by Jodie Bailey
This was either the beginning of a whole new thing in her life or the ending of a friendship she’d come to value more than any other, one that challenged her, pierced her soul and changed her life. Once she confessed everything to Lucas, she’d change their friendship forever. Either into something she’d never known she craved or into ashes. After she’d shoved him away constantly and acted like he was a criminal after he kissed her, she wouldn’t fault him if he ran as far as he could to get away from her.
Lord, give me a chance to explain.
It was coming easier, this praying thing.
She stared across the yard at the empty garage and said another quick prayer for the Camaro’s return. It was all she had left of her brother and, even though he’d proved to be the worst of what everyone thought, he was still the only family she’d had left.
Kristin stretched out the side of her neck and turned to head to the basement to wait for CID with Lucas. Maybe even to talk to him about what would happen next between them.
A movement from the deck stairs turned her head, and a body slammed into her, knocking her to the wide wooden boards below and blasting the breath from her lungs. She gasped and fought the weight that pinned her on her side, shoulder digging painfully into the rough deck board. She tried to see out of her peripheral who her attacker was, but she already knew it had to be William Morrissey.
Fighting a rising panic, she grasped at what she knew. She’d successfully fought him off in the woods, though she’d failed in her kitchen. She was batting .500. Well, that was good enough.
Slackening her shoulder, she gained enough leverage to roll onto her back, freeing her hand and driving it toward Morrissey’s chin. The blow glanced at an angle, and he grunted, leaning away then regrouping fast, slamming something cold and hard against her forehead.
Kristin froze. A pistol. Hard and cold and bruising...pressed to her head.
NINETEEN
Lucas pressed End on the phone and stared at the screen. This couldn’t get much worse.
“Lucas?”
He lifted his head and felt a rush of cold fear. Kristin stood at the top of the stairs, a figure behind her holding the barrel of a pistol to the side of her head.
Her face was white, the lines around her mouth tight as her eyes locked on Lucas.
His body stiffened, and he rocketed to his feet, scanning for anything he could use as a weapon. He jerked a hammer from the weight bench and gripped it hard, his fingers aching with the strain. It was all he had. All he had against a gunman with Kristin helpless.
Her worst nightmare.
And now his.
A man’s voice spoke, and Kristin eased down two stairs as her captor stepped into view behind her.
William Morrissey, his dark eyes trained on Lucas. Gone was the man who’d fought by Lucas’s side overseas, the man whom everyone had believed to be a top-notch soldier. Lucas’s thoughts folded over on themselves, fighting to reconcile this new reality with his past. He kneaded the hammer in his fist, trying to find a way to get Kristin out of danger. Morrissey didn’t want her. He was after what was hidden in her basement walls. “Let her go and I’ll help you get this stuff out of here.”
“I let her go, I have no leverage. You’ll get the stuff out of here to the truck, then we’ll talk.” His voice was hard and matter-of-fact, the voice of a man who’d do anything to get what he wanted. He’d already killed his own platoon mate. He wouldn’t hesitate to take Kristin out, too. “Put down the hammer.”
Lucas cut his eyes to Kristin, who caught his and never turned away, cold panic shifting across her features. The gun at her head had her frozen, the danger likely recalling the worst night of her life.
He set the hammer on the bench, watching Kristin the whole time, trying to ground her in this space, in his presence. In the fact she could trust him.
In the fact she could save herself if she could snap out of this.
He flicked his gaze to the side, away from the gun to Morrissey behind her.
Kristin didn’t move; her expression didn’t change.
Hours passed in the next seconds as Lucas tried to communicate with her as Morrissey watched.
“Enough.” He urged Kristin farther down the stairs, keeping the weapon leveled to the side of her head, his finger on the trigger guard but not yet in firing position.
