Taming Deputy Harlow

by Jennifer Morey

  Who lived here and did they have an obsession with security? The only way in or out was through the doors in front, and she saw those were thick and made of metal. The windows were probably bulletproof.

  Holcomb took her from Bishop, grabbing her arm and walking with her to the first door on the right in the hall. The door was open and she spotted a tall, big, lean man sitting behind a huge black desk with four monitors on it. One side of the office was lined with more monitors, each showing varying scenes, none of them of this structure. He looked at her through pale blue eyes. He kept his hair slicked back and wore a giant gold ring and thick chain.

  Reese wondered if he was stuck back in the eighties.

  He stood. Nothing changed on his face. He seemed to view the world with the same impassive regard. Not glad. Not sad. Not friendly. Not angry. Just...his way.

  “You may leave us now,” he said to Holcomb in an Eastern European accent.

  Holcomb left, shutting the door behind him. The man before her studied her without rushing. His intimidating way threatened her calmness.

  “So, this is the woman who captured Jamie Knox’s heart.”

  She decided to play along with his veiled cordiality. Show no fear.

  “You appear to know me, but I don’t know you,” she said.

  His brow rose. “Jamie did not tell you of me?”

  She didn’t reply. Let him think what he would.

  “He is very sure of his security. Did he not consider I might not take kindly to his meddling in my affairs?”

  What was he talking about? What business did this man have with Jamie? Jamie had left Aesir International. Why would he come after them now? Revenge?

  “What do you want from me? Why are you here? Jamie said he no longer works for you.” She left out all he’d actually told her.

  “So he has told you something of me.” He smiled in a calculating way, superior and knowing. “Come.” He turned. “Have a seat. We have much to discuss.”

  She trailed him to a seating area. “Have you lived here long?” She sat on a chair across from him, sure she had little chance of escaping with Bishop and Holcomb in the house.

  “I am only staying here. I searched for the perfect place and invited myself in.” He looked around. “Quite appropriate, don’t you think?”

  His accent gave him an air of sophistication, but the look in his eyes told a much darker story. Caution should be exercised when dealing with this man. And his self-invitation must not have been welcome. What happened to the owners?

  “It’s different.” She glanced around. The walls had been finished but it seemed odd to build into a mountain if national security wasn’t at risk.

  “Jamie has taken great pains to shield you from the truth of his association with me.”

  Reese slid her gaze to him, preparing herself for his version of Jamie Knox. Did she want to hear it?

  He crossed his legs and elevated his head with an air of superiority. “Did he tell you he left the Army to join my company?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he tell you why?” He lowered his head, eyes piercing and hard.

  “He said you must have viewed his reason as rebellion. He left the Army honorably.”

  Some of his hardness eased and he leaned back against the chair, uncrossing his legs. “The appearance of honor is of great importance to Jamie. I learned that about him very shortly after hiring him. It’s one of his flaws. Jamie had a thirst for danger that was not quenched during his enlistment. He craved third-world chaos. Some soldiers come to me for work because chaos is the only way of life they know. Not Jamie. Jamie came to me so he could unleash the animal inside him.”

  That didn’t sound like Jamie. Jamie had a soft side, a side that liked to charm women, make love and save lives rather than take them.

  “What I am certain he left out of his narration is the many missions he participated in where the innocent got in the way. They are what you would call collateral damage in the fight for world peace.” He seemed so unruffled, and perhaps arrogant.

  “Jamie wouldn’t kill innocent people.”

  “Ask him yourself if you do not believe me. He told you how I framed him, yes?”

  She didn’t respond but her eyes must have betrayed her.

  Stankovich’s eyes smiled in affirmation. “He did, I see. It is true. I did frame him, but only for his own good. He struggled with his real identity, the man who needs chaos. He is pretending to have changed. Going to work for that righteous crusader, taking up with you as though he means to begin a family.” Stankovich scoffed. “He is fooling himself. I may have been too hard on him, but he will never survive in such a domesticated life.”

  Some of what he said touched on truth. How well did she really know Jamie? How well did he really know himself? How could he go from such a dangerous profession to an office job that might require occasional travel? He’d always be in an executive management role. He would no longer have to go into the field. Stankovich might have the intentional-violence part wrong, but he may not have the family-man part wrong.

  “Jamie worked for me for nearly three years. Toward the end of that time, he participated in missions in Iraq. One mission in particular became challenging from the moment the men landed. The insurgents learned they would arrive and were waiting. They were attacked. My men fought back. Unfortunately, the insurgents used women and children as shields. They were forced to shoot them all to secure the area.”

  Jamie had shot women and children? “I don’t believe you.”

  He waved out a hand, indicating her belief or disbelief didn’t matter. “Ask Jamie. If he is honest, he will tell you he had to shoot women and children to reach the insurgents and stop them from causing more harm.”

  Reese could no longer hold back her reaction. She put her hand to her mouth and looked away. What this man implied about Jamie was appalling. She couldn’t believe it, but it could have happened. He may not have wanted to kill innocents, but he may have been forced.

  “I am sorry to have told you this.”

