Keeping Watch: Heart of the Night\Accidental Bodyguard (42 page)

“And you didn’t recognize the truck driver?” he asked again. The simplest scenario was that whoever had killed the others had followed her to Wyoming to finish the job by killing her. “He didn’t seem familiar to you?”

She shook her head. “It happened too fast. All I saw were those tan coveralls, like Billy was wearing.” She was thinking, replaying the images in her mind. “But he had a sweatshirt on underneath. With a hood. It covered his face from the angle I saw him.”

“And there were no markings on the truck?” She shook her head again. “I didn’t see anything except the Wyoming plates myself. It’ll be simple enough to get a Beaverton phone book and check out the kid’s story.”

“And then what?” she asked.

Jonas lowered his voice in case Prescott and his buddy stopped their put-on laughter long enough to listen in. “We go to the library, of course.”

M
AYBE SHE SHOULD HAVE
been the one to call the Beaverton Garage, thought Faith. According to Jonas, they had no one on a call near Elk Point. They claimed to have only two trucks, and both of them clearly bore their business logo. According to Jonas.

An unidentified man in an unidentified truck? Maybe she shouldn’t be so ready to trust him. Of course, he had thrown himself in front of the truck to save her. But if he knew something and wasn’t telling her, if he even suspected what was going on—shouldn’t she be wary?

None of the other patrons seemed to be concerned by their presence in the Elk Point Community Library. Of course, since only the quietest of hushed conversations were allowed, there wasn’t much opportunity to gossip about the grizzly-size mountain man and his mud-stained companion, sitting at the bank of public-access computers.

Faith, however, grew increasingly nervous as each minute passed. Had she made a huge mistake in sharing her story with Jonas? She couldn’t even think of him as Mr. Beck anymore. He now knew what frightened her, what haunted her footsteps. They’d created an odd sort of intimacy by trading secrets.

Not that he’d shared much. She still wasn’t sure who The Watchers were. Or rather, who they used to be. She’d never heard of the top secret security organization. And Jonas had warned her that the government would deny its existence and his own if she got curious enough to check out his story. And now that The Watchers were supposedly disbanded, there would be no one around to verify his background, anyway.

He looked the part of a security operative, the kind of man who could save lives and mete out justice with equal skill.

But he could just as well fit the image of the man who pursued her.

In one horrible version of her imagined future, his former job as a security agent was just a story he’d made up to get her to talk. Even if he wasn’t Copperhead, intent on retrieving the disk and killing her, he could still use the information to take advantage of her. He could trade her in to the sheriff in exchange for leaving him alone to grouch about his mountain in peace.

He could blackmail her, force her to become some sort of servant to his desires. Though he hadn’t touched her sexually in any way, she’d seen the fire blazing in his eyes. In the alley, when she’d been so frightened, he’d touched her gently and stroked her beneath the chin. He hadn’t been angry then. He’d been…hungry. For her? For any woman?

Now that was an unsettling prospect.

Faith glanced over at the man in the cubicle beside her. With Jonas intent on the information scrolling by on his monitor, she had a few moments to study his harsh profile. The strands of life experience that peppered his short, dark hair. The immense strength of his shoulders. The straight line of his back. The power and dexterity of his large, well-shaped hands.

Faith’s pulse hummed a little faster through her veins. Though she would be slave to no man, the idea of being the object of Jonas Beck’s desire wasn’t an altogether objectionable idea. At once daunting and thrilling, she imagined making love to him would be like riding a wild tornado. There’d be little finesse. But there’d be no mistaking his desire, no denying his need.

In her sheltered life and limited experience with men, she’d never really fantasized about a lover. But the idea never seemed far from her mind now that she’d met Jonas.

Maybe that was all the more reason she shouldn’t trust him.

“Any luck?”

Faith suddenly felt herself bathed in a gaze of clear icy blue. She blinked rapidly and turned back to her own computer as she realized Jonas had caught her staring. Fortunately, he didn’t call her on it. “No, not yet. It takes several minutes to run each search. He wasn’t listed under
scientist
or
engineer
so I’m running a more general search. If nothing shows up this time, I’ll include other countries besides the United States. Or a deceased list. Maybe Dr. Rutherford’s friend passed away and he didn’t know it.”

