Mine to Keep (11 page)

Nothing that a few stitches wouldn’t cure.  “Yes, baby, I am.” And so was she. He had to remember that.

“Mr. Weston!” The frantic shout reached him. “Mr. Weston! I’m coming to get you out!”

Trace lifted his head. He glanced over and saw that the right side of the vehicle was a tangled mess.  The door was twisted. The windows shattered.

But a groan of sound heralded the opening of the door on the left-hand side of the vehicle.

The driver—a young guy named Matt Norris—peered in and, with a shaking voice, he asked, “Please, sir, please, tell me you’re okay—”

“We’re okay.” It was Skye who responded.

Trace helped her to slide out, and he followed right behind her. As soon as they were clear of the wreckage, he grabbed Matt. His fingers fisted on the man’s jacket. “What the
fuck
just happened?”

“Please, it’s not my fault! I-I waited for the light to change, but the other car came out of n-nowhere!”

Trace’s head turned to study the scene. They were in the middle of an intersection.  It was close to midnight, and the dark road was eerily silent. Glass littered the ground. Chunks of metal from the crash were scattered across the street.

A blue BMW had smashed right into the side of the limo. The driver’s side door hung open, swaying slightly.

“Where’s the driver?” Skye asked.

“H-he ran off,” Matt said. “I called out for him to stop, but he kept going.”

A siren echoed in the distance.  Trace shoved Matt away from him.

“He must’ve been drunk,” Matt told them. “He ran cause…cause he knew the cops would realize it, right? They’d be able to tell that he’d been drinking.”

Fury tightened Trace’s body.

Another car braked near the scene. A man poked his head out. “Dear God, is everyone all right?”

Trace stared at the wreckage.  A hit and run. A drunk driver?

“Trace…” Skye’s hand wrapped around his shoulder. “You lied to me.”

He flinched. “Skye, I—”

She wiped the blood from his face. “You are hurt. You need stitches.”

“It could’ve been worse,” he told her, and the words were true. So terrifyingly true. Because what if she’d been hurt?

The siren was coming closer.  Someone, somewhere had called for help. Maybe one of the folks in the apartments down the road. Lights gleamed from those buildings.

Or maybe the call had even come from the SOB who’d hit them and fled.

His gaze tracked around the scene. Lifted. He stared at the red lights.

And at the cameras mounted near them.

A grim smile curved Trace’s lips.

I’ll find you, asshole.

Because no one hurt him and just walked away.  

***

“What the hell happened to you?” Noah demanded as he stepped into Trace’s office. Then his lips twisted. “Wait, let me guess, a fight with the little ballerina?”

Trace glared at him. He’d gotten the stitches only because Skye insisted. The cut was high on his forehead, deep and, yeah, he knew it would scar. He didn’t care.

He rolled his shoulders, trying to push away the tension he felt, and said, “On the way home last night, some asshole drove right into the side of my limo.”

That wiped the grin right off Noah’s face. “You’re not kidding.”

When had he ever?

Trace motioned to the empty chair near his desk.  “He left the scene, ran away on foot.” But the guy wasn’t escaping. Trace had already pulled some strings, and he’d be getting that video footage from the crash scene any minute.  He’d see the man who’d walked—
ran
—away.

“You think it’s related to Sharpe’s death?”  Now Noah’s voice was cautious.

Exhaling slowly, Trace decided to put all of his cards on the table. “I don’t know what the hell to think of Sharpe’s case. I got the autopsy report.” He nodded toward the manila file that sat on the corner of his desk. Getting a copy of that report had been easy enough. Just a matter of pulling more strings. “It wasn’t a robbery. Sharpe was homeless. He had nothing to take.”

Noah grabbed the file. His fingers flipped through the pages. “A knife thrust straight to the heart…and a slice right across his jugular.”

Trace nodded. “There were no signs that Sharpe even had the chance to fight back.” That worried him. “Sharpe was crazy, but he was a fighter. He wouldn’t just stand there and let some SOB kill him.” And, shit, he’d been the one to send Ben away from the penthouse—
without weapons.
Yet even without his knives, Ben knew a dozen ways to defend against an attack. Provided, of course, that he’d had the chance to use his skills.

