Her Own Best Enemy (The Remnants, Book 1) (10 page)

He leapt to his feet. “So we find what the key fits.”

He snagged his backpack off the floor and strode to the door.

“Wait.”

He stopped, impatience sparking to life, and turned back to where Grace still kneeled on the floor.

She rose to her feet.

“What about Ryker?” The key rested on her palm. He reached for it, but she snatched it back. “If we go on a wild goose chase over this key, my son may never be found.”

He clenched his jaw. “The key may tell us where Ryker is.”

She bristled, crossing her arms across her chest. “Or it might not. It may turn out to be nothing more than a hotel key Mark forget to return on his last business trip.”

“Do you have any other bright ideas, then? If you do, speak up. I’m all ears.”

Her hands fell to her sides, shoulders drooping. “No.”

Hell. She’d already had her hopes crushed once today. He couldn’t blame her for worrying the key’s trail would turn out the same.

He forced himself to soften his next words. “This is the best plan.”

“Fine.” She stiffened her spine. “But I keep the key.” She shoved it deep inside her jeans pocket.

“Fine. I wouldn’t have suggested otherwise.”

She snorted. “Like you don’t have your own stake in this.”

He stalked through the open cabin door. “I never said differently.”

Her footsteps scuffed the rough red earth several paces behind him. “No, you didn’t. Which is why I can’t trust you not to run off to follow your own agenda.”

He spun on his heel and stepped nose to nose with her.
She
couldn’t trust
him
? The very thought boiled his blood.

“If following my own agenda would’ve been my main goal, I wouldn’t have waited for you at The Cheshire in the first place. I’d have escaped rehab and been gone. Didn’t I say we were in this together? You help me, I help you.”

She crossed her arms. “And who gets to go first?”

He glared at her, bitterness clawing at his throat. Just when he thought he’d found the only trustworthy woman on the planet...

“I gave you my word. We’ll find Ryker.”

She blinked her big, worried eyes at him. “You’re right. I’m...sorry.” Her fingers touched the back of his hand in a fleeting caress, sending an electrical tingle up his arm.

An unfamiliar sensation dropped in the pit of his stomach: lust mixed with tenderness and a good dose of wary caution thrown in for good measure.

“Yeah. Okay. Let’s move out.”

He lifted his eyes to the sky and choked back a curse. The sun burned low. Too low. It had already started its dip back down to earth. They’d never make it to the top before dark.

Which meant another night spent in close proximity with Grace, another night keeping his thoughts—and hands—away from her.

“We’re not going anywhere tonight, are we?” Grace’s voice was little more than a tremulous whisper, but he caught the hint of dread as it echoed across the vast desert.

It matched his own.

Chapter Six

The low-wattage light inside the cabin added intimacy to the already tense atmosphere. Grace couldn’t stand it. After returning to the office to pay for the night’s stay, she’d eaten dinner with Keith in strained silence at the dining hall, then they’d returned to the cabin to pace, to breathe the same thick, musty air, and dance around any sort of meaningful conversation.

She stopped short of the bed, the muscles in her neck fisting into a tight knot. Keith passed on her right and stopped at the miniature kitchenette where he poured water from the tap into a tall glass. She couldn’t look away as he touched it to his lips, tipped his head, and downed the contents in three long swallows. Those firm lips had been on hers just hours ago. They’d teased, and caressed, and comforted. She’d hated every minute of it, even as she’d eaten it up, her body had screamed for more.

He lowered the glass a fraction and his eyes clashed with hers over the rim. It was foolish to stare into them. Even more foolish to read beyond the cynicism that stayed on the surface. But, oh, Lord, when he looked at her like she was that glass of water he’d just greedily consumed, she wanted to be back in his arms, his lips on hers, his hands caressing her skin.

He set the glass on the counter. The clink on Formica was unable to drown out the blood thundering in her ears as he took two purposeful steps in her direction.

The rushing in her ears clashed to a crescendo and she stopped breathing altogether.

Ryker.

The single thought lanced through her heart and brought the rapid flutter to an abrupt halt. She covered her mouth with her hand and cried out, whirling away from Keith and coming up short at the foot of the bed.

The bright red fabric of Ryker’s backpack seemed to bleed across the mustard yellow blanket.

Grace snatched the pack from the bed and made a beeline for the door, Ryker’s belongings spilling across the floor from the open zippered compartment.

It didn’t matter and she certainly wasn’t about to stop to pick them up. She needed to get out of here. Now. Needed to regain her focus and her sanity, because she must have well and truly lost it if she had that much difficulty keeping her hands off Keith.

She pushed at the screen door with the palm of her hand, finding satisfaction in the squeak and slam that followed. Moonlight guided her down the trail to the edge of the creek that flowed into the Colorado River. She sat on one of the large boulders and hugged Ryker’s backpack to her chest.

Oh, baby, what have I done?

How could she have forgotten, even for one moment, about Ryker? Her throat tightened and she buried her face in her hands.

She was despicable.

She’d given into desire, taken comfort from the strength of Keith’s arms and the gentleness of his mouth. And worse, she wanted to do it a second time.

And for what? What did it get her?

She couldn’t feel this...this strange drowning sensation every time she looked at Keith. She didn’t like him. How could she want him when she didn’t trust him? Worse, how could she desire him when her son was somewhere in danger? Hurt, sick, with Mark, without Mark—she didn’t know and it was killing her.

She curled her fingers into fists and gulped in the crisp night air, letting it fill her lungs.

She wouldn’t fail Ryker. Not by giving up, not by losing hope, and certainly not by letting Keith’s kiss get under her skin. As far as she was concerned, it never happened. She had to turn that lie into reality.

