“Join the Navy,” Chuck would say. “Serve your country and protect all citizens.”
He’d joined the service as Chuck wanted, but Egan had yearned to do more—something that counted, so he signed up for the SEALs. After weeks of grueling training, going through BUD/S selection, he earned his Trident. His first deployment as a SEAL was in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan. Two years later, Rory was killed. Uncle Chuck died of a heart attack not long after. Everyone close to Egan was suddenly gone.
“What do you think?” Kellee asked.
He snapped out of the past to gaze at the vision in front of him.
A pair of short-shorts accentuated Kellee’s tanned, toned legs. The material barely covered her bottom. The tank top clung to every curve, leaving nothing to his imagination.
His chair dropped with a thud to all four legs. Heat flooded through him, heading places it had no business going. He crossed his ankle over his other leg, hoping to find a more comfortable position.
Her Cheshire cat grin embodied an expression of sheer delight. No doubt, in deference to his reaction. “Good,” she said. “I’ll get these and the others, too.” She whipped around and returned to the dressing room to change.
Egan took a breath and scrubbed a hand over his face. God help him. He didn’t need more reminders of what a sensuous woman Kellee O’Neal had become. A woman he couldn’t ignore.
Chapter Fourteen
After their morning shopping, Egan drove Kellee through the small town of Little Landing and back to the boat yard parking lot. Even though only the two of them were staying on the boat, they’d bought enough groceries for a week. So far, they hadn’t come across any threats. Maybe her father was wrong about the danger to her. If this mystery would just go away, she could go home and straighten out the mess with the dead Russian and start moving on with her life. Then again, having a few more days to change Egan’s mind about their relationship sounded pretty good too.
She couldn’t wait to change into the new clothes she’d bought. The swimsuit just begged to be shown off and visions of lying on top of the Suzy G’s cabin to catch a bit of sun seemed like the perfect way to spend the afternoon.
Once Egan parked, she climbed out of the SUV and walked around the back to unload the packages. The memory of Egan’s expression when she’d stepped out of the dressing room had remained with her, giving her hope for a long-sought-after victory over his resistance.
Kellee walked along the dock ahead of Egan, carefully holding her packages. She stepped over the gunwale and turned with a smile to tell him thanks for the shopping spree. Her smile froze.
Behind Egan stood a thick-necked man wearing sunglasses. The pistol in his beefy hand was pointed straight at them. “Egan!”
Egan wheeled around. There was a muzzle-flash, but no sound. Egan’s head jerked to the side. In grotesque slow motion, he tumbled off the dock. The side of his head collided with the railing on the Suzy G. He slipped under the water with hardly a splash.
Kellee dropped her sacks and rushed to the edge of the boat where Egan disappeared.
Sunlight glared off the water, and for a moment, she couldn’t see him. Then she caught a glimpse of him drifting under the inky surface. She threw her leg over the side of the boat to jump in.
Instead of finding herself diving for the man she loved, she was dangling above the dock like a rag doll. The thick-necked man had somehow caught her before she touched the water. He held her by one arm and clamped the other hand over her mouth, choking off her scream.
Panic overrode her Aikido training, and her feet peddled wildly in mid-air. She swung her fist, trying to free herself. Egan would drown if she didn’t get to him. When she couldn’t reach the man’s face, she grabbed his wrist in both hands and tried to leverage out of his hold. He juggled her for a second, then shifted his hold to wrap an arm around her middle, all while keeping her feet from touching the dock.
Holding her like a load of lumber, the big man headed down the dock away from the boat—away from Egan—toward the parking lot. His other hand still muffled her screams as she thrashed against his hulking body. If she could touch the ground, she could find a way to free herself and reach Egan before it was too late.
Ahead of them, a second man walked backwards, keeping an eye on the Suzy G. His head swiveled from side to side, but his gun remained pointed toward the boat.
Her blood ran cold. If Egan was still alive and tried to come for her, he’d be shot. She squeezed her eyes closed. Please let him be okay.
