Secret Intentions

Chapter Two

About a hundred yards ahead, the Audiovisual Assets truck pulled off the road into a gas station and parked in front of one of the pumps. In his ear, Jesse heard Evie’s cell phone ring once before a deep voice came on the line. “Cooper?”

Great. Evie’s father, General Baxter Marsh. Not one of Jesse’s biggest fans. “Yes, sir. I was hoping Evie had turned up.” He slowed near the gas station, watching the truck’s driver and passenger disembark from the cab and walk into the food mart. Jesse parked on the other side of the gas pump.

“No sign of her.” Marsh sounded worried. “What’s going on, Cooper?”

“I told you the wedding was targeted.”

“I hired security.”

“Sir, I have to go. I’ll call back.” He hung up, aware his abrupt goodbye would hardly endear him to the general, and stepped out of the car. The truck blocked his view of the food mart, which meant it also hid him from view of anyone inside.

This might be his only chance to look inside that truck.

He eyed the cab, making sure there wasn’t anyone else inside before he shifted his attention to the trailer part of the truck. On the passenger side facing him was a door set into the side of the trailer box. No padlock, just a sliding latch with a metal screw threaded through the latch to prevent it from being opened from the inside.

Interesting.

He pulled his SIG SAUER P220 from his hip holster and darted a quick look around the cab of the truck, trying to catch a glimpse of the truck’s passengers inside the store. But the plate-glass windows were a mirror, bouncing his own reflection back at him. He scooted behind the cover of the truck again and took a deep breath as he eased the screw from the latch.

He swung the door open, wincing as it made a creaking noise. He listened for sound from inside, but anything he might have heard was masked by the traffic noise behind him. He was going to have to risk taking a look. Edging closer, he stuck his head inside the truck.

Out of the darkness, a foot slammed against his forehead, knocking him backward into the gas pump. As he struggled to keep his feet, a small, half-naked figure leaped from the truck and tried to dart away.

He caught a slender bare arm and held his assailant in place, despite her fierce struggle. She was small, curvy and deliciously hot, and for a second, all sensible thought leaked out of his head as his body reacted to finding her soft body pressed so intimately to his.

The flailing, red-faced creature was Evie Marsh. Her eyes were swollen nearly shut, but that didn’t keep her from pounding him with her fists and feet as she tried to escape his grasp.

He shook her. “Evie, it’s Jesse.”

She froze, her body flattening against his, sending his head reeling again. “Jesse?” Her voice was a painful rasp.

He stared at her streaming eyes and dragged his mind out of his jeans. “What did they do to you?”

“Pepper spray,” she growled. “Get me out of here now!”

He darted another quick look around the cab of the truck. The door to the food mart was open, the two men from the truck emerging with large cups of coffee. The driver locked eyes with Jesse and went instantly on alert.

“Go!” Jesse half carried Evie across the gas-pump island to his car and shoved her into the passenger seat. Driven by the sound of pounding footsteps racing across the gas station lot toward him, he slid across the hood and half dived behind the steering wheel.

So much for a clean getaway.

He jammed the key into the ignition, bracing himself for gunshots that didn’t come. Leaving the gas station in a hurry, he turned in front of an oncoming car, barely escaping a collision in a flurry of squealing brakes and a few choice gestures from the other driver.

In the rearview mirror, he spotted the truck fifty yards back, barreling toward them. He slammed the accelerator to the floor.

“Are they behind us?” Evie turned in the passenger seat, squinting.

“No way can that truck catch us.” The extra weight of the truck would give Jesse the advantage, but if he didn’t keep other vehicles between him and the truck, a high-powered rifle could quickly even the playing field.

He also had the advantage of knowing the back roads of Chickasaw County better than their pursuers, whipping the Ford Taurus down a pothole-pocked blacktop road. The road cut past Mill Pond, where he’d caught one of the biggest bluegills he’d ever seen, and twisted up the southern face of Gossamer Mountain. Over the hill lay Gossamer Lake and home.

He checked the rearview mirror frequently. No sign of the truck.

“Do you have any water?” Evie tried to stifle a cough.