Noah glanced up. “He didn’t have the time to fight, that’s what you’re thinking.”

“
You
could get the drop on someone like that,” Trace pointed out. “You could get close enough to kill without making a sound. By the time the victim realized it, the knife would be in his heart.”  Because it was true. Noah might pretend to be the elegant businessman, but that façade was a lie.

It was the same lie that Trace presented to the world.

“And so could you,” Noah retorted, voice hardening. “We had the same training. Same missions.”

Trace tapped his fingers on the desk. “I didn’t kill him.”

Noah shrugged. “Neither did I. So we just need to figure out who the hell did.”

“Sharpe said the past was coming back.” This was the part that Trace needed to reveal. “That Skye was going to be my destruction.”

Now Noah’s face showed his concern. “A woman nearly destroyed us before.”

An innocent face…to hide deadly intentions.  “They both died.” 

They…

The woman who’d tried to betray his team. And her lover.

“It sure as hell seemed like they did,” Noah agreed as he tossed the folder aside.

“Then why was Sharpe so afraid?”

Noah held his gaze. His lips tightened, then he said, “There’s something I should tell you.”

This wasn’t going to be good. The man’s tone told him that.

“Last night, right after you left, I called Drake.”

Trace tensed.

“If the past is coming back, he needs to know, too,” Noah snapped. “Look, the threat isn’t just to you. If someone is striking at us—”

“Is Drake in the city?”

Noah nodded. 

Great. Drake Archer wasn’t exactly a safe fellow to have around. 

And Drake and Trace hadn’t ended their partnership on the best of terms. Mostly because Drake had been spiraling, and Trace hadn’t been able to help him.

Drake didn’t want help. He wanted to implode.

A knock sounded at Trace’s door. He glanced over, frowning. “Come in…” 

The door opened, and his assistant, Sara, poked her head inside. “The video footage should appear in your Inbox within the next five minutes.”

Good.  Grim satisfaction filled him. He might not have a handle on Sharpe’s killer, not yet, but he
would
be taking down this asshole.

***

“So just how much longer are you going to be playing guard duty?”  Skye asked Reese as she slanted a glance at him.

Reese gave her a smile. “Last night’s crash put the boss on edge.”

Right. Like she’d missed the frantic intensity that filled Trace. 

But she was tired of being in his cage.

This morning, she’d started to feel as if she were suffocating.

“That was an accident,” she said, shrugging. “Despite what Trace wants, he can’t protect me from everything. The world is too unpredictable for that.”

Reese reached for his coffee. Two PM, and she knew that he was hitting his fourth cup of the day. “You know Trace. Control matters to him.”

It mattered to her, too. And she was
done
with the cage.

The nightmares had come back last night. She’d been trapped in that basement once more, and Skye had woken up gasping. Even the walls of the penthouse had seemed to close in on her.

She needed freedom.

Not a constant guard, even if that guard was her friend. 

“My classes start tomorrow,” she said. Excitement slipped through the words. She had full classes—every single one. Sure, some of those students might just be coming because they were curious about the prima ballerina who’d been splashed across all the papers.

But they’d see the truth soon enough. The classes weren’t about sensationalism. Skye meant business. The studio was about the dance. About what she could teach her students.

And I’ll teach them plenty.

She narrowed her eyes on Reese. “I don’t want my students nervous, so the bodyguard bit is ending.” 

His brows lifted.

“Not that I don’t love you, but I think your time can be better spent on activities that are a little more…dangerous.” She used the word deliberately because Reese did enjoy his danger. “Now I’m going outside—
alone—
to get a few minutes of fresh air.”

She’d taken four steps when Reese called out, “I love you, too, Skye…and that’s why I’m playing guard duty. The last thing I want is for you to get hurt.”

A lump rose in her throat, but she kept going. Reese had gotten underneath her skin. In the weeks that she’d known him, he’d become her friend. She didn’t have a lot of friends.

He and Trace made her feel less alone in the world.

She grabbed her bag and then headed onto the sidewalk in front of her building. The air was warm, but not hot. Summer would be there soon enough.

Skye stared up at the sky. Blue, bright blue, like Trace’s eyes.

