enveloped him as he held Lisa in his arms.
7
To his complete astonishment, Duarte slept five-plus solid hours, clear through to daybreak. So much for his chronic insomnia. Apparently, all he needed was a good fuck and the warmth of a good woman in bed beside him—the latter more than he cared to admit.
Lisa was still sound asleep, curled up like a kitten in the tangled sheets, her loose honey hair fanned across his pillow.
The warrior in him wasn’t accustomed to soft nights and slow mornings, but he was in no rush to leave her side. For a brief moment, he imagined waking up every morning to that vision. Unbelievable that she’d been married to a man who’d been stupid enough to let her go. Then again, Duarte himself had once been that stupid, too.
Ancient history. Except last night had brought their past back to life in living, breathing color. And this morning, reality slapped him awake with the reminder that it was time to start thinking with his head again.
He twitched with the need for movement, for exertion, for action. Before his body decided to work out those impulses indoors with Lisa again, Duarte eased out of bed and got dressed.
The rain had passed overnight. He thought about her disabled car she’d told him she’d left down on the mountain road. He didn’t like the idea of leaving a vehicle out to be discovered in the daylight. Three years living off-grid had worked for him because he’d been cautious, inconspicuous, unfailingly private. Deliberately closed off from the rest of the world as much as he could be.
Now he had a Phoenix operative’s sister lying naked in his bed and her car abandoned practically in his front yard. He should have made a point of going down to retrieve it or hide it last night.
Yeah, he should have done a lot of things differently last night.
Scowling at himself as he left the cabin with the key fob to Lisa’s Toyota in his pocket, Duarte tucked his pistol into the back waistband of his jeans as was his habit any time he stepped outside. A shortcut took him through the acres of woods he knew like the back of his hand, and down to the dirt road near the base of the mountain.
Her silver Camry had made it a few hundred yards up the muddied tract before getting stuck. Duarte ran a hand over his beard-grizzled jaw as he eyed the deeply entrenched rear tires. They were spun down to the rims of their hubcaps in the thick mud. And with the rain stopped hours ago, the drying mud had turned to concrete.
Shit. No way the puny little two-wheel-drive, four-cylinder was going to have the horsepower to plow out of the deep rut. Gonna have to dig it out.
Using a sturdy stick from the surrounding forest, he went to work freeing the vehicle. It took a lot of elbow grease, and he had to hunker down to chip away at mud encasing the tires. As he dug out the last rut, his gaze strayed to something odd clinging to the underside of the rear bumper.
A small black magnetic GPS tracker.
Holy hell.
He wrenched it off on a harsh curse, his blood running cold.
Someone had been watching Lisa. Thanks to her brother’s careless text, Duarte didn’t have to guess at who might have put the damn thing on her vehicle. Phoenix’s enemies, tracking her.
For how long?
Long enough to know her activities and movements.
Long enough to know where she was now, and whoever it was could easily follow her to the mountain. If they hadn’t already.
And Duarte had just left her all alone, unprotected, at the cabin.
As the dread seized him, a sudden chilling image flashed into his mind’s eye: Lisa in the hands of a killer, a gun jammed against her temple.
It was there and gone in an instant, like glimpsing a single frame from a rolling film. Nothing to tell him where or when it would happen, only the stark vision of Lisa’s pretty face contorted in terror as the nose of a SIG nine-millimeter pressed tight at her head.
Fuck. For all he knew, it could be happening right now.
Icy panic froze his
7
To his complete astonishment, Duarte slept five-plus solid hours, clear through to daybreak. So much for his chronic insomnia. Apparently, all he needed was a good fuck and the warmth of a good woman in bed beside him—the latter more than he cared to admit.
Lisa was still sound asleep, curled up like a kitten in the tangled sheets, her loose honey hair fanned across his pillow.
The warrior in him wasn’t accustomed to soft nights and slow mornings, but he was in no rush to leave her side. For a brief moment, he imagined waking up every morning to that vision. Unbelievable that she’d been married to a man who’d been stupid enough to let her go. Then again, Duarte himself had once been that stupid, too.
Ancient history. Except last night had brought their past back to life in living, breathing color. And this morning, reality slapped him awake with the reminder that it was time to start thinking with his head again.
He twitched with the need for movement, for exertion, for action. Before his body decided to work out those impulses indoors with Lisa again, Duarte eased out of bed and got dressed.
The rain had passed overnight. He thought about her disabled car she’d told him she’d left down on the mountain road. He didn’t like the idea of leaving a vehicle out to be discovered in the daylight. Three years living off-grid had worked for him because he’d been cautious, inconspicuous, unfailingly private. Deliberately closed off from the rest of the world as much as he could be.
Now he had a Phoenix operative’s sister lying naked in his bed and her car abandoned practically in his front yard. He should have made a point of going down to retrieve it or hide it last night.
Yeah, he should have done a lot of things differently last night.
Scowling at himself as he left the cabin with the key fob to Lisa’s Toyota in his pocket, Duarte tucked his pistol into the back waistband of his jeans as was his habit any time he stepped outside. A shortcut took him through the acres of woods he knew like the back of his hand, and down to the dirt road near the base of the mountain.
Her silver Camry had made it a few hundred yards up the muddied tract before getting stuck. Duarte ran a hand over his beard-grizzled jaw as he eyed the deeply entrenched rear tires. They were spun down to the rims of their hubcaps in the thick mud. And with the rain stopped hours ago, the drying mud had turned to concrete.
Shit. No way the puny little two-wheel-drive, four-cylinder was going to have the horsepower to plow out of the deep rut. Gonna have to dig it out.
Using a sturdy stick from the surrounding forest, he went to work freeing the vehicle. It took a lot of elbow grease, and he had to hunker down to chip away at mud encasing the tires. As he dug out the last rut, his gaze strayed to something odd clinging to the underside of the rear bumper.
A small black magnetic GPS tracker.
Holy hell.
He wrenched it off on a harsh curse, his blood running cold.
Someone had been watching Lisa. Thanks to her brother’s careless text, Duarte didn’t have to guess at who might have put the damn thing on her vehicle. Phoenix’s enemies, tracking her.
For how long?
Long enough to know her activities and movements.
Long enough to know where she was now, and whoever it was could easily follow her to the mountain. If they hadn’t already.
And Duarte had just left her all alone, unprotected, at the cabin.
As the dread seized him, a sudden chilling image flashed into his mind’s eye: Lisa in the hands of a killer, a gun jammed against her temple.
It was there and gone in an instant, like glimpsing a single frame from a rolling film. Nothing to tell him where or when it would happen, only the stark vision of Lisa’s pretty face contorted in terror as the nose of a SIG nine-millimeter pressed tight at her head.
Fuck. For all he knew, it could be happening right now.
Icy panic froze his
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