Loe raamatut: «Relentless Protector»

Chapter One

Lisa Meador was running late again, ridiculously late thanks to the passive-aggressive front office manager, who had scheduled her for yet another dental cleaning way too close to school dismissal.

Still in her scrubs following her long afternoon, she was wound up in knots and already thinking about her next errand when she swung into what ought to be the line of parents waiting in cars at her son’s elementary school.

Except there was no line. She was the last and only car. The last parent, picking up the last and tiniest of students, who stood with an impatient-looking teacher in attendance.

I’m so sorry, Lisa mouthed before her older-model silver Camry slowed to a complete stop. But the knot of tension in her stomach loosened as five-year-old Tyler came dashing toward the car, his huge smile seeming to run ahead of him.

It was the smile Lisa lived for, the one thing that had kept her breathing, putting one foot before the other, in the thirteen months since her husband, Devin, had been killed by a suicide bomber in Afghanistan.

Only twenty-eight when she was widowed, Lisa was determined not to dwell on the unfairness of her loss. Instead, she focused on the five good years she and Devin had had together and the tawny-haired boy whose antics kept her scrambling to keep up.

The teacher on duty, a plump, graying woman in old-fashioned cat-eyed glasses, did some scrambling of her own to beat tiny Tyler to the back door of Lisa’s car and hold it open.

“No running into the circle, Tyler, or you’ll have to miss next recess,” she warned as the boy clambered into his booster seat like a spider monkey. “We don’t want anybody getting hurt, now.”

“Yes, ma’am, Mrs. Davies, ma’am.” Tyler’s back straightened, and his right hand shot stiffly to his brow in his best approximation of a soldierly salute. His dad’s salute, remembered only from Skype calls and home videos. Duty done, Tyler snapped the buckle and hugged his plush stuffed octopus in his arms before tacking on a worried “Sorry I forgot again. I’ll do better next time.”

Mrs. Davies flicked a pointed look toward Lisa before her stern pretense dissolved into a smile. Lisa understood, since it was hard staying angry, even for a minute, at the smallest boy and biggest live wire in the kindergarten class.

“I’ll remind him, too,” she told the teacher. “And I promise, I’ll be here earlier tomorrow.”

She swore she would keep that promise, even if it meant a showdown with the most vindictive office manager in all of Coopersville. Because as important as Lisa’s job was to her and Tyler’s well-being, she refused to give in to the reign of petty evil.

Once they left the school, she turned onto the town’s main drag. Her heart constricted as she noticed that most of the businesses had put out both American and Texas flags, along with a host of cheerful signs and banners welcoming home the heroes of the nearby base’s returning combat unit.

Devin’s combat unit, or what was left of it.

Swallowing back grief, she drew a deep breath and gave a silent prayer of thanks for all those who were coming home to happy families. Walking into their arms instead of being carried in a grim, flag-draped procession.

“I’m really hungry, Mommy,” said Tyler. “Can we stop for a kid’s meal? Please?”

“Sorry, sweetie,” she said, glad for the distraction. “We have to go get Rowdy—the groomer’s closing early today. And then we’re heading straight home for the good stuff.”

Tonight she was determined to cook her son a healthy dinner with some actual vegetables in it, no matter how stressed she was or how tempted by the idea of an easy drive-through pickup.

“But kids’ meals are the good stuff,” he argued. “They have toys inside.”

Sighing, Lisa mentally cursed whatever marketing genius had dreamed up putting kiddie kryptonite inside the cartoon-covered boxes. Tyler sulked, refusing her attempts to talk about his school day. Choosing to ignore the behavior, she soon pulled into the parking lot of a small gold bungalow, sliding into a space between a beat-up white panel van and a bright yellow Beetle with a

Buttercup’s Cuts-4-Pups bumper sticker.

“Come on, champ,” Lisa said with as much cheer as she could muster. “Let’s go bail out Rowdy. He’ll be so glad to see you.”

For a moment, Tyler looked as if he meant to balk, but apparently the thought of seeing his beloved dog—a rescue puppy she’d adopted on impulse two days after Devin’s funeral—was enough to get him moving.

