Chapter Two
Saxon kept a close eye on the blonde when they pulled up to the little no-tell-motel on the outskirts of Miami. She hadn’t said anything else during the drive. Definitely not the “Thank you” that she should have offered considering that he’d saved her life. And she sure hadn’t apologized for kneeing him in the balls.
He hadn’t seen that one coming. It wasn’t often that Saxon was caught by surprise, but when the sexy little tease had been pressing her body to his so temptingly and offering him the sweet heaven of her mouth, he’d dropped his guard. Stupid mistake—thinking with his dick instead of his brain, so the bit of pain had been earned.
He’d be sure not to make another dumbass mistake like that one again. No matter how pretty the lady was. Besides, she was about to become SEP—someone else’s problem. And he was going to ride off into the sunset. Hello, new life.
Good-bye, dark past.
He had too many ghosts dodging his steps. It was way past time to start fresh some place new. He’d been counting down the days to this new life. Saving money. Planning every spare minute to turn his dreams into reality.
“Keep a hand on her,” Victor Monroe ordered as they headed toward the motel. Victor had already gotten the room for them. In a place like this, no questions would ever be asked. Privacy was a given.
Saxon kept a close hand on the woman. It was still dark outside, but as soon as they entered the little motel room and Victor flipped on the lights, the blonde whirled to stare at them both with her freaking amazing eyes. The greenest eyes he’d ever seen.
Her gaze darted between him and Victor, and he knew that neither one of them looked reassuring.
And he still had his hand on her.
“Ms. Ward,” Victor began in his smooth, I-Can-Take-Care-of-Shit voice, “I realize you’ve had a terrifying night, but we’re here to help you.”
She swallowed. And didn’t look reassured.
Maybe she’d try to knee Victor in the balls, too. That would be fun.
But when she backed away, retreating nervously, Saxon dropped his hold on her. There were two doors in that place. One led back to the parking lot. One led to the room next door—but if she tried to make a run for that connecting room, he’d be on her in an instant. Quite simply, there was nowhere for her to run.
“I-if you want to help me,” she said, “call the cops.”
Saxon liked her voice. Husky, rich. It made him think of tousled sheets and naked skin.
“Ma’am,” Victor drawled, “we are the cops.”
She blinked.
“I’m FBI Special Agent Victor Monroe, and this…” He waved his hand toward Saxon. “This man saved your life tonight.”
Saxon pulled up his shirt. The wire was chaffing him. He tossed the shirt aside and felt her eyes on his chest. He looked down and saw the small black wire and the black tape in the middle of his chest. With a quick yank, he tossed the wire at Victor. “Guessing you got everything?”
“My men will have Kurt Taggert in custody by dawn.”
Damn straight. Then his work was done. Hello, freedom. No more changing his hair color every few months for the undercover jobs, no more lies as he spent his days with the worst criminals in the U.S. Paradise is waiting for me.
He rubbed at the back of his neck, pushing away the tension there. When he looked up, Elizabeth’s eyes were on his chest. His lips quirked.
“You…you had on a wire?” Her gaze rose to meet his. “You’re FBI? I-I don’t believe it.”
Well, that was just insulting.
Victor slowly closed in on her. He pulled out his ID and offered it to Elizabeth. “We’re quite legit, Ms. Ward.”
Her shaking fingers closed around the ID, but she didn’t look away from Saxon. “Why didn’t you say something to me?”
And when should he have done that? “Before…or after I busted you out of The Blade?”
“I-in the alley. When we…when you—”
“When you were kissing me,” Saxon supplied. “Sweetheart, right then, my mouth was busy doing other things.”
Her cheeks stained bright red. That was cute. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a woman blush. The ladies he hung out with were usually long past the blushing stage.
“Ms. Ward…” Victor cleared his throat and pocketed his ID once more. “We’re going to need you to testify against Kurt Taggert.”
“Who?”
“That would be the jerk who put the gun to your head,” Saxon told her. He noticed that Victor was still standing close to Elizabeth. A bit too close. When he’d gotten the call from his buddy to move in, get the confession at The Blade, and to save the victim inside…he’d sure never expected the woman to be so…
Tempting.
