Christmas On The Run
“Cool it!” he commanded as she tried to hook a leg around his, pull him off balance and free herself.
“Let me go,” she growled, wrestling against his hold. His instinct was to do what she’d asked. She was shorter, lighter and weaker than he was, and from the age of twelve on, he’d been taught good manners, good morals and fair rules of combat.
Those things flew out the window when it came to protecting family or staying alive. He tightened his grip. Not enough to be painful, but enough to make her think long and hard about continuing the fight.
“Tell me why you’ve been running by my place every morning for three weeks, and I will,” he said, and she stiffened.
“Dallas?”
“You sound surprised.”
“I...am.”
“Because you didn’t expect to be caught?”
“Because things don’t usually turn out that great for me.”
“Me being out here is great?” He released his hold and took a step back, trying to see her face in the predawn light. Gaunt. Deep hollows beneath high cheekbones. Dark shadows beneath light-colored eyes. That was about all he could see.
“It’s better than the alternative.”
“Which is?”
“I put something through the mail slot. That will explain.”
She started jogging, heading away from the house. He could have let her go, but there was something about her that worried him, a kind of desperate energy he often saw in clients who were looking for help.
He snagged the back of her running vest, pulling her to a stop. “Save me a trip to the house. Tell me now.”
“I’m Carly Rose,” she said, as if the name should mean something to him.
“If this is a test, I’m going to fail it, because I’ve never heard the name before.” He cut to the chase. She obviously knew him. She’d obviously been casing his house. He wanted to know why. He wanted to know who had sent her. He wanted to move on with his day, because he had a boatload of physical therapy to get through before he returned to HEART. Five weeks recovering from a torn meniscus, and he was almost cleared to return to work.
He was counting the days, because the house was too quiet, the days too long, the nights even longer with nothing to occupy him.
“Kelley,” she added, then he knew, and a half dozen memories of his brother filled his mind.
“Josh’s widow,” she continued, as if he might be too dense to put it all together.
“I get it.” He released her vest, stepped back. She wasn’t anything like what he’d have expected. Josh had always gone for blonde, voluptuous. Fake. “What do you want?”
“To leave.” She glanced toward the dead-end street. He’d chosen the house because of the privacy and the park that butted up against the yard. Plenty of room to run, hike and bike.
“You looked me up for a reason.”
“I...need your help, but I can’t explain. There isn’t time.” Her watch beeped again, and she took off, sprinting into the street and heading toward the end of the road.
He should let her go. Josh had only ever been trouble. Even before they’d entered foster care, before they’d been adopted, before he’d stolen from the only two people who had ever loved them, Josh had been all about getting what he could however he could from whomever he could. Dallas had some regrets about their relationship, but not enough to make him want to connect with his widow.
So, yeah, he should let Carly Rose Kelley go, but he was at loose ends, and Christmas was coming. His parents did their best to get his mind off the season. For the past six years, they’d invited friends and family over to their place for a loud and loving Christmas exchange. Dallas always attended, and then he’d return home to his silent, empty house that should have been filled with the excited squeals of the twins, his wife, maybe another child or two.
Lila had wanted a big family.
He liked to pretend he’d have agreed to that. He wasn’t sure, though. He’d never thought he’d be that great of a husband or father. He hadn’t planned to be, either, but then he’d met her, and he’d fallen hard and fast. They’d married four months after they’d met, and she’d been pregnant three months later.
If they’d lived, the twins would be turning seven on Christmas Eve.
He shoved the thought and the memories away. He needed distractions this time of year. Carly was the perfect one.
He could still see her, slowing as she reached the end of the street, apparently less frantic now that she’d put some distance between them. There was another entrance to the park in that direction. Maybe she was heading there.
Whatever the case, he planned to follow. At his own pace, because even if he lost sight of her, he could find her again.
That was what he’d spent the past several years doing—finding people, helping them, bringing them home. Something moved in his periphery, and he swung around, saw a guy walking toward him, coming from the same direction Carly had, sauntering like he had nothing but time on his hands. Except he looked sweaty, his hair plastered to his head.
