For her he’d conquer the world

Eyes burning with fervor, Abbie leaned forward and her scent of almonds and honey teased him. “I can’t go back, Gray. I can’t just sit there and wait for the next shot through the window.”

He crouched beside her and reached for her hand, trying to ignore the kick-in-the-gut need touching her brought. He thought the distance of years had made him immune to her power to dazzle him. But there it was, fizzing through his veins like a shook-up can of soda. “If you testify, you destroy his make-believe world. Without that power, he loses everything.”

“You don’t get it.”

“He’s just a man, Abbie, not some sort of a superhero.”

“He owns me.”

Gray pounded a fist against the tabletop. “Nobody owns anybody.”

She turned her face away from him. “As long as Rafe is alive, he can get to me.”

“Not if we destroy him.”

Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,

Summer’s winding down, but Harlequin Intrigue is as hot as ever with six spine-tingling reads for you this month!

* Our new BIG SKY BOUNTY HUNTERS promotion debuts with Amanda Stevens’s Going to Extremes. In the coming months, look for more titles from Jessica Andersen, Cassie Miles and Julie Miller.

* We have some great miniseries for you. Rita Herron is back with Mysterious Circumstances, the latest in her NIGHTHAWK ISLAND series. Mallory Kane’s Seeking Asylum is the third book in her ULTIMATE AGENTS series. And Sylvie Kurtz has another tale in THE SEEKERS series—Eye of a Hunter.

* No month would be complete without a chilling gothic romance. This month’s ECLIPSE title is Debra Webb’s Urban Sensation.

* Jan Hambright, a fabulous new author, makes her debut with Relentless. Sparks fly when a feisty repo agent repossesses a BMW with an ex-homicide detective in the trunk!

Don’t miss a single book this month and every month!

Sincerely,

Denise O’Sullivan

Senior Editor

Harlequin Intrigue

Eye of a Hunter
Sylvie Kurtz

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Flying an eight-hour solo cross-country in a Piper Arrow with only the airplane’s crackling radio and a large bag of M&M’s for company, Sylvie Kurtz realized a pilot’s life wasn’t for her. The stories zooming in and out of her mind proved more entertaining than the flight itself. Not a quitter, she finished her pilot’s course and earned her commercial license and instrument rating.

Since then, she has traded in her wings for a keyboard where she lets her imagination soar to create fictional adventures that explore the power of love and the thrill of suspense. When not writing, she enjoys the outdoors with her husband and two children, quilt-making, photography and reading whatever catches her interest.

You can write to Sylvie at P.O. Box 702, Milford, NH 03055. And visit her Web site at www.sylviekurtz.com.

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Abrielle Holbrook—Abbie witnessed her father’s murder and has been running for her life since. The WITSEC program that was supposed to protect her has become a minefield of death.

Grayson Reed—Abbie was once the golden girl of his dreams, now he has to take all he knows about her, Echo Falls and tracking prey to protect the woman he loves, but can’t have.

Deputy Marshal Phil Auclair—How had the old marshal survived three deadly attacks on his subject when younger deputies had died? Was it simply devotion to his job or did he have inside help?

Raphael Vanderveer—Abbie’s camera caught him murdering her father. Now he wants her and his freedom back and nothing can stop him from getting what he wants—not even the inconvenience of being on trial for murder and treason.

Elliot Holbrook—He gave his life to protect his daughter, the family business and the town he loved.

Hale Harper—The new Seeker has a chip on his shoulder the size of California. Is he willing to trade Abbie’s life to ease his own pain?

Brynna Reed—Gray’s sister is not the girl he remembers. She’s embroiled in troubles of her own. Does she need money badly enough to betray her best friend?

Pamela Hatcher—Rafe’s assistant longs for action and adventure.

Sister Bertrice Storey—How could Abbie’s mother’s best friend betray the girl she’d treated as a daughter?

Contents

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

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter One

Abrielle Holbrook was watching cable television in yet another cheap motel when Deputy Marshal Ed Kushner’s chair was thrown backwards. His body toppled against the television screen, blotting out Gene Kelly, who was singing in the rain.

In the next instant the lamp on the table at her elbow shattered, throwing the room into the flickering gray haze of the television’s moving pictures. WITSEC Inspector Phil Auclair tackled her to the stained burnt-orange carpet and shoved her toward the connecting door between their rooms. “Stay low.”

She knew the drill by now. Pulse frantic and hyper-ventilating, she crawled to the bathroom, still steamy from Phil’s shower, and hugged the floor. So much for witness security. Three weeks. Three relocations. Three dead deputies. She didn’t even know where she was. What day it was. Couldn’t remember her current alias. It was all too much. Her chest cracked under the spasm of her tears. When would this nightmare end?

Phil shouted into his cell phone while Gene Kelly tap-danced in the next room. At this moment Abbie would give anything to slip into Debbie Reynolds’s role and join Gene on the wet movie set. Even rain sounded good. Maybe it could wash away the image of blood constantly tainting her vision. Closing her eyes, she let the click-clack of taps and the beat of familiar music form the colorized pictures of the oft-seen movie. And against the screen of her mind she shadowed Gene’s every move.

The next thing she knew, someone was tugging on her elbow. She blinked up at him and for a second mistook the gray hair and worried blue eyes for her father’s.

Phil all but yanked her to her feet. “Time to go.”

Even though there were half a dozen armed men patrolling the parking lot, Phil scanned every shadow as he hurried her to the waiting armored car with the tinted windows. He’d barely slammed the door shut before the car sped off.

Abbie sank into the seat that smelled of cigarette smoke and canned deodorizer and let her heavy head plop against the window. “I can’t do this anymore.”

Phil patted her elbow. “Ten more days, princess. Once the trial’s over, you’ll be safe.”

She tried to draw reassurance from the man who’d become her lifeline in the past year since her camera lens had captured her father’s murder at the hands of his partner. But the soul-deep cold wouldn’t leave. Safe? She didn’t think she’d ever feel safe again. “I can’t.”

“Don’t you want to clear your father’s name? Don’t you want to see Vanderveer pay for his crimes?”

What good was she doing her father like this? “I just want my life back.”

“If Vanderveer is set free, you never will.”

You won’t ever be free from me, Abrielle. I won’t ever let you go. I’ll be in your dreams and in your nightmares. I’ll follow you wherever you go.

Somehow even behind bars Rafe Vanderveer had managed to do just that. Even from behind bars he would kill her. When was the last time she’d slept without having a nightmare about him? When was the last time she’d slept through the night? “Ten days is a long time to stay alive when my protectors keep dying.”

In the dim light from the dashboard Phil’s jaw seemed to sag with the weight of his responsibility. “I’ll keep you safe. I promise.”

But doubt tailed her the three long hours until the car stopped again. It followed her in the shower, where even blistering heat couldn’t loosen the icy horror glued to her skin. It cozied up to her on another too-soft mattress of another motel bed with sheets that were too stiff and a pillow that was too flat.

Phil checked the doors and window, made a call, then slid into the second bed fully dressed. “Try to get some sleep.”

Code phrase for We’ll be moving again in the morning.

She aimed the remote at the television, turned the volume down low and flicked through channels until she landed on West Side Story. As Richard Beymer sang his heart out to Natalie Wood, Abbie relaxed. Then later, as the Sharks and the Jets duked it out, the doubt mutated into a fear so sharp, it cut her breath.

Someone knew. Not just anyone. Someone on the inside. How else could they have found her? The first time was her fault. She’d needed to hear a familiar voice and had called a friend from back home. But not the other two times. She’d trusted Phil. She’d believed he had her best interest at heart.

She craned her head toward the man who’d become a friend since she’d entered the program. Deep lines bracketed his mouth and wrinkled his forehead. Purple moons bruised the skin beneath his eyes. Eyes that were kind and understanding like her father’s. Was experience enough to account for his being alive while three younger men were dead? What reason did he have to betray her?

