Hard to Hold (19 page)

He straightened. Anna’s panic kicked in. She wrestled and flailed. Twisted, kicked,
tried to head butt. His eardrums bent under her yells, his eyes watered at her language.
He wrapped one arm around her and glued her to him while dropping the aid over her
head. The rip cord released in the struggle, the jacket inflated with a whoosh. He
took advantage of her momentary stun to fasten the trailing canvas ribbons tight around
her waist, triple knotting them to make certain they’d hold her fast.

“Now, carry her out on deck,” ordered Antila, waving his gun at him.

Utterly silent, Anna lifted her head, her eyes wide with horror. Wide in disbelief.
And he watched something inside her die. He knew the black mark it stamped on his
soul would never heal.

The rain drilled needles into his back. Th
e wind slapped his cheeks. Anna’s arms, tight around his neck, half-strangled him.
“The team will pick you up, baby. You won’t be in there for long. Stay strong. Kick.
Use your arms. Get away from the boat. As far as you can.”

Mutely, she clung. Her legs gripped around his waist. Her arms anchored around his
neck. “Please, baby. Let me go.” He thought he’d have to get rough with her. She spared
him that. She gave up. Slumped in his arms.

The force of the explosion behind him drove his hips hard into the deck railing. A
fireball sped toward him.

Lifting his arms, he dropped Anna over the side.

He’d promised Antila she’d scream. She didn’t.

Chapter Seventeen

Wrist deep in the soil of a flower bed, Anna smiled at her daughter kicking contentedly
in a Moses basket on the lawn beside her. Things hadn’t been easy—forsaking
her past,
Hinterland Heroes
, her friends—but being submerged deep within the witness protection program had kept
Elle safe. That’s all that mattered.

For all the many regrets she carried, Elle wasn’t one of them. Her daughter reminded
her she still lived where the throb of her pulse and the quiet beat of her heart didn’t.
To almost everyone who’d known her, she was dead. Tragically drowned in a pleasure-boat
accident.

She and Elle were moved regularly, every four weeks or so, always without warning.
But, at least, they’d gotten to stay in the UK. She’d fought for that. And she’d grown
used to the stream of changing names. She still hated the loss of identity though.
Hated not being allowed to leave a smudge that she even existed. Hated the uncertainty
of what her gray, quiet future might hold.

The Commander had warned her she’d have to face three years or more of the nomadic
life, but that if she acquiesced to their rules, then one day she might be able to
put down roots. She wasn’t holding her breath on that score. Antila’s body had never
been recovered. Antoinette’s had. And the Borosky family grew strong on their anger.
So far, she’d done eleven months, two weeks, and three days. She’d given up counting
the hours. There didn’t seem much point.

Not with Nick dead.

She hadn’t gone to his funeral,
they
—the Service—hadn’t let her. She’d had to weep her good-byes and bury her heart with
him from afar. But, Christ, did she miss him. Every goddamn moment of every goddamn
day. A private pain she kept from everyone because she couldn’t tolerate the idea
that
they’d
fuss.

Crouching, damp grass stains scuffing her knees, she tore off the top of a packet
of seeds and poured the contents into her hand. Then, in an open-armed sweep, she
scattered them at random. Forget-me-nots. She wasn’t supposed to leave behind any
trace of her existence when they moved her on, but she didn’t think the Commander
would mind. What harm could a few seeds do? They’d either grow and flourish, or die,
depending on their fight for life. She’d performed the same ritual in every house
in which she and Elle had been billeted—an insignificant act of defiance that never
failed to give her a thrill.

She reached for a plant, upended it into her hand, and then placed the root ball firmly
into the hole she’d dug. She firmed down the soil around it. The earth felt cool against
her palms. She didn’t know what kind of plant it was, and she didn’t much care. All
she asked for at the garden centers she visited was for a plant that was resilient,
and once established, would run amok. Her little toast to Anna Key Marshall, the woman
she’d once been.

A shadow fell over her. Her hand slid swiftly beneath the cloth on the ground by her
side, her fingers immediately fastening round the grip of her Sig 126. The one Jack
Ballentyne had taught her to fire and that she always kept close. Day and night.

Just as quickly, a hand fastened round her wrist and the weapon disappeared. “No shooting
the good guys, Anna.”

