Hold on Tight (5 page)

She’d go to the office in the morning. Now she needed a shower, needed to regroup and figure out if she should bow out of this investigation based on the fact that she’d slept with the witness.

But when she pulled in her driveway, she stopped the car dead, jerked it hard into park and sat staring at her front steps.

Sophie was sitting there in the early spring chill. She wore some kind of shawl and ripped-up jeans, looked like a cross between a rock star and a model. At thirty-four, she was prettier than she’d been when she was younger. Haughtier too.

She’d chopped off all her hair, so it fell in a gaminelike fringe around her face, the dark color a strong contrast to her smooth ivory skin and big brown eyes, which looked dark and haunted, even from Jamie’s view through her windshield.

“I was going to call,” Sophie told her as soon as Jamie forced herself out of the car, but Jamie stopped her.

“I can’t do this—not now, Sophie. I’m tired. And you can’t walk back in, just like that, after the way you pushed me out of your life.”

Typical Sophie, didn’t offer an explanation, merely shrugged, stood and picked up the large duffel sitting next to her. She swung it over her shoulder and prepared to leave.

“I didn’t say you needed to leave; you can stay here. I just … I just need some time tonight.” Jamie leaned tiredly on the railing.

“You’re still really angry with me.”

“How long did it take you to figure that out, Sophie?”

“I’d prefer it if you called me PJ.”

Jamie’s head began to throb. “I’m not calling you by that name.”

“You’re upset that I didn’t fall all over you for saving me.”

“You really think that’s what I’m upset about? Fine,
PJ
, if you’re coming in, come in. If not …”

But Sophie was already walking away from the house, down the driveway.

“No wonder I’m so good at running,” she muttered as she watched her sister’s retreating back.

For a few minutes, she thought about going after Sophie, apologizing. But then her stubborn streak kicked in and she went inside instead, too tired to argue with anyone anymore.

She flipped on the lights and stood uncertainly in the foyer, because sometimes when she walked in after being away for a bit, it hit her.

She lived alone.

She’d never been alone before Mike’s death—she’d moved from her foster father’s house to college. After that, she roomed with another FBI trainee and then she’d moved into Mike’s house, first as his roommate while looking for her own place and then later as his lover.

But she’d been on her own now for ten months, refused Kevin, her foster father’s invite to stay with him and his wife, Grace, who’d reluctantly helped raise Jamie and her sister. No, this was her time to grow up. To fly, at twenty-eight years old.

She couldn’t seem to do either correctly. Plus, she still slept with the gun under her pillow. Cliché, but true, because there was no alarm system in place. With Mike, it hadn’t felt necessary and since his death she couldn’t bring herself to have one installed. To admit failure. It would prove that she couldn’t get over her past.

Instead, she was up most nights, waiting to hear from Sophie and wondering if things would get better.

When Jamie had returned from Africa two months ago, things seemed better. Now she wasn’t so sure. She’d certainly screwed things up with Sophie just now—so wasn’t sure if she was angrier at herself or her sister.

What a mess.

She dropped her bag by the door, locked it behind her securely and kicked off her shoes on her way through the living room. And then she stopped short.

Things had been moved.

She was meticulous in everything she did and her house was no exception. Nothing seemed to be missing, just … moved. Her living room furniture was rearranged a bit—the chairs neatly placed across from the couch instead of one under the window and the other next to the couch, the way she’d left them.

A walk into the kitchen showed that the four-person table had been moved as well. Dishes were all in the cabinets but they’d been rearranged too—not everything, but enough to trip the alarm bells in her mind. She’d done this for too long not to react.

Cold. She was cold, and with her gun pulled she went to the bedroom and grabbed a sweatshirt. Nothing in here had been touched—clothing still in the same place, both in the drawers and in the closet. Had she come home too soon, foiled someone’s plans?

Or did they intend to come back?

She should call someone. The police. Kevin. Her supervisor. But she didn’t call any of them, just sat on the floor and forced herself to breathe.

And that’s when she saw the small vase full of fresh flowers, sitting on her dresser—the same way it always was after Wanda had been there.

Wanda was here while I was gone
. Dammit. She put a palm to her forehead and remembered the housekeeper she and Mike had hired years ago to come in twice a month. Wanda had a key.