Even if he hadn’t, someone else had.

He couldn’t keep her safe. No one could. Raphael Vanderveer had too much to lose by letting her live.

WITSEC had taken everything from her, erased her past as if she’d never existed. But it wasn’t enough. Rafe remembered her. He wouldn’t let go. Not when she was the only thing between him and his freedom.

Somehow he’d done this to her and would keep doing it until she was dead. Then the town, the mill, the house, everything that was still part of her fondest memories would be his to abuse and destroy.

If she was to stay alive to avenge her father and make sure his murderer never left prison or touched her beloved town, if she was to have a chance to once again live an ordinary life, she could trust no one.

When Phil’s gentle snores told her he was asleep, she slunk out of bed. No point trying the front door. He’d be up with the first clink of the lock. She stumbled to the bathroom as if she’d just woken up. He’d heard her do that often enough in the past three weeks to think nothing was out of the ordinary.

In the bathroom she checked out the small window. Doable. Like Phil, she’d crawled into bed fully dressed. She’d given up on pajamas after the second attack. She glanced at her feet and wriggled her toes. No shoes. But she couldn’t risk going back for them. Hiding the slide of the window with a flush from the toilet, she took a deep breath. Then, balancing on the seat, she pushed herself onto the sill.

Outside, cold asphalt met her bare soles. Panic snaked up her spine until her teeth chattered. If Phil can’t hide you, what makes you think you have any chance to stay alive on your own? Glancing at the window, she thought of crawling back to her only safety net. A safety net full of holes. No, her best chance to stay alive was on her own.

A thick gray fog wrapped around her like a shield, giving her a skin of courage. Become smoke.

From not far away came the sound of trucks rumbling by on a highway. Like the swish of a lighthouse, the beams of the trucks’ headlights cut starry circles into the dark murk. She couldn’t go home, but she could disappear. All she had to do was hide for ten more days.

With one last look over her shoulder she faded into the mist.

“HEY, HOLLYWOOD, CONGRATULATIONS on your successful hunt.”

Grayson Reed paused at the door of what served as a briefing room in the basement bunker of Seekers, Inc.—also known as the Aerie—surveyed the four men around the conference table through the mirrored lenses of his glasses and copped a superhero pose. “No sweat.”

As Noah Kingsley strode past him toward the octopus of wires attached to the computer system, he jabbed Gray in the ribs with an elbow. “Never any sweat with you.”

Not that his target had made the game of hide-and-seek easy, but once he was cornered, he’d seen that walking out willingly was the wisest of options—especially with the LAPD SWAT team surrounding him. Gray had dealt with bullies often enough to have learned a few tricks. Even scum wanted to believe it deserved respect. Gray let them think he gave them what they wanted; then they gave him what he wanted. He was always one for win-win.

Dominic Skyralov studied the plate of muffins in front of him, chose a lemon-poppy seed and grinned his good-old-boy smile as he peeled the paper. “How was the mother state?”

They all thought Gray was a California boy born and bred. They’d choke on their coffees if he told them he’d lived less than an hour from Wintergreen until he’d graduated from high school—then he’d gone as far away as he could from the butt-end-of-nowhere town that was Echo Falls. Moving away to someplace where no one knew him, where no one had any expectations, had allowed him to reinvent himself. He flashed Skyralov a toothpaste-commercial smile because the blond cowboy expected it. “All sunshine and surf.”

As Kingsley set up the computer for whatever presentation Falconer had planned, he eyed Gray up and down. “What happened to you? The dry cleaner run out of perchloroethylene?”

Gray smoothed the wrinkles on his silk-blend dove-gray blazer. What was the point of buying cheap when suits took such abuse in this line of work? Cheaper to buy top-of-the-line in the long run—not that any of them gave him a break for his good sense. “Red-eye. Couldn’t wait to see you guys, so I didn’t even stop home.”

Skyralov and Kingsley smirked.

Gray dropped into a leather chair around the cherry-wood conference table. Farthest from the door—his usual post. Lounging against the wall, Sabriel Mercer, with his dark and dangerous looks, nodded acknowledgment but didn’t speak. Never did unless he had something important to say. Hale Harper, the new guy, was still feeling his way into the group. He was almost as dark and brooding as Mercer. For the life of him Gray couldn’t figure out why Falconer had hired someone with such a big chip on his shoulder. That could only lead to trouble.

Sebastian Falconer, head honcho of Seekers, Inc., strode in and took his place at the head of the table.

As Gray reached for an orange-date muffin in a basket with a lacy doily, he chuckled. “You really ought to tell Liv that lace clashes with the macho image we’re trying to build here.”

“Eat up those blueberries.” Falconer’s features remained stiff and formal while he shuffled papers in readiness for their meeting, but amusement leaked into his voice. “Liv wanted me to mention they’re good for the prostate.”

Laughter exploded. Skyralov scooped blueberries onto the plate next to his muffin. “Next she’ll issue Kevlar vests every time we leave the bunker.”

“Back-ordered. Won’t be here till next week.” The corner of Falconer’s mouth twitched in what, for him, passed as a smile. His wife, Liv, had sustained a brain injury a year and a half ago. She couldn’t remember a thing of her life before the accident, but since then, the organizational skills she’d had to learn to cope with her condition had made her an invaluable part of Seekers, Inc. She fussed over them all as if they were family. None of them minded.

Falconer tented his hands on the table in front of him. “Okay, bring me up to date.”

Grasping his red suspenders, Kingsley gave the daily security update. Mercer clipped through his usual terse report on the activities of his current tracking cases. Between bites, Skyralov announced he was leaving for Louisiana in an hour to follow up on a tip on the serial marrier who squeezed his brides dry, then left them hanging. An Austin society dame had hired Seekers, Inc. to find the man who’d defrauded her daughter out of her fortune. The mother didn’t care how long it took or how much it cost as long as the “dirty, rotten scoundrel” never enjoyed a penny of her family’s money.

The screen at the front end of the room went blue, and Kingsley said, “Ready when you are.”

Falconer reached for the remote that controlled the PowerPoint presentation. “Yesterday afternoon we were hired by our old outfit.”

Skyralov paused, a spoonful of blueberries hovering just outside his mouth. “The U.S. Marshals Service?”

Falconer nodded. “One of their WITSEC subjects bolted and they need her back.”

Gray leaned back in his chair as if that would help him take in the whole situation. “Why are they involving us?”

“They seem to think one of their own is responsible for compromising her security.”

Gray gave a low whistle. Admitting that one of theirs was dirty was never easy for the Service. Having worked the WITSEC program in the past, he knew its usefulness even as he saw the possibilities for betrayal. Every good had its ugly side.

Falconer aimed the remote at the screen and a face popped onto it. “We’ve been tasked with finding Abrielle Holbrook, daughter of Elliot Holbrook of Holbrook Mills in Echo Falls, Mass.”

Everything in Gray stilled. Though the mirrored lenses of his glasses shielded his eyes from everyone, the gray tint was light enough for him to see every detail clearly. Abbie’s picture filled the screen, and the past he’d worked so hard to leave behind slapped him between the eyes. There in front of him was the image of everything he’d ever wanted. Everything he’d been told he could never have.

Abrielle Helena Holbrook. A.H.H. Not just her initials but also the sound people usually made when they saw her.

Abbie was golden—from her honey hair to her honey eyes to her achingly sweet personality. You wanted to hate her for all she had, but you simply couldn’t. He had never met a single person who didn’t like her. Seeing her face on the screen knocked him off center. She was the absolute last person he’d have thought would ever need WITSEC. How could the girl every guy had been in love with and every girl wanted as a friend now be running for her life—not only from the scum who’d forced her into WITSEC but from the program itself? The girl was allergic to conflict.

“Isn’t Holbrook Mills involved with the Steeltex project?” Skyralov asked.

“They are,” Falconer said.

