Satan, Line One

by M. J. Schiller

Mr. McCord and I had just made it into the shadow of the house when the police made their announcement and switched on their big lights. He lugged me down behind their air conditioner. He was breathing hard.

  “Can you see anything?”

  I leaned around the corner of the unit. Even though we were pretty far back, the light still hurt my eyes, as they had adjusted to the dark.

  “There’s more units now. And men. But…I can’t tell how many. They’re just kind of blobs.”

  “Okay. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change anything. I still need to get inside.”

  “You mean we need to get inside.”

  He set his jaw and looked like he was about to argue with me when James’ voice rang out. “Don’t shoot! I’m sending them out.”

  Mr. McCord scrambled to his feet, poking his head over the top of the air conditioner. Someone—they were only an outline of black to us—slowly moved into the light and Myles began to cry.

  “It’s Zoe!” I could tell by the shape and the size. We waited.

  “Where’s the third hostage?” A shadow shouted into a megaphone. “We need you to release Mrs. McCord.”

  There was no response. We looked at each other. He pushed my shoulder. “Go to Zoe. Make sure she’s okay.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not letting you go in there alone.”

  He pushed me. It didn’t take much, because I wasn’t stable in my crouch, and the lawn sloped away from the house.

  “STAY DOWN! DO NOT ATTEMPT TO MOVE.”

  I turned slightly. Mr. McCord was already to the back of the house. Four guys in combat gear stepped out of the shadow of my house, their rifles pointed at me.

  “Don’t move!”

  “Zack!”

  When I looked in the direction of her scream, Zoe burst into the light, running toward me.

  I staggered to my feet, putting my hands behind my head when I was up. Considering the situation, it was about the stupidest thing in the world to do. “Zoe, no!” I was afraid someone would shoot her.

  “HOLD YOUR FIRE!”

  Despite that order, two guns were trained on me and two were trained on Zoe as she ran to me.

  “GET DOWN!”

  Someone shoved me in the shoulder, but, with their guns, they only had one hand free, and I stayed on my feet.

  “Don’t shoot! He’s my boyfriend.”

  “HOLD YOUR FIRE! HOLD YOUR FIRE!”

  I brought my hands down, and she collided with me, almost taking me to the ground like her father had.

  I buried my face in her hair. “Zoe. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I—”

  The rest of what I was going to say was lost to her kiss as she covered my lips with hers.

  Someone tapped me on the shoulder. “You need to follow us.”

  She put her hands on either side of my face. “I love you!”

  I squeezed her tighter, closing my eyes. “I’ve loved you. Always. It’s always been you.”

  “Come on.”

  Hands shoved us closer to the property line, out of the light, and we were hustled to the front. A guy in a suit, holding the megaphone, strode over to us, and he didn’t look happy.

  “What the hell were you thinking, son?” Before I could form a response, he started in again. “Why does every civilian have to act like they’re some blockbuster movie star in an action flick?” He paused, working his jaw. “Well, your little action scene could have cost someone their life. There’s a reason why we attend a police academy, and are constantly receiving further training. We’re the experts. We know the best way to handle things.”

  Part of me wanted to defend my actions, but I knew he was right. “Yes, sir.”

  He wiped his free hand across his face and exhaled. When he spoke next, he was calmer and his voice was softer. “Look. I know it’s difficult seeing your loved ones in danger.” Here he looked at Zoe, who was glued to my side. “But you put them in further danger when you interfere with us trying to get everyone out in one piece.”

  I glanced around at the faces of the policemen around us. Some looked sympathetic, others seemed equally as angry as he was.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Okay. Get her checked out by the EMTs.” He waved at an ambulance half parked on the island in the middle of our cul-de-sac. “Then Officer McBride will take her statement.”

  We took a step in the direction indicated and my mom ran forward and about squashed Myles in between us. It was then I registered the sounds of his screaming. I was reassuring her I was okay when some man tromped over with a few officers.

  “How much of a threat is this guy?”

  “He told Mr. McCord he killed his own wife.”

