by Debra Webb
She glared at him. “Actually, it’s not. I’m a hostage. That makes you a criminal. You’re either crazy or you have some other motive. Like my uncle’s money.”
Anger simmered in his gut. “I have no interest in your uncle’s money.”
“Too bad. That means you’re crazy.”
“Possibly.” He’d been told that a time or two.
“Why would Teddy say you’re an old enemy of my father’s?”
“No idea.” That was the one truth he could tell her up front. “I didn’t know your father.”
She didn’t say anything else for a while. The Winchester exit was coming up. He checked the directions on his phone. Less than half an hour to the location Keaton had arranged.
He had plenty of gas and enough bottles of water and snacks to get by. Good thing. He couldn’t risk a stop. She might try something and he would not hurt her in any way. His gut warned that she was very much aware of this and that was why she remained fairly calm. The situation was not exactly to his advantage.
“My uncle wouldn’t just suddenly come home unless he was very worried.” She crossed one leg over the other. Her foot tapped against the console. “He must be certain that you pose a threat of some sort.”
Linc posed a threat to her so-called uncle, all right. He’d like nothing better than to see that bastard dead. But Linc had no desire to spend twenty-to-life in prison for ridding the world of a scumbag. He stole a sideways glance at Lori. He had better plans for the next twenty-to-life.
“You have my word,” Linc promised, “that you’re safe with me.” He would die before he’d let her be hurt again in this lifetime.
“Woo-hoo. I feel safer already. I’ll just sit back and enjoy the road trip.”
That worked for Linc.
Five minutes passed before she broke her silence again. “No matter what you say, he wouldn’t say that for no reason.”
“He wants you to be afraid of me.” Maybe that was saying too much, but Linc didn’t want her getting unreasonably scared or anxious.
“If you didn’t know my father, how does my uncle know you?”
She watched him, probably looking for hints of deception. “We met during a joint venture back in L.A.” Linc skated on thin ice here. He shouldn’t have said so much, but there was no other way to logically answer the question.
“My uncle travels a lot so he may have very well done business on the West Coast,” she allowed, her voice stiff with frustration. “But I can’t imagine what sort of venture the two of you would have shared. He deals in priceless antiques and artwork. You don’t seem like the kind of guy who likes old things.”
Linc focused on the driving directions before answering her question. Getting lost wasn’t on his agenda. He followed the main street through a sleepy little town called Huntland until the street gave way to a county road that forged a path through farmland. The pastures and fields quickly turned to thick woods as the road narrowed, hugging the mountain on one side and skirting a deep, wooded gulley on the other. Keaton had been right about this place being isolated. All Linc could see for miles were trees and the rocky mountainside.
“Are you ignoring me?”
“I bought the Reid house, didn’t I?” That was damned sure old.
“I suspect you had a hidden agenda for that one.”
He glanced at her. She was angry. Her chin thrust out and her arms stayed crossed. A smile pulled at his lips. Typical Lori. “You can’t prove that.”
She arrowed him a furious glare. “I think this is sufficient proof.” A hiss of disbelief accompanied a shake of her head.
“You’re going to have to trust me.”
“I don’t think so.”
Something in her voice had changed. Tension rippled through Linc, putting him on a higher state of alert. “There are some things I’m not at liberty to disclose at this point,” he offered, in hopes of defusing this new agitation he sensed in her. “As soon as I have the go-ahead, you’ll know everything.”
She turned in the seat to face him. “I’m tired of waiting.”
MIA DIDN’T WAIT FOR MORE hedging from Reece. She released her seat belt and dove under the steering wheel. He’d put the gun under the seat. If she could grab it—
He snagged the back of her T-shirt and tried to pull her up. She fought the pull, groped beneath the seat. She had to get the gun. It was the only way to stop him.
The SUV weaved precariously.
Her fingers touched the cold, hard butt of the weapon. He yanked harder. The neck of the T-shirt choked her. She ignored it. She had to get the gun.
