Asher blew out a breath. Not the bombshell he was expecting.
“Yeah, sure. I can just waltz back into Hidden Hills and ask for my records.”
“You might try asking someone else for them.”
“The army?” Asher snorted.
“That nurse.”
“Tabitha Crane?”
“Yeah, I thought she might be the one standing over there, but now I realize if she was and she really wanted to help you, she’d have given you that file.”
Paige asked, “How do you know Tabitha has the file?”
“They all know it now. We have orders to track her down just like you—and that’s the reason. She’s become public enemy number two.”
“I have a question for you, Linc.” Paige stepped from the shadows. “What are you supposed to do with Asher when you find him?”
Linc’s gaze darted to the barrel of the gun and back to Paige’s face. “Kill him.”
The wooden wall across from Asher splintered. Cold air rushed into the boathouse.
Asher lunged in front of Paige and grabbed her hand, yanking her to the floor.
“Get down! They’re shooting the place up.”
Chapter Fifteen
When Asher had pulled her down, he covered her body with his as the bullets rained above them.
She squirmed beneath him. “Asher, I can’t breathe.”
He rolled off her and leveled a finger at Linc cowering in the corner. “Did you bring them here? Did you know?”
“No, no. I swear.”
“Leave him, Asher.”
“His bosses are not going to be as generous as I was.” Asher scooted toward the door and kicked it open. “Our only chance now is Peter’s boat. Those shots are coming from the house. Follow me.”
Paige gritted her teeth as Asher crawled outside. Every cell in her body was screaming, but she pushed past her fear.
When she joined him on the short dock, he shocked her by pushing her off. She rolled into the small powerboat, even as another wall of the boathouse ripped open.
Asher jumped in next to her, flattening himself on the deck of the boat. He jammed the key into the ignition and pulled on the throttle. The engine roared, churning up the frigid water of the bay.
The boat leaped forward and Paige’s head banged against the side.
“Hold on, Paige. I don’t know where I’m going and I can’t see anything. I don’t want to put on the lights until we’re farther along.”
The boat skimmed across the water, away from the shore, away from the bullets. Paige rubbed her head, tracing the knot already forming there.
After several minutes, the boat’s course evened out and Paige realized Asher was upright at the helm.
She dragged herself up, leaning against the inside of the boat, still holding her hand to her head and feeling slightly nauseated, which had nothing to do with seasickness.
Asher’s head jerked to the side. “Are you okay? My God, were you hit?”
“No. My head banged against the side of the boat during our escape.” She squinted at the distant lights on the shore. “We did escape, didn’t we? We got away?”
“We did.”
“Y-you weren’t shot, were you?”
“No.”
“I’m glad you held on to Peter’s keys instead of putting them back in his pocket.” Paige covered her eyes with one hand. “But all our plans—the car, our clothes, the money—all gone. We’re back to square one.”
“We’re alive.” He stretched his hand out to her. “And you’re with me.”
She wrapped her fingers around his. “You remember me, remember our engagement, remember all the ugliness and you’re still here.”
“Where else would I be?” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed the tips of her fingers. “I don’t know. Square one feels good to me.”
His words created a warm bubble around her, and she just wanted to float in that bubble, but they weren’t in the floating stage yet.
“Do you think Linc knew he was walking into a trap? He didn’t act like it.”
“Maybe he was told to play along. He did seem accommodating, but I just had him pegged as a coward.” Asher eased off the throttle and the boat’s nose lowered in the water. “Or maybe his employers were tracking the phones and noted the unusual activity. Linc looked as surprised as I felt when the bullets started flying.”
“Maybe he figured the cavalry coming to rescue him would at least wait until he was out of the way before starting to blast away.”
“There’s little honor among thieves—another lesson I learned at my father’s knee.”
“Do you think Linc was telling the truth about your file and Tabitha stealing it?”
“That part makes sense, doesn’t it? Linc might’ve felt he could tell me the truth because he figured I’d be dead ten minutes later.”
“Then we need to get our hands on that file. You can take it to the army. There might be a few traitors, but I refuse to believe the entire army and Delta Force unit are after Major Denver—unless he’s really guilty.”
“He’s not.”
“Showing what the doctors at Hidden Hills tried to do to you will put you back on track, anyway. They wouldn’t be able to claim you were crazy or a traitor or AWOL then, could they?”
“Somehow I think sneaking back into Hidden Hills is going to be harder than sneaking out.”
“Unless we find Tabitha’s copy of the file.”
“We could return to her family’s cabin and look there. My guess is if she has it, she was planning to use it to blackmail me to bend to her wishes.”
Paige huddled into her coat. “I don’t recall seeing a computer there. It was probably in her car.”
“You still have her phone, right?”
“Which I haven’t been able to access yet.” Paige tried to snap her cold fingers and gave up. “She might have her email on the phone. Maybe we could get some information from that.”
“It can’t hurt.” Asher pointed to some lights along the shoreline. “We’re going to have to get off this bay sometime.”