She squirmed, trying to get free. The more she fought, the tighter the man’s hold became. Finally, her martial arts training kicked in. Giving up her fruitless struggles, she went limp, imagining herself a floppy, cooked noodle, knowing her dead weight would be harder to hold.
At first, her tactic didn’t work. Her captor shook her and growled in a language she didn’t understand, but sounded like Russian.
Could it be? The Russians were after her? When she didn’t respond to his throaty commands, his grip relaxed. He must have thought she fainted because he let go of her mouth and she could breathe easier. She started to slide out of his grasp. An inch, then two. Her feet were almost touching the boards.
She opened her eyes and saw they were almost to the end of the dock.
A third man, this one wearing a bright blue shirt and ball cap, stepped into view. A rescue!
The man holding her stopped walking. The second man who had been walking backwards glanced over his shoulder.
The next instant, a cloud of pink mist burst from the second man’s head. Blood showered Kellee’s face—first warm, then cooling quickly in the humid air. She hadn’t heard any gunfire, only a soft plop. She stared in horror as the second man crumpled to the dock. She stiffened and screamed.
Her captor swung her body upright and positioned her directly in front of him like a human shield. She was finally on her feet, and the arm around her middle released, but she wasn’t free because of his chokehold around her neck. A pistol appeared in his other hand pointed straight at Blue-shirt.
“Durak!” her captor exclaimed. Now that she heard him clearly, the language definitely sounded Russian. Fear’s icy fingers clawed down her spine. Her nightmare was happening all over again.
To Kellee’s horror, she recognized the man in the bright blue polo shirt that hung loosely over khaki cargo pants. He was the same man who’d approached her at the truck stop a couple of days ago. He must have been following her and Egan the entire time.
Blue-shirt laughed. “I am no more an idiot than you, Chernko.” The other man spoke in English, but with a Russian accent. A gun held in his steady hand was aimed directly at her captor’s head.
“Oleg Vasiliev!” her captor said in English, also with a thick accent. “What is the meaning of this?”
“Nikolai Orlov’s orders.”
“But you serve Solonik, like us…” Her captor glanced down at the body of his friend. “…me.”
“And Solonik serves Orlov.” Blue-shirt’s eyes narrowed at her captor. “How did you follow me?”
“Solonik has his ways.”
“A tracker?” Blue-shirt’s eyes widened. “Where?”
Her captor snorted. “Anywhere—in anything Solonik gave you. Solonik is sneaky. He was concerned after Petre died. You didn’t return. Now you killed Alexis,” he said, nodding to the dead man on the dock.
“You are not good enough to speak of my brother. Solonik’s impatience caused Petre’s death. So I come to avenge him and claim this prize for myself.” Blue-shirt gestured to Kellee and stepped closer.
“I do not understand.” Her captor’s grip tightened.
Kellee’s air was cut off. She was losing her equilibrium. Her sight blurred, making the dead man on the dock look like a heap of rumpled laundry.
“You choke her to death,” Blue-shirt said. “Let her go, and I will spare your life.”
“Nyet.” As her captor spoke, his grip tightened.
Kell
ee fought back the dizzy haze. She was not going to die here. Finding her center, she fought for the next breath. Instinct told her to choose between the lesser of two evils—her captor or Blue-shirt. Not an easy choice. Distracting her captor might provide a means of escape—if Blue-shirt didn’t shoot her first.
Blue-shirt’s stare flickered over her. A predatory gleam crossed his face, and she rethought her options. For all she knew, he could be worse than her captor. Worse or not, Blue-shirt was the wild card, and her best chance out of the situation. Was he a good enough shot to kill her captor without killing her?
“We leave now.” Her captor edged forward, keeping her body angled as his shield.
Kellee ground her heels against the dock’s planks, hoping to slow their progress. She wasn’t going without a fight. Her captor was stronger and forced her ahead of him as he would a reluctant child. A soft plop from Blue-shirt’s pistol sounded at the same time one of the dock’s wooden planks splintered at their feet. Her captor froze.
“Bring her to me,” Blue-shirt said.