Got it! Her fingers tightened on the barrel.
The SUV bumped something and he abruptly released her. Then it tilted and her heart all but stopped. The vehicle was going over the shoulder.
She tried to raise up, but Reece held her down.
The SUV bucked and rocked and Mia screamed. Her hold on the weapon slipped. But right now, grabbing the gun took second place to getting out of this truck alive.
And then, as if the fates mocked her, the SUV plunged forward.
Mia could barely inhale a breath before they hit something and the vehicle came to a jarring stop, pitching her forward. A pop echoed in the truck, and glass shattered. The back of her head banged the underside of the dash as fragments of glass pelted her back.
The world went eerily silent…until Reece swore.
Mia blinked, tried to clear her head. White powder floated down around her like snow.
Strong fingers fisted in her T-shirt and dragged her up. Too late she remembered to reach for the gun.
Reece surveyed her, his gaze frantic. “Are you hurt?”
She stared at him a moment. Maybe she was shaken up or maybe it was the canted position of the SUV, but she couldn’t assimilate an answer. The vehicle was pointed nose down. The windshield was shattered. Trees were all around them. Two huge white balloonlike things lay shriveled and impotent on the steering wheel and the dash. Airbags, she realized.
They’d crashed.
“Lori!” He shook her. “Are you hurt?”
She stared at him again. “What?”
He yanked free of his seat belt. His hands were suddenly all over her, roving every inch of her body.
She slapped his hands away. “What the hell are you doing?”
He swiped at his forehead with the back of his hand. Blood smeared across his brow. “Are you hurt?” he demanded again.
Mia performed a quick inventory. She was shaking inside but felt no pain. “I’m okay.” She reached toward his head but fell short of touching him. “You’re the one who’s hurt.” This was her fault. What had she been thinking? They could have been killed.
“It’s nothing.”
He tried to open the driver’s side door, but it didn’t budge. He rammed it with his shoulder, once, twice. The door whined as it opened. He climbed out, reached to the floorboard and retrieved his gun.
Mia felt like a fool. She wrenched the handle of her door, but it too failed to budge. She swore, something she rarely did. Ramming her shoulder into the door accomplished nothing but a pain in her arm.
“I can’t get out.” She looked over the seat at Reece, who was back there doing something.
He moved to the driver’s door. “Climb out this way.” He offered his hand.
A backpack was slung over his shoulder. Blood wasn’t dripping down his forehead but the cut was bloody. She needed her first aid kit. She glanced at his outstretched hand. He’d put new bandages on his fingers. The image of her hand sander lying on the floor amid all that broken glass flashed among the other jumbled thoughts and pictures in her brain.
She took his hand and allowed him to help her out. Emotion churned inside her. She wasn’t sure whether she should cry or scream.
Her feet and legs sank into waist-deep underbrush. She looked up at where the road was supposed to be and she gasped. They’d bumped over that shoulder and barreled down a grassy ditch that widened and deepene
d into a tree-infested ravine.
It was a flat-out miracle they hadn’t been killed.
Her knees buckled.
Reece caught her before she went facedown in the bush. He steadied her. “You sure you’re okay?”
She stared up into his eyes and realized she felt completely safe with him holding her. It felt safe and…familiar.
The gun in his waistband grazed her stomach, shattering the confusing sensations. She jerked out of his hold, swayed but quickly steadied herself. “I told you I’m fine.” She turned her attention back to where the road should be, but it wasn’t actually visible from here. The only thing on her mind right now was getting up there and getting help.
Mia plowed through the brush and started the long climb to the top of the ravine. She grabbed handfuls of the wild plant life to pull her way upward.
Reece stayed right behind her.
Mia didn’t give one flip. As soon as she reached the road she was going to run as fast as she could back toward that little town they’d passed through.
She didn’t care if he chased her or shot her.
She was running.
Chapter Eleven
Reece reached the road first.
