The Fugitive

by Nichole Severn

  Facing the mirror, she ran her fingers through her hair once again, but there seemed to be a lightness—a glow—to her skin now. Whether it was from the rush of heat from Beckett’s kiss, or something...deeper, she didn’t know. Didn’t care. Scooping her dirty clothes from the floor, she deposited them into the garbage can under the vanity and shut the cabinet door. Mentally and physically. She had to move on, had to give this baby a real shot of happiness.

  She had to leave the past behind.

  Raleigh followed the maze of hallways back into the custom chef’s kitchen. White cabinets adorned with gold fixtures surrounded a large steel fridge. The island became the focus of the entire space with navy blue shiplap and cascading white marble down each side as Beckett set two plates on the surface. For an instant, she was back in the bedroom, wondering what it’d be like to wake up to this sight every morning, live here, raise a family here.

  Beckett half turned toward her. “You want cheese and crackers with deli turkey or a grilled cheese sandwich? I wasn’t sure what you or the baby would be in the mood for, so I made both.”

  “Is it embarrassing to admit I want to eat all of it?” A laugh bubbled past her lips, something foreign since... She couldn’t remember how long.

  “Oh. Guess you’re technically eating for two, right?” He focused his attention on the fridge, his hands flat on the marbled island. “Okay. I can eat the pickles Reed left in the fridge. He’s the only one who likes the damn things.”

  “I’m joking.” She threw one hand out, palm first, as another laugh escaped her chest. “Partly. I could eat it all, but I’ll take the sandwich. Deli meat is frowned upon when pregnant.”

  A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. When was the last time someone had made her something to eat? While she wasn’t sure what Beckett had put together would last long between the two of them, he’d obviously put thought into it, having cut the sandwich down the middle to make it easier to eat. Her stomach clenched at the sight of gooey yellow cheese running over the edges of toasted, buttery bread, but she couldn’t drown the thought that none of this was for her. Not really.

  He’d cleaned her wounds, given up the last of his water, offered his protection. All of it because of the baby. Not out of any kind of loyalty or feelings for her. So then why had he kissed her? “You happened to have cheese, bread and cold cuts here?”

  “Two marshals from my office were here a couple days ago installing new dead bolts and sensors.” He handed her the plate with the grilled cheese sandwich and turned back toward the fridge. “When we seize a property, we like to make sure the previous owners can’t get back in.”

  “I don’t suppose they’ll mind I borrowed some of their clothes, then.” She took a seat on one of the distressed-metal bar stools as silence settled between them.

  Beckett turned his head partially toward her.

  “I’m sorry about your brother. I didn’t realize how many details were missing from the police reports, and I made assumptions about you I shouldn’t have.” Setting two water bottles onto the countertop, he skidded one toward her. He leveraged both hands wide against the cold surface of the island, gaze down, and her skin prickled. “My father stole millions of dollars from hardworking Americans when I was a kid by getting them to invest in his Ponzi scheme.” He twisted the cap off the bottled water and swallowed several mouthfuls. Strong muscles along his throat flexed and released. He set the bottle down carefully, then dented the plastic in a strong grip, knuckles fighting for release through the back of his hand. “They didn’t have any clue he’d been stealing from them for years until the feds caught wind. They trusted him with their hard-earned money, depended on him to ensure they had a future, then lost everything in the blink of an eye. That’s why I became a marshal. I’ve been hunting him ever since, but I lost his trail soon after he dropped off the radar.”

  The muscles down her spine hardened vertebra by vertebra. Her mouth dried as the nail he’d driven into her heart when he’d disappeared after her arrest settled deeper. She sat a bit straighter, not sure how to respond, what to say. “You’ve never talked to me about your family. Before...”

  “I don’t have a family.” His voice graveled. “Hank Foster made sure of that when one of the people he swindled came looking for him and shot and killed my mother instead.”

  What? A forgotten sensation spread through her with a deep inhalation. Something she hadn’t felt since that first time she’d realized he was never going to return her messages or her calls after she’d been arrested. That he was never going to live up to his promise to stay by her side, no matter what happened. Breathlessness overwhelmed her control. His mother had been murdered? Why hadn’t he told her? She could’ve done something—anything—to help him through that pain, to support him, to comfort him, but he’d kept it all to himself. Why? With her next breath, the answer slipped to the tip of her tongue. He hadn’t revealed that part of his past for the same reason she hadn’t told him about her brother up front: to bury the darkness deep, to hide from it. But there was no hiding for either of them. Not anymore. “Beckett, I’m so sorry. How old—”

  “Sixteen.” He let go of the bottle, the plastic making a cracking sound with the sudden release of pressure. “After I found out about your arrest, I was right back there. I was that sixteen-year-old kid witnessing the damage a single act could inflict on so many lives firsthand, and done by someone I trusted, no less. Someone I thought cared about me.”

