Full Force Fatherhood (16 page)

Craig held the small revolver steady as he struggled to his feet. There was no smile left in him.

He was all pissed.

“You had another gun?” Mark asked, frustration and anger clashing inside of him.

“Welcome to Texas!”

Chapter Twenty-One

The good part about fighting in such a narrow space was that the only way Craig could easily escape was by backtracking several feet before fleeing through the stairwell door. On the flip side of that coin, Mark was in the same boat. To get out of view or range of the gun in Craig's hand, Mark would have to run backward and hope he could turn around either corner before the crazed man got a shot off. The other option was to rush him but, by the look in Craig's eyes, Mark knew he'd be shot in the process.

So Mark quickly weighed his limited options as Craig got to his feet. His gun never wavered. He raised his hand a fraction, getting a better bead on Mark's head. The bodyguard tensed.

He needed to move—to disarm the man—or else Mark wouldn't be able to protect the people in the basement counting on him.

To protect Kelli.

“I'm done with this,” Craig ground out. Blood stained his teeth as he spoke. “You're not worth all of this trouble.”

Mark bent, ready to charge, when a loud
bang
sounded.

He froze. He hadn't been fast enough. He was too late.

Craig had shot him and now he was going to die.

Mark waited for the pain or the darkness that introduced death to overtake him.

But it never came.

Craig dropped his gun arm to his side and fell awkwardly to his knees. Even though he was wearing black, the bodyguard could see blood blossoming right above his stomach. Craig's wide eyes traveled over his shoulder.

“Drop the gun or I'll shoot higher next time,” Kelli demanded, voice even. Mark whipped his head around.

Kelli Crane was absolutely fierce.

She stood barefoot, legs braced apart, both hands holding the gun with an almost perfect stance. Her hair was wild, and he couldn't help but notice that her dress had a new slit showing almost all of her bare leg. He wasn't as thrilled about the blood he could see dripping from her elbow, but there was no doubt that Kelli was holding her own. And then some.

Mark's attention went back to Craig as he dropped his gun. That got Mark moving. He closed the space between them and picked up the weapon. The sound of Kelli's bare feet slapping the concrete echoed around them as she surprised Mark once again. She pushed past him, put her foot on Craig's chest and kicked.

He fell backward with a groan.

“That's for threatening my daughter and hurting Lynn.” She reared back and kicked him in the groin. He rolled over with a yell. The bodyguard cringed. “That's for hurting Mark.” She lowered the gun at him. “That bullet is for me,” she whispered, voice so cold it froze Mark to his spot. Was Kelli really going to kill Craig? Would he try to stop her? Could he?

She took a deep, shuddering breath. Luckily, he wasn't going to have to find out. Without turning, she handed the gun back to Mark. “And the fact that I'm not going to kill you right here and now is for Victor. He'd give you mercy, a courtesy you didn't extend to him or his family.”

Kelli turned to Mark with one unmistakable expression written across her face.

Relief.

“Are you okay?” she asked. Her tone had warmed up considerably.

“Thanks to you.”

A small, tired smile tugged up the corner of her lips.

“Do you think you can carry him into that room?” Kelli motioned to the door behind them. It was offset to the right so he had to move to the side to see it. That was probably the reason Craig hadn't noticed Kelli walk up at first.

“Yeah, but I think we should get going before anyone else catches up to us,” he advised. The two men who had chased them into the basement must be somewhere close.

Kelli's smile grew a fraction.

“Believe me, I think we have enough firepower between us now that we'll be okay until the cops get here.” She sobered. “Dennis is fading. I don't think we need to move him any more.”

Mark nodded after some consideration. The possibility that they'd be met with more force in the lobby—or even the stairwell—was high. At least they had two guns now. If they holed up in a room, then waiting wouldn't be as stressful.

“Don't worry about being gentle with him,” Kelli said when Mark reached for a still-writhing Craig.

“It didn't even cross my mind.”

* * *

K
ELLI
HADN
'
T
EXAGGERATED
when she said they had enough firepower. She watched Mark's surprised expression with a bit of pride as he took in Lynn standing near the two downed men with a gun in each hand. After calling Jonathan and updating him on their location, he got the entire lowdown of what had happened from Lynn.

“Maybe you should think about joining Orion,” he said.

Kelli shrugged. “When you back Mama Bear into a corner...”

Mark laughed. She realized how happy the sound made her.

A few minutes passed before a sound she
wasn't
happy to hear met their ears. Footsteps were pounding across the concrete in the hallway they'd just left.