“Morning,” he said as he passed, without looking in Dallas’s direction. He also stayed near the center of the street, far enough from the houses to keep motion-detecting security lights from being triggered. And he seemed to be following the same path as Carly. Minus the trip to Dallas’s porch.
“Cold morning for a walk,” Dallas said, and the man stiffened.
“Yeah. It is.” He put on a little speed, increasing his pace just enough for it to be noticeable.
“You going anywhere interesting?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Just thinking that if you’re following the lady, you might want to stop.”
“Mind your own business, buddy,” the guy growled.
“It’s my business when a woman is running alone and she’s being followed,” he responded.
“You want trouble?” The guy turned, his eyes blazing. The sun had finally drifted above the horizon, the gold-gray light glancing off mud-brown hair and dull blue eyes.
“I’m not going to walk away from it if it comes calling,” Dallas replied. Poking the pig. That was what his father called it. It was something Dallas always seemed compelled to do. Something that had gotten him into trouble more times than he could count.
This time was no different.
The guy moved fast, reaching under the hem of his jacket, the motion smooth and practiced. Dallas had seconds to react, to throw himself sideways, pull his Glock. And then the world was exploding into chaos—a woman screaming, a hundred memories filling his mind as he found his mark and fired his first shot.
TWO
She screamed.
She couldn’t stop herself.
And then she ran faster, racing away from the man with the gun, the one who’d been following her.
Racing away from Dallas. He was in danger because of her. She could try to deny it. She could tell herself all kinds of pretty lies, but if he’d been shot, it was because she’d dragged him into trouble. She glanced over her shoulder, stumbling as she reached the transition between pavement and park path.
Nothing in the street. No sign of Dallas. No guy with a gun. Lights had come on in a few houses, and she could hear sirens in the distance. Someone had called the police. She could stay and tell them what she’d seen. She could talk to them about the gemstones she was supposed to be cutting, the threats against Zane. She could put her faith and trust in fallible human beings and an overburdened criminal justice system.
Or she could keep going and leave Dallas to face the consequence of her decisions. She could let him talk to the police, explain what he’d seen, what she’d said.
And while he was doing that, she could be packing and leaving town.
But if he’d been shot...
She stopped, eyeing the empty street, the lit houses, the rising sun glinting off winter-bare trees. Nothing moved, and she took a step back the way she’d come, because she couldn’t just abandon Dallas. No matter how much she might want to.
She stopped in front of his house, scanning the yard, looking for signs that he’d been injured. She found what might have been a splotch of blood on the pavement, another drop of it a few inches away. But there was no one lying bleeding on the ground. There was nothing but the gold-gray light of dawn, the chilly winter breeze and the sound of screaming sirens.
She found more blood on the grass, and she followed the trail of it around Dallas’s house and across the field that separated his property from the park. The police would arrive soon, and she shouldn’t be there when they did. She’d blown it. She’d made that first cut in the stone and she’d gone too deep, pushed too hard. There was nothing to do when that happened but scrap the old plan and come up with a new one.
But she couldn’t leave until she knew Dallas was okay. This was her fault, her trouble coming to call on him.
She should have thought about that before she’d taken the chance, but she’d been desperate to keep Zane safe, and Dallas had seemed like the kind of guy who could hold his own in a battle. On paper, he’d even looked like a hero. Not that she believed in those. The fantasy of a white knight riding to her rescue had died about three months after she’d married Josh, right around the time she’d seen a florist receipt on the floor of their closet. For his mother.
She’d believed the lie because she’d wanted to, but she’d never again believed he was everything he’d pretended to be.
But those were thoughts for another time.
Right now, she needed to find Dallas and make sure he was okay. Once she did that, she’d do what she should have a month ago. Plan B: leave town, her life, her career. Leave Jazz.
