Rescue Me (30 page)

“Heading back home.”

“Kathryn, please talk to me.”

“Kat. Remember?”

“Are we back to that?”

“We never left that.”

“Damn it, Kathryn!” He growled deep in the
back of his throat, the sound twisting hard into her heart. She was
an idiot to think it wouldn't turn into this the instant he spotted
her. “Why won't you talk to me?”

“Because I don't even know you.” She'd made
it to K-SAR in one piece and breathed a sigh of relief as she
pulled behind the office and up to the shop.

“Please don't shut me out.”

“It hurts, doesn't it?”

“Baby, don't do this. Don't give up on us.
Not again.”

She stiffened at his choice of words.
Again?
Oh, hell no. “You think I gave up?”

“You were the one who left.”

“At least I showed up in the first place!”
She screamed into the phone, her fury too much to contain. “Tell me
this, Spencer. Were you ever planning on telling me the truth? Or
was this just another one of your secrets? Was us getting back
together all part of your game? Did you fuck me to gain my trust so
I wouldn't question you?”

“Don't,” he warned, his voice low and
dangerous. “Don't ever call what you and I do as
fucking
.
You know it's so much more than that.”

Tears burned as they invaded her eyes. “It
used to be.”

He let out a shaky breath. It pulled at her.
“You and I getting back together had nothing to do with any of the
shit storm happening between us right now. I care about you. I want
to be with you. That hasn't changed.”

She took a deep breath as a burning tear
rolled down her cheek. “Everything else has.”

“Don't do this!” he roared into the phone.
She choked on a sob. The way he pleaded with her had her so close
to giving in.

He drew in several ragged breaths. “Nothing
has changed. You found out something you didn't like. It was over a
year ago. Let's work together and move past this.”

She gripped the steering wheel at tight as
she clenched her jaw. “Something I didn't like? I found out you let
me
take the fall for something
you
did. Were you ever
going to tell me the truth?”

“I fucking tried!”

“At the search.”

“Yes.” He sounded so tired.

“How convenient.” She refused to believe that
if she would have just listened to him instead of talking with that
TREX agent about where to set up the lunch truck, they'd be in a
different place right now.

“Damn you, Kathryn. God
damn
you.” He
sighed wearily and she could have sworn she heard a sob in the back
of his throat. She'd never even seen the man with a misty eye, let
alone heard him sob. The thought of how upset she made him made her
even more unstable, her emotions more volatile.

Her eyes swelled with the burning tears of
realization, of humiliation, of heartbreaking regret. She fought to
keep her emotions under control. She failed as another sob tore
through the lump constricting her throat.

“Forgive me,” he whispered, his voice so full
of raw emotion it took her breath away. “Just...” He paused. “Just
don't give up on us. I can't lose you. Not after everything else
I've lost. Please, baby. Don't walk away.”

She sobbed, openly crying and not caring that
she'd broken down in front of the one man she wanted to remain
strong in front of. “I can't ever forgive you for what you've done.
Please don't call me again.”

“Kathryn!”

Kat ended the call, cutting him off as he
cried out her name again.

And then she broke down completely.

Kat blinked awake when the sun peered through
the window and shined on her face, warming it. She sat up and
rubbed her eyes. The clock on the dash read 6:00. She let out a
shaky breath and stood to stretch out the kinks. The chairs in the
Com Van were definitely not meant for sleeping.

Did she imagine the last week of her life?
Did Spencer really purposely alter the search that almost killed
her career, not to mention her self-esteem? Did he really let her
take the fall? Did someone really break into her apartment right
under her nose?

She slipped on her shoes and went to the
door, for some reason feeling guilty sleeping in the motorhome. Her
investors had paid a considerable sum of money for K-SAR to convert
the rig into a top-of-the-line mobile communication center, not for
a place for her to hide from reality.

Since she was already here, she walked over
to the office and went to unlock the door, only to find it
open.

Oh, shit. The guy must have followed her
here. Her pulse skyrocketed and slammed in her ears.

