Witness to Passion (Entangled Ignite) (Guarding Her Body) (4 page)

GDG Security Solutions. The independent firm Shane and his friends, Ciaran Ross, Khalil Jordan, and Maddox Wright, owned and ran together. She’d always been curious about the business—a company made up of ex-military and law enforcement—and had even once purposefully driven by the brownstone on Arlington Street where the office was located. Everything she’d discovered about the firm, she’d Googled, too embarrassed to ask Addisyn and reveal her hunger about any details regarding Shane to her best friend.

“GDG.” She leaned forward. “I’ve always wondered what it stood for.”

A beat of silence. “Gold Dust Green.”

Huh
. “Does it mean something special?”

“In the military, it means everything’s okay, good to go.” Another beat of silence. “Focus, Fallon.”

Irritation flashed, and she took another sip of tea. “I am focusing. Sue me for being curious. But fine. I should’ve called you when I decided to do something as foolish as witness a gangland hit. My bad. Next time it happens, you’ll be first on my to-do list. Right under ‘don’t die,’” she drawled.

He didn’t roll his eyes, but she suspected it was a close call.

“Agreeing to be a state’s witness against a notorious gang leader when other people probably would—and did—claim spontaneous blindness and deafness is commendable,” he said. “But I’m not going to lie, Fallon, if I had a vote, I would’ve preferred you’d been one of those witnesses struck dumb and mute rather than have you involved with Jonah Michaels and the Lords of War. Yeah, it’s brave, but damn, it seems like trouble finds you like a heat-seeking missile.”

“Aaand this is my fault, how?” she asked from between gritted teeth. “Hold on, hold on,” she countered, holding up a hand, palm out. “Let me guess. I’m reckless, rash, and I don’t think through consequences.”

How many times had she heard
those
words from him through the years?

He studied her, drumming his fingers on the arm of the chair. “Have you forgotten about buying property on the moon in case an apocalypse swept across the Earth—”

She snorted. “I was seventeen and had just finished reading
The Stand
.”

“And the time you donated your first year’s college tuition check to the Hurricane Katrina relief fund without your father’s knowledge—”

“Really?” she demanded. “Forget it being an incredibly altruistic gesture, but I did that years ago.”

Shane arched an eyebrow. “And breaking into Addy’s ex-boyfriend’s car and planting spoiled eggs and garbage under the seats? That was just two years ago.”

Stiffening, she set her tea on the coffee table. “He was a douche who cheated on Addy and broke her heart. Was it childish? Sure. But if you’re waiting for me to apologize, forget it. Sometimes you have to go ‘yippee-ki-yay’ on a person who deserves it.”

He stared at her. Blinked. Then slowly nodded. “Yippee-ki-yay. Got it. Next time you’re in lockup and I’m trying to get you out, I’ll make sure to explain your philosophy to the arresting officer. I’m sure he’ll understand.”

“I think I liked you better when you didn’t talk so much,” she grumbled, snatching up the remote control and turning on the television.

He had a point—and she hated it. But other than the anomaly with Doug the Douche, Addisyn’s cheating rat-bastard ex, she’d prided herself on using her head more often now, not rushing headlong into situations with the purpose of seeking attention.

Once upon a time she’d been thirsty for someone—anyone—to notice her, to love her. But one morning in her sophomore year of college after waking up in the bed of boyfriend #4 in as many months, she’d stumbled into his bathroom, stared into the mirror above the sink, and found her mother gazing back at her—seeking affirmation and love in the false words and affections of anyone with a halfway decent line and dick.

That day, she’d walked out and vowed that if no one could love her, she would have to depend on herself to do it. No more careless relationships or reckless acts to threaten her academic and professional future. She didn’t need a man or his pretty lies to validate herself. She’d buckled down, decided what she’d wanted to do with her life, and pursued it with a passion and diligence that had surprised her father and delighted Addy. And herself.

But Shane wouldn’t know about any of that. He’d been deployed overseas, and then when he’d returned home, spending time with her hadn’t exactly been on his to-do list. She probably fit somewhere between waxing his short ’n’ curlies and a colonoscopy.

