Protector for Hire (2 page)

“The sad thing is, I have no idea if you’re kidding.”

“What? She’ll like it out there. Smells nice and woodsy.”

“Schwartz—”

“Relax, baby brother.” Schwartz folded his hands around his own coffee mug. “Don’t get your panties in a twist. I ordered one of those rollaway beds online. Even bought some fancy sheets from that website Sheri likes.”

He watched Grant’s face soften at the mention of their sister, and his own stomach did a weird twist. Saying her name out loud made him miss her something fierce. So had seeing her in person at her wedding a few months ago. Granted, she hadn’t seen
him
—he’d taken great pains to stay hidden in the shadows, to make sure no one noticed him or had a chance to ask why he’d stayed away so long.

Grant took another sip of coffee. The wince was less pronounced this time, but it was still there. “I trust you, Schwartz. No matter what happened before or what demons you’re fighting all alone out here, I still trust you more than anyone else in the world.”

The words were like tiny daggers in his chest. He didn’t deserve anyone’s trust. Sure as hell not his family’s.

Schwartz grunted again. “You told her to pack snow boots, right?”

Grant blinked, then nodded. “Yeah. And a parka. And everything else on your list. It’s autumn in Montana. She might be a city girl, but I’m pretty sure she understands this isn’t Malibu.”

“Good.”

Grant studied him again, and Schwartz resisted the urge to get up and leave the room. They were only eleven months apart, and even though Schwartz had always been the outlier in his staunchly military family, Grant was the one he’d been closest to. It was the reason he’d trusted Grant with his contact info, though he’d commanded his baby brother to use it only in emergencies.

This sure as hell qualified.

It wasn’t like he’d cut his family off completely. He’d sent Christmas cards and wedding gifts, birthday wishes and Mother’s Day flowers.

Mother’s Day.

The thought of Stella Patton flushed a fresh wave of nostalgia through his veins. He frowned down at his coffee and wondered how long it would take his brothers and the cops to locate Jacques Armistead. Truth be told, he hoped his brothers got to the bastard first.

“You doing okay?” Grant asked at last.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

Grant raised an eyebrow. “I’ve worried about you. Out here in the middle of nowhere all alone for this long—”

“Is this conversation almost over?”

Grant smiled. “You sure you won’t lose the beard?”

“Fuck off.”

“You look like the goddamn Unabomber.”

Schwartz felt himself start to smile in spite of his best efforts not to. “Get out of here. You got what you came for. I let you come all the way out here to scope things out and make sure I haven’t gone completely feral.”

“The jury’s still out on that.”

He found himself smiling still wider, which probably fucked up the hard-ass vibe he was going for. “In any case, you’ve satisfied your curiosity. Your sister-in-law will be well-hidden here.”

“That, I’ll agree with.”

“Now go on. I have to leave pretty soon if I’m going to make it to the bus station to pick up the girl.”

“Janelle. Her name is Janelle.”

Janelle Rebecca Keebler.
She’d briefly been Janelle Rebecca Armistead, or Mrs. Jacques Armistead in formal settings. Her childhood nicknames included JJ, Nelly, and Princess Puffybutt. Schwartz knew it all by heart, but he grunted instead. “Yep. Gotta pick the girl up. You leaving soon?”

Grant stood up, smiling a little sadly as he walked over to the tiny kitchen and dumped the contents of his mug into the sink. “Your coffee tastes like horse piss.”

“I love you, too, man.”

Grant just barely managed to mask his surprise. “I love you, big brother.”

“Now get the fuck out of here.”

Grant nodded and set the mug on the counter as Schwartz stood up. He walked over and gave Grant a stiff, one-armed hug, but Grant pulled him tighter into a big, sloppy bear hug. They stood like that for what seemed like hours, but it was probably only a few moments.

“I’m working on a special intelligence project for PACOM over at Fort Lewis for the next few months,” Grant said, breaking the hug. “Washington’s not that far away from Montana, if you need anything.”

“I won’t.”

“Thanks again, man.”

Schwartz only grunted in response as he watched his brother walk out the door. He shut it softly behind him, and Schwartz listened as Grant’s boots crunched through the freshly fallen snow. He walked to the window and watched Grant get into a blue pickup truck with a light dusting of snow on the windshield. He fired up the engine and idled a few moments while Schwartz stood watching, silent.

