Chapter Seven
Two SUVs arrived just after sunset, their headlights cutting through the pine trees as they pulled up to the cabin. Holly watched from the window as three people emerged, moving with the same lethal efficiency Jonah possessed.
"That's Vincent and Ellen," Jonah said, coming to stand beside her. "And the one checking the perimeter is Blake. They're good."
"You trust them?"
"With my life. With yours."
The team came inside with tactical bags and enough weaponry to supply a small army.
Vincent was tall and lean with dark skin and an easy smile that didn't match the coldness in his eyes.
Ellen was compact and fierce, her black hair pulled back in a tight bun.
Blake looked like he could break someone in half without breaking a sweat.
"So you're the woman who got Jonah to quit," Vincent said, extending his hand to Holly.
Holly shook his hand, feeling the calluses that matched Jonah's. "I didn't ask him to quit."
"No, but you gave him a reason to." Vincent's smile was genuine this time. "First time I've seen him choose himself instead of just following orders."
"Vincent," Jonah's voice held a warning.
"What? I'm complimenting your taste." Vincent turned back to Holly. "We're going to secure the perimeter and set up motion sensors. You just stay inside and let us do our job."
They spent the next hour transforming the cabin into a fortress. Holly tried to stay out of the way, feeling useless as they checked sight lines and established defensive positions. She was an artist. She painted abstracts and sold them to art lovers. She had no skills that mattered here.
Jonah found her in the kitchen, staring at her hands. Paint-stained fingers that had never held a weapon, never knew how to fight, never learned how to be anything but a liability.
"Hey," he said, his voice gentle. "You okay?"
"I'm dead weight. Everyone here knows what to do except me."
Jonah stepped closer, his hands framing her face. "You staying alive is the only job you have right now. Let us handle the rest."
"I hate this. Hiding while other people fight for me."
"I know." He pressed his forehead to hers. "But that's not weakness. That's survival. And right now, that's enough."
Holly wanted to argue, but the exhaustion hit her all at once. Three days of isolation followed by her father's confrontation, and now armed guards in her temporary home. She was so tired of being afraid.
"Come here," Jonah murmured, pulling her against his chest.
She went, letting herself take comfort in his solid presence. His heart beat steady under her ear, and for a moment she could pretend they were normal people having a normal relationship instead of two people trapped in a nightmare.
***
THE MOTION SENSORS went off at two in the morning.
Holly jerked awake to the sound of Jonah's voice, clipped and commanding as he spoke into his radio. He was already dressed, already armed, already moving toward the door.
"Get to safe room,” he said, his gaze locking on hers. "Don't come out until I come get you."
"Jonah—"
"Promise me."
Holly swallowed her protests. "I promise."
He kissed her, hard and fast, then disappeared into the hallway. Ellen appeared a moment later, her expression grim.
"Let's go."
The safe room was a reinforced closet in the back bedroom, windowless and fortified with a heavy door. Ellen showed Holly how to lock it from the inside, handed her a phone with a single emergency number programmed in, then left.
The lock clicked into place, and Holly was alone in the dark.
She could hear sounds through the walls. Muffled voices. Footsteps. Then the sharp crack of gunfire that made her flinch so hard she hit her head on the wall behind her.
More gunfire. Sustained bursts that seemed to go on forever. Holly pressed her hands over her ears but it didn't help. She could still hear it, could still imagine Jonah out there, could still picture him bleeding or dying or—
The gunfire stopped.
The silence was worse.
Holly counted her breaths. One. Two. Three. Tried to focus on anything except the scenarios running through her mind. Jonah was alive. He had to be alive. He'd promised to come get her.
Minutes crawled by like hours.
Then she heard footsteps approaching. Heavy boots on hardwood. Coming closer.
The doorknob rattled.
"Holly?" A man's voice. Not Jonah. Russian accent. "I know you're in there. Why don't you come out and we can talk?"
How had he gotten past Jonah? Past the others?
"Your boyfriend is dead." The voice was casual, almost friendly. "Along with his friends. You're alone now. But if you come out, I promise we'll make it quick. Better than starving to death in a closet, yes?"
Holly's hand shook as she reached for the phone Ellen had given her. Her fingers were numb, clumsy. She managed to unlock it, pull up the emergency number.
The door shuddered as something heavy hit it. Once. Twice.
Holly pressed dial.
