Chapter One
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COLTON BELLS WOKE at 3 a.m. to a blaring television and one hell of a hangover.
His mouth was as dry as an Oklahoma cotton field and he had to pee, but his brain was fuzzy with the remnants of another dream about Shelby. While his bladder told him to get moving, it took him a minute to remember where he was and why he felt like shit.
Because of Shelby? Check. She’d been laughing in the dream. Calling his name and waving at him to follow as she danced through the tall wheat grass of a field behind her childhood home. He knew that place all too well.
His blurry eyes caught on a mostly empty bottle on the coffee table, his cell phone and keys tossed next to it. The dragon in his chest laughed. Bourbon? Yeah, that might be the cause too.
On the TV screen, his latest Netflix marathon played on, and it looked like he’d missed at least two episodes of the space drama.
Science fiction was so much more satisfying than real life.
Shoving himself into a fully sitting position, he wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth and looked around. Outside of the couch, coffee table, and TV, there was a mini kitchen and a bathroom. No curtains, no pictures on the walls, nothing to differentiate this place from any of the others he’d been in recently.
Except…
Oh, yeah. There it was. The hole in the wall his fist had made the last time he’d been in DC when his dragon had raised its head. He’d had to help with a little incident involving his boss—she’d given birth during an ambush at her home by a black market antiquities dealer and her goons. Colton had beat ass over there to help a couple of other Shadow Force members stop the woman from killing Beatrice, her husband, Cal, and their baby, Sloane.
The Reeses had all survived. The antiquities dealer, not so much.
Colton attended an impromptu baby shower for the family a few weeks ago and Beatrice and Cal had been so happy. Afterwards, his dragon would not leave him alone. He’d had so much pent up frustration over the fact he wasn’t married to Shel anymore, and the kids they’d always talked about having were nothing but a pipe dream, he’d punched the wall of his apartment and drowned his sorry self in bourbon.
It was becoming a habit.
A habit Beatrice Reese wasn’t going to tolerate for much longer.
Thank God she understood his neuroses. His inability to stay in one place worked for her and Shadow Force International. The dragon kept him on the move, never able to settle in one place without lashing out, so B sent him on regular missions and floated him between the three SFI headquarters—one on each coast and the latest in Chicago.
Chicago had been a blast, working with Jaxon Sloan and taking down a couple of no-good terrorists. But now he was back in DC.
Alone.
Colton pushed off the shabby couch and plodded into the bathroom to relieve himself. He was washing up when he heard his phone.
Good. Maybe SFI had a new mission for him. He needed something other than Shelby, bourbon, and Dark Matter marathons to focus on.
Shelby. God. Every. Fucking. Moment. He couldn’t get her out of his mind. Ever.
Honest truth was, he didn’t want to.
The phone barked again, and he realized it wasn’t his work cell. The ringing was coming from the couch—inside the couch.
Digging between two cushions, he felt around, and yep, there it was. The ringing phone he never answered.
Because his personal cell never rang.
His one friend, Connor McKenzie, worked at SFI as well. He had no mother, father, or other family to ever check on him. Hence, the phone had managed to go AWOL into the couch without him even noticing.
Unknown Number. Hmm. A telemarketer or some scammer in a foreign country, no doubt, oblivious to the fact it was the witching hour along the Eastern US seaboard.
Colton hit the decline button and tossed the phone back onto the couch cushion. Tipping back, he closed his eyes, only to hear a soft knock on his door.
He peeked open one eye. Who would be at his door at this hour?
The knock came again, a little more urgent this time.
Shel?
He smacked an open hand against his forehead. What is wrong with me?
Hundreds of miles and a set of divorce papers separated them. Regardless of those two minor things, there was no way Shelby Claiborne was on his doorstep.
Colton hauled himself off the sofa and grabbed his sidearm from the coffee table. Nobody showed up at your door at 3 a.m. unless there was trouble.
His dragon stirred. The damn thing loved trouble.
Slowly, quietly, he made his way to the door and listened.
No sound came from the hallway. He eased over to peek through the peephole.
His brows crashed together when he recognized the scrawny kid standing there. Three flicks of his wrist and the door locks gave way.
He holstered his gun and threw open the door. “Marcelo?” His thirteen-year-old downstairs neighbor looked ashy under his dark skin. His eyes were wide saucers. “What is it, buddy?”