At last, Grant eased the truck away from the bank of trees next to the cabin. His taillights flickered as he reached a bend in the gravel road, then disappeared around a corner.

Schwartz stood there for a few more beats, his throat feeling tight again.

At last, he stepped away from the window and walked to the kitchen. He dumped the contents of his own coffee mug down the sink, untouched. Then he turned and walked to the bathroom.

Hesitating in front of the mirror, he studied the jagged scar across his left cheekbone. He ran a finger over it, feeling the texture, remembering how it got there.

Then he reached under the sink and pulled out the shaving cream.

…

Janelle cupped the phone against her ear, the sleeve of her blue cashmere sweater riding up to expose her Cartier wristwatch. It was almost three o’clock, so she should be arriving at her destination any minute now.

She gripped the phone tighter as a wave of homesickness pushed her back against the cracked vinyl bus seat.

“This wig itches,” she whispered into the receiver.

“You’re almost there, right?” On the other end of the line, her sister, Anna, sounded nervous. “You’re sure this call can’t be traced?”

“I’m using that disposable phone Schwartz sent. Plus I’m pretty sure Mac put some sort of tracking device on the bus. And on my luggage. And on—”

“And you’re sure no one saw you get on the train yesterday? Or in the cab back in the city?”

“For the hundredth time, I’m sure.” Janelle’s voice had risen just above a whisper, but no one else on the bus seemed to notice. She practically had the whole space to herself. An old woman wearing three jackets and an orange knit hat sat snoring up front near the driver, her head lolling back against the seat. Near the middle of the bus, a sullen-looking teenager fiddled with a Game Boy while wearing earphones that blasted music loud enough for Janelle to recognize the song.

No one seemed to see her in the back of the bus.

Thank God.

“So how will you recognize him when you get there?” Anna asked. “Schwartz, I mean. Do you know what he looks like?”

“I saw that photo, remember? The one Grant took when Schwartz got out of the hospital after his tour in Iraq?”

“That was ten years ago, Janelle. I’m sure he looks way different. How will you know it’s him?”

Janelle thought of the black and white image, the deep brackets around the man’s mouth, the haunted look in his eyes.

“I’ll know,” she said, surprising herself with the certainty in her own voice.

She wasn’t certain about much else these days. Well, she felt certain her ex-husband was trying to kill her. Kill her or remarry her, which wasn’t all that different in Janelle’s mind.

If only you’d gotten away sooner. If only you hadn’t seen what you saw.

She looked out the fogged bus window, not entirely certain where she was or where she was going. She’d boarded the first bus in Oregon after she got off the train from California, then caught another bus through Washington State. She was somewhere in northern Idaho now, but that wasn’t her final destination. She didn’t know where she was headed next.

The landscape along the highway was a sea of shaggy evergreens dusted with powdered-sugar snow. Off to one side was a sparkling, frothy river lined with boulders the size of small automobiles. In the distance, a towering fringe of mountain peaks jutted up through a film of clouds. Janelle shivered.

“I’m worried about you.”

The softness in her sister’s voice made Janelle’s throat tight. “I’ll be okay,” she murmured. “This family you’re marrying into—the Pattons? They’ve got their shit together. Between Sheri’s crash course in handguns, Mac’s twenty-four/seven surveillance on Jacques’s men, Stella teaching me how to make a hand grenade with hair spray and a bobby pin, and your fiancé making all these arrangements to have Schwartz hide me out in the middle of nowhere—”

She swallowed, overwhelmed by how much they were all doing for her, these people she’d only met in the last few months.

“They’re good people,” Anna agreed. “All of them. You can trust them with your life.”

“I kinda have to.”

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out with the witness protection program. I really thought the cops could—”

“Don’t,” Janelle said. “None of that was your fault. You couldn’t have known what Jacques was capable of. How hell-bent he is on getting me back.”

Dead or alive,
she almost added, but didn’t want to freak her sister out more.

“Do you think it’s weird Mac was never able to find Schwartz?” Anna asked. “I mean, Mac handles covert government deals all over the globe. He knows what a terrorist in Afghanistan ate for breakfast or what a warlord in Yemen is watching on television. How come he never tracked down Schwartz?”