“You’ll have to testify against him, Ms. Ward,” Victor continued. His blue eyes were fixed on Elizabeth. “Kurt Taggert was hired to kill you tonight, and if it weren’t for Saxon, well, you’d be dead now.”
She took a step back. “Hired to kill me? Me?” Her head shook, sending her blonde hair falling over her shoulders. “Why would anyone want me dead?”
Why indeed? Her death would be such a waste. There were so many things Saxon could imagine doing with her delectable body.
“You’re lucky we had eyes on The Blade,” Victor told her with a slow nod. “We saw you being hauled in the back and I was able to send in a…rescue team.”
Her gaze was on Saxon once more.
He grinned. “That would be me.”
“You…you…FBI?” She sure seemed to be having trouble processing that bit of information. So maybe he looked a little rough around the edges. He worked undercover assignments for a reason. Because he fit so well in the darker parts of the world.
“We need names from you.” Victor started to pace around the small room. There wasn’t much furniture in the place. An old desk—one with its right front leg propped up on a book. A faded chair. A big bed. Nothing else. “Give us some suspects to run with here, Ms. Ward.”
“I don’t have suspects!” Her bare toes curled into the dark brown rug. “You know more than I do. I mean…how did you even know my name?”
“I ran your picture through our database.” Victor waved that away. “Crimes like this are either personal or professional. I already know that you work as a Public Relations specialist for a firm here in Miami. Have you ruffled any feathers? Pissed off any colleagues?”
“Not that I’m aware of.” She pushed back her hair. “I mean, my biggest project has been a fundraiser for the local children’s hospital. That isn’t the type of work that makes someone want to kill me.” Elizabeth retreated another step. Did she even realize she was edging closer to the bed? Saxon doubted it.
“Then maybe it’s personal,” Saxon said, and yeah, he took a step toward her. When he’d been close to her in that alley, when her body had been pressed against his, the scent of sweet honey had teased his nose. So maybe he wanted to catch that scent again.
Or maybe he just wanted to be closer to her.
“Ditch any lovers lately?” Saxon asked her because a woman like her, she’d have plenty of lovers. Men who’d fight like hell to get in her bed. Like I would.
Her eyelids flickered, just a bit. Ah, there it was. Anger pumped through him. “We’ll need that name.”
“He’s not a lover, okay. I may have been…dating someone, but that ended, all right? It ended easily, without any big drama. And certainly without the guy wanting me dead!”
Saxon took another step toward her. She retreated until the back of her legs hit the side of the bed. “A name,” he told her.
“Fine.” Her breath huffed out. “It’s not going to mean anything but—”
“A name.”
“Wesley Locke, okay?”
His gaze shot to Victor. He saw his buddy’s eyes squeeze shut. Keeping all emotion from his voice, Saxon said, “One more time….”
“Wesley Locke. He’s a businessman here in Miami. He owns a few bars and he—he was helping me raise money for my charity.”
The hell he’d been. Wesley Locke was a criminal straight to his core. His bars were just fronts for his drug business. And if the guy had put a hit out on Elizabeth, then she’d probably seen something that the woman hadn’t been meant to see.
So her hit had been both personal…and professional. The worst of both worlds.
“You’ll need to stay here with her,” Victor said to Saxon, voice low. “Until I can figure out what the hell is going on, I have to make sure she stays safe.”
Hell. He’d been afraid Victor would say something like that. “Twenty-four hours,” Saxon gritted out. Because he had plans, too. And Victor wasn’t about to drag him back into the business again. “And then I’m done. Out. You know that.”
Victor closed the distance between them and slapped his hand on Saxon’s shoulder. “Whatever you say, buddy.”
Saxon’s eyes narrowed.
“Uh, excuse me?”
They both turned to look at Elizabeth.
“I am not staying here. I have a home. A home I worked hard to get. I have a job waiting. I’m not just vanishing for the night!”
Civilians could always be so hard to handle. “I don’t remember hearing that you had a choice in the matter,” Saxon told her. “Vic, did you give the lady a choice?”