“Where are we going to go and what are we going to do without money?” The reality of their situation punched her in the gut, and she folded her arms across her midsection.
“I wouldn’t say we have no money.” Asher patted the pockets of his jacket. “I didn’t want to keep going into the bag in the trunk for cash, so when we were packing up I crammed my pockets with the stuff. We’ll be okay.”
Paige threw her arms around his neck. “You’re right. We’re safe for now and we’re together. All we need is Ivy to make us whole.”
“We’ll get there, Paige...and we’ll be stronger than ever.”
* * *
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, after ditching Peter’s boat, hitching a ride with a trucker and picking up a pizza, Paige fell across the bed in the dumpy motel they found outside of DC.
“I think I might be too tired to eat—bullets, boats and trucks can do that to a girl.” She hoisted herself up on her elbows and watched Asher dig into the pizza. “Another spot of good news is that it doesn’t seem like you’re going to have a relapse of going into a drugged stupor.”
Asher pounded his chest with his fist, a piece of pepperoni pizza in the other hand. “I feel great.”
“I texted Martha again about the mayhem at her mother’s house, but she hasn’t responded. I hope she’s okay.”
“She wasn’t planning to go to the house. I’m sure she’s fine.” Asher wiped his hands on a napkin and held up a can of soda. “If you’re not going to eat anything, have something to drink.”
“I think I will have a piece.” She slid off the edge of the bed and pulled a slice out of the box, pinching off a string of cheese with her finger. “Do you think the men with the guns went into the garage and found our
car with all our stuff? My laptop’s in there.”
“I doubt they wanted to stick around that long. They probably swarmed the boathouse, thinking they killed us or trapped us, and found Linc and Peter instead.”
“I wonder if they killed Linc...or Peter for that matter.”
“Don’t waste your sympathy. Do you think either one of them would’ve hesitated to kill us if they’d had the chance?”
“Ugh, I don’t like this world.” Paige dabbed her lips with a napkin and took a swig of soda.
“I know you don’t. I’m sorry you’re in it.” He tossed his crust onto a paper plate. “You should be back in Vegas, safe with Ivy.”
“Then who’d be your wingman?” She dug her thumb into her chest. “That’s me.”
Asher leaned forward and kissed her mouth, the spicy pepperoni on his lips making their connection even hotter. “You are my wingman, but you’re much, much more, and I want to finish what we started earlier.”
She dropped her pizza and stretched her arms over her head. “I don’t know. When we were going to make love this afternoon, you were all juiced up on Preston’s magic antidote. This could be a total letdown.”
“That other guy today? All strength, no substance.” He winked. “Do you trust the tub in this place?”
Her gaze scanned the small, plainly furnished room. “It ain’t the Ritz, but it’s clean. I’m down for a bath.”
“Allow me.” Asher pushed away the pizza box and jumped up from his chair. “I’ll get things ready.”
“Do you want me to save this pizza? There’s no fridge in here.”
“When did leftover pizza ever need to be refrigerated?” Asher pulled off his boots and socks, one foot at a time, and padded barefoot into the bathroom.
Paige tossed the used paper plates and napkins in the trash and closed the pizza box. Leaning forward, she flipped the curtains at the window.
The lights of the motel office glowed in modest comparison to the headlights of the cars passing on the highway in the distance. They couldn’t have been followed or tracked this time. Asher had ditched Linc’s and Peter’s phones in the bay, and her own phone was turned off. Only the temp phone was active. She’d turned off Tabitha’s, but this place—a motel along a string of them on a busy highway—might be the ideal location to turn it on and start entering passwords again.
As far as she knew, phones could be tracked only generally, pinging the nearest cell tower, which could be miles away.
The water stopped running in the bathroom and Asher shouted. “I’m ready. What are you doing out there, finishing off the pizza?”
“Coming.” Paige twitched the curtains back in place and put the temp phone along with Tabitha’s on the nightstand.
Pulling her sweater over her head, Paige started humming some striptease music as she sauntered to the bathroom. She stopped in the frame of the door and twirled her sweater around by its arm. “Are you really ready, big boy?”
Asher lowered his naked body in the tub, the steam swirling around him. “It’s about time.”
She dropped her sweater to the floor, yanked off her camisole and bra, and shimmied out of her jeans and panties.
“Hit the switch. I don’t have candles, but at least the muted light from the other room lends a little romance to the atmosphere in here.”
She tiptoed to the bathtub. “Where’d you get the bubbles?”
“Dumped half this bottle in the water.” He held up a small plastic bottle of shower gel.
She dipped a toe into the water between Asher’s raised knees. The tub couldn’t accommodate the length of his legs stretched out, but she couldn’t imagine they’d be in this little tub that long.
She sat down in the water, and the bubbles crackled around her body. Stretching her legs out as far as she could, she leaned back against Asher’s chest, finally skin to skin.
Her head lolled against his chest. “I could fall asleep right here.”
“You’d better not.” He scooped up some bubbles in the palms of his hands and arranged them over her breasts like a mermaid bikini.
