HER HOLIDAY BODYGUARD

When journalist Samantha Colt finds herself tied up and dumped on a landmine outside her boss’s country house, she has no memory of how she got there. And her only clue is an ominous note warning her to quit before it’s too late. Fortunately, the quick-witted soldier who’s house-sitting for her boss rescues her…and agrees to become her bodyguard until the danger ends. Joshua Rhodes might be protecting Sam as a favor, but the spark that immediately sizzles between him and the determined, lovely reporter can’t be denied. If the puzzled pair can’t swiftly outsmart Samantha’s tormentors, though, their brimming holiday romance will be snuffed out…along with Samantha’s life.

“Do you think something bad will happen if I move you?”

Yes.

“Will somebody attack us? Like there’s somebody nearby lying in wait?”

No.

“How about a booby trap?”

Yes. Her eyes cut to the floorboards hoping he’d understand.

“Underneath you? Like a pressure-sensitive device?”

Yes! She nodded her head.

“Well, then, I get why you’re so twitchy.” He set the gun down, reached into his back pocket and pulled out his knife. “It looks like you can move your head freely without setting it off. So now that I know what’s going on, I’m thinking that if I’m really slow and careful I can probably cut off your gag and then you can tell me exactly what we’re dealing with, okay?”

Yes, but—

She took a breath and then nodded.

“Okay,” he said. “Let’s do this.”

MAGGIE K. BLACK is an award-winning journalist and romantic suspense author with an insatiable love of traveling the world. She has lived in the American South, Europe and the Middle East. She now makes her home in Canada with her history teacher husband, their two beautiful girls and a small but mighty dog. Maggie enjoys connecting with her readers at maggiekblack.com.

Kidnapped at Christmas

Maggie K. Black

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Say to those with fearful hearts,

“Be strong, do not fear; your God will come.”

—Isaiah 35:4a

Thanks to Roz for giving me a safe place to hide and write. Thanks to Sunny for the puzzle-piece metaphor. You are remarkable women, and you both inspire me.

Also, thank you, Bethany, for lending me your very special headphones when mine broke, so that I didn’t have to write the suspenseful kidnap scene while listening to “Under the Mango Tree.” You are very awesome and I love you.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Bible Verse

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

EPILOGUE

Dear Reader

Extract

Copyright

ONE

A fierce, biting cold that seemed to dig right into her skin was the first thing journalist Samantha Colt felt as her groggy brain swam back into consciousness.

The second was the sharp tip of the knife pressed against her throat.

“Don’t move.” The voice was coarse, male and contained more than a hint of a threat.

She froze. She was lying on her back and couldn’t move her arms or legs. The metal floor of some kind of vehicle vibrated beneath her. The shriek of December wind rose above the rough sound of the engine. A gag filled her mouth. She opened her eyes and saw nothing but a blindfold.

I’ve been kidnapped.

The thought hit her like a jolt. But who’d kidnapped her? How had they grabbed her? What could they possibly want?

She had no idea.

Help me, Lord! she prayed.

She closed her eyes again and struggled to piece together the strands of what she could remember. It had been quarter after five in the morning when she’d left her small one-bedroom apartment on the top floor of a converted house in downtown Toronto. There’d been new flyers plastering the staircases. Bright blue this time, with dire warnings from her landlady Yvonne about the dangers of both trespassers and raccoons. The streets were dark. The world was frozen. She’d slipped through the icy back alleys toward the Torchlight News office. She’d buried her hands in the pockets of her vintage wool overcoat, feeling for her gloves before realizing she’d left them behind. And then?

She wasn’t wearing her coat now.

How long ago was I kidnapped? Did I even make it to work?

With Christmas only two days away, the newspaper’s office was already closed for the holidays. But she was the newspaper’s main fact-checker. She was never really off. Last night her laptop had refused to load, so she’d headed into the office this morning to grab a backup tablet so that she’d have something to work on—because a good story waited for no one.

Samantha had singlehandedly created and updated the paper’s research database—nicknamed ATHENA, because “Aggregated Torchlight Hub for Enforcement and News Analysis” was a mouthful. Not that she ever got the glory. Or wanted it, for that matter. Samantha was a desk jockey. Someone who was quite comfortable working in the shadows, making sure overenthusiastic reporters—and their stories—stayed accurate. It was her job to verify that Torchlight got every fact right, to see the bigger picture and to even catch patterns that others might miss.

Was that why I was kidnapped? Because of something I researched?

“I think she’s awake.” The rough voice yanked her attention back to the freezing van. The stench of stale cigarettes filled her lungs. A man seemed to be crouched in the back of the van beside her. A gloved hand pushed a long strand of honey-blond hair off her cheeks. “Or maybe not. I can’t tell. She’s still breathing anyway. We almost there?”

“How should I know?” A second voice came from the direction of the driver’s seat. Also male, but higher-pitched and with a bit of a whistle. Like a mean stray dog who’d lost some teeth in a street fight. “You think I can see any street signs out here?”

The van hit a bump. Her body bounced against the cold, metal floor.

“Hey! Watch it!” The one that smelled like cigarettes swore. The one that whistled laughed. Neither sounded that much older than their midtwenties. Silence stretched out endless around her again, filled with nothing but the howling wind, the bitter cold and the rumble of the engine.

Fear ran cold through her veins. This had to be a dream. This couldn’t really be happening. Years ago, in college, she’d been tormented by night terrors for months after a fellow student had broken into her room in the middle of the night. But even at their worst no nightmare had ever felt as real as this.

Come on! Focus! She could think her way out of this. Her bare hands were bound together at the wrists in front of her by what felt like fabric. Her feet were tied together at the ankles by something thin that rustled as she shifted. The road turned rough beneath them.

Who are these people? What do they want? How did I get in this van? She didn’t know. Panic swirled like turpentine inside her mind, wiping her memory clean and filling her throat with bitterness. Facts. She had to focus on facts, no matter how small. There’d been a congratulations card in her bag for her editor, Olivia Ash, who’d just had a baby girl. There’d been a shiny new billboard for Eric Gibson’s morning radio show on top of the Silver Media building. Would Eric suspect something was wrong when she didn’t show up for coffee? She’d met the charming radio host a few months ago, when he was dating her neighbor. The neighbor had moved out and moved on, and suddenly Samantha had found herself being Eric’s shoulder to cry on.

Was their Christmas coffee today a date in his mind? Or had it finally sunk in that she really did love her single, quiet, workaholic life and didn’t need anything more? It was hard to tell if Eric was interested in her romantically or if he was just trying to be a good friend. Figuring out people had never come as easy to her as sorting out facts.

The vehicle slowed to a stop. She heard the metallic shriek of a van side door sliding open.

“What is this? Is that a light on over there?” The one who smelled like stale cigarettes sounded more than a little irritated. “You told me no that one would be here.”

“Well, I didn’t really know, now did I? Let’s just get it over with.”

Hands grabbed her ankles and dragged her out across the floor. She kicked out hard with both feet at once, catching her abductor in what she hoped was something vital. He swore and let go. The bonds binding her legs snapped free. She fell, landed on the ground beside the van and scrambled to her feet. She ran through the snow, waiting any moment to feel rough hands grab her again. A gunshot shook the air. Wet flakes pelted her head. The air was dark around her. However long she’d been in that van, the sun still hadn’t risen yet. She kept going, blind, through trees, over the snowy ground, using nothing but differences of light and shadow to guide her, holding her elbows out in front of her to protect her head, as her bound hands struggled to free her eyes from the fabric covering them.

Then a yellow gleam of light shone ahead, so bright the blindfold shone gold.

She ran toward it. The snow turned to gravel beneath her feet. The comforting smell of wood smoke filled her senses. Her knees hit a step. She pitched forward, landing hard on a staircase. With a desperate yank she pulled the blindfold down from her eyes and looked up at the towering farmhouse. A single light shone down from a window on the second floor. She could hear a dog barking inside. The relentless and determined yapping seemed to fill her heart with hope. A window slid open above her.

“Hey! Hello! Is there somebody out there?” A deep, rich voice filled the air, wafting down from above through the pelting snow. Her dark eyes looked up to the shape of the man standing in the window above her. Light shone from behind him, ringing his tall silhouette. He had broad shoulders and strong arms. Her fingers pulled at the tight gag still binding her mouth, struggling to make sound escape her lips.