In a flash, Mark raised the handgun Kelli had used to shoot Craig, Kelli grabbed the revolver Craig had almost used to shoot Mark and Lynn pointed both her guns all at the doorway. They were done messing around.

“Whoa, whoa! I come in peace, guys!” Jonathan Carmichael held his hands up in surprise at the scene when he opened the door. “When you said you had this, I was assuming you were just trying to seem manly in front of the ladies, but damn!”

With Jonathan came a flood of police and two EMT groups. One dispatched upstairs to check on the downed men there. The second came for Dennis and the others.

“Take him first,” Lynn said to one of the EMTs. She pointed to Dennis. “He's the good guy, not them.”

And they did just that.

Finally, escorted by Jonathan and the head of police himself, Kelli, Mark, Lynn and Dennis made it out of the Bowman Foundation. Lynn gave her statement in the parking lot before asking to be dropped off at the hospital so Dennis wouldn't be alone, while Mark and Kelli went straight to the station. There they told the entire story.

When they'd finished, Kelli said, “And if you don't believe us—” she maneuvered her dress around under the table and pulled the recorder from her new favorite accessory “—pretty sure we recorded the entire thing.”

Luckily the police already had believed them. The recording only solidified their next actions. An all points bulletin went out on the missing Hector Mendez. The CEO of the Bowman Foundation, along with almost all of the staff, were quickly brought in for questioning. Radford Bowman, despite his importance within the foundation, appeared to have no idea what his publicist was up to while on the clock. The lackeys who
had
been working with Hector confirmed Bowman's innocence while condemning those who were not innocent in the least, each trying to swing a deal for their knowledge against Hector.

Mark and Kelli didn't stay long enough to get a head count of how many were in on the scheme. They got the okay to leave with the promise they'd be back the next day.

The sun was coming up by the time Mark and Kelli made it back to his apartment. Nikki greeted them with tight hugs and congratulations for “kicking serious butt.” Jonathan had given her the CliffsNotes over the phone and she, too, jokingly offered Kelli a job.

Mark stayed in the living room to fill the woman in on everything else that had happened while Kelli excused herself to the bedroom. Finally able to take off the dress she had ruined—but knew she'd always keep—Kelli snagged one of Mark's long shirts and unapologetically crawled into his bed.

Grace, feeling the movement, reached for her mother.

Kelli reached right back.

* * *

“T
HIS
PLACE
IS
a dump.” To prove his point, Jonathan grabbed the railing and freely wiggled it. The movement nearly took it clear off. Mark rolled his eyes. “I'd never stay here,” Jonathan continued.

Mark was with him there. The motel was as run-down as they came. A far cry from what a man like Hector Mendez was probably used to. Yet they had followed him here to the small Florida town's decrepit motel that not even tourists used. It was a perfect place to hide.

If he wasn't being pursued by Orion agents and a private investigator wife. Oliver and Darling Quinn had used every connection in their combined books to follow his trail right to the outside of the one-level motel.

It had been two days since Hector had fled, and Mark was itching to finally take him down. It was a three-way race between Hector fleeing the country, Mark and Orion getting Hector before that, and the FBI agents who had taken over the case catching Hector before anyone else. The Feds had booked it to a town three cities over following up on a reported sighting of the man, along with a credit card used in his name, but Darling had said the information was wrong. She knew more than a few people on the shadier side of the town and was able to track the man to the motel instead. She'd asked if she should let the Feds know of their location but Mark had told her that if and when they caught their man they could give them a ring then.

“Just don't do anything illegal or I'll arrest
you
,” the local beat cop, Cara Whitfield, had warned on the ride over. She had talked to the police in Dallas and had been filled in on the possibility that Hector had fled to her small town. It was a possibility she hadn't liked at all. She'd agreed to accompany and help them despite the fact that they weren't truly law enforcement.

Now she stood with the two of them as they stopped to discuss a plan.

“How do you want to play this?” Jonathan asked. Their target was in the room farthest from the office.

“We could always pretend to be housekeeping,” Mark offered. “Works for Darling on some of her cases.”

“Unless you have a convincing female voice, I don't think he'll answer the door,” Jonathan insisted.

“Hey, men can do housekeeping, too,” Mark scolded. “Thinking otherwise is sexist.”

Jonathan nodded. “True,” he admitted. “Let me say it, then.”

Cara made a noise that clearly indicated she was unsure whether or not to be amused.