Zane would be devastated. Especially with Christmas coming. It was his favorite holiday. He loved all the traditions. More than anything, he loved having his little family together. Not this year, though. This year Jazz was going to be with her fiancé’s family, starting new traditions. Zane had cried when he’d found out. He’d cry more when he realized that he was never going to see his aunt Jazzy again.
But he’d be alive. He’d be safe.
That was what mattered.
She pushed through a thicket and found herself on the trail she’d run in on. No blood there, and the earth was too packed for footprints to be visible. She crouched, searching the ground for any sign that Dallas had been there. The sirens stopped abruptly, and she knew the police had arrived. They were probably questioning whoever had called in the report of gunfire. It wouldn’t be long before they found the blood. They might call in a K-9 unit and extra manpower, and she’d be out in the woods, ready to be found and questioned.
Don’t go to the police. Don’t tell anyone.
She hadn’t gone to the police, but she had tried to tell someone, and now the police were closing in. The people who’d been following her had to know it.
Fear zipped through her, the metallic taste of it filling her mouth. While she was tromping around in the woods looking for Dallas, the people who’d been threatening her could be knocking on the door at her place, making up some excuse for entering the premises.
“Dallas?” she called quietly, the word barely carrying on the morning air.
There was no response. She hadn’t really expected there to be.
The blood, the silence. He was injured. Or worse.
And it was her fault.
“Dalla—”
A hand slapped over her mouth, and she was pulled back against a rock-solid chest, her arms pinned to her sides by someone much larger and stronger than she was. She’d learned to fight the same way she’d learned to run, because she’d had no choice. It was that or be used and abused and tossed onto the side of the road like garbage.
She went lax, her weight dropping against her attacker’s arm.
When that didn’t loosen his grip, she went for his instep, shifting her weight and stomping down hard.
“Stop,” he hissed in her ear. “It’s Dallas, and there’s some guy with a gun wandering around out here. You want him to hear us?”
She shook her head, and his hand slipped from her mouth.
“Are you hurt?” she whispered, trying to turn, but his arm was still locked around her, and she couldn’t move.
“Quiet,” he said, his lips nearly touching her ear, his warm breath tickling the hair near her temple. She could feel the heat of his body through her vest and T-shirt, the strength of his muscles against her arms and abdomen. It had been a long time since she’d been physically close to a man, and if his grip hadn’t been viselike, she’d have jerked away immediately.
“He’s gone,” Dallas finally said, releasing his hold and stepping away from her.
“Who?” she asked, turning so they were facing each other. He was taller than she’d thought. Much taller than Josh had been. Probably six-two or -three.
“You tell me,” he responded, his eyes an odd green-blue that seemed to glow in the dim morning light.
“How would I know?” she asked.
“You said you needed my help, Carly. Two minutes later some guy I’ve never seen before took a potshot at me. You knowing something about him seems like a logical conclusion.”
She couldn’t deny it, and she couldn’t waste time discussing it. “I need to go.”
“So you said, but here you are, still hanging around in the park.”
“I was looking for you. I thought you were hurt, and I was worried that...”
“What?”
“That you’d been shot and it was my fault,” she admitted.
“Why would it be your fault?” he asked, circling the conversation back around to get the information he wanted. But she didn’t know who the guy with the gun was. If she did, she’d have gone to the police long ago.
“It’s a long story. I don’t have time to tell it. I left you a note. Read it. Decide what you want to do about it, if you want to do anything, but right now I have to get to my son.”
“Your son?” he asked, and she heard the hidden question, the words he didn’t say.
“Mine and Josh’s.”
His face went blank, every bit of anger and annoyance seeping from his eyes.
He hadn’t known.
Of course he hadn’t. Just like with everything else, Josh had lied about telling his brother about the baby.
“He said he told you,” she said into the awkward silence, and his jaw tightened.
“Josh said a lot of things that weren’t true.”
“I know.”
“So maybe you could have made sure his family knew about the baby instead of believing him.” He started walking away, and she should have done the same, but she felt the desperate need to make him understand, because she needed his help. She needed it more than she’d ever needed just about anything else.
“I didn’t have contact information for your parents, and I only found contact information for you after Josh died.”