Five minutes and fifty dollars later, they emerged with Rowdy, freshly shorn of much of his cream-colored hair. Once he reached the grass, the little dog rolled and peed and jumped and barked and spun like a deranged wind-up toy on the end of his leash. But at least the Lhasa apso mix’s excitement had Tyler laughing again.

It had Lisa laughing, too...right up until the moment she felt something hard and unyielding shoved against her lower back.

She didn’t know it was a gun at first, not until she heard the hiss of a woman’s voice in her ear. “Stay very still, and don’t scream. Not unless you want your brat to watch you die.”

Lisa’s eyes widened, and her muscles froze. Shock waves detonated through her; she couldn’t move or breathe or think.

But her eyes instinctively found Tyler, squatting beside Rowdy and rubbing the wriggling animal’s belly. Worthless as a watchdog, the animal remained as oblivious as the boy.

“That’s such a good girl,” the woman praised her, the menace clinging to the words redefining the word “evil” in Lisa’s mind forever. “Now get him in the car. We’re going for a ride.”

Never let an attacker take you to a second location. The advice floated up from memory, one of her police officer dad’s grim lessons from her younger years.

“You can have my purse. My paycheck’s in it.” Her voice trembled. “I’ll even sign it for you and give you the PIN for my bank card.”

The barrel ground painfully against her backbone. “One bullet in your spine, another in your head. And then I start on him, if you don’t follow my directions. To the letter. ”

“Tyler, honey,” Lisa croaked. “Tyler, in the car, please. Take Rowdy with you. Quickly.”

Tyler looked up sharply, his blue eyes huge and worried as his gaze moved from her face to whoever was standing behind her. “Hi?” he ventured, his voice very small.

“Better do as your mom says,” the stranger advised, and something lurking behind the iced-sugar sweetness of those few words had Tyler scurrying to comply without a word of argument.

As the pressure on her spine eased, Lisa dared to turn her head. Not all the way—she feared she would be shot point-blank if the woman caught her staring—but enough to get a peripheral impression of a taller figure topped with blue-streaked, unnaturally black hair, hacked unevenly to chin length. Dressed in black, too, all skintight straight-leg jeans and a tiny micro T-shirt that clung to small, pigeon’s-egg breasts.

“What is it you want?” Lisa asked as the white door of the panel van slid open.

When a skinny man stepped from the opening, fresh dread launched icy daggers through her system. He was slightly taller than the woman. His shaved head and the black chin-strap beard weren’t half so alarming as the wild gleam in his eyes and the way sweat plastered his wife-beater T-shirt to a wiry-thin body crawling with dark tattoos.

Could this be about rape, then, if not robbery? Did they mean to take her somewhere in the white van, leaving her child here alone?

Gut-churning as the thought was, Lisa knew that at least Tyler would be safe here. He would run inside the groomer’s shop as soon as she disappeared from view. Even if terror froze him in place, someone would soon find him. Then the police would call her sister, who would get here as quickly as she could. Who would raise her child if she had to.

Because Lisa knew if she got inside that white van, she wasn’t coming back alive.

“What we want,” the woman finally answered, shifting her thin shoulder beneath the strap of the oversize duffel bag slung over it, “is for you to take us all for a little ride in your car. We’re going to the main branch of the First National Bank of Coopersville.”

Confusion sent Lisa’s mind spinning back to thoughts of robbery. “But my bank’s the military credit union over on-post.”

“You damn well better do what she says!” the man roared, making Lisa jump. “ Exactly, or it’s over.”

Hurrying to obey, she fished her keys from her purse, then opened the driver’s-side door and got in. Before she could stab the shaking key into the ignition, the woman had climbed into the passenger seat beside her.

More horrifying still was the moment the man climbed into the rear seat, sitting right beside her son, who started wailing loudly.

As Rowdy, on the booster seat’s opposite side, began to whine, too, the woman thrust the gun toward Lisa’s face. “Shut the brat up, or I swear I’ll do it for you.”

Panic spiraled through Lisa’s body, a sickening physical sensation that took her back to the moment she’d learned of her husband’s death. She hadn’t been there to stop it, but she wasn’t letting this sick couple do anything to her son. Whatever she must endure, she swore she would keep him safe.

With that vow, an eerie, disconnected calm washed over her in warm waves, giving her the strength to turn to Tyler, to reach back and touch his small leg. “Tyler, baby. You have to listen. Listen to me, soldier.”

