Harlequin Romantic Suspense July 2021 Box Set

by Carla Cassidy

  Landon took the folder from his hand and promised, “I’ll make sure she gets it.”

  A sigh slipped through the young man’s lips and he murmured a grateful “Thanks” before rushing away.

  Just as he’d told her, Jocelyn was scary as hell. Even scarier to Landon now that he’d had sex with her. He’d never felt anything as intense as what they’d shared. Hell, he wasn’t even sure what it had been, and before he’d been able to figure it out, her cell had blared out an alarm.

  It must have been her wake-up call for work—since she’d scrambled to get ready to come into the office. But it had been Landon’s wake-up call to remind him that keeping her safe was his job—not seducing her.

  But he wasn’t exactly sure who had seduced whom. She’d seemed to want him as badly as he’d wanted her. As he still wanted her...

  His hand shook, and the folder nearly slipped from his grasp. He glanced down at it and noticed it was a dossier on her coworkers. Despite her arguing that nobody in her office could be Luther’s mole, she must have had her doubts, or she wouldn’t have asked the young paralegal to compile the information for her.

  No wonder the kid had been so nervous. He hadn’t wanted any of his coworkers to know that he’d helped her investigate them. He shouldn’t have been the one doing it. Landon was the one who needed to help her, not just to keep her safe but because he personally wanted to deal with whoever the hell kept shooting at them.

  So, after making sure his backup bodyguards were within sight of Jocelyn, Landon continued down the hall toward the employee break room. He wasn’t much of a coffee drinker, but he approached the pot a few other people loitered around. Mike Forbes and Dale Grohms glanced up at him with feigned surprise. They’d been close enough to her office to overhear him telling Jocelyn where he was going.

  He smiled as he reached for a cup and the pot. “Good morning, gentlemen.”

  “Morning?” Dale asked. “It’s a little later than that now.”

  “That’s because Jocelyn was late this morning,” Mike Forbes said. “What’s up with that lately? Your fault?”

  Landon chuckled. “What makes you think I have anything to do with it?”

  “You’ve become her shadow lately,” Forbes said. “And I’m not buying the boyfriend act. Who are you really?”

  “You don’t know?” the young paralegal asked from where he stood behind the men. “He’s a bodyguard with the Payne Protection Agency.”

  Had Jocelyn had the kid investigate him as well as her coworkers? How did he know who Landon was? Landon studied the kid now, wondering if he’d been more nervous over running into him than he’d been over having that folder on him. Had he met the kid before, back when he’d been working vice?

  Could he be one of Luther’s crew or at least an indebted customer? He narrowed his eyes and studied the kid—even while he felt everyone else studying him.

  “Is it true?” Grohms asked. “Are you her bodyguard?”

  “I’m a bodyguard,” Landon admitted. There was no point in denying what they could easily find out on their own.

  “Why does Jocelyn need a bodyguard?” Dale asked.

  “Didn’t you hear about the shooting at her house last night?” the kid asked. And now the other men were studying him as intently as Landon was.

  They were surprised that he knew, but they didn’t look surprised about the shooting. They’d already known about it. How? Because one of them had been the shooter? Or was it now just common knowledge around the office?

  “I don’t envy you,” Dale Grohms said.

  Which surprised Landon because he’d thought the guy had a crush on Jocelyn. But of course, now he knew that Landon was just her bodyguard—not her boyfriend. Except after last night—or this morning, actually—Landon wasn’t just her bodyguard.

  He wasn’t her boyfriend either. He wasn’t sure what the hell he was but in trouble. Deep trouble...

  “Why’s that?” Landon asked.

  “You have a very dangerous job,” Grohms said.

  “Jocelyn Gerber has a lot of enemies,” Mike Forbes added.

  A chill chased down Landon’s back as he realized the other man spoke the truth. Jocelyn did have a lot of enemies. So keeping her safe was going to require all his concentration. He had to redraw that line and make damn sure he didn’t cross it again.

  Both their lives depended on him staying focused. He had to protect her. And he had to protect himself, as well.

  * * *

  Jocelyn stared down in confusion at the folder Landon slid onto her desk. “Where did this come from?”

  He lifted his broad shoulders in a faint shrug. “Male paralegal. I didn’t catch his name.”

  “I didn’t ask him for this,” Jocelyn said. She knew who her coworkers were; she didn’t need a list of names with their addresses, marital statuses and criminal history. Fortunately, not many of them had a criminal history beyond some speeding tickets, and one had a driving-while-impaired charge on his record.

  “You should have,” Landon said. “You need to find out which of them is working for Luther.”

  She sighed. “I’m not sure it is one of them.”

  “You’re not naive, Jocelyn,” he said. “You know it has to be one of them. I would have noticed someone following us to your house. The shooter had to know where you live.”

  She shivered. “That doesn’t mean they work with me. Someone in the police department could have found out.”

  He tensed, then begrudgingly nodded in agreement. “Maybe...”

  “You said yourself it’s possible that someone within the police department got rid of the evidence you and your unit brought me to bring to a grand jury,” she reminded him.

