by Angie Martin
“Can you handle that?” Schaffer asked.
“Yeah,” Logan said. “I thought about taking her out in the morning to run with me and Jack.”
“That’s a start.”
“Any news on the leak?”
“I’ve been examining your recent jobs to look at your teams. I’ve also reviewed all of the debriefs.”
“And?”
“And nothing. You consistently use the same teams on your jobs. Nothing stood out as being odd in the debriefs.”
“Who knew about my jobs?”
“Jack, Les, Charlie, Kyle, Doctor Connors, and myself. Occasionally you use Austin or Phil.”
“I trust all of them, which is why I use them all the time. What about the intel from this job? Is there anything unusual about that besides the amount of it?”
“I have a friend at the bureau looking into that.”
“When will they be ready for us to bring her in?”
“Three more days. Can you manage?”
“Yeah, but this is it for me. I’m taking time off after we’re done here.”
“Take as much time as you need, but when you come back, I’m taking you out of the field except for a job here and there. Time for me to start thinking about retirement and time for you to take over. If you still want to, that is.”
“I do,” Logan said. “You saved my life and gave me a second chance. We need to continue that work for others like me.”
“Good. I don’t want anyone other than you in this position. Karen would have wanted that for you, too.”
Logan didn’t respond directly to the statement, but instead ended the call. He didn’t want to think about his future, but Karen did want him to be happy with everything he did. She reminded him every second of the three years he spent rebuilding roads with a construction crew of how much he needed to go back to The Boys Club and do what he loved. The problem with pursuing that path presented itself when Langston had a bomb planted in his car. Now that Logan was alone without his wife, spending his remaining working years heading up The Boys Club wasn’t such a bad idea.
He just wished he wasn’t alone. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, Jack giving him permission to find someone else opened up a new door for his thoughts to explore. Maybe it was okay to find someone else, someone he could love as much as Karen. Someone with whom he could share every bit of his life, even the bad things. Someone kind, understanding, intelligent, soft, and beautiful…
Someone like Sara.
Logan chased away the crazy, stray thought from his mind. He headed back outside to spend more time in the clear air under the full moon, alone with his memories and regrets.
Chapter Twenty-three
As soon as Logan shut and locked the door, Sara turned on the bed. Throwing her back up against the wall, she crossed her arms. Who the hell did Logan think he was? From the way he had spoken to her since the beginning she expected honesty from him, not some half-cocked story about her father and the FBI. He acted as if she were the stupidest person in the world, but expected her to trust him and only him.
She lowered her head and massaged her temples, her growing headache the least of her concerns. Though the whole of Logan’s tale made no sense, some of it rang true. Her gut instinct over the past few months told her that her father had mishandled his money and not on accident. The runaround he gave her and the simple explanations Stephen spit out only fueled her suspicions.
She knew how to recognize the signs of money laundering. Though she didn’t want to admit it before, she knew that’s what he had done. He had quite possibly been doing it all along. Logan telling her that he was up to no good cemented that thought, but the idea of the FBI investigating him seemed far-fetched. Or did it? She only saw the accounts of the one company. His illegal activities could span across everything he did.
What she had problems reconciling was that he wanted her dead. Sure, they weren’t always on the best of terms and the thin ice she skirted across to please him had plenty of cracks, but he wouldn’t kill her. He wasn’t that kind of criminal.
Sara gasped as the word rolled across her brain. Criminal. She had thought it before with regards to her father, but never connected the two into one idea. It was the same thing she accused Logan of being, and yet Logan had treated her far better than her father ever had. Could Logan be one of the good guys despite having kidnapped her?
The lock on her door clicked and the doorknob turned. “I just wanted to check on you,” Charlie said, as he stepped through the narrow opening. “Are you doing okay?”
An exasperated laugh left her lips. “I don’t know what ‘okay’ means anymore.”
Charlie sat at the end of the bed, unfazed by her comment. He hiked his leg up on the bed and faced her. “What’s going on?”
Sara shrugged. “Logan said all kinds of things about my dad. I don’t know what’s true, what’s a lie, and what’s skewed.”
“I can’t talk to you about that without Logan here.” Charlie started to move off the bed. “I can get him and we can talk—”
“No!” Sara reached her hand out to stop him. “I don’t want to talk to him. I want you to tell me the truth about why you kidnapped me.”
“I don’t know what Logan told you or didn’t tell you and I’m not supposed to talk to you about any of this without him here.”
Everything went back to Logan. Her frustration grew, but she didn’t want to take it out on Charlie. “Just one question,” she said, keeping her voice even-keeled. “Did my father hire someone to kill me on my honeymoon?”
He slid off the bed and studied her for a moment before folding his arms across his chest. “Again, I don’t know what Logan told you,” he said, “but whatever he said is true. Logan doesn’t lie. He doesn’t know how. Now, is there anything you need? Food, a breathing treatment?”