He responded when she called him soldier, coming to attention so sharply that she thanked God for this phase he’d been going through for months now. But red blotches stood out on his pale face, and tears trembled on his lashes. If she didn’t reach him right away, he would quickly lose it again.

“When Daddy was in battle, he had to keep his troops safe. Rowdy and Octobuddy are your troops now. It’s up to you to set a brave example, to keep them safe and calm.”

The anxiety in his blue eyes shifted; just like that, he slipped into the plane of childish imagination, a safe haven from this nightmare. “I can... I can be brave,” he said uncertainly.

She looked into her only child’s face, directing every atom of love and confidence she could muster toward him. “You can be a hero, Tyler, with medals just like your dad’s and generals coming to salute you. And Daddy will be so proud, watching over you from heaven.”

Tyler gave her a crisp salute, his moppet’s bangs falling into his eyes. Swallowing past the lump in her throat, Lisa saluted back.

“Real freakin’ touching,” said the woman, a sneer on her thin face. A face and voice that nudged a memory Lisa couldn’t place.

Could she have met this woman before? Inadvertently done something to bring on this horror? Before she could stop herself, the question slipped out. “Who are you?”

To her surprise, the woman’s mouth twisted into a cruel smile, and she answered, “You can call me Evie. Let’s make it Evie LeStrange. Now give me that damned purse.”

As she yanked it away, then pulled a straw bag from her duffel and tossed it at Lisa, the backseat passenger hooted with laughter before the woman sliced her vicious blue gaze his way. He fell silent in an instant, confirming Lisa’s suspicion that “Evie” was calling the shots.

Heart pounding, Lisa risked a second question. “Why are you doing this to us? Have I somehow—”

A blur of motion preceded a sharp blow—the barrel of the woman’s gun striking the side of Lisa’s skull. Her vision dimmed as pain arced through her, but terrified of upsetting Tyler, she did no more than gasp.

Beside her, her assailant snarled, “Any more questions? Good. Now let’s get movin’. Bank’s closing in a half hour, and trust me, Sweet Girl Baby, you do not want to be late.”

Sweet Girl Baby. The familiar words sent a queasy ripple through Lisa’s midsection, but she was too occupied with keeping herself and her son alive to think about it now.

* * *

L ONG AND LEAN AND standing tall as Texas, Cole Sawyer strode into First National as if he owned the place. Months of doubt and worry over whether he had done the right thing mustering out of the army had all been vanquished by the letter of acceptance in the inner pocket of his jacket. The letter guaranteeing him a place in the next class of U.S. Marshal recruits two months from now in Georgia.

The army brass had hated losing a warrior in his prime, and his fellow Rangers couldn’t understand why a trained sniper, a hawkeyed marksman who could take down a camouflaged enemy a half mile distant, would “bail” on them. Why he would allow a single incident, viewed through his scope, to instantly, irrevocably make him lose his taste for the kind of clean kills that supported his team’s mission.

Better he should move his accounts rather than leaving his money at the military credit union, where he would continue running into his former comrades all too often. Where he would be forced to face their disappointment or, worse yet, their attempts to convince him that in wartime, people died, that he hadn’t been the one to kill them.

He was sitting in a glassed-in booth, filling out the paperwork to open his new accounts, when he saw the brunette walking past him toward the teller’s counter. After months of self-imposed celibacy, he couldn’t help noticing her, his eyes drawn to the curvy figure that her loose raspberry-and-white scrubs could not hide and the wavy, coffee-rich hair that fell well past her shoulders. His gaze flicked to a pretty face, no older than late twenties, and his heart jerked as he was slammed with recognition, followed instantly by guilt.

She was one of the widowed military spouses featured in last month’s article in USA This Morning—a woman widowed thirteen months before. Widowed because he’d failed her husband.

He’d known that Lisa Meador and her son lived in town still, had made a note of where she worked and found out where their house was, when he was still thinking of going to her and explaining his role in her husband’s death. Of begging her forgiveness for that one death, one of many. Somehow, though, his C.O., Drew Woodsen, had gotten wind of it and ordered him to steer clear. Cole would have gone anyway, if Woodsen hadn’t made him understand that his appearance would only amount to a selfish—and totally unnecessary—bid for absolution that would end up causing Lisa and her son even more pain.