He just kept walking.
“I sent you a note when he passed away. You sent a signed card with no indication that you wanted anything to do with me.”
He stopped short. “I know what I sent. I figured you were like every other woman he’d ever dated.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing anymore. He’s gone. You’re here, and you’re telling me I have a nephew. You’re also telling me you need help, but you’re not saying anything about what kind of help.”
“I...can’t. Not here.”
“Then I can’t help you.”
He was walking again, and she was just standing there watching him go, because she couldn’t tell him what was going on, how much was at stake, how scared she was. The words were stuck in her throat, the threats she’d been hearing for two months echoing through her mind.
“Dallas,” she said, her voice raspy and harsh.
“What?”
She might have answered—she might have told him everything—but her phone buzzed, and she glanced at the caller ID, sure it was Jazz asking why she was out running in twenty-degree weather.
Only it wasn’t Jazz.
It was him.
Unknown caller. Texting words that made her breath catch, her heart stop.
I hope you kissed your son goodbye last night.
Her breath caught, the veiled threat filling her with terror. She hadn’t shared anything with Jazz, hadn’t even hinted at the trouble she was in. Jazz wouldn’t be on guard, because she wouldn’t be expecting trouble. Fingers shaking, she texted her friend, telling her to keep Zane inside until she got home. She’d explain when she got there.
She didn’t wait for a response. She didn’t bother explaining to Dallas. She needed to get home to her son before it was too late.
* * *
Dallas needed to talk to the police. He’d discharged his weapon, and he’d obviously hit the perp. He’d seen the blood, but the guy had moved fast, running between houses and preventing Dallas from getting another clear shot. He hadn’t wanted to risk a bullet going through an exterior wall and injuring someone. He’d sprinted after the guy instead, his bum knee keeping him from going full-out. He’d turned around at the path, worried about Carly, concerned that she might be heading straight toward the perp. And, of course, she had been.
And now she was on the move again, sprinting along the path, her long-legged stride even and practiced. She was a runner for sure, an athlete. Young. Pretty.
A mother. And Dallas was an uncle.
If what she’d said was true. He didn’t know her, hadn’t been invited to the wedding, hadn’t received anything but a cursory email from Josh that said he’d been married. By the time he’d received Carly’s note about Josh’s death, it had been too late to attend the funeral. Even if it hadn’t been, Dallas had been in no shape to travel. He’d been in the hospital recovering from the car accident that had taken the lives of Lila and the twins. He’d spent three weeks there, the burns on his arms and chest healing a lot more quickly than his heartache ever would.
Josh’s death had been a tiny pinprick of pain compared to the agony of losing his wife and unborn children.
He shook the thought away, concentrating on the run and on keeping his gait even. Carly was sprinting west along a dirt trail that wound its way to one of several parking lots, running like her life depended on it. If he hadn’t been so much taller than her, he and his bum knee might have had trouble catching up. As it was, he caught up to her on the first hill, his knee twinging with pain as he matched her pace. His doctor wouldn’t be happy. His physical therapist would read him the riot act, but he wasn’t going to let Carly head off into the sunrise while an armed man wandered the park.
He grabbed her arm, pulling her to a stop.
“Let go,” she muttered, tugging away.
“Running isn’t going to solve your problems,” he said, and she swung around, her face white, eyes blazing. He’d been afraid she’d be crying, but she looked angry, her words hard and staccato.
“Neither is staying. Go back home, Dallas. I never should have tried to contact you.”
“You didn’t try. You did contact me.”
“It was a mistake.”
“Mistakes can’t be unmade,” he replied, and the muscles in her jaw tightened, her lips pressing together. “You came to me, Carly,” he continued. “So did some guy with a gun. I want to know who he is and what he wants.”
“I told you—”
“Nothing. Except that you left me a note. And that I have a nephew. Do you think I’m going to forget about him now that I know?”
“I think that you’re not going to believe he’s your nephew until I offer proof,” she countered, swinging around to run again.