Jesse reached into the backseat to retrieve the bag of supplies he’d packed for his stakeout. He handed Evie a bottle of water from the bag, and she flushed her face and eyes. “Someone grabbed me at the church. Sprayed me right in the face with pepper spray. I couldn’t even catch my breath long enough to yell for help.”

“How about now? You breathing okay?”

“Mostly.” She coughed again. “I’m better.”

He pulled out his phone and dialed his brother Rick’s cell number.

Rick answered on the first ring. “Where are you?”

Jesse caught his brother up on what had happened. “I’ve got Evie, but I’m not sure I should take her back to the church. Can you call Evie’s cell number? Someone will answer and you can tell them Evie’s safe.”

“I’m not ruining Rita’s wedding!” Evie protested.

Jesse slanted a quick look at her. “That can’t be a consideration, Evie. You know that.”

“Am I your prisoner?” she shot back, her glare lethal even through swollen eyelids.

“You think putting yourself and the rest of your family at greater risk is going to make her happier?” Jesse argued.

“Take me back to the church, Jesse.”

“Take her to the church,” Rick said. “We’ll meet you there.”

Jesse pressed his lips into a thin line, every instinct telling him to stash Evie in the nearest safe house. But was he letting his affection for Rita’s kid sister get in the way of his good sense? He needed Baxter Marsh’s cooperation now more than ever. Spiriting his daughter away without even consulting him was hardly going to win him over.

“Okay,” he said aloud, ignoring the twisting sensation in his gut. “We’ll go back to the church.”

* * *

“Y OU CAN ’ T POSTPONE the wedding.” Evie looked at her sister in dismay. “All that money going to waste? It’s ridiculous.”

Rita’s lips curved in a faint smile. “Trust you to look at it from an accounting perspective.”

“Rita, please. If you postpone it now, we let those creeps win.”

“You can’t walk down the aisle when you can barely see, Evie.” Rita winced as she looked at Evie’s face. “And I know you were looking forward to being my maid of honor.”

“I was looking forward to your getting married to a man who makes you happy,” Evie answered, even though her sister was right. She had been looking forward to being her sister’s maid of honor.

Their relationship over the years hadn’t always been close, especially during the teenage years when Rita had resented her younger sister’s constant tagging along, and Evie had been jealous of Rita’s being first to do everything. But they’d forged a strong bond over the past few years, and being her sister’s chosen attendant had been a big deal to Evie.

“Oh, Evie,” Rita murmured, her eyes filling with tears.

“I want you to marry Andrew and be disgustingly happy for the rest of your life. That’s all that matters.”

Rita’s gaze slanted to her left, where Jesse Cooper stood near the wall of the bride’s room, a silent sentinel. Evie wondered what her sister was thinking about her ex’s presence. She had tried to warn Jesse that coming into the bride’s room with her might not be the best idea, but he’d refused to let her out of his sight. Apparently he’d assigned himself to be her personal bodyguard, and he took the job very seriously.

“I should thank him,” Rita said, reluctance thick in her voice.

“It’s not necessary. He lives for this kind of thing.”

Rita’s lips curled upward again. “I know.”

Evie supposed she did. Jesse Cooper hadn’t changed much in the past ten years, despite his change of careers. The same strong sense of honor, duty and ethics he’d learned in the Marine Corps had traveled with him to his new job as head of Cooper Security.

“I’m glad he came.” Rita kept her voice low so that it wouldn’t carry to where Jesse stood watch. Evie suspected it was a futile effort; knowing Jesse, he could probably read lips.

“Why’s that?” she asked Rita.

“Because it helped me be absolutely sure I’m over him.”

“You didn’t know that before you said yes to Andrew?” Evie tried to arch an eyebrow, but the stinging pain of her swollen eyes wouldn’t allow it.

“I thought I knew. I was pretty sure I knew.” Rita smiled. “But now I know for certain.”

Evie darted a quick look at Jesse, wondering if he was over Rita, as well. Their courtship had been intense and passionate, their breakup equally explosive. Even now, Jesse couldn’t hide his reaction whenever Rita’s name came up in conversation.

“Are you sure, Evie? About our going ahead with the wedding?”