  Air stalled in her throat. He’d really believed she’d stolen that money. Not because of the prosecution’s case pristinely wrapped in shiny paper but because he’d already learned the people who were supposed to care about him could turn on him at the drop of a hat. The same lesson she’d learned when her aunt had taken the single most important person in her life away. Twenty-four hours ago, they’d stood on the opposite sides of the law, but it seemed they weren’t that different after all. Her fingers tingled as Raleigh reached across the cold marble and wrapped her hand in his. Blue eyes blazed at the contact, but she wouldn’t pull away. Not this time. “I cared about you—”

  A bullet exploded through the window above the kitchen sink.

  And found its mark.

  Chapter Six

  “Beckett!”

  Raleigh’s voice pierced through the sudden rush of pain, and he held on to that invisible anchor as tight as he could while reaching for his service weapon. A flash of movement registered through the darkness closing in around the edges of his vision. Raleigh. He had to get her out of here, had to get her somewhere safe.

  Long fingers pried him from off the cold marble island, the surface no longer white. She pulled him into her and forced him to sit against the oven’s stainless-steel surface. Hell. The shooter who’d ambushed them at the cabin had caught up with them. Beckett locked his back teeth as another wave of agony rolled through his shoulder. The bullet hadn’t gone straight through. If it had, he wouldn’t have been the only one bleeding out. “You have to go. Get out of here. I’ll hold them off as long as I can.”

  “That better be the blood loss talking. I’m not leaving you here to fight a gunman alone.” She pressed her hands on either side of his shoulder, trying to apply pressure to the wound, but it wouldn’t do him any good right now. They had to keep moving. He had to keep her and the baby safe. Raleigh glanced up over the countertop, toward the window the bullet had shattered on the way into his shoulder. “You’ve been shot. Tell me what to do.”

  “Find something in this kitchen I can use to stop the bleeding.” He set his head back against the cool steel behind him, and a bit of the pain ebbed. He nodded toward four drawers stacked one over the other on one side of the island. “That should help long enough for us to get out of here. Try those drawers.”

  Keeping low to the ground, she crawled on her hands and knees and opened one drawer after the other. Her hands left bloody prints on the pale hardwo
od, and his insides jerked. She was wasting time she didn’t have. The shooter had taken the shot that would leave Raleigh the most unprotected, and it was only a matter of time before their attacker tried to force their way inside to get to her.

  “I don’t want to think about why they have this in the kitchen, but it’s the best we’ve got.” She faced him, sliding back toward him on both knees, and held out a length of clear plastic tubing. With quick, sure movements, she wrapped the tubing around the space between his shoulder and neck and below his armpit, then lifted her gaze to his. Waiting. At his nod, she tightened the makeshift tourniquet as hard as she could, and white streaks shot across his vision.

  A scream escaped up his throat. Latching on to her hand, he leveraged his heels into the floor and pressed his back against the oven as hard as he could to compensate for the pain. He couldn’t afford to pass out. Not as long as there was an active shooter out there targeting the woman at his side. She adjusted her grip in his hand, the pain draining the longer she held on to him, but he didn’t have time to wonder how that was possible. Neither of them did. He knocked his head back into the oven. “Damn it all to hell. The next time that bastard shoots at me, he better put me down.”

  “You said the other marshals on your team installed new locks and alarm sensors on all the doors and windows.” Placing her hands alongside his rib cage, she helped pull him to his feet, and his heart rate hiked into overdrive. Hints of the shampoo she’d used in the shower dived into his lungs, something sweet. Like lavender and honey. “Tell me that will be enough to keep the shooter out.”

  Beckett clamped a hand to his shoulder, the gun heavy in his grip. “As long as the power is on—”

  An audible electrical surge reached his ears.

  Turning toward the now blank LED light over the burners on the stovetop, he pulled his phone from his jeans with his injured hand and tapped the screen. No service. Maneuvering Raleigh behind him, Beckett stepped around the wall blocking his view from the front door. The alarm panel installed beside the door had gone dark, which meant no contacting his team, local police, the feds. Nobody. They were on their own. “They cut the power from the backup generator. Whole system’s down.”

  “I counted three exits when we got here. Front door, back door and that side door across the living room. Not to mention the windows.” Her fingers slipped over his arm as though the mere contact with him could steady the frantic tone in her voice. She studied the wide expanse of open field between the house and the tree line to the west. “They can’t cover them all. We could get to those trees without them knowing we left the house. Make a run for it.”

  “I’m not taking the chance they didn’t come alone.” His gaze dipped to the slight bulge along her lower abdominals. The stakes were too high. Dropping the magazine out of his weapon, he counted three rounds left after the shoot-out at the cabin and slammed it back into place. He’d left his extra ammunition in his SUV back at her aunt’s cabin, and the rounds Raleigh had buried in backpacks all over that forest didn’t fit his weapon. Damn it. There were too many windows in this place, too many sight lines and not enough bullets to keep Raleigh safe. For all they knew, whoever’d stolen that money from Mothers Come First could’ve contracted the job to tie up loose ends out to a professional. “Get behind me and stay there. Anything happens, use me as a shield.”

  She did as he asked, the spot where her fingers had held on to him still warm. Her exhalation brushed against the back of his neck as she lowered her voice. “Please tell me you have a plan to get us out of here.”