Harper frowned so deeply, his eyebrows met in the center of his forehead. “What’s Steeltex?”

Falconer clicked the remote, and a picture of a soldier dressed in camouflage came onto the screen. In the next slide, only a miragelike shimmer distinguished the soldier from the brick wall behind him. “It’s a new fabric the U.S. Army is working on. It transmits visual information about color, light and patterns through the fiber to make whoever wears it nearly invisible against any background. Microdots are woven in to locate a downed soldier. The latest model contains conductive fibers in the chest area that can monitor vital functions of an injured soldier. This information can be relayed by wireless signal to a remote location such as a field hospital.”

The V between Falconer’s eyes deepened. “That project and the safety of our troops out in the field are compromised if Abrielle Holbrook isn’t found in time to testify at her father’s murder trial. Because of the Steeltex project, the trial’s high threat.”

“Her father was murdered?” Gray’s nerves were running a marathon, but he spoke as casually as if he were relaxing beachside.

Falconer clicked the next slide forward, flashing a picture of Elliot Holbrook on the screen. Gray-haired, blue-eyed, fair and generous. The man had kept the small mill town of Echo Falls alive when everyone else had given it up for dead. No one was good enough for his daughter. But, then, when you had a daughter like Abbie, how could they be?

The next photo was of a younger man who’d tried his best to present a Pierce Brosnan 007 image but couldn’t quite cut the right attitude. He wore the better-than-you sneer of the typical bully. “Elliot Holbrook was murdered by his business partner, Raphael Vanderveer.”

The next slide turned Gray’s stomach. In color that was so vivid it almost looked fake, the James Bond wannabe held a pistol at Holbrook’s head. Smoke puffed out of the muzzle. Red mist sprayed out from Holbrook’s head. Gray recognized the place—Holbrook’s office in the back of the mansion on the hill.

Mercer’s voice floated from the shadows of the wall. “Where’d that photo come from?”

“The subject took it.”

Abbie had photographed her own father’s murder? The fast-food egg-bagel sandwich he’d wolfed down on his way here turned to brick. He hoped to heaven someone was there for her. She adored her father. Her whole world revolved around pleasing him. Losing him, witnessing his murder, would’ve torn her apart.

“Over the last month,” Falconer said, “information on her whereabouts was compromised three times. Three deputies are dead. After the last attack she disappeared and hasn’t been seen since. The Service is worried about her safety.”

Six slides clipped by, showing a photo of each of the three men as it appeared on their badges and a crime-scene photo of each of their corpses. Gray’s skin grew cold. His mind couldn’t wrap itself around Abbie having to witness such violence. That was his world, not hers. Hers was all softness and light. She could capture magic with her camera, render a child’s face into a work of art, a family portrait into an intimate revelation of cohesion. The photograph she’d taken of him and his sister at Brynna’s sixteenth birthday party was the only thing he’d taken with him when he’d left Echo Falls. Had she shut down as she had when her mother died? Without her tight-knit group of friends who would have shaken her out of her mental fog? Where had she run?

“Here’s our subject’s profile.” Dry statistics that couldn’t even begin to describe the life that buzzed around Abbie glared at him from the screen.

Skyralov sipped green tea. “What was her last location?”

Kingsley popped a suspender. “Ed Kushner was killed in Providence, Rhode Island. After that, Inspector Auclair took her to a small motel outside of Hartford, Connecticut. She escaped through a bathroom window.” Pictures of the motel, the window and the surroundings clicked across the screen. A lone imprint of a bare foot on the shoulder of a road. That more than anything made it real. Abbie’s foot in the sand. How often had he seen that image?

Gray shook his head. Don’t go there. “Where’s the trial?”

“Boston,” Falconer said. “Eight days from today. We have to find her. Without her, Vanderveer has no reason to reveal the extent of his treason. We have cause to believe he’s behind the attempted murder of Abrielle Holbrook.”

Falconer’s chair whispered as he turned to face Mercer. “Mercer, I want you to track the witness and bring her back. Reed, since you’ve worked WITSEC, you’ll go in posing as a deputy to find the inside—”

“I’ll track.” Gray sat as still as an art-class model. He could not let Falconer know how much he wanted to lead the retrieval team.

Falconer frowned at him. “This isn’t multiple choice.”

“I’ll track.” Be firm. Keep it cool. “I know how to find her.”

Falconer contemplated him with his hard eyes and sharp face. Without breaking eye contact, he said, “Harper, you’ll go undercover. Mercer, you’ll help Reed track.”

“I can track alone. No sweat.”

“That’s all, gentlemen,” Falconer announced. “Check your PDAs for updates. Reed, stay behind.”

Four sets of curious eyes appraised him as they filed out.

After Kingsley closed the door, Falconer sat on the corner of the conference table. “How much sleep have you had?”

Gray flashed him a smile. “You know me. I can sleep anywhere. I got some shut-eye on the plane.”

“It cuts close to home.”

“I know.”

“Can you handle going back?”

The strange thing about Falconer was that he asked for everything and somehow you felt compelled to give it to him. He knew the deep, dark secrets of each of his team’s men. But the courtesy didn’t extend both ways. He was still a mystery to them. But there was trust. And that said a lot. Falconer knew about Echo Falls, knew about the strained relationship between him and his sister, Brynna, knew the hard time he’d had surviving the unforgiving label of coward branded onto him by small-town narrow-mindedness.

But he didn’t know about Abbie. Gray had never told a soul about Abbie.

Gray leaned back in his chair, hands behind his head, arms splayed wide—the image of relaxation. “Yeah, I can handle going back. That’s why I took your job offer in the first place.” Sort of.

Falconer turned the remote in his hand. “You’ve been here over a year and you haven’t set foot in Massachusetts.”

Gray popped a careless shrug. “Guess I just needed a push.” If he had, he’d have known about Abbie’s father and could have helped her.

“I’m not sure this is such a good idea.”

“I know her. I know Echo Falls. I can find her faster than anyone here.”

Someone within the program wanted to harm his golden girl. He might have had nothing to offer her thirteen years ago, but now he could keep her safe from the bullies who wanted to hurt her. “I understand her. I understand where she’s coming from. I understand the program that betrayed her.” He was her only chance.

“It’s not just Abrielle, Reed. There’s WITSEC’s reputation and the lives of soldiers at stake.”

“I get that.”

A long silence loaded the room with tension, high-strung and expectant. Never let them see you sweat.

Falconer reached forward and with a finger flicked Gray’s glasses so they rested on top of his head. “Tell me about Abrielle.”

Gray willed his naked gaze to meet Falconer’s straight on. Never let them see your pain. He grinned and made a joke out of the feelings that had nearly eaten him alive. “She was the princess in the mansion and I was the guy from the wrong side of the tracks.”

“I see.”

Gray feared maybe Falconer was seeing too much. “I never stood a chance.”

“A schoolboy’s first crush can make him blind to boundaries.”

“But he still understands their restrictions.” Especially when they were pounded into him.

“Make sure you do.” Falconer rose and gathered his files. “You find her and you bring her in. Is that understood?”

“Crystal clear.”

“Mercer’s my best tracker. He’s going with you. This is too important.”

Just what Gray needed—a shadow to witness his weakness.

ALL PRISON TELEPHONE conversations were taped, so Raphael Vanderveer had to learn to talk about what to the censors would sound like treason as if it were apple pie. But what did the little minds know about how the world really worked? They didn’t understand he was selling defective merchandise to the enemy while working on the real thing for the U.S. government. Why shouldn’t he profit from the enemy’s greed? “I’ll need a new suit for court.”

“Check.”

That’s what he liked about Pamela Hatcher—her efficiency. With just those few words she’d know what to do. It wasn’t that they were intimate. He’d hired her because he wasn’t attracted to her. She was a steel stork of a woman, with a face like a scarecrow and delusional fantasies of being the next Lara Croft. But her mind was sharp enough to cut paper and she understood him. So few people did. A vengeful woman was a force more fearsome than an atomic bomb, and he never wanted pleasure to interfere with business. No sex. No jealousy. No need to worry about female revenge. Pamela got that. What she wanted from him wasn’t passion; it was adventure.