Yes! I’m here! She yanked at her gag as it stole her voice from her lips. Help me! Whoever you are, help me!

“Hello?” he called again. “Is everything all right?”

Please! I think they’re going to kill me.

She stumbled to the front door. Her bound hands fumbled for the doorknob. It was locked. The barking grew louder, with the hint of a snarl.

Then the window shut above her. He was gone.

Please, Lord, she prayed. Wherever I am, whoever this man is, I need his help. He’s my only hope.

Footsteps sounded heavy and hollow on the wood behind her. She turned and caught a quick glance of an old, ugly scar slashed across an unfamiliar face. Gloved hands shoved her down onto the snow-covered porch. She kicked out hard, twisting her body against the man’s grasp. But he held firm. One hand slid something hard and round underneath the small of her back.

She tried to sit up. But he pushed her down.

The device beneath her clicked.

“Now listen carefully, Miss Colt,” he hissed. The stench of stale smoke filled her nostrils again. He pulled a roll of something red and shiny from his pocket. “There’s a live land mine under your back. You hear me? A land mine. An explosive. I’m going to tie your legs again and you’re going to lie still. Because, if you move, it will explode and you will die.”

* * *

The dog was still barking, hurtling its tiny furry body through the upstairs hallway of the Ash family’s country house so quickly that even with almost a decade of military service under his belt, Corporal Joshua Rhodes of the Canadian Armed Forces could hardly keep up.

Not that the soldier ever needed much of a kick to sprint into action. A few short days of holiday leave was hardly enough time to readjust his system to the quieter rhythms of civilian life. He’d been lying, already dressed, on top of the sleeping bag he’d slung on the bed in the front room, wrestling with whether or not he wanted to reenlist in the army when his term was up in June, when a gun blast cracked the early-morning air. Surely, nobody would be dumb enough to try deer hunting on his friend’s private property, and with a handgun no less. But the feeling of concern that had tapped his attention had grown to a full-fledged warning beat when he’d slid open the window, called out and heard nothing but the muffled sounds of a struggle below and someone trying to open the front door.

Well, God, he prayed, I don’t know what’s going on out there, but something’s very wrong. Help me know what to do.

Whatever it was, Joshua was about to face it alone.

The Ash family were staying at their apartment in Toronto for a little while after the birth of their new daughter. Their two other houseguests for the holidays, stepsiblings Alex and Zoe, had left the house over half an hour ago for some hard-core early-morning skiing. He’d have gone with them too, but then that army “re-up” reminder email had arrived asking him to commit several more years of his life to a career he’d never particularly enjoyed. But, he was good at it, and if he kept at it he’d eventually retire with a pension, and as Gramps would say, what kind of man walked away from a good job just because he didn’t like it? If growing up in a household of only men had taught him anything it was that solitude was best for thinking. So he’d told his friends to go ahead skiing without him while he wrestled with the choices in his mind. That’d left him alone with Zoe’s puppy, Oz, who while plenty loud wasn’t much for backup.

Joshua’s hand slid to the solid, familiar weight of his .45 on his hip. His watch read ten after seven but pitch-black air still pressed up against the windows. He ran quickly but quietly down the wooden staircase into the first floor kitchen, crossed the floor, then paused. The rattling at the front door had stopped. The dog’s barking had subsided to a low, threatening growl that rumbled in the back of the Cairn terrier’s throat. Joshua grabbed his leather jacket off a hook, shoved his hands into gloves and his feet into his boots.

Then he threw the back door open and heard a voice.

A muffled cry rose on the wind. So faint, he could barely hear it, but unmistakable nonetheless. There was a woman out there somewhere in the cold and dark. She was frightened. And in trouble.

The gun was tight in his grip. He stepped outside, pressed his body against the side of the house and crept toward the porch. The friend whose house this was—Daniel Ash—was a bodyguard and private security specialist who’d recently hired Alex and Zoe to join him in the business, as he converted the country property into a safe house and home base for operations. Meanwhile, Daniel’s wife, Olivia, was a journalist whose newspaper had a reputation for tenaciously exposing criminals and corruption.

The Ashes weren’t strangers to tough situations. Joshua couldn’t even begin to guess what kind of trouble might be waiting in the darkness. But as he focused his heart on the faint, terrified sound of the woman’s cry as it seemed to rise and fall between the gusts of wind, the idea of leaving her alone in the cold while he waited for backup was unthinkable. Joshua reached the corner of the house.

He saw her. She was lying on the porch lit by the dim light from the upstairs window. Her legs were bound just above the cuff of her high-heeled vintage boots. She was wearing thick black tights, a plaid skirt that stopped at the knees and a long-sleeved sweater, but no jacket. Her hands were gloveless and tied together in front of her. Her body was shaking.

So much was wrong with this picture. If she’d been abducted, then why dump her here? If a kidnapper was going to tie her hands, why not tie them behind her back?

He stepped up onto the porch. The wood creaked under his boots. Her head rose. A whimper slipped from her lips. Joshua took a deep breath and prayed that this wasn’t a trap. Then he crossed the porch, knowing he was going to do whatever he could to save her life, whether it was a trap or not.

“Hey.” He knelt down beside her. “It’s going to be okay. My name’s Joshua Rhodes. I’m here to help you.”

Her face tilted toward him. Large dark eyes looked into his face, framed with long, full lashes and filled with fear. Something in their depths hit him like a one-two punch to the gut. She was terrified—and she was beautiful. Cascades of blond hair spread out around her shaking shoulders. He reached for the gag and froze. A gold velvet ribbon parted her lips. Another larger red ribbon had slipped around her throat from what he could only guess had once been a blindfold. Two other ribbons bound her hands and feet. He sat back on his heels. His heart shuddered in horror and sympathy. She’d been wrapped up like a Christmas present.

What kind of evil was this? Who would ever do that to someone?

Never let your eyes get all distracted by the looks of a pretty woman. They’ll knock your mind off course, distract you from the job you’ve got to do, and bring you nothing but trouble and pain. His late grandfather’s voice suddenly echoed in the back of his mind. Growing up it was the only kind of answer he’d ever really gotten from the widower to questions of why the family was just him, Gramps and Dad. Joshua slid his arms from his leather coat. “I’m just going to drape this over you while we figure on what’s going on here.”

But she shook her head furiously like she was even scared of his jacket.

God, please help me. He took a deep breath as he prayed. His eyes rose to the skies above. What kind of trouble is this woman in? What kind of danger am I getting myself into by helping her?

TWO

Panic rose in Samantha’s chest. She could feel the land mine pressing against the small of her back and had no clue how sensitive the trigger was. But if this strange man suddenly dropped his coat on her or moved even a little, would the explosion kill them both?

Please, God, help me make him understand the danger we’re in!

Faint morning light now rose at the horizon, casting the snow and trees around them in long shadows and shades of blue. But she could still barely see Joshua’s face.

“So, you don’t want my coat?” He said the words slowly, like he’d just been thrown a curve ball and was struggling to make sense of what was happening. He set his coat down on the porch beside her. “It’s okay. I promise. I won’t hurt you. I’m a corporal in the Canadian army. It’s my job to help people.”

My heart wants to trust you, soldier. But my mind’s telling me not to be naive.

Both of his hands rose slightly. There was a handgun in his grasp. “What if we start by my untying your gag?”

“No.” Her head shook. The muffled cry sounded more like nah than no. She closed her eyes. This was useless. She’d never been that great at knowing how to talk to people even when she’d had a voice. Besides, she could shake her head all she wanted, but that didn’t mean he’d actually listen. Just like Eric never seemed to hear her whenever she explained she was actually very happy spending her evenings working at home alone and didn’t want him showing up with fast food or a DVD. Maybe Corporal Joshua Rhodes was a better man than most. But even still, eventually he was going to just take matters into his own hands, and pick her up or something, and kill them both.

“Go!” she pleaded through her muffled gag. At least one of them should have the opportunity to getting out of this alive. “Run!”

Tears filled her eyes. It was hopeless. Her go sounded like ga and she couldn’t even make a sound that was anything like run.

“Go?” he asked.

Thank You, God! He understood that much at least.

