Safe and Sound (The Safe House Series Book 3) (10 page)

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The ride to the courthouse was long and cramped with the four of them piled into the police vehicle. Max had accepted Jack's invitation to drive. In his line of work, it was imperative to switch vehicles as often as possible, especially when transporting a client. He just hoped protocol didn’t outweigh good instincts. In the caged backseat, Max was a fucking sitting duck.

He doubted, however, Jack would try anything with Lola beside him in the passenger seat. Any man that backed up brotherly love with a nine millimeter reeked of loyalty.

The trip largely passed in silence, but for the occasional ten-code chirps from the police radio. Early on, Lola kept a steady, calming dialogue going, catching Jack up on all that had happened, sans the intimacy parts. She did a superb job of parsing the story for her brother, but she shot frequent looks at Max and blushed when she noticed him listening. They both knew there was no hiding their tryst from her brother—not with the way Jack had discovered them—but all three of them appreciated her tact on the subject all the same.

It was extremely obvious that in contrast to his sister's more forgiving feelings, Jack Reyes loathed Aiden Baudin, so much so that Max suspected it was more personal than just a cop seeking justice. He wouldn't be surprised if the two of them had more than one run-in in the past; Baudin's silence seemed to confirm, at least, that he knew the majority occupants of the car did not number themselves among his friends. Either that, or he was nervous about testifying. Max almost missed the days of calculated quips and muttered French obscenities. Almost. For the past thirty miles, Baudin had his beads out, rubbing them hard enough to start a fire.

Jack pulled into the courthouse parking lot with four minutes to spare. He called in their arrival and updated security on the situation. Two men in dark suits and shades descended the steps to meet them.

"This is so exciting," Lola whispered to Jack as security ushered all four of them out of the car. "What do I do? I don't want to be in anyone's way."

Immediately, Max reached for her hand. “Stay close to me. That way, I can protect you if anything goes wrong."

"Aren't you supposed to be protecting Baudin?"

Max said nothing in reply.

"Besides, nothing can go wrong in a courtroom with this much security and Freeman in custody."

Her comment told him how much Lola
shouldn’t
be here. She believed in courtroom shows on television where the good guys dish out justice in a neat little one-hour pocket of drama. It was the very thing about her that balanced his cynicism, that allowed her to give so much of herself. Had Max any other choice, he would have kept her in that belief forever. She didn’t belong in his world.

"I wish I could be sure of that," Max muttered below his breath.

Lola’s stomach edged the moment she laid eyes on Miller Freeman.

He was an unassuming man in his mid-fifties, sitting at the long defense table opposite the aisle to front row seat, surrounded by an assembly of council that positively dwarfed him. But there was something undeniably commanding about his presence. Even the prosecution's side of the proceedings seemed to give him a wide and reverential berth.

Lola sat sandwiched between Jack and Max, clutching her handbag in her lap and trying not to feel guilty for taking up bench space reserved for important people. They had even poured her a glass of water from the prosecutor’s decanter to match the glasses on the tiny ledge in front of Jack and the Federal Marshal, who was also testifying.

Max had insisted that she required as much protection now as any of them. She didn't feel right about being here, but she couldn’t deny her excitement. A far cry from sorting plastic coin replicas into old soup cans. She was almost as jumpy as Baudin, who occupied the seat on the other side of Max. His odd soothing rituals caught and held her attention.

The hitman did not appear to do well in public. He muttered prayer after prayer underneath his breath. Her gaze descended to his lap where Baudin fiddled with his rosary, but not in his usual, orderly way. And something about the string, itself, seemed off, so Lola counted.

Several of the beads were missing.

A dull ache bloomed fresh in her stomach.

She tugged on Max’s shirt sleeve. He leaned his ear close.

“Something’s wrong. Three of his beads are missing.”

In one fluid movement, Max wrenched the beads out of Baudin's unsuspecting hands.

Baudin’s posture bolted upright as if he had been electrocuted.

Jack didn't appear to notice the struggle going on beside him. He raised his water to his lips. At the bottom of the glass, Lola spotted one of the missing red beads roll around, shrink and disintegrate.

A strangled noise caught in her throat.

"Lola! The water!" Max shouted and lunged to his feet, his eyes trained on Jack’s glass.

Every eye in the courtroom turned on them.

Lola backhanded the glass out of Jack’s hand. A little too hard. The glass sailed through the air and shattered in a wet explosion at the feet of the wide-eyed judge, who had just entered from her chambers.

"Lola!" Jack echoed her name in confusion. "What the hell is your problem?"