Yet…his opinion still mattered.

And it still hurt that he couldn’t see there was more to her than the rash eighteen-year-old who’d ambushed him in his mother’s kitchen. How did she fight that?

A better question.

Why did she care?

…

The air, thick and sticky, trapped Fallon in its smothering embrace as she turned around, the movement torturously slow. The barrel of the gun seemed to expand, to fill her entire vision. She tried to shift backward, to the side, attempted to do anything to avoid that ugly, black void of death. But it followed her like the head of a striking snake. Running was useless—impossible. Her feet were fused to the ground, refusing to move.

The gun barrel started to glow an ominous red, orange, and yellow like a fire simmering in the belly of a great dragon. She opened her mouth wide, but the same air that stifled her motions seemed to fill her throat, lodging the scream in her windpipe.

Frozen, she stared as fire exploded from the end of the weapon, and the bullet sliced toward her…

“
No
.” Fallon jackknifed off the couch, the sheet she didn’t remember covering herself with, tumbling to her waist. Wild, she scanned the room, frantically searching for the gun and the men who wanted to take her life. Heart striking her chest like a hammer against metal, she clutched the white cotton covering her legs. Sweat dampened her skin. Terror stole the moisture from her mouth. She shuddered, a whimper escaping her.

“Shh.” A large, hard, warm palm cupped her cheek. “It’s just a dream, baby. You’re safe.”

She latched onto Shane’s hand as if it were a lifeline, an assurance in the dark that she was indeed, safe. “Hey. Look at me.” The gentle but firm command reached past the jagged edges of panic and snagged onto the reason not enshrouded by the remaining vestiges of her nightmare. She met his bright, steady gaze, clung to the comfort and security in it. “It was just a dream. You’re okay, baby. Breathe for me. With me. That’s it.” He lifted his other hand, cradled her face between his palms. Instinctively, she followed his deep, even inhalations, and eventually her breathing leveled. Her heartbeat no longer thundered in her ears like relentless waves crashing against a rocky shore.

The pad of his thumb swept the skin under her eye. “Better?”

No
. “Yes.”

“Good,” he murmured and rose from his crouch next to her.

Alarm blared inside her, loud, harsh, violent. “No,” she rasped, her grip on his wrists tightening. “Don’t leave me. Please.”

Yes, she was begging him to stay with her, to continue touching her. Yet, she couldn’t dredge up disgust for how weak she sounded. Not when the claws of the nightmare lurked just on the fringes of her subconscious, waiting for her to become vulnerable again. Waiting to sink its talons into her once more.

He hesitated, but after a moment, lowered to the cushion beside her. The solid heat from his hip pressed into hers, but it wasn’t enough. Like a little girl afraid of the monsters under her bed, she scrambled onto his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face in the crook between his throat and shoulder. She inhaled his fresh scent, took it into herself like a lucky talisman.

“Fallon,” he murmured, tone as strained and tense as the big body beneath her.

“Just for a little while,” she pleaded. “Please.”

A caress so light that for a moment she almost believed her desperate mind had imagined it swept down her hair. The air stilled in her lungs. Because if she had conjured it, maybe the soft stroke would come again. And it did. A strong arm curled around her back, long fingers settling on her hip. Slowly, she exhaled. Relaxed. Burrowed into the welcoming, safe haven of his chest.

Sighed.

Her lashes lowered, drowsiness creeping in to tug at her. She drifted, floating on a delicious, warm current. Quiet descended over the room, the only sounds their hushed breaths.

As she drifted back to sleep, firm lips brushed over her curls, across her forehead.

“I have you,” a low voice rumbled. Vowed.

Or maybe she dreamed that, too.

Chapter Five

The weak late-morning sun struggled to beam down on Shane as he leaned against the hood of his truck outside the District A-1 station of the Boston Police Department. The breeze was surprisingly brisk for May, and several people hustled past him, hands shoved in pockets or collars jacked up around their ears as they hurried toward the front entrance of the station. A couple of officers shot him curious glances as they passed by him in the parking lot.

