Under Fire (7 page)

Liam adjusted the rearview mirror, the three garters swaying. “I trust her completely.”

Her?
“But you still didn’t tell her everything about what Brandon said, I hope.”

“Not over a cell phone, no. I can’t be sure of privacy until we’re in a secure room. Even talking out here could be risky, so why don’t we save the rest for when we get there.”

She looked sharply from the water to the man, headlights from oncoming cars streaking across his face, just as quickly gone, leaving him in shadows. The light and dark flashes reminded her of the two sides of Liam. At one moment he was the charmer who wowed her with his smile and wit. And in a flash he became the honed professional, a military man in charge of his universe.

She’d sought him out because of that professional side of him… not because she hadn’t been able to forget him for even one day over the past six months. Right? She fingered the tear in the Jeep’s ragtop. “Tell me more about your friend in OSI.”

Where had that question come from?

From the part of her that liked his smile and that almost quaint way he had of squeezing her hand.

“Not much to tell,” he said. “We’ve been stationed together a couple of times, deployed together once. She’s helped with intel on a few missions, always sharp, always right.” He shot a quick glance her way. “I answered your question, and now I have one of my own. Why did you choose Florida for your big move?”

Her heart flipped. Because she’d heard
Florida
and thought of him? “The rescue group in D.C. that works with pairing shelter pets with vets identified this area for expanding the concept. The timing was right for me to move. I accepted the challenge for a change.”

“That’s a pretty radical change just because you’re burned out on work. Most folks would opt for a vacation rather than another emotionally draining career field.”

“I’m following dreams I’m passionate about.” She shrugged, the wind lifting her damp hair and reminding her of the moment Liam burst into the bathroom. “I have no family entanglements. There’s nothing to stop me from picking up and relocating if I wish. I guess I’m a lot like a female version of you—without the trail of ex-spouses.”

“Fair enough. But why? You were damn good at your job.” His praise reached across as tangibly as any touch. “More than that, you seemed intense about your search and rescue work.”

“Too intense. I told you I burned out in the Bahamas and I meant it.” Her emotions had felt all the more close to the surface with Liam around. She’d hoped returning to D.C., staying away from him, would bring balance back to her life.

No such luck.

“So you decided to work with PTSD patients? Sounds like a real party.” He snorted.

“Okay,” she said, half smiling along with him. God, he was so wonderfully irreverent. “I can see why it wouldn’t seem the logical choice, but after so many failures in the Bahamas, so many dead people… dead children… I needed to do some saving.”

His smile faded. “I get that.”

Of course he would. She sometimes forgot how he’d once told her that he’d been an Army Ranger before shifting to the air force. Even now, there had to be unbelievable stress in his job, and somehow he’d managed to continue the grind for over a decade. “How do you hold tough through the ones you can’t rescue?”

“I can’t quit. There’s always another one who needs me,” he said simply, steering the Jeep steady on. “It’s the only way I know to be.”

Palm trees whipped past one after the other in perfectly spaced rhythm, leading toward a distant bridge like going from one rescue to another, week after week, month after month, until years passed. Lives were saved and still no life had been built.

How did a person go about building a life that wasn’t wrapped up in the calling to rescue people? A calling that consumed a person until there wasn’t time left for anything else. “What about retirement?”

“Are you calling me old?” He cocked an eyebrow.

A laugh burst free and even managed to deflate at least an ounce of tension with it. “Hardly. You’re so honed and in shape, you could take down anyone I know.”

And just that fast her admission of how very much she’d noticed his body was out there. Hanging in the air heavier than any salt-water-laden humidity. The attraction she’d felt for Liam hadn’t lessened one bit.

As his bottle green eyes held hers, she could see an answering call in his gaze. He’d made it clear before how much he wanted her, and apparently time hadn’t changed a thing between them.

If anything, the need had just increased. She’d been fooling herself that she could come here and keep it in check. Her whole body hummed with an awareness and fire that grew with each minute together, gathering force until she pressed her knees tightly together against the ache.

“Liam?” she whispered, and wondered at the husky, hungry sound that crawled from deep inside her.

He hauled his attention front toward a bridge only fifty yards ahead. “God, woman, you tear me up inside from wanting you. And you also have the strangest timing. Right now, we have somewhere to be. But let me be clear. Once we finish there, we’re not pretending we’re just work acquaintances anymore. You’re not going to just fall off the planet without warning again. Got it?”

Wow, he was really laying it all out there. No dancing around the subject or giving them time to sort through feelings. And on top if it all, she still had to deal with an exploded town house and a possible treasonous threat. “I hear you.”

Just these few hours together made her accept that the move to Florida hadn’t been coincidental. The attraction to Liam was magnetic, to say the least. His eyes locked with her only for a second, but this man packed more in an instant than most put into a lifetime.

Then his gaze slid away, his attention back on driving, checking the rearview mirror—

“Shit!” he hissed.

Frowning, she glanced at him as they drove onto the mile-long bridge. “What’s wrong?”

“Someone’s following us and gaining fast… damn it.” His arm shot out across her. “Brace yourself! We’re about to be hit.”

Rachel jerked around, expecting to find the silver sedan tailing her again. She looked and found…

Her navy blue SUV. With the customized license plate she’d chosen in honor of her dog. There was no mistaking the word
Disco1
as the Ford accelerated closer. Her Ford, which she’d left on base and now someone else was driving…

Her
car rammed the Jeep.

Jolting forward and back in her seat, Rachel braced against the dash with one hand and reached behind with her other to grab Disco’s collar. If they’d been in her SUV, she would have had him in a crate, secured. Hell, if she’d been in her own vehicle, none of this would be happening at all.