“Positive,” she answered. “And who knows? I have an hour to recover. If I’m feeling better, I can put a little extra makeup on to cover the redness and swelling. Besides, everyone will be looking at you anyway.”

Rita took a deep breath before she spoke. “Okay, then. We’ll go ahead with the wedding. Try putting cold compresses on your eyes. I want you up there with me.” She gave Evie a quick, fierce hug.

As Rita followed their mother back to the private chamber to finish her preparations for the wedding, Evie dropped wearily on the nearby bench, pressing her hands to her throbbing forehead. The stinging burn of the pepper spray had mostly subsided, and her vision had cleared up considerably, but those irritations had been replaced by the beginning of a brain-pounding headache. She hoped it would ease off soon because she was going to do everything she could to stand at the altar as her sister’s maid of honor, headache or not.

“You okay?”

She looked up at Jesse’s gravel-voiced query. “Yeah. Just working on a headache. All the stress, I guess.”

Evie’s father crossed to her side, subtly positioning himself between her and Jesse. “Do you need ibuprofen?”

“That would be great.”

Her father pulled a small pillbox from his pocket and fished out a couple of pain relievers. He slanted a pointed look at Jesse. “There’s a water fountain in the hall with a paper-cup dispenser.”

Jesse frowned, clearly not happy about leaving Evie alone, even with her father, but he’d been a Marine long enough to balk at disobeying an order from a general. He disappeared through the door.

“We need to call the police,” her father said. “They should be looking for the truck.”

“Jesse thinks the local police aren’t equipped to handle the men who kidnapped me.”

“Jesse thinks.” Her father grimaced. “Jesse thinks a lot of things.”

“He’s right about this. You know he is.”

“He thinks the men who took you were SSU agents.” There was little skepticism in her father’s voice, despite his obvious dislike for Jesse. He knew as well as anyone just how ruthless the mercenaries who’d once worked for MacLear Security could be. One of his most trusted colleagues had already died at their hands, and another had spent nearly a month as a captive of the deadly soldiers of fortune, along with his wife and daughter.

“I’m pretty sure Jesse’s right about that, too.”

Her father touched her face, his fingers gentle. “You’re not keeping anything from me, are you? They didn’t hurt you more than you’ve said—”

“No, they didn’t. But given time, they would have.”

Her father met her gaze for a long, electric moment, then looked away.

“You need to talk to Jesse about General Ross’s journal.”

Her father’s mouth tightened but he didn’t answer.

Evie gave a little growl of frustration. “I don’t know why you’re being so stubborn about this, Dad. Look what happened today—you think they won’t go after us again? Maybe Rita this time, or Mom. And Jesse Cooper won’t be there to save them.”

His gaze snapped up to meet hers, pain vibrating in his blue eyes. “I’m doing what I can to protect us all.”

“By staying silent? That’s not enough for these people. You have to know it’s not. I don’t understand why you don’t just tell people what you do know, even if you don’t have proof.”

“I’ll increase our security team,” her father said, ignoring her last comment.

“Are you going to make them aware of the level of the threat against us?” She shook her head. “If you put the average security guard up against the SSU, he’ll lose every time.”

She knew her father couldn’t argue. He’d been around for the downfall of MacLear Security, a once well-respected private security firm that had done business with the Pentagon for years. MacLear Security’s training corps had been made up of top-notch former military and law-enforcement personnel. Even the company’s legitimate agents had possessed the knowledge and skills of elite soldiers. And the Special Services Unit, MacLear’s secret unit of guns for hire, had layered those skills in with an utter lack of a moral compass.

Ruthless and violent, the SSU had been a wickedly efficient private army for a corrupt State Department official named Barton Reid. Their work for Reid had eventually led to the company’s downfall, thanks to Jesse’s cousins, who’d thwarted the secret soldiers’ plans to abduct a child as leverage. The Coopers had exposed MacLear’s seamy underbelly and brought the company down, but not before several of the SSU operatives had made their escape and formed a new alliance.

Funded by a mysterious company called AfterAssets, LLC, the dirty operatives had recently been involved in at least one assassination and another assassination attempt. They’d kidnapped an Air Force general and his family and now had tried to kidnap Evie, as well.