“Grandma’s going to the hospital. She’s not feelin’ good.” A dog behind Marcelo’s leg wagged its tail. “I need to go with her. Can you take care of Salisbury for me?”
Colton’s neighbor, Paulina, was eighty-some years old with a heart condition, and Marcelo’s parents were out of the picture. The only person Marcelo had was his Grandma P.
And the stray dog he’d picked up off the streets last winter.
“What’s wrong with Paulina?” Colton asked, eyeing the dog.
The dog eyed him back, tongue hanging out the side of his mouth. Salisbury had lost a few teeth during his time on the streets, creating a gap that his tongue gravitated to. With his scruffy hair and jagged ears, he was about the ugliest dog Colton had ever seen.
And Colton had seen a lot of ugly dogs.
“Her chest hurt and she told me to call 911.” Marcelo wiped at his nose and blinked hard as he hurriedly looked away from Colton and focused on a dim overhead light in the hallway. “The ambulance guy said she needs to go to the hospital.”
Ah, hell. The poor kid looked like the Grim Reaper might jump out from around the corner.
His scared eyes came back to meet Colton’s. “Can you watch Salisbury? Please? I don’t know when I’m going to be back, and I can’t leave him alone.”
Being scared and alone at thirteen was all too familiar to Colton. His throat tightened and there was too little air in his lungs. “Sure.” He cleared his throat and forced his arms to hang loose. What am I doing? “Don’t worry about the mutt. He’ll be fine. You just take care of your grandma, y’hear?”
The kid stuck out a hand. “Thank you.”
Colton shook it, allowing the kid a brief moment to feel like a man and not a scared teenager with no one to turn to.
“You’ve got my number, right? It’s programmed into Paulina’s cell phone. You need anything, you call me.”
Marcelo nodded, but he was already bending down to ruffle the dog’s ears and kiss the top of Salisbury’s head. “You be a good boy, Sal. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” One more hug and he told the dog to stay.
The overhead light was dim, but Colton saw the dampness on Marcelo’s cheeks as he turned and ran down the hallway.
Once he was out of sight, Colton glanced down at the dog, still sitting in the same spot with his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth as he looked back with expectant eyes.
Wonderful.
Crossing his arms over his chest, Colton gave the dog the stink-eye. “Rule One, no peeing on my furniture. Rule Two, no sleeping in my bed. I’m the alpha male here, and what I say goes. Got it? You follow the rules, we’ll get along just fine.”
The dog thumped his tail against the floor in what Colton took as agreement. He stepped back and motioned the mutt inside.
Salisbury peered into the living room as if considering whether to accept the offer or take his chance once more on the streets.
Colton couldn’t say he blamed him.
His phone went off again. He left the door open. “S’up to you, pal.”
Snatching the phone from the couch, he saw it was the same unknown number. Didn’t this asshole know normal people were sleeping right now?
The click-click-click of the dog’s nails sounded behind him as Colton slumped onto the couch. On the TV screen, a spaceship was being shot at by the enemy.
Colton knew the feeling.
Might as well have some fun. He had nothing else to do but aggravate whoever was calling.
“Hello, gorgeous!” He tipped back and ran his tongue over his teeth. “Where have you been? Y’know I’ve been waiting for you to call. What are you wearing?”
A slight, uncomfortable pause met his ears and he grinned. Yep, this was going to be fun.
The dog jumped up on the sofa and sniffed the cushion, then made three turns in a circle and harrumphed down, his dark eyes settling on the TV.
“Colton?” a woman’s shaky voice asked.
A lightning rod shot down his spine and he straightened. The dog’s hairy brows danced as his gaze shifted to Colton.
“Martha?”
Her voice was low and slightly muffled, as if she were covering the receiver. “Yes, it’s me. I’m sorry to call so early in the morning, but it’s the only time I could sneak away from Jack.”
“What is it? What’s going on?”
But he knew before the words came out of her mouth—the one and only reason anyone from Oklahoma, from his past, would be calling him. “It’s Shelby,” Martha said. “She’s awake.”
The bolt hit both of his legs and he stood. “She’s out of the coma?”
“She’s asking for you.”
My God. “Is she okay?”
“She’s…” Martha’s voice hiccupped. “She’s still my daughter, Colton. Tough, bullheaded, and opinionated, but she’s not the girl she used to be.”
Three months in a coma could do that to you. “How bad is it? The brain damage?”