"The water is poisoned,” said Lola.

The Federal Marshal had his wide eyes trained on her. He quickly put down his own glass.

Baudin’s focus shifted between them all. He looked like a cornered animal, but there was a lethal cunning in his eye that Lola had never seen before. She realized a split second before the others did what he was about to do.

Baudin dove across the table at Jack.

Lola went for her only defense. Purse in hand, she swung. Hard.

Her handbag clocked the side of Baudin's face. The blow landed so hard that, as the man collapsed to the ground, she felt certain she had broken his jaw. What else could have made that horrible cracking sound?

But the thunderous
crack
came an instant after she knocked her purse into him. The wooden half-wall separating them from the lawyers exploded into splinters. Lola blinked in confusion, but she had little time to process what had happened. Max grabbed her and threw her hard to the floor beside him. He shoved her half under the bench and shielded her other half. Her brain finally clicked reality into place.

Someone had fired a gun.

Screams rent the courtroom.

“
Ohmygosh, ohmygosh
.” Her lips moved but no sound came.

From her vantage point, she saw Baudin’s head pinned between the floor and Jack’s knee. His eyes were round and glossy, nearly catatonic, his stare aimed directly at her.

Blood pooled in her ears. Her entire body shook. It was no longer exciting. This world was downright terrifying.

She wanted to go home.

“They’ve pinned the shooter,” said Max. “Stay down until the room’s secure."

She thought it
was
secure.
Ohmygosh
.

"Did he hit anyone?" She couldn't keep the panic out of her voice. Her eyes sought Jack. Her brother was moving, fine, as energetic as ever. In fact, he forced Baudin's face into the floor with maybe a little too much enthusiasm.

“We’re clear,” said Max.

Pandemonium ruled the courtroom. Two security teams escorted the gunman and Freeman out separate side doors of the courtroom.

Jack hauled Baudin to his feet and handed him off to another officer.

Lola and Max rose slowly together. She looked at Baudin, whose stare had not left her. His lower lip bled from a deep cut, and the left side of his face swelled from where she had landed her strike. Turns out the rock she had slipped in her purse to remember Max and their garden stroll wasn’t so silly after all.

"You saved my life." Baudin sounded mystified, as if he had never considered that he had a life worth saving before.

“You tried to kill my brother.” Lola’s eyes narrowed. Her dry throat threatened to choke out her words again. “I believed in you. When no one else did.”

Baudin’s stare crumbled to the floor.

"Come on, Lola,” said Jack. “You don't need to be here anymore,"

Jack snagged her arm and escorted her out of the room, away from Max. She felt thankful to escape the line of fire, but she shot a desperate look back over her shoulder in Max’s direction. He made no attempt to follow; he was a statue, all but his eyes that followed her until her final glimpse.

In the hallway, Lola tugged against her brother’s determined pace. “Jack, wait.”

“Wait for what, Lola? I think you’ve been through enough.”

“I want to see Max.”

Jack sighed. He rerouted them to an empty corner of the hall, out of the way of energized reporters streaming the building to catch a sound bite for the evening news. Her chest felt bruised, but not from anything that had transpired in the courtroom. Twice, her eyes threatened to mist over—the shock, the after burn of fear, the goodbye she felt coming on like a parasite, worming its way around her heart, constricting the blood flow until it threatened to stop altogether. Mercifully, Jack said nothing.

Twenty minutes passed. Max threaded his way through the dwindling crowd of reporters. His gaze collided with Lola’s.

Her pulse stalled.

Max held his hand out to Jack. Jack gave it a reluctant shake.

Lola exhaled a tentative breath at the truce.

“The shooting wasn’t random,” said Max. “Freeman planned to take Baudin out as soon as he killed you and the Marshall. Why have two dead witnesses when you can knock out three? The prosecutor’s office will be calling you Monday about attempted murder charges.”

“What happens to Baudin?”

"He has agreed to testify, for real this time," said Max. "He's being transferred to a maximum security unit.”

Lola lost track of the action streaming around them as Max gazed down at her. Jack drifted away to give them privacy.

"You were right, Max. I was too naïve to see him for what he really was.”

“Not naïve, Lola. Hopeful.” He flashed her a sad smile. “I think being on the wrong end of an assassination attempt shook him up a bit. It’s possible he’ll find a higher purpose in prison. Chaplain or something. I wouldn't count on it too much, though. It's hard to fundamentally change people. At the end of the day, it's better to just accept the ones into your life that you know are a sure fit."