That was all Lucas needed for now. Kristin wasn’t hearing him, but if he played this right, maybe he could get Morrissey close enough to disarm him. Or to get through to Kristin. “Tell me what to do and we’ll get this over with.” He didn’t trust the other man one bit, knew if he held to past experience, he’d kill them both as soon as they weren’t useful anymore. Kristin was alive now because she was the pawn in this game, the pawn to keep Lucas moving. Once they were done...
Lucas cast a glance at Kristin and tried again. If she heard him, the move was dangerous, but it might be all they had. “You know, you’re brave getting close to her. She tore Cronin apart at the company today.”
Something flashed in Kristin’s expression, but then she swayed and grabbed the stair’s open railing, trying to steady herself.
Morrissey chuckled. “He was too easy on her. If he’d been rougher, she’d have talked sooner and we wouldn’t be here now. He should have—”
His words sliced off as Kristin braced herself against the railing and threw her head backward, connecting with Morrissey’s nose and driving him against the wall.
The gun fell from his hand and bounced off the corner of one of the open stairs before clattering to the cement floor and disappearing beneath the staircase.
Lucas dived for the weapon as the stairs above him shook and thudded, but it had disappeared into the shadows. He couldn’t search long. Kristin needed him. He came to his feet in time to see her land a solid blow to Morrissey’s bleeding nose before he roared and shoved her away.
She staggered down three steps but kept her balance as she skittered backward across the floor. She caught her footing and charged.
“Kristin, don’t!” Lucas lunged toward them. She didn’t need to get in reach of the man again. If he got a hand on her before Lucas could dive in...
But the words weren’t even out of his mouth before a shot cracked and a bullet slammed into the floor at Kristin’s feet.
Morrissey had a second weapon.
Lucas skidded to a stop a few feet from Kristin as she froze.
“Now that I have your attention.” Morrissey kept the gun leveled at Kristin, pain deepening the lines around his eyes as blood streamed from his nose and darkened the front of his black shirt. “Both of you are alive right now because I need you to do the heavy lifting while I keep an eye on her. But, trust me, I won’t hesitate to tear this place apart myself if I have to.”
“I don’t know where Kyle hid anything.” Kristin’s voice was low, her head still turned toward the gun in Morrissey’s hand.
Lucas couldn’t tell if she was frozen in place or faking weak to make a play. From his angle slightly behind her, he couldn’t see her face.
“Looks like you dug some out already, so I’m guessing you know where the rest is, too.” Morrissey turned to Lucas. “She offered you a cut? Never figured you’d go dirty.”
“I didn’t. CID will get everything we’ve found.”
The blow landed. As Morrissey’s fingers tightened around the pistol’s grip, something like panic flashed across his face, but then he strengthened his stance. “I don’t think so. I have to turn it over to some men who aren’t too happy it’s taken this long to get a delivery.”
Lucas’s eyes narrowed. The way he was talking, William Morrissey wasn’t the head of this operation like everybody thought. “You’re a courier, like Coleman was.”
Morrissey’s eye twitched, and he jerked the gun toward the open wal
l. “Start packing that into boxes.”
“You didn’t kill him, did you?” Lucas eased closer to his former soldier, everything coming into focus. If Morrissey had killed Coleman, he wouldn’t have hesitated to kill Kristin. He wasn’t a mastermind. He was a punk running scared. “You made certain you came up hot on the drug test. You wanted out of the country, to come here, where it was safe. Who’s after you?”
Without turning away from Lucas, Morrissey whipped the gun to Kristin, his arm steady. “No more questions.”
“You know, if you didn’t kill Kyle, then—”
“I said get moving!” The roar of his voice blended with the thunder of the pistol firing.
Lucas’s whole body froze, air trapped in his lungs as Kristin dropped to her knees, blood staining the left shoulder of her teal workout shirt. Her eyes locked with his, wide with pain and confusion.
Lucas scrambled to Kristin, pulling his sweatshirt over his head as he banged his knees on the floor. He eased her to lean against the wall and assessed the damage before pressing his sweatshirt tight to her shoulder, trying to get a rein on his anger and fear before they swamped him and dulled his tactical thinking. He had to turn away from her, to find a way to take out William Morrissey before he fired again.