“Who would you give the disk to, then?”

“I don’t know.” Doubts crept in, fraying the edges of her determination again. “Maybe I’m not supposed to give it to anybody. But locating his friend could at least give me a place to start finding answers. There must be some useful connection.”

“Well, I hope you have better luck than I did.” He wrapped the minidisk she’d shown him in Dr. Rutherford’s handkerchief once more and handed it back to her. “None of these computers will run a disk this size. We need something high-tech.”

Faith lifted the disk and handkerchief to her nose, inhaling the fading scent of her friend and mentor, reminding herself why she was here in the first place. Before she lost the fight to the tears stinging the backs of her eyes, she stuffed the disk into her pocket and shook her head. “I’m not going back to Eclipse Labs.”

Jonas agreed. “I used to have access to the type of technology we need, but not anymore. Not legally, anyway. And there’s nothing else we can use here in Elk Point.”

“How close is the nearest university?” An academic lab or technology school would be likely to have the equipment they needed.

“Laramie.”

“Isn’t that on the other side of the state?”

“Pretty much.” He turned in his chair to face her. One of the craggy lines beside his mouth became a dimple as he tried to smile. “But I don’t have any pressing business keeping me in Elk Point. Do you?”

“I can’t let you drive me that far.”

His effort at gentling his expression vanished and he pushed to his feet. “Just write the mileage in that little book of yours and pay me back later.”

Faith snagged his wrist to keep him from stalking away. “I don’t want to be your charity case. I already feel like I have no control over my own fate. I have to be responsible for something. It helps me believe I’m going to get my life back.”

“Shh.” The white-haired librarian at the front desk took heed of their raised voices.

Jonas held up his hand by way of apology to the older woman, and Faith released him and spun away. The red-and-white message flashing on her computer screen reminded her just how lost she was: No Match Found.

She propped her elbows on the desktop and her chin in her palms, and considered how the same man could raise her hopes and fuel her desperation in the span of one short conversation. One minute he had her thinking they were a team, that there might even be some kind of friendship or unlikely attraction budding between them. The next, he made her mad enough to spit.

“That’s the name you’re looking up?”

Jonas’s deep, hushed voice cut through her thoughts and alerted her to some unspoken danger.

Faith risked a glance at the front doors, but Mel Prescott and his watchdog buddy were still parked outside, leaning against the hood of their county car, sipping from their cups of coffee. They hadn’t moved since she and Jonas had come in half an hour ago. Where was the threat?

A prickle of goose bumps teased the skin along the back of her neck. Maybe Jonas was the only thing making her nervous. “I’ve tried different spellings. I thought of using the name Darren, but I’m sure he said Dar-i-en with three syllables.”

Jonas reached over her shoulder and punched the delete key. “No wonder someone tried to run you down.”

“Hey.” He clicked another button and her screen went blank. “Jonas—” She swallowed her surprise on a huff of air. “Why did you do that?”

His hands clamped around her shoulders and he was lifting her to her feet before he answered. “You have no idea what you’re up against, do you?”

She lowered her voice to counteract his brutish invitation to leave. “We’re in a public place. You’d think you could mind your manners here—”

He pulled her along beside him, ignoring the librarian’s shocked
O
that pinched her lips. “Mr. Beck?”

“It’s all right, Mrs. Curtis. I didn’t find any books today, so we’re leaving.” With that terse explanation, the librarian reluctantly returned to her work as Jonas dropped a harsh whisper in Faith’s ear. “Why don’t you just send up a beacon and tell him where you are?” he accused.

Accused her of what? “What are you talking about?” Faith asked, trying to decide whether fear or anger was the better response.

Latching on to that now familiar spot on her upper arm, Jonas shoved open the double doors. Faith tried to take hold of his hand, but he was beyond any of the decorum she’d taught him earlier. Driven by some inexplicable demon, he scanned the parking lot and road beyond, then hurried her down the sidewalk toward the parking lot.

