“It sounds like an angry man’s revenge,” Calvin agreed.
Jackson gave a thumbs-up. Hannigan quieted.
“And Oliver, Jonathan and Mark haven’t seen anything suspicious at the Averys’?” Calvin asked, referencing his notepad.
“No. When and if they do, they’re supposed to call me. Until then they check in with me through text.” To prove the statement true, Nikki pulled up Oliver’s latest text from that morning and showed the detective. He waved it off as unnecessary.
“There’s an all-points bulletin out on Andrew and the two from the coffee shop, but there’s no clue as to where any of them went or have been staying,” Calvin said. “We got an image of one of the men from the security camera and ran it through the system, but so far nothing has come up. As for Andrew, I can’t find anything on him, either. But knowing the history between you and him, I’m not surprised.”
Nikki gave him a questioning look.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
The detective ran a hand under his chin, thoughtful while simultaneously not happy with the thoughts he was having.
“This man sounds like he’s been nursing a wicked grudge against you for a long time,” Jackson answered instead. “Which means he’s had just as long to plan it.”
Calvin nodded in agreement.
“Which means catching him might not be that simple,” the detective said. “The only lead we have is Ronald Dabney.”
“Ronald Dabney?” Nikki asked. She didn’t recognize the name.
“The dead man in your tub,” Hannigan interjected a little too harshly. Maybe he was still bitter about last night.
“But who is he?” Jackson asked, sitting straighter in his chair.
“A local narcotics dealer who, like Redstone Solutions, usually deals with a wealthier clientele,” Calvin answered. “Basically, not one to break into a woman’s apartment and beat her under someone else’s direction without some pretty heavy incentive.”
“I never knew the bottom of Andrew’s pockets,” Nikki said. “But I think it’s safe to assume by the myriad of sports cars he drove to work, he wasn’t hurting for money.”
“Great,” Jackson said. “So potentially, this man has been planning for years, has unlimited resources and isn’t afraid to let you know he’s after you.” He gave Nikki a look that she couldn’t describe or define. “When Jonathan said this job could get exciting, I thought he was just trying to be friendly.”
Nikki wanted to smile, wanted to crack a joke to help the mood, but the gravity of the situation was starting to settle. Jackson’s expression softened.
“So what’s the plan?” he asked, directing the question to Calvin. “What do we do now?”
Calvin looked between Nikki and the bodyguard before he let out a long exhalation.
“We will find Andrew and his gunmen,” he said. Then he pointed at Jackson. “And looks like your boss just became your first client.”
* * *
NIKKI’S PHONE WAS lighting up like a Christmas tree by the time Calvin had explained in excruciating detail how important it was for Nikki to stay cautious. She looked at the caller ID and saw it was Kelli’s extension at Orion, which immediately put her on alert. She excused herself to the empty break room and answered. “Hey.”
“Don’t you ‘hey’ me, Nikki Waters,” Kelli said, voice pitched high. “You tell me right now what happened last night at your apartment.” Nikki didn’t respond fast enough before the pregnant woman was on her again. “And before you make up some nonsense, know that Mrs. Garner called the office to make sure you were okay.”
Nikki gritted her teeth. Of course her neighbor, an elderly woman keen on gossip, would call to ask what had happened. There was probably crime-scene tape still up across her door. Just as she was about to flounder out a response, Nikki’s stomach dropped. If Andrew was really set to take her down, wouldn’t Orion be on the list of places he’d go?
“Kelli, I want you to leave the office now,” she said, angry that she hadn’t thought about Kelli’s safety until then. “Leave now and call me when you get into your car.”
Bless her, Kelli listened without a fight. It hadn’t been too long ago that Kelli was in her own world of danger. While she waited for the call from Kelli’s cell, Nikki watched through the break room’s window as Jackson followed the newly arrived Reardon from the conference room to down the hall opposite her. To where, she wasn’t sure. Her phone lit up again.
“Okay, in my car,” Kelli answered, skipping a hello. “Where do you want me to go?”
“Home,” Nikki said. “And lock your doors, grab your gun and call your husband home.”
“You know I’m going to ask you to elaborate,” Kelli replied, voice going calm rather than erratic. Her ability to focus when needed was a skill not many possessed. Nikki had always respected that.
“It’s starting to look like Andrew Miller might be trying to hurt me, and I’m not so sure he won’t use the place and people I care about against me.” Nikki decided if the woman asked for even more details Nikki would comply, but Kelli didn’t. She’d heard the bottom line and knew she was a part of the people who might be caught in the cross fire. If there were any. Nikki was still having a hard time really accepting that Andrew’s vendetta against her was real.
I’m not that important.
“And what about the Averys?” Kelli asked. “When Mark tells the boys what’s going on, you know they won’t stay.”
Nikki rubbed the back of her neck. She winced at the soreness still in her side.
“Jackson thinks the Averys were a distraction to get me alone. I don’t think Andrew knew we’d hired Jackson yet, either. And,” Nikki dropped her voice to a whisper, “I can’t help thinking that that fact has already saved me twice in two days.”
Kelli sucked in a breath. She was worried. “Do you need anything right now? Where are you even?”
