Take Me Deeper (10 page)

“A couple of days probably. They'll have to figure out I took her, then they'll have to find us.”

“Well, we don't want any of this shit going down here, which means you need to take her someplace else. In fact, maybe we want her out and about to draw them away.”

Instantly the tension was back in Iris's muscles, he could feel them shift under her skin. “You want me to be bait?” She wasn't looking at him now, she was looking at Quinn.

No way. Quinn may be the one running Lone Star, but if anyone was going to handle Iris, it was going to be Zane. And Iris wasn't going to be anything, let alone bait for a bunch of dangerous cartel assholes.

“Hell no,” he said, his voice flat with denial. “Iris is going somewhere safe.”

Quinn frowned. “It would make more sense to have her out in the open, so we can pick the battlefield. You take her somewhere safe and they find her, you've lost the advantage, you know that.”

Unfortunately, he did. From a military perspective Quinn's logic couldn't be faulted, but this wasn't a mission and they were dealing with a civilian. A woman. A defenseless woman.

Everything in him rebelled against it.

God, if she got hurt because of him…

Blood seeping through her pretty blue dress, onto his hands. The fear in her eyes as her gaze held his. “Don't leave, Zane,” she'd whispered. “Don't let me go.” And he hadn't. But her life had drained anyway, no matter how tightly he'd tried to hold on.

“No,” he repeated, the word hoarse. “Fuck no.”

“Fuck yes,” Iris said unexpectedly and with total conviction.

“Oh boy,” Rush muttered. “I'm gonna leave you with that one.” He levered himself off the bar and wandered out whistling something that sounded suspiciously like “I Shot the Sheriff,” which wasn't encouraging.

“You might not get a choice from the sound of it, Zane,” Quinn said, his attention on his phone as he made swiping motions across the screen. “Looks like Iris has got a better handle on this than you do.”

“Quinn.” Zane didn't look at his brother, holding Iris's gaze instead. “I'd really appreciate it if you fucked off right about now.”

Quinn lifted his phone to his ear, extending a middle finger in Zane's direction as he did so. But then he followed Rush out the door, allowing Zane some privacy.

As soon as he left, Iris jerked out of Zane's grip. She looked pissed, which he couldn't understand because who wanted to be bait for one of the most evil drug empires on the planet?

“What do you mean yes?” he demanded. “Please don't tell me you actually want to do this?”

The expression on her delicate face had hardened. “Yes, I actually want to do this.”

He desperately wanted to reach out and grab her again, hold her close, as if his touch alone was enough to keep her from making what could turn out to be an epically bad decision. But he didn't, pushing his hands into his pockets instead. “You know what'll happen if those guys catch you, don't you?”

Her jaw tightened. “Of course I do. I'm not stupid.”

“And what would happen to your sister, Iris? What would happen to Jamie?”

“But Jamie's why I
have
to do this.” She took a step toward him, her gaze suddenly burning. “The reason she's in foster care is because of what I did. Because of that one stupid choice I made. And all this time I've been looking for a way to get her back.”

He stared at her, at the desperation she couldn't quite hide. “You thought skipping bail would get her back?”

“No, obviously not. But I couldn't risk jail, not when there was a chance the cartel would get me there.” Her hands were in fists at her sides as if she wanted to punch someone. “All she has is me and if something happens to me, she'll have no one. No one at all.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Which means you going somewhere safe—”

“I want to do something, Zane,” she interrupted fiercely. “I
have
to do something. And if being bait will draw these bastards out, then I'll do it. Don't you see? If the charges are dropped, then I can get her back.”

Ah, Christ. That expression on her face, that fierce note in her voice. It was so damn familiar. Because it reminded him of himself, of the need to fix things, make things better.

The problem was, she didn't know yet that some things couldn't be fixed no matter how hard you tried. Some things you only made worse.

“They're ruthless, Iris. If they catch you and find out you had a sister, then you think they wouldn't use her to get to you in some way?”