There was an urgency to his hold on her. His hand was firm, but not rough. “Dammit. He could have tracked you down through the Internet from the moment you first typed in his name thirty minutes ago.”

“Why are you so angry? Do you know Darien Frye?”

“Gentlemen.” He halted right in front of Mel Prescott, startling the deputy into dropping his cup and spilling coffee down his pant leg. He purposefully blocked Prescott’s escape route to the driver’s-side door.

“Beck.” Prescott cleared his throat, making a poor effort at hiding his nerves. “Is everything all right?”

Jonas leaned in and Prescott immediately reached for his gun.

“Jonas!”

But his big hand locked down over Prescott’s, preventing him from drawing his weapon. “You tell me. Who’s your boss been talking to this morning?”

Mel was already shaking his head. “I don’t… He just told us to keep an eye on you. I don’t know what’s going on.”

Jonas freed him. His pointed gaze encompassed both men. “You do that. You keep a real close eye on me. Don’t let me out of your sight.” Even Faith shivered at the warning in his voice. “Or I may come back to haunt you.”

“Why, you—” Prescott’s useless threats stalled in his throat.

Jonas pushed Faith in front of him, angling himself like a shield behind her. She felt, more than heard, his lips dipping beside her ear. “I know Frye.”

He stopped to unlock the passenger door on his Humvee, and Faith shook herself loose to protest being manhandled. “You see? This is why I don’t want to owe you anything. I thought you wanted to help me. You can’t keep hauling me out on the street and dropping bombshells without—”

“Get in the car.” It was an order, not an invitation.

He wasn’t even looking at her. Instead, his eyes were focused at some far point on the horizon.

Faith planted her hands on her hips and refused to budge. “I’m not going anywhere with you until you tell me what’s wrong.”

His answer was to scoop her up in his arms and set her inside.

“Dammit, Jonas!”

“Don’t cuss in public,” he mimicked her, pinning her to the seat with one arm and buckling her in with the other.

“Sometimes the situation calls for it.” She pummeled the big shoulder that passed by her face. But she was trapped, prisoner to his unexplained whims yet again. She really had no way to hurt him, to overpower him, to put a dent in his cold, callous armor. “Jonas, please.”

The battle between them ceased for an instant. He turned his head and looked at her. He had the oddest expression on his face. As if there was something softer, kinder, more patient inside him trying to get past the vivid slash of his scar and the glacial tint of his eyes.

Caught up in the mysterious message behind his features, she didn’t immediately see his hand come up beside her face. When her gaze darted to the broad, tanned fingers, he hesitated. His nostrils flared on a silent breath and then he brushed his fingers across the feather of her bangs that had caught in her lashes, and smoothed them off her forehead.

It was an awkward touch, but it was a gentle one. It was a tender gesture that surprised her with its calming effect on her temper, its soothing reassurance to her fears. And it surprised her by triggering something deeper inside. A slow-burning desire to touch him in the same gentle way.

The opportunity passed before she could act on it. Without further word, Jonas pulled away, closed her door and circled the hood of the car. Since he could pretend that charged moment hadn’t happened, so could she. “The deputy’s on the radio, calling something in,” she reported, looking out her window while Jonas started the engine.

“I imagine he’s telling Sheriff Prince that I assaulted him.” He quickly backed out of the parking space and put the Humvee into gear. “Maybe he’s telling him I assaulted you.”

“Jonas!” The random bruises on her arms and legs were from their tumble into the ditch on White Horse Road, not anything he had inflicted on her. “I’m alive because of you. You haven’t hurt me. And they can’t arrest you for rudeness.”

He made a grunting noise that she interpreted as a laugh. “That may not make any difference to Prince. It’d be a perfect excuse to lock me up.” He pulled onto the highway heading up toward his cabin. “He’d like us to stay in town.”

“And we’re not going to?”

“Not for long.” He checked the rearview mirror and pressed down on the accelerator, pushing their speed up to the legal limit.

She watched him check the mirror again, then grabbed the armrest for balance as he zoomed around the first double-back curve. “What happened at the library?” she asked.

His voice grew darker, scarier, almost predatory in its warning. “You don’t want to find Darien Frye.”