Run me in
. He met their gazes head-on.
You’ll be doing me a favor after last night
. Yeah, a little disturbing the peace charge would be the perfect excuse to avoid a repeat of the hell he’d endured the night before. Allowing the police to do his dirty work smacked of cowardice. But when a man faced down temptation that made Eve’s apple look like a Little Debbie snack, he could be forgiven for contemplating running scared.

“Fuck me,” he growled, crossing his arms. He deserved a goddamn medal for the restraint he’d exhibited. Especially when Fallon had kissed the scars on his back. Scars he could’ve gone the rest of his existence without her ever glimpsing. A hot flash of humiliation speared him. He wasn’t ashamed of his wounds. How could he be? Not when Marcus had given his life so Shane could stand here today, damaged but alive. On reflex, Shane grazed his fingers over the three dog tags concealed beneath his shirt. Two of them belonged to him, and one to Marcus. The other half of his dead friend’s ID hung around his GDG partner Khalil’s neck.

Still…

He hadn’t wanted Fallon to ever see the marks. They represented a dark period when he’d been terrified, grieving, vulnerable. When the body he’d always considered strong and capable had been dependent on the tubes invading his flesh, and his mind and reason had been muddied by drugs. A period when he hadn’t been able to see a future past the frosted glass doors of Walter Reed Army Medical Center’s ICU.

If he’d had his wish, his mother and sister wouldn’t have been allowed in to see him, but his CO and doctors had overruled that while he’d been under. His family’s presence at his hospital bed had been out of his control, but Fallon’s had not. He’d refused. Having her witness him hooked up to countless machines, helpless as a baby…weak…

Yeah, never would’ve been too soon for her to observe those scars. And last night…

His gut clenched at the phantom sensation of her lips caressing flesh that had been deadened to sensation since an enemy bullet had gouged out a chunk of skin and tissue. But, it’d seemed like the moment she’d pressed her mouth to him, nerve endings had regenerated and fired to life. The pleasure—the pleasure had bolted through him like he’d stuck his finger into an electrical outlet. For a moment, he’d forgotten every reason why touching her was a bad idea: little sister’s best friend; different as night and day; asking for trouble if Addy ever found out.

It’d taken every scrap of control he tenuously possessed not to tangle his hand into those gorgeous curls, drag her around, crush his mouth to hers, and taste the sweet flavor he’d spent seven years trying to forget. Required every ounce of restraint not to lay her out on the couch, floor, table—hell, any flat surface would do—and sink his cock into her inch by inch.

But he hadn’t. He’d walked away. Damn near ran away, needing space and a breather before he could return with a semblance of calm.

And he deserved to be fucking canonized for the sacrifice.

A memory flashed across his brain. Fallon, standing at the end of the sofa in a T-shirt that did nothing to hide the perfect thrust of her breasts and shorts that barely covered her hips and ass. Fallon, a hunger she probably wasn’t even aware she revealed darkening her gray eyes. Fallon, staring at his cock like it was the Eighth Wonder of the World.

He clenched his jaw against the onslaught of lust razing a path straight to his dick.

Damn canonized. He deserved a halo and wings.

The front entrance to the police department swung open once again, and this time the man he’d come to see emerged.

Tristan Scott, Boston Police detective and Shane’s childhood friend, crossed the parking lot, his long, confident stride eating up the distance. He had every right to that self-assurance. At thirty, Tristan was one of the youngest detectives on the force. He’d always known what he’d wanted for his future—to be a police officer just like his father and his grandfather. He rose steadily in the ranks of a career he loved and owned a home in South End with his beautiful fiancée of two years, Joy Sanders. Tristan had the dream—at least the dream Shane desired.

Stability. Family.

Growing up with Trudy Roarke as a mother, he appreciated the need for stability, security, and routine. While he’d never doubted his mother’s love, and she’d never shorted him and Addy on affection, hugs hadn’t paid the power bills or the rent. Kisses hadn’t filled the refrigerator with food. And neither could erase the dread of climbing the stairs of their South End apartment building, afraid to look at the door in case another eviction notice was taped to the front. He’d craved normalcy. Had joined the Army in search of it. While others had chafed at the rules, discipline, and rigid structure, he’d craved them—flourished under them.