  Growing angry now, she dropped her hand and turned to him. “Why are you then?”

  “You should know the truth.”

  “A human trafficker worked for you. Do you really expect me to believe you?”

  “I make no excuses for who I am.”

  But Jamie did? “Why did you bring me here?”

  “Two reasons. To see if Jamie loves you. And two, to kill him.”

  He said it so matter-of-factly she had a terrible glimpse into the way this man lived. Criminal. No value for life. Power. Control.

  “Why does it matter if he loves me?” Love? Did Jamie love her? If she wasn’t in this situation the shock would have knocked her off her feet.

  “Oh, it matters a great deal.” Stankovich’s eyes took on a zealous gleam. “You see, the one thing I aspire most to gain from all of this is Jamie Knox’s suffering.”

  “Why did Bishop try to kill us then?”

  Stankovich didn’t give her an answer, but his eyes narrowed enough to reveal whatever drove him fueled angry emotion.

  Jamie had taken from him and now he’d have his vengeance. What would become of her? And Jamie...

  Despite reeling from the possibility he could already love her, knowing in her heart he could, an even bigger dilemma presented itself just then.

  What if she’d fallen in love with him? What if they’d had all the makings of love from that very first moment they’d seen each other? Spending time with him afterward had only sealed a powerful, undeniable union.

  The notion closed in on her even as it enchanted her.

  Stankovich stood. “Come. I promise you’ll be comfortable during your stay here.”

  Reese had no choice other than to follow him. He opened the door and B
ishop waited.

  “Put her with the other one.”

  Reese glanced back at him as Bishop gripped her arm and began to haul her away. The other one?

  * * *

  A few minutes after Reese had been taken away, the sheriff had returned to find Jamie hollering in the cell and Margaret close to losing consciousness. Now Jamie saw the woman being loaded in an ambulance as he stood outside the sheriff’s office and jailhouse. Snow had begun to fall. He forgot that a winter storm had been forecast, which would only hinder his search-and-rescue efforts. He also had the sinking realization that Stankovich wouldn’t have taken her without plans to have him join the party. He meant for Jamie to suffer.

  He went back into the sheriff’s office and began pacing. Where would he have taken her? How long would he make him wait if he couldn’t find her first? And what was he doing with Reese? Was she all right? He wasn’t accustomed to losing control like this. Nobody ever outsmarted him on a mission. He must have gone a little soft pursuing Reese with those crazy ideas of home and hearth.

  What was the matter with him? He batted his forehead a few times.

  The sheriff entered, pausing as he saw Jamie beating his own head. Without commenting, he took off his hat with a sigh. “That poor girl’s been our office manager for fifteen years. Nothing like this has ever happened to our team.”

  When Jamie didn’t answer, he looked over at him two or three times as he hung up his jacket.

  Then he walked over to Jamie. “Reese is a very good deputy.”

  He didn’t want to doubt her ability, but he knew full well the enemy who had her. “Have her parents been notified?”

  “I called them just a little bit ago. I’ll let them know what happens.”

  Let them know? That sounded like they hardly cared.

  “Are they concerned?”

  “Of course they are.” The sheriff eyed him peculiarly, as though wondering where that question had come from. “They were both very upset when I told them. They were going to drive in and wait here with us, but I told them not to.”

  “Reese doesn’t seem to be very close to them.”

  The sheriff looked at him closely some more and walked toward him. “Mr. and Mrs. Harlow are quiet folks. They don’t show emotion much. Good people but don’t count on a long, stimulating conversation with them at a local barbecue. I imagine Reese has a different relationship with them, though. She was always a good kid, and some day she’ll take over as sheriff. You wait and see. The girl’s got ambition and she’s smart. I couldn’t hope for a better successor.”

  Jamie wasn’t so sure. He thought Reese staying and taking over as sheriff might be beneath her capability. Maybe her parents held her back. She had exuberance for life and achievement. She was more like her real father. Trouble was she didn’t realize what she was doing, that she was settling for a quieter life than what ran in her veins.

  Reese had grown up with few hugs and few displays of affection. No wonder she was so independent. She didn’t know how to love. No one had ever taught her. He remembered the way she’d watched Kadin and Penny. Back then he thought it had been fascination. It had, but it had also been more. She soaked in the sight of true love, curious and not understanding the feelings the two had for each other. She could only observe. She had no basis to recognize when she felt it.

  Every time she made love with him, every time he touched her, kissed her, she had to feel something. Maybe she tried to subdue it, but it was there. If he found a way to break through her barriers, she might realize what she denied herself. She didn’t behave that way intentionally—she had grown up being taught how to be conservative, to not show an overabundance of emotion, or even heightened emotion. Her parents probably only showed that kind of emotion when they were alone. Or maybe even then they both held back, guarded themselves against feeling too much.

  “What makes you think her parents don’t care?” the sheriff asked.

  “I’m sure they do. It’s like you said, they’re quiet people. It’s just... Reese isn’t a quiet kind of person.” A louder version was trying to burst free every day.