He waited for Mia.
Out of breath, she dragged herself up to the rocky shoulder. Any notion that she was in shape went out the proverbial window. Catching her breath would be essential before making a run for it. She swiped her hands on her jeans and looked around. They were in the middle of nowhere! The mountain bellied up to the pavement on one side of the road; the gulley gutted the other side. Trees camouflaged everything else, including the sky, but it was daylight. Barely.
“This way.”
Mia spun on her heel and stared in disbelief at the man who’d dragged her all this way. “I don’t know what you’re thinking! We are in the middle of nowhere! The car is destroyed and town is miles back that way.” She hitched her thumb in the direction opposite the one he’d chosen. “Whatever scheme you were planning you need to rethink the situation. It’s over.” She took a breath and started toward town.
Stupidly she had hovered on some mental fence about whether to feel sorry for him or come to terms with the idea that he was off his rocker. She’d sat like a zombie in the passenger seat while he’d driven for two hours. How could she have been so thick-skulled? So delusional? He was not some poor guy in need of her sympathy and support. No matter that he’d suffered as she had, lost so much, he wasn’t to be trusted.
Even as her brain latched onto that conclusion, her heart balked. What was wrong with her? Stockholm syndrome, apparently. Not that she would have jumped out of a moving vehicle, but at least she could’ve tried harder to talk some sense into him.
Idiot.
Strong arms wrapped around her. “I said this way.”
Before she could wrench loose, Reece had flung her over his shoulder and started marching in the other direction, away from town.
Mia screamed. Then she pounded his back, for all the good it did with the danged backpack in the way. He held her legs firmly against his chest.
“Scream all you want.” He tightened his hold. “No one’s going to hear.”
He was right. She snapped her mouth shut. Trees were all she could see. The neglected road was deserted and silence was the only sound for miles.
She growled ferociously and thumped his back with both fists. Every swear word she’d ever heard and some she hadn’t even realized she knew gushed off her tongue as if she’d spent the last year living on a ship filled with salty sailors. When she’d exhausted her crude vocabulary, she sucked in a desperate, frustrated breath.
“That was interesting.”
Her eyes bulged with another blast of anger and she cut loose with a second tirade.
“Guess that quiet, naive artisan persona wasn’t the real you.”
Exhausted with struggling and yelling, she couldn’t summon an adequate comeback. Instead, she slumped against him, one cheek pressed against the canvas backpack, her face crammed into his shirt and the taut body it clung to. She hated how her own body reacted to his male scent. And it had to be all him, no cologne could possibly smell that naturally sexy. Dammit. Dammit. Dammit.
Fury boiled in her belly. She was a hostage and she couldn’t even muster the proper reaction. In spite of all this, she wasn’t afraid of him hurting her. If that had been his intent he certainly could have done so already.
It was official. He wasn’t crazy. She was.
Maybe it had been so long since she had experienced any excitement in her life that she was desperate for it. Or, more likely, the brain damage she’d suffered had stolen her ability to distinguish good from bad, intelligent from imprudent.
The sound of gravel crunching beneath his shoes snagged her attention. Mia raised her head to stare at the road, and a frown tugged her lips downward. He’d turned off the paved road onto dirt and gravel. Before she could demand an explanation, he bent forward and settled her onto her feet.
He restrained her arm with his hand to ensure she didn’t try running. She wasn’t going to waste her time. Paying attention to the details of their route was far more important. When she managed an escape she would need to remember the route. Mia had never been to this part of Tennessee. This far south they were probably very close to the Alabama state line. Truth was, she didn’t travel much at all. Occasionally she went to South America with her uncle but always on his plane, and never for a minute was she out of his sight.
She stumbled but Reece caught her. Their gazes bumped and she realized something while she looked into those concerned blue eyes. She wasn’t really living. No relationship knocks, no falling, emotionally or otherwise, no nothing. She was just poor, sweet little Mia. Fragile Mia. The one who needed looking after.