The color slowly leached out of her skin. “What?” Her eyes looked black and huge in her pale face. “But they don't know that. I made sure no one knows.”

“They'll know,” he said, because they would. Men like that made sure they knew everything since everything could be used as a lever. “Don't be naïve.”

She looked away from him, her expression unreadable. “Do you think she's in danger now?”

The question sounded calm enough, but he could hear the undercurrent of fear in her voice. It twisted something inside him. “No,” he said with as much conviction as he could. “Not unless they find you.”

“But if they don't find me, I'll never get her back,” she murmured, staring off at something near the bar. “God, what a stupid bitch I've been.”

He knew what taking responsibility meant. How heavy it could be. And he sensed this woman was already carrying a crushing-enough burden as it was, she didn't need to add to it. So before he could stop himself, he was reaching out, taking that obstinate little chin in his fingers, and turning her to face him again. “You can't think about that.” He kept his voice quiet, firm. “What's done is done. The only thing that's important now is to get out of this alive. For your sister's sake.”

She stared up at him, dark eyes full of secrets and shadows. “Why did you do it? Why did you say you'd stay here for six months? I know you don't want to.”

“You're right, I don't. But there are other things that matter more than what I want.”

“Such as me?” she asked. “You're willing to do all of this for a woman you've only known less than twenty-four hours?”

Unable to resist the urge, he brushed the curve of her lower lip with his thumb, her skin all warm and velvety. “Why shouldn't I want to do that for you? Don't you think you're worth it?”

Something shifted in her eyes, her throat moving as she swallowed, and he could feel again that subtle tension in her, making him firm his grip.

“What are you doing?” Her voice held a husky edge to it. “Let me go.”

Yeah, you really should.

Yet he didn't. Instead he gently pressed his thumb against her lower lip, testing the soft give of her mouth beneath his touch. “You didn't answer my question.”

She scowled. “Look, if you're going to kiss me, then kiss me. Just stop grabbing my face.”

Snarky little thing. Yet clearly she wasn't as cocky or as confident as she sounded because her cheekbones were stained red, as if she was embarrassed or shy. Kind of like the way she'd been yesterday when she'd thought he was going to take her up on her blow job offer. An offer she hadn't had that many men take her up on no matter what she said.

“Just how many blow jobs have you given to complete strangers?” he asked, suddenly wanting to know.

Her eyes widened fractionally, then she jerked away from him, still scowling. “None of your damn business. Though certainly more than you.”

It was clear he made her uncomfortable, which was interesting, not to mention satisfying since he had a feeling it wasn't because she didn't like him touching her. In fact, it was definitely the opposite.

Which means nothing. Because you're not going to touch her, are you?

No. Of course he wasn't.

He laughed instead. “Well, that's true.”

For some reason, her blush deepened and she looked away from him. “I know you want me safe, Zane, and I appreciate it, don't think I don't. But I need to get my sister back, and if being bait means those bastards go to jail instead of me, then I'm going to do it.” She glanced at him again, meeting his gaze, unflinching this time. “And if you try to stop me, I'll gut you like a fish.”

God. She was nothing if not determined. And the really annoying thing was that he understood exactly where she was coming from. Except how could he stand it if anything happened to her? When he had the power to prevent it?

This is not about you and your issues, asshole. If she wants to go get herself killed, you have to let her.

He didn't like it, not one bit.

But then, as he had to remember, he wasn't anyone's hero these days, and he definitely didn't want to be. He was done with trying to be a white knight. Done with trying to make a difference.

He was done with caring.

If something bad happened to Iris, he would regret it, but it wouldn't smash his heart into little pieces, leaving only jagged shards in its place.

Zane shoved his hands back in the pockets of his pants. “Well, okay then. Message received loud and clear.”

She gave a sharp nod as if that was the answer she'd been expecting. “So what's next?”