“The doctors believe she’ll make a full recovery. For now, her vision comes and goes and she has trouble forming the correct word sometimes. Jack put her in Premiere Therapy in Tulsa, and yesterday, she walked all on her own. It’s a miracle, but…”
She was walking already? “How long has she been awake, Martha?”
Another hesitation. “Six weeks.”
“Six weeks! And you’re only calling me now?”
Salisbury sat upright, fully on alert.
Martha’s voice rose. “You know I couldn’t call you. Jack would kill me. I’m only contacting you now because Shelby begged me to.”
Jack could go to hell. “This isn’t about the reverend. This is about Shelby.”
“Oh, Lord, my angina…” Colton could almost see Martha rubbing her chest. Grandma P might not be the only one in need of an ambulance tonight.
His own heart wasn’t beating all that normally either.
He rubbed his gritty eyes, images of Shelby lying on the steps of their house, bleeding from the bullet wound in her head, flashed behind his lids. “How much does she remember? About that night?”
“Nothing. The doctors say her memory may never come back fully, but…”
“But what?”
“She won’t say why, but she’s adamant that she needs to speak to you. It’s possible she doesn’t remember that you’re…you know.”
Yeah, he knew. Shelby might not remember that he was a douchebag. That she’d divorced his ass.
But why had she insisted on talking to him in person that night? Why had she asked him to fly to Good Hope to meet her?
The cops had found nothing on the shooter. Colton had undertaken his own investigation, but came up with zip as well. He’d even broken the rules at SFI and used their resources. Not that it had helped. Beatrice, thankfully, had let it slide. “I’ll be there in a few hours.”
“No! You can’t come here. I thought maybe you could just call her. If you show up, Jack will—”
“Just let Shel know I’m on my way.”
He hung up before his former mother-in-law could argue. The dog sat, wagging his tail, tongue out. Colton eyed him for a moment. He had no business taking care of a dog. Hell, he could barely take care of himself, but he couldn’t leave the dog alone in his apartment. There was no telling when Paulina and Marcelo would get back.
If Paulina got to come home at all. What would happen to Marcelo if his grandmother died?
Colton shook off the all-too-familiar feeling of dread. He’d take care of the old woman and her grandson somehow—and the damn dog—but first, he needed to grab his overnight bag and buy a plane ticket.
Five minutes later, he was at the door, work phone in hand. “Yeah, thanks, Beatrice.” She’d given him a 72-hour ‘vacation.’ She needed him back at the office for an assignment by Friday, but hadn’t offered up the private jet, and the next plane out of Dulles and headed for Tulsa was hours away from takeoff and required a three-hour layover. His dragon couldn’t stand that, so he was going to drive. “I owe you.”
Again.
She made a comment to that effect and they disconnected. Colton once again found himself staring at the ugly mutt, now perched in front of the door.
Grabbing his keys from the hook, he shook his head. “You can’t come, Sal. Someone will be by to get you in an hour. You’ll get to hang out at SFI headquarters. Maybe you can fool around with Maggie. She’s a big, beautiful black Lab. You’ll have your paws full with her.”
The dog stuck his nose in the crack of the door, ready to bolt the moment Colton opened it.
“Salisbury,” he said, moving the dog back with his foot. “You can’t come with me. Trust me, buddy, Oklahoma is nowhere you want to be.”
The dog went right back to the door, gluing his nose there.
Cut me some slack, here, dog.
Beatrice was going to check on Paulina and make sure Marcelo had someone to take care of him until more permanent arrangements could be made. She’d even offered to bring Salisbury to the office to hang out with her dog, Maggie.
But the temptation of a warm bed and female companionship didn’t seem to sway the mutt who continued to plaster himself against Colton’s front door.
Shelby’s waiting. “Come on, man. I gotta go. This woman means everything to me. Don’t make me lock you in the bedroom.”
Salisbury just wagged his tail and panted, giving Colton a sad look.
Dammit. He never could say no to sad eyes. “Fine,” he huffed. “You can come.”
The dog jumped straight up into the air, wagging his tail furiously. Two more jumps, both on Colton, and for some stupid reason, the dog’s joy made him smile.
At least I made someone happy tonight.
“Come on,” he said, opening the door. “Let’s go.”
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Twelve hours later
HER LEG WOULDN’T move.
At least not the way Shelby wanted it to.
A lot of things weren’t working the way she wanted. Things like her coordination, her balance.
My brain.