She wondered how this scene could be happening without some cry of alarm from witnesses. Then realized only a few minutes had passed. This standoff couldn’t last forever. She had to take matters into her own hands if she wanted to live. If she could reach her captor’s gun without it going off—or at least deflect the shot—she’d be able to escape and dive off the dock. Hide among the boats, maybe even swim for help and find Egan.
Time seemed to slow as sensations passed through her like driftwood on a tide. In the distance, a warning buoy sounded. Water slapped a gentle rhythm against the boat hulls. Her captor’s rank body odor mingled with the salt air. Sweat trickled between her breasts and soaked into her bra.
Her captor kept a firm grip on the pistol, while his other arm held her against him. His stance was solid while he focused on the other man.
She lowered her chin.
Blue-shirt’s attention flickered between her and her captor, reacting to her change in posture with an imperceptible lift of his weapon.
Now or never.
She exhaled and turned into the chokehold. Sinking her weight, she extended her elbows and, like a bird taking flight, lifted her arms upward against her captor’s gun hand.
The movement took her captor off-guard and he fired, but the shot went wide. The bullet missed Blue-shirt, puncturing the side of a nearby sailing yacht.
Blue-shirt took aim and fired.
Kellee wasn’t entirely freed from the choke when her captor’s body convulsed, tightening his grip. Then he went limp. She stepped away as he fell to the dock. Turning around, she saw the neat little hole in her captor’s forehead. Blood pooled under his head. She averted her eyes, feeling her breakfast rise in her throat.
“You will come with me.” Blue-shirt’s gun now pointed at her.
“I don’t think so.” A voice spoke from behind Blue-shirt.
Egan stood a few feet away, water dripping all over the dock from his wet clothes. He had a pistol pointed squarely at Blue-shirt.
“Egan! You’re alive!” She skirted Blue-shirt and ran to him, but he sidestepped her embrace.
“Get behind me,” he commanded. He was soaked to the skin. Blood smeared down his shirt, but she couldn’t see a wound.
“You are making big mistake,” Blue-shirt said. “There will be others. I can take her where she will be safe.”
“No,” Egan snapped. “Put the gun on the dock. Barrel first, and step away.”
“And if I do not?”
“Then you can join your friends.”
For the first time since he’d found her, Kellee heard an edge of cold steel in Egan’s voice.
Blue-shirt didn’t take long to think over Egan’s ultimatum. Easing his finger off the trigger, he lowered the gun to the dock.
Egan motioned for Blue-shirt to turn around. When the man’s back was turned, Egan picked up the other gun and stuffed it into his waistband. “Move,” he said. “You’re coming with us.” Without taking his eyes off Blue-shirt, Egan forced him at gunpoint toward the boat. Finding Kellee, he took her hand and pulled her along, too.
****
Onboard the Suzy G, Egan looked out over the gray Atlantic. They were a mile offshore. Enough distance to keep them out the shipping lanes, and still make it difficult for their prisoner to attempt an escape.
He clicked the radio mic into its holder. Paul, the dockmaster, hadn’t been pleased about the mop-up job of two bodies they’d left on the dock near the boat yard, but the former Marine knew how to handle a crisis—he’d be fine. Egan was glad Paul hadn’t been harmed when the Russians stormed the docks. The old guy had been on an errand and missed all the action.
As friends of his uncle’s, Paul and his wife had taken most of the pictures in the album Kellee discovered earlier. Paul had given both Egan and Rory a hard time for enlisting in the Navy instead of the Marines. The rivalry of squid versus grunt was mostly good-natured. Sometimes the disagreements got heated, especially after Rory died, but in the end, Paul always covered Egan’s six.
The double murder mystery would tie up the local police, and it would be a while before they linked any of the dead bodies to Egan or Kellee. They’d been fortunate the scene took place on a late morning during a September weekday. The dock had been deserted. No one had witnessed the killings and near-abduction, which should ensure their anonymity a while longer.
Taking a black marker from a drawer, Egan noted their position on the navigation chart. His thoughts played back the scene on the dock—how it had happened—how he’d failed in his mission to keep Kellee safe.