A car horn honked in the distance. It was lunch time, so, of course, the street was busy.

Tomorrow, she’d open her dance studio. Her students would come.

Her gaze drifted around the street.

Tomorrow…

A man with a hood covering his head stood across the street. Half-hidden by the shadows as he stood under the awning of another office.

He lifted an object.

Snapped a picture.

Her breath sawed out. A reporter. Again. 

She couldn’t have the reporters bothering her students.

And I can’t hide forever.
Straightening her shoulders, Skye headed for the cross-walk.

***

Trace clicked the file and watched the image load onto his screen. 

“The city needs to invest in some better quality equipment,” Noah muttered as he leaned over Trace’s shoulder. “Because that image is crap.”

Yes, it was. Trace leaned forward. He hit the button to advance the footage.

The limo was there, waiting at the light.

And, just down the road, the BMW waited, too.

Waited.

When the limo accelerated, the BMW raced toward it.

“Shit, he’s
aiming
for you,” Noah said.

Yes, yes, he damn well was.

The phone on Trace’s desk rang. He picked it up, still staring at the footage. “Weston.”

“Mr. Weston, it’s Joseph Hadden. I’m at the police station…”

There was a buzz of activity in the background. Joseph Hadden was one of Trace’s agents. A guy on the rise who always got the job done. Trace had sent him down to the PD because he wanted to know exactly what was happening with the investigation. 

Trace paused the video. The screen froze on the image of the BMW slamming into the side of the limo.

“They brought in the owner of the BMW,” Joseph told him. “But that guy swears he hasn’t driven the ride in months. He’s claiming that someone must have stolen it. Says he didn’t even notice it was gone until the cops started asking questions.”

Eyes narrowing, Trace hit the button to advance the video.

Glass shattered. Metal bent.

And the driver of the BMW jumped out. He didn’t immediately run. He stopped. Stared at the wreckage.

It was too dark to see his face clearly, but Trace could see his body. Tall. Narrow. 

“What does the owner look like?” Trace asked, fighting to keep all emotion from his voice.

“Alan Brenthouse is sixty-four, he uses a cane and—”

“And he’s not the asshole who ran us down.”  Trace rewound the video. “Stay down there. Keep digging.”  He slammed down the phone.

Hit play once more. 

The BMW waited.

The limo advanced when the light turned green.

The BMW raced forward.

The crash was brutal. Hard. Deliberate.

The driver got out. Stared at the limo. 

“He tried to kill you,” Noah said.

Yes, he had. “He should’ve tried harder.”
Because now, bastard, I’m coming after you.

***

The reporter spun on his heel. He yanked down his camera and hurried away from her.

Oh, no, he was not just going to run.

“Stop!” Skye called out as she hurried behind him.

He still had his hood up. Maybe it was the one who’d been there to catch her picture last time. Clyde. That had been his name. “Clyde!”

The reporter kept going. He turned, darting down an alley.

She pumped her legs, going faster—

Another man suddenly appeared before her. Tall, with wide shoulders, and dark blond hair. His green eyes glinted down at her. “I don’t think you want to do that.”

She stumbled to a stop. And, instantly, her hand dove into her bag. Skye had brought the bag along for a reason. She wrapped her fingers around her pepper spray that she kept in her bag. “You need to step away from me!” Who was he? Why would—

“It’s been a while since I was on guard duty for you, Skye, but I doubt the rules have changed much.”  His lips hitched up into a faint smile as he gazed down at her. “Trace would never want you following some stranger into a dark alley.”

It’s been a while since I was on guard duty for you…

She backed up a step. The street was busy. Plenty of people were around.
I’m safe. I’m safe.
The mantra repeated through her mind. 

The blond shrugged his broad shoulders. “Especially not if Sharpe was right…well, Trace sure as hell wouldn’t want you following strange men.”

“Look, buddy, I don’t know who you are—”

“Drake Archer.”

“—but I was following a reporter,” she finished angrily.

“That wasn’t a reporter. That was a man who seemed far, far too interested in you.”  His head tilted as his gaze swept over her. “He was so interested in you that I was able to get a good, up-close look at him.”