Sweat trickled down her temple as she gripped the walker with both hands and sent another message to her right leg. She had ten feet of Therapy Alley in front of her, and by God, she was going to get down this ugly runway come hell or high water.
Determination screamed through her veins. Everything in her body tightened. Lift…shift…move…
“Rabbit tits!” she yelled. Her damn leg was still in the exact same place.
Heads swung her way, some surprised, others snickering. Her therapist, Alicia, looked up from where she crouched beside Shelby’s uncooperative leg.
“Rabbit tits, huh?” Alicia gripped Shelby’s ankle and moved her foot into the right spot. “That’s a new one.”
“I meant…” Donkey balls, but she couldn’t form the words. They were right there in her head, but somewhere between her injured brain and her mouth, what came out was…”Cotton dicks.”
Cotton dicks? Well, at least dicks and balls were in the same general vicinity, anatomically speaking.
Alicia started laughing and Shelby finally joined in, because, really, if she didn’t laugh, she’d cry.
“Colton would like that one,” she mused, wiping sweat from her temple. “And it’s rude of you to laugh at me.”
Alicia nodded, still grinning. “Completely unprofessional of me, but you have to admit, your colorful expressions are the most entertaining thing about my day.”
The rest of the patients and their therapists went back to working on their own rehab. Shelby watched, trying not to feel sorry for herself as the nine feet of carpeted track stared back at her. She had all four limbs—even if one of them still wasn’t working at 100%—and she could see, eat, and function almost normally. Some of the others in Premiere Physical Therapy couldn’t.
“Glad I can be of service.” Pushing the walker forward, she took a step with her left leg. At least she had one that cooperated. “But man, this was so much easier yesterday.”
Alicia stood, analyzing Shelby’s stance. “This isn’t unexpected. You’ve made amazing progress in the past few days alone, and will continue to gain more control over your gross motor skills as time heals you. Those cognitive puppies in your brain will straighten out as well. But some days, it’s going to be one step forward and two back. Literally.”
No. There’s no going back. “Can I get an extra session in the hydro tank again today? That might help.”
“One session a day,” Alicia reprimanded. “You know the rules. If you push too hard, which may be your problem right now, you’ll only set your progress back.”
Alicia’s reprimand was spot on and Shelby knew it. She’d insisted on having two therapy sessions yesterday, and it had left her body overly tired. When her body couldn’t keep up with her will and determination, she ended up more than a little frustrated.
Which led to her brain fritzing out and things like rabbit tits and cotton dicks coming out of her mouth.
Rabbit tits and cotton dicks. You’re a poet and don’t even know it—she could hear Colton’s voice now, mocking her. He’d be laughing so hard at her outbursts, he’d probably be rolling on the floor.
God, she’d give anything to see his cocky grin.
To see him period.
It was damn frustrating when her mind was filled with things she needed to do and people she had to talk to and her body wouldn’t play ball.
Her right foot was a boat anchor. Until she could walk the ten feet of Therapy Alley, her doctors wouldn’t release her. She wanted to smack something.
Use that anger.
Tighten, shift, mooove…
Her leg slid, anchor that it was, a whopping inch. That was it.
God, defeat sucked.
“I can’t,” she said, closing her eyes. Sweat rolled down her left ear and she wiped it away. “Lift it, I mean.”
“No worries. Take your time.” Alicia, ever the patient coach, crouched beside her again. “Relax, take a deep breath, and clear your mind. The more relaxed you are, the easier it will be.”
The only easy day was yesterday.
Once again Colton’s voice was inside her head, the SEAL refrain hitting the heart of the truth. She’d had so much energy yesterday. Moving her leg had been a breeze.
Flipping her eyes open, she bitch-slapped the defeat and realized Colton was standing at the end of her carpeted runway. “Come on, sugar. You can do it.”
“Colton?” she blinked and he disappeared.
A heavy sigh rushed through her lips and she wanted to sink down right there on the floor. Her brain had been hallucinating off and on since she’d opened her eyes six weeks ago. At first, she’d blamed it on her blurry vision, but as her eyesight cleared, she continued to see him.
Alicia’s gaze went to the spot where Shelby was staring. “Pretend he’s there, Shelby. Pretend he’s holding your favorite dessert in his hands. All you have to do is reach him.”
Alicia knew about Shelby’s hallucinations. She was one of the few, in fact, who didn’t freak out about them.