Tears welled in her eyes and she shook her head. Charlie slunk out of the room, leaving her alone once again when she wanted nothing more than to talk to someone about everything Logan had said. She had hoped Charlie would give her answers, not more questions. Logan had his thumb on every part of the kidnapping, right down to who could tell her what. Charlie’s statement that Logan didn’t know how to lie scared her even more. If Logan didn’t lie, her father hired someone to kill her. And Stephen might know about it.
She shook the thought from her mind and went into the bathroom to get ready for bed. It was far easier to stay mad at Logan for fabricating her reasons for being there rather than believe her own father and the man she agreed to marry might want her dead.
Chapter Twenty-four
Logan dragged himself out of bed after another restless night of very little sleep. He figured he would be half dead by the time the job ended if he didn’t find a way to rest soon. Already asleep when he came back into her room, Sara also seemed to suffer from anxiety during the night. She tossed and turned in her own bed, all while staying in the grip of sleep, adding to his insomnia.
Throughout the night, he wandered between his bed and hers, watching over her while she fidgeted in her sleep. At one point her lips moved and an inaudible utterance emerged, letting him know just how distressed he made her with his narrative. His stomach twisted at the thought of upsetting her. He hadn’t intended to be so forward, but once he started speaking, he couldn’t stop.
Schaffer’s suggestion to get to know her, to see her as a person, also contributed to his unrest. He wanted to do that, to understand her and get her to trust him, but a strange unsettling surfaced in his gut every time he considered knowing her more. In the early morning hours, he finally realized why. He already saw her as more than a person who needed saving. He saw her as a woman, one who had caught his eye when he first saw her, and he couldn’t control his attraction to her.
Once he admitted his fascination with her, he understood why Karen plagued his thoughts. He never thought of Karen while involved with Allie, but only because he knew his relationship with Allie ended with sex. Sara intrigued
him on a different level, the same one on which Karen entered his life. The idea of meeting someone else he could see as part of his life frightened him in a way he hadn’t experienced since he first lost Karen.
More than that, Sara represented nothing more than a fleeting moment. She would leave his life as quickly as she came into it. In a few days, the FBI would take her away and she could quite possibly spend the rest of her life in hiding. He wouldn’t see her again after she disappeared into WITSEC and he couldn’t do anything to change that outcome.
Logan left the room when Charlie got him for breakfast. He opted for fruit instead of a large meal, as he had already decided to take Sara out running. For a moment he considered getting Les and Jack to do it for him, but he couldn’t take a chance with the leak still uncovered, no matter how much he believed his team wasn’t involved. At least having Jack with him would provide a buffer so he could ignore Sara.
After he ate and swallowed half a cup of coffee, he found Jack in the backyard. They planned a route across the four acres of land behind the house. Though Sara ran five miles a day, they decided half the distance would be best at first. If everything went well, they could increase the distance for their next run. They agreed to hang back and let her run in front of them to give her a sense of freedom. Both men could outrun her if she tried to escape and keeping her contained between the house and the trees at the back of the property held little risk.
Back in the house, Jack detoured into his bedroom to change while Logan made his way to Sara’s room. He knocked and waited for her permission to enter before unlocking the door. Logan pushed the door open and found Sara sitting up in bed, the comforter pulled to her chest and her childlike eyes fearful. The sight battled for control of Logan’s good spirits and he reminded himself that his reason for being there would soon change her demeanor.
“How about a run this morning?” he asked.
Sara eyed him for a long moment before responding. “That would be nice, but I don’t have anything to wear.”
“You do, in the suitcase. I made sure of it. I’ll have Charlie bring it back for you. Do you want to eat before we go?”
“I can eat and shower afterward.”
“Just come out when you’re ready.” He closed the door behind him, but left it unlocked to help her feel more comfortable. He spoke to Charlie about the suitcase, then went into the guest bedroom and changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. He had not gone running in over a week and the idea of the fresh air and exercise made all the negativity from the night before disappear.
When he emerged from the guest room, Sara turned the corner with timid steps. “I wasn’t sure where to go,” she said.
“You’re fine.” He motioned for her to walk in front of him and they started down the hall. “Jack is meeting us out back.”
As they entered the living room, she twisted her head to look at him. “Jack is one of the others here?”
“Yes, him and Les. We might see Les out on our run, but he usually keeps himself busy in the shed.”
Her eyes roamed around the living room, examining every corner. Logan interpreted her actions as looking for weapons or a way to escape, but he had no fear that she would leave. Though he made a mistake in dumping all the information about her father and the hit on her at once, he had also planted enough in her mind to create some doubt about her family.
On the back porch, Logan introduced her to Jack, who gave her a firm handshake and a warm smile. Sara tucked her chin down and shrugged with a shy hello. She seemed to struggle with how to act around them and Logan wanted nothing more than for her to feel comfortable. The more she trusted them, the easier it would be to get her into WITSEC.
As she stretched in preparation for their run, Logan’s eyes wandered to the side. Her palm flat against the side of the house, she pulled her foot up, until her heel was flush against the back of her thigh, her clothes hugging every curve. He turned and tried to stretch himself, but looked back at her when movement caught his attention. From the corner of his eye, he watched her bend at the waist and reach for her running shoes.
