She jabbed at the down button with her thumb and held her breath, prepared to make a run for the stairs if she had to. The door slid open and she fell over herself getting in. She punched the button for the ground floor and turned just as the doors started to close, only to find herself staring at Marcus’s frozen expression several feet away.
“Sarah—”
The doors closed, cutting him off. The elevator descended, sending Sarah’s stomach into even more turmoil.
She simply couldn’t process what she’d just witnessed. Marcus had killed Allen Cross. She couldn’t even muster any regret. Only fear. Fear for Marcus. How could he think he could get away with something so bold?
The elevator came to a stop and she shoved at the doors, trying to make them open quicker. She pitched headlong into the lobby, stumbling to gain her footing. Just as she righted herself, a hand curled around her arm and yanked her upright.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
She gasped and stared into the eyes of evil.
Stanley Cross, Allen’s brother, gripped her arm until she cried out in pain. His eyes sparked fury, but more than that, they warned her of just what kind of man he was. She knew all too well.
A sob welled in her throat as she faced down the man who was in her nightmares for the last year. She hadn’t seen him since that night in Allen’s office when he and Allen had forever changed the course of her life.
She hated them both more than she ever imagined being able to hate another human being.
Fear paralyzed her for what seemed an interminable amount of time. Her throat closed in and the ball in her stomach knotted painfully until it was all she could do not to vomit all over Stanley’s shoes.
“I asked you a question,” Stanley snapped. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Oh God, he’d find Allen’s body and think she murdered him. Or worse, he’d see Marcus and then Marcus would go to jail. Stanley could place them both at the scene. Even if she wasn’t herself accused of the crime, she could be forced to testify against Marcus.
Something snapped inside her. Rage mounted and swirled like a tornado. She thrust her knee into his groin, balled her fist and swung as hard as she could just as he howled in pain and doubled over.
Her fist met his jaw and he went sprawling.
As he started to scramble up, she ran for the entrance, burst into the night and bolted toward the street. She saw an off-duty cab rounding the corner and she ran in front of it, her arm held up to stop him. The cab screeched to a halt a mere inch from her knee. The driver threw his fist out the window, and obscenities blistered the air.
Ignoring his outrage, Sarah yanked open the back door and crawled in, slamming the door behind her. “Drive!”
The cabbie gave her a disgruntled look in the rearview mirror, then accelerated sharply, muttering about crazy women as he swerved through traffic. “Lady, I was not in service.”
“I’ll make it worth your while. Just drive!”
He heaved an exasperated sigh. “Where to?”
She slammed her eyes shut for a moment as she sought to regain her bearings. Where could she go?
Think. God. What did one do in a situation like this?
She stared down at the purse slung over her neck. She had some cash, her passport, a credit card, her driver’s license. She couldn’t go back to her apartment, could she?
Stanley would have found his brother’s body by now. He’d probably already called the police.
Think, Sarah, think!
“Airport,” she managed to get out.
Her cell phone rang, startling her. She rummaged in her purse and turned it over to check the LCD. Marcus.
Tears burned her eyelids. Her brother. The one person in the world who loved her. He was all she had and now he’d killed for her.
She opened the phone and put it to her ear.
“Sarah,” Marcus barked before she could even get a greeting out.
“Marcus,” she croaked out in a cracked and scratchy voice.
“Sarah, honey, where are you?”
“It doesn’t matter. I can’t ... we can’t ... I have to stay away. I need to go away.”
She was babbling, but she didn’t care.
“Sarah, stop. Listen to me.”
“No.” She cut him off, her voice firmer now. “I have to go. Don’t you see? They’ll know. They’ll know I saw you. They have surveillance in that building. All they have to do is play the security tape back and they’ll know we were both there. You have to get out of here, Marcus. Go. I’m going too.”
“Sarah, goddamn it, listen to me!”
She closed the phone and turned it off so he couldn’t call back. She leaned her head back against the seat and closed her eyes.
She had no idea where she was going or what she’d do when she got there, but she couldn’t stay here. She could never come back.
“I’m so sorry, Marcus. It should have been me who killed him,” she whispered.
GARRETT Kelly came awake with a start, his muscles tense, sweat beading his brow. His breaths came in rapid, harsh huffs. For a moment he lay there, his unfocused gaze sliding across the window to the darkness beyond.
Explosions echoed in his ears. The staccato of gunfire made him flinch, and the smell of blood and burning flesh assaulted his nostrils, making them flare as his breaths tore from his lungs.
God.
He shook his head and raised his hand to scrub the sleep from his eyes. His shoulder protested, and he snarled with impatience at the ache, which still nagged. He rolled and sat up in bed, planting his feet on the floor. He stayed there, head hanging toward his knees, sucking in air like some pantywaist in basic training about to puke his guts up after a twomile run.
It pissed him off when past memories ambushed him. He’d gone a long time without the images that interrupted his sleep. For some reason, after taking a bullet for his sister-in-law, he’d had a harder time sleeping. His consciousness seemed more vulnerable to things he’d shut out.
He cast a sideways glance at the clock. He wouldn’t be going back to sleep and everyone would be up in an hour anyway. Maybe a run would clear his head and get his blood flowing again.
With a sigh, he hit the shower and turned it cold to shake the cobwebs and the lingering smell of blood. After he was dried off and dressed, he walked quietly down the hall and out the front door.
It was still dark when he started off down the winding road that paralleled the lake. He ran farther this morning, pushing himself beyond his normal routine. He could still hear the explosions and still hear his teammates. He closed his eyes and increased his pace until his lungs screamed and his side ached.
It was over. A lifetime ago. He needed to get over it. He had gotten over it. All this R and R was for the birds. It had only served to make him lazy and idle. Fuck it. He wanted back in. A mission. Something besides all this goddamn free time.
By the time he returned to the house, he was sucking serious wind. The sky had lightened to shades of lavender and a diamond-sized star hung stubbornly over the lake, blanketed in the soft hues of dawn. He stood on the dock staring over the water—smooth, not a single ripple disturbing the surface—and breathed the clean, unspoiled air.
He let the peace of home and the lake he loved envelop him until all the noises of the past dulled and receded.
CHAPTER 2
SWEAT beaded Garrett’s brow as he completed his last pull-up. He held himself, chin hovering above the bar, until his muscles rolled and contorted and his shoulder burned. His lips thinned and nostrils flared. When his arms began shaking, he dropped to the floor and palmed the scar on his shoulder.