The world skidded on its axis. Paralyzed, she fixated on a clod of earth a few feet
in front of her. She’d had these little trips into la-la land before and no longer
considered them alarming. Haunting her was probably Nick’s way of checking up on her.
“It’s currently Sarah, and last month it was Tess.” She desperately wanted to sound
matter-of-fact, but instead her voice was oddly ragged. Turning around wasn’t an option.
She was scared that if she did so, he’d disappear, fade away, like he always did in
her dreams. “God knows who I’ll be next month.”

“You’ll always be Anna to me. Anna Key Marshall, even if I’m forbidden from ever uttering
that name out loud again.”

“You’re dead, Nick. You can’t keep tormenting me like this. It’s not fair.”

“Good to know you still think of me now and again. And it’s Callum, Callum Norton
to be exact. I really hated being Noah. It didn’t seem right. You’re not the only
one who’s had to get used to switching identities, addresses, and friends,
Anna
.”

Goose bumps the size of the Andes erupted across the surface of her skin. No way would
a phantom’s breath be that warm against the nape of her neck. No way would it smell
just like Nick—all male with a hint of fired steel.

She turned and let her eyes drink him in. The months hadn’t changed him, though he
bore a few more little creases round his mouth. The goose bumps flattened beneath
the sudden heat washing over her. Bastard. While he’d found time to laugh, she’d cuddled
up to misery. But she had to admit, the new lines suited him. He’d even lost that
censorious frown she’d feared had taken up permanent residence. In fact, Nick almost
looked laid-back, in an I’m-trying-hard kind of way.

She reached out and poked him with a muddy forefinger, still not quite believing he
was real. “I…you…I don’t understand.”

“Every precaution had to be taken. I had to wait until it was safe.”

“Oh.” She nodded slowly. “I see.”

She barreled into him then, knocking him flat onto his back, her full weight pinning
his chest, her dirty hands grasping his shoulders. “You stupid bastard, I thought
you were dead.”

“Hey, and here I was envisaging a romantic reunion. All tears and kisses, sweet gratitude
and heartfelt relief. And what do I get? A whirling dervish spitting obscenities.
Thank God, you haven’t changed a bit. I’m sorry, Anna, I knew you were hurting, but
it was essential everyone believe we’d both perished that night…and I’d appreciate
it if you could move your knee a little to the right. I’ll need that part of my body
shortly. I hope.”

What she wanted was to shoot him, but he’d taken her gun. And she didn’t appreciate
the way he’d folded his arms around her. Or, the way he’d fixed one of his hands round
the nape of her neck, his thumb caressing the little dent at the base of her skull.
He knew full well the effect it had on her.

“Your heart feels like a little bird trapped in your chest, Anna? Am I making you
nervous? Or, should I put your sudden fluster down to something else?

She wriggled, desperate to increase the space between her pelvis and his telltale
protrusion pressing into it. She wasn’t flustered. Nothing flustered her. She was
a grown woman, for Christ’s sakes. So he had an erection. Deal with it. “What have
you done with my ex-husband? He doesn’t laugh, not that easily. Stop it.”

“No, I’ve only recently rediscovered the art, and I missed it.

She pinched him.

“Ouch! What the hell…?”

“Just double-checking to see if you’re real.”

He sobered. “I’m real. You wanted an ‘us.’ Well, you’ve got it.” He tightened his
hold on her, almost crushing her to his chest. “I had to do it. Throw you into the
sea. It was the only way I could think of to save you, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t
kill me to do it. Christ, I’m sorry. So sorry. Give me a second chance, baby. I need
an ‘us,’ too. I—”

She quickly placed a finger across his lips, then just as quickly, brushed at his
lips to dislodge the dirty smudge she’d left. “I survived. You survived. Elle survived.
That’s all that matters.”

“I love you, Anna Key Marshall. What the hell do you think the last eleven months,
two weeks, three days, and”—he glanced at his watch and grinned—“eight hours, and
twenty minutes have been all about? I’ve missed you. I don’t want to live without
you. I
can’t
live without you.”