  “Not someone within my unit, though,” he said defensively. “We were all determined to get Luther off the streets.”

  She hoped he was right. Or the chief had put the wrong franchise of the Payne Protection Agency in charge of protecting the people associated with Luther’s trial. But another department had aroused her suspicions. Not like Landon aroused her, though.

  Just looking at him chased away the chill of fear from her as passion rushed through her. He was so damn good-looking. And now she knew how magnificent his muscular body looked with no clothes.

  How it felt.

  How he’d made her feel.

  She barely resisted the urge to wave the folder in front of her face to cool herself off. But she closed her eyes to shut out the temptation that he’d become.

  “I think it could be a CSI,” she admitted.

  “Wendy Thompson?” he asked with a gasp.

  She opened her eyes again. “Not Wendy. She didn’t handle the evidence for those other cases—just this one.” And that was why she’d been able to get a grand jury to indict—because the evidence hadn’t mysteriously disappeared before she’d been able to present it to them.

  He nodded. “That makes sense,” he agreed. “But CSIs aren’t the only ones with access to the evidence.”

  With the evidence locker in the police department, pretty much every officer had access. And when the evidence was sent to the district attorney’s office...

  “I know,” she said. “But let’s start with the CSIs. Let’s talk to the chief.” She could have just called Chief Lynch, but since she didn’t have court today, she needed an excuse to get out of the office. The space was too small to share with Landon for too long.

  His scent already filled her head. It was a combination of soap from the quick shower he’d taken mixed with male muskiness. She wanted to bury her face in his neck and breathe in it, breathe in him. And her body tingled with awareness and desire. She wanted him closer, wanted him touching her like she wanted to touch him.

  No. They could not stay any longer in her small office. She jumped up from her desk. “Let’s go.”

  �
��Don’t you want to see if he’s available first?” Landon asked.

  She shook her head. “If he’s not, we’ll talk to Wendy Thompson and see if she has any suspicions. We should check on her anyway. With the witness missing, Luther will probably focus all his attention on taking out Wendy.”

  If anything happened to that evidence or the evidence tech, Jocelyn’s case against Luther would be in serious trouble. Landon held the door for her, and when she passed him, her body reacted to his closeness—her pulse quickening, her skin tingling—and she knew she was already in serious trouble.

  With him...

  * * *

  For years, there had been speculation that someone in the district attorney’s office was working for Luther. Some people even suspected it was Jocelyn. The real spy grinned at his reflection in the rearview mirror.

  That was perfect. He would have to figure out how to frame her for it. But first he had to get rid of her—because he worried that she would figure it out first.

  She was too damn smart.

  And she worked too hard.

  Or she had until this bodyguard had started protecting her. Of course, she’d been a little busy trying to stay alive to worry about work. That was why he couldn’t stop trying to take her life—it kept her from tearing his apart.

  And if she was dead, she could never discover the truth. He watched as they opened the door from the district attorney’s offices and stepped into the parking garage. When he’d seen the bodyguard standing at her door, he’d figured they might be leaving, so he’d rushed to the parking garage and started the vehicle he’d rented a few days ago.

  He hadn’t wanted to risk anyone seeing his. He pulled his hood tighter around his face and adjusted his dark glasses. He didn’t want to risk anyone seeing him either. But he had to take the risk of trying to kill her again.

  The longer Jocelyn lived, the more likely she was to discover his connection to Luther Mills. He had to kill her and her bodyguard, too.

  He couldn’t wait until they got into the SUV. He’d tried to follow the bodyguard before, but he drove too damn fast. They would get away from him if they got into their vehicle.

  Fortunately, he’d had his rental running beforehand. He’d already pulled out of his spot and gotten into position. So the minute they stepped away from the door to the building and headed across the parking area, he gunned his engine and bore down on them.

  There was no way they could outrun him. No way they could escape him.

  The man was definitely a bodyguard—with the quick reflexes and protective instincts. He shoved Jocelyn between two parked cars and jumped just as the rental’s bumper neared him. Instead of striking the bodyguard or Jocelyn, the car struck those other cars. Metal crunched and screeched.

  He pressed harder on the accelerator, cramming into that small space between those cars. Either they would crush Jocelyn and her bodyguard or his rental car would.

  But the bodyguard surged up from the ground to which he’d fallen with Jocelyn. His arm was outstretched, the barrel of his gun pointed at the windshield, and he began to fire.

  He ducked as the windshield shattered, but he kept his foot on the gas. He needed to take them out, needed for them to die. The shooting stopped, and he glanced up, peering through that broken windshield.

  And finally his front bumper struck the concrete half wall of the parking structure. Either they were beneath his car or the ones he’d crumpled, or they’d gone over the wall.

  He grinned. Either way, they were dead.

  And he needed to get the hell out of there before he was caught. He shifted into Reverse and tried backing up. Those other crumpled cars caught on his, metal catching and twisting, rubber burning.

  But it wasn’t just the other vehicles he had to worry about escaping. People had rushed up behind him, a security guard and a couple of burly men he’d noticed inside the building. More bodyguards?

