For Love of Money (30 page)

Chapter Forty-nine

“Tim.” Holly backed away from the Tahoe. “You’re talking about
murder
. The premeditated kind.”

“You don’t give me much choice.”

The man was as nuts as his wife. “Of course you have a choice. Do it and you’ll fry.” She sprinted toward the road.

Tim lunged and caught her wrist. He dragged her backward, then shoved.

She skidded across the dirt driveway, adding a new layer of scrapes and bruises. She sprawled on the ground beside the SUV, directly in Nicole’s line of sight.

Oh, crap
.

Nicole pointed, yelled, and a bullet pinged off the Tahoe’s fender.

Holly scrambled to her feet and dove back behind the metal barrier.

“You’re divorcing me?” Nicole yelled, redirecting her rage at Tim.

The rhythmic thump Holly had noticed earlier grew louder, and a helicopter buzzed over the tree line. An amplified voice called, “This is the police. Drop your weapon.”

That command only works on sane people,
competed with,
Thank you, God
.

Her relief was short-lived. Tim shoved her again. She grabbed the fender and hung on.

“Let go.” He jerked at her arms.

Hell
no. She kicked him, but her sneakers didn’t make a dent in his determination. His fingers tightened around her wrist and wrestled her injured hand from the fender. She shrieked in pain and slammed her shoe into his groin.

He yelped and staggered back, hunched around his pain. “Goddamn you.”

The chopper swooped lower, raising a cloud of dirt and fine pebbles. A man shouted through the loudspeaker. “Drop it
now
!”

“You
bastard
.” Nicole’s shrill voice cut through the bedlam.

Tim halted warily, one hand still clutching the family jewels.

“She’s yelling at
you
, asshole,” Holly said. “Maybe you should rethink your throw-me-to-the-wolves plan.”

“Me?” His head turned toward Nicole. “Why’s she yelling at me?”

“You’d leave me for that
whore
?” Nicole was already halfway across the clearing. She squeezed off another round. More parts of the Tahoe shattered.

Tim dropped to the ground beside Holly.

“Do something! Say something,” she urged.

Tim looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Finally, he rose to his knees and peeked through the mangled rear window at his wife. “Honey?”

“Why?” Nicole stood less than ten feet away. Tears streamed down her face.

The plaintive question tore at Holly’s heart, but she wasn’t waiting around for the next act. She took a step toward the orchard but Tim whipped out a hand and grabbed her. He locked an arm around her waist.

“We had a good life—a perfect life. I made it perfect for you.” Anguish twisted Nicole’s features.

Tim dragged Holly back to the car and held her clamped against his chest, a human shield. “Sweetheart, I know that.”

“You coward.” Holly writhed in his grip, a helpless hostage. “Be a man for once in your life.”

The cops in the helicopter were still yelling over the loudspeaker, but no one paid any attention to them.

Tim’s wife advanced on him. Judging from the expression on Nicole’s face, Holly didn’t even exist anymore.

Tim had her arms pinned. She stomped on his foot again, but her sneakers didn’t stand a chance against his work boots. In desperation, she tucked her chin and slammed her head backward into his face.

“God
dammit
.”

She heard his roar through a haze of stars and pain. He clamped down on her body until she could barely breathe.

Nicole braced a hand against the Tahoe’s hood, the pistol pointing at Tim. The only problem with that arrangement was Holly was in front of him, right in the line of fire.

The helicopter changed position and hovered behind Tim and her. “Drop your weapon
now
,” a male voice thundered.

Like that worked the first time?

A rifle blast split the air.

Holly screamed. Tim dodged away from the flying bullets, dragging her down with him. When she opened her eyes, Nicole no longer stood on the other side of the car.

“Nicole.” Tim threw Holly aside and raced around the Tahoe.

Holly took off in the other direction, toward the police cars that were barreling down the dirt road.

…

Cops were everywhere.

Uniformed police spread out, swarming the grounds. Several disappeared inside the farm building, while others examined a damaged white truck. Two officers deposited a handcuffed Tim into the back seat of a cruiser. Another group surrounded Nicole. Her plaintive calls for Tim rose above the noise of auto engines, men’s voices, and helicopter blades.

Holly turned, trying to see everything at once.
Where was he?
He’d said he was coming.

Strong hands grabbed her by the shoulders and whirled her around. JC stood face to face with her. Relief surged through her entire body. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“About time you got here.” Her voice quavered too much for the words to pack much punch.

He shook her. “I don’t know whether to throttle you or…or…”

“Getting shot at by the crazy lady wasn’t my idea.” She reached out, curling her fingers to clutch his jacket, wanting very badly to reach under it, to feel his flesh, warm and alive and real against her own. But anything more would probably embarrass him and make her feel like a fool and—

His arms closed around her and he pulled her close. “You scared the crap out of me,” he whispered into her hair. “All I wanted was to know you were safe.”

“Safe? Is that all?”

“Jesus, Holly. I don’t want to think about a world without you in it.”

Much better
. She slid her arms around his waist and rested her head on his shoulder. He didn’t seem to mind in the least. Instead, his arms tightened and she felt…protected.

And cherished.

A few synapses fired in her brain. Hope poked up its inquisitive head and announced,
This is the behavior of a man worried about his woman
.

For the first time,
his woman
had a nice ring to it. She raised her head and studied his expression. It had moved past furious to something that sped up her heart rate.

“When I realized what was going on in that car—ah, hell.” He brought his mouth down on hers in a crushing kiss. Neither cared that a dozen uniformed officers stood and watched them.

A long time later he came up for air. “Don’t you ever, ever, do that to me again.” He punctuated his words with gentle shakes.

“I promise to never again go joyriding with the psycho wife of a sleazeball client.”

His eyebrows clashed. “Holly.”

Arms wrapped around his waist, she smiled at him until at least part of the tension left his body. “We need some new rules in this relationship. But don’t think you can decide all of them.”

A slow smile turned up the corners of his mouth. “How about in our vows we make it fifty-fifty?”

Vows?
Her mouth fell open but no words emerged. She swallowed and tried again. “How about we start with dating?”

Both dimples appeared. “As a negotiator, you should know to go for the moon with your first position.” He dropped a kiss on her lips. “You just have to know what you
really
want. And how to ask for it.”

She smiled back, seeing the moon and the stars in his eyes. Oh, yeah. First position sounded good.

For starters
.

Her phone rang.

Her gaze moved from his face to her jacket pocket. “
Now
it works?”

The Bluetooth device was somewhere in the orchard. She pulled out the phone and clicked it on. “Your maternal instinct’s working sorta slow this morning,” she told her mother.

“What are you talking about? I thought you were meeting me at the office.”

She glanced over at JC and smiled wider, thinking of all the negotiating positions she wanted to try out with him. “Yeah, about that. I may be a little late.”

Acknowledgments

This book wouldn’t be finished if not for my friend, critique partner and fellow author, Renee Rearden. Thanks for keeping my characters true. A special thanks to my wonderful editor, Nina Bruhns, and the entire team at Entangled Publishing for making it possible to share Holly and JC’s story with readers.

About the Author

Cathy Perkins’s award-winning suspense writing lurks behind a financial day job, where she learned firsthand the camouflaged, hide-in-plain-sight skills employed by her villains. She lives in the Pacific Northwest, the setting of FOR LOVE OR MONEY, with her workaholic husband, several dogs, and the resident deer herd. You can learn more on her website
http://cperkinswrites.com

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