A Stranger Is Watching

by Linda Randall Wisdom

  “You honestly think you have the right person,” Jenna said. There was nothing in her voice to indicate how she felt about that idea.

  Riley nodded. He slid back his chair and stood up. In a swift movement, he picked her up and hugged her tightly.

  “I feel it, Smitty. Dave will do even more digging and there’s going to be enough found to implicate the bastard.” He swung her around in a circle.

  Jenna looked as if she was afraid to hope it would soon be all over. The broad grin on Riley’s face said otherwise.

  His eyes danced as he kept hold of her.

  Jenna arched an eyebrow. “Riley Cooper, you have that look in your eye. You don’t even know you’re right.”

  He started nuzzling the tender spot just behind her ear. “I’m right,” he muttered. “Maybe they’ll say they can’t positively prove that Carter Leonard is really Leonard Randolph. But fingerprints don’t lie. All they need is a strong enough lead and they can take it from there.”

  Jenna clung to him. She wasn’t sure whether to laugh with relief that it could all be over or cry for the same reason. “Let’s go outside for a walk.” She shook her head at his bemused expression. “I want to go outside without feeling I have to look over my shoulder all the time. I want to go outside feeling deep inside I’m truly Jenna Welles again.”

  Riley smiled. “I’ll get our coats.”

  Within moments they were walking along the shoreline with one of Jenna’s hands snugly tucked into Riley’s jacket pocket.

  “You are a very sneaky man, Riley Cooper,” she accused.

  He was surprised. “I’ve been called a lot of things, but sneaky is a new one.”

  She stopped and turned to face him. “You deliberately left drawing equipment in just about every room. You were trying to wear me down.”

  He looked all too smug. “Looks like it worked, too.”

  She looked down at her gloved hand and thought of the pain whenever she attempted to hold the pencil. She knew she would have the same trouble when she started picking up brushes.

  “Physical therapy will help with that,” he said quietly, easily reading her mind. “You’ll be able to start pretty soon too.”

  Jenna smiled at his determination, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

  “It wasn’t easy to track him down, Riley. Do you honestly think he’ll make it easy to be charged with what he did?”

  “Nothing’s easy, but this will be settled. No more running for either one of us.”

  “No more running,” she repeated. “I’d like that.”

  The office was as cold as a cave and just as dark. The small lamp on the desk shed little light beyond the desk’s bare surface.

  “I do not like to hear that the man who came so highly recommended has now disappeared,” the man behind the desk said in a voice as cold as his office.

  The man standing before him—he was not invited to sit down—took a deep breath before replying.

  “I’ve sent out queries, and it’s as if he disappeared off the face of the earth, sir,” he said in a quietly respectful tone that was not echoed inside him. He hated the man with a passion, but he knew better than to show his feelings. “Nothing has been heard from him since he arrived in Mexico.”

  The other man lit a cigar, the glow from the tip looking eerily like a devil’s eye.

  “I pay my people excellent wages because I expect a job well done. It appears this is something I will have to take care of myself.” His smile was as dead as the expression in his eyes. “I want to know where they are, and I want to know by tomorrow morning. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, sir.” He backed out of the dark office and hurried down the hallway. He silently cursed John Smith for putting him in this bind, and at the same time he silently cheered him for having found a way to escape.

  “I don’t want to do this anymore,” Jenna panted. She dropped to the ground and flopped onto her back. The ground was hard with frost, but she was past caring. She was too tired to move.

  Riley stood over her, his face glowing from the run they’d just finished. He didn’t seem to have any problem catching his breath, she grumpily noticed. She knew if she had enough energy left she’d hurt him.

  He’d hauled her out of bed at dawn for a run and today had even picked up the pace. Now she was so tired she didn’t want to move from her hard resting place. Jenna felt ready to crawl into bed and stay there for a year.

  “Ah, come on. You know you feel better for it,” he told her.

  She looked up at him with murder in her eyes. “I’d only feel better if you would drop with fatigue.”

  “Want to try some more kickboxing after lunch?”

  Jenna gave a less-than-feminine snarl as she slowly sat up. “Only if you promise to stand very still. Better yet. Let me practice my shooting while you pretend to be the target.”

  Riley tsked and shook his head. “Don’t be a grump. You wanted to do this.”

  . “You just didn’t have to enjoy torturing me so much.” Jenna wrapped her arms around her drawn-up knees and rested her chin on them. “What if we could draw him out?”

  Riley dropped to the ground beside her. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  She nodded. “Isn’t that what you do when you want to catch someone who’s hiding? Bait the trap with something they can’t resist? Wouldn’t he be ecstatic to get both of us?”

  “No way,” he said without hesitation.

  “Why not?” she asked, starting to get huffy.

  His jaw looked as if it had been carved out of granite. “Because this is my problem.”

  Jenna looked at him as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “Your problem,” she said slowly, “became our problem the night I was attacked. No arguments, Cooper. I’m in this just as much as you are.”