Not like Shelby’s parents. Even though the doctors had explained multiple times to her mom and dad about how the brain injury had caused minor damage and many of its effects would fade over time, Jack and Martha feared the worst—their precious, former-Miss-Oklahoma daughter had lost her marbles.
Maybe I have. Any woman who would want Colton Bells back in her life had to be a few fries short of a Happy Meal.
I never claimed to be smart when it came to Colton.
Taking Alicia’s advice, Shelby imagined her ex-husband standing at the end of the walkway, all smirks and smartass comments. He didn’t need to hold a treat for her—although she could really use one of those monster yogurts from the yogurt bar up the street, covered in nuts, fudge, and gummy bears…
Back on track! Reining in her thoughts, she geared up for another try. Colton’s simple presence would be enough of a carrot, if only he was there.
“There’s my girl!”
Her father’s booming voice carried across the room, and Shelby had to force herself not to cringe. Once again, she was the center of attention.
That’s what happened when your father was a former pro-football player-turned-TV evangelist who regularly got millions of hits on his YouTube Channel and had more Instagram followers than Rihanna.
“Hi, Daddy,” Shelby said as her father stopped at her side. Another man was with him—tall, model-handsome, and dressed in a sharp suit.
Her dad—known to everyone as Reverend Jack—kissed her cheek. “Honey, you remember Theo Ingram, right?”
“He’s my boss, Dad. Of course I remember him.”
Her father looked like he’d won the lottery, just because, yes, she remembered someone from before the brain injury. The memories of her life that she’d lost mostly centered around the day of the accident, but making her parents understand that hadn’t worked so far.
Sure, she still had moments when the right words wouldn’t come or she’d blank a name or face for a few seconds, but honestly, didn’t everyone? Simple slips couldn’t all be blamed on the bullet that had nicked her skull or the fact that when she’d fallen, she’d smacked her head on a concrete step.
Her parents’ concern was justified; they’d been through a terrible scare. Every success—no matter how small—was a huge win in their eyes.
Yet, dammit if she wasn’t sick and tired of everyone acting like she was five years old.
Alicia stepped back, one hand discreetly checking her hair as Theo shook Shelby’s hand. Shelby wasn’t sure if Alicia’s smile was for her father or Theo. Probably both. Powerful men tended to bring out the feminine side in women of all ages.
Shelby looked at Theo and nodded. “Checking up on me, sir?”
His million-dollar smile made him even more attractive as he politely kept his eyes behind the dark frames of his glasses off her walker and on her face. “It’s good to see you’re up and about. Reverend Jack says you’re doing better every day. Everyone at the office is asking about you, so I thought I’d stop by so I can give them a report.”
Underneath the charm and megawatt smiles, Shelby knew the real reason Theo had stopped by. He wanted to check her memory of that day. He wasn’t the Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Tulsa office because he was a nice guy. He was the ASAC because he got the job done.
After the fiasco with 12 September—a terrorist group she and Colton had taken on to rescue a friend of theirs—she’d been shipped back to Oklahoma. Since her superiors in Washington were a bit upset with her after Colton had ruined the FBI part of the mission to capture the leader, Iman Quan, she’d been lucky to land in Theo’s group.
With her skills at reading people, she’d been a huge asset at interrogations. She was a natural when it came to the science of people, reading micro expressions to figure out who was lying and why.
Then something had changed after she’d uncovered a connection between several veterans who’d been assassinated in close succession. Theo had assigned her to a small, mostly-unknown hidey-hole of agents working very specific, sensitive cases involving military veterans.
Welcome home. She’d ended up back in Good Hope, working a serial murder case.
Making sure her legs were balanced, she took one hand off the walker and pointed at the folder Theo had under his arm. The man who’d shot her was still on the loose. “Mug shots?”
His smile faded. “Is there somewhere we can talk privately?”
“You can use my office,” Alicia volunteered a little too quickly.
“How gracious of you.” Another Theo megawatter, this time at Alicia, and Shelby thought her physical therapist might melt through the floor. “We only need a few minutes, and then I’ll give Shelby back to you.”
Alicia practically giggled. “It’s not a problem. I’ll show you the way.”
Shelby’s father kissed her cheek. “Want me to carry you, sweetheart?”
The last thing Shelby wanted was for her dad to carry her in front of all these people, especially the ASAC. “Thanks, Daddy, but I’ll use my chair.”
As Alicia showed Theo out of the gym, Jack grabbed the electric wheelchair and helped Shelby into it. “I’ve created a whole month of sermons on miracles, Shel. I’ll be taping the first this weekend for my Revival subscribers. I’d like for you to be there.”