Her lips tightened with resentment and anger. She yanked her arm free of Reece’s hold. “What do you want from me?”
Surprise, then confusion crossed his face.
“Just spell it out. Do you want something from me or from my uncle?”
For a moment Reece simply stared at her. Then he said, “I want him to pay for what he’s done.”
Mia lifted her chin defiantly. “So this is about money.” Disappointment dropped like a rock into her stomach. She was a fool for believing on any level that this man was basically good.
Reece shook his head. “His money has nothing to do with my motives. I want him to finally answer for his crimes.”
Crimes? “What’re you talking about?” She planted her fists on her hips. “I doubt my uncle has so much as an outstanding parking ticket.” His accusation was completely off the wall.
Reece started walking again, just turned his back and kept going.
Mia stormed after him, the gravel crunching under her shoes. “He hasn’t committed any crimes,” she said, but Reece didn’t slow down. “Are you listening to me?”
“Your uncle is a dangerous man.” Reece said this without so much as a glance at her and with hardly any emotion in his tone. That part wasn’t exactly out of character.
“I don’t believe you.” She walked faster to match his stride. The whole town of Blossom loved Vincent Lopez. A whole town couldn’t be wrong. Mia wasn’t wrong. This man—this stranger out of nowhere—was wrong.
“I can’t fix that.”
Fix that? Was he insinuating something about her loss of memory? Or her intelligence level? “I don’t need you to fix anything.”
Reece stopped and turned to face her, effectively blocking her path. “That didn’t come out right.”
She wanted to tell him where to go but she just stared into those dark blue eyes. They drew her, made her want to keep looking until she was lost inside him…was a part of him. Yes, she was definitely crazy.
“The man you know as Vincent Lopez is a wanted fugitive and I will bring him to justice.”
Mia moved back a step. Reece couldn’t be serious. “That’s impossible.” The entire concept was ludicrous. Who was this m
an? He’d shown up in her life, made her like him and now he told her this. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Like I said,” he grumbled as he started up the gravel road once more, “I can’t fix this. I don’t even know how to begin to make you see.”
She considered turning around and running the other way but she couldn’t. Reece had to understand. Her uncle had saved her, had been there for her when no one else was. She owed him everything.
“Vincent Lopez supports dozens of charities.” She lengthened her stride to keep up with Reece. “Before he returned to Blossom, the town was dying. He brought it back to life. The people here see him as a hero. I see him as a hero.”
“Have you ever wondered why he spends so much time in South America?”
Mia wished the canopy of trees would open up and let the morning sun through. She hugged her arms around herself. A chill had invaded her bones in spite of the uphill trek. “He has family there and he specializes in—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Reece marched onward, his determined strides matching his tone. “Antiques and art. Doesn’t that seem a little clichéd to you?”
His responses confused her. Vince shipped all sorts of beautiful pieces from South America. Some he sold in Blossom’s shops, others went to buyers all over the country. Mia had marveled over many of them. “Nothing you said makes sense to me.” Another concept materialized in her whirling thoughts. “Are you a cop?” Had he mentioned his occupation? At the moment she couldn’t remember. “Not anymore.”
She hurried to get in front of him, almost lost her footing in the loose gravel. “You used to be a cop?” He’d said that he and her uncle had worked a joint venture in L.A. That couldn’t be. The man she knew, who had dragged her back to the land of the living, wouldn’t be involved in criminal activity.
“In L.A.”
Something like apprehension logjammed her throat. She stood very still, waiting for it to pass. A few yards ahead she could see part of a roof. Reece kept going in that direction.
She didn’t want to go.
Mia’s feet seemed to mire in the dirt and gravel, sinking into an imaginary muck. Every instinct warned that if she kept going, that if she listened to anything more Reece had to say, her life would be turned upside down. She had worked so hard to rebuild her life. Starting over again felt insurmountable…overwhelming.