Cole meant to drag his gaze away before she caught him looking, but there was something in her glazed, wide-eyed stare that brought him to his feet. Something he’d seen frozen on the features of the female terrorist in the moments before she’d self-detonated in the center of that crowded market.

Could Devin Meador’s widow be so undone by his death, or facing such financial hardship, that she would actually...

“Is something wrong, Mr. Sawyer?” asked the bank’s customer service manager, a stout, middle-aged woman with a sprayed blond helmet of a bob. Following his gaze, she smiled on seeing Lisa. “Oh, she is a pretty thing. A friend of yours?”

“Not yet,” he said with a wink he wasn’t feeling. “Would it be all right with you if I drop these papers back here first thing in the morning?”

Misreading his distraction, the manager laughed. “Anything for love. You have a pleasant evening.”

Cole stepped from her office, feeling for the concealed handgun hidden in his waistband just in case. Licensed to carry in the state of Texas, he had come armed only to safeguard the cashier’s check he’d meant to deposit, a check representing the bulk of his life’s savings.

Never in his wildest imaginings had he figured on the possibility that he might have to stop a bank job, a holdup by a woman radiating the sort of desperation that got people hurt—or killed.

He hoped his instincts were off, that his own guilt had him imagining things, and the look he’d seen on her face signaled something far more mundane. Maybe she’d been laid off or was behind with a car payment, not planning to resort to a federal crime. As she reached inside an oversize straw handbag at the teller’s station, he willed her to come up with a paycheck, or maybe a withdrawal slip or her ID.

He gazed across the bank lobby, but he found no help there. Only a big-bellied, older security guard looking at his watch. Checking to see it was just ten minutes before he could lock the doors and get home to enjoy his evening. Mentally, the man had already clocked out.

And why wouldn’t he, with no other customers in the lobby but the fortyish business type filling out his deposit ticket at an island counter and the pretty raspberry-and-white scrubs woman who pulled out a piece of paper and passed it to the teller before shoving her hand back into the bag...?

Where she was holding something, Cole was certain. Something that—damn it all—had to be a gun.

Though he couldn’t see the weapon, he knew it from the way the petite, red-haired teller stiffened and took on the same pale green color as the maternity blouse that covered the late-term swell of her midsection. Cole edged a few steps closer, his hand on his own gun.

His heart was thumping, adrenaline priming every nerve and muscle, readying him for a fight he didn’t want—the fight to keep everyone inside this bank alive, including his fellow soldier’s widow. No matter how justified the circumstances, he knew that any discharge of his weapon would trigger an investigation, which could easily result in his missing the start date for his training class. And heaven only knew when there might be another.

But no matter what it cost him, it wasn’t in Cole Sawyer to walk away from trouble, not the sort of trouble that could get a pregnant teller or a distressed widow killed. Swearing he wouldn’t fire unless he absolutely had to, he took another cautious step.

“Don’t scream, don’t even think of triggering an alarm, and you’ll be fine, I swear it,” Lisa whispered, the tension in her own voice like the sizzling of a fuse.

A fuse quickly burning toward a deadly detonation. Cole saw it all too clearly, as the teller’s green eyes widened even farther. She was about to lose it, about to give way to a fit of shrieking guaranteed to spell disaster....

A disaster he had the chance to stop. A second chance...

He took another step, trying to gain an angle that wouldn’t put the pregnant woman in his line of fire.

He was interrupted by a sharp cry of alarm, not from the teller but from the friendly service manager who’d helped him. “Oh, no!” Her terror echoed off the glass and marble of the room. “He’s got a gun!”

She was pointing at him, he realized, as Lisa whirled in his direction, her weapon rising from her purse.

Cole acted on instinct, diving to one side to avoid fire from both the robber and the security guard, and getting off a single shot of his own, a shot meant to disable and not kill. Because in spite of all his training and several hard lessons underscoring the damage a wounded combatant could still inflict, an older instinct guided his hand. An instinct prompted by the desperation in the brunette’s beautiful brown eyes....

And the trickle of bright red blood already dripping from her hairline before he squeezed the trigger.