Lawman On The Hunt

“I really don’t think we should be talking about this.” She glanced up the drive toward the wrecked car. “I have to go.”

He moved in front of her. “I think it’s past time we talked.” This really wasn’t the best place for this conversation, but he couldn’t keep the words back. “I loved you. I thought you loved me. We were going to be married, and then one day I get home and all I’ve got left of you is a note on the kitchen counter.” The note had read I’m sorry, but I’ve changed my mind. Please don’t come after me. This is for the best. Love, Leah. The “love” had trailed off at the end, as if her hand had shaken as she’d written it.

She wouldn’t look at him, staring instead at the ground. Her hair was coming undone from its ponytail, and she had a streak of dirt across her cheek. “Sometimes things aren’t meant to be,” she said.

“Are you married to Braeswood now? Or should I call him Ellison?”

She jerked her head toward him, her eyes wide. “No! Why would you think that?”

“The neighbor called you Mrs. Ellison.”

“Oh, that. That’s just...” But she didn’t say what it was. He filled in the blank. Her cover story. The lies they told to hide their terrible purpose here.

“I get that you don’t love me anymore,” he said, letting that harsh truth fuel his anger. “But I don’t understand this. Do you know what Duane Braeswood and his friend Eddie do? They’re terrorists. They kill people. It’s fine if you want to hate me, but do you hate your country, too?”

She bowed her head and closed her eyes. “I know what they do,” she said softly. “And I don’t expect you to understand.”

“You’re right, I don’t understand.” He leaned toward her, his face so close to hers he could smell her perfume. An image flashed in his mind of her naked, her body soft against his, his nose buried in the satiny skin of her throat, inhaling that floral, feminine scent.

He blinked to clear his head, and the blare of a horn yanked him back to the present. He looked past her, down the road, where the Escalade was barreling toward them. “I have to go,” she said, and turned as if to run.

He snagged her arm and dragged her with him into the underbrush, seconds before the Escalade screamed into the drive.

Chapter Two (#ulink_a44139ce-7fdf-578b-b2bf-eef5bc06cda6)

Travis had a glimpse of Duane Braeswood at the wheel, his face a mask of rage, as the SUV flew by.

He retreated farther into the underbrush. One arm wrapped around Leah, holding her to his chest, he used his free hand to pull out his phone. “Abort!” he shouted as soon as Gus answered. “Braeswood and Roland are here. And two other guys. I didn’t get a look at them.” They had been only dark figures in the backseat of the SUV.

Gunfire reverberated in the trees before he had the phone back in his pocket. “Let me go!” Leah pleaded, and struggled against him.

“You’re under arrest.” He pulled a flex-cuff from his back pocket and wrestled it over her wrists.

“No!” she wailed, but he cut off the cry by pulling out his handkerchief and stuffing it in her mouth. She glared at him, her brown eyes almost black with rage.

“Don’t worry, it’s clean,” he said. “The last thing I need is you letting the others know where I am.”

He debated binding her ankles also and leaving her out here in the woods, but if the fight moved in this direction, she might get caught in cross fire. Besides, he didn’t trust her not to find a way to escape. Better to keep her with him.

He dragged her up the steep slope toward the house. The blasts of gunfire became almost constant as they neared the building, and when they reached the edge of the clearing his heart twisted at the sight of a khaki-clad figure slumped in the drive. He couldn’t tell which member of the team had been hit, but knowing they had lost one of their own was enough to make him want to get back at these guys.

He checked his weapon. The Glock wasn’t going to be of much use at this range. What he wouldn’t give for a sighted rifle right now. He would sit here and pick the bad guys off as they exited the house.

He looked at Leah again. Tears glistened on her cheeks, and he had to harden himself against the pain in her eyes. “Killing a federal agent is punishable by life in prison,” he said. “You can be convicted of felony murder even if you didn’t fire the shot, simply by your association with these killers.”

Something flickered in her eyes—regret? Fear? He once thought he knew her better than anyone, that he could always read what she was thinking. But that was obviously only one of the many things he had been wrong about when it came to her.

He turned away from her to study the house again. Several windows had been shot out. At one, long drapes fluttered in the breeze. The gunfire had ceased, but he thought he heard someone moving around in there. What was the best way for him to help the agents inside? Braeswood and his men would probably expect an attack from the front, but if he could get around back he might be able to reach his trapped fellow agents.

“Is there a back door?” he asked. “Another way inside?”

She nodded.

“How do I get to it?” He pulled the handkerchief out of her mouth so she could answer, but remained ready to stuff it back in if she started to yell.

“There’s a path through the woods, on the side,” she said softly. She nodded toward the west side of the house. “The door leads into the garage. There’s a back door, too, but it leads from an enclosed patio. You can’t get to it without being seen from the house.”

“Right. Here we go then.” He started to stuff the handkerchief back in.

“Don’t,” she said. “I won’t say anything, I promise.”

“Since when can I trust your promises?” He replaced the handkerchief in her mouth, ignoring the hurt that lanced him at her injured look.

He took her arm and led her around the house toward the back door, keeping out of sight of anyone inside. His phone vibrated and he answered it.

“Recon Three, this is Recon One. Where are you?” Blessing spoke in a whisper, but his voice carried clearly in the silence around them.

“Outside the house. West side.”

“They’ve got us pinned down on the second floor. Looks like a rec room. Did you say there’s four of them?”

He looked to Leah for confirmation. Four? he mouthed. She nodded. “That’s right. Braeswood, Roland, and two others,” he said.

“It’s too high up to jump out of the window, though it may come to that,” Blessing said.

Leah tugged on his arm. He shook her off, but she tugged harder, her expression almost frantic. “Hang on a minute,” he said, and pressed the phone against his chest to mute it.

He jerked the gag from her mouth. “What is it?”

“If they’re in the rec room, there’s a dumbwaiter,” she said. “In the interior wall, behind the panel with the dartboard. It goes down to the garage.”

He pressed the phone to his ear again. “Check the panel behind the dartboard,” he said. “There’s a dumbwaiter that goes down to the garage.”

“Won’t they know to block it off?” Blessing asked.

Leah shook her head. Travis muted the phone again. “They know about it, but I don’t think they’ll think about it,” she said. “I’m the only one who uses it, when I unload groceries.”

“I’ve got the woman with me,” Travis said. “She says she’s the only one who ever uses the dumbwaiter—Braeswood and the others won’t remember it.”

“You don’t think she’s setting a trap for us?” Blessing asked.

“I don’t think so.” Maybe that was his old image of Leah, fooling him, but he had to trust his instincts now.

“Then we’ll have to chance it.” Blessing sounded older. Bone-weary. “If you can, station yourself to lay down cover fire.”

“There’s a side door in the garage that leads outside. I’ll cover you there.”

He and Leah repositioned to conceal themselves as near to the garage as he dared, taking cover first behind a propane tank, then behind a section of lattice fencing used to block trash cans from view. He half reclined, bracing his right hand on the fence. “Get down behind me,” he ordered her.