  More was said, but I lost it in wave of shock that hit me. Zoe had been held by a man who took his wife’s life, and Dani was still in there.

  “Oh, my God.” Her voice was barely a whisper. She must have heard him, too. She shook and cried. I held her. What could I say?

  “He’ll get her out, Zoe. Your dad will get her out.” I closed my eyes, squeezing her tighter and saying a prayer.

  Tucker

  I allowed myself a second of relief. Zoe and Myles were safe.

  But Dani was still inside. With a maniac who had killed his own wife and felt I had wronged him. I crept up the few stairs to the back door with my key in hand. I tried to slip it in, but, of course, this was the one lock in the house that was finicky, so I had to work it a moment. By the time I’d unlocked it, sweat gathered along my hairline. I took a breath and slowly turned the handle, pushing the door open. This, of course, was also the door that really needed some WD-40. I kicked myself for procrastinating on it. I cringed when it creaked, but the sight of the blood on the floor totally made me forget about the door. It looked like a lot of blood, but I hoped the way it was smeared made it look like more than there was.

  I was low when I came in the door, as it had a window in it I was trying to avoid. As I was straightening, the door to the living room swung open. I had no time to hide or get a weapon. He had Dani in front of him, the gun to her temple, his back pressing the door against the wall. A stripe of blood ran from her hip to the hem of her white nightgown.

  “Well, well, well. Lookie what we have here. Decide to join us, did you, Tuc-ker?” His eyes glowed, powered by his hate for me. “This is perfect. You can watch me splatter your pretty bride’s brains all over your kitchen.” Dani closed her eyes.

  I threw my hands out in front of me. “No! No! Wait!”

  He raised his chin, sucking air in between his teeth.

  “It’s not her you’re angry with.”

  “Angry? Angry!” he shouted. “I passed angry long ago, McCord. I’m well on my way to deranged now.”

  “Okay. Okay.” I took a breath. I was a lawyer. I was going to have to give the best argument of my life. “But leave her out of this. It’s between you and me. Think of your boys. They’ve been the innocent parties through all of this, right? Dani’s innocent, too.” I made the mistake of looking at her and almost lost it. “She—” My voice broke.

  Get a grip. Get a grip. Dani’s life is riding on this.

  I closed my eyes for a second and swallowed, trying to get my voice back. “She doesn’t deserve to be hurt.”

  “If everyone got what they deserved, I’d be with my boys right now instead of having this little conversation with you.” He looked at Dani, and my stomach lurched.

  I wracked my brain. What did I have to barter with? “What if I could arrange for you to talk to your sons?”

  His eyes snapped to me and a vein near his jaw pulsed. “That bitch of a mother-in-law would never let me talk to them.”

  “I’ve already talked to her, and she agreed,” I lied.

  His face went rigid. “You’re a liar. The boys aren’t even home. They spent the night at a friend’s. I watched them leave.”

  “But they came back. One of them was sick.”

  “Which one? Bobby?”

  “She did
n’t say. Only said they threw up on the lady’s Oriental carpet.”

  He hesitated.

  “Thomas. We both know none of us may make it out alive from here. Don’t you want a chance to talk to your boys one more time?”

  He shifted his weight.

  “What do I have to do?”

  “Let Dani go.”

  He jerked her to him, the veins in his arm protruding. “No way.”

  “I’ll take her place. Then you’ll still have a hostage.”

  “No,” Dani managed, despite the arm across her throat.

  “It’s me you have the beef with, not her.”

  “No,” she whimpered.

  “And you’ll let me talk to my kids? You promise?”

  “Yes. You have my word.”

  Tears tracked down Dani’s face, but I tried not to look at her. I was getting someplace.

  “How do I know if I let her go, you’ll stay?”

  I slowly drew a kitchen chair out and lowered myself into it. “You can tie me to the chair.” He took a step forward. “But if Dani doesn’t appear outside, the cops won’t patch the call through. You have to let her go.”

  He licked his lips. He wanted me to watch her die. But I prayed he wanted to talk to his boys more. This was a huge gamble, but the fact he was even tempted gave me hope.