“Have my tailor cut a dress for you while he’s at it.” Raphael pulled on the cigar he’d paid a small fortune for.

“Really?” Pamela’s squeal of delight was real. In his generous understanding of her fantasy, he’d offered her the kind of assignment that would send someone like Pamela in throes more satisfying than any orgasm. How often had she asked for a more hands-on part in this game he was playing with his captors? Now she’d get to tackle the role of private investigator.

“Any word on the Belgian chocolates yet?” Abbie was a sweet more delicious than any candy, as Pamela already knew. But Abbie had escaped the box he’d put her in, and he needed her back.

“You don’t pay me enough for all this runaround.” Pamela pretended to whine.

Another little ruse. The censors heard an overworked, underpaid assistant. But Pamela knew the worth she brought him, and he paid her accordingly. Nothing Uncle Sam could get his hands on, mind you. All part of the fun for Pamela. “I just gave you a designer dress.” Out of fabric so secret, being caught wearing it would have her tried for treason.

“Um, so you did.” She giggled like a schoolgirl, already anticipating the thrill of the hunt. He beamed at his foresight to hire her.

“Check the order confirmation and track down that chocolate. And make sure the contents aren’t damaged.” He blew out rings of smoke. As soon as he got what he needed from Abbie and erased her from the picture, he could get back to business. She’d already cost him almost a year of his life. He’d make her pay for all of her sins. “I want to celebrate my release in style.”

Chapter Two

Gray had sent Mercer to sniff Abbie’s trail at its last known point, but the shortcut to information lay in this armpit Gray had sworn he’d never come back to.

The skeleton of houses forming the backbone of Echo Falls appeared through the rain-drenched windshield of his Corvette. How could so little have changed in thirteen years?

Echo Falls squatted in northwestern Massachusetts, east of Highway 91, north of Route 2. A town lost in time, tucked in its own little world. Settlers had followed the law of least effort, taking advantage of the natural fall of water from Holbrook Pond to Bitter Lake, which then emptied into the Prosper River and into the Connecticut River. To make up for the falls’ lack of grandeur, the founding family had somewhere along the road built a spectacular granite arch bridge over the fast-moving river.

Originally water powered the wool mills; now it was electricity. The surviving mill buildings still stood on their original site, reflecting on the pond on sunny days. Built in 1774, Holbrook House still faced south, overlooking the river. As the family grew, more estates were built on Holbrook land. Five grand brick homes once lorded over the lower village where the peons lived in boardinghouses on Peanut Row. In the late 1800s, that constituted enough political power to divert a railway to this nothing town.

The train had long ago stopped coming and the tracks turned into nature trails. Modern gabled capes, contemporaries and colonials mixed in with the old brick homes, Victorians and farmhouses. Posh homes still cropped up in the small upper village. Working stiffs still lived paycheck to paycheck in the larger lower village. Of course, Holbrooks didn’t own all the fancy homes now, only the original house on Mill Road.

As Gray crested over the last hill, he let out a breath he wasn’t aware he’d held. Orange construction barricades closed off the old bridge and redirected traffic through the lower village. Great. He’d hoped to avoid meandering through the center of town.

At least the rain watered down the hard edges. He didn’t really want to see the old hometown and all the bitter memories that stagnated there. The plan was to talk to his sister, get a lead on Abbie and get out of this hellhole as fast as possible. Take it in like a reporter, Gray. Or a travel writer. Notice, don’t feel.

He gritted his teeth as he passed the middle school. Even through the slosh of rain and the tint of his sunglasses every ugly detail glared at him. His grip tightened on the steering wheel and he pretended not to see the redbrick building. Voices from the past crowded in, making his skin shrink too tightly around him. Cry-baby. Loser. Wimp. You can’t do anything right. Run, you coward, run.

Coward.

He rolled his shoulders, trying to dislodge the old taunts that had been the steady staple of his school years.

To his left, the high school’s mustard-brick facade smeared between swipes of his wipers. There he was voted most likely to fail and end up in jail. This in spite of being ranked ninth in a class of one hundred and three, lettering in three sports and working twenty-five hours a week. Ironic really that his job was putting scumbags back behind bars where they belonged. Including, once, a former classmate. The all-grown-up Mr. Soccer Star still liked to pick on boys who were smaller than he was.

Who’s laughing now?

It was all in the past. He was no longer the runt who had to play class clown or run to save his hide. He no longer had to fight his sister for the last scrap of food on the table. He could stand up straight and be proud of who he was and what he’d become. He was good enough for anyone—including Abbie.

Yeah, right. Her old man would still have found fault with him.

At Peanut Row he slowed. The old weight of doom he’d dragged around like a ball and chain fitted itself around his neck. He loosened his tie. You’re not that kid anymore.

Spinners’ Tavern still stood on the corner. Still had a steady clientele even at eleven in the morning. His mother had probably spent more time on the second bar stool from the right than she had at home. Like a stick of peppermint gum was going to mask the booze and fool them into thinking she’d actually gone to work for a change.

The last house on this dead-end street looked better than the last time he’d seen it. The door and shutters wore a fresh coat of lipstick-red paint. But not even the bright color could erase the tired slouch of the roofline or the defeat of the sagging siding. The wipers taunted him, coward, coward, coward.

Now that he was here, he wasn’t quite sure what to do. The last time he’d talked to Brynna, she’d screamed at him to never call her again and had slammed down the phone. All of his calls after that were screened through a voice box, and she hadn’t returned any. But then Bryn had never played by anyone’s rules; she’d made up her own. That’s what got her kicked out of the police academy. Last he’d heard she’d gotten a P.I. license. He couldn’t imagine that business was booming for her here.

Maybe she was right. Maybe he was a coward for not pushing the issue. Maybe he had run from his responsibility to her. But only an idiot went where he wasn’t wanted.

Rain drummed impatiently on the ragtop of his Corvette, reminding him of his mother’s red nails clicking against the cracked kitchen table. Are you just going to sit there? Her shrill voice taunted. For heaven’s sake, Grayson, grow a spine. Do you want to end up like your father?

Don’t know. That might be a good thing.

The imagined smack of his mother’s slap stung his cheek.

He twisted off the ignition and, rounding his shoulders against the pelt of rain, trotted across the street to the red door. For a second his hand hovered above the glossy red paint, then he knocked.

A volley of small yips answered him. “Quiet, Queenie!”

Bryn. Yet not Bryn. Something was off in her voice. “Bryn, it’s Gray. Open up.”

The silence on the other side of the door was so deep, it seemed to suck the breath right out of his lungs “Bryn. Please.”

“Go away.”

“I need to talk to you.”

“Yeah, well, you’re a decade too late.”

“Open the door, Bryn.”

“I can’t.” The broken tone of her voice tore him apart. What on earth had happened to her? Why was her hatred of him so deep? He was the one who had been all but driven out of town. What could she possibly hold against him?

Something slid down the other side of the door, rattling the wood on its hinges. “You left me, Gray. You left me with her.” Her voice, low on the other side of the door, hardened. “You left me with them.”

Gray swore silently and slid down the front side of the door. They sat back to back with the door between them. “I couldn’t take you to basic training. You know that.”

“You left me, Gray.”

Rain blitzed his face, soaked his suit and sank into the Italian leather of his shoes. “You liked it here. Mom always took your side. Mama’s baby never had to do anything. You and Abbie, you were the toast of the town. Queen of this. Princess of that. Brynna Reed and Abrielle Holbrook. Everybody’s friends. Why would you want to leave that?”

“Things change.”

Hands draped over his knees, he closed his eyes and leaned his head against the hard wood. “Talk to me.”