“Or we can use this,” she said, waving a key in the air. “The front-desk clerk said a man fitting Hector's description was the one to pay for the room.”

That sobered the men.

“Lead the way,” Mark said to the officer. She pulled her gun from her holster.

“Let's try not to get anyone shot.”

The three of them sidled to the left of the door. Although Hector was dangerous, the best Cara would let them do was have their stun guns—not cell phone–shaped—as weapons. That was fine by Mark. He wanted to lay hands on the man. Not bullets.

Despite her annoyance at their antics, Officer Whitfield didn't use the key right off the bat. Instead, she rapped on the door.

“Housekeeping,” she called.

No one responded.

“Housekeeping,” she tried again.

This time there was a loud crash and scuffling on the other side of the door.

“He's running,” Cara yelled, putting the key in the door.

Instead of sticking behind her, Mark turned and ran around the building. He'd already noticed that each room had a back window.

Sure enough, Hector was climbing through it.

“I don't think so,” Mark yelled. Hector thumped to the dirt and scrambled to stand.

It didn't work.

Mark threw a punch that put him back on the ground.

Cara was yelling something through the window, but Mark didn't hear it.

“Your luck just ran out, buddy,” Mark said.

Hector cradled his jaw, eyes wide in fear. “Let me go and I can make you a very rich man,” he said quickly. “You could have everything you've ever dreamed of.”

The bodyguard didn't skip a beat.

“Sorry, my dreams can't be bought.”

“How about your happiness, then?” Hector whispered angrily as Cara and Jonathan ran up. “You can have
whatever
you want.”

Mark pictured Kelli and Grace and smiled.

“What I truly want in life, money can't buy.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Kelli hadn't been in the hospital since she gave birth to Grace. She wasn't afraid of them. She just wasn't comfortable in them. However, she voluntarily walked through the sterile-smelling hallways with determination.

It was time she had a talk with someone.

She finally found the room she was looking for and knocked, oddly nervous. Talking followed by laughter floated out as the door was opened.

Lynn was a little dressier than normal, wearing an orange-and-white floral jumper with matching flats. Her hair was even teased out a bit, with her prettiest hair band secured around her head. It was her smile, though, that was the most beautiful part of her outfit. She was happy, no doubt about it.

Kelli raised her eyebrow at her friend, who promptly averted her gaze.

“Hey, Kel,” she greeted her. “Is it time already?”

Kelli smiled. “Yeah, the movers get to the house in an hour,” she said. “Everything is all ready to go except Grace's toys and some random knickknacks.”

“Where's Mini-You?”

Kelli felt her lips stretch wider. She didn't bother hiding the bigger smile. “She's at the house. She was trying to get Mark to play Pretty Princess with her when I left.”

Lynn laughed. “I'll go try to save him,” she said, reaching for her purse against the wall. When she straightened, she glanced back in the direction of the hospital bed Kelli couldn't yet see from her spot in the doorway. “Do you want me to stay for this or...?”

“You can leave,” Kelli assured her. “I'll be fine.”

“Oh, I wasn't worried about you,” Lynn shot back with a wink. “I've seen with my own eyes you can handle your own.”

They said goodbye, and Lynn left after a few words to the patient over her shoulder. Kelli took a deep breath and went farther into the room.

Dennis Crawford was propped up in bed, hooked up to machines, but also looking a thousand times better than he had when he'd been brought in. One emergency surgery and lots of bed rest had done the man wonders. She even rethought her earlier assumption that he was forty.

“I was wondering when you'd come,” he said.

“Apparently life didn't pause itself while we were unknowingly taking down a drug-running operation.” She shrugged. It made him laugh, but not too long. He seemed to still be uncomfortable with his healing wounds.

Dennis motioned to the chair next to the bed. It was really close and smelled like Lynn's favorite perfume. Kelli made a mental note to ask her about this new relationship she seemed to be starting. But Lynn had been through a lot recently, so she wouldn't tease her too much just yet.

“How are you feeling?” Kelli asked, unsure of how to talk to the man she'd thought was the ultimate evil just two weeks beforehand.

“Sore but alive. I'm told that you refused to leave me in that basement.” He gave her a half smile. “Thank you for that.”

“I heard I was returning the favor.” She shifted in her seat and stopped dancing around what she wanted to ask. “Tell me everything. Lynn offered, but I wanted to hear it from you.”

Like her visit, it seemed Dennis was anticipating Kelli's desire to have him explain as much as he knew. He leaned back against his pillow but held her gaze as he spoke.

