? She slid a sideways gaze at him. Maybe his mental issues involved more than amnesia. Maybe he’d been kept naked and drugged because he did pose a threat to himself...and others.

  She could feel his hard stare boring into the side of her face. A stranger’s stare.

  “Is that it? Are you one of them?”

  His harsh voice grated against her ear, and she took a deep breath. If he could listen to reason and think logically, that would tell her a lot about his mental state.

  “I’m taking you to my motel right now. We should leave as soon as I can check out. This is a small town and the people at that house of horrors will most likely fan out there first to look for you.”

  He nodded, his mouth still tight.

  “Why would I contact you secretly and help you escape if I were in cahoots with the hospital and planned to deliver you back to them? What would be the plan? To test you? They don’t need to test you. They have you captive and a pharmaceutical cornucopia to keep you complacent.”

  His firm jaw softened and he blinked his eyes.

  “What did they tell you about the woods yesterday? Because I can tell you right now, one of those stooges who came after you, Lewis or Granger, shot a dart in the side of your neck to take you down.”

  Asher clapped his hand against the left side of his neck. “They said I passed out.”

  “Yeah, like a lion passes out after a few hundred blow darts sink into him.”

  “I suspected something but didn’t let on.” He touched the back of his head. “I’m still pretty confused, but I pretended everything was great so that I’d have another opportunity to go outside...in case you came back.”

  “Well, I did.” She reached for his thigh and stopped herself. He still thought of her as a stranger, but she planned to remedy that.

  She grabbed the bottle of water in the cup holder instead. “Do you want some water?” She shook the bottle and the water sloshed back and forth. “It’s not laced with anything—except my germs.”

  His hand hovered near the bottle for a couple of seconds and then he snatched it from her. He downed the rest of the water. “Sorry. Those damned drugs make me thirsty.”

  She looked away from the road and pointed to his feet. “We’re going to have to take care of those.”

  “My feet are the least of my worries right now—and I have plenty.”

  About a half hour later, they hit the outskirts of Mooseville and Paige tapped Asher’s shoulder. “You should slump down in about five minutes, just until we get through the town. My motel is tucked away from the main drag. I can sneak you inside without a problem.”

  “I’m not going anywhere sitting in this car.”

  “Excuse me?” She always did have to deal with Asher’s stubbornness, but his stubbornness combined with amnesia and fear just catapulted it to another dimension.

  “It’s too risky. Pull over now and I’ll get in the trunk.”

  “The trunk?” Her gaze swept his large form, unchanged from weeks of captivity and bed rest.

  “I can squeeze in. I’m not taking any chance of anyone seeing me in this town. Is it really called Mooseville?”

  “It is and I will.” She pulled over and popped the trunk from the inside of the car. They both got out and she lifted the lid of the trunk. “Make yourself comfortable.”

  “Looks like heaven compared to that hospital bed.”

  He crawled inside the trunk and his hospital gown spread open, revealing his mighty fine backside.

  “Here, let’s get you decent.” She tugged the gown around his thighs, her fingers skimming his cold skin. She started to remove her jacket.

  “Leave it on. You shouldn’t look any different from when you left... Shut it.”

  Paige slammed the lid of the trunk on Asher, curled into a fetal position. She could do this, despite what her mother believed.

  She drove through the sleepy town of Mooseville and pulled up to her room at the motel. She shouted over her shoulder. “I’m back at the motel. I’ll just grab my stuff and check out.”

  After Asher gave his muffled assent, Paige slid from the car and pushed the door closed with a click. It took her ten minutes to throw her stuff in a bag. She dumped the three bottled waters from the fridge into a plastic bag, along with her leftover sandwich from the day before.

  She strode to the motel office, swinging the room key from her finger. The bell on the door jingled when she swung it open.

  Charlie, the motel’s proprietor, peeked around the corner of the back office. His eyes widened when he saw her. “You’d better get out of here.”

  The key flew off her finger and her jaw dropped. “Why?”

  “They’re looking for you.”

  Goose bumps rippled across her flesh. “Who?”

  “Those folks at the rest home on the hill.” Charlie looked both ways as if the two of them weren’t the only ones in the room. “Government folks.”

  She stooped to pick up the key and smacked it on the counter. “They’re looking for me by name?”

  “You...and others.” He swept the key from the counter and dropped it in a drawer. “They came charging in here asking about this one and that one—mostly men—but then they mentioned your name, Paige Sterling. Said you also might be using Paige Knight.”

  Paige gripped the strap of her purse. “They asked for me by name? What did they want to know?”

  “If you’d been here, checked into the motel.”

  She glanced over her shoulder at the parking lot and her rental car with one big Delta Force soldier stashed in the trunk. “And you said...?”

  Charlie folded his arms and narrowed his eyes. “Told ’em they’d need to come back with the cops and a search warrant if they wanted to see my guests’ names. I did tell them I didn’t have any single women staying here.”

  “Thank you, Charlie. I’m not involved in anything illegal.”

  He waved a hand. “I don’t trust that bunch up there. Wouldn’t give ’em the correct time of day if they asked.”

  “I don’t trust them, either. I’m out of here. You can put the balance for the room on the credit card I used.”

  “Will do. Too bad I already ran it. That can be traced now.”

  “When I checked in here, I didn’t realize...” She shook her head. “It’s all right.”

  “Safe travels.”

  She slammed the office door harder than she’d intended and jogged to the car. She opened the back door and tossed her suitcase and pack onto the seat. When she slid behind the wheel, she turned her head to the side. “They’re already looking for me, and others. They must realize you had help. The guy at the motel didn’t tell them anything, so they can’t know I’m the one who’s here.”

  A thump resounded from the trunk, and Paige knew Asher had heard her.

  She squealed out of the parking
lot and raced toward the town. As she turned down the main street, she said, “Can you pound on the trunk again or something so I know you’re still alive back there?”

  Another loud thump answered her but did nothing to calm her nerves. “As soon as I get the chance, I’ll let you out of there. We need a place to go.”

  She pulled up behind a white van at the one stoplight in town. The red light turned green, and she removed her foot from the brake pedal and held it above the accelerator as the car rolled forward.

  The van hadn’t moved, and she slammed on the brake. The car heaved forward and back. “Sorry, but there’s some idiot who won’t move.”

  Her hand slid from the steering wheel and rested on the horn in the center of it. “I’m going to give this guy two more seconds.”

  In less than a second, both doors of the van swung open and a hulking man dressed in the scrubs of a hospital orderly burst out of the passenger side and into the street.

  He pinned her with a menacing glare and started to charge toward her.

  “Oh my God, Asher. It’s them. They found us.”

  Chapter Four

  Adrenaline pumped through his body, and Asher’s limbs jerked with the power of the sensation.

  Paige screamed and he flushed with rage. She had to get out of here, had to move the car. Unless they had her boxed in. A car in front and one in back that she didn’t notice?

  He pounded on the roof of his prison with his fist. The car jumped in Reverse, and his head whacked the side of the trunk. He didn’t even care. They were in motion.

  He heard a man shouting. Sounded like that giant oaf Granger. The tires squealed and the smell of burning rubber assailed his nostrils.

  The car jerked to the left. Asher felt like he was on some amusement park ride that kept you in the dark so you couldn’t see the next turn of the track.

  Paige must’ve floored it, because the car leaped forward and then the back fishtailed. As the car picked up speed, a crash echoed outside the trunk. Asher braced his body for an impact, wedging his bare feet against the side of the trunk...but none came.