The smell she associated with Pax—a mix of citrus and pine—fell over her.
She tried to wrestle away from him until she saw the familiar black suit on the stranger at the end of the alley. And the gun he held in his hand.
“Get down.” The heat of Pax’s body enveloped her the second before his words sank in.
The air rushed out of her and her footing failed. Pax’s legs tangled with hers as his body wrapped around hers from behind. His weight pummeled into her and they both dropped through the air. She raised her hands and closed her eyes, waiting for her face to smack against the hard pavement and hoping her fingers could somehow minimize the painful blow.
Noise thundered around her until she couldn’t tell the sounds of her screaming from the other shouts filling the air. Her legs took flight behind her. One minute she saw the ground racing up and the next they twisted and she landed with a hard smack against Pax’s chest. He grunted and swore as his hand curled around her head and his body absorbed most of the impact.
They’d barely landed when he rolled and tucked her under him. In a continuous move, he came up over top of her and swung out his arm. One, two bangs boomed above her. She smelled a faint scent of burning and heard people yelling at the end of the alley for someone to call 911.
Pax’s hand dropped and his body grew limp, pressing deeper against her. “Got him,” he whispered.
In her head the whole scene took an hour, but she guessed it was less than a minute in real time. She let her head drop against the ground as she watched a puff of white cloud shift as it skimmed the blue sky. It took another second for her breathing to return to normal and her heart to stop knocking against the inside wall of her chest.
Her head fell to the side and she glanced back at the SUV. Joel lay stretched out on the seat with his hands still fixed on the gun with the weapon aimed. That fast, she remembered the suited man, and her gaze flipped back to the opening to the street where people now gathered. A man was down with a gun visible by his hand.
When she looked up again, Pax loomed over her, staring down. “I had to.”
She tried to raise her hand and put her palm against his cheek, but her arms suddenly weighed a ton each. “You shot him.”
Pax winced as if she’d struck him. “He was going for you.”
She didn’t understand the look of pain in his eyes. Who he really was and why he’d walked into her life were still parts of a greater mystery, but this time she didn’t doubt his protection.
Maybe it was intuition or adrenaline, or just the shock of so much violence on the quaint streets of Annapolis. “Right.”
His eyes narrowed as he struggled to sit up and help her do the same. “This is about your brother.”
“I … wait, what?” Of all the things she expected him to say, that wasn’t even on the list. “What are you talking about?”
“Your brother ticked off the wrong people and now someone wants to bring you in to flush Sean out.”
The words pelted her. They scrambled and unscrambled, but she couldn’t put them together in any logical way in her brain.
“Talk later. We need to get out of here.” A shadow fell over them. Joel bent over with his hands on his knees. His voice wobbled a bit on each word. “Ben’s handling things out front, but the police are coming and we need to be gone.”
She nodded because she had no idea what to say. This, like so much in her life, was about the men in it. First her dad, now Sean. Their choices. Their actions.
Pax grimaced as he stood up and stretched his legs. When he reached down to her, this time she grabbed his hand and jumped to her feet. Standing in front of him, her fingers speared through his, an odd calm blanketed her. They weren’t out of danger and none of what had happened made sense, but for the first time since Pax walked through her door this morning, a sense of safety radiated through her.
He gave her hand a squeeze. “No more running.”
“I don’t trust you, but I’m not stupid. You always go with the guy who saved your life.”
“Smart woman.”
But she wasn’t ready to turn to mush and follow every order he threw out. “I want answers.”
“Then get in the car.”
BRYCE KINGSTON BALANCED his palms against the sill and looked out his office window. His fingers tapped against the glass as he watched the steady lines of traffic move in each direction and with amazing slowness on the highway sixteen floors below.
After a quick glance at his watch, he shook his head with a harsh laugh. Never mind the hour of the day, barely lunchtime and nowhere near rush hour. The close-in proximity of Tysons Corner, Virginia, to Washington, D.C., meant cars idled and passengers baked in the burning sun and claustrophobic humidity as they tried to go anywhere in the summer heat.
The high-rise space, with its soaring windows and plush carpet, telegraphed the business image he wanted. The granite lobby and bank of security monitors, all designed by him with a team of high-priced architects, created the desired public impression of safety and wealth. He didn’t have a fancy water view or the prime location near the Kennedy Center, but he had the end of the cul-de-sac spot in a business park within a reasonable drive of the airport.
Then there was the real-estate advantage in terms of the clients, and that’s all that mattered to him as the founder of Kingston Inc. One division provided high-speed communication services to the government, ensuring continuous service and functioning networks.
But the new division would be the key to the company’s future. He was sure of it. The high-tech division dealt with top-secret electronic surveillance and assisted the intelligence community and military in collecting and relaying information.
Not bad for a guy who spent most of his youth getting beat up on the school bus for spending so much time in computer class.
After a few years of leaner times and financial insecurities, the business plan was back on track. Well, not all of it. Sean Moore proved to be a wild card. Bryce never expected a low-level computer programmer to sit at the heart of potential corporate-ruining disaster.
“Sir?” Bryce’s assistant, Glenn Harber, stuck his head in the small space he made when he opened the door.
Bryce didn’t hear the knock, but he knew Glenn didn’t skip that requirement. Tall and lean and still an expert rower and member of a team of young businessmen who met on the Potomac River well before dawn twice per week, Glenn knew about structure. He was not a man who shortcut the rules or invaded privacy without a care.
Four years out of business school and loaded down with two master’s degrees and a host of other useless academic information, Glenn had demonstrated his commitment to the company. He came in early and left late. He often flew on the corporate jet for meetings and visits to military bases for demonstrations. And right now he looked as if he’d eaten a heaping plate of rotten conference food.
“Come in.” Bryce pushed away from the window and sat down in his overstuffed desk chair.
The wife had chosen the décor. To Bryce, the dark furniture, set off with patriotic photos