  “You’ll still have the satisfaction of watching me die,” I said grimly.

  Dani sobbed.

  I did this to her. She could have lived her whole life without going through something like this if it weren’t for me.

  He pushed her forward and she had to grab the tabletop to keep from falling. “You tie him.” He took a handful of zip ties from his pocket and tossed them on the table in front of me.

  Dani stared at them in horror. “No. I’m not going to do it.”

  “Dani.” I waited until she looked at me. “Do what the man says.”

  “No, Tucker. I’m not gonna tie you up so he can shoot you. I won’t do it!” she screamed.

  “Honey.”

  “I could just kill you both,” James threatened. But I knew now he wanted to talk to those boys.

  I looked Dani in the eyes. “You need to trust me.” Something flicked in her face. Either she had a plan, or she believed I had a plan, which I didn’t. I had one thing on my mind. Getting her out. She moved slowly around the table.

  The sound of the shot and the window breaking seemed to happen simultaneously. Dani screamed and hit the floor. Men rushed in from every direction. I got over to Dani and covered her with my body, but when I looked over, I knew Thomas James was no longer a threat to us.

  Chapter 21

  Killian

  When we pulled into her driveway, I was telling her the story about when me da and Uncle Seamus tried to milk a random cow in some old farmer’s field. I had her laughing so hard she was holding her sides, but as we quieted I realized I didn’t give myself enough time to figure out how to properly end the evening with her.

  “You’ll come in for a drink?”

  It jolted me. Along with the devilish glint in her eyes. Should I? I wanted to take things slow with her. Work her into it. From some of the comments she’d made, I got the sense she didn’t have much experience in the relationship department. She was a hard worker, me Jo, and left precious little time for dalliances.

  But she had this other side. An almost wanton, brazen hussy of a girl who made me dream of doing all kinds of things with her I hadn’t done with other women. That’s who was sitting in the passenger’s seat beside me right now, seducing with simply the way she was looking at me.

  Then, to the careful observer, which I was, a third side to the multi-faceted woman who was Josephine Compton existed, and I think that was the side I most yearned for. The one who was careful with whom she showed her inner self. Burn away all the rest and she was someone whose heart was full of love she was ready to give, but she hadn’t had a chance to share it with anyone yet. This was the lonely girl who protected herself because she had no one else to protect her. And no one else to love her properly. She deserved this and so much more. In some ways I felt unworthy of her, but…everyone has their weaknesses, and she was mine.

  “Or…if you’d rather not….” She was getting out of the car.

  I grabbed her arm. “No. I want to….”

  She smiled. “Well, then, come on in.”

  I switched off the engine. It appeared as if I was going in.

  She unlocked the door, strode in, deposited her purse and coat on a hook beside the door, and held out her hand for mine.

  “Oh.” I slipped out of it and handed it to her with a smile.

  “Do you want to keep your hat on?”

  “Oh.” I swiped it off and hung it on top of the coat. Why did I feel like an awkward teenager all of a sudden?

  She turned and I followed her into a wide, sunny kitchen.

  “So…your dad and Seamus weren’t hurt, were they?”

  “Nah. But they both decided that night to never be bullfighters.”

  She laughed. Opening cabinets and closing them again.

  “I have to say…” I looked around. “Your house isn’t what I expected.”

  She spun around, scrutinizing me. “Annnd what do you mean by that?”

  I leaned against the center island, hands stuffed in my pockets. “I…. I expected something more modern. Straight lines. Blacks and whites, and maybe a few reds.”

  “Oh.” Her gaze traveled the room and her face fell.

  “No. No. I like this better.” I clutched her hips. Strangely, I was better when I was touching her. “This is my soft, warm Josie. The one she doesn’t show to many.”

  She looked around again. “Yes. I suppose that’s true.” She sighed. “Besides repairmen, I don’t think anyone else has ever seen the inside of my house.”

  This shocked me. “Well. And I guess I’m sort of a repairman, too.”