  “The previous owner had a car in the garage when we seized the property.” Beckett scanned the property through the wall of windows on the other side of the house, heart in his throat. He slid his phone from his pocket and handed it to her. “I’m going to get you to it. Then I want you to get as far from here as you can. Lie low until I can come for you. Understand? If I don’t make it out, don’t come back here.”

  “I told you,” she said. “I’m not leaving you here to fight alone.”

  “You’re pregnant with my baby, Raleigh. I think I’m entitled to put your safety first—” Movement caught his attention from one of the windows. Beckett twisted around and lunged, colliding with her. “Get down!”

  They hit the floor hard as another bullet ripped past overhead. Adrenaline dumped into his veins, and the pain in his shoulder dimmed. Hauling her into his chest with his uninjured arm, he got them both to their feet and pulled her into the hallway for cover. He raised the gun and took aim around the smooth corner of the wall, firing once. Twice. Glass shattered onto the hardwood floor, but Beckett wasn’t going to stick around to see if he’d hit the target. Raleigh was the priority. Getting her to that vehicle was the priority. “Go!”

  Light gray walls and unfamiliar artwork blurred in his vision as they raced past the small home office and bedrooms branching off the hallway. Blood trickled along the inside of his arm, coating his palm. Wouldn’t take long for the shooter to figure out where they’d gone. All they had to do was follow the trail Beckett was leaving behind, but he’d be waiting for them. One bullet. That was all it would take to keep Raleigh safe.

  She wrenched the garage door open and disappeared inside mere steps ahead of him.

  Darkness enveloped them as Beckett charged through the door. He couldn’t see a damn thing with the automatic lights out of commission. Raleigh’s heavy breathing cut through his senses, and he reached out for her. Soft, damp hair slipped through his hand, triggering his heart rate to slow slightly. They made their way to the front of the garage. The faster he got her away from here, the sooner she’d be safe. That was all that mattered. “We’ll have to open the door manually.”

  “We’ll be giving up our position if we do that,” she said. “We can still make it to the trees.”

  His heart beat hard behind his ears, but through that dull sound gravel crunched beneath heavy footsteps outside the garage door. Her outline took shape beside him as his eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness. Beckett pulled her flat against him and lowered his mouth to her ear. “They already know we’re here.”

  And seeing as how the shooter had tracked them here so quickly, it looked like they weren’t going to stop until they got what they’d come for. Raleigh.

  He shifted his weight between both feet, tension tightening the tendons between his neck and shoulders. Pain slithered across his back and down his left arm as he held on to her. “Get in the car. Last time I checked, the keys were in the middle console. The second I get that door open, I want you to floor it as hard as you can.” He felt more than saw the hesitation in the hardness of the muscles along her arm. “You went into hiding to protect our baby. I’m going to need you to do that again. Promise me you’ll get as far from here as possible.”

  She nodded. “I promise.”

  The sound of footsteps died. One second. Two. Raleigh slipped into the luxury car and started the ignition as Beckett reached for the small red manual release attached to the garage door. The moment he opened this door, they’d be exposed. Vulnerable. Fumes built inside the enclosed space and burned down his throat, but he wasn’t going to make the first move. He adjusted his grip on the gun. He had one shot left. What was their attacker waiting for?

  Gunfire tore through the metal door, white streaks of light piercing through the small holes. A click registered. The shooter was reloading. Beckett pulled the release, and the garage flooded with sunlight as the door shot up the track. “Now!”

  The car shot backward, barely missing the single masked shooter dressed in head-to-toe black, and spun around toward the dirt road leaving the property. The shooter had reloaded and took aim at the car, but Beckett was already running. He collided with a wall of lean muscle, the bullet in his shoulder screaming in protest. The shooter’s weapon slid into the dirt, out of reach, as Beckett fought for control. Sunlight glinted off metal as he shoved to his feet. He dod
ged the first swing of the assailant’s blade, then the second. He struck out, bone meeting flesh, and the suspect stumbled back. The shooter raised his weapon to take the final shot. Raleigh had almost made it to the fence, but the car was crawling to a stop. No. No, no, no, no. She had to keep going. She had to get out of here.

  His opponent recovered fast. Charging with the knife in one hand, his attacker went for the soft tissue in Beckett’s gut. He managed to dodge the fatal strike to his organs, but Beckett wasn’t fast enough to block the next move with his injured shoulder.

  The blade sank deep into his right thigh. A scream lodged in his throat as the shooter hit him in the left kidney, then the right, and his gun discharged. Lightning struck behind his eyes a split second before he hit the ground. The bastard followed through with a kick to his ribs. The sickening crunch of bone crushed the air from his lungs. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. He strained to get a visual on the car. On Raleigh.

  Fire engulfed the sky.

  The explosion rocked through him, a wall of dust fleeing in the wake of red-and-orange flames shooting into the air, and his entire world shattered. “Raleigh!”

  Grip on the knife in Beckett’s leg, the shooter stood above him and pulled the weapon free. Then wiped it clean with one sleeve. “None of this would’ve had to happen, Marshal Foster, if Raleigh would’ve just taken the fall like she was supposed to.”