“You want me to just leave you here?” He drew his hands back and looked at her like she was a very difficult problem he needed to solve. “You don’t want me to touch you, you don’t want me to untie you and you don’t want my coat? Instead, you do want me to hightail it out of here—and that’s just not going to happen. Right now, you and I are in this together. So, here’s how this is going to work, I’m going to ask questions. You’re going to nod yes or shake your head no. That work for you?”

She nodded. Yes.

“I get that you don’t want me to move you or touch you. Is it because you’re injured?”

She shook her head. No.

“Do you think something bad will happen if I move you?”

Yes.

“Will somebody will attack us? Like there’s somebody nearby lying in wait?”

No.

“How about a booby trap?”

Yes. Her eyes cut to the floorboards hoping he’d understand.

“Underneath you? Like a pressure-sensitive device?”

Yes! She nodded her head.

“Well, then I get why you’re so twitchy.” He set the gun down, reached into his back pocket and pulled out his knife. “It looks like you can move your head freely without setting it off. So, now that I know what’s going on, I’m thinking that if I’m really slow and careful I can probably cut off your gag and then you can tell me exactly what we’re dealing with, okay?”

Yes, but—

She swallowed back the thought. Her pulse was racing so quickly she was worried it alone might somehow set the land mine off. She hadn’t woken up this morning looking for a crash course in trusting her heart.

But, somehow, Joshua, something inside tells me I can trust you.

She took a breath and then nodded.

“Okay,” he said. “Let’s do this.”

She felt the tip of the blade brush lightly against her jaw. It slid under the gag. He breathed a prayer under his breath and flicked the blade upward. The gag tore free.

“Thank you!” She gasped. Then smiled, just slightly, her face creasing in relief. “I’m Samantha Colt.”

“Good to meet you, Samantha.” He tapped her fingers lightly, like a substitute for a handshake, and then slipped the gag into his jeans pocket. “Now, how about you tell me what’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” Her voice shook. She could guess it had something to do with something she’d been fact-checking for work. Military operations maybe? Criminal gangs? Missing women? Maybe the illegal weapon trade, considering the use of a land mine? But those were all long shots at best. And she wasn’t about to start throwing out wild guesses, especially to a stranger. “Honestly, I don’t know what happened, why someone would do this to me, or even where I am.”

“Hey, it’s okay.” He set the knife down too. She had no idea how he was managing to keep his voice so calm and yet she appreciated it. “You’re in the Ontario countryside, middle of nowhere really, about an hour and a half north of Toronto, at the home of my friend Daniel. He’s a bodyguard with a private security business.”

It rang a very faint bell. But she couldn’t place why. “I don’t know who that is.”

“Where’s the device?” Joshua asked.

“Under the small of my back. He said it was a land mine and that if I moved it would kill me.”

“He?”

“The man who tied me up and left me here. He didn’t tell me anything except about the land mine. I didn’t see much of his face, just that it was scarred. But he stunk like he smoked six packs a day. He had a partner with missing teeth, by the sound of it. They weren’t exactly chatty.”

“Did you happen to see what the device looked like?”

“No, but it’s round and about the size of a bagel. So, like an antipersonnel mine. Too small to be an antitank mine and definitely too flat be a bounding mine. It clicked.”

His jaw dropped. “How do you know so much about mines?”

“I’m a fact-checker. I know a little bit about a whole lot of things.”

He nodded slowly, like he was absorbing everything she was telling him. His lips moved in what looked like silent prayer. The wind was picking up, tossing the ends of her hair and ruffling her clothes.

“It’ll probably take the police over an hour to get here. Even then they might not be able to disarm the explosive, only detonate it.” There was a deeper, stronger timbre to his voice now, like a commanding officer preparing his troops for battle. “So, here’s what we are going to do. First, I’m going to, very slowly and very carefully, cut the ribbons holding both your hands and your feet—”

“Ribbons?” She’d been able to tell her abductor had tied her feet with something red. But still a shiver of horror slid down her spine at the thought of someone tying her up like a Christmas present.

“Ribbons,” Joshua confirmed. “Now, again, I’m going to cut them off and you’re going to help by staying very still and not moving, which might be hard considering your instinct’s going to be to stretch.”

“Got it. I won’t move.”

She felt the knife brush along her calves. She stayed as still as she could, but even so she could feel the pressure in her ankles shift the moment he cut them free. Then he moved up to her hands. His fingers held hers gently as the knife sliced. Then the bonds fell away. The digging pain disappeared from her wrists. Gently he slid both of his hands over hers and rubbed warmth and life back into her fingers. She almost whimpered with relief.

“Now,” he said, “I’m going to slide my hand underneath your back, nice and slowly, until I feel the land mine. Then, I’m going to hold the detonator down. When I do that, I’m going to shout ‘go,’ and then I need you to roll down the stairs as fast as you can. Don’t try to stand up. Just roll.” He slid off his jacket and threw it down into the snow. Then he took off his gloves and tossed them after it. “You can put those on when you get there. You’ll be needing the warmth. Now, you ready?”

She nodded. “As ready as I’m going to be.”

He squeezed the tips of her fingers and whispered another prayer under his breath. Then he slid his hand underneath her torso. She felt his hands feeling their way along the curve of her back. Slowly, gently, he worked his fingers in between her body and the metal casing.

“Okay, I’ve got it. When I say ‘go’, you’re going to roll down those stairs right here, down to the ground. No hesitation. No thinking. Just roll. Ready?”

“Ready.”

“Go.”

She rolled down the stairs, her body beating hard on the frozen wood, expecting at any moment to feel the searing heat of an explosion consuming her body.

She landed on her face in the snow, pulled herself up, and looked back at her rescuer.

Joshua was kneeling on the porch, both hands pressed against the small land mine, in a position almost like CPR. Faint morning sun fell from above, onto his head and shoulders. He had a strong nose and a tender mouth. Even through the folds of a dark fleece she could see the broad cut of his shoulders. The faint scruff of day-old shadow brushed the lines of his jaw.

She slid on his jacket and gloves and felt the residual warmth fill her limbs.

“Now run,” he said. “Get as far away from here as you can. You won’t get a cell signal anywhere on this road, but if you turn left you’ll reach civilization eventually. To be totally honest, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to defuse this thing. If I do, I’ll come find you.”

She hesitated. So he’d had no actual plan other than taking her place and substituting her life with his?

An engine roared from beyond the trees. From inside the house, she could hear the dog barking again, and only then realized it had ever stopped. Someone was coming.

“Samantha!” Joshua’s voice sounded clear and commanding. “Get out of here. Now!”

Headlights shone through the trees, then flashed across her face.

She ran.

* * *

The glare of approaching headlights filled Joshua’s view. As much as he hoped it wasn’t a foe, he hated the idea of putting any friend in the situation he’d found himself in. Samantha had disappeared into the shadows and he couldn’t see where she’d gone. He looked down at the small land mine he was now keeping depressed with both hands at once. He’d seen this kind before. Round and beige, his buddies in ordnance disposal said there were thousands of them still littered over the world’s abandoned battlefields. Not that he ever expected to find one in Canada. Or be in the situation he was now.

Whoever Samantha is, she knows her land mines.

A truck pulled down the driveway. The engine cut and doors slammed.

The headlights faded slowly, as a lightly bearded man started down the driveway, with the kind of smooth, confident walk Joshua had secretly spent a good chunk of his teen years trying to copy.

Thank You, God! A prayer filled his heart. Alex and Zoe were back. Alexander Fletcher had been Joshua’s best friend since kindergarten. While Joshua had been overseas serving his country, Alex had tried studying first to be a doctor, then quit to become a paramedic, before dabbling with the idea of a career in law enforcement and spending a few years teaching high school math and gym. He was the smartest man Joshua had ever met, even if Alex had spent years going through life like a boat searching for its anchor. But he’d finally taken up Daniel’s offer of moving to rural Ontario to help him start up Ash Private Security.

Alex was one in a million. And there wasn’t a single person on earth Joshua knew more about, which just might save them now.

“Code yellow jacket,” Joshua shouted. “Big, huge, code yellow jacket.”

It was their own private in joke, which they’d used to warn each other of serious trouble ever since a teenaged Alex crashed Joshua’s first truck when a wasp flew in the window.

Alex froze. “Zoe, stay back.” His arms shot out to keep her from coming any closer, looking like an umpire calling a runner in safe. “Josh? Where are you? What’s going on?”