Typically, the woman didn’t rearrange things but she was always on Jamie to change things up. Jamie had grown tired of explaining that she liked things the same and made sure she worked late on the days Wanda was here. She always came home to a vase of flowers, fresh from Wanda’s garden.

Jamie had
definitely
done this for too long—twenty-two years of being in hiding with witness protection, even though the first two were relatively uneventful, did not get easier over time.

Heart beating too fast, she put the safety on the gun and left it on the table next to the bed. She sank into the mattress and shook her head, glad no one else had been around to see her overreact.

Her head began the familiar throb—by morning, she’d have a full-blown migraine if she didn’t take medicine. But she hated the meds; they made her feel loopy and not like herself. Kind of the way she was around Chris.

She didn’t want to like Chris Waldron. Didn’t want to get involved with him, sleep with him or find herself fascinated by him. Didn’t want him to know the things he did about her past. She’d exorcized him from her life two months ago. The only place she’d been unable to rid herself of him was in her dreams. At night, in the dark, her hands would trail over her body the way Chris’s had in that dark, downed plane, and she could hear the rain strumming the roof as she touched herself.

The sensation was never the same, left her with a big, empty ache that forced her to curl into a ball until morning light. And when morning did come, she was that cool, confident woman again. She was capable.

No, she hadn’t told Chris Waldron everything. And she never would.

“Five went in, two came out. It was a dangerous mission. They’re all dangerous. But when major world figures go to Africa and bring massive publicity with them, there’s going to be trouble,” Saint was saying, even as an interview of the ambassador and his wife was displayed in living, breathing Technicolor across the screen.

They’d been on every major news media outlet since their escape, praising the military for the action it took. However, the actress mourned the loss of African lives, as well as those of the peacekeepers. All Chris could hear when he watched her speak were her cries.

She still bore bruises on her cheek and arms, although she swore she hadn’t been raped. She’d told Cam that the men who’d kidnapped them had threatened her, scared her—that she’d been screaming because she heard them torturing an American in the next room.

Hearing that spoken out loud made Chris wince.

In retrospect, it probably hadn’t been the best idea to meet tonight with the lawyer defending him.

“I’m advising you not to speak to Cam,” the lawyer, whose name was Bob or Todd or something, told him.

Chris nodded in agreement, knowing full well he had every intention of not following that advice. Cam was driving in to see him tomorrow—the two men planned on hashing out what had happened, the way they hadn’t been able to before.

“I’m serious, Chief,” Bob-Todd continued. “You don’t want to be set up to take the fall. The FBI’s got some serious allegations and some damned good evidence. The agent assigned to investigate you hasn’t pulled any punches—she wants a meeting for tomorrow. According to the ME’s initial report, they’re doing an autopsy to see if ballistics indicates a match grade M25. Only you and Mark carried that particular weapon.”

“And rebel soldiers as well.” Saint slammed his fist down. “Do you have anything helpful to tell us?”

The lawyer shifted and Chris knew the man hadn’t ever seen combat. Not that he couldn’t be excellent at his job, but for this … well, he’d have a tough time understanding. “Chris needs to get his story straight. It sounds … confused.”

“Because he is confused. He was trying to keep the whereabouts of the men straight in the middle of a rebel coup and an explosion. I’d worry more if he knew, point by point, what happened. That would tell me he was lying.” Saint’s eyes blazed.

Chris watched Saint arguing with the lawyer with a strong sense of disinterest, as if they were talking about another person entirely, as if he didn’t witness Mark being dragged off in order to be killed. “I can’t do this now.” He stood and walked away from the table and out the door, toward his motorcycle. He’d parked it here two nights before he boarded the plane to Africa—they’d had only forty-eight hours of prep, for going through every possible scenario of what could happen.

He paused for a few seconds—out of respect for his CO, waited to see if Saint would walk out the door after him. Reprimand him. But no one came out and so Chris started the bike and took off, the wind buffeting him hard as he tried to pretend that the events leading to Mark’s death hadn’t ever happened, and fuck, he’d never had to regret anything about his career up until this point.

He guessed he’d been lucky as shit and that was the only luck he’d concede to in this entire fucking disaster.

