Chapter 17
The person pursuing her had been so close that for a second Lakin had felt his breath on the back of her neck, his hand reaching for her hair.
She’d screamed and ran harder, faster, more desperately because she hadn’t thought anyone would hear her scream any more than they’d heard the blare of her vehicle alarm.
But then Troy had called out to her. She should have been relieved, but now she was afraid for both of them.
Instead of calling back with the man so close to her, she’d ducked under some low-hanging pine boughs. She held her breath, terrified.
Until she heard the gunshots.
She screamed Troy’s name. But the shots weren’t as close as she expected. Had the man turned around and gone back toward the office? Or had he gone after Troy instead?
Like the white knight he’d always been for her, Troy had rushed to her rescue, putting his own life in danger.
She didn’t know what to do. If she ran from her hiding place, she could get shot, too. And then she wouldn’t be able to help Troy. If she turned on her phone, the light or the sound of it could give away her location. But she had to get help.
Pulling her RTA shirt out of her waistband, she concealed her phone inside it, then texted an SOS to her sibling/cousin group chat. Her fingers were trembling so badly that all she managed was in fact SOS. She couldn’t text that she was afraid Troy was hurt.
That he might have been shot…
She didn’t even want to think it, as if putting her fear into words would somehow make it come true.
Tears burned her eyes, and so many regrets rushed through her.
She’d been so frustrated with him since he’d come back, so disappointed with his stubbornness.
She’d wasted so much time being angry when she could have been with him like she’d been last night.
Like she wanted to be now, wrapped up in his strong arms, feeling his heart beating against hers.
Was his heart still beating? Was Troy alive?
Or had one of those gunshots stopped his heart? If it had, Lakin suspected hers would stop, too.
* * *
The SOS scared the crap out of Kansas. It wasn’t like Lakin to ask for help ever.
Not even back when she was being bullied in school.
She’d just ignored the bullies until one of her brothers or Kansas or the Amoses had put a stop to it.
Of all of them, Troy had been the most effective at ending the bullying.
Where was he that Lakin had sent out an SOS? He was back from the oil rigs, so he should have been where he usually was when he was in Shelby, at Lakin’s side.
“Can’t you drive any faster?” she asked Eli, even though he probably already had the accelerator pressed to the floorboards of his ABI SUV.
He didn’t even spare her a glance. Was he mad at her? If she hadn’t talked him into the trip to the lab, he would have been here with Lakin, protecting her from whatever compelled her to send that SOS text.
“Scott really thought he might be able to get something off the photograph,” she said. “And if this Whitlaw guy is the Fiancée Killer…” He was even more dangerous than they’d thought.
And he was out there, somewhere in Shelby, stalking Lakin.
Kansas swore, then added, “I’m really sorry.”
Eli still didn’t say anything, but a muscle twitched in his cheek from how tightly he’d clenched his jaw. And Kansas knew if something happened to Lakin, Eli wasn’t going to forgive her any more than she was going to forgive herself.
As they neared RTA, other sirens blared and lights flashed.
Kansas had called the local police, knowing that they would reach the location given for Lakin’s cell sooner than she and Eli would.
But it wasn’t just the local police already on the scene, an ambulance was as well.
Had someone been hurt? Kansas prayed that it wasn’t Lakin.
But if not her, who? So much of their family worked at RTA.
Even her dad and her uncle stopped by frequently despite having “retired” from the adventure business they’d started when they first moved to Shelby.
When they’d fled from family tragedy to start over.
But had family tragedy found them again?
* * *
Troy flinched as the EMT pressed something against the stinging skin on his cheek. He wasn’t sure if a bullet had grazed his face or one of the tree branches he’d jumped into for cover. But he didn’t care about himself.
“Are you really all right?” he asked Lakin again. He tried to see her around the paramedic treating Troy in the back of the ambulance.
Once the emergency vehicles had pulled into the parking lot of RTA, the shooting had stopped, and Troy wasn’t the only one who’d rushed out of a hiding place. Fortunately Lakin had been hiding, too.
“Like I already told you, I’m fine,” she said. “He never took any shots at me. I didn’t even know he had a gun until I heard the shooting start.”
“Who was it?” Kansas asked just as Bobby Reynolds opened his mouth. Probably to ask the same thing. Clearly Lakin’s cousin and brother weren’t willing to leave this investigation in the officer’s hands.
Lakin shook her head. “I never saw more than a shadow. He was standing by my SUV when I clicked my key fob to unlock it. Then I set off the alarm.”
“That was smart,” Kansas said.
“But then I couldn’t see anything with the lights flashing,” Lakin said.
“You couldn’t tell if it was Jasper Whitlaw?” Eli asked, appearing beside Kansas.
“Where were you?” Troy asked the ABI lieutenant. “I wouldn’t have left her if you hadn’t said you were meeting her at the office.”
“That was my fault,” Kansas said. “I thought one of our techs could get DNA off that photograph, but he wasn’t able to after all.”
“So he couldn’t get any DNA to see if it matches…” Lakin said, her voice soft with obvious disappointment.
“He’s not your father,” Eli said.
She nodded. “I know that Dad is—”
“That’s not what I meant,” Eli interrupted her. “He can’t be your biological father because he was in prison for assault. He was serving a two-year sentence during the time you would have been conceived and born.”
“He’s been in prison,” Troy said, his gut churning with fear for Lakin. Just as he’d suspected, the man was dangerous as well as a liar.
Eli nodded. “More than once. He’s been in and out a lot for assault. And he just got out recently.”