“What's next?” he echoed. “We put you somewhere the cartel will think twice about approaching while we work on a plan. Somewhere that's not here.” He turned toward the door. “And I think I have just the place.”

Iris sat down on the billowing softness of the super-king-sized bed and stared around the room in a kind of disbelieving amazement.

When Zane said he had just the place, she hadn't realized he'd meant the Four Seasons hotel in downtown Austin.

She'd never been anywhere so luxurious and for a girl brought up in a run-down trailer park, it was a little overwhelming. Certainly it beat the pants off the motel she'd been staying in.

Zane had booked her a room handling the reservation process, including the credit card deposit, then had gone off to do something with Quinn, telling her he'd be back later. She'd tried to protest, that surely there were other, way cheaper hotels she could be staying in, but Zane had apparently decided that the cartel wouldn't dare mess with the security in a high-end hotel and risk bringing heat down on themselves, so staying here she was.

“It'll also look like we're having a dirty weekend,” he'd told her as he'd swiped the card through the reader and pushed open the door. “Like I'm screwing you, which we might be able to use in our favor.”

“Great,” she'd muttered, stepping into the suite he'd gotten for her. “All the fun of being threatened without any of the good bits.”

He'd given her a repressive look at that, then scouted out the room, making sure she was settled in and issuing instructions about not opening the door to anyone, before taking off to wherever it was he was going. Quite frankly it was nice that he wasn't around since it wasn't only the hotel she was finding overwhelming but him too.

Her lip was tingling from where he'd brushed it with his thumb earlier, and she could still feel the touch of his fingers gently holding her chin. There had been something about the way he'd held her, the firmness of his grip or the warmth of his fingertips, she didn't know, but it made her ache. Made her want more.

The problem was, she didn't want to want more. She didn't want to be attracted to him, she didn't want to be curious about him, not in any way, shape, or form. Yet for some reason, her stupid body was all about the touch of his hand, the intense blue of his eyes, the impression of strength in his wide shoulders and muscular chest. The feeling of being small, of being fragile, of being helpless next to him.

Those weren't things she should be feeling. At all. Not when she'd had to be strong and tough and resourceful to simply survive.

Yeah, she didn't much like being the helpless female and having him be all macho and protective over her. Doing her laundry and feeding her pastries, booking her in high-class hotel suites.

Iris stared around at the massive bedroom, then into the suite's lounge area with the big flat-screen TV with on-demand cable. There was a door opening to a balcony that looked out over Lady Bird Lake and on the coffee table there was an ice bucket with a bottle of chilled champagne in it. Through the door on her left was a massive bathroom the size of the entire motel room she'd been staying in previously, with a tub she was longing to laze around in.

Nope, she didn't like it at all.

She sighed and flopped back onto the bed, feeling the give of the mattress beneath her and the soft down of the comforter enfolding her.

“Jesus,” she muttered at the ceiling. “I feel like
Pretty Woman
.”

You're the one who insisted on this.

Well, sure, but she hadn't expected this. All she'd been thinking was finally—
finally—
a solution to her problems had appeared, and there was no way in hell she was going to let it slip away.

A way to get the cartel off her back, get her charges dropped, and get Jamie out of foster care.

In fact, when Zane had initially suggested it, she'd stopped feeling like Goldilocks and had started feeling like Cinderella. With Zane as the fairy godmother.

Except when he'd started being all macho and stupid about protecting her. Yes, she'd actually kind of liked his protectiveness, and, yes, a part of her wanted to do exactly what he said and find somewhere safe to hide, but a larger part had said a resounding no to that bullshit.

Maybe they would have gotten the cartel without her being bait, but maybe they wouldn't and she just couldn't take the risk. Especially if they decided to go after Jamie in order to draw her out.

A wash of shame went through her at the thought.

God, she'd been so naïve. The one silver lining in all of this had been that though the cartel might be after her, at least her sister was safe. But of course that wasn't the case and she'd been a fool to even think it.

