Worth the Risk (5 page)

Chapter 5

C
oherent thought flew from Meredith’s brain as Sam kissed her. His exploration was almost tentative at first. Gentle. But as soon as she lifted her arms to his shoulders, welcoming the attention, the kiss deepened, and Sam’s exploration grew more demanding. He tasted the corners of her mouth with his tongue, probing firmly.

Then his hand lifted to the small of her back, and Meredith gasped at the contact. He took advantage, delving between her lips. And each time his tongue found a new spot, Meredith’s desire spiraled higher. In mere moments, a fan of heat radiated through her. It was hottest at the points where Sam’s body touched hers directly. Their mouths. The tips of his fingers under the back of her T-shirt. The brush of his cheek on her chin. But where it was most distracting was at the points where she
wanted
to be touched.

Everywhere,
she thought.
I want him to touch me everywhere.

Except he was already pulling away, already giving her lip a final, light tug and putting a few inches of space between them.

“Meredith...” He spoke her name in a low, sexy rumble and ran his thumb along her jaw. “I’m not going to apologize for that.”

Apologize?

She stared at him wordlessly. She seemed to be having a hard time catching her breath. And it had nothing to do with their frantic escape. Not that she would fully trust her voice anyway. She’d never, not in all her twenty-seven years, been kissed like that. Never felt such a strong attraction to a man after such a short time. Maybe never at all. She didn’t know if the adrenaline really was heightening things, or if it was just Sam. All she knew was that the last thing she wanted was an apology. But she couldn’t make the words come.

After a silent minute, Sam sighed and pulled a slim black phone from his pocket. He keyed in a set of numbers, then carried on a monosyllabic conversation before turning his attention back to Meredith.

“Worm’s on his way.”

She finally found her voice. “Worm?”

“A guy I trust when I can’t trust anyone else.”

“Why can’t you trust anyone?” Meredith’s forehead creased with worry.

He met her eyes. “The less I tell you, the safer you are.”

“Then I must be the safest person on the planet, because you haven’t told me anything.”

“Meredith.” His voice was flat. Totally at odds with the kiss he’d just given her.

Fine. We can both do that.

“Tell me why you showed up at my door this morning,” Meredith said, just as evenly. “And tell me why you’re looking for Tamara. I think I’ve been patient for long enough.”

A smile tipped up one corner of Sam’s mouth. “This is you being patient?”

Meredith narrowed her eyes. She wasn’t going to let herself be charmed.

“Tell me, or I swear I won’t go another step with you. I’ll walk up to one of these big houses and knock on the front door and tell them I need to call 911,” she warned.

He shot her a glare, but when she took a step toward the closest driveway, he relented.

“I’m a private investigator, Meredith. Someone—a client of your sister’s—hired me to look in on Tamara.”

“Why?”

“I’m breaking the terms of my contract by telling you anything, you realize that?”

“And I’m breaking the terms of my
life
by running through the streets while someone tries to kill me.”

He let out another sigh. “Fine. The client showed up for an online session, and your sister wasn’t there. I guess that’s pretty unusual.”

“The business is everything to Tamara,” Meredith stated. “She’d never abandon a client.”

“Which is what she said. So when Tamara missed a second session that week, she started to get worried,” he explained. “The client didn’t want her identity compromised and she didn’t want to involve the police, so she called me.”

She sensed there was more. “And?”

“I haven’t been able to locate Tamara. And now this.”

“Do you think—” Her voice caught. “Do you think someone took her?”

“I try not to get ahead of myself.”

“But you won’t call the police?”

Sam’s face darkened. “I can’t.”

Worry spiked at his unwillingness to involve the authorities. Then she thought about the police at Nick’s office. Was it something she should tell Sam? It seemed more and more relevant. But aside from his skills as a lifesaver and as an incredible kisser, what did she really know about the man in front of her? She had no clue if his reluctance stemmed from a lack of trust in cops, or if it was something darker. Meredith opened her mouth to ask—or maybe just to insist that the situation was far too dangerous to not call for help—but an oversize truck whipped around the corner, cutting her off. It barreled toward them, then jammed to a stop a few feet away. A big, fully bearded man with a curly ponytail stuck his head out the window.