“On the porch. Holding a live land mine.”

“And you went with ‘code yellow jacket’?”

“Figured you were more scared of wasps than explosives.” Nothing like a friend you could joke with when you were one wrong move away from death. “It’s pressure sensitive. Small blast radius. I’m leaning into the detonator right now, keeping it down. If I let go, it explodes.”

“Okay.” Even in the pale morning light he could tell Alex’s face had gone white. “Zoe, we got a situation.”

“Tell me what you need.” Zoe leaped out of the vehicle. She was tiny, barely four foot eleven, with the kind of sharp, single-minded focus her stepbrother had occasionally lacked. Her chin-length hair was currently black with a few streaks of red. A world-class athlete in both gymnastics and mixed martial arts, Alex’s sister had been Daniel’s second private security recruit. It was her dog, Oz, who’d been barking just moments ago. Couldn’t hear the pup now.

“All right,” Joshua said. “Zoe, open the kitchen door, get Oz out of here, drive until you get a cell phone signal and call the police. Tell them we’ve got a live land mine. If you run into a beautiful blonde woman wearing my leather jacket, her name is Samantha. I think she needs help, but I don’t necessarily trust her and you probably shouldn’t either.”

He could feel his teeth grind at the very thought of warning them against Samantha. But what did he know about her really? Nothing. Except that she’d appeared on his friend’s porch tied up tight with an explosive underneath her. And after witnessing too many foolish men implode both their military careers and personal lives over meaningless war-zone infatuations, Joshua had learned there was a whole lot of truth to Gramps’s warning against trusting any attraction sparked in a moment of crisis.

Zoe didn’t even pause, she just ran for the side of the house. Alex started quickly but carefully toward the steps. “And what do you want me to do?” Alex asked.

“Find something we can replace my weight with. Something big and heavy. It’s a pressure trigger and it’s armed, so if I let go of it something else needs to take my place.”

“Should I ask who this beautiful blonde is and how you got into this mess?”

“I don’t know who Samantha is,” Joshua said. “I just found her here on the porch, freezing cold and tied up on top of a land mine. She said she was a fact-checker. And yeah, she’s staggeringly attractive—unbelievably so—like the kind of woman you don’t just run into in real life. So if there’s any chance I’m dreaming, now would be a really great time to pinch me.”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Didn’t think so. Anyway, whoever Samantha is, she’s lost, she’s in trouble and she’s absolutely terrified of whoever left her here.”

Oz shot past. The dog tore down the driveway. Seconds later, Zoe and Samantha came back around the corner of the house, dragging a bag of cement between them.

“I take it that’s her?” Alex’s eyebrow rose.

“Yeah, but I told her to run.”

“Hey, I’m Alex.” He ran toward them and grabbed the middle of the bag, sharing the load. “I see you’ve met my sister, Zoe.”

“I did.” Her voice strained under the weight. “I’m Samantha. Hope you don’t mind but I let the dog out. Sounded pretty frantic. Found this by the garage. Thought you could use it to counter the pressure on the land mine.”

Joshua didn’t know if he was more relieved, impressed or amazed by her plan. Not that he exactly liked the idea of her doing the exact opposite of what he’d just told her to do to save her own life. But she was quick-thinking. And brave. He had to give her that.

Slowly, Samantha, Zoe and Alex hauled the cement up to the bottom of the steps, then started climbing up toward him. They reached the top step and he directed them until they were holding the bag right over his hands. Then they lowered it, inch by inch, until the weight rested on top of his fingers, pressing them deeper into the trigger. He took in a sharp, painful breath.

“Now, you all go. Run. I’m going to inch my fingers out of here and we’ll all pray it doesn’t blow.”

The three of them ran back down the steps. Alex and Zoe made it almost as far as the truck before stopping. But Samantha stopped in a faint pool of light at the bottom of the stairs.

“Samantha, please.” His eyes searched her face.

“You just saved my life. I didn’t hear one quiver of doubt from you when you were doing this for me. Your nerves were rock steady.”

Yeah, but that’s only because I was so totally focused on saving you I blocked out the danger that I was in.

“So, logically you’ll be safer if I stay,” she went on. “Just do what you did with me, only do it in reverse and don’t blow up. I believe in you.”

He inched his fingers out slowly, one by one, feeling the weight of the unmixed concrete sliding in to take their place. First one hand, then the other slid out until the bag of cement lay across the porch in front of him where Samantha’s body had been just moments ago.

He let out a long breath and slid his gun back into his holster. Then he stood up and carefully inched his way around the bag. He could hear Alex clapping but didn’t look at him. Instead, his eyes locked on where Samantha was still standing at the bottom of the stairs. A smile of relief crossed her lips.

“I told you to run,” he said.

“I told you to run first.”

“That’s not exactly the same thing.”

I’m a professional soldier. It’s my job to save people. And you’re just whatever “fact-checker” is.

He took another step. The porch creaked.

The bag of cement shifted behind him.

The land mine detonated.

THREE

An explosion shook the frozen air. Smoke and flame billowed upward, filling Samantha’s view. For a moment she felt rooted in place as if time had frozen around her.

Then she saw Joshua, leaping between her and the flames. He caught her in his arms and pushed her down to the ground. They landed in the snow, his body sheltering hers. Her head tucked into his neck. Debris rained down around them. The world seemed to roar with the sound of glass shattering and wood splintering.

Then the world stopped shaking and all Samantha could hear was the steady beat of Joshua’s heart and his ragged breath inches from her face.

“You okay?” he asked. His voice was gruff, but soft. He slid off her into the snow.

“Yeah, you?”

“Yeah.” He stood slowly, reached for her hand and helped her to her feet.

“Everyone okay?” Alex called. He and Zoe were running toward them.

“Yes.” Joshua let go of her hand. “Thankfully the land mine wasn’t that strong. Though I’ll have to have a word with Daniel about reinforcing his windows if he wants to convert this place into a safe house.”

Both men smiled at his weak attempt at a joke, but she could see the worry filling their eyes. A hole lay on the porch in the place where her body had been. Judging by the mass of broken glass, the land mine had launched the cement bag through the front window. A high-pitched alarm was ringing from somewhere inside the house.

“I’ll go sort out the alarm.” Zoe ran toward the back.

“Make sure the police are called, if the alarm doesn’t do that automatically,” Joshua called after her, realizing as he said it she was probably already thinking two steps ahead of him.

Alex’s eyes ran from Joshua to Samantha and back again. “I’m going to go see if I can find something to tape the window up with until we can get some new glass installed.”

He disappeared after his sister. The alarm stopped. Joshua and Samantha walked around the side of the house. Rays of winter sunlight stretched across the snow around them. They stepped through the back door and into a warm welcoming kitchen. Even the shattered window on the other side of the house couldn’t dampen its hominess—and its heat.

The clock over the stove read eight fifteen. The smell of fresh bread and unbrewed coffee grounds filled the room. She slid off his jacket and gloves. “Thank you for these. I hope you’re not frozen.”

“I’m fine. There was enough adrenaline to keep me plenty warm.” Joshua kicked off his boots and brushed the snow from his hair. It was light brown, the color of maple syrup, short on the sides as she’d expect of a soldier, but just long enough on top for someone to run their fingers through. The eyes that now searched her face were the same hazel-green as a forest pond. Muscles rippled through his shirt. But somehow they didn’t make him look hard, only strong. An old-fashioned coffeemaker stood on the counter. He filled it with water. “I was going to make myself coffee. But would you rather have tea or something like that? There’s a whole box of different colored ones around somewhere. Also, there’s fresh banana bread. I threw it in the bread maker last night.”

“Coffee is perfect, thank you.” A slight smile crossed her lips. “Your mother raised you well.”

“Nope.” His smile grew tight. “Grew up in an all-bachelor home with just my gramps and dad. But they taught me well enough.”

Her tongue felt heavy in her mouth, like she should apologize. But before she could even start to figure out what to say, he kept talking.

“The closest hospital and police station are over an hour away.” He leaned back against the counter and slid his hands into his pockets. “But Alex used to be a paramedic and Zoe’s probably giving the police directions on how to get here as we speak. Now, you said you have no idea what happened or what you’re doing here?”