“In the beginning, I was contacted directly by Bowman's CEO, Radford, to do a spotlight on the foundation,” he started. “It seemed like an open-and-shut story, and I truly thought it was. Until the fire.” He averted his eyes for a second, pained. It was an emotion he'd masked well in his office when she'd first confronted him. “Radford came to my office the next day to offer his condolences. I told him I still wanted to honor Victor by printing his last story. He thought that was a great idea. He left, and then a few hours later, Hector showed up. He told me Victor had gotten some names wrong in his story. I didn't believe him. Victor was one of my best writers. Very thorough, especially so close to turn-in. Hector also started acting very strange as he tried to convince me otherwise, but I insisted Victor wouldn't have made that mistake.”

“What did Hector say to that?” Kelli found herself leaning in a bit.

“He got angry. Stood up and shut my office door. Then he laid it all out for me.”

“He told you about running drugs? Just like that?”

Dennis smirked. It wasn't in humor.

“He was proud of what he'd done. I think he wanted someone who knew what it was like to be successful to be in awe of the success
he'd
achieved.” Kelli realized she wasn't that surprised. She could picture Hector's arrogance with ease. “And, in all honesty, I was impressed in a strictly objective way. Turning half of a charity into a cover for running drugs in direct competition with the cartel? That takes serious guts and absolutely thorough planning.”

“And a good dose of stupidity,” she added. If the cartel had found out they had lost business because of Hector, he—and everyone connected to him—would have met a very bad end.

“That, too. When he realized that Victor had actually snagged the names of two ex-cartel runners who helped make his venture possible, he panicked. Especially when the calls to the house didn't so much as make Victor think twice. To say Hector escalated quickly is an understatement.” He frowned.

“Did he admit he hired Craig to start the fire?”

Dennis nodded. “Those weren't his exact words, but he heavily implied it. He told me he was a well-connected man who wouldn't hesitate in burning me...like Victor had burned.” Kelli's jaw tightened. She fisted her hands on her lap. Dennis paused, then continued, voice low. “However, now I know that he wasn't actually all that well-connected. There are very few people who would directly run against the cartel, in direct opposition. And, if he had been so well-connected, I have no doubt that all of us would have met our ends some time ago. Instead, Hector personally visited me and talked to me about covering up the article that could put him in the spotlight. I think his venture was a start-up of sorts and too new for him to really have any allies yet, aside from the lackeys beneath him. Either way, when he came here he must not have believed me when I said I'd keep my mouth shut and change the story—which was good, because I wouldn't have—so he gave me a new incentive.”

“Grace,” Kelli whispered. After the fire, the secret of her pregnancy had become public.

“And you.” His expression softened. “In my line of work, I've had to become a lot of things—hardened, blunt, often seemingly without an ounce of empathy—but something in me seemed to soften, to almost break. What if I did report the real story and wasn't able to get the evidence to put Hector and the whole business away? What if the FBI swooped in and still couldn't manage to get anything to send Hector away for life? I didn't even have Victor's original notes and didn't even know they existed at the time. Every way I looked at it I realized that, for once, I couldn't take a chance on everything falling through. I couldn't gamble with your lives. I wouldn't. So I changed the names the way Hector wanted and hoped you'd never look into it.” He gave her a wry smile. “But then you showed up with Victor's original notes and an unwavering amount of loyalty.”

That relaxed her a bit. She gave him an apologetic look. “Sorry,” she said, not at all meaning it. Dennis waved his hand to dismiss what he also knew was a lie. “How did they know I had the journal?”

Dennis didn't hold back his anger for the answer. “When I came to speak to you at your new house—to try and get you to stop—I had already been visited by Hector. He said if I didn't get you to stop and get the notebook, then you'd pay. He also let me in on the fact that apparently my house was bugged so he could ensure I wasn't up to anything. Something I had suspected but hadn't been able to prove yet. He may have been arrogant but he was also clever.”

“So at the Foundation dinner—” she started.

“I gave him the notebook and told him to leave you all the hell alone.” He motioned to the fading bruise across his nose. “He wasn't happy.”

“I'm sorry,” Kelli said, meaning it that time.

“In the end, it turned out better than I could ever have hoped. I heard Mark was able to be the one who grabbed Hector from Florida, right?”

Kelli loved being able to nod at that.