“You know I love being paraded in front of your flock and used as a prop for your sermons.”
“Really? You’ll do it?”
Was he serious? “We talked about this. You can’t discuss what happened to me—it’s an ongoing case and the shooter is still out there. Plus, I don’t want you making my job with the Bureau national news. No one needs to know outside of our family. It could ruin my work.”
“You’d be perfectly safe at the church,” her father said, lowering his voice as he wheeled her along, refusing to let her do it herself. “And you can’t honestly think you’re going back to work for the FBI, do you?”
Shelby whirled in her chair to look up at him. “Of course, I am.”
He sighed dramatically as he pushed her through the open door into Alicia’s office lined with windows so Alicia could keep an eye on all the patients and physical therapists in the rehab area. On the walls hung her various degrees, along with pictures of all of her rich and famous clientele. Football players, track stars, actors; they came here to receive star treatment while recuperating from debilitating injuries in secret. After all, who would come to Oklahoma if they wanted to actually be seen?
This was her dad’s kind of place, which was probably one of the reasons he’d insisted on the 18-bed Premiere Physical Therapy Clinic for Shelby’s recovery, once she came out of her coma. Three chef-created meals a day, around-the-clock nurses and therapists, and interior design straight out of Elle Decor magazine.
Nothing but the best for his little girl.
Except, she wasn’t little anymore, and she hated all this extravagance. She wanted to go home, be in her own house, and do what most people did—go to therapy once or twice a week.
Unfortunately, she could barely walk, much less drive. She certainly wasn’t able to live on her own yet—her place wasn’t equipped for a wheelchair by any stretch of the imagination. Plus, with the killer still running loose, she’d need round-the-clock bodyguards. The thought made her shudder.
“I’ll see you later, honey.” Her dad tousled her hair like she was a toddler instead of a twenty-eight-year-old woman. “I hope you’ll reconsider doing the show with me. You can at least come for the taping. Daniel will be there.”
When pigs fly. Especially if Daniel Mitchum was there.
The junior pastor was a little too happy whenever Shelby was around, and her mother had already dropped multiple hints about how much it would mean to them if Shelby married a preacher. Daniel, who taught at the Bible College and assisted her father with his flock, was a win-win in their book.
“Bye, Dad.”
Alicia gave Shelby and Theo a small wave and closed the door behind her as she walked Shelby’s dad out.
Theo, thankfully, dispensed with his charm and got right down to business, setting the folder on the desk and leaning on the edge. He crossed his feet at the ankles and made a big deal out of cleaning his glasses. “I’m sorry to interrupt your therapy, but it is good to see you up and walking.”
“I’m getting stronger every day.
In the past three months, his crow’s feet had deepened. There were a few strands of grey in his dark hair. “Have you remembered anything from the night of the shooting?”
“I would have called you if I had. I don’t think I saw the shooter, if that’s what you want to know. If I did, I can’t remember him.” Curiosity ate at her. “What’s in the file?”
His face was inscrutable. “This is the case you were working on when you were shot. Thought maybe you should take a look at it and see if anything jumps out at you.”
“Do you have any leads on the gunman?”
There were seven emotions that showed on the face unilaterally across age, sex, race, and culture. They consisted of anger, fear, sadness, disgust, contempt, surprise, and happiness. When someone attempted to conceal his or her emotions, “leakage” of their true emotions was usually evident on their face.
A firming of the lips suggested Theo felt disgust. “We assume from the angle and distance, your shooter was a professional. Military trained.”
Shelby had already stewed about that and had strong doubts. “Why didn’t he kill me then? He certainly had the skill necessary.”
“Maybe you weren’t his target.”
His gaze shifted to a commotion out in the gym. His face blanched at whatever he saw through the glass window. Fear. “We need to get you to your room. Now.”
“Why?”
“Because one of the suspects in your case file just walked through the door.”
Shelby swiveled in her wheelchair to follow his line of sight. Her breath caught.
She cranked farther in the seat, telling herself not to blink as she stared at a man in holey jeans and scuffed boots holding a dog in his arms that looked as ragged as he did. “Oh my God, tell me he’s real.”
“Real?” Theo sounded as perplexed as Shelby felt. “Of course, he’s real.”
There, looking as hell-on-wheels sexy as ever, stood the man who dominated her hallucinations as well as her dreams.