He tossed a suspicious look at Meredith. “Who’s that?”

“The target’s sister,” Sam replied. “Meredith, this is Worm.”

“Why’s she here?”

Sam put an arm around Meredith’s shoulders. “Because she is.”

Surprise registered on the big man’s face for a second before he recovered. “Let’s see it.”

Sam stepped away from Meredith, reached into his pocket and pulled out the smashed camera.

“What the hell did you do to it?” Worm reached out and snatched it away.

“Disabled it. I hope,” Sam replied drily.

“Possibly. Sure as hell didn’t give the serial number a fighting chance.”

“It’s there,” Sam assured him.

Worm ducked back into the truck and, over the engine, Meredith swore she could hear the sound of a keyboard clacking. A minute later, the bearded man leaned out the window again, drew back his hand and tossed the camera through the air.

“You were right,” he said. “Police-issue.”

Meredith gasped. “The
police
planted the camera?”

Well. At least now his paranoia about the local authorities made sense.

“Still want to call 911, sweetheart?” Sam teased grimly, then looked up at Worm. “Can you give us a hand, my friend?”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” the big man replied. “Hop in.”

As Sam helped boost her into the truck, Meredith’s mind alternated between wanting to go numb and wanting to race wildly. What had Tamara done? Fixed the wrong marriage? Or
not
fixed it? Or was it Nick? Had he crossed the wrong client? She still had a hard time believing her sister would call
her
in an attempt to help
him
. And what about the police involvement? She didn’t have an answer for any of the questions bogging her down, and she was left staring out the window blankly, wondering just how she and Sam would figure it out.

She and Sam.

From the backseat, she stole a glance at him. His held his head tipped to the side, his striking profile on display. He was on the phone, talking in a low voice, attempting to leave a message for the client who hired him to track down Tamara. When he hung up and shot her a reassuring smile, Meredith’s heart gave a surprising lurch.

A half a dozen other questions surfaced. What would have happened to her if he hadn’t shown up when he did? Would the gun-wielding man in the sedan have kidnapped her? Killed her? And what about Tamara? Would her sister have stood a chance if the local PD had been put in charge?

“You okay?” Sam’s voice cut through her worried thoughts.

“Should I be?” she replied.

“Probably not,” he admitted. “But I’m working on it. And we’re here.”

“We’re where?”

“My place,” Worm said and cut the engine.

Belatedly, Meredith realized the big truck had come to a halt in front of a squat bungalow.

“You can rest up,” Sam told her. “Maybe eat something, if you want. Though from what I remember, Worm’s cooking skills consist of takeout and toaster waffles.”

“I’ve had worse,” Meredith said and she let Sam help her from the truck.

Her body ached, and as weird as it seemed, her stomach rumbled the second she thought of food. But as soon as they’d settled into Worm’s living room, and Sam started to lay out his plan, hunger and exhaustion quickly took a backseat to her concern.

“I need to get my notes from my apartment,” Sam said. “Once I have them, Worm’ll use his super tech skills to track Tamara’s movements. I won’t be gone long.”

“You don’t really expect me to agree to being left here, do you?” Meredith asked.

Sam shot Worm a look, and the big man glanced from one of them to the other, muttered something about making coffee, then disappeared up the hall.

“Sending him away isn’t going to change my mind,” Meredith said. “You’re my only lifeline to my sister. If something happens to you while you’re out there getting your notes...”

At the end, her voice almost broke. Because it suddenly struck her that it was true. The man standing over her was the only one she could count on right that second. He was the only other person who knew Tamara was missing and quite possibly the only other person searching for her. The police couldn’t be trusted. Nicholas was nowhere to be found. Not that she exactly trusted him, either. Meredith also couldn’t put any of her friends in danger by telling them what was going on. And if the media got involved, the situation would turn into a circus and Tamara’s life would be at risk. If it wasn’t already.