He still embraced them.

“Hey.” Tristan dragged Shane forward and into a brief, back-slapping hug, which Shane returned. “I haven’t seen you in a while. What’s up? Everything okay at the firm?”

“Yeah,” Shane said, returning the friendly pound. “We’re good.”

Releasing him, Tristan ran his dark green gaze over Shane’s face. “As good as it is to see you, somehow I doubt this is a how-the-hell-are-you? visit. What’s up?”

“Jonah Michaels,” Shane stated, getting right to the point. He didn’t have time to beat around the bush. In the hour since he’d followed Fallon to her job and left her under Maddox’s watchful eye, a relentless itch had settled between his shoulder blades. The sense of urgency hadn’t abated but had grown more insistent. He couldn’t explain the feeling, but he didn’t question it, either. It’d saved his ass too often to count both in Afghanistan and on the job here in Boston.

A frown creased Tristan’s brow. “Jonah Michaels,” he repeated. His eyes narrowed. “Why are you asking me about him? What do you know?”

“I know a couple of his boys nearly killed Fallon last night.”

A cold mask dropped over his friend’s features, and in that instant, he transformed from best friend to hardened cop. “Where?” he quietly demanded.

“Her apartment. They were lying in wait for her to arrive home.” Shane relayed what’d occurred the night before.

“Shit. Where are these two now? Why didn’t you call the police?” Tristan snapped.

“Because we handled it.” A small, nasty smile curved his lips as he recalled the early morning phone call from Ciaran and Khalil.

After some…persuasion, the two assholes had spilled everything they knew. Which admittedly, hadn’t been much. Low in the pecking order, they’d been told to take care of Fallon and make it seem like a mugging gone bad. Nothing more. Shane silently snorted. That assignment had been an epic fail, and in a couple of hours, those two would find themselves with room and board courtesy of the Boston PD.

“You. Handled. It,” Tristan bit out. “You had no business ‘handling it.’ You’re not the cops. Are they alive?”

“They’re alive.” Damn, he was the second person to ask him that. What? Did he and Fallon believe he’d devolved into a bloodthirsty savage? He snorted. “All we did was transport them to a secure location to ask them some questions.”

“And?” Tristan pressed.

“And nothing.” Truth. The two thugs were low-level gang members following orders and hoping to gain more status by killing the woman responsible for their leader being locked up. Shane cocked his head, a burgeoning anger simmering in his chest and rising like the mercury in a thermometer. “You don’t seem surprised to hear Michaels’s and Fallon’s names linked. Why is that?” he asked, his tone as deadly soft as Tristan’s.

A pause. “Because I’m the lead detective on the case.”

You can’t punch him. You can’t punch him. He’s not just your friend but the police
. Screw it. Shane crowded into Tristan’s personal space, his chest bumping the other man’s. “You mean to tell me you’ve known all along that Fallon was in danger, and you didn’t think to mention it to me?”

“Back off,” Tristan snarled, fire leaping in his eyes. “We offered to place her in a safe house, but she refused. And since Michaels was locked up and her identity kept under wraps, we didn’t force the issue. Besides, you know damn well I couldn’t tell you. It was—
is
—a police matter. Only a few of us were aware of her name, and the fewer people, the better chance she remained anonymous.”

Logic didn’t cool the rage seething inside him. “Well, that ship has not only sailed but been blown to hell and back. Still, it begs the question,” Shane continued, unease skulking through his veins and sending the itch between his shoulders into a full-out rash, “why are you being so forthcoming now when you’ve been close-lipped for the past three months?”

Tristan shifted back a couple a steps and dragged a hand over his short, auburn hair, glancing over his shoulder as if ensuring no one overheard him. “Because Jonah Michaels escaped from our custody this morning.”

Unease blazed into razor-edged panic. It sliced into him, sharp, terrifying. Escaped? How?
Jesus Christ
. Inhaling deeply, he buried the alarm beneath a slab of ice. “What happened?”