Unlike her, Nick hadn’t thought it futile to count the hours, even the minutes. The
little bird he’d claimed had taken up residence in her chest took flight. She tightened
her arms unable to work out quite when they had mysteriously slid from pushing against
his chest to hugging him tight.

“There wasn’t a minute of any day that I didn’t itch to reach for the phone to let
you know I was alive,” he continued, pressing little kisses against her throat as
if to punctuate his words. “It was torture knowing you hurt. Agony knowing you thought
you were alone. But the risks were too great, and what’s a year when you’ve hopefully
got a whole lifetime to look forward to? Loving you was all that kept me from telling
the Commander what he could do with his rules and sage advice. In fact, I came close
to shooting him a time or a dozen.”

“You’re babbling, Nick. And you never babble. You’re always too certain.”

He gave a single thrust of his hips. “Yes, I am, but I’m burning up here.”

She bit her lip and tried to ignore his innuendo. “They wouldn’t let me attend your
funeral. I hated them for that.”

“Trying to deflect me isn’t going to work, Anna, and that was my fault. I wasn’t prepared
to risk a final good-bye from you. I was scared you’d move on.”

She pulled back, locking her elbows. “Well, that was bloody heartless.”

“Selfish, too, but I knew you were strong. I
should
be sorry, but I’m not. If you’d had the chance to say good-bye, you might have made
it permanent, and I refused to lose you again.”

“You never lost me, Nick, just…misplaced me for a while.”

She watched his smile unfurl slowly. “Thanks for not giving up on me, baby, well,
apart from the occasional wobble. You were right. Hope goes a long way. Now, you ready
to give me an answer yet—any room in your little family for me?”

She needed no reminder of what he’d put her through, and although her heart was singing
Alleluias, he deserved to pay. “I’m not at all sure. You’re kind of hard to live with.
Moody. Very controlling. Insufferably so.”

“Protective, too, and fiercely committed, which is what you and Elle need. I quit
the Service, but I’m
really good
with a gun. How’d you feel about a personal bodyguard? No thinking, just go with
your instincts.” He groaned and dropped his lips back to her neck. “Those are words
I never thought I’d say. God, help me.”

“I want more kids, lots of them.”

“Deal. And I can start straightaway in case you haven’t noticed.”

She wasn’t sure at what point he’d managed to slip his thigh between hers, she was
just acutely aware that he had and her whole body was flushing. “Okay, you can join
Elle and me, but no ordering us about. At least, not—”

He didn’t give her a chance to finish. His lips and hands went to work. When he finally
broke contact they were both breathing heavily enough for it to register as a tornado.
“Inside, now. I’ll bring Elle. Much as I don’t mind an audience if you don’t, I’ve
got better things to do in the hours ahead than make arrangements for an extraction
team to get us out and move us somewhere we
haven’t
created a public scene.”

“Talking of scenes,” she asked daringly, “is this going to be a hot and fast session
or long, deep, and slow? Not that I have a preference. Both work for me.”

Nick hauled her to her feet and gave her a little push toward the cottage, his hand
flicking a slap at her butt.

She was still giggling as she entered the house. Finally, she had a family. Comprising
the man she’d loved forever, a child, and Nick’s promise of more. She’d call her next
daughter, Rosy—like her future.

Allow us to

IGNITE

Your passions and imagination…

Did you love this Entangled Ignite novel? Check out more of our titles
here
!

And for exclusive sneak peeks at our upcoming books, excerpts, contests, chats with
our authors and editors, and more…

Be sure to like us on
Facebook

Follow us on
Twitter

Acknowledgments

A “thank you” could never be enough, so instead, come the revolution, here’s who I’d
want on my side:

Catherine Hughes, for flying the flag for Wales, and always being there.

Tracy Montoya, editor extraordinaire, for her patience and tolerance of “hanging dialogue”
and “Britishisms.”

Entangled Publishing and the Ignite team for believing.

Andrea Walpole for being…well, quite extraordinary.

Margaret Smith for her grace and friendship.

Caroline and Andrew Bond for their unbelievable kindness and compassion.

…And of course, the Naughties—Aimee Duffy, Alison Lodge, Lindsay J Pryor, Tracey Rogers,
Fiona Chapman, Jane Hunt, Alexa Fiennes, and Rae Rivers—all writers, and funny as
all hell.