“We’re at the police station and no, I’m not going to stay at your house tonight, so don’t offer,” Nikki said, already knowing that was what the other woman was going to ask next. “I can stay with Jackson tonight.” The pregnant woman gave her a pregnant silence. “I want to use Andrew’s lack of knowledge on him as an advantage,” Nikki reasoned. Though she couldn’t deny she felt her cheeks heat a bit. Not to mention, she hadn’t even asked the bodyguard yet. “But you can do me a favor and call all active agents and staff and let them know that the office is closed until further notice. That includes you and the boys. No one goes in until this is resolved.”
Nikki imagined Kelli nodding.
“Stay safe, Nikki, and keep me updated.”
“You, too.”
The call ended. Soon her closest friends would know that Andrew hadn’t just stopped by to ruffle her feathers. Soon they would all be headed back to Dallas to help stop him, despite her desire to keep them out of harm’s way. Soon those she loved would try to stop a man from their past from destroying her future.
Nikki exhaled.
Her relatively quiet life was about to become very loud.
Chapter Ten
Jackson and Reardon weren’t in the building.
Nikki walked past the chief’s closed office door and the filing room and found herself at the back door of the station. No one stopped her or called to her, so she opened the door, not really expecting the two men to be in the little alleyway. However, that was exactly where they were.
“—buddy of mine’s dad. Good man,” Reardon was saying before the door banged against the brick. He turned to Nikki and she went on alert. Unmistakable anger was rolling off him. His shoulders were squared, his nostrils flared. Jackson, on the other hand, facing her over Reardon’s shoulder, was a blank slate.
“Why don’t you give us a minute?” Reardon nearly snarled. Nikki threaded her a
rms across her chest and walked around him to Jackson’s side.
“No,” she said. “I don’t see why that’s necessary.”
If it had been Calvin, she would have trusted him enough to ask why instead of flat-out refusing, but there was no reason that she could come up with as to why Reardon, a beat cop, would have Jackson out back in the privacy of an alley. Especially when he seemed to be so upset.
“Oh, come on, Mom,” Reardon mock whined. “We were just having some fun.”
Nikki shared a look with Jackson. He didn’t look like he was having fun. She hadn’t known him long, but she could guess that he, like everyone else, had a breaking point and Reardon had been trying to find it.
“Whatever you need to say to Mr. Fields, I’m sure you can say it in front of me,” she said, voice even. “Unless it isn’t police business. If that’s the case, then you’ll just have to be professional and wait until you’re off the clock.”
Reardon’s eyes narrowed at Jackson.
“So, what? You let a woman fight your battles for you?” he asked, voice rising. “Why don’t you say something?”
“You didn’t bring me here to talk,” Jackson said, his tone chilling. Reardon looked momentarily surprised. Jackson snorted. “What? You think you’re the only cop to try to ‘show me what justice looks like’? I’ve been dealing with people like you since I was nineteen.”
“People like me?” Reardon asked. Nikki didn’t like how he’d taken a step closer. Jackson didn’t seem to care.
“Authority figures who use justice as an excuse to be total dicks.”
Reardon threw the punch so fast that Nikki didn’t process it until Jackson stumbled backward, holding his jaw. He didn’t fall. He also didn’t break eye contact with the cop.
“You have no right to call anyone anything after what your family did,” Reardon roared. “Your dad was crazy and you’re no better than—”
Two things happened at once.
Calvin yelled, “What’s going on?” down the hallway, the door still open into the alley, at the same time Nikki realized she’d had enough.
Her entire world had been shaken up around her the last few days, and the only person who had stuck by her side, even though she hadn’t wanted him there, was being treated like he was the bad guy again.
Nikki reared back, made a fist and delivered it to the cop’s right eye.
No one, and to some degree not even Nikki, had expected the punch. Reardon didn’t move an inch before he took the hit. Everything seemed to freeze. A single moment of clarity rang through her head.
I just hit a cop.
That thought was quickly replaced by another truth.
Worth it.
Then time sped back up and more things happened at the same time.
Reardon recovered and turned on Nikki, rage clear on his face. Calvin grabbed the beat cop before he could lunge just as Jackson’s arms wound themselves around Nikki, pulling her backward. She’d realize later that it must have looked like she wanted to take another swipe at the man. And maybe she did.
“What on God’s green Earth is going on?” Calvin yelled, pulling Reardon even farther away.
Reardon was still struggling when he answered, “She hit me!”
“He deserved it,” Nikki yelled back.
“That, I don’t doubt,” Calvin said. “But right now we have bigger issues to deal with.” He pushed Reardon off him. His tone was so sharp that the beat cop’s attention turned to the detective. Jackson let go of Nikki. “One of the patrols that went to look for the gunmen isn’t responding and we just got a report of shots fired in the area.” Calvin pointed to Nikki and Jackson but spoke to Reardon. “So your issue with them just ended. Go do your damn job.”
Reardon, despite his personality, listened. He ran back into the station without a sideways glance to the woman who had probably given him a black eye. Calvin turned to her. “Do you have a safe place to lie low until we get a better hold on this Andrew thing?”