  “No.” She undid a button on my vest. “To me, you’re much more than that.” She undid the rest and slid her hands around my waist. “I don’t have any alcohol.”

  I smiled. “You knew that, didn’t you?”

  She nodded, biting her bottom lip and looking into my eyes with that same naughty twinkle in hers I’d seen in the car. Captivating.

  “Well,” she brought her hands out, though I still held her, and played with my tie. “I did think I had a bottle of some kind of watermelon vodka I’d gotten on a particularly hard day…actually, I got it on my twenty-first birthday for myself. Took a couple of swigs, and threw up. Turned out I had the flu.” She frowned, and looked at the cabinets behind me she hadn’t tried yet. “I think I may have gotten rid of it the last time I checked expiration dates.”

  “They have those?”

  She laughed. “Yes. Remind me never to eat at your house.”

  I looked at her, turning serious. She struck a chord in my heart, she did. “I don’t need any alcohol, Jo.”

  The corners of her mouth lifted and she slowly slid her hands around my neck. Her gaze dropped to my lips. “Me, neither.”

  I tilted my head and lowered it, an inch at a time, enjoying the anticipation of kissing her. Her mouth was warm and inviting, and offered me a plethora of pleasurable sensations. What began mildly picked up speed at a tumultuous pace, like a train leaving a station. She jerked my shirttails out, her hands stealing along me chest, across my skin. And I’ll admit to suckin’ in me gut to make a good impression. She moaned into my kiss.

  I guess a good impression was made.

  I found her skin, too, underneath the back of her shirt—petal-soft—and ventured a few inches inside her waist band. I was not taking this any further than she wanted; she had the lead.

  She took it, and ran. Feverishly she worked my buttons until she got to me tie, which I think she’d forgotten about. I let her go for a half-second and jerked on it, sliding it over my head. Our lips didn’t like the separation, so they met again. I’d barely brought my hand to the isl
and but she was fidgeting those last buttons open and spreading her hands wide across my chest. Miss Josephine Compton was disrobing me in her kitchen. And I wasn’t putting up much of a fight.

  She created some space and dropped her gaze. “Man,” she sucked in a breath, “you’re built. How did you get this body?”

  Again, her forthrightness threw me a trifle. I shrugged. “Lifting kegs, I guess.”

  “You mean, you don’t work out?”

  “If you mean at one of those fancy gyms, nah. I fool around with some free weights, and run, of course. And I have a pullup bar.”

  She took a step back and smiled. “Take your shirt off.”

  Wow. She was really being a bold one now. I stood straight, slipped out of it and my vest, and laid them on the island. When I turned back the sly vixen was checking out my butt. She giggled and came closer, rubbing her arms across my chest again.

  “I love it.”

  I took hold of her biceps and yanked her in, her arms between us, and crushed her mouth with mine. Now I was half-clad in her kitchen, I could barely wait for what would come next. We staggered back a few feet till we hit the counter. I brought my hands under her sweet little ass and lifted her onto the counter without breaking our kiss. She spread her legs, her skirt riding to nearly her hip, so I could come closer, then changed her mind and pushed me away. She clasped the hem of her tank. I grabbed her hands and brought them to my shoulders, still kissing her.

  “My turn.”

  Her eyes flashed. “Okay.”

  I tried to whip her top off, but got it caught in the necklace and had to ungracefully wrestle it free. She laughed. Her hair was mussed. I smoothed it, and we quieted. She grasped the countertop on either side of her. I looked her in the eye and held her gaze for a moment. I was filled with a tenderness I’d never known.

  “I don’t even have to look to know you are beautiful.”

  But I slowly lowered my gaze and—my Gawd—beautiful was not a powerful enough word to describe her. She had on this black, lacy—damn. A man didn’t stand a chance. I looked back up and she must have seen it in my eyes, because there was no hiding it. She put her hands on either side of my face and our mouths came together with a wild intensity. She wrapped her legs around me. I nibbled along her jaw, and down her neck. She arched her back, laying her head against the cabinet door behind her and moaning.