“That’s right,” she said. “I’m a journalist from Toronto. My job is researching and fact-checking mostly. Making sure those hotshot Torchlight reporters can actually back up what they’re writing about with cold hard facts. I was heading into work this morning to grab a tablet when I was abducted. But I don’t remember what happened exactly and I don’t know what whoever did this to me wanted.”

Light dawned behind his eyes and with it came an almost reflexive grin that warmed something inside her.

“If you’re a reporter,” he asked, “does that mean you work with Olivia Ash?”

“Yes! Olivia is my editor at Torchlight.”

“This is her country house.” His eyes grew wider. “My friend is her husband.”

No doubt she’d feel terrified later about what that could mean about the motives of the men who’d kidnapped her. Right now, she was just too relieved to discover she was in the home of someone she already knew and trusted.

“They’re staying at their apartment in the city until the baby’s a little bigger and the roads improve,” he added. “Which you probably know given you work together. I’m just thankful that I was here, and the house wasn’t empty.”

She dropped into a chair as the sudden joy she’d been feeling evaporated just as quickly. “Yeah, me too.”

“So, I’m guessing whoever did this to you wanted to get your boss’s attention and didn’t know Olivia wouldn’t be here. Did she have you working on anything dangerous?”

“I see pretty much every story before it goes to the press,” she said, “and I fact-check all the big ones. I’m like the factual safety net for our front-line reporters. It’s my job to comb through each article and circle every fact with a red pen that a reader might question, just to make sure our backs are covered. Of course, our reporters write about everything. But in my job, almost everything I work on involves something criminal. I even built what they call an ‘intranet’ database, called ATHENA, that pulls all of our stories and background research together in one place on our online server, where only Torchlight reporters can see it. It even includes pointers on understanding human behavior, criminal pathology and body language to help reporters figure out whether or not the people they’re interviewing are telling the truth. It’s like a simplified version of the ways police detectives learn to analyze criminal traits.”

But what would police make of her inability to remember how she’d even gotten there? She couldn’t remember a single thing about how or where they’d grabbed her.

It had been the same back in college when that guy from her floor had broken in. She’d barely remembered anything afterwards. And while they’d eventually caught the culprit and he’d admitted to being high at the time, thanks to her faulty memory they’d only given him a slap on the wrist. She’d been forced to switch schools and start over.

Then, the nightmares had started.

Joshua pulled his right hand out of his pocket. There was something gold and glittering between his fingers. It was a ribbon. And with a start she realized it must’ve been the same one that her abductor had gagged her with. He looked at it carefully, holding it by the very edges.

“If you were on your way to work, it’s entirely possible they were after any Torchlight staff they could get their hands on, and you just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. “But it’s also entirely possible this has nothing to do with the newspaper you work for and someone tried to abduct you for a completely different reason. Does this mean anything to you?”

He laid the ribbon over the table in front of her and for the first time she saw blurred streaks of what looked like Magic Marker. Between the snow and the struggle whatever had been written on the ribbon was smudged beyond recognition, except for the last two words:

always,

Magpie.

His eyebrow rose. He didn’t even have to ask the question.

“I have never heard of Magpie.” She could feel her lower lip quivering but it was more from frustration than fear. She should know. If there was someone out there upset enough at Torchlight’s reporting to abduct and threaten one of their journalists, she was exactly the one person who should already have a whole file of stories and research on them in the ATHENA database. “I have no idea who or what that is.”

“Neither have I,” he said. “Someone twisted enough to kidnap a woman and plant a land mine under her doesn’t just spring up out of nowhere. Is there anyone else you can think of who’d want to hurt you? Work situation? Family? Relationships?”

“My parents are retired and live in Montreal. They’re pretty awesome people and I can’t think of any reason why anyone would want to hurt them.” Tension pulled along her shoulder blades. She could tell he was probably trying to help but sorting out her own mind was hard enough without having someone firing questions at her. “Work is great, really. I’m probably what some people would call workaholic, but to me that’s a good thing.”

“A land mine is a very specific weapon,” he said, “and using the Christmas ribbon was very specific, as well. Someone was clearly trying to send a message. Any other problematic relationships?”

“No. No relationship problems.” Unless someone counted the fact she got completely tongue-tied every time she tried to explain to Eric that she just wasn’t hotwired to spend that much time with an enthusiastic extrovert. “Really, I’m just a happy, quiet workaholic with no enemies.”

Except the dangerous and unknown Magpie. Why don’t I know who that is?

There was a knock on the door frame. She turned. It was Alex. He glanced down at the ribbon warning lying on the table. “Sorry to interrupt. Zoe got through to the police. They’ve asked us all to stay put and to please try to keep from talking to each other about what happened until we’ve all been interviewed separately by police. I’m guessing they don’t want us colluding on one version of events or getting our stories muddied. Even accidentally.”

Yeah, that was pretty standard for police investigations.

“Thank you,” she said, finding the words totally inadequate for the situation.

“We’ve figured out Samantha’s connection to the Ashes,” Joshua said. “Samantha works for Olivia at Torchlight News. We should call Daniel and Olivia too and let them know what’s going on.”

“Good idea.” Alex sat down beside Samantha. “How are you feeling?”

“Bit shaken, but not bad. Thankfully, I wasn’t out in the cold that long before Joshua found me.”

“Can you hold out your hands for me?” Alex carefully checked her hands for frostbite. Then he slid a small flashlight out of his pocket and checked her eyes. “Any headache? Nausea?”

“No.”

Alex ran one finger slowly back and forth a few inches in front of her eyes. She followed it with her gaze. “Stomach upset? Double vision?”

“No. I’m rattled, obviously, but physically I feel fine.”

“How’s your memory?” Joshua asked. “Any short-term amnesia? Memory gaps?”

Her brain froze as she turned to look at him. Why had he asked that? Those hazel-green eyes were focused intensely onto hers. A dozen thoughts cascaded through her mind that she couldn’t figure out how exactly to turn into words.

Yes, I’m having memory gaps. Everything between the moment I realized I’d forgotten my gloves and almost arriving here in the van is a blur. It’s frustrating. It’s terrifying. The same thing happened years ago, after someone broke into my dorm room, and it was like I could only remember it in the nightmares which plagued me for months.

She broke his gaze and look down at the table. “Yes, and I know we shouldn’t talk about the details of how I was abducted or anything that’s happened until the police have questioned us. But I won’t lie. My memory is really patchy. Like I said, I don’t know how I got here.”

There was a long pause and an ache in her chest, like something inside her heart had started to open just a bit, and she was waiting for it to clang shut again.

She hadn’t admitted having memory gaps to anyone for a very long time. Not since she’d tried to report the attack in college to some very unsympathetic people in campus security.

But the very fact Joshua had asked gave her the faint hope that he might actually get it.

“It happens.” Joshua pushed off the counter. “Don’t worry. I’m sure the police will figure out what’s going on.”

No. He didn’t understand.

* * *

Early-afternoon sunlight glistened off the frost on the corner of the windshield as Joshua steered the car down the tree-lined parkway into downtown Toronto. A vicious snowstorm was scheduled for later, but for now the city seemed to sparkle in the sun. He glanced sideways at Samantha. Her face was turned toward the passenger-side window. His borrowed leather jacket enveloped her body. Something inside him ached to ask her what she was thinking.

They’d both talked briefly to Daniel and Olivia on the phone and then the police had arrived at the farmhouse before they’d even finished breakfast. Four vehicles and six officers, including a forensics team. They’d quickly taken over, questioning each of them privately and going through the scene, until finally they’d given Samantha permission to go home and allowed the others to replace the glass in the window and nail some boards over the hole in the porch.

It had been an odd, unsettling experience, standing on the sidelines, watching people in uniform do their thing. Between his training and his military service, he was used to being in the thick of it. He was comfortable there. Dad had always been a cop and had no plans to retire. Gramps had served in the military. Both had instilled in him a deep respect for authority and a strong sense of duty. It had been pretty clear by the time he reached high school that he was expected to follow in either one man’s footsteps or the other.

He didn’t imagine Gramps would’ve thought much of Ash Private Security or Daniel hiring Alex and Zoe as bodyguards. In fact, he pretty much knew what Gramps would’ve said: So, instead of having a real job, your friends are just gonna run around and play at being cops? I suppose now you’re gonna want to quit your job and join them?