“It doesn’t matter. You should leave now.”

He thought he heard tears in her voice. What the hell was he supposed to do with that when she wouldn’t talk? “This isn’t about me, Bryn. It’s about Abbie.”

“Abbie’s safe wherever she is.”

“No she isn’t. Someone within WITSEC is selling her out. If I don’t find her, she could die.”

Silence, except for the sting of rain spiking against the concrete stoop and rattling against the siding.

“She’s already lost so much,” Gray said. Noncriminals paid a higher price than criminals in WITSEC. Loss of identity, self, dignity. Abbie was a woman of her world. She belonged here in the same way he never had. Losing her father, her life, her world, he couldn’t imagine how she’d survived it all. “She doesn’t deserve to die for a mistake her father made.”

“Elliot died to protect her.”

“What makes you say that?” That tidbit wasn’t in the briefing notes.

“I’m not going to betray her.”

“It’s not betrayal when you’re helping her.”

“She’s safe.”

Stubborn. Hardheaded. Foolish little witch. It wasn’t her life she was playing with; it was Abbie’s. But he swallowed the barbwire of anger and talked to his sister as if logic would make a difference. “People on the run tend to go back to the familiar. I need to know if she came to you for help.”

“She’s safe.”

“Did you know that her safety was compromised three times in the past three weeks? That three deputies died trying to protect her? That right now Raphael Vanderveer is negotiating with teams of lawyers and that, if Abbie chooses not to testify at the trial, he could end up out on the streets again.”

“Like you said, she’s lost so much. Maybe she feels she has nothing more to lose.”

“There’s her life.”

“What’s the point if she always has to live in fear? Maybe she’s tired of running, Gray. Did you think of that?”

A skewed barb? “I couldn’t take you with me, Bryn. And even if I could have, you wouldn’t have come. You fit too well here.”

“Yeah, maybe you’re right.”

Nothing he could say would change her mind. “I care about Abbie. You know that. I have to find her before Vanderveer’s snitch does. In your heart you know that, too. Where is she?”

But Bryn didn’t answer. The push of her body against the door yielded a loud creak.

He sprang up and pounded on the door. He wrenched the doorknob, but the lock wouldn’t give, and he’d long ago lost the key. “Bryn, you have to help me. Please. I don’t care if you hate me till the day you die. But you have to care that Abbie’s life is in danger.”

Bryn’s footsteps padded away. The dog’s toenails clicked on the linoleum as it followed its mistress.

A moment later “Stayin’ Alive” blasted from a stereo.

He wasn’t stupid. He got the hint. As always in this town, he was on his own. He turned and strode toward his car. His being here was causing Bryn grief, and whatever he represented to her was a threat. Too bad she couldn’t think of her friend. He needed to find Abbie to help her stay alive. Couldn’t Bryn see that? He yanked the car door open and fumbled in his soaked-through pocket for his keys. With one last look at the sad house that looked like a tired, made-up whore, he cranked on the ignition.

As the engine growled to life, a smile cracked his lips. He reached into the glove compartment for the holey gym sock he kept there to wipe fog off the windshield and dried his sunglasses.

“Stayin’ Alive.” From the soundtrack of Saturday Night Fever. Maybe Bryn hated him, but she did care about Abbie after all.

DON’T THINK OF IT, Abrielle. Nobody knows where you are. Nobody can find you. Still, the edge of her peace started to curl at the sound of the ferry’s horn. Once a day it brought supplies, mail and possibly people. And a troop of fear. That was the one chink in this otherwise perfect armor.

Out here in her refuge of growing fog, she listened for Bert’s footsteps on the rocky path that were the pre-arranged all-clear signal. Only the gentle lap of water against rocks reached her. Was there a problem this afternoon? Had someone suspicious gotten off the ferry? She fiddled with the aperture ring on the camera Bert had loaned her. Let it go, Abbie.

Bert wouldn’t spill her secret.

Strains of “High Noon” crept into her mind as Abbie imagined five-foot-two Bert in a showdown with one of Rafe’s thugs. She laughed out loud and the fog swallowed her voice, replacing it with the quiet push and pull of water on rock.

After the chaos of the past year, this quiet was a blessing. She lifted the camera and forced herself to relax into the calming rhythm of nature around her. Back to basics, Abbie. The first essential of a good photograph was awareness. What personal statement did she want to make today?

“Part of finding your God,” Bert had said when Abbie first showed up on the convent doorstep begging for sanctuary, “is finding yourself.”

And here in the cool afternoon air, with a pale white haze on the horizon, Abbie could almost believe she’d have a chance at connecting with her lost self—and surviving for another eight days.

Though the Sisters of Sacred Heart were in the midst of their summer tourist season, Bert—Sister Bertrice Storey to everyone else—had found a room for her in the old granite convent. People came to Retreat Island at times of transition—divorce, death, milestone birth-days—that made one want to look deep into oneself or beg some higher source for answers to questions that really had none. But the quiet did heal and it had a way of leading one to some sort of peace.

There were no televisions here, no mad schedules, no hectic running from one appointment to the next. There was room for a dozen overnight visitors to find their own voices in the silence. They could join the sisters in their daily prayers. They could work in the gardens. They could walk in the woods. If someone needed to talk, a sister was there with a willing ear. Chapel bells woke the residents at six every morning, and small signs on the walls discreetly reminded guests that their silence was their gift to their companions.

Though Bert had insisted they had a full house, the island was big enough that Abbie hadn’t run into any of the other guests. They, like her, were seeking solitude. And two days into her ten-day retreat, that sense of peace was starting to envelop her as thickly as the fog bank tucking in around the island.

Fear retreated and she lost herself in the beauty of nature around her. Viewpoint and composition. Light, form and tone. Texture. Pattern. Through the lens of the camera she searched. The scent of spruce and sea air and damp earth connected her to the here and now and grounded her to her surroundings. Crouched among the rocks and boulders that lined the western shore, she aimed the camera at the departing ferry that was moving into the fog like some sort of spaceship and snapped the shutter.

Fog folded in around the ferry’s departing bulk, swallowing it whole. Bert’s footsteps crunched on the path. All was safe for another day.

Her sigh filled the night air. With a smile she straightened, threw her head back and spread her arms like Julie Andrews at the beginning of The Sound of Music, then twirled on her rocky perch to meet Bert. Before she could start singing, the sight of a wind-carved spruce bending over a ledge of rocks caught her eye. She lifted the camera and focused on the image that gave the impression of a pointy-hatted gnome stroking its long, bristled beard.

Bert’s footsteps stopped on the trail.

“What took you so long?” Abbie asked, moving one foot to a neighboring boulder in order to accentuate the spruce gnome’s nose. “I was starting to think something happened.”

“Your Sister Bertrice is one tough cookie. It took me a half hour to convince her I was one of the good guys.”

At the sound of the male voice Abbie jerked around, lost her footing on the wet rock and landed hard on her backside. Fear serpentined through all of her limbs, setting them shaking. How could Bert have trusted anyone after what Abbie had told her? Men—all men—were a threat to her. No matter how charming—especially if they were charming—they belonged to Rafe, and the only thing Rafe wanted from her was permanent silence. Scrambling, she managed to get up and over the rock, away from this threat.

“Abbie! Hey, wait, no!” The dark shape scurried after her, swearing as he slipped on the slick rocks. “It’s me. Gray.”

“Gray?” Heart hammering, she froze, holding the camera against her heart like a pitiful shield. Gray had once had a way of making her feel as if her mere presence in this world made it a better place. What teenage girl didn’t want to see herself as a goddess in a handsome boy’s eyes? Then she’d ruined it all with just a few words. “What are you doing here?”

“Can we climb down from here?”

“No.” She needed distance. This was too unexpected, too startling. Gray, here, now. Wrong time. Wrong place. She shivered and wished she’d worn a sweater over her sleeveless blouse. He detached himself from the fog, and she sucked in a breath.