Oh, God. What if she’s—
Meredith shut down the thought before it could even finish. She refused to consider that her sister was anything but alive.

Sam sat beside her on the couch, and she lifted her hand to stop him from getting any closer. She knew if he touched her, that zap of attraction would floor her again, and she’d be in a bad position to say no to whatever he asked. And she wasn’t backing down. But as her arm raised, so did his, and before she could draw away, his fingers closed on her wrist. He pulled her palm to his chest in a gesture that was both strangely intimate and comforting at the same time.

“I promise I’m doing what I think is best to help Tamara,” he told her gently. “And nothing’s going to happen to me while I’m doing that. It’s my job.”

“If you really believed that, you wouldn’t be asking me to stay here.” Meredith shook her head. “And this might be just a job to you, Sam, but to me, it’s my sister’s life.”

“I didn’t say this was
just
a job,” he amended. “I said it
is
my job.”

“I don’t see the difference.”

He finally let her wrist go.

“I get paid, but I’m not in it for the money. My goal is always the same—to help people. Because I know how it feels to—” He cut himself off abruptly, cleared his throat, then started again. “I’ve seen how my clients feel when someone they love can’t be located, and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. I only take on missing-persons cases, nothing else. My closure rate has been one hundred percent since I started doing this. So the difference is, Meredith, it’s
never
just a job for me.”

At the end of his short but impassioned speech, Meredith stared at him. What had he been about to say before he stopped himself? And why did she get the feeling that, whatever it was he did before he became a PI, his success rate
wasn’t
a hundred percent and that made him unhappy?

So many more questions. And no time to ask them.

“If all of that’s true,” she said, “then you know I can’t just sit around waiting.”

“Let’s say I agreed to let you come with me. What if something
did
happen? How much worse would it be if you were there? How much worse would it be if I couldn’t protect you?”

“How can you protect me at all if I’m here and you’re somewhere else?”

He said her name in a frustrated growl. “Meredith...”

“Just because you don’t want me to be right doesn’t mean I’m not.”

Sam lifted a hand to his hair, which he tugged, then released. “The car.”

“What?”

“You’re going to wait inside of it. You’re going to hold my phone with Worm’s number set to go. If a single thing goes wrong, you call him. You don’t follow me, you don’t call the cops. Just Worm.”

And Meredith nodded her head quickly, afraid if she spoke, he’d change his mind.

* * *

Sam kept his mouth shut and his eyes on the road as he maneuvered the borrowed hatchback—another of Worm’s vehicles, but a far less obtrusive one than his truck—through the streets. He hated that Meredith had talked him in to letting her come along. He hated that it still seemed better than the alternative of leaving her behind. She was right, though. He couldn’t keep her safe if she wasn’t in sight.

Is that the real reason you want her here?
asked an irritating voice in his head.
Or is it something more?

Her safety was definitely a factor, no question. The problem was what was making that safety so important to Sam.

He cast a quick look at Meredith. She’d closed her eyes, her long lashes dipping down to caress her skin. Sam was ridiculously envious of that motion. When was the last time he’d felt an attraction like this one? Had he ever? The jolt each time they touched was definitely unique. Even now, his fingers itched to reach across and trace the ridge of her cheekbone to her delicate jaw. He longed to feel her lips again.

That kiss.

He’d told her he wouldn’t apologize for it, and he wouldn’t. It might’ve been a mistake, but that didn’t mean he was sorry. If anything, he was glad. Life was fragile; sometimes moments
had
to be seized in case they never came again.

No one knew that better than Sam. His heart squeezed. He’d almost told Meredith how well he knew it. That was far more significant than any kind of physical attraction.

He tightened his hands on the steering wheel. Sam didn’t talk about his past. He didn’t discuss the reasons he’d left the police force or the motivation for his devotion to his business. With Meredith, he’d almost slipped up. Another thing he never did.

What was it about her that made him so careless? What made him want to dredge up things better left buried, lay them bare and share them with her?