Gramps had never thought much of Alex, and Joshua couldn’t even guess what he’d say about tiny, feisty Zoe protecting someone. It wasn’t that Gramps didn’t respect women. He just believed they needed caring for, and had cared deeply for the ones in his own life—and so he had been devastated when his wife had died in a traffic accident when Joshua’s dad was small. That pain had only compounded when Joshua’s dad had grown up to then marry a woman who’d abandoned her husband and child when Josh was just a toddler.

His grandfather’s voice rang in his ears. See, Joshua, losing your heart to a pretty face is always a bad idea. Beautiful women are all flash bang, but no staying power. Go meet a good, decent, steady woman, who’s not too pretty, not too fancy, not in any trouble, and happy with a calm and boring life. Trust me. The human heart is dumber than dirt when it comes to falling in love.

It had been a comfortable drive to the city despite the rambling in his brain. They’d driven more or less in silence. When they’d first gotten into his rental car, the radio had been blaring Silver Media’s early-morning radio show. The host had been loud and grating, like he’d overdosed on caffeine. But Samantha’d instantly leaned over and switched it off, which he was happy for. Since then, the car had been filled with nothing but the rumble of the engine and the tires crunching on the snow-covered road.

“Toronto police recovered my bag, by the way.” Samantha’s voice drew his attention back into the present. “An officer told me, just before they gave me permission to leave. They found it in an alley Dumpster almost halfway between my apartment and work. I also called my landlady Yvonne while you were being questioned and told her police would be stopping by. I gave the police permission to look around my apartment in case they find something there. But considering where they found my bag, police don’t think either my apartment or the office is a crime scene, and it’s most likely I was grabbed off the street. Unless someone kidnapped me elsewhere and threw my bag in a random Dumpster to confuse things.” She ran both hands through her hair. “I should’ve told you earlier, but my brain’s just been so overwhelmed it’s like I couldn’t process the information right away.”

He nodded. “That happens. Sometimes when something big happens on deployment it’s like everyone’s sleepwalking for hours afterwards. Might take days before people are able to start talking about it.”

Of course, most never talked about the hard stuff. No matter how many times they all got reminded that therapists and chaplains were available for a reason.

“I should get my bag back sometime today,” she said, “and still manage to catch a train to Montreal tonight. I was supposed to leave this morning, but the good thing about the train is I’ve got options. As long as I make it to the station by noon tomorrow I’ll make it home for Christmas Eve dinner. How about you? When do you leave?”

“I’m due back on base December twenty-seventh,” he said. “I’m going to spend Christmas morning with Alex and Zoe—probably Daniel, Olivia and the baby too—and then head up to Barrie after lunch for a really late dinner with Dad. He’s a cop and tends to work Christmas, so that the officers with young kids can be home with their families. I’ll take up a big plate of turkey leftovers for him, and we’ll celebrate together after he gets off work.”

Dad would ask him right off the bat if he’d decided whether or not to reenlist when his term was up in June. And if he said no, Dad would be expecting a pretty good answer why.

She nodded. Like he’d just answered a more important question than the one that she’d asked. “So, you don’t come from a military family?”

“My grandfather served, but when he was widowed, he transferred home to Canada to raise my father. I have such a huge amount of respect for him, for both him and my dad, in fact. Gramps used to say God put us on this planet to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves. He’s the reason I enlisted.”

Lake Ontario glittered ahead through a maze of skyscrapers.

“You can get off here.” Samantha pointed to the right.

He took the exit, and drove through the quirky mishmash of shops, expensive condos and older buildings that made up downtown Toronto, following her directions until they reached a thin, standalone town house between two warehouses. The lights were off. A sign in the window read Torchlight News. He pulled into a narrow alley and parked between the garbage cans and a fire escape. His eyes scanned the silent building. “It looks closed.”

“It is closed.” She unbuckled her seat belt. “But like I told you, my laptop died so I’m going to pop in and borrow a tablet so I can keep working over the holidays.”

“Are you sure that’s wise?”

“You mean because some unknown threat that calls itself Magpie tried to kill me today?” She swiveled on the seat. “I might have data on this Magpie thing lurking in my database somewhere that could help the police catch them. Magpie has probably done this before and will do this again, if nobody stops them. I can match my experience against other crimes and maybe find a pattern. Like you just said, we have a responsibility to protect others.”

She hopped out of the car and closed the door behind her.

Yes, but in this scenario, you’re the person who needs protecting. He followed her around to the front of the building. She punched a code on the front door and it swung open. The entrance space was tiny. A door marked Publishing lay to his right. A second labeled Editorial lay dead ahead. She opened it to reveal a narrow flight of stairs.

“I hear what you’re saying,” he said. “But you’re not the authorities. You’re not the police. It’s not your job to find or stop criminals. You’re the victim.”

Samantha paused, her hand on the door leading up to the editorial offices.

“Do you have any idea what the solve rate for violent crimes is in this city?” she asked. “Sure, it’s better than a lot of places, but it’s definitely not one hundred percent. Do you know how often Torchlight journalists have given the police key information they need to make those arrests? Or the role that journalists even play in investigating crimes the police don’t have the resources or remit to investigate? My job is facts. I find them, sort them, connect them, make sense of them and see patterns. I’m good at that. So, yeah, I’m going to spend my Christmas researching crimes like the one I just survived. Even if you think I’m too useless, or helpless, or whatever it is you seem to think I am, to do my job.”

It was the longest string of words he’d heard her say since they’d met, and it had all bubbled out of her with a passion that knocked him back a step. He opened his mouth but couldn’t think of what words to say to that, so closed it again.

“What if the police never figure out who Magpie is?” she went on. “It’s not like I’ve given them much of anything to go on, except ‘Strangers grabbed me somewhere, for no apparent reason. One smelled like he smoked a lot and the other had missing teeth.’ I told you back at the house, I don’t remember being abducted. I don’t remember anything useful. I remember leaving my apartment. I know I ended up tied up in a van at Olivia’s house. The last thing Olivia needs, with a new baby! Everything else is missing. Like my brain’s ability to remember anything more than that has been broken.” A fire flashed like gold in the dark of her eyes. “But that doesn’t mean I have to just sit around now and wait for someone else to save me. You don’t get to decide I’m nothing but a helpless victim. Nobody does. Not even Magpie.”

Then before he could even think of anything else to say to all that, she turned on her heels and started up the stairs. He watched her legs disappear up the stairs but didn’t follow. She’d told him back at the house that she couldn’t remember being abducted, and he’d presumed it was just the normal haze people had when their adrenaline was pumping. Most people don’t pay attention to detail at the best of times and so tend to forget a lot.

But Samantha isn’t most people.

He sat down on the steps, stretched his legs out and dropped his head into his hands.

Dissociative amnesia. Short-term memory loss. Those were two phrases he’d heard far too many times over the years to describe the way the brain protected itself from remembering things that happened in times of intense trauma. Over the years he’d heard person after person he’d served with, and officer friends of his father’s too, describe the symptoms. They talked about “memory gaps” and “brain fog,” and the sense that certain memories had been stolen from their minds. It hadn’t even registered that’s what she’d meant when she’d told him that her memory was patchy. He couldn’t even begin to imagine how frustrated and scared she’d felt, or how insensitive he must’ve sounded. He let out a long breath and prayed, “God, please just help me figure out how to best help her.”

Then he pulled his phone out of his pocket and dialed Daniel.

“Hey, Josh!” Daniel whispered. “Olivia and the baby are asleep. How is everything going? Alex told me you were taking Samantha home?”

“We decided to stop at the newspaper on the way.” Joshua stood up. “Apparently she wants to pick up some kind of computer tablet thing so she can do some research on whoever this Magpie is.”

Daniel chuckled. “Yeah, Olivia predicted she would. I know we didn’t talk to Samantha long, but Olivia knows her well. Apparently, Samantha’s tenacious when it comes to collecting and understanding information.”

Joshua started up the stairs to the second floor. “I wish the police had offered her some decent ongoing protection instead of just letting her leave there with nothing but a phone number to call and a recommendation for counseling from Victim Services.”

“I’m sure the police do too,” Daniel said. “But they can’t assign an officer to every single person in trouble.” Which is where Ash Private Security came in.

“Do you have a phone number or contact details for Theresa Vaughan?” Joshua reached the landing to the second floor and found a hallway of closed doors. “Alex’s former fiancée? The therapist? Last I heard she was volunteering with Victim Services.”