“They want General Ross’s journal,” she said.

“Do you know where it is?” her father asked.

She shook her head. “But they think you do.”

“I don’t know where it went after Cooper took it from Lydia Ross,” the general murmured, glancing toward the door. “I bet he knows.”

“Probably so. But it’s important nobody else knows where it is, because you seem determined not to tell us what you know.”

He bent toward her, as if he was going to tell her something, but a soft knock on the door interrupted. Evie crossed to the door. “Yes?”

“It’s me,” Jesse said from the other side of the door.

She let him in. He slipped inside, handing her a cup of water.

“Thanks.” She downed the two ibuprofen tablets her father had given her. “That took longer than I thought—did you get a call? Any news?”

He glanced at her father briefly, then looked back at her. “Rick and Megan found the truck abandoned on the side of the road two miles up from the gas station where I found you. We’re processing it for prints, but it’s not likely we’ll find anything.”

“You should bring the real police into this,” Evie’s father said with a grimace. “You’re screwing up any chance of a court case against these guys.”

“A court isn’t going to stop these guys. Half of them were already indicted along with Barton Reid, and you see how well that stopped them,” Evie told her father. “The bigger picture is what matters. We need to stop whoever’s funneling money to them to pull these jobs.”

“I know you think the Espera Group may have something to do with it.” Jesse looked at her father. “I know you want to expose their real agenda. But to do that, you have to let me help you.”

Evie winced as her father’s expression grew stony. “I don’t have to do anything,” he snapped. “Except make sure my daughter gets married today to a fine man who treats her like a queen.”

Jesse didn’t flinch outwardly, but Evie didn’t miss the slight flicker of anger that darkened his eyes. “Very well.” He turned to Evie. “I’ll wait outside until you’re dressed, then I’ll escort you to the chapel.”

“That won’t be necessary,” her father said. “I’ve already assigned one of my security guards to stick with Evie wherever she goes today.”

Jesse’s eyes narrowed. “Because they did such a good job before?”

Evie put her hand on her father’s arm. His muscles were hard with tension, but he remained silent as she looked at Jesse.

“I’ll be okay,” she said, although she wasn’t sure she was right. But having Jesse around today of all days was too stressful for everyone. Despite her earlier reassurances, Rita couldn’t be happy about Jesse crashing her wedding, however good his reasons.

“I’ll just go back to what I was doing earlier today, then,” he said.

She hid a smile. Back to the convenience-store parking lot, then. Watching over the wedding from afar.

A part of her wished she could believe his concern was specifically for her and not her family in general. Like Rita, she’d never been immune to Jesse Cooper’s sexy strength and leatherneck sense of honor. But unlike Rita, Evie didn’t find his hard-driving, adrenaline-soaked lifestyle a deal breaker. In fact, she craved the sort of meaning and purpose he seemed to find in risking his neck to help people. It was one reason why she’d taken him up on the offer of a job at Cooper Security.

But not the only reason.

Unfortunately, Jesse clearly saw her as Rita’s little sister and nothing more. So that was that. Time to get over her schoolgirl crush on Jesse and move on.

Still, her gaze remained on the bride’s room door long after he’d closed it behind him.

Chapter Three

The bride and groom emerged from the back of the church to a cheering crowd of well-wishers tossing birdseed. Jesse couldn’t resist the urge to raise his binoculars for a closer look, focusing on the pink cheeks and bright eyes of the bride.

Rita was stunning. At thirty-two, she looked nearly a decade younger, her fair skin unlined. Her cornflower-blue eyes glowed with a joy he could see even through the impersonal lenses of the binoculars.

She was happy. It radiated from her like sunshine, warming him from a distance. There had been a time when he’d have resented her finding someone else who could make her happy, but those days were long gone. Maturity and experience had softened the edges of his jealous nature and time had taught him that real love was unselfish.

He would always love Rita and want the best for her, but that didn’t mean he had to be the one to give it to her. If he’d been able to do that—and if she’d been able to make him happy as well—they would still be together.