“Saxon…” A warning edge had entered Victor’s voice. That was Victor—always the careful one. Not wanting to frighten folks when terror could be a very useful tool.
“Here’s the thing,” Saxon said as he turned to look at Elizabeth once more. “Your ex…he’s trouble. Big damn trouble. And if Locke put a hit on you, just what do you think the guy is going to do when he realizes that hit wasn’t successful?”
But she stubbornly shook her head. “Wesley wouldn’t do that. You don’t know him.”
And she was blind. Put a guy in a fancy suit, give him enough cash to toss around, and no one ever suspected who the guy was beneath the surface. In my next life…no one will suspect me, either. No one will see my darkness. “I know him,” he said grimly. “And if you walk out of that door now…” He pointed to the door of motel room number thirteen. “Then you’re a dead woman.”
She didn’t move.
“Ms. Ward…” Ah, Victor was trying to calm the waters. “It’s just for twenty-four hours. Just long enough for my men to bring Kurt Taggert into custody. He’ll point the finger at the man who hired him, and we will take the next step then.”
She didn’t look reassured. “The next step…that will be me going home?”
“Your safety will be our highest priority.”
Did she notice that Victor didn’t answer her question? Probably not. The guy could be a slick bastard.
“You had a gun to your head less than an hour ago,” Saxon reminded her bluntly. “You really want to run away from the only guys offering you protection right now?”
She licked her lips. The sensual swipe of her pink tongue had his body tensing. She didn’t need to do stuff like that, especially not when he was riding the hard edge that came from ending a mission. Adrenaline pumped in his blood, and he couldn’t shake the memory of her sweet, hot mouth from his mind. The things he wanted to do with that little pink tongue of hers…
Her voice was a whisper as she said, “You’re the good guys.”
Good? Not so much. But they were the guys who weren’t currently trying to kill her.
“It’s the weekend, Ms. Ward,” Victor told her. “No one from your job will even know you’re gone. By Monday, this could all be a memory for you.”
Or it could be something else entirely.
But she nodded, obviously buying Victor’s words and thinking she’d be home free in a day. “Twenty-four hours,” Elizabeth said as if she was agreeing to some kind of deal.
Victor smiled. “The FBI appreciates your cooperation.”
Bullshit. Did Elizabeth realize the FBI would have made her stay in that motel room? She’d never had a choice in the matter.
When Victor turned for the door, Saxon followed him. Victor didn’t speak until they were outside. “She doesn’t leave your sight,” he ordered.
Where was she supposed to go? “It’s a small motel room. I’ll be able to see her plenty.”
Victor grunted. “Try to keep your hands off her. This is business.”
But Saxon shook his head. “I just finished my last case for the FBI. I’m done.” He didn’t need the paperwork to be processed. “This is a favor for a friend.” Because Victor was one of the few people that he actually considered a friend. Hell, Victor was family. The bond they had went far deeper than blood. “I’ll watch your blonde, and you go get those assholes off the street.” It was time to get justice for Jenny Long and for all of the other victims that Kurt Taggert had claimed. He wouldn’t be killing anyone else.
Victor nodded. “I’ll call you when it’s clear.” Then he was gone. Saxon waited a few moments before he headed back into that motel room. Lucky number thirteen.
When he opened the door, Elizabeth was exactly where he’d left her. Way too close to the bed and looking far too sexy.
A victim. The woman is a victim. He was supposed to reassure victims. But the problem was that Saxon wasn’t the suave one. Victor was the one who was so good at spouting BS.
“Can I…can I trust you?” Elizabeth asked him.
Just for the hell of it, he decided to be honest. “No.”
And the fear came back to her pretty face.
***
Kurt Taggert paced in front of the bar. The Blade had cleared out—his men had emptied out the damn place right after Elizabeth Ward had vanished with that bastard Saxon. His nose had finally stopped bleeding—Saxon had broken it, and he’d be sure to pay the jerk back.
As soon as we find him.