“Back away from her, Sarge. We get moving. Now.”
Lucas ignored him. “Stay with me.” He grabbed Kristin’s right hand and pressed it against the sweatshirt over her wound. “I’ll get us out of this.”
She met him with a hard stare, then shifted her gaze to the right, to the floor beneath the stairs, her expression a silent signal.
Easing back as though he were going to stand, Lucas followed her signal and caught a glint of the pistol Morrissey had dropped earlier, lying near Kristin’s foot, out of his reach.
But not out of hers.
Standing, Lucas eased away from Kristin, lifting his hands in mock surrender. “Tell me what to load the stuff in, but don’t hurt her again.”
Morrissey nodded and jerked his chin toward the far corner of the basement. “Those plastic bins over there. Use them.”
Edging toward the open space between Kristin and the stairs, Lucas nodded. “I’ll do that.” He glanced at Kristin. They had exactly one chance to either end this thing or die trying. He swallowed hard. Everything hinged on the next five seconds. “Now.”
Sweeping her leg, Kristin kicked the pistol from beneath the stair and sent it skittering toward Lucas, who was already diving for it. His fingers closed around the grip as he rolled to one knee, took aim and pulled the trigger.
TWENTY
Kristin eased into the couch cushions and hurled an orange at the front door. The entire world was frustrating.
“Was that really necessary?” Casey bent and retrieved the bruised fruit. “What did vitamin C ever do to you?”
“I can’t even peel an orange.” Kristin threw her good hand into the air. Her whole body ached, but her shoulder and back led the charge with searing, throbbing pain even prescription ibuprofen hadn’t dulled. The doctor had ordered more powerful pain medication, but she didn’t want to touch it. It made her woozy, and woozy was worse than pain any day. The bullet through her shoulder had required surgery, but she wouldn’t believe everything was going to heal properly until she felt the proof. “I hate sitting still.”
“You hate being helpless, you mean.” Dropping onto the couch beside Kristin, Casey peeled the orange and passed over a section. “Good news is you can’t stress eat yourself into a vitamin C overdose. At least not without some help.”
“You’re such an optimist.”
“And you’re such a crank.”
“I’m not cranky.”
“Yes, you are. As cranky as a two-year-old who’s an hour late for nap time.” Casey sectioned the rest of the orange and spread it on a paper towel on the coffee table. “Somehow, I think this is less about pain and more about the fact Lucas isn’t at your bedside anymore.”
Kristin bit her tongue before she protested too much. Lucas had been by her side in the hospital but had gone to work this morning to deal with the fallout from Morrissey’s treachery and the shooting that had left him wounded but recovering.
“Any word about who was behind everything? Who killed your brother and was pulling Morrissey’s strings?”
“No.” Kristin shook her head. “I asked Lucas to run point between me and the cops but...” No news. No word.
And no time alone with him. Doctors and nurses had been in and out at the hospital, and Casey had hardly left her side. When would she get to tell him what had happened in her heart before William Morrissey almost destroyed everything?
She couldn’t rewind to what they’d had before. And after the way he’d kissed her, she was pretty sure he felt the same.
Two taps on the door sent her heart rate so high she was glad the heart monitor at the hospital was no longer in play.
Lucas slipped through the door, his brown eyes sparking with something that swirled in her stomach in the best of ways. “Doing any better than you were this morning?” He swept his beret from his head and shut the door behind him.
It took a second for Kristin to find her voice. Now that she’d opened her heart, she always had to prepare herself to see him. “I was fine this morning.”
“Wrong.” Casey stood and swiped her hands down her jeans as she looked at Lucas. “You going to be here for a while? I have to go in to the office.”
“I don’t need a nurse.”
“Yeah, I’ll hang around.” Lucas winked at Kristin, and her last protest died as Casey slipped into her jacket and out the door without another word.