Logan cleared his throat and walked away from her. When he reached Jack, he started to speak, but noticed Jack looking around him to catch a glimpse of Sara. Logan tightened his mouth to avoid laughing at Jack’s obvious behavior.
“How far ahead of us do you think we should let her go?” Logan asked.
“Ten feet at the most,” Jack said. “I think this will go a long way in getting her to warm up to us. We should let her stay out of her room the rest of today, too.”
Logan wondered how much of Jack’s request was oriented to the job, but he couldn’t deny the logic. “Keeping her prisoner all day in that room doesn’t seem to be working.”
Jack grinned. “Just leave it to me and I’ll have her warmed up by the end of the day.”
Logan started to reply, but stopped when he heard Sara behind him.
“I’m ready,” she said in a quiet voice. She tucked stray strands of dark hair behind her ear.
“You can go ahead of us and we’ll stay back a little ways so you can have some privacy,” Logan said.
“Like my security detail does.”
“Exactly like that,” he said. “You’re not going to try and give us the slip, are you?”
She flinched and her eyes flew up to his face. “You know about that?”
“We know a lot of things,” Jack said, “but taking off on us never crossed your mind, did it?”
“No.”
“Whenever you’re ready,” Logan said.
Sara turned and started with a slow trot. They quickly picked up speed and settled into a comfortable pace. Jack rambled from topic to topic, filler to make the time go by quicker. Logan gave short answers, but focused more on clearing his head so he could start again with Sara. He would keep Charlie with him this time and keep his own feelings about her father at bay. Sara did not know what he had done, and Logan intended to keep it that way.
As they neared the end of the run, Jack nudged Logan and gestured toward Sara. “Check out the view.”
Logan glanced at Jack. “As far as you’re concerned, there is no view.”
“Ah, come on. Tell me you didn’t notice.”
“I didn’t notice.”
“Liar.”
Logan allowed a small smile. “Alright, she looks… nice.”
“What are you, like fifty? She doesn’t ‘look nice.’ She’s hot as hell. I can’t even look at her without thinking about stripping those sweaty clothes off her body and—”
“You don’t want to do anything to her but keep her safe.”
“Are you kidding me? Just ‘cause you want to walk the straight and narrow doesn’t mean we all have to.”
“It’s not a matter of the straight and narrow. She’s the job, not some girl at a bar waiting for someone like you to take her home.”
“Why did Doctor Connors have to get her such tight running clothes?”
Logan had wondered the same thing himself, many times during the course of their run. Memories from searching her the day before flashed in his brain. The images reminded him of her timidly standing in front of him with most of her beautiful, fair-toned flesh exposed, enough of it so he could imagine what he couldn’t see.
He fixed his gaze on the back of her head, watched her short ponytail bop from side to side, and reminded himself again of his job. He did his best to not let his eyes fall down her body again, but he couldn’t help himself.
“Yeah,” Jack said. “You noticed.”
“Just shut up and run.”
Jack laughed and bumped into him, shoving Logan off to the side. Logan grinned and returned the hit. Spending their teen years together had turned them into brothers and allowed them the leeway to still act like it as adults.
Sara’s head turned to the side with the commotion, but Logan focused his eyes forward and ran straight ahead, as if being caught goofing off by the teacher. As soon as her head rotated b
ack around, Jack laughed again and jabbed Logan’s arm. Logan shook his head and kept running.
Chapter Twenty-five
Sara’s lips curled upward into a large smile for the first time since waking up in the strange room yesterday. After having the men steal her away and hold her captive, the sun warming her skin gave her hope that they would soon let her go, even if it was to hand her over to the FBI.
Though her mind seemed to clear with her first breaths of the pure morning air, her confusion built with every fall of her feet. Her anger with Logan had subsided by the time she woke up, and allowing her out of her room to run only made her believe that he told her the truth about her father.
The idea terrified her. Her father had never been happy about taking her in, but hiring someone to kill her took his restrained annoyance with her to a whole new level. But if he had taken out a hit on her, did Stephen know?
The question had plagued her since last night. Stephen worked closely with her father. He seemed to know everything her father did, but she couldn’t fathom he knew about the hit. They may not love each other, but they did have some feelings, enough to sustain them spending their lives together.
Stephen didn’t know, she decided. He couldn’t know. Just two days earlier, the same day Logan kidnapped her, they had spent the morning in bed. Nothing in his touch signified that he wanted her dead. If anything, he had been gentler, more attentive. He had told her he loved her, several times, and she almost believed him.
But if he had lied about loving her, the same as she lied to him, everything else in their relationship could also be a lie. Logan said that the hit would have happened on their honeymoon, after he had married into her family, the end game of their forced relationship. Maybe he didn’t need her after the wedding.
Sara tightened her jaw and pressed forward, refusing to believe Stephen knew about any of it. She struggled enough with the thought that her father wanted her dead. If Logan told the truth, which she believed more and more, then maybe Stephen could help her. She just needed to get back to him.