Fury suffused his friend’s face, tightening his mouth into a grim, flat line. “He had a court appearance this morning to set a trial date. On the transfer in, the prison bus was hijacked, and Michaels escaped. A corrections officer was killed, as well as the driver. I just returned from the scene not too long ago. Fallon needs to know. With him on the loose and his gang crazy enough to attack a prison bus, she has to go into witness protection. If her identity has been leaked, killing her will be his first order of business.”

“Witness protection? Your department couldn’t even protect her name, and now you expect me to entrust her life into that same care?” He shook his head. “No. I—GDG—will guard her.”

A part of him conceded his accusation was unfair. The program didn’t claim to be infallible, but it worked way more often than it failed. Yet, that small percentage existed, and he wasn’t willing to take the chance of Fallon beating the odds. He’d observed firsthand the devastation that it going wrong had wreaked. Five years ago, Ciaran had convinced an associate of one of the most vicious crime families in the country to testify and enter witness protection. Someone had leaked the location, and while trying to rescue the informant, he’d been shot and the informant killed. Ciaran carried the enormous guilt to this day.

An image of Fallon jerking awake from a nightmare, her gray eyes nearly black and sightless with terror, slid across his mind’s eye. No, he couldn’t bear the possibility of Fallon ending up as a statistic. Not on his watch. And not if he could prevent it.

“I repeat,” Tristan ground out. “This is a police matter. Now, since you were sitting on her last night, I’m assuming you know where she is right now.” At Shane’s silence, Tristan moved forward, reclaiming the space he’d placed between them. “Shane, you are my best friend, but I swear to God I will haul your ass into that station and have you brought up on obstruction charges. If you care about your sister’s friend, you will let me do my job. Now where is she?”

Shane arched an eyebrow, not in the least bit intimidated. “Home,” he lied. When Tristan glared at him, mistrust glittering in his eyes, Shane added, “Maddox is with her.”

Finally, Tristan nodded, the anger slowly fading from his features. Sympathy and resolve replaced the darker emotion, and a slight twinge of guilt over his deception twisted Shane’s stomach. Slight though, and nothing he couldn’t deal with if it meant Fallon’s safety.

“All right,” Tristan said, glancing over his shoulder in the direction of the station. “Thanks for the info. I need to get over there then. And, Shane,” he clamped a hand on Shane’s shoulder, squeezing it, “I’ll keep her safe. I promise.”

“Tristan.”

They both turned at the sound of the soft, feminine voice. As the willowy, tall blonde in a dark green pantsuit approached them, Shane glanced at Tristan…and snorted. God, please never let him wear that same sappy expression on his face. He was embarrassed for his friend.

“What?” Tristan asked, shooting a look at Shane before switching his attention back to Joy Sanders, his fiancée.

“Nothing.” Shane shrugged. “I just always wondered exactly what whipped looked like, and now I know.”

“Fuck off,” he murmured without heat, affection for his woman softening his green eyes and curving his lips. “Hey, sweetheart.”

Joy rose on tiptoe and pressed her mouth to Tristan’s, her love for the detective just as obvious. Even after the tame kiss, their eyes remained connected, as if transmitting a secret message only the two of them knew. Shane glanced away, feeling like a damn Peeping Tom.

Shane tried not to envy his friend the love of his fiancée. Joy, a computer programmer at one of the most prestigious software companies in the state, was intelligent, beautiful, and kind. She didn’t begrudge Tristan his long hours but supported him, and Shane couldn’t help but like and admire her. She was perfect for his friend.

He cleared his throat, and Joy smiled at him, sliding an arm around Tristan’s waist.

“Hi, Shane,” she greeted. “We missed you at dinner last week.”

“I’m sorry. Work came up. But I’ll be there next time.”

“Good.” Joy nodded. “I’m holding you to it. So,” she said, tipping her head back and refocusing on Tristan, “are you ready?”

“Damn.” Tristan winced. “We were supposed to have an early lunch.”

“Supposed?” She arched an eyebrow.

“Yeah, something came up on one of my cases, and I have to take care of it immediately. I’m sorry.”

Joy shook her head. “No worries, honey.” She brushed her lips across his jaw. “I understand. Will you be home for dinner?”

“I should. If there’s a problem, I’ll call ahead.”