  “That’s why she’s going to make a great Ute County sheriff.” The man beamed as though proud to have a part in her transition, as though he’d trained her and groomed her himself.

  “Meeting her real father might change that.” Kadin would never withhold his emotions from his daughter, not after losing his first so terribly.

  The sheriff sobered as he realized what Jamie had said. Kadin had a lot more to offer Reese than anything in Never Summer did. If only she realized that now.

  * * *

  Deputy Miller broke the painful silence when he opened the door and entered with the aroma of warm cinnamon rolls. Jamie lifted his head from his hands, sitting at Reese’s desk. Deputy Miller stomped snow off his boots and removed his snow-caked cap. The storm had settled in.

  Jamie had spent the entire evening and night going crazy wondering if Reese was all right. He kept hearing Holcomb say, “You know.”

  Stankovich would make him suffer for as long as it satisfied him, and then he’d call. Jamie would know where to go, where his nemesis had taken Reese. He’d just have to wait in agony. Payback for Watts. For quitting. For being hard to kill. All of it. And then Stankovich would kill them both. Or was this about something else?

  The insurance he’d taken on that whole situation was secret, a card he hadn’t played because he hadn’t been forced to. Stankovich couldn’t possibly know about that. No one but Jamie did.

  Foreboding climbed up his chest and into his throat.

  What if Stankovich had discovered what Jamie had for insurance on him?

  Jamie sprang up from the desk chair and paced from one end of the small office to the other while Deputy Miller stopped in front of Reese’s desk and put down the bag of cinnamon rolls. Where was she?

  Stankovich could have taken her out of town by now. Jamie had checked all the airports. No private flights had left, and nothing suspicious turned up in any commercial airports. He checked the hotel and all of the other accommodations in the area. No one fitting Stankovich’s description had checked in.

  Jamie’s hope had reached a bleak low by mid-morning. He’d even tried calling Stankovich, but he’d changed his number since he and Jamie had last been in contact.

  The sheriff came out of his office and stood beside Deputy Miller as he opened the bag of sweet-smelling cinnamon rolls. Jamie stopped pacing behind the desk. The deputy withdrew one for the sheriff and then handed another to Jamie.

  Jamie held up his hand and shook his head. All he could think about was Reese, as he fought his imagination over what she might be enduring. And Stankovich’s plans...

  The sheriff’s phone rang. It wasn’t the main office line. He took his roll with him and sat down to answer.

  “Say again?”

  Jamie sat straighter and turned the chair to see him. He wrote something on a pad of paper.

  “We’ll go check it out.”

  Deputy Miller stopped chewing his bite as the sheriff walked back to them. “Ray Benson didn’t show up for work this morning. Candace over at the bank said he’s never late.”

  Ray could be having a medical emergency. Jamie was about to tell him he’d stay here while the sheriff checked it out when Deputy Miller changed everything.

  “Ray lives in that converted mine, doesn’t he?”

  Converted mine? As in, a remote old mine converted to a house on the outskirts of town?

  “Yeah, sure does.” The sheriff put on his hat.

  Jamie stood. “We should all go, and be prepared for the unexpected.”

  He couldn’t stress that enough. The unexpected could be far more dangerous than making Jamie pay. If his secret insurance ever came out to the wrong people, they’d have more than a co
rrupt private military company leader to deal with.

  Chapter 12

  “We’re never getting out of here,” Ray said.

  For a lanky six-foot man nearing seventy, the strain of being locked in his spare room must have been taxing for him. He still had good eyes in that he didn’t have to wear glasses, but there were dark circles shadowed beneath and he looked dehydrated. They’d had their unexpected introductions last night. Once Reese had tried to check the hall and found a gunman she didn’t recognize standing guard. She and Ray were imprisoned in this room. Built into the mountain, there were no windows in any of the back rooms.

  “They will never let us go,” Ray said. “We’ve seen their faces.”

  “They’re not the kind of men who worry about things like that.” She put down the TV remote, giving up on finding anything that would take her mind off her situation, or wondering what Jamie and the sheriff were doing. The room was depressing to her, which didn’t help. With no light other than that from two three-way lily table lamps on each side of the queen-size bed, the room was dim. Ray had offered her the red-floral quilt-covered bed, but she’d declined.

  She had stayed up most the night talking with him. He’d explained how Stankovich and his men had broken into his home and told him his house belonged to them for as long as they were here. They made him a prisoner in his own home.

  She hadn’t told him everything about Stankovich. She didn’t want to frighten him.

  “Why haven’t they killed us yet? Why haven’t they killed me?” he asked.

  She’d rather not go there.

  He got up from the hardwood-framed Victorian armchair and walked to the dresser, where the television played at a low volume. Reese had stopped channel surfing at an animated movie. Currently it was the most cheerful thing in the room.

  “I haven’t been myself since my wife died.”

  He sounded so desperate. Reese hadn’t heard him talk about his wife.

  “She loved this room.” He looked all around, moving to see everything the way his wife might have. “I didn’t change a thing in it, but I never come in here. When I do, I can only stand it for a few minutes before I have to leave and shut the door.” He walked to the door and then back to where a window ought to have been.