  They began to fire at his vehicle as they advanced on him. But finally his car jerked free of the wreckage. The back bumper struck one of the men, sending him flying back into another one—knocking them both to the ground.

  He shifted into Drive now and accelerated, careening around corners as he headed all those stories down to the exit to the street. He sped up as he neared the garage exit and crashed through the gate at the end. It wasn’t as if he could have used his parking pass. That would have been traced back to him.

  He had to make sure that nothing could be traced because now he wouldn’t just be facing conspiracy or aiding-and-abetting charges. He would be facing murder charges.

  Jocelyn Gerber had to be dead. There was no way she or her bodyguard could have survived a fall from the fifth story of the concrete parking structure.

  He waited for a flash of guilt or regret or something...but he felt nothing but triumph. Of course, if he’d had a conscience, he wouldn’t have started working for Luther Mills in the first place.

  CHAPTER 12

  The parking structure had been designed in such a way that every other level had an area of uncovered parking. So when the car had kept coming at them despite Landon shooting at it, he’d had no choice. He’d grabbed Jocelyn up from the asphalt and he’d leaped over the half wall to the level below them.

  It had just been a one-story jump down to the uncovered parking area. But the fall, and subsequent crash onto the roof of a vehicle, had knocked all the air from Landon’s lungs. They burned as he struggled to breathe.

  There was such a weight lying on them—on him. He moved his arms and reached up and found Jocelyn pressed tightly against him. He’d held her as he’d jumped, turning so that he took the brunt of the fall.

  It was what Clint had done when he’d leaped out of the witness’s apartment to avoid getting killed. But they’d fallen three stories into a dumpster. Landon had just struck the roof of an SUV. And Jocelyn was light. She hadn’t hurt him.

  But she wasn’t moving.

  He stroked his hand down her back and then up to her neck. He needed to check for a pulse. But before his fingers brushed her skin, she shivered and finally moved.

  And he sucked in a breath as his ribs, which must have been bruised, ached in protest along with a twinge in his lower back.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  He should have been asking her that. But before he could, someone leaned over the half wall above them and called down, “Are you all right?”

  He tried to reach for his holster, but it and his weapon were trapped beneath her body. He had no way to defend them—to protect her—if that person started firing.

  But then he recognized the voice, and he focused on the face of the man leaning over the half wall. Unlike Cooper Payne’s team, who were all former Marines who wore their hair in military brush cuts, this guy’s hair was long and dark blond.

  “You all right?” Garek Kozminski asked again. “An ambulance is on its way.”

  Maybe Jocelyn had recognized him, too, because she moved against him, struggling to sit up. Not wanting her to fall off the car, Landon caught and held her. He was finally able to draw in a deep breath again, so he sat up. Then he helped her down to the ground again.

  Her legs nearly buckled beneath her. But he’d jumped down from the car and caught her before she fell. “You’re not okay,” he said.

  “I’m scared,” she said. “But I’m not hurt. What about you?” Her gaze moved over his body, reminding him of how she’d looked at him and touched him the night before.

  Heat rushed through his body. If he could feel attraction and desire, he wasn’t in too much pain. He shook his head. “No. I’m fine.” He glanced back up at Garek. “We don’t need an ambulance.”

  “The security guard does,” Garek replied as he glanced over his shoulder. “He got hit when the guy backed up.”

  “Did you get a look at him?” Landon asked.

&n
bsp; Garek shook his head. “No. You?”

  Landon cursed. “No. He had a hood drawn tight around his face and dark glasses.”

  “I’m surprised you saw that much with the tinted windows,” Garek remarked.

  Landon wouldn’t have seen that much had he not broken the windshield. He must not have hit the guy, though, not if he’d been able to escape. “So he got away?” he asked for confirmation, a sick feeling roiling through his stomach.

  Garek sighed and nodded. “Sorry...”

  It wasn’t his backup bodyguard’s fault. It was Landon’s. He should have made damn certain the man had not escaped. Hell, because of that disguise, he didn’t even know if it had been a man trying to run them down.

  He was no closer to finding out who was after Jocelyn than he’d been after the shooting. He only knew that the person was getting more and more bold, which meant he or she was getting more and more desperate.

  That was not good. Desperate people were unpredictable. There was no way to know when they would try to take out Jocelyn again.

  The only thing Landon knew for certain was that they would try again and would keep trying until they were either caught or succeeded in killing her.

  * * *

  Jocelyn could not deny that someone wanted her dead. She wanted to deny it. She wanted to go on believing all those threats she’d received were empty. But they weren’t. Somebody was determined to make good on those threats.

  Somebody was determined to end her life.

  “Will the security guard be okay?” she asked Landon as the ambulance headed out of the parking structure with the middle-aged guard strapped to a stretcher in the back.

  “Looks like it’s just a broken leg,” Landon said.

  How did her bodyguard not have any broken bones? He’d taken the brunt of the fall when he’d propelled them off the half wall onto the level below and the roof of an SUV.

  “Are you really okay?” she asked him.

  “No,” he admitted.