It was well past midnight when he arrived at Jamie’s house, thanks to Max’s contacts at the DMV. Max was a captain in Naval Intelligence, the man who brought the teams home and did them more favors than they could ever hope to repay. Chris had never been to Jamie’s place before, but her car was in the driveway and all the lights in the house blazed behind heavy curtains.

He slammed down the kickstand on his bike and eased his battered body off it and then headed toward her front door. It was time to tell her about a few things, to see if he could explain his gift to her … it was time to tell her she was pregnant.

The door contained no glass and when he knocked, he noted it was made of heavy reinforced steel. Odd for an old house like this, but for an FBI agent, maybe not so odd. For a woman who’d grown up in witness protection, probably perfectly normal.

He’d been haunted by what she’d revealed to him about her past, wondered what she’d lived through as a young girl.

After two more quick raps, he heard her feet on the other side of the door. He stood back slightly from the peephole, the way he’d done in Africa so Jamie could see him. In seconds, she was opening the door, her gun in her hand, even though it was down at her side and not pointed at him.

She was unapologetic. Dressed in a gray sweatshirt and dark blue FBI shorts, she looked young. Her hair was out of its usual ponytail, loose around her bare face. Her toenails were polished a bright blue and that made him smile. For a second.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded, but he ignored the start of the tirade and pushed past her. She only offered the slightest resistance and he ended up in the middle of her living room, his boots probably ruining the white shag rug. Everything in the place was white—her couches, the chairs. The walls. There was a touch of color, thanks to some throw pillows, and shit, he never did understand much about design, but he’d be scared to touch anything in here.

Well, anything but her, and he was pretty sure he’d get over worrying about messing something up once that happened.

He wanted to tell her that he was here to see her, to take her to bed, to wake up with her in the morning, but fuck, none of that was an option. Not with the investigation hanging between them. “I can’t believe you think I’d kill Josiah.”

With great reluctance, she closed the front door—locked it too but didn’t let go of the gun. “The evidence points to you. Even Cam doesn’t have that kind of sniper experience, nor did he have that kind of rifle with him.”

He motioned to her own weapon now. “You feel the need to defend yourself against me now, Jamie? Are we back to that?”

“We’re not back to anything. You’re being investigated in the murder of an FBI agent—”

“And you slept with me. During your investigation,” he pointed out.

“I thought the case was closed. Based on what you’d told me, I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Just a tragedy.”

“And then someone at the FBI told you what to think.”

“Forensic evidence dictates where my investigation leads. We take care of our own, just like you, right?”

Yes, she was right—his own were fighting their asses off to clear him. “I didn’t come here to fight with you. I have something to tell you. Something else about that night.”

“You shouldn’t be here, telling me things. You should tell your lawyer. I’m not on your side.”

He wanted to tell her that was bullshit, but he didn’t. Instead, he concentrated on why he’d come here in the first place.

“What I’m going to tell you, I’m not telling anyone else. Not my lawyer. And I know you’re not going to use it, I know that. But I thought maybe, if I told you …” He trailed off, realizing he sounded ridiculous. Pathetic.
Fuck
. “I saw what the soldiers had already done to Mark. He wasn’t conscious when they carried him out. He’d been stripped, beaten. Whipped. Burned. Missing fingers.”

Jamie stared at him from across the room but he refused to back down now. “How did you know he was still alive?”

“I just … know.”

“That answer’s not good enough.”

“It’s going to have to be.”

“I don’t understand—do you want to go to jail?”

“I knew he wasn’t dead then because I knew he was about to die.” He paused. “I didn’t think. I’d hoped I wouldn’t be able to sense death again. This was the first time in nearly thirteen years it had happened.”

“You know when people are going to die?”

He shook his head. “No, not everyone. Just when it’s someone close to me. Really close. I can see that they’re going to go right before it happens.”

“So you think you’re psychic or something? God, I can’t believe that you’re using this crap now, as a defense.”

“It’s not a defense, Jamie. It has nothing to do with Josiah—I have no idea what happened to him. I wouldn’t. I barely knew the guy.” He didn’t take his eyes from her, wanted to see her gut reaction. But she had a really good poker face and she wasn’t letting him inside this time. “You don’t believe me.”