Suit-clad men surrounded the bride and groom, guiding them down the sidewalk toward a limousine parked nearby. The reception would take place at The Lodge on Gossamer Lake, a sprawling resort on a scenic overlook with a stunning view of the lake. Jesse already had agents positioned there to augment General Marsh’s security contingent.

He watched the limousine move with a stately lack of urgency, the bride and groom waving at their well-wishers as they passed near the front of the church on their way out.

Jesse’s phone rang. Isabel. “You got the limo?”

“I’m on it,” she said. “You’re going to keep an eye on Evie and her parents?”

He spotted Evie waving at the passing limousine. Her face was still a little puffy and red, but her makeup job had hidden the worst of it, and her small, compact body looked amazing in the dark red gown she’d worn as her sister’s maid of honor.

Sometime in the past ten years, Rita’s gangly little sister had grown into a woman. She wasn’t tall and willowy like Rita, but what she lacked in height, she made up in lush curves in all the right places.

She’d been working out at the Cooper Security gym; Jesse had spotted her there a few times when he’d been working out himself. She’d taken the fitness ethic of Cooper Security seriously, even though her work was confined to the accounting department, and he’d seen the results of her efforts a few weeks ago when she’d been caught in a late-night ambush at the office.

She’d held her own, despite being injured and drugged by an SSU operative who’d been part of a siege on the building. Jesse had been impressed.

So why hadn’t he told her so?

Evie followed her parents to a black SUV driven by one of the security guards Jesse had seen earlier outside the bride’s room. But she didn’t get inside, shaking her head as her father clearly tried to coax her to join them. Finally, he stopped arguing and joined her mother in the SUV.

Frowning, Jesse watched the SUV drive away, his chest tightening with alarm. What the hell was she thinking? He sent a quick text to his brother Rick, who was parked nearby.

General and wife in black SUV. Follow.

He adjusted the binoculars and saw Evie was holding her cell phone in her hand. She punched a button and lifted the phone to her ear. A second later, Jesse’s phone rang.

He didn’t bother with a greeting. “Have you lost your mind?”

“Stop worrying.”

“Where’s your bodyguard?”

“On his way.” She pointed to a lanky man approaching from her left. “I just thought it would be better if we didn’t all go in the same vehicle to the reception. I keep thinking about what happened to the Harlowes.”

She had a point. General Emmett Harlowe, his wife and his daughter had all been kidnapped together from the north Georgia vacation cabin they owned. Spreading the Marsh family into different vehicles would make it hard for the SSU to get to them all.

“Be careful, okay?”

“You going to join us at the lodge?” she asked, falling into step with the guard as they walked toward a navy SUV parked nearby.

“That’s the plan.”

“There’s not a convenience store across the street where you can lurk.”

He smiled at the humor in her voice. “That’s okay. I know that area about as well as I know any place in the world. I’ll figure out something.”

“My guard is giving me the stink eye. I guess I need to get off the phone.”

“Be careful.”

“You, too.” She sounded serious.

He hung up and lifted the binoculars again, watching until she was safely inside the SUV. He started his car and pulled up to the road, waiting for Evie and her guard to pass. He didn’t bother trying to keep his distance. If the guard spotted him, Evie could explain his presence.

No way was he letting Evie out of his sight this time.

* * *

“H E ’ S NOT A DANGER,” Evie told the guard in the driver’s seat, a lanky, quiet man in his early forties. Her father had introduced him as Alan Wilson, a former Jefferson County prison guard. “He’s my boss.”

“Jesse Cooper?” Wilson asked.

“You’ve heard of him?”

“Everyone in the security business has heard of him.”

She felt a surge of pride and had to remind herself that she had little right to feel flattered by any praise for Cooper Security. She’d worked there less than half a year as an accountant, and she certainly had no right to take pride in any of Jesse Cooper’s accomplishments.

He was just her boss. Not even her direct boss—there were a couple of layers of middle management between them at least. And any personal connection between them had been severed completely less than an hour ago when her sister had married someone else.

She turned to look behind them, spotting Jesse’s car only forty yards back. She couldn’t see him through the glare on the windshield, but she took comfort knowing he was there. They started around a curve, temporarily hiding Jesse’s car from view. With a sigh, Evie turned back to face front.