The first two gunmen must have been hiding between the docked boats, just out of sight, and then snuck in behind them. The third guy in the blue shirt was the joker Egan had seen talking to Kellee at the truck stop. Egan hadn’t finished calling himself all kinds of stupid for not realizing they’d been followed for the last three days. That man had been the one he noticed at breakfast this morning.
Rolling up the chart, he slid it in the holder and turned to check on their unexpected guest. Blue-shirt was stuffed in the tightest corner at the galley table with his hands secured behind his back. The limited mobility ensured the man couldn’t get up, even if he’d wanted to.
Across the table, Kellee held Blue-shirt’s pistol, the business end pointed at the man’s heart. The safety was off. Lucky for him, her trigger finger wasn’t shaking anymore.
Egan forced his mind away from what had almost happened to her. He couldn’t forget the incident completely, but he could compartmentalize it until he was better prepared to deal with the fact that he’d nearly lost her because she’d somehow slipped under his skin without him knowing it. “Put the gun away, Kellee. I don’t think he’s going to try anything.”
“How can you be sure?” Her voice held a mix of anger and fear.
Egan nodded to the blue-gray water around the Suzy G. “We’re a long way from land. Even if he got free, it’ll be a difficult swim with his hands tied behind his back.”
He pocketed the marker and reached out his hand. Kellee hesitated, then placed the pistol in his palm. Flipping on the H&K Mark 23’s safety, he examined the suppressor screwed onto the barrel. A lot could be learned about a man from the type of weapon he carried. This wasn’t a street thug’s .38 special. The .45 ACP made it a deadly assassin’s weapon, a tidbit of intel Egan didn’t shrug off lightly. Putting the gun in a drawer near the wheel, he locked it, and slid the key into his pocket.
Kellee’s eyes flickered between Blue-shirt and the drawer, clearly anxious, but she seemed to hold herself in, keeping her fear from showing. A vise locked around Egan’s heart. Damn, she was one tough woman. She glanced at him and gave him a tentative smile. The vise loosened a little. She would be okay. He’d made a promise to protect her, and he intended to keep it.
Touching the bandaged wound near his temple, he realized how close he’d come to never being there for her again. He was lucky it was a flesh wo
und, even though it had bled pretty good. The pounding he took when he collided with the boat’s hull, hurt worse than the bullet. Fortunately, the cold water had kept him conscious. The sluggish climb up the mooring lines had sapped his strength. When he’d reached the boat and saw Kellee missing, he’d felt his heart stop.
He had refused to believe he’d never see her again. Then he’d spotted the stand-off at the top of the dock. The few seconds it took him to slip back into the water and swim along the dock to surprise the attackers felt like the longest time in his life. Longer than watching Rory die.
Once he’d seen the carnage from the gunfight, he was amazed she hadn’t been shot. She’d made a horrific sight—covered in blood spatter, her face ashen with shock and fright. But she was standing. Relief and undeniable elation sprinted through him that she was alive.
He wasn’t glad simply for O’Neal’s sake either. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, Kellee had wormed her way into his heart. She’d become more than a mission. If it weren’t for more pressing matters, he would have shown her exactly how much more.
Maybe…when this was all over…
With some effort, he dragged his attention back to Blue-shirt. First, they needed some answers—and now they had a source of information. Folding his arms across his chest, Egan asked, “Who are you? Why are you after Kellee?” They’d left two bloody bodies back on the docks. This was no time for niceties.
Blue-shirt eyed Egan. A sneer of antagonism curled his lips, but the wary flicker in his stare revealed awareness of his vulnerable situation. Then his attention settled on Kellee. Sheer male appreciation replaced the wariness.
Egan didn’t like the way he leered at her. His fist tightened and he had to unfold his arms and force his grip to relax. It wasn’t jealousy he felt, but protectiveness. He told himself she was his responsibility. Yeah. Just keep repeating that.
When Blue-shirt spoke, it was directly to Kellee. “You have been discovered. And you should fear for your life.” Through his thick, guttural accent, he sounded utterly sincere. And Russian.
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