“I don’t know what the hell to believe, Chris. You come here and tell me some crazy story that you’re a fortuneteller.”

He sighed and stared up at the ceiling. “I’m not a fortuneteller. My skills are … different.” And something he’d never wanted.

You couldn’t tell we’d be arrested?
Nick had bitched at him years earlier while the two of them sat overnight in the jail cell, right before they’d enlisted, and yeah, Chris had known it was a distinct possibility, felt the danger in his gut. He’d attempted to beat the odds and his own instincts and he’d lost, big-fucking-time.

Since then, he hadn’t tried to outrun his instincts or change an outcome. Sometimes he was able to ignore them successfully. More often than not, he wasn’t—something he ignored as well as he could.

The sight is what made him a superior sniper—used to living his life on complete instinct, he just knew the right time to fire.

“Why are you telling me this now?” she asked.

He couldn’t reveal that to her, not yet. Maybe not ever. “I just needed to tell you. I didn’t when we first met. You shared a lot with me and I didn’t tell you.”

“None of this helps your case.”

“I didn’t say it would. Shit, after I saw that, I can’t be sure of much else beyond the explosion. I was just so focused on getting to Mark.”

As soon as the words came out of his mouth, he understood why Jamie was looking at him oddly. She took a deep breath, spoke the words they’d both been thinking, albeit reluctantly. “And if Josiah got in your way when you were trying to save Mark, if he held you back or ordered you to stand down …”

“I would’ve punched him, not shot him.”

“Did Josiah pull a weapon on you? Threaten you?” she persisted. “Everyone knows how quick you are, Chris. Even if he threatened you with a weapon first, you would’ve won that battle. Was that it, was it self-defense?”

“I didn’t shoot him.” He did move toward her now, close, so close that he could smell the shampoo she used—something with coconuts, reminded him of the beach. Of Africa. Of bad times made good because he’d been with her. “You have to know that too.”

“I don’t know anything—don’t you understand that? You turned my life upside down when we first met and now you’re back, doing it again.”

“But when I do come back, you don’t exactly turn me away,” he pointed out. “You didn’t at the hotel.”

She tucked some of the hair that brushed her cheek behind her ears impatiently. “We have chemistry, yes.”

He pulled her body close to his—slight resistance but not enough to deter him. “Lots of it. It’s more than just sex and danger.”

“You didn’t try to get in touch with me.” Her voice was practically a whisper. “Not once.”

“I couldn’t push you. Not then.”

“But now …”

“But now,” he agreed.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this psychic thing before, back at the hospital?”

“I don’t like talking about it, don’t like having it. Can’t you see how it gets in the way, how it can cloud everything for other people?” He fisted his hands in frustration, his gaze cutting to her kitchen, where the counters held stacks of cups and plates. She was doing some major reorganizing. “You’re worried about something.”

“I’m busy. You need to leave, Chris. I’m sorry—about everything, about your teammate and the other night.”

“That’s not what’s bothering you now.” He reached out to touch her shoulder, her cheek, but she pulled back.

“I thought you were psychic. So why don’t you tell me what’s wrong.”

“You’re pregnant,” he said bluntly, and yeah, so fucking
not
the way he’d wanted to break the news to her.

“What are you talking about?” she asked, even as her hand went to her belly unconsciously, and she knew—just knew—that he was right.

Knew that he was the father too, although he’d bet she’d try her damndest to deny that too. “When we were together, the first time in Africa, you got pregnant.”

“How would you know that?”

“I can tell, Jamie. The changes are subtle, but they’re there.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets to keep himself from reaching out to touch her, because right now, she looked like a woman who didn’t want to be touched at all. She looked more like she wanted to throw something at him, and since she still held the Glock in her hand, he didn’t want to risk anything.

“You’re just saying this to get me to resign from the investigation. Goddamn you, Chris. I didn’t think you’d sink this low, but I guess you’re really worried. And from what you just told me, you’ve got good reason to be.”

Yeah, this wasn’t going well. Nowhere near what he had planned. He was handing her ammunition. And yet, somewhere deep in his heart, he didn’t give a shit. Mainly because Jamie and the baby were more fucking important than his job—he’d always valued relationships over career. “What I’m telling you about the baby—”