She heard a click and froze. Wait, was that
the copy machine? Glancing around for a weapon, she found a single
golf club Travis liked to use to knock golf balls into coffee cups
when they had down time. With the club firmly in her grasp, she
tried not to make a sound as she snuck through the small reception
area and turned to the right toward the copy room. Walking down the
narrow hall, she paused outside the room to get up enough nerve
to…what? Beat the guy with a golf club? Jump out and yell,
“Gotcha!”

The copy machine fell silent and she braced
herself. One. Two.

“Holy shit!” Travis walked out of the room
and fell back against the doorframe, clutching his chest. “You
scared the hell out of me.” He spotted the golf club she held over
her head and frowned. “What are you doing? Is that my putter? Why
do you look like you just woke up?”

Her hair had to be a mess. Dark circles
accented her eyes, according to the reflective surface of a picture
as she snuck by. She still wore yesterday's clothes, which were now
wrinkled.

“Why are you here at six in the morning?” she
demanded as she fought to get her heart to beat at a normal
pace.

“Copying my notes from the Green search for
the files. I wanted to take the day off so I thought I'd come in
early and just get it done. Sheila wants to take the girls to
Snoqualmie and go sledding, like we can't find a hill closer.” He
eyed her up and down. “You look like shit. What the hell happened
to you?”

Was he someone she could trust? They may not
be the best of friends, but they were business associates and she
knew he'd have her back if it came to it. Plus, she did trust him
enough to confide in him with the story about Salazar and
the
Order
. “Are you busy for the next couple of hours?”

He threw her a puzzled look as she dragged
him out of the building and over to her truck parked behind the
shed. When she pulled out of the parking lot, he still hadn't said
anything. Not until she stopped in her parking spot at her
apartment complex did he even turn to her.

“Uh, now do I get to ask?”

“Yesterday someone broke into my apartment
while I was at K-SAR.”

He leaned back and frowned. “Are you shitting
me? Was anything missing?”

“Just some papers.” Kat hopped out. Travis
followed. As she climbed the stairs and opened her door, she
finished telling him what she knew. “So then I ran out.” She threw
her keys on the counter in the kitchen. Travis walked in after
her.

“And you went straight to the office?”

“I slept in the Com Van.” Kat grabbed a water
bottle out of the refrigerator. She didn't feel the need to fill
him in on the rest of her night, as embarrassing as it was when
Spencer caught her.

“Have you gone to the cops?” He opened the
spring water Kat threw at him and took a long drink, then made a
face and set it down. “I need coffee this early. Put on a pot?”

“No, I didn't go to the cops.”

“Why not?”

“Because it was just some papers. No big
deal.” She forced a troubled smile to play down the tantrum in her
stomach. If she would have gone to the cops over a break in with no
sign of forced entry and only a few measly papers missing, they
would have laughed her right out of the building.

“And your only choice was to bring me here?
Dude, I don't know shit about break ins. You should call the
cops.”

She shot him a look.

Travis brought his hands up in surrender.
“Seriously. You should be talking to a cop. Or maybe some alpha
male TREX agent that grunts a lot. You seem to like that type.”

Wonderful. More attitude about she and
Spencer. “We aren't exactly talking.”

“Again?”

She nodded. “Again.”

“Maybe you should actually stick with that
this time.”

Kat turned to him and set a fist on her hip.
“Do you have a problem with me being with Spencer?”

“Present tense?”

She wished. “No. Past.”

“Then no.” When she continued to glare, he
went on. “Kat, you can do so much better than him.”

But he was exactly what she wanted, even with
the current state of their relationship, if she could even call it
that.

“He lied to me, Travis.”

“News flash, baby. We all lie. Men. Women.
Even kids.”

“But this lie was a doozy.”

“So tell me.” He rested his chin on his hand
and waited.