“She can stay with me,” Jackson answered without skipping a beat. Calvin looked to Nikki for an okay. She nodded.
“Give Dispatch your address and we’ll send a car over when we figure out what’s going on.” Calvin didn’t say anything more. They followed him back inside before he shut the door behind them. Then he was gone. He had a job to do.
* * *
JACKSON DIDN’T SAY much on the cab ride to his apartment. He kept his eyes forward and mouth shut.
Nikki, normally not one to shy away from starting an uncomfortable conversation, respected the silence. She hadn’t meant to disrespect Jackson’s honor, or whatever it was that was making him quiet, by hitting the cop. She’d just... Well, she’d had enough.
Jackson deserved better, and in that moment, she’d believed shutting up Ryan Reardon would somehow achieve that.
Nikki hid her hands beneath the bag she’d packed the night before and rubbed the knuckles of her right hand. Like her side, it hurt. She mused that Jonathan would have been proud, regardless. He’d been the one who insisted on training her on the punching bag last year.
Kelli called and confirmed she was home just as the cab stopped in front of an apartment complex not too far from a British-style pub Nikki had been to a few times with Jonathan and his girlfriend, Kate. As they got out onto the sidewalk facing the front of the faux-stone beige building, she thought about mentioning the fun fact, but Jackson started to walk toward the front doors without a word. Nikki followed just as silently.
They went through the lobby, rode the elevator up to the second floor and walked the length of the hallway until Jackson stopped at 44B. He pulled out his key, unlocked the door and held it open for her. Nikki slipped inside, trying to find a phrase or string of perfectly placed words to fix whatever she’d broken. It was true, Jackson Fields annoyed her to some degree and they’d gotten off on the wrong foot, but now it bothered her that it bothered her that he was upset. How could a man affect her like this in such a short time of knowing him?
The bodyguard locked the door behind her, took the bag from her hand and put it down on a small table. For the first time since the alley, he turned to face her.
“Listen, Jackson,” she started, no longer able to stand the quiet. “I’m sorr—”
Jackson grabbed her face and crushed his lips against hers. The momentum of the kiss pushed Nikki’s back flush against the door, but the man didn’t pull away.
And Nikki realized she wasn’t pulling away, either.
His lips were warm and rough and gentle and strong all at the same time. A maddening combination that had both frozen Nikki in place and set her body ablaze. The heat was fast and nearly all-consuming. It thawed her lips but seconds too late to reciprocate.
Jackson pulled away, lips red and eyes hooded.
“Sorry,” he breathed, voice husky. His hands dropped to her sides, his body still close enough for her to feel her own heat bouncing off. “No one’s ever defended me before.”
It was such a simple, innocent statement that Nikki felt her heart squeeze. Her lips pulled up to one side.
“I guess I should punch cops more often,” she joked, breath also coming out lower than normal. The heat that had shot through her body found its way to her cheeks. Still, she didn’t look away. In fact, she stood right where she was as Jackson angled his head down again. One of his hands dropped to her hip. The other pushed back into her hair.
Nikki closed her eyes, ready this time for the bodyguard, when the other bodyguards of her life interrupted. Her phone blared to life. The moment between her and the man with a storm raging in his eyes dissolved. Jackson smiled, almost apologetic, and broke contact with her. He bent to grab the bag he’d put on the table and walked ahead into the living room.
Nikki looked at the caller ID and sighed. It was Mark. She
knew it was only a matter of seconds before Jonathan’s and Oliver’s calls would come in.
She watched Jackson’s retreating form with such a strong flood of disappointment that it surprised her. There had never really been room in her life for anything other than Orion and work. She hadn’t minded at first. Finding a way to deal with Morgan’s death and her hand in it had taken up what she thought was already-owed time. Then Oliver’s, Mark’s and Jonathan’s respective happiness had made her rethink the idea that she had to be alone. So she’d started to try. Friends set her up and she’d gone to karaoke and even the disastrous speed-dating event with Andrew Miller’s surprise appearance.
Yet...
It wasn’t until she watched Jackson walk away, her lips still warm, that she felt the full force of her loneliness.
Clearing her throat, she answered the phone.
* * *
JACKSON EXCUSED HIMSELF to the shower while Nikki answered several incoming calls. Partly because he had been wearing the same clothes since the fight at her apartment and partly because he needed to cool down.
Where did that kiss come from? he wondered.
The water, cold for good measure, ran across his body. It was true that even before his father had snapped, Jackson’s life had already been fractured. His mother, the only other family he’d had, had passed away when he was just old enough to remember loving her. After her death, his father hadn’t tried to fill the role of the caring parent. Jackson could never fault him, though. He’d worked long hours to provide for them. So what if when he’d come home he’d yell and drink and remind Jackson of all his faults? He’d provided. But then Christian Fields took his guns into the local police station and killed eleven men and women before he was killed himself.
Jackson turned the water off.
A guilt he tried to convince himself wasn’t there swam around him like the water circling the drain. He flashed back to Nikki’s claw-foot tub, the tile floor covered in red wine and Ronald Dabney holding the naked woman up by her hair. His hand curled into a fist.
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