  “No, you’re not. This man would kill you without a second thought just because he would want to do it.” He held up his hand to silence her expected retort. “Just because you’ve learned some self-defense doesn’t mean you’re capable of protecting yourself against a trained killer. And that’s what we’re dealing with.”

  Jenna glared at him as she rose to her feet. She didn’t say another word as she stalked into the house.

  Even a long, hot shower didn’t ease her temper any.

  But she did find something that did calm her down.

  She dragged out one of the sketch pads and several drawing pencils.

  Her first strokes of the pencil were still awkward. But she didn’t stop. Jenna was back for good.

  Riley stayed out of Jenna’s way for the rest of the afternoon. He figured it was safer that way. He called Dave and spent a couple hours on the phone, listening to what Dave had to say.

  “I’d say you’ve found your man,” Dave said, confirming his suspicions. “He’s got quite a compound out there. It’s got an electric gate and a block wall with broken glass and razor wire all across the top. He also has motion-detector lights all around the house and dogs that run loose all night. The closest house is ten miles away, and the closest town fifteen miles away. He obviously doesn’t have drop-in company too often.”

  Riley clenched his fist and thrust it up in the air for victory. “Man, I’d love to be there when you go after the bastard.”

  “You forgot something, old buddy. Such as hard evidence. And I don’t think that’s something he leaves around on top of his desk. We did find out something interesting though.” His voice grew quiet. “His personal jet is having some mechanical work done and he was insistent it be ready for takeoff by tomorrow morning. The flight plan was filed for Denver.”

  Riley grew still. “There’s no way he could have tracked us here.”

  “If you get Benedict’s place shot up, he’s going to be really ticked off,” Dave said with dark humor. “He’s already having a fit because you broke in there so easily. He was positive the place was locked up as tight as Fort Knox.”

  Ri
ley winced. He had been more than familiar with his former superior’s infamous temper.

  “Just goes to show he needs to reevaluate his alarm system. Just reassure him we haven’t had any orgies.” He switched the phone from one ear to the other. “Yet.”

  He could hear Dave’s heavy sigh. “I suppose you figured out the combination to his gun safe, too.”

  “Piece of cake.” He walked back and forth, too antsy to stand still. Besides, he always felt he did his best thinking when he was moving. He took a deep breath. “I need you to come out here and get her. Hopefully, before they show up.”

  Riley looked down and saw the sketch pad lying on a table. He used his fingertip to lift the top and flip it back. He did that with several pages. True, they didn’t show the grace of the work he remembered, but he saw something else there. The stark lines and slashes were those of a woman who’d grown far beyond the person she had been.

  He swallowed the lump in his throat as he moved on to find a sketch of himself. He looked hard and dangerous, due to the strong strokes of the pencil. Just the way he’d felt lately. Except for the time he spent with her.

  “Riley?” From the sound of Dave’s voice he’d said the name more than once.

  “Ya,” he murmured, “I’m here.”

  Riley was determined to finish this. He wasn’t going to allow Jenna to be afraid any longer.

  Chapter 15

  “Is it safe?”

  Jenna looked up from her drawing. Riley stood in the doorway holding up a white handkerchief in one hand. The other was hidden behind his back. She tried not to smile at his sign of surrender, but her lips twitched, anyway.

  “Safe enough,” she said, closing her sketch pad and setting it to one side. “Where have you been hiding?”

  He walked into the room, holding out his other arm, revealing a bottle of wine and two glasses.

  “Here and there. Mostly there, figuring out the combination to Benedict’s wine closet. He used his and his wife’s birth dates. Not a good idea. He may be a great lawman, but he has no imagination.”

  Jenna was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bed with her black-and-red flannel patchwork skirt billowed around her. She had pushed up the sleeves to her black knit top.

  Riley set the glasses down and poured wine into them.

  “What’s the celebration for?” she asked.

  “We figured out who’s behind this. Dave’s happy. We’re happy. That’s all that’s needed.”

  Jenna uttered a short laugh of relief.

  “Do you mean it’s over? We can go home?”

  Riley’s heart ached at the sound of joy in her voice. He should tell her the truth, but she’d hate him for it. No, better to have this all-too-short celebration. She could hate him later. For now, he wanted to share in her exhilaration.

  Instead he picked up one of the wineglasses and dipped his finger into the contents. He then proceeded to paint her lips with the wine. Once they were wet and glistening, he leaned forward and delicately licked the moisture from them. She smiled as he repeated the gesture.

  Jenna dipped her fingertip in the glass and did the same thing to Riley. Then she dipped her finger in again and this time traced a line down his throat. She unbuttoned his flannel shirt, her finger still trailing downward. As her tongue followed the path, she pulled his shirt out of his jeans, then unfastened them.

  “Smitty.” His voice was ragged with desire as he watched her pull his jeans downward.

  She looked up with a smile that turned her eyes a dazzling blue. She took the wineglass out of his hand and spilled droplets onto his bare chest.

  “Just lie back and relax, Riley,” she murmured in a husky voice guaranteed to send shivers along his spine.

  “Relax? I’ll be lucky if I don’t die within the next ten seconds,” he said in a strangled voice.