“That’s the point, isn’t it?” Janelle asked. “The guy obviously knows how to stay hidden. If no one’s been able to find Schwartz all these years, then Jacques shouldn’t be able to find me.”

I hope.

Janelle cradled the phone tighter against her shoulder, missing her sister. She also kinda missed the creature comforts of her home in San Francisco. She hadn’t had a good latte for days, and her manicure was chipped and faded. Silly things to think about at a time like this, but she had to focus on something besides fearing for her life and wondering if she’d ever be able to go home again.

She tried not to cry as the bus slowed down. “Sweetie, I have to go now,” Janelle said. “It looks like we’re in some sort of town, so I think we’ll be stopping soon.”

“Okay. Stay safe?”

“I’ll do my best.”

“I’d tell you to call me, but—”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to.”

“I know. I understand. Still, if you get a chance, let me know you’re okay.”

“I will. I love you.”

“I love you, too, hon. I miss you.”

“Tell your hottie fiancé thanks when you see him.”

“Okay. Stay safe.”

Janelle clicked off the call, mentally tallying up the number of times Anna had uttered those words.

Stay safe.

Like Janelle had any say in the matter. Her safety was entirely in other people’s hands at this point.

One person in particular.

The bus slowed to a crawl, and Janelle clutched her Louis Vuitton case tighter in one hand. The snoozing woman at the front of the bus stirred, then sat up, wide-eyed and blinking like a confused owl. The surly-looking teen didn’t glance up from his Game Boy.

The bus turned a corner, ambling past squatty brown buildings that were all no more than twenty or thirty feet tall. No skyscrapers here, and the sky was so bright blue it nearly hurt her eyes. Janelle knew this wasn’t her final destination, but she already felt a million miles from San Francisco.

The bus lumbered into the parking lot of a gas station and screeched to a halt next to the pumps. “We’re here, folks,” the driver said, probably avoiding naming the town because he had no idea himself.

Janelle glanced out the window again. A funny-looking black-and-white bird was picking at the remains of a box of french fries squashed into the asphalt. A woman in chaps walked bow-legged from a horse trailer at the gas pumps toward the front of a convenience store, a gust of snow dust swirling around her boots. Next to the bus sat a pickup truck so ancient, it had five colors of paint on its rusty hood. There was a man in dark sunglasses motionless behind the wheel.

Janelle stared. The driver stirred, then opened the door. A leg the size of a tree trunk swung out, followed by another, and Janelle felt her heart surge throbbing into her throat. There was nowhere for her to run. Nowhere to hide if Jacques and his men came looking and—

The man slammed the door of the pickup and stared up at the bus, a permanent scowl etched into his clean-shaven face. As he tugged off his sunglasses, Janelle felt her heart skid back to a normal rhythm. Well, mostly normal. The guy was huge. The guy was terrifying.

The guy was Schwartz.

The photos she’d seen of him were nearly a decade old, but she would have known those eyes anywhere. The clear gray-brown hue, their haunted depths, the deep fan of lines spread out from each corner.

But as much as she fixated on his eyes, she had to admit the rest of the package was pretty fine to admire as well. He was scary-big like his brothers, but well put together with broad shoulders and a chest that looked like he might be wearing armor plates under his faded flannel shirt. He had a slim waist and well-worn jeans that strained a bit over his—

“Ahem.” The bus driver cleared his throat. “You getting off, miss?”

I will be if I keep staring at that guy’s crotch.

Janelle stood up, clutching her bag to her chest. She made her way down the aisle of the bus, her knees feeling like they were made of KY Jelly. She wanted to blame the long bus ride and not the sight of that flannel-clad Viking standing on the asphalt waiting for her.

She clomped down the bus stairs in her designer snow boots, wobbling a little on the last step. She felt her left knee buckle and reached out to catch the edge of the door.

The door was warm and covered in flannel, and it took her several breaths to realize she was in Schwartz’s arms. She blinked up into his eyes and felt herself gasp.

“Good God.”

His mouth moved into something that almost resembled a smile, and she wondered how often that happened. “Nope,” he said slowly. “Schwarzkopf Alexander Patton, but if ‘God’ is easier for you to pronounce than Schwartz, I suppose we’ll go with that.”