Lola's heart climbed into her throat and curled itself into a knot at his words. Was he saying what she thought he said? "I don't know if I believe that," she said slowly. "Max…"

"I'll get ahold of your brother. Have some paperwork sent over." His tone was security, all business. "It might be tedious. I apologize for that. I know you have a lot on your plate as it is."

"Yeah." Even as she agreed with him, her voice shook a little. She knew he was right, and that he tried to spare her more responsibility now by walking out of her life this way. Maybe it was for the best. Maybe as soon as she got home, she would forget all about Max Sterling, except to reflect on him with gratitude that he had made the ultimate decision for her.

She wondered if he would count her as one more loss.

The awkward silence stretched between them like a yawning chasm. Slowly, peripheral noise bled back into her awareness, and Lola remembered they stood in a public space and that people still swarmed around them.

Max cleared his throat and extended his hand to her, handshake-style.

“Goodbye, Lola.”

The gesture gutted her. Lola stared at its wide width, trying not to remember all the ways she had found herself in his touch. She pressed her lips together because she didn’t trust her voice would come when she needed it. She doubted she could ever utter
goodbye
, anyway.

She shook Max Sterling’s hand and plastered on a brave smile.

Lola made it all the way home before Eugenia’s extended arms pulled her close and the floodgates opened.

Lola frantically prepped a science lesson involving tomato seeds, soil and Styrofoam cups before her class spilled back in from the playground. Most teachers used bean seeds because they were easiest to sprout. Lola thought of Devin. If she couldn’t be with him each day over the summer, at least he had a fighting chance of filling his belly each day.

Meg had taken recess duty this week. Everyone had been so nice to her. Her principal offered her as much time off as she wanted. She returned to work Monday. Her co-workers attributed her reserved nature to the ordeal she had been through. She told no one about Max. She gave enough of herself—Max taught her that. If he was relegated to a memory, Lola intended to be selfish about it.

The unmistakable swarm of fifty first-graders, even well-behaved and in orderly rows, had her checking the clock. Her moments with them dulled the pain, and she was grateful to have them all afternoon. Turns out she needed them as much as they needed her.

Kayleigh was first in the classroom. She held an individual white board Lola had made for each of her students from cardboard, special contact paper and fun duct tape. A rather shaky capital
I
filled the board.

“Kayleigh, why did you take your board to recess?”

The normally talkative girl smirked and pranced to a spot on the carpet where the line leader stood when they prepped to leave the room, proudly holding her board in front of her.

Devin was next. His board had a
capital L
. Backwards, of course. He stood to the right of Kayleigh.

Lola smiled and bit her lip. They had all been so sweet to her.
Missed you
cards. Flowers. She settled into her rocking chair at the reader’s circle to enjoy the rest of the message.

One by one, her class assembled in a straighter line she had seen in quite some time.

O-V-E-Y-O-U-.-M-A-

Someone had given the Nelek twins the Rs. The boys had perpetual ants in their pants. The rollicking of R-R had her stomach churning.

Y-M-

That was it.

Somewhere near a very sneezy Caleb Elkin, she had lost the message.

Meg ushered in the final child and ducked behind them, straightening boards and reminding them to rest the letters against their tummies so Miss Reyes could read them.

Avery’s board held a dot. More like a booger, really.

Lola didn’t get it.

Meg moved a few tiny bodies here and there to group them into words.

I.

Love.

You.

Marry

M—

A rush of lightness swooped down and caused her stomach to take flight. Devin giggled. Lola brought her hands up to cover her mouth that had dropped open far enough to swallow all the flies they had brought with them from recess. Her gaze drifted to the classroom door.

Max crowded the doorway, breathtakingly handsome in a dark suit and tie, the final white board in hand.

An
E
.

A grin tugged at his mouth. He flipped his board. Across the back, he’d written:
I quit
.

Lola stumbled to her feet, unsure if her legs would hold her. She tottered on the edge of the alphabet rug. In a flash, Max was there to steady her.

He lowered himself on one knee and took her hands in his.

Twenty-three six year olds and a handful of teachers on her hall went ballistic.

Tears washed her vision.

A chorus of
shhh!
s reached a crescendo in the room. Lola giggled. The room gradually quieted again.

“It’s time for a different duty. Husband.”

Two seconds ticked by before Devin shouted, “Well?”

More snickers.

Lola looked into Max’s hopeful face and saw her future.

She reached for the blackboard tray beside her, picked up a stick of chalk and wrote Y-E-S on the board.

Max scooped her off her feet and kissed her.

The room’s high-pitched cheers turned to one scandalous first-grade, cootie kind of note: “OOOOOOOhhhh!”