Tomorrow morning they’d trek back up the canyon. Tonight her focus needed to be on their direction once they reached the top. The cardkey had to be important for Mark to plant it in Ryker’s backpack.

She tugged the rectangular piece of plastic out of her pocket and angled it to the sliver of moonlight that peeked above the canyon wall. The key could fit anywhere and looked like dozens of others she’d seen before. White, with bright blue shapes on the front, and the dark magnetic strip running the length of the back.

She sighed. How many places used cardkeys in Arizona? In the world? Tears stung her eyes. Ryker couldn’t afford to have them rush out on a wild goose chase over this key.

There had to be a better way.

She flipped the key over and ran her thumb along the magnetic strip. The moonlight reflected against the strip and revealed a set of block letters in a silvery rainbow hologram.

She held her breath and squinted.

SecureStor.

A storage unit? Like there weren’t thousands and thousands of those around. Still, it was a lead. She had to tell Keith. Maybe the name would mean something to him.

Grace snatched the backpack off the ground where it had fallen earlier, whirled around and ran up the path, urgency, excitement, coursing through her veins. The cardkey slipped from her fingers and she bent to pick it off the dusty path. Her fingers grazed plastic, she scooped it up and started to straighten when a beam of blue light cut through the brush. Her skin prickled, goose bumps rising on her arms.

Someone had followed them.

Instinct had her throwing herself to the ground. She sucked in a breath and held it. With her face pressed to the earth, small pebbles poked at her cheek. A beam cut a swath through the darkness and swept across the night above her.

Her heart pounded. Perspiration trickled down her wrist and loosened her grip on the key. She waited, chewing on her lower lip as dread pitted in her stomach with each passing second. The beam passed over her and dimmed in the distance. She pushed herself to her knees and chided her foolishness. It had probably just been some late night hiker.

She shook her head and got to her feet, making the rest of the short trek to the cabin.

At the front door, she collided with Keith. He grabbed her upper arms and steered her away from the front door.

“I need to tell you—”

“We have to get out of here.” His voice cut through her words, insistent and urgent.

Her gaze flew to Keith’s tense face. His hard jaw, alert eyes, and brusque no nonsense stance shot her heart back to warp speed.

She hadn’t imagined it. Someone was following them. She’d made the mistake of relaxing her guard, but the Army had made Keith a soldier through and through.

He let go of her long enough to lean inside the open doorway and grab their backpacks. He tossed one to her and she stumbled, struggling against the added weight.

He shouldered his own pack and set off up the trail, away from the river and the bridge that would lead them to the South Kaibab trail.

She scrambled into action, shoving the cardkey deep into the pocket of her jeans and unzipping her backpack enough to push Ryker’s smaller one inside it. She yanked the zipper closed and wrestled her arms through the shoulder straps.

Keith’s form had almost blended into the darkness. She jogged to catch up to him. The warning signs she’d seen that morning came back to haunt her.

They could die hiking out of the canyon at night. One false move, one misstep...

Adrenaline shot through her. Her legs shook with the effort of planting one foot firmly in front of the other. She hadn’t wanted to waste the night down here in the first place. Earlier she’d been more than ready to risk the night hike. But now that they faced it, she was frightened. Terrified, in fact.

Her feet ached; her tennis shoes were woefully inadequate for the terrain.
She
was woefully inadequate. But Keith wasn’t.

Ahead of her, he scrambled up a small outcropping of rocks and flattened his body along the short plateau. He held out his hand.

She hesitated. Oh, God, he was the only one who could get them out of this safely. And, yet, she couldn’t make herself put her hand in his. Her breath trapped in her throat.
Do it. Just grab his hand. It doesn’t mean anything.

From the other side of the river, bright blue dots bobbed along the trail and then suddenly stopped. Suspended in motion, they hovered in a line, like some sort of eerie alien spacecraft. Only they weren’t aliens. These were men who were all too happy to kill her and prevent her from ever finding Ryker.

Keith rolled and grabbed her wrist, yanking her down beside him. Her hip struck the rock causing her teeth to cut across her bottom lip.

“What were you waiting for? Someone to use you as target practice?” His icy whisper slithered over her.

“No, I—” she started, intending to defend her actions. But how could she defend something she knew had been foolish?

“Don’t ever ignore a command again.” He sliced a hand in front of them, punctuating his statement.

Keith peered into Grace’s eyes, wide with fear and a shimmer of wetness barely visible by the light of the moon, and his anger kicked up a notch.

Damn her. She couldn’t have made a bigger target of herself if she’d painted a bright red bulls-eye on her chest. He counted four infrared lights as they swiveled in their direction, confirming what he had already suspected. The men were equipped with night vision goggles.

Shit. He wanted to slam his head against the solid rock. Shit. Shit. Shit. Had he not been so distracted by that damn kiss—and the urge to do it again—he might have gotten the jump on them.

Never get involved. Do not waver from the objective.

And his number one sacred rule, which he never broke—not under any circumstance—do not lose control.

He took a deep breath. Staying calm had served him well in the past and helped him out of plenty life and death situations. He never cracked under pressure.

But, he’d never had to worry about someone like Grace. Or what her death would do to her son.

From the angle of the lights, the men were hiking the South Kaibab trail. If they could circle around to the Bright Angel trail undetected while the men crossed the four hundred and forty foot black bridge leading to Phantom Ranch, he and Grace just might succeed in eluding them one more time. Bright Angel trail was a longer hike to the rim, but it was also less steep, which would be to their advantage.