“Remember the Haynes search?” She waited
until he nodded before continuing. “Apparently TREX already had the
outcome of that search planned before they even called in K-SAR.
Spencer fed me false information to keep our teams away from the
subject. We were there to keep the bad guy trapped. We were never
meant to find him.”

Travis dropped his jaw as his face lost all
color. He then stood and stormed into the kitchen. “Are you
shitting me? As if I don't have enough reason to hate that guy.
What a motherfu—”

“Anyway,” she stopped him before he went on,
not wanting anything to add to the flame fueling her anger. “That'
why we aren't talking right now.”

Travis reached across the counter and rested
his hand over hers. When he squeezed it, he followed it up with a
smile. A hunger darkened his gaze and changed the atmosphere,
thickening it with uncomfortable tension. “You deserve someone who
treats you right.”

She slipped her hand out from under his and
turned from him. He looked at her differently and she didn't like
it.

“Sorry,” he offered.

“You're married.”

“I know.” He said it with such
disappointment. “That doesn't mean I can't want what's best for
you. It's February. The month of love. Go out and find yourself a
valentine actually worthy of you. That TREX asshole is not it.”

“Valentine's Day is just a single day.” And
she'd spend it single.

“Spoken like a true Valentine's Day
Scrooge.”

Kat lowered her eyes. The perking of the
coffee filled the silence. She didn't even know what today's date
was. And to think, she'd actually asked Spencer to be her
valentine. It seemed a lifetime ago. Well, this year if stupid
cupid tried to target her with his arrow, she'd shove it up the
little cherub's ass.

After the coffee finished, she poured Travis
a cup before doing the same for her. The robust smell awakened her
senses.

“So, what do you think about the guy breaking
in last night?”

Travis shrugged and scratched his head. “I
don't know. This is way out of my league. Some guy breaks in when
you aren't even home, stays until you get home, then steals some
papers. Real crime of passion there.”

“I'm not calling Spencer,” Kat snapped,
annoyed that he kept bringing him up.

“I never said Spencer. Call the police. Hell,
call the FBI. Anybody who deals with this sort of stuff. I'm just a
blue-collar worker. Talk to me about demolition and I'm your
man.”

Okay, so maybe she was the one who kept
bringing up Spencer. Enough was enough. Pushing Spencer out of her
mind, she gave Travis her attention. “You know, I've worked with
you for five years and in all that time you never told me what you
did before K-SAR.”

“Demolition. It's really cool. You know,
there is nothing more satisfying than watching something you rig
blow up exactly as you plan it.”

Kat saw the boyish flicker of satisfaction in
his eyes. “What is it about men and blowing things up?”

“I used to stick firecrackers in my army men
as a kid. I guess I just went from there. How about you? Have you
always been looking for someone?”

She lowered her eyes and ignored the jolt to
her heart. He couldn't have meant Spencer and it bothered her to
the core that her mind immediately jumped there. “Something like
that.”

“I guess you have the upper hand since you
were actually the subject of a search as a kid. You know, that's
why K-SAR has such a high success rate. You can put yourself in the
subject's shoes. What's the story about when you got lost? I've
always wanted to know.”

“I was ten. My mom asked me to watch my
little brother. He was five at the time and decided to go inside
and take a nap in his toy box. Of course I didn't know that and
thought I'd lost him in the woods. So I went looking for him and
couldn't find my way back.”

“Must have been pretty freaky. I'm
thirty-eight and it would freak my shit out.”

“I panicked, as any ten-year-old would. I was
actually closer to my house than anyone thought. I kept going
around in circles, but I thought I was miles away.” She shuddered,
lost in her memory. “When I heard my dad calling for me, I didn't
answer at first.”

“Why not?”

She shrugged. “I thought I was in trouble.
I'd been gone for two days without permission. But then I heard the
explorers calling for me and I knew he wouldn't spank me in front
of others. So I called back and there you have it.” She pushed away
from the counter, not wanting to think about those two nights any
longer than she had to. “Do you mind if I take a shower?”

“A what?” He cocked his brow as his voice
jumped an octave.

“You stay out here.”