“And came looking for me,” Lakin remarked. “Why? Since I’m not his daughter, what does he want?”
“I don’t know,” Eli said.
Troy had an idea. Money. But when he’d mentioned that before, Lakin had gotten upset with him. And he didn’t want her to be upset with him again, especially not when they’d come so close to losing their lives.
“What are you going to do to keep her safe is the real question,” Troy said.
“We don’t know that the person who shot at you is Jasper Whitlaw,” Eli pointed out.
Troy had given the lieutenant some other potential suspects. But he couldn’t see Billy Hoover waiting all these years before trying to take him out. Unless he was so damn drunk he wasn’t thinking straight. And Seller…
Did a guy as rich as that do his own dirty work? And why would he go after Troy anyway? Why would anyone? Unless it was just because he was in their way, standing between them and Lakin.
Harrison’s threat rang in his ears again, about losing more than his job if he went through with the lawsuit. Had he been talking about Troy’s life?
But the shooter had been waiting in the parking lot for Lakin, trying to get her alone. Well, if anyone knew Troy at all, they would know that it would hurt him more if Lakin was hurt. Hell, it would destroy him.
“We have to make sure Lakin is safe,” Troy said.
“You’re the one who nearly got shot,” Lakin pointed out. “You need protection, too.”
He needed her. He needed to close his arms around her and never let her go. But he wasn’t sure that would keep either of them safe.
“We’ll keep an officer in the area,” Reynolds said.
“We’ll be close, too,” Eli said, gesturing toward him and Kansas.
Reynolds nodded. He probably knew better than to argue with a Colton. When one of them was in danger, they were going to rally around their loved one.
Troy was counting on that. He wasn’t doing a very damn good job on his own keeping Lakin safe. But he definitely wasn’t going to leave her side from now on, either.
He told her as much when they were finally escorted safely inside her cabin.
Instead of the pushback he expected, she linked her arms around his neck and hugged him. Then she pulled back and touched his face below the bandage on his cheek.
“Never leaving my side isn’t safe or practical,” she said. “You could have been killed tonight.”
“And here everybody has been worrying about me working on the oil rigs,” he said. “I’ve been in more danger since coming back to Shelby.”
“But all you have so far is a scratch,” she said. “You were hospitalized from working on the oil rig.”
Hospitalized and paralyzed. The fear of feeling that helpless ever again never left him. Though he’d nearly felt that helpless tonight when he hadn’t known where she was or if she was safe.
“I was so worried about you,” he admitted. “When I saw the alarm going off on your vehicle and then I heard you scream…” He shuddered as he relived those moments.
She hugged him again. “I’m safe, Troy.”
For now. “I’m going to do everything I can to make sure you stay that way,” he assured her.
“So now you’re my bodyguard?”
He nodded. “Until you’re no longer in danger.”
“We’re safe here,” she said. “You know there are officers and troopers outside watching the cabin.”
Troy stepped back. “So you don’t want me close?”
“I want you even closer,” she said with a smile. She entwined her fingers with his and tugged him through the open bedroom door.
His pulse quickened almost to the speed it had been when he’d heard her scream. He’d been so afraid that he’d lost her. But she was here, with him. Safe.
But he was still so afraid he was going to lose her. Maybe not to a killer, but to his own stubbornness. “I love you, Lakin,” he said.
And he waited for her to say it again. But she kissed him instead, her mouth moving over his. As she kissed him, she undressed him.
Once he was naked, she dropped to her knees and closed her lips around his shaft. He groaned, and she lifted her head. “Are you all right?”
“No,” he said.
“Where are you hurt?”
“I ache,” he said.
She jumped up from the floor. “Do I need to call the paramedics back?”
He shook his head. “You’re the only one who can relieve this pain,” he said.
“Oh…” She smiled as she realized what he was saying.
“I need you so badly.” His entire body was filled with a tension only she could relieve. But he didn’t want her to do it with her mouth. He wanted to be inside her, part of her.
He undressed her, baring every silky inch of her skin for his touch and his taste. He ran his lips and his tongue over her breasts and then lower.
Her knees buckled, and she dropped back onto the bed, pulling him down with her. He rolled over so that he wouldn’t crush her, but Lakin wasn’t small or delicate. She was strong, and she pushed him onto his back and straddled him. Then she guided his cock inside her, and it was like coming home.
She moaned and bit her lip. Then she began to move with frantic urgency, as if she was as desperate for release as he was. He reached up and cupped her breasts in his hands.
She leaned down, her dark hair falling like a curtain around them as she kissed him. Their mouths mated like their bodies.
He stroked his thumbs over her nipples. She moaned again and moved faster, rocking back and forth, sliding up and down, driving him out of his mind. Then she came, her inner muscles convulsing around him, squeezing his cock.
She screamed his name. His body tensed, and finally his release came. He thrust his hips up, filling her as she filled his heart with the love he felt for her.
He didn’t dare express it again, afraid that she wouldn’t say it back.
That she couldn’t. Maybe she didn’t love him anymore, or at least not like she once had when she could see a future for them.
Their business, a family… All the dreams she’d had for their life together…
He’d taken them away from her with his unwillingness to commit.
And tonight someone else had nearly taken his life. Had the shooter been after him or her?
He must have tensed up again because she wrapped her arms around him and murmured, “Go to sleep. We’re safe here.”
He was worried they wouldn’t be safe anywhere from whoever was after them. Was it Jasper Whitlaw? Someone else? Someone who might be even more dangerous, like the Fiancée Killer?