Familiar features formed as he drew closer, and the sizzle she’d thought of as teenage infatuation stirred her blood. His sandy hair now sported a salon do instead of the home-butchered bowl cut. His high cheekbones still begged for a camera’s attention. His lips were still tempting. He still wore the mirrored shades he’d taken up in high school. Cool then, scary now because she couldn’t read his intent in his eyes.

Her hands tightened around the camera and she struggled with her desire to inch it up to her eye to capture this ghost from her past. That sleepy smile. That careless pose. That air of endless time on hand. They were all a skin he wore to protect himself and hid a steely determination. She’d admired that survival instinct in him, that fire to succeed that no one could douse no matter how much water they threw at him. That relentless ability to pursue suited his job, but it would also return her to a captivity that doomed her to die. “Stay where you are.”

“I’m here to help you, Abbie.”

“I was safe until you showed up.” She stepped up to the next boulder and away from the frustrating tug of outgrown teenage hormones that had once made her do crazy things like swan dive into the quarry to get his attention.

Balancing himself on the slippery soles of his leather shoes, he followed her. “I don’t work for Vanderveer. I don’t work for the Marshals Service. I work for a private firm. I’m here to help you. You know me, Abbie. Trust me.”

“I can’t. Leave me alone.” She continued putting distance between him and her on the path of rocks she’d traveled time and again over the past few days. She couldn’t trust him. She couldn’t trust anyone. She was learning that lesson blow by painful blow. Look where trusting Bert had gotten her. Where would she go now? “How did you know where to find me?”

“A lucky guess.”

“Brynna.” Tears blurring the path, Abbie reached out to steady herself on a neighboring boulder, then continued her upward climb to the stand of spruce. How could Brynna have sold her out? Even to Gray? Especially to Gray?

“She didn’t say a word.” Gray puffed too close behind her. “Why won’t she open the door for me?”

“You left her.”

“I had no choice.”

“You asked me to go with you.”

He slid and mumbled a curse. “That was different.”

“Not to her.” Not when Bryn knew her only protection from her mother’s hard life was Gray. But he couldn’t know, and it wasn’t Abbie’s place to tell him. “How did you find me?”

“It wasn’t that hard. People tend to go back to what’s familiar. Your parents are dead. Brynna’s too obvious and too close to home. Who else could you trust? Then I remembered your mother’s college friend who used to take you to see all those musicals in Boston when you were a kid. Had a hell of a time tracking her down. Who would’ve thought a theater major would end up in a convent?”

She’d hoped no one. Her mother had died so long ago and Bert hadn’t been an active part of Abbie’s life since then. Abbie had assumed Bert wouldn’t show up on anyone’s radar. Except Gray’s. Because he knew her so well. What if Rafe’s hired goons had followed him? “Please, Gray, if you ever cared for me, go away.”

“You know, between you and Brynna, my ego is taking quite a beating.”

“Then you shouldn’t have come back to the people who can hurt you.”

“You have to testify. I can keep you safe until then.”

Rain started, pecking at the fog. She reached the stand of spruce and looked down at Gray’s dark shape struggling for footing on the rocks below. She’d missed him. But after the way she’d hurt him, she had no right to expect him to put his life on the line for her. She wasn’t the old Abbie, and he wasn’t the old Gray. Too much had happened to both of them. “Go, Gray. Please leave me alone.”

“I can’t, Abbie. Not this time.”

She didn’t wait to see if he made it safely over the last muddy stretch of cliff. She ran through the woods, following not path but memory. Something moved to her right? A deer? She turned her head but saw nothing in the soupy murk. Gray had her imagining Rafe’s minions all around her.

“Abbie!” The alarm in Gray’s voice froze her. A moment later he tackled her to the ground. The hard knock jammed the camera into her chest, stealing her breath. A second later something bit into the tree at her side, drooling chunks of bark onto her arm.

“Stay down,” Gray said, then took off after whoever had shot at them. He disappeared into the fog she’d counted as a blessing only moments ago.

Desperately trying to rasp breath into her lungs, she clawed at the earth at her side. This could not be happening. Not here. This was a safe place. Drops of rain splattered around her. She’d been wrong. Rain didn’t wash away the fear. It was still there. Big and immovable. Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head. She shook her head. Don’t go there. Not now. She had to get away. Tonight. She had to disappear again.

“Can you stand?” Gray’s hand reached down to help her up.

She nodded and sat up, finally getting air into her lungs. “I’m fine. Did you get him?”

“No. He got away.”

She hadn’t realized until then that she’d counted on Gray to catch him and give her a chance for a safe getaway. The bitter hiccup of tears joined her lung-filling breaths. “I have to get back. Bert’ll worry.”

Gray’s hand didn’t let go of her arm. “Abbie.” He opened his left hand. There on his palm rested the proof that her safety was nothing more than illusion.

Chapter Three

“How did he get hold of this?” Abbie’s fingers shook as she picked up the ripped square of fabric from Gray’s palm. Like a chameleon, the square rippled from light to dark, then settled, taking on her skin’s color, and all but disappeared. Steeltex. The experimental fabric her father had developed for the U.S. Army. “How could Rafe’s goon get into the mill? It’s fenced now. Gated. Guarded night and day by military police.”

“I don’t know, but we have to get out of here.” The tautness of Gray’s voice, the protective stance of his body and the predatory way he scanned the area around them ratcheted the tightening squeeze of anxiety in her chest.

“Is he still out there?” She craned her neck and probed the shifting shadows that pooled the woods into shades of black. Her body was strangely numb, as if it didn’t quite belong to her, and it automatically shrank closer to Gray.

Gray poked at the scrap of material peeking out of the top of her fist. “He’s got the advantage. He can see us, but we can’t see him.”

He shook off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. “We need to get moving.”

The jacket had trapped his heat and his clean scent, and both swaddled her like a security blanket. A muscle in his jaw twitched as he adjusted the lapels around her neck, then his face settled into a sharp set of unreadable lines.

“I don’t need this—”

He stopped her efforts to remove his jacket. “The white of your blouse drinks in what little light there is and turns you into a beacon.”

Her gaze dropped to his chest. The pearl-gray of his shirt shimmered in the fading light. “But now you—”

“Shh. Let’s go. We have to get to the convent.”

A look in his eyes yielded only a reflection of her dazed-deer look in the lenses of his glasses. This running, this constant fear, wasn’t going to end. Not until either she or Rafe was dead. “We won’t make it…” Alive stuck in her throat. Their hunter was too close. Behind that tree? Behind that rock? The noises of the island became skulking footsteps on the undergrowth, sour breath in the fog, evil glee on the water. “It’s too far.”

“We will.” He tugged on her hand, breaking her paralysis. “One step at a time. Like old times.”

Like the time when she couldn’t run one more step at track practice and he’d fallen back to her pace and joked until she’d forgotten the cramp in her side. His no-worries tone, the warmth of his hand holding hers, the solidness of his body pressed against hers almost had her believing this could be just another training session.

How easily she’d fallen back into the old roles. Him watching out for her, her letting him. Except this time there was no smile to seal the lie that everything was okay. His vigilant scanning and cautious movements erased all delusions this was anything but a hunt and they were the prey.

Trailing behind him, camouflaged in his jacket, she was once again his kid sister’s best friend, one of the girls he continually had to get out of trouble. Then she’d wanted his attention. Now his taking charge was making her feel small and helpless.

Just like her father’s well-meaning control.

Just like Rafe’s manipulations.

Just like WITSEC.

With Gray it was supposed to be different.

Comfortable. Easy. Safe.

At the edge of the woods Gray paused. His breath puffed close to her ear as he took in the obstacle before them. In the creep of fog and darkness the ground continued to slope gently toward the darker mass that was the convent. Like an invitation an irregular patchwork of fog-blurred lights burned at some of the windows. Between her and Gray and the granite walls of the building was a wide expanse with nothing but open space. The manicured lawn with its meandering stone path, park benches, birdhouses and fragrant rose border was magnificent in sunlight, inspiring a slow pace and self-contemplation. Now it seemed peppered with armed mines and much too exposed.