Hard on the heels of the shame came the icy grip of fear and she sat up again, reaching into her back pocket for her phone and swiping through her contacts until she came to Linda's number, Jamie's caseworker. Then she hesitated, staring down at the name on the screen.

She hadn't reached out since one brief call the night she'd left Dallas, too afraid that any contact whatsoever might reveal where she was and the police would come and get her. She'd sent Jamie a couple of letters telling her what was going on and that she knew she'd done wrong, but she was going to fix everything. And that when she had, she was going to come back for her, take her away, find the home they'd always dreamed about together.

Except she couldn't call, could she? Linda had told her that if Iris called again, she'd have to tell the police. And maybe the police would then use the call to track her down. Because they could do that, couldn't they? Track a person's cellphone signal? Or a landline?

Well, even if they couldn't, it wasn't worth the risk. Not when Zane's plan hadn't even gotten underway yet.

Fear turned like a knife in her gut. What if the cartel had gotten to Jamie? What if they'd hurt her or taken her?

Frustrated and angry with herself, Iris flung the phone aside and got up off the bed, needing to move, burn off some of the adrenaline pumping inside her. She walked into the lounge area, pacing back and forth in front of the windows that looked out over the lake.

Oh God, if something had happened to her sister, they wouldn't even be able to contact her because she'd taken off and no one knew where she was. And it wasn't like she'd left her cell number with anyone. Jamie could be hurt or dead right now and she wouldn't even know.

Fear was a boulder on her chest, relentless fingers crushing her throat.

She couldn't breathe.

Coming to a stop in front of the windows, she tried to calm herself the hell down, but it didn't work.

This was her fault. All of it was her fault. She'd made a series of monumentally bad decisions and the end result could mean her sister being killed or put in danger. It could mean her own death too, though really, at this point, that seemed the lesser of the two evils.

Yeah, you really fucked up, didn't you?

Iris swallowed.

She'd spent years reassuring herself that okay, so she wasn't the world's greatest caregiver, but at least there was food on the table most of the time and her sister had a roof over her head. At least she had someone who loved her.

At least she had someone who was there for her, who hadn't up and left as soon as someone better had come along like their mom had done.

She put a hand onto the cold glass of the window, staring sightlessly across the lake glittering in the hot midday sun.

“You'll be fine,” her mother had said the day she'd left. “You're a big girl and I know you'll take care of Jamie real good.” She'd touched Iris's hair once, the last time she ever touched her. “I'm sorry, Iris. I'd love you to visit, but you know how George hates kids.”

Oh yeah, she'd known. Just like she'd known that her mother hadn't really wanted a visit. Her mother had never wanted kids, period. What she'd wanted was a way out of being dirt-poor and stuck in a trailer park, and she'd found it in the form of a man. Who cared that it meant leaving a one-year-old in the care of her eighteen-year-old sister? Mary Lou Callahan hadn't.

That day Iris had decided that she and her sister didn't need their stupid, lousy mom. She'd take care of Jamie better than Mary Lou ever had.

Except she hadn't, had she? Jamie had ended up in foster care while she was on the run from the law, trying to fix a mistake she should never have made.

Great job, Callahan. Mom would be so proud of you.

Her eyes prickled with unshed tears, but she wouldn't let them fall. Crying was for people who deserved to feel sorry for themselves and she didn't, not given the complete screwup she'd made of her life.

Instead, she swallowed them back and turned from the view, scanning the suite for something to do, anything to take her mind off the situation she was now in. Zane had told her to stay put until he came back, and she would. No point in messing up the situation any more than it was already.

Wandering over to the television, she switched it on, then sat on the beautifully squashy couch in front of it, her gaze drifting to the ice bucket on the coffee table and the champagne sitting in it. Okay, she wasn't going to let herself cry, but maybe she could drink a little. She'd never had champagne before and judging by the French label on the bottle, this one was the real deal. Reaching for it, she tore the foil off the top, unscrewed the wire holding the cork in place, then popped it. The sound was disappointingly subdued as it came out, and there was no white foam bubbling up from the open top of the bottle, which was also disappointing. Wasn't champagne supposed to do that?