Kristin winced and watched her go. Clearly, she was taxing enough to send her best friend packing at the first opportunity. “Am I that difficult?”
Lucas threw his jacket over the back of the chair and eased onto the couch beside her, careful not to jostle her shoulder. “Let’s say it’s a good thing I know who you really are when the pain isn’t talking.”
“Sorry.”
“No worries. I can handle you.” He smiled, and Kristin’s stomach quivered. “They found the Camaro.”
It took a second for the shift in his conversation to register. She turned so fast the muscles in her shoulder protested. “Seriously?”
“Safe and sound in a storage unit on Yadkin Road.”
Kristin felt her shoulders ease, some of the tension peeling away with the news. Kyle might have done her wrong, but she still needed a piece of family to help the grief heal. “Who took it?”
Lucas stretched his arms along the back of the sofa, letting his fingers rest in her hair and brush against her neck, sending a warm shudder through her that made her forget all about the pain. “Guy named Arlo Henshaw is the ringleader. He’s been at this for two decades, hitting war-torn countries and selling their antiquities to the highest bidder. And, believe me, there are some high bidders. He dangles cash in front of young soldiers, convinces them these treasures are better off in the hands of people who will care for them and get them out of harm’s way. He’s smooth.”
“And Kyle bought into it?”
His fingers stilled, then moved in slow circles in the hair at the nape of her neck. “So, the car... After Kyle was killed, Morrissey decided to take his place. He failed his drug test on purpose, hoping we’d send him here so he could retrieve what Kyle hid, but he didn’t count on us holding him until we redeployed and then confining him to quarters until he chaptered out. He tried to break in the day after he got out, but it set off your alarm, so he came at you on the trail thinking you were working with Kyle and would talk. When you didn’t, he took your keys and was going to use the clicker on your key ring...”
“But I had the remotes for the alarm disabled.”
“He set off the alarm again, and he di
dn’t want anyone to know he’d been here, so he had to make it seem like a simple robbery. The car key was by the back door and the Camaro was collateral damage.”
Kristin fingered the edge of her sweatshirt, her eyes following the motion of her hands while her gut sank lower, along with her voice. She didn’t want to ask the question, but she had to know. “Who killed Kyle?”
Lucas slipped his hand from her neck and laced his fingers through hers. It was almost enough to make her forget everything else. “Kyle was the receiver. They shipped the things here to him, and he hid them until they found a buyer. The ten grand was a payment before he came home on R & R. He’d have gotten the second half when he delivered, but he never delivered.”
“Greed?”
His fingers tightened around hers. “A bigger payday. He stole from Arlo Henshaw. He was supposed to ship a bunch of the items after we redeployed, but instead, he’d been on the dark web getting buyers of his own. When he didn’t ship out orders on R & R like he was supposed to, Henshaw had Morrissey kill him.” He let go of her hand and laid a finger on her cheek, turning her to face him. “He knew it was risky and they’d come after him, and I’m guessing that’s why he willed the car to you while he was home on R & R, why he made you his beneficiary on his insurance. Some part of him wanted to take care of you.”
She turned away, a sense of peace beyond description washing over the grief that tried to set in. Sure, he’d done a lot she would never be able to explain, but Kyle had tried to reach out to her in the end, even if he’d inadvertently pointed the finger of suspicion at her. She’d survived.
Lucas had insisted once that Kristin had “survived for a reason.” Maybe it had been for this, to bring a killer to justice. Or maybe... She turned her head, muscles trembling with the weight of what she was about to do, and eyed Lucas, who was watching her with concern. “Maybe it’s you.”
His expression darkened, the skepticism heavy. “Maybe it’s me what?”
“I’m here for a reason. You said it yourself.” Baring her soul was harder than she’d thought it would be, even to the man who’d unlocked the door in the first place. “The other night, before we tore apart the basement, I had a long talk with Jesus. There’s a reason I’m still here. Maybe the reason, or part of it, is...”