“I’m pretty sure that Olivia does. Why? Do you think Samantha should talk to her?”

“Maybe.”

A crash sounded above him. A scream filled the air.

Samantha!

“Daniel!” he said. “I think we have an intruder at Torchlight. Call nine-one-one!”

He stuffed the phone in his pocket and pelted down the hallway. A second scream came from above now. This one was louder, angrier, like a wildcat fighting for its life. The door at the very end of the hall was open. He dashed through and found himself pelting up a second, narrower flight of stairs that opened into a huge, open-concept space with steeply slanted ceilings and a scattering of cluttered desks.

The image of a bird spanned the sloping wall ahead of him in dripping spray-painted strokes of black. Beneath it a graffiti artist’s signature tag read: Hermes.

Two more lines of scrawl curled in uneven strokes along the adjacent wall.

The Magpie says,

You’ve been warned.

Delete—

The words cut off in a trailing line of paint. Joshua could feel the hackles rising on the back of his neck.

Delete what?

A muffled cry came from his right. He turned. Samantha stood still in the entrance of a long narrow alcove. Instinctively his hand reached out to her, a question forming on his lips. But as he stepped toward her, the shadows shifted, and he saw why she stood frozen. A man grasped her tightly around the neck from behind. A white hoodie and a buglike painter’s respirator mask covered his face. Hermes’s arm tightened around Samantha’s neck, yanking her back in a choke hold.

FOUR

Instinctively Joshua’s hands rose in front of him, hoping the universal sign of non-aggression would buy him enough time to figure out what was going on, and how to get Samantha out safely. Quickly he surveyed the room, his battle-ready gaze rapidly taking in the details. Winter light and cold air streamed through the alcove, which Joshua guessed must lead to the fire escape. The scrawl on the wall was still wet and dripping. A single overturned chair and a few papers strewn on the floor signaled a small-scale struggle. But the room hadn’t been ransacked. The mask that hid the intruder’s face was the kind of plastic respirator mask worn by graffiti street artists and people doing home repairs. Despite the heavy leather boots on the young man’s feet, the baggy hoodie covering his head implied he was a common thug, not a military operative.

“Hermes” kept one arm around Samantha’s neck. The other hand was buried in his sweatshirt pocket. Whatever that hand was holding inside the pocket, he was pushing it hard against Samantha’s side. So, Hermes had a weapon. A knife? A gun? Another explosive? Whatever it was, there was no way the man would miss hurting Samantha with it at that range, and there was no way to safely disarm him in a space that narrow.

So, Hermes. I’m guessing you didn’t expect to find anybody here and don’t have a plan.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Joshua kept his voice steady. “It’s all going to be okay and nobody needs to get hurt. Can I call you Hermes? That’s your graffiti tag, right?”

No answer. Gray eyes glanced up suspiciously over the top of the respirator mask.

Joshua risked taking a step toward him, his voice level and his hands still slightly raised. “You don’t want anybody to get hurt, do you, Hermes? You’re not a bad guy. You’re not looking for trouble. You just came here as a messenger from Magpie to paint something on the wall, right?”

With every step he could feel the empty space on his hip where his service handgun would normally be. But Canadian gun laws being what they were, even he didn’t have a permit to carry a service weapon while on home leave.

He glanced at Samantha. His eyes took in every inch of her form. Her clothes were disheveled. She hadn’t given up without a fight. But her limbs now shook. Her gaze darted around the room.

Look at me, Samantha. Please, I know your brain is going to want to switch off and let the fear take over. But fight it. Stay focused. Stay with me.

Hermes took another step backward, dragging Samantha after him by the throat.

Come on, Samantha! Please! I need your help to get us both out of here alive.

Hermes slunk deeper into the alcove, blocking out the light. Samantha’s eyes closed in what he hoped was prayer. Joshua’s silent pleading turned to prayer too. God, please help me defuse this situation! I’m going to have no choice but to rush Hermes. But if I do, I’m putting Samantha’s life in danger.

Hermes spun Samantha around sideways and for a moment seemed to get caught as he jostled for room in the narrow space. Then, with a cry, Samantha tumbled backward out the balcony door. Joshua sprinted across the room. The graffiti artist yanked a gun from his pocket and fired. Instinctively, Joshua dropped to the floor and rolled, as the sudden bang and flash seemed to fill the room. But the sound of the bullet’s impact never came. He crouched onto his toes and looked up. Hermes closed his eyes and fired again. No recoil. Joshua almost snorted. Hermes was shooting blanks. Joshua vaulted over the second desk and charged. Hermes turned on his heels and ran out the door after Samantha. But before Joshua could even reach the alcove, he heard a crash and an angry scream of pain filled the air.

Joshua ducked into the alcove, ran through and came out on a small balcony leading to a fire escape. He blinked. Hermes now lay flat on his back. Shards of pottery were strewn around him on the icy wood. Dirt covered Hermes’s body like soot. Joshua turned and saw the reason why. Samantha stood by the fallen graffiti artist. Pale sunlight fell over her face. Fierce defiance flashed in her eyes. The remains of a heavy clay vase were still clutched in her hands. A jolt rippled through Joshua’s heart like it was attached to jumper cables.

Samantha had grabbed the vase and broken it over Hermes’s head.

Sirens sounded in the distance. Samantha’s eyes snapped to Joshua’s face. “Please tell me you called nine-one-one.”

“Daniel did.”

“I’ve got the gun from him.” She held it up. “But he was just firing blanks.”

Huh. So she knew something about both guns and land mines.

Hermes was groaning. The young man pulled himself onto his hands and knees. Joshua pushed him down and pinned him with an arm against his throat.

“Who are you? What are you doing here? Who sent you? Who is Magpie?”

He yanked off the respirator mask. Frightened eyes stared up into his face. Something inside Joshua’s heart lurched. Hermes was clearly overwhelmed and terrified. Had Magpie even told him the gun was loaded with blanks? Joshua sat back on his heels, loosening the pressure on the boy’s throat. Someone that unseasoned and scared probably wasn’t going anywhere.

He turned to Samantha. “Do you have any idea who this is? Have you seen this guy before?”

“Sorry, no.”

“Is it possible he was one of the men who abducted you this morning?”

“I don’t think so. Similar age, I think. I barely saw the one guy’s face but it was very scarred and he practically reeked of tobacco. The other one definitely talked like he had teeth missing.”

“All right, I’ll watch him until the police come,” he said.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. But there was something in her voice and about the way she’d said “sorry” that made him look back at her face. It was like she was being hard on herself for not knowing more. Something inside Joshua’s chest suddenly ached to just give her a hug and tell her that everything was going to be okay. “Look, I’m sorry if I sounded insensitive earlier. But—”

Out of the corner of his eye, Joshua saw Hermes’s hand dart toward something on the ground. He spun back. But it was too late. Hermes slashed at him with a small, jagged pottery shard that just barely missed his jugular. Instinctively Joshua reared back, releasing his weight on Hermes’s body, as he lunged to grab the shard. Hermes kicked up, hard, one boot just managing to catch Joshua in the chin. Pain exploded in Joshua’s head, not enough to make him let go, but enough to let Hermes slither back on the icy wood and twist from his grasp.

“Stay back!” Joshua yelled to Samantha. He leaped to his feet. “And stay out of the way.”

But it was too late. Hermes leaped onto the fire escape and bolted down the stairs.

* * *

She watched as Joshua leaped over the ledge onto the fire escape below, skipping the first flight of stairs entirely. He pelted after Hermes. Their footsteps clanged on the metal steps. Samantha grabbed the edge of the balcony with both hands. Everything inside her wanted to chase after them. But Joshua’s words still seemed to echo around her in the frosty air. Stay back. Stay out of the way. And why would he even want her to try and help? She’d fought as hard as she could against Hermes, but he’d still overpowered her. She’d broken a vase over Hermes’s head and then he’d managed to grab a shard of it and use it as a weapon. Joshua already made it perfectly clear he doubted she could be any use at all in stopping Magpie.

He’d never understand. Joshua had height, brute strength and military training. She had two left feet and a tongue that tended to either babble or freeze. He’d probably thought her big speech on the staircase had been pretty ridiculous. But, whether he got it or not, she really had joined Torchlight to make a difference.