“Mark and Jonathan tracked him down and now the FBI have him back in town. I've since been assured that no amount of money will keep him out of a lifelong prison sentence. I also learned that, thanks to some publication that has been blasting the story all over the internet, the Feds publically confirmed that Hector's entire operation has been shut down while all of those that followed him have admitted to their part in everything. I also couldn't help but notice that my name and Grace's were never mentioned. I think the publication is called the
Scale
?” She smiled and cocked her head to the side. “You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?”

It was Dennis's turn to lie. He shook his head. “I've been attached to this bed since they brought me in. I wouldn't even be able to do that.”

Kelli laughed, and just like that, the weight of the unknown lifted. She finally had the entire story behind Victor's death. Justice had been brought not only to the man at the top of the operation but also to those who had helped build his tower.

“Thank you, Dennis,” she said, holding his gaze with a look of absolute sincerity. “If Victor were here he would thank you, too.” She took his hand in hers and squeezed it.

He squeezed back. “He was a good man.”

“Yes, he was.”

* * *

K
ELLI
PULLED
UP
to the house for the last time and got out with a much lighter heart. The Dallas weather had been kind enough to revert to its normal heat instead of the freak storms that had plagued the city the past two weeks. If Mark hadn't resigned from his construction job to become a full-time Orion agent again, he probably wouldn't have had work for a while. Kelli couldn't help but smile when she thought about the bodyguard.

After he and Kelli had gotten back from the police station, he'd told Nikki she could go home. He had—with permission—fallen asleep next to Grace and Kelli. Kelli had awoken hours later to the sound of Mark and Grace playing blocks in the living room. Since then, the three of them had fallen into a groove of being together.

One that just felt right.

One that, without saying it aloud, they'd both decided to continue to explore.

One that Kelli hadn't expected but absolutely loved.

“Hello?” she called into the boxed-up house.

“Back here, and please bring your camera,” Lynn called.

Kelli, not one to question Lynn's excited voice, pulled her phone out and hurried to Grace's bedroom. Once there, she almost doubled over in laughter.

Mark sat on the floor, a bright pink boa wrapped around his shoulders, a plastic crown on his head, cheeks tinted with blush. He had a plastic teacup in his hand while Grace—also wearing a crown and blush—sat in Lynn's lap across from him.

“I see someone just had his first taste of Pretty Princess,” Kelli said around her fits of laughter. She quickly snapped a picture while she spoke. She looked at Lynn. “I thought you were supposed to help save him?”

Lynn put her hands up in defense. “I tried!”

Mark snorted. “By
tried
she means she tried to get me to wear some of your lipstick,” he said. Kelli almost hooted at that.

“Hey, listen here, buddy, I was trying to offset the blush we had to put on to match your boa,” Lynn shot back.

Grace just giggled between them.

“Is this my life now?” Kelli joked.

Mark's lips stretched into a grin. “One can hope,” he said.

His words made Kelli's stomach flutter.

Lynn stood and picked up Grace. “Okay, gag me, guys,” she said. “You're all over here making Pretty Princess somehow
romantic
. I think it's time we go outside and look for bugs or something, don't you, Grace?”

Grace nodded so hard that her crown nearly fell off. Kelli adjusted it and kissed her forehead before the two left the room.

“Do you want to keep that on or take that off before the movers get here?” Kelli asked the bodyguard.

He shrugged. “I don't know. I think it's a really good color on me,” he joked.

“Well, how about I make you a deal?” She walked over to him and took the boa from his neck, her hand lingering beside his cheek. “Help me box the rest of this, and Grace's toys, and I'll let you play dress-up with us whenever you want.”

Mark laughed. “Deal.”

Together they finished boxing the last of the house's stray contents. Kelli spent the time telling him what Dennis had said. He also admitted his opinion of Dennis had gone up exponentially.

“Lynn's been spending a lot of time at the hospital with him, I've noticed,” he added when they had finished.

Kelli put her hands to her ears.

“Yeah, yeah, don't get me started on how weird that is,” she said. “But after today's talk, maybe I can come to terms with the possibility of them spending more time together. Then again, when have I ever been able to stop Lynn from dating a man she likes?” She paused, then elaborated, because Mark probably didn't know that answer. “Never.”

They conducted a walk-through to make sure everything was ready for the movers. When Kelli was able to confirm that it was, they found themselves standing near the front door in a house devoid of sound. Mark took her hand in his and pulled her close.

Bending down a fraction, he met her lips with a kiss that took her breath away. It put fire in her body and passion back into her heart. He pulled away too soon, much to her disappointment.