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- Author: Hope Anika
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Ha! “You burned that bridge a long time ago, big brother.”
“Then give me a chance to rebuild it.”
More words that shut her up. And the silly, irrational muscle in her chest leapt, and she reached up to rub the back of her neck, wholly unnerved. The angst churning within her didn’t know what to do: attack or retreat?
Because this was certifiable.
“The show is an ideal hiding place,” Max insisted. “People rarely look too close. It will work.”
For crying out loud. She wasn’t really considering this, was she? “What’s going on that you can’t keep her in a safe house? Has your precious Bureau turned rotten?”
His silence was answer enough, and the chill within her spread like an ugly stain.
“Seriously,” she said sarcastically.
“It’s just for a few weeks,” he promised quietly.
But it was one thing to knowingly endanger herself; it was quite another to knowingly endanger her help and everyone else on the show.
Son of a biscuit!
“She’s only fourteen years old, Fi, and two nights ago she watched her entire family get capped. It’s my job to keep her safe. I’m all she has.”
You were all I had, too. And he’d walked away without a backward glance.
But this wasn’t about her.
Even if he knew better than anyone that she was hard only on the outside; even if he wasn’t above using that knowledge. Because this wasn’t about Max, either. It was about a kid who—even faceless—Fiona could relate to.
She knew exactly what it was to be utterly alone in the world.
So what are you going to do? Who are you going to be?
Who you want to be, or who you should be?
Shit!
“Three weeks, no more,” she said shortly. “And I’m putting her to work.”
“Deal,” Max said quickly. “We’ll be there tomorrow, before noon.”
He ended the call with an abrupt disconnect, and thunder rumbled overhead, a sudden, violent drumbeat that resonated through Fiona’s bones. She squinted up at the darkening sky, her head spinning.
Lost your damn mind, she thought. Because to trust Max, when she knew intimately how unworthy he was of that trust…and to bring the kind of danger that came with him here was…
Insanity.
No matter what he said about having things covered.
No one would be safe.
Which was on her. Because this choice, it was pure selfish. That she was cursed with a soft heart was moot; the fact of it was, no matter how much she hated Max, she loved him, too.
Always had, always would.
In her hand, her cell vibrated. “Yeah?”
“Thank you,” he said into her ear and hung up.
“Shit,” she said. Because…thank you.
Another thing he’d never said to her.
“Shit!” she said again, angry.
And deeply uneasy.
Because what could have happened to change him so drastically?
She didn’t know. Not a single, solitary thing.
The last time she’d seen him, he’d been on leave from Afghanistan. She had no clue where he’d been in the decade that followed, not who he’d been, not what he’d been doing. She only knew he was FBI because Hatchet mentioned it once in passing.
Hatchet. Who was the closest thing to family she had left, and who’d obviously kept in much closer contact with Max than she’d ever realized.
The sneaky old fart.
She looked around and wondered how much more was going on around her about which she was utterly clueless.
It was not a nice feeling. And it made her even angrier.
But worse, it made her suspicious.
Because a federal agent turning to his carny stepsister to keep his murder witness safe?
In what frigging universe?
That’s what the U.S. Marshals were for—no? Men with badges and guns; trained men, armed men. Men with license to do whatever was necessary to protect those they served. Was it not their very job to babysit federal witnesses?
Yes. Yes, it was.
So why would Max turn to her for help—instead of them?
Thunder boomed down again, startling her. The sky had grown dark, and rain was falling in earnest now, heavy sheets that washed down the midway toward the unlit Ferris wheel. Giant, dark, and foreboding, the ride loomed over the bright array of games and concession trailers like a grim headstone.
Nice. Way to be optimistic.
With any luck, it wasn’t prophecy.
When Ash Kyndal inherits her Uncle Charlie’s Private Investigation firm, she wants nothing more than an out. Because how could anyone think putting her in charge of anything is a good idea?
But Charlie saved her once, and Ash owes him. Big time. So in spite of her reluctance—and the mysterious, taciturn Russian who’s abruptly materialized on her doorstep, intent on repaying a debt to a dead man—Ash dives in.
Because seriously. How hard can it be?
Two missing clients, half a dozen men in black, and one crazy, utopian conspiracy designed to alter the very fabric of humanity later, Ash has her answer: crazy hard. And now that she's found herself on the front lines of an unexpected, vicious battle over the fate of the human race, she has a choice to make: stay and fight, or run like hell.
Because the clock is ticking.
And war is coming.
“You tell me what I want to know…or she’s dead.”
The breath accompanying those words exuded an aroma of red onion, spicy brown mustard and pastrami on rye, which somewhat diminished their menace.
Still, Ruslan thought the Glock 45 pressed against his lapel looked serviceable enough. And the woman whose image was reflected on the laptop across from him—a woman who’d been tied to a wooden chair with coarse, cheap rope—also had a 9mm SIG Sauer pointed at her head, so the threat, while rather pungent, was quite real.
“You hear me?”
The short, stocky bald man whose Glock was creasing Ruslan’s suit stood less than three inches away, so Ruslan assumed the answer was obvious. He was not, after all, deaf, something he also presumed the man would know.
Should know. If he was competent.
But competence was a rare and vanishing skill. The ability and willingness to pull a trigger had somehow eclipsed intelligence, ingenuity and dedicated expertise. No one took pride anymore.
“I mean it, man. Dead!”
A gloved hand shot out and backhanded the woman on the screen; her head snapped back, and the chair she sat on slid across the floor. Ruslan watched dispassionately, noting the blood that trickled from the corner of her mouth, the swelling that had begun to bloat the line of her cheekbone.
The murder that glinted in her eye.
Competence. Theirs was about to be tested.
“You tell me where the kid is,” the bald man snarled, “and we’ll let your girl go.”
An empty promise. In addition to the bald man, there were two others, men with faces of stone and weapons beneath their coats. Any talk of walking away was fantasy. But no matter. There would be no “telling.” No letting anyone go. The Firm had been hired to protect “the kid,” and that’s what Ruslan would do.
No matter the threat. Or the cost.
“You tell me.”
“You’re a frickin’ moron!” Butch heckled from where he sat beside Ruslan, his body slumped against the plastic ties that secured him to a metal chair. The
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