"Breaking down this door will take time," the voice continued. "But I have time. And when I get through, I'm going to hurt you before I kill you. Unless you open it now."
Another blow to the door. The frame cracked but held.
The phone rang once. Twice. Pick up. Pick up pick up—
The door exploded inward in a shower of splintered wood.
Holly screamed.
A man filled the doorway, backlit by the hallway light. Tall, broad, holding a gun. He smiled at her.
Then Jonah appeared behind him, moving like death itself.
What happened next took seconds, but it felt like it was happening in slow motion. Jonah's arm around the man's throat. The gun falling from nerveless fingers. The Russian's face going red, then purple. The wet crack as his neck broke.
The body hit the floor and didn't move.
Jonah stepped over it and into the safe room. Blood spattered his face and shirt, but he seemed uninjured. His gaze raked over Holly, checking for wounds.
"Are you hurt?"
Holly shook her head. She tried to speak but no words came out.
"Come on. We need to move."
He held out his hand. Holly took it, let him pull her to her feet. Her legs were like jelly, but she forced them to work. Jonah kept himself between her and the body as they left the room.
The cabin looked like a war zone. Bullet holes in the walls. Broken glass. Dark stains on the floor that Holly tried not to look at too closely. Vincent was binding a wound on Ellen's arm. Blake was on his phone, speaking in terse sentences.
"Three attackers dead, one captured and restrained," Blake said as they entered. "The local police are ten minutes out."
"We need to be gone before they get here," Jonah said. "The Popovs will have people in the department. We get processed, we're sitting ducks."
"What about Vincent?" Ellen's face was pale beneath her tan.
"The field dressing is good enough for now." Jonah's voice was flat, emotionless. "Grab essentials only. Five minutes."
Everyone moved at once. Holly stood frozen in the middle of the chaos, her mind struggling to process what had just happened. Someone had tried to kill her. Multiple someones. Jonah had killed a man right in front of her. Had broken his neck with his bare hands like it was nothing.
"Holly." Jonah was back, a duffel bag in one hand. "I need you to pack."
She nodded mutely and went to the bedroom. Her clothes were scattered across the floor, mixed with Jonah's. She grabbed what she could, shoving it into a bag without thought or organization. Her hands were shaking so badly she could barely work the zipper.
When she came back out, Vincent was waiting by the door, his weapon drawn. Blake was dragging an unconscious man out of the house.
“What’s going on?”
“Blake is going to question our friend before turning him over to the police.”
They piled into two SUVs, engines already running. Jonah drove. He looked hard and focused. Holly sat in the passenger seat, her bag clutched in her lap like a shield.
As they pulled away from the cabin, she looked back. In the darkness, she could see shapes sprawled in the driveway. Bodies. People who had come to kill her and had died instead.
She turned forward and didn't look back again.
They drove for two hours, taking back roads and changing direction multiple times. Holly didn't ask where they were going. She just stared at the trees blurring past her window and tried not to think about the sound of that man's neck breaking.
Eventually, they pulled into a cheap motel on the outskirts of a town Holly didn't recognize. Vincent went in to secure the rooms. When he came back he and Ellen took one room. Blake stayed in the vehicle with their prisoner. Jonah led Holly to a room at the far end of the building.
The door closed behind them, and the silence was crushing.
Holly set her bag down. Turned to face Jonah. He was cleaning his weapon with mechanical movements, his face blank.
"Jonah."
He didn't look up.
"Jonah, look at me."
He did, finally, and the emptiness in his gaze made her chest ache.
"Are you okay?" she asked, even though it was a stupid question.
"I'm fine."
"You killed someone tonight."
"Three someones." His tone was flat. "And I'd do it again. They came to kill you. I won't apologize for stopping them."
"I'm not asking you to apologize." Holly moved closer. "I'm asking if you're okay."
"No. I'm not okay. Someone on my team is injured because of me. Because I put personal feelings ahead of—"
"Don't." Holly's voice was sharp. "Don't you dare blame yourself for this. You didn't attack us. They did."
"I should have moved us as soon as your father left.”
"You're not God. You can't anticipate everything." She reached for him, her hands on his face, forcing him to focus on her. "You saved my life tonight. Again. You don't get to feel guilty about that."
He pulled her against him, his grip almost painful, his face buried in her hair. Holly held him back, feeling the tremors running through his body.
"I thought I was too late," he said into her neck. "When I heard you scream, I thought—"