“Josh didn’t want kids,” he responded, because it was true, and because he wanted to push a little harder, force her to give him the information he needed.
Behind them, the woods were filling with voices as the police hunted for the person who’d left the blood trail. He’d need to check in with them. If he didn’t, his boss, Chance Miller, would want to know why he hadn’t. As a member of the hostage-rescue team, Dallas had an obligation to follow protocol. Even when he wasn’t on duty.
“Sometimes we don’t get what we want,” Carly panted. “Sometimes we get what we don’t want. Zane is Josh’s son. He’s your nephew. And he needs me. I have to go home.”
“You left him alone?”
“Of course not! He’s only six!”
“There are plenty of people who leave kids younger than that at home alone.”
“I’m not one of them. He’s with my friend, and... I’m worried.” They’d reached the end of the dirt path and pounded onto a paved one, their steps in sync, their breathing almost synchronized, her gasping breaths matching his steadier ones almost perfectly.
She was obviously a long-distance runner, but he doubted she was a sprinter. She was slowing, the speed zapping her energy. He slowed with her, his body humming with adrenaline as he scanned the woods to either side, looking for a glint of metal, a subtle movement. The perp would be a fool to stick around when the police were so close, but people were often willing to be fools if the cause was important enough, what they stood to gain big enough.
“You’re worried about the guy with the gun,” he said.
She nodded but didn’t speak, every bit of her energy pouring into muscles that he could see trembling.
She was done, but she’d keep going. Whatever was driving her—her son, her fear, her need to escape Dallas—forced her to continue. He grabbed her arm again. Gently, because his adoptive father, Timothy Morgan, had taught him how real men were supposed to treat women. It had taken him a couple of years to learn the lesson, to understand that true strength lay in gentleness, calmness, kindness. Once he’d learned it, he hadn’t forgotten. Sometimes, though...sometimes he reverted to the troubled inner-city kid who’d walked into the Morgans’ suburban home carrying nothing but a plastic bag filled with old clothes.
She jerked away, stumbling as she accidentally stepped off the pavement and onto icy grass.
“Stop,” he said as gently as he’d grabbed her arm. His work gave him plenty of practice calming frantic people. He’d dealt with parents who’d lost kids, spouses who’d lost partners, people desperate to find friends, neighbors, lovers. He knew how to keep his voice steady and his approach soft.
“I can’t,” she said, her voice breaking. There were no tears in her eyes or on her cheeks, but she was on the verge of losing it.
“Eventually, you’ll have to.”
“Not until I’m home.”
“What’s your address?” he asked, studying her face, trying to find some hint of who she was, what she really wanted. All he saw was a woman who shouldn’t have been his brother’s widow. She was too young, too tired, too skinny. Too desperate. Josh’s widow should have been full figured, smiling, made-up and fake. She wouldn’t have had a care in the world, and she sure as anything wouldn’t have had a son.
“I told you, I made a mistake contacting you,” she panted.
“I’m sure you remember my response.”
“I don’t have time to play games, Dallas.”
“Neither do I. You said you needed my help. I plan to give it.”
She shrugged, rattling off an address in DC. He knew the neighborhood. It was part of a revitalization project designed to beautify the city. Not far from HEART, and filled with young professionals who loved the hustle and bustle of city life, young families who enjoyed the community vibe, older men and women who were on their own and loving it. It was the kind of neighborhood he and Lila had planned to live in until they’d found out she was pregnant. Then they’d chosen a cute house in the suburbs halfway between his parents and hers. They’d decorated the nursery yellow because Lila hadn’t wanted to know the gender of the babies. He tried not to think about that or about the way she’d looked when she’d picked him up from the airport that last night—her belly softly rounded and pressing against the pink sweater she wore. She’d been six months pregnant and glowing with it. He’d told her that she’d never looked more beautiful.
He released Carly’s arm, pulled out his cell phone and sent a text to his boss, shoving aside all the old memories and focusing on the present. That was how he’d survived the first year, and it was how he continued to survive.