“Liam?” she shouted against the roar of insanity. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” he said quickly, his voice calm, controlled, his toned body seemingly impervious.

Except she knew too well how even the strongest of soldiers could be brought down in a flash.

They slammed the concrete railing. Her body jerked and her thoughts fractured. She bit her tongue. The tinny taste of blood filled her mouth as the vehicle skidded. The echo of grinding metal shrieked along with honking horns. She looked out the passenger window as the Jeep scraped along the railing. The ocean churned below, dark and murky, waiting to swallow them if the barrier gave way. She looked up fast at the rearview mirror just as her SUV rammed them again.

The barrier had looked plenty sturdy when she’d driven over it earlier today. And now? It looked flimsier than a couple of two-by-fours holding out against a bulldozer.

Her heart lurched, then raced faster than the Jeep accelerating back into traffic. Squealing brakes sounded from behind them. She searched for ways to help, to alert Liam to anything that might help. In the rearview mirror, she saw a VW bug spinning out along the bridge, her blue SUV whipping fast. Oh God, what if this chase accidentally caused someone else to go over the side, into the ocean? Her dog jockeyed for balance with the same sure-footedness that had saved him when they worked disaster sites.

Liam steered on a dime and whipped around the other evening commuters. But so did the SUV, until it roared right up on their tail again. Whipping to the side, the vehicle—her car, which someone had stolen—accelerated beside them.

“Down!” Liam shouted, palming the back of her head.

She ducked just as a shot rang out. Both side windows shattered—driver’s, then passenger’s. Her heart in her throat, she reached to touch Liam’s chest right over the steady thump of his heart. A sigh of relief cascaded through her. With her other hand, she reached back. Her dog nuzzled her, crouching low without flinching. He was trained well.

Liam covered her hand with his briefly, firmly, then took the wheel again.

“I’m fine,” he said, the Jeep surging ahead. “But I need your help.”

“Anything,” she answered without hesitation.

“Sit up carefully and hold on to the steering wheel.”

Um, what?
She inched upward warily. “Are you nuts?”

“Hold. On.” He grabbed her hand and placed it on the wheel.

He let go.

Sitting up fast, she held on tight, her shoulder pressed to his. “This really isn’t the time for you to find your sense of humor.”

“No games. I’m calling for help.” He arched off his seat to pull his cell phone out of his pocket.

A quick glance in the rearview mirror showed her the SUV was three cars back. “I would have been happy to do that, you know.” She gripped the steering wheel, easier said than done with the Jeep barreling along the bridge. Humor seemed like a good idea after all, anything to steady her freaking-out nerves. “Nine. One. One. Try it. I learned it back in preschool.”

“My help is a bit more intense than that, and they’ll want to talk to me. You need code words and crap like that to get through.”

“You have connections?” She narrowly avoided a slow-moving truck with stacks of orange crates.

“You could say that.”

“Of course you do. That’s why I’m here. I just didn’t expect… Forget it.” She didn’t dare look at him, just held the vehicle steady as—thank God—they cleared the bridge. “Tell your connections those goons back there are driving my car, which means somehow they got on base.”

The highway was marginally wider, at least. Except for the oncoming traffic on one side and a steep drop-off into the water on the other. Risking a look in the rearview mirror, she bit back a scream as the image filled with the car still hot on their tail.
Her
car. With two men in front, blurry shapes at such a high speed. Liam’s curse hissed low and long, riding the wind whipping through the shot-out windows.

Bluetooth headset in place, he took the wheel back. “I’ve got it now.”

He whipped past a Mack truck, then… nothing. No one followed them except the truck. For now. The hammering of her heart grew stronger in the aftermath. Her heartbeat?

No. His.

She still had her hand over Liam’s chest, taking reassurance from the steady beat.
Betraying
a
little
too
much
about
herself.
She wasn’t the clinging-vine type, damn it. She snatched her arm away and twisted her fingers in her lap.

People told her she had nerves of steel. She’d worked earthquake-ravaged regions, walking in rubble shifting with aftershocks. She’d trekked up a rugged mountain trail, searching for a missing child, with wolves howling in the wind. There had even been times she’d helped the police track an escaped convict. But sitting here while Liam’s life was at risk because of her? That was threatening to send her over the edge faster than any jolt from a car. She shouldn’t have come here. She should have gone from cop to cop to cop until somebody listened to her…

Listened to her say what? Bottom line, she knew so little. How could this bring down such a firestorm onto her life?

Dimly, she registered Liam speaking cryptically into the phone, lots of alphas and bravos and other code-sounding talk. And then an end to the conversation, roger and out.

He tossed the phone back into the cup holder between them and checked the rearview mirror again. “Looks like we’ve lost them. You did great, keeping your cool.”

“Thanks, but I really don’t deserve any praise. It wasn’t like you left me any choice.”

“Plenty of people still would have panicked. You’re a good wingman.” His eyes held hers in the rearview mirror.

Her stomach did a tumble that had nothing to do with fear. She looked down and away. Her gaze landed on his cell. “Your phone? May I use it, please?”

“Sure.” His hand fell to rest on it. Nicks and scars shone along his knuckles. “But first I need to know, who are you contacting? You have to be careful who you speak to.”

“Brandon deserves to know what’s going on, even if I just leave a message. Maybe I shouldn’t tie up your phone after all. I’ll just fish my bag from the back.” She started to twist around, the seat belt cutting into her neck. She reached to unbuckle—