The guy’s motorcycle had been found, with its trademark skulls on the sides of the ride, but Saxon had gone to ground some place in the city. The guy had a reputation for being one crazy bad-ass, a man you weren’t supposed to ever cross. Kurt normally wouldn’t be going up against him, but this wasn’t a normal situation.
He had to get Elizabeth Ward back.
His phone rang. Kurt looked down, and when he saw the number flashing on the screen, he started to sweat. “H-hey, man,” Kurt said when he answered the call. “You didn’t—”
“Is she dead?” The flat, hard voice demanded.
Fuck me. I am so screwed. “There’s been an…incident.”
Silence. “She’s dead.”
She should be.
“An insane bastard named Saxon Black took her.” Didn’t that mean she was as good as dead? Kurt figured Saxon would screw her, then eliminate her.
“What?”
“He…wanted her.” He’d seen the guy’s gaze rake Elizabeth’s body. Sure, she was pretty enough for a fast fuck, but to take down Kurt’s men? Just to screw her? Saxon really was a crazy—
“She’s not dead.”
That icy tone had Kurt’s stomach knotting. Normally, it took a whole hell of a lot to scare him, but this man—this man had power. Power that Kurt needed. If he turns on me, I’m done.
“I paid you ten thousand dollars to kill her. That’s what you do, right? You kill people.”
Kurt heard the creak of the floor behind him. He whirled around, and that tricky bastard was right there, with the phone at his ear. Kurt had never even heard the fellow walk in. He really is as good as they say.
“Killing people isn’t so hard,” the guy said as he lowered the phone. He put it into his pocket—only to immediately bring his hand back up. This time, that hand was holding a knife. “It goes something like this…”
Kurt tried to grab his own weapon, but the guy had already attacked. The knife sank into his chest and Kurt slammed into the bar. He looked down and saw the blood covering his shirt.
“See? Not hard at all.”
Kurt hit the floor. He slammed down, hitting the dirty concrete floor of The Blade face-first.
“Never pay someone for the job you can do yourself.”
Kurt’s body felt cold.
“Your screw-up won’t be tied to me.”
“The…the FBI—” That was all he could manage. The pain was burning through him.
His attacker laughed. “They didn’t see me come in. You’re the one who screwed up. You knew the FBI was keeping tabs on you—I told you that shit—and you still just brought that woman right in the back door! People saw you!”
He’d been…following orders. He’d thought the guy standing over him—the man who’d just knifed him—would help to protect him.
You really can’t trust anyone in this world.
And the bastard just left him there. With every painful breath that Kurt tried to suck in, he could feel his blood pouring out of him. He fought to hold on to life, for just a few more moments because he didn’t want to go out like this. Not on the floor, not with booze and trash around him. He was better than this. He had plans. He was so much…better.
Every second seemed to stretch for an hour. Each breath was a painful saw from his lungs. He tried to crawl forward, but his hands just slipped over the floor. He cried out, but there was no one there to hear him.
All of my men…are out hunting. I’m going to…die alone.
His heart was still beating, and with every beat, more blood pushed from his body. He was in a growing pool of his own blood, and he was so cold.
His eyes were sagging. He fought to keep them open. Then he heard the rush of footsteps. Coming fast. He tried to turn his head toward the sound, but he couldn’t move.
“FBI!” A voice blasted.
If he could have, Kurt would have laughed then at the freaking irony. He was dying, and now the FBI was coming to bust him. Too late, asshole. Too late.
“Kurt Taggert?” That voice demanded, then the guy started swearing.
He was flipped over and Kurt looked up. A man with dark hair and blue eyes glared at him. “You’re going to die on me?”
Yeah, he was. At least that meant no one would be shoving him into a jail cell.
“Who did this?” The guy demanded. “Who shot you?” And the agent even put his hands on Kurt’s chest, like he was going to help him.
He was long past help. He couldn’t even feel the man’s touch. He couldn’t feel anything. Funny…he’d killed so many people and he’d never even wondered…is there anything after death?
Fear trickled through him. He tried to speak. Maybe jail wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe it would be better than what waited after death. Kurt tried to tell the agent about the man who’d knifed him but…
Too late.