Hermes was still running down the fire escape. The graffiti artist might not know his way around guns, but he was wiry and fast. This probably wasn’t the first time he’d vandalized something and run from getting caught. Hermes’s feet hit the ground. He pelted across the pavement. Joshua was only a few steps behind him. In a second, he’d caught Hermes by the shoulder and swung him around. The youth thrashed. But Joshua yanked his arm back, pinning it behind his back and holding him firmly in place.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” Joshua’s voice echoed in the concrete alley. “I promise you that. I’m just going to hold you until the police get here. But if you keep fighting me, I’ll be forced to tighten my grip.”

The rest of his words were swallowed up in the sound of police sirens. She stood there for a long moment, looking down at Joshua as he calmly but firmly held the squirming vandal in place. Then she turned back toward the office. Any moment now, cops would be all over the place and Torchlight News would be a crime scene. If she was ever going to take a look at what had happened with a critical, journalist’s eye, it had to be now.

Carefully, she took a methodical look at Hermes’s unloaded gun. It was a Glock. The serial number had been filed off and it looked like someone had tried to tamper with the barrel in order to make it something more dangerous than it already was. But they’d done it so badly she doubted the gun would ever be much use to someone who was actually trying to hit their target. Illegal handgun. Modified by an amateur. Loaded with blanks. It was the kind of weapon a stupid kid might use to try to intimidate someone, but never actually intend to fire. Thanks in part to Canada’s strict gun laws, Toronto police had warned recently of an increase in replica and damaged weapons being used to commit thefts. Sometimes just waving a weapon around was enough to get someone to give a thug what they wanted. Trust criminals to get creative.

But it was even more evidence Hermes had been sent as a messenger not a killer. She could almost feel her brain storing the information like memory chips sliding into mental slots.

She walked back through the alcove into the office. The smell of wet paint still lingered in the air. Hermes had graffitied two walls, one with a warning message and the other with a huge, crude bird. Quickly she took a picture of both with her tablet and uploaded them to the ATHENA database on the Torchlight News server. Then she slipped back onto the balcony just long enough to zero in on Hermes’s face as Joshua held him pinned waiting for the police. She saved that picture too. As long as she had computer access and her Torchlight password she could access ATHENA no matter where she was in the world. Then she grabbed an electronic stylus pen and started for the stairs.

Questions burned in her mind. She paused on the second-story landing, opened a fresh document on the tablet and jotted them down with the stylus, using them like an electronic pen and paper, just as if she was sitting in the corner of an editorial meeting listening to a reporter talk about their big new exposé. Why would Magpie send a graffiti artist to break into Torchlight News and scrawl a warning on the wall the same day they kidnapped a journalist? Why do both? Vandalism was vile, yes, but if a reporter was pitching this story in an editorial meeting, methodical Samantha would have pointed out that threats usually escalated in severity. That is: normally the warning came first, then the attempted murder.

She wrote “Does Magpie have a vendetta against Torchlight?” in block letters at the top of the page and underlined it twice. No doubt Olivia would get every single journalist at the newspaper to report in on what they were working on. Maybe the mysterious Magpie would emerge from there and the paper would know what it did to land on Magpie’s radar.

She crossed the second-floor landing and froze. Olivia’s office door was ajar. She could hear the creak of someone’s weight shifting on the old office floorboards and computer keys clacking. There was somebody else in the building. Her heart raced through her chest, so suddenly she found herself battling to breathe. Were the police in there already? But if so, wouldn’t they have announced their presence? The door swung open quickly. She was face-to-face with a stranger. He was short, in plain clothes and probably forty, with a square face and a red baseball cap.

And familiar. So very familiar. And she didn’t know why.

“Who are you?” she demanded. “What are you doing here?”

The man hesitated. Then suddenly he lunged for her tablet computer and tried to yank it from her hand.

“Drop it!” he shouted.

Was he kidding?

“No! Get out of here! The police are on their way!” Her grip tightened on the tablet. For a moment, she thought he was going to succeed in pulling it from her hands. But then, while all his body strength was focused on the tablet, she kicked him as hard as she could. He swore and let go. She yanked the tablet back, hearing the edge of the case crack as she wrenched it from his hands. She ran down the stairs to the ground floor, panicked tears building in her throat.

“Joshua! Help!” She grabbed the front door handle, Joshua’s name escaping her lips even before she could finish yanking it all the way open. “There’s another intruder in the building!”

“Ma’am! Get away from the building!” Strong hands grabbed her shoulders and pulled her away from the door. Samantha looked up into the face of a senior officer whose hair was tied back in a tight bun at the nape of her neck. Half a dozen more officers rushed past them into the building. “Are you all right, ma’am?”

“I’m... I’m fine. Thank you, Officer. But there’s a man in the building. Second floor. He’s short and wearing a red baseball cap. I don’t know if he’s armed.” Samantha looked around. Police vehicles and people in uniform seemed to be spilling down the streets in both directions.

But she couldn’t see Joshua anywhere.

FIVE

Half an hour later she was sitting alone in the small, quirky café across the street from the Torchlight News offices, watching the foam swirl in the top of her coffee and trying not to wonder where Joshua was. Was he being questioned by police? Had something happened with Hermes? He wouldn’t have just taken off without saying goodbye. She was certain of that. Well, almost certain. After all, it wasn’t like he’d signed up to do anything more than give her a ride back to Toronto. Even that he’d only done because she’d suddenly landed on the doorstep in danger. She sighed. Truth was, there was so much data she simply didn’t have on the man. Despite the odd effect he seemed to have on her heart.

Sprigs of holly and pine bows curved along the window frame. Her coffee smelled like nutmeg and cinnamon. She held the side of the mug tight with one hand, feeling the comforting heat of the ceramic seep into her palm. With the other, she idly ran an electronic stylus along the computer tablet. She’d let the officer who’d questioned about the break in look it over. But with all of ATHENA’s data saved on Torchlight’s online server, there wasn’t much saved on the actual tablet to look at, and she knew her job well enough to know she didn’t have to relinquish it without a warrant. Fortunately, the officer seemed satisfied to let her keep it.

Slowly she sketched out everything she could remember about the second-floor intruder, using the pieces of her memory like puzzle pieces. The lines of his square, clean-shaven jaw. Deep-set eyes. The shape of a holster on his hip. She focused on every tiny detail she could remember. The two kidnappers and Hermes may not have sparked anything in her mind, but there was something about this snoop that was familiar and she was going to figure out what.

Where have I seen your picture before, stranger? What did you want with my tablet?

Are you Magpie?

Bells jingled and clattered as the café door opened, bringing a gust of cold air in with it. She looked up, embarrassed at just how much part of her hoped to see Joshua standing there.

“Olivia!” Samantha jumped up as a woman with flame-red hair and a voluminous white scarf crossed over to her table. Even dressed in a tracksuit without any trace of makeup on her skin, the Torchlight editor seemed to beam with both happiness and confidence. Samantha gave Olivia a gentle hug, and was surprised at how strong her embrace was in response. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d be home with the baby!”

“She’s with Daniel.” Olivia unwound her scarf and dropped into the seat farthest from the window. “Police needed someone from Torchlight to come in and confirm the state of things. Our apartment is only a few blocks from here and to be honest we really needed a walk.” A tired but genuine smile crossed her lips. “We finally decided on a baby name by the way—Abigail Rose.”

“It’s beautiful.” Samantha sat down opposite her. Olivia leaned her arms on the table and squeezed her hands.

“How are you doing?” Olivia asked. “Are you holding up okay?”

There was an understanding in her voice that tugged at something deeper inside Samantha, reminding her that there were times others in the Torchlight family, including Olivia herself, had faced criminals, danger and threat of death to get the story. I’m okay.” Samantha squeezed her back and let go. “Not great. Still kind of shaky. But I’m okay. Thank you for asking and understanding.”

“Do you remember Theresa Vaughan?” Olivia asked. “We did an article on her a few months back. She’s a therapist and counselor, who does a lot of work with Victim Services.”

Samantha nodded. “I think so.” The woman Joshua had mentioned. Why did her thoughts keep turning to him?

“I gave her a call about what happened to you today. She and I have talked in the past about running something for the staff. She’s willing to meet with you before you leave town. She’s really good at helping people sort out their memories and feelings about trauma.”

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