Three deputies had already died trying to keep her safe. The thought that Gray might be next terrified her.

“He’ll see us. We won’t make it.” The imagined infrared dot of the assassin’s scope burned her back.

“Walk in the park, hon.” He flashed her teeth, but the false smile didn’t fool her. He removed his shirt and dropped it behind a rock. His tanned skin blended in better with the darkness of the approaching storm, even with the rain giving it sheen. “Like the quarry parties. Think of it as racing the park ranger to the gate.”

“Not exactly the same.” The park ranger hadn’t pointed a gun at them, and even if he had, he would have shot to miss.

“We’ll give him the smallest target possible and take a path he can’t anticipate.”

“Right.” Everything in her screamed to stay in the relative security of the shadows. Don’t move. Stay. Just a bit longer. Just until she could dig a little deeper for her last scrap of courage. “Why you? Your firm could’ve sent someone else.”

“I figured that by now you’d need a familiar face.”

She did. Desperately. She gazed at the face that had given her countless sleepless nights, at the face she’d been looking for in crowds for more years than she cared to admit, at the face that could still jolt her heart like a double shot of espresso. He’d come to her when it would surely have been easier to let someone else take the job. Had he forgiven her?

He squeezed her upper arm. His chin jerked toward the convent that seemed a hundred miles away. “Come on, Abbie. Let’s make a run for it.”

Right. “If you remember correctly, I was never much of a sprinter.”

“That’s all right. I’ve got you covered.”

And even as they crouched at the edge of the woods waiting, he did. The firm planes of his body curved over hers. The breadth of his shoulders stretched across hers. The hard weight of his arm was armored plate around her. Her awareness of his heat and his scent and his steely determination to protect her hurt with its acuteness. After thirteen years, shouldn’t she have moved on? Oh, no, not homebody Abbie. She hung on to things that did her no good. Like a magnum of champagne, just one touch and her mind uncorked with all her unfulfilled childhood fantasies starring Gray. But being around Gray had always been like that—a combination of confusion and longing she’d never quite known how to handle.

“Ready?” he asked.

And just like that the fantasy popped. The man Rafe had hired to silence her was somewhere out there in the fog and storm. He was real and he was after her. Not Gray, not side trips into fantasyland could take away the fact that she was a target. For all she knew, the assassin was standing right there beside her, laughing silently, waiting for her to move. Deal with it, Abbie.

Throat too tight to speak, she nodded.

“Stick close.” Not that Gray was giving her a choice. Hands hard on her shoulders, he plunged them into open space and steered her into a zigzag path toward the kitchen door of the convent. She pumped her arms and legs hard until her lungs burned and every muscle shrieked from the assault.

To their right a shape rose and darkened against the fog, then disappeared again. Something whizzed by her ear and plunked into the pole holding the multiapartment birdhouse. Martins exploded out and scattered like buckshot.

Rafe’s assassin was shooting at them. She was going to die. Rafe was going to win. She wasn’t ready to die. She hadn’t even figured out the basics—like what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. For sure it wasn’t running. Or hiding.

Gray cursed as he pressed the armor of his body closer to hers and shifted directions, practically lifting her off her feet. “Faster!”

She was nothing more than a rag doll at the mercy of her protector and her hunter. A bank of tears dammed her throat. Her legs were moving, but she could no longer feel them. Rafe had promised to destroy all she cared for. He’d poisoned her existence. He’d raped the mill and Echo Falls. He’d killed her father.

Another bullet screamed past her, blasting rose petals on the path. She stumbled. Gray held her up. She couldn’t see a thing. Not the convent lights. Not the ground at her feet. Not even the end of her own nose. The dam of tears broke and spilled.

You won’t ever be free from me, Abrielle. Rafe’s laughter echoed in her mind. I won’t ever let you go. I’ll be in your dreams and in your nightmares. I’ll follow you wherever you go.

“Hang on, Abbie. We’re almost there.”

Gray’s voice and Gray’s push shoved her back into the chase.

Life and death. The line was thinner than she’d ever imagined.

If Rafe knew about Gray, he would destroy him. Rafe reveled in exploiting weaknesses to his best advantage.

She couldn’t allow Gray deeper into this mess. Not unless she wanted to lose him, too.

GRAY SHOVED ABBIE THROUGH the convent’s kitchen door and barred the heavy wood door behind them. His Glock wasn’t a match for a sniper’s rifle, and he doubted the good sisters packed heat. Would the shooter dare to violate the sanctuary of a convent? Would he kill defenseless nuns to get to Abbie?

When the local marina hadn’t had any rentals available, the daily multi-island ferry ride had seemed safe enough. An open target was usually riskier than fading into a crowd. But now it was clear he’d messed up. He had to get Abbie off this bull’s-eye target and behind Seekers, Inc.’s thick walls as soon as possible.

At their noisy entrance, Sister Bertrice, who was standing at the counter, gasped and whirled around, brandishing a knife like a sword. A spatter of strawberry juice plopped onto the dark gray of her skirt.

“What happened to you?” she asked, clutching the silver cross dangling at her neck with her free hand. She took in the bits of twigs and dirt that clung to Abbie’s shoulder-length honey-brown hair and the mud that streaked her jeans and white blouse.

“Nothing,” Abbie said, but the compulsive wringing of her hands gave away her anxiety.

“You look as if the devil was after you.” Sister Bertrice dropped the knife on the cutting board and rushed to Abbie’s side. “Are you all right?”

She ushered Abbie to a backless bench, polished by years of use, and skewered him with a look of accusation.

“I’m fine,” Abbie said, tripping slightly over the toe of her sneaker as she sat down at the table. “Really. I think I’ll just go to bed.”

She started to rise again, but Gray caged her in. “Someone shot at Abbie.”

“Shot at?” Sister Bertrice crossed herself and hugged Abbie. “How can that be?”

“Is there any way to get off this island tonight?” Gray asked. Mercer was somewhere in Connecticut, thanks to Gray’s reluctance to have a witness when he first caught up to Abbie. The rest of the team was just as far and time was of the essence.

Eyes pinched with worry, Sister Bertrice said, “The ferry comes only once a day. You won’t be able to leave until tomorrow afternoon.”

Unacceptable. Clothed in Steeltex, Vanderveer’s hired gun was essentially invisible and able to move as he pleased. He’d be watching and waiting for Abbie to move. For another chance to earn his pay.

The homey aromas of dinner’s home-baked bread fresh out of the oven, vegetable ragout bubbling on the stove and strawberry shortcake scented the air, but the cold granite walls reeked of primitive defenses easily breached. “What if you had an emergency?”

“Then we can call a medevac helicopter, but this doesn’t qualify.”

“Why not? It’s a matter of life or death.”

Sister Bertrice’s white dandelion puff of hair swayed with the shaking of her head. “They answer only medical emergencies.”

“Whoever shot at Abbie is still out there.” Gray paced the span of the double-wide arched kitchen door leading to the outside, more to keep Abbie in than to keep anyone out. Her body was tensed for flight. Her gaze kept darting to the door. He didn’t like the pallor of her skin, the dazed look in her eyes or her stubborn insistence that she was fine when her body betrayed her shock at the near miss.

Seeing her again had been a shock to his system—like jumping into ice-cold water—and had knocked him for a loop. But he could not let his teenage infatuation with her get in the way of doing his job.

“Have any new guests arrived since Abbie got here?” Identifying the shooter would make keeping Abbie safe that much easier.

“Other than Abbie, you’re our only arrival this week. Do you think there’s a danger to any of our other guests?”

“No, the shooter is after Abbie.”

“What can we do?” Sister Bertrice clutched her cross as if it would provide her inspiration. He’d leave the prayers to her and rely on a solid plan of action.