Iris poured some of the wine into a flute that was sitting beside the ice bucket, then raised the glass in a toast. “Here's to not fucking up again,” she muttered before taking a cautious sip. The champagne was not at all sweet and tasted a bit like yeast. It was delicious.

Of course it would be better with chips.

Five minutes later, Iris was settling back on the couch, glass of champagne in one hand, a packet of Pringles from the minibar in the other, and a dumb movie on the TV.

Her day was definitely starting to look up.

The movie—some action flick that felt a little too close to home for comfort—was long and about halfway through, Iris began to feel sleepy, which was strange considering how much sleep she'd been having recently. It might have had something to do with the champagne, though surely three large glasses wouldn't make a person feel
that
sleepy that fast.

Deciding to rest her eyes for five minutes, she opened them again to find the curtains drawn, the lights on, and six feet three inches of lean, muscular male leaning over her, eyes the color of dark sapphires blazing down into hers.

She let out an involuntary squeak of fright before her muzzy brain got itself in gear.

“It's okay,” Zane said, his cool voice as soothing as cold water over a fresh burn. “It's just me. Decided to have a party on your own, did you?”

Iris swallowed. Her mouth felt dry, she had the beginnings of a headache behind her eyes, and she was slumped on the couch amid a detritus of crumbs, chip packets, and one empty champagne flute.

Dear God. She'd better not have been drooling.

“I…”
Was feeling pathetic and decided to self-medicate with champagne.
“Uh…hadn't had champagne before.” She hauled herself into an upright position, feeling like death. “Perhaps I had a bit too much.”

Zane picked the bottle up from the table and looked at it. There was barely a third left.

“Oh no.” She stared at it, feeling sick. “I didn't realize I'd had that much.”

“You liked it, huh?” He put the bottle down again and gave her a dispassionate glance that somehow made her feel even worse, like a child who'd done something embarrassing in front of an adult she admired.

She found herself blushing. He was standing there looking ridiculously hot in his blue suit and crisp white shirt, while she was lying in the remains of her chip-and-champagne debauchery, in an old T-shirt and jeans with holes in the knees.

Classy, Callahan. Very classy.

Yeah, well, she didn't need to be classy, did she? She was trailer-park trash after all. Anyway, she shouldn't be giving a shit about her appearance or what he thought of her. His opinion wasn't supposed to matter.

Yet when he crouched down in front of her and reached out to brush a lock of her hair away from her forehead, she suddenly found that his opinion mattered very much indeed.

“I had too much,” she said thickly. “I was worried about Jamie. I might have put her in danger when I left Dallas, and I can't call her caseworker in case they can track my cellphone signal or something.” The unsettled feeling in her gut turned over, making her feel even more miserable, and somehow she found everything spilling out whether she wanted it to or not. “I don't know if she's even still alive because if anything happened to her, no one knows where I am to tell me. And it's my fault. It's
all
my own stupid fault.”

Zane said nothing, the look on his lean face far too sharp for comfort. Then he rose to his feet in a smooth, fluid movement that had her mouth drying for reasons other than too much champagne and went over to the unit that held the minibar. He poured a bottle of water into a tumbler, then came back to the couch, holding it out to her. “Drink this,” he ordered. “Then give me the number of Jamie's caseworker.”

“But she won't give you any information—”

“Just do it.” There was no heat in his voice, only a calm certainty that he expected her to do exactly what he asked.

Much to her own shock, she found herself doing just that. Drinking down the glass of water like she was dying of thirst and handing over her phone with the caseworker's number in it. Then she watched him as he walked over to the windows and dialed the number, speaking in his cool, authoritative way.

It was strange to have someone else take charge like this. Strange, too, to let him without even a protest.