  “I want you alive, Cooper.” She lapped up the wine with a feline grace, and followed the droplets farther down.

  Riley wanted to close his eyes against the exquisite pain Jenna was inflicting. But he couldn’t stop watching her love him so passionately. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours. All he knew was he would die among the stars.

  Unable to take anymore, he grabbed her arms and pulled her up over him. Her skirt billowed around him as she settled down upon him. He hissed what could have been a curse or a prayer as he discovered she wore no underwear and was hot and wet.

  He arched upward, thrusting deep inside her. At the same time Jenna lowered her face to his, kissing him deeply, her tongue teasing him as her body teased his.

  Riley’s eyes were like polished stones as he watched the woman he had claimed so long ago and intended to keep beyond forever. Her eyes glittered with raw desire as she looked down at him.

  “No more looking over our shoulders, Riley,” she whispered as she moved her hips in a manner that had him groaning her name. “No more worries. I won’t go back to what I was, and I won’t let you leave me. You’re stuck with me.”

  “We’re stuck with each other,” he whispered back, wanting to accelerate the rhythm but wanting their loving to last forever.

  In the end there was no way they could prolong it. Jenna’s breathing hitched a note as she moved her hips faster. Riley held on to her, watching her lose herself just before he couldn’t hold back any longer and followed her into the star-filled void.

  Jenna lay against his chest. Her body quivered with aftershocks.

  Riley licked his lips. For a moment he wasn’t sure if he could form a coherent word.

  “I think we could get a hell of a lot better once we get some practice in.”

  Jenna laughed. She lifted her head and kissed him. “You were the one who started this.”

  “Maybe so, but then you took over and just about killed me.” He brushed her hair from her face, his hands warmly cupping her cheeks. “I could never get tired of looking at your face,” he murmured.

  She blinked rapidly. “Don’t say things that will make me cry.”

  Something—his conscience, maybe—tugged deep inside. She had no idea what was going to happen. What he had planned for her. She would probably hate him afterward, and he couldn’t blame her. She wouldn’t understand that he was doing it for a good reason. She would hate him with equal good reason.

  When it was all over, he would just have to do whatever was necessary to make her love him again.

  “I promise, I will never make you cry unless it’s for a good reason.”

  Jenna looked uncertain for a moment then smiled again. “As long as it’s for a good reason.”

  Riley wrapped his arms around her and allowed sleep to overtake him even as he sensed her also falling asleep. He knew as long as he held on to her, nothing could hurt them.

  Jenna wasn’t sure what woke her up. It was as if something unwanted had shifted the air in the house.

  She sat up carefully in hopes she wouldn’t awaken Riley and remained very still. She let her senses reach out as she waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Except she now knew what woke her wasn’t something she needed to see, but something she could hear. The soft hiss of helicopter blades.

  She looked down and saw Riley’s eyes open.

  “They couldn’t have found us,” she said more in hopes he’d agree with her. But there was no smile or words of reassurance. Just an expression of sad acceptance.

  Riley straightened up and got off the bed. He snatched up his clothing and pulled it on.

  Jenna stood by the bed and silently watched him dress. It wasn’t until he picked up her sketch pad and pencils, putting them in a tote bag that she realized the significance of his actions.

  She ran to the window and looked out. There was no doubt the helicopter parked a short distance away had a the seal of the U.S. Marshal’s Service on it. She spun around.

  “Is there anything else you want to take with you?” Riley asked quietly.

  Jenna said nothing. She went over to the closet, gathered up
clothing and escaped to the bathroom.

  Even over the thunder of the shower, Riley could hear her crying and cursing his name. He moved like a tired old man as he packed the rest of her clothing.

  When Jenna walked out of the bathroom, her eyes were dry and red. She didn’t say a word as she followed him out of the house to the waiting helicopter. As they approached it, the door swung open and Dave stepped out. He looked at one and then the other.

  Jenna looked at him for one long moment, then turned to Riley. The pain in her eyes was as sharp as a laser.

  “You trained me to take care of myself.” Her anger fairly flew from her mouth. “You can’t just make me leave without a fight.”

  “Are you sure?” Dave asked from behind Jenna.

  Riley took a deep breath. He glanced over her shoulder.

  “She’s going with you, Dave.”

  His words were enough to unleash the final torrent.

  “I won’t be your pawn any longer!” she shouted, her fists clenched at her sides. For a moment Riley was positive she was going let go and hit him.

  “You just can’t stop pushing me away when things get rough, can you?” she screamed. “It’s easier for you to let me go than to stick to something!”

  She shook off Dave’s restraining hand. But he persevered and grabbed her arm, gently pulling her back toward the helicopter. She dug in her heels, but he was stronger.

  Riley stood there, not reacting to the anguish marring her face or the harsh tears rolling down her cheeks. He didn’t flinch as the blades started rotating and the roar of the engine assaulted his eardrums. And he didn’t turn away as the helicopter slowly lifted and all he could see was Jenna’s face pressed against the glass.

  It was clear at that moment that she realized exactly why he was sending her away.