Vanderveer couldn’t have bought every cop in the country. Though Gray couldn’t pull jurisdiction, he could get the USMS to, if it came to that. First he’d try the cooperative route. He’d explain the situation to the locals, then hitch a ride back to the mainland. “We’ll have to call the local cops.”

“Gray, no! I can’t go back into protective custody.” Arms wrapped around her middle as if she were in pain, Abbie turned to Sister Bertrice. “If you hadn’t told him where I was, I’d still be safe.”

“If I hadn’t told him, dear, you might be dead.”

Abbie blinked as if to hold back tears and made a small sound low in her throat that made him want to wrap her into his arms and promise her a happy ending. She’d always been a sucker for happy endings.

“Your young man is right, Abbie. This is too big. You can’t handle this alone. You have to trust someone. I wouldn’t have sent him after you if I hadn’t remembered him from your seventh birthday party, when you got hit with the piñata bat. He’s the one who held a napkin to your temple until your father could whisk you off to get stitches. He has your best interests at heart.” She patted Abbie’s hand with obvious affection. “I’ll go place that call now.”

Abbie hung on to the lapels of his jacket that was still draped over her shoulders. The gold feather earrings hanging from her lobes shivered. Her eyes beseeched him. “I can’t go back, Gray. I can’t just sit there and wait for the next shot through the window.”

He crouched beside her and reached for a hand. It was cold in his—as cold as the diamond-and-topaz ring on her finger. He rubbed her fingers to bring back warmth and tried to ignore the kick-in-the-gut need touching her brought. “Seekers is as safe a place as there is. It’s outfitted with the latest security technology. It’s a damned fortress. No one will be able to get to you there.”

“Except Rafe. You don’t know him. He’s a manipulator. He’ll use you to get to me, and you won’t even know it until it’s too late.”

“Is that what happened to your father?”

She pressed her lips into a thin line and nodded.

He didn’t like the mechanical stiffness of her body or the flat look in her eyes. She tried to pull her hand free. He hung on to it, needing to keep that small connection between them. “A bully has power only as long as people believe in his vision.”

“My point exactly.”

Eyes burning with fervor, she leaned forward and her scent of almonds and honey teased him. He’d thought the distance of years had made him immune to her power to dazzle him. But there it was, fizzing through his veins like a shook-up can of soda. “If you testify, you destroy his make-believe world. Without that power he loses everything.”

“You don’t get it.”

“He’s just a man, Abbie, not some sort of superhero.”

“He owns me.”

Gray pounded a fist against the tabletop. “Nobody owns anybody.” Especially not a bully.

She turned her face away from him. The same living-dead expression she’d worn after her mother had died cloaked her face. He hadn’t known how to reach her then, and the same kind of bewilderment rippled through him now. His golden girl should glow with happiness, not have the weight of sadness dull the light in her eyes. “Abbie.”

Her restless fingers knitted themselves with the hem of his jacket. “I know I have to testify. My father used to tell me that with privilege came responsibility. He owned the mill, but he was responsible for the well-being of the people who worked for him. He believed that if he took care of his people, they would return his loyalty.”

“I read about the fire. About his keeping his employees on the payroll while the mill was rebuilt.” Her father’s selfless actions had turned him into a hero. And a hero’s image was a tough one to uphold.

“To keep his promise he had to take on a partner. When George Vanderveer died, Rafe inherited his father’s options in the mill. Without Rafe’s money Dad couldn’t have bid successfully on the Steeltex project, and the mill desperately needed to win that contract. I owe Dad. I owe the employees who trusted him.” She turned to look at him, her eyes an open window to the knock-out-drag-down brawl between her fears and her duty. “But don’t you see? As long as Rafe is alive, he can get to me.”

“Not if we destroy him.” For her he’d conquer the world. She had to know that.

“How exactly do you plan on doing that? He’s already in jail, Gray. What will a life sentence do to him? He’ll still have his pack of goons to send after me. Even if Massachusetts had a death penalty, what would it do to him? He’d still have years of appeals to torture me. After he’s convicted, he’ll be even more desperate for revenge. I won’t ever be safe.”

Gray plucked a piece of twig from her hair and tucked a soft dark gold strand behind her ear, catching the tip of his finger on the chain around her neck. “I took care of Trevor Osborn when he was stalking you.”

The gold flecks in her eyes whirled as she touched the bump on the bridge of his nose. “He broke your nose.”

“And when that dog had you treed when you trespassed at the apple orchard,” he said, his voice rustier than he’d expected. “I got him away from you.”

Her gaze slid down to his calf, where the zigzag-scar souvenir of that battle resided. “He tore your jeans to shreds.”

It was worth every rip of denim and skin to have Abbie fuss over him once the mutt had hightailed it back to the farmhouse. The way she’d clung to his arm all the way back to the mansion had had him preening peacock-proud for days.

Don’t go there, Gray. His brain frantically fired warning messages. The past wasn’t someplace he wanted to get stuck. He’d worked too hard to free himself from the bonds of Echo Falls to get trapped there. “Good thing I’ve got a tough hide.”

“Not tough enough for Rafe. He has no conscience.”

“Bullies rarely do.” Gray had to remember all the hard-learned lessons beaten into him in that snake pit of a town.

“It’s not the same, Gray. We’re not in high school anymore. He’ll kill you to get to me.”

A frown rucked her forehead, and he had to stop himself from ironing it out. No, they weren’t in high school anymore. They’d moved on. Abbie to her career and him to his. In spite of her situation, she still belonged in a world of light and color. She’d always be his golden girl, but he was the wrong kind of man for a woman like her. He saw that now. She needed someone who could share Echo Falls and the mill and all the responsibilities that went with privilege and position. And he needed to keep showing bullies the error of their ways. Raphael Vanderveer was next up on the slate. “Failure is not an option.”

Not then. Not now.

There was no need to revisit old patterns of emotions they’d both outgrown.

“Four people have already died because of me. Three deputies and my father.”

“And you’re thinking that because of that you should go it alone until the trial?”

She gave a small nod and her voice dipped into a featherlight whisper. “I have to.”

His brave, foolish girl. Her willingness to sacrifice herself for the things she held dear was one of the qualities he’d admired about Abbie. But her sacrifice wasn’t acceptable. Protecting Abbie was his job. Getting her to Seekers was his job. Seeing her make it in one piece to testify was his job. “It’s out of your hands. There’s too much at stake.”

The squish of Sister Bertrice’s soft-soled shoes returned. “Because of the weather, the police can’t come until morning.”

“Then we’d better lock up tight.”

He always got the job done.

“THE CHOCOLATE ORDER SHOULD be in state by tomorrow night,” Pamela announced toward the end of their daily briefing phone call. The faint clanging of a bell buoy pealed in the background and had Rafe cursing Abbie for all she’d stolen from him. “I ran into a bit of trouble, but I have a tracer on it. I know the expected arrival time and destination.”

Rafe went giddy with joy at the prospect of having Abbie back in his sights but kept his voice strictly business. “That is good news indeed.”

“It’s going to be held at customs for a while, though, unless I can get the release numbers I need. It’s because of the Limburger cheese that somehow came with it.”

Stinky cheese. Cops of some sort. Who had tagged on to Abbie? Phil Auclair again? He thought he’d taken care of the determined marshal. Why did Pamela need information from their inside patsy? Talking to that contact too often could compromise his advantage. “When did this happen?”

“Yesterday. It’s from a private reserve.”

Private cops? Had Abbie turned to her pathetic childhood pal? He had to nip that in the bud. “Contact our friend and say we need that customs release information. That we can do much to keep this import business thriving if our request is expedited.”

“And if there’s trouble rerouting the cheese?”

No cop—private, public or paid for—was going to get between him and what was his. He had no qualms about ridding the world of one more badge-wearing bull. “We’ll simply make fondue.”

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