She breathed out. “Nice.”
Those hands skimmed down her belly and parted her thighs.
Her head fell to the side and her tongue darted out of her mouth and swept across the warm, soapy flesh of his arm.
His fingers stroked between her legs and she rocked with the sensations flowing through her body, creating little waves in the tub. If he kept touching her like that, they’d create a tidal wave.
She arched her back and planted her hands on his knees, digging her fingernails into his skin. The heat from their bodies seemed to bring the water temperature to boiling.
When her orgasm claimed her, she lifted her hips from the water. The pleasure clawed through her body, and her hips pumped the air with every stab.
Asher slid two fingers inside her, and she shuddered around him before falling back to the water, collapsing against his belly.
The water lapped up the side of the tub and spilled over onto the floor.
Asher nibbled her earlobe and then whispered, “You created a tidal wave.”
She rolled over to face him, the water giving her buoyancy. “Now I’m going to create a volcano.”
Laughing, he wrapped his arms around her. “Not in here, you’re not. If I stay in this tub any longer, I’m gonna get stuck.”
“Me first.” She straddled him and stood up in the tub, dripping water on his head and chest.
Looking up at her, he said, “This is the best view I’ve had all day.”
“Hope you plan to do more than admire the scenery.” She stepped over the edge of the tub and grabbed both towels. “Do you need help getting out?”
He flipped the drain stopper with his toe, shifted to his side and rose from the water like Neptune coming out of the sea.
She shook out his towel and crammed it against his chest. “Meet you in the bedroom.”
Strolling to the bedroom, she dried herself and then flipped back the covers on the bed. Maybe they’d actually get to make love this time.
She heard Asher’s footfall behind her, and before she could turn, he enfolded her in a hug, pressing his front against her back. “It’s been too long. I’m kind of glad Peter interrupted us last time. I feel more like myself now, not hopped up on anything, not waiting for any texts or bad guys to show up on our doorstep.”
As he kissed the wet tendrils of hair that clung to the back of her neck, he caressed her breasts. She shivered.
“Are you cold?” He scooped her against his body even tighter.
“A little.” She wriggled out of his grasp and flung herself across the bed. “Warm me up.”
He stretched out beside her on his side and kissed the bump on the side of her head. “War wounds.”
He traced the outlines of her face. “I can’t believe I ever forgot this face.”
“The mind can do funny things. Why don’t you touch the rest of my body to make sure you never forget again?”
With his fingers and tongue, he skimmed her flesh, raising goose bumps and setting fire to her nerve endings at the same time. While he reacquainted himself with her body, her fingers idly played in his hair while her other hand stroked his erection.
By the time his head was level with her toes and his feet rested on the pillow next to her head, he was fully aroused and her heart was thundering in her chest.
She rolled to her side so that Asher’s erection plowed between her legs. “I think you’ve proved that all the drugs are out of your system now. I need you inside me. I’ve waited long enough for you to remember me, remember you love me, forgive me all over again, and now I have you right where I want you.”
He tickled the bottom of her foot and then his head joined hers on the pillow. “Ditto.”
He kissed her mouth as he s
traddled her.
She wrapped her legs around his hips as he entered her, like she never wanted to let him go again.
Their lovemaking fell into the familiar pattern they’d established over their years together, but it contained another quality that she couldn’t name. Deeper? More satisfying? More secure? Maybe for the first time with Asher, she didn’t feel as if she had something to prove.
When they’d finally slaked their need of each other, Paige rolled to her side, snuggling into the crook of his body, a perfect fit.
He stroked her from the nape of her neck to her derriere. She stretched, curling her toes against his shins.
“Mmm, all my cares just melted away. It’s going to be hard going back to the real world.”
“You’re like a content cat right now, a kitty cat who’s lapped up all the cream.”
She giggled. “Is that supposed to be some weird double entendre? Ugh, and I just flashed on Tabitha and her obsession with cats. It probably rivaled her obsession with you.”
“Sorry I brought up cats.”
A light bulb clicked on in Paige’s head and she bolted upright. “Tabitha. Cats.”
“I said I was sorry.” Asher ran a hand down her arm, but she scrambled over his body to reach the nightstand and Tabitha’s phone.
“I got it. I know her password.”
She snatched the phone from the bedside table and powered it on. The daunting password prompt glared at her again, but this time it had met its match.
She entered the password that had come to her in a flash and yelped when the phone responded by letting her in.
“You did it.” Asher gave her a high five. “What was it, genius?”
She rolled her eyes. “Tabbycat, of course.”
Paige’s finger trembled as she clicked through to Tabitha’s email. “What’s the password for the Wi-Fi in here?”
Asher reached past her and dragged a card from beneath the lamp on the nightstand. “Guest.”
“That makes it easy.” Paige entered the password and held her breath as Tabitha’s phone loaded her emails.
Asher hovered over her shoulder, his hot breath stirring her hair. “Check her texts first to make sure nobody’s looking for her yet.”
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