Page 59 of Her Delta Force Protector

Chapter Thirty

Theo slammed his fist on the table. “Where the hell is she?”

“Don’t know,” Rex said. “But keep it down. You’re getting attention.”

They should have met somewhere besides a diner during the breakfast hour when it would be crowded. He lowered his voice. “Can’t you do something to trace her computer?”

“Not until she turns it on. I’ve explained this to you already.”

“And you’re sure she’s not still at the Church house?”

Rex sighed. “No, but there’s no sign of her or Kade Church. After your screw-up, it makes sense that he’d go into hiding with her.”

Theo was seconds away from putting a fist through his cousin’s face.

Rex pulled out a twenty and dropped it on the table. “Since she hasn’t followed up with your fake detective about what she thinks she knows, it looks like she wants everything to go away. That means we don’t have to worry about her. Stockton’s talking about kidnapping the kid to trade for her, and that’s a no-go for me.”

Stockton’s idea would be worth considering if they weren’t dealing with a Special Forces soldier, a police chief, and a sheriff. That was too much heat to bring down on their heads. He’d really like to get his hands on Harper Jansen. Not only did the bitch need to be taught a lesson, but she knew where Lisa was. He’d gotten impatient when he’d decided to kill her. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.

Rex stood, put both hands on the table, and leaned his face close to Theo’s. “I’m going home. You’ve gone way past thinking of this as strictly business, and you’re all over the place. One minute wanting to kill her, the next wanting to kidnap her to teach her a lesson. They don’t know who we are, so we should just halt filming for a few months, let things blow over, then we pick up where we left off.”

“You just worry about finding Jansen.” She might have muscle on her side, but he was smarter than them all put together. Some bitch of a woman wasn’t going to bring them down. They had a moneymaking enterprise going, one that was putting more dollars in his pocket than his job ever could, and they weren’t going to put a halt to it. He was meant for bigger things than arresting lowlifes who were thicker than a brick.

The twenty Rex had left on the table would cover their breakfast with little change left over. Theo shrugged as he walked out, not adding anything for a decent tip. What did he care about some nobody waitress in a two-bit town with the ridiculous name of Marsville?

Outside the diner, a police car across the street caught his attention. He recognized Tristan Church from the photos his cousin had shown him. The police chief was standing with an old woman who was banging her cane on the street. Next to them, a turquoise Cadillac that had to be from the sixties was parked, taking up two spaces. Looked like the old bat didn’t take kindly to being told she needed to park between the lines.

Theo didn’t want to catch the chief’s attention. Small-town police were always suspicious of strangers. He’d never admit it to Rex, but they shouldn’t have met at the town’s diner. He walked to his car while the man’s attention was still on the old lady.

As he drove to the cabin outside of town that he’d rented for the week of vacation his captain thought he was on, an idea came to him, and he grinned. It was a brilliant plan.

Chapter Thirty-One

Kade held the binoculars to his eyes as he scanned the lake. He stopped on the boat headed their way, identified the occupants, then watched to see if it was being followed. “They’re on the way.”

“No one’s following them?”

He lowered the binos and glanced at Harper. “Nope.” They were drifting in the middle of the lake on his boat, the safest place he could think of to meet his brother and Skylar. They were coming from a marina on the opposite side where they’d rented a small boat. He whistled for Duke to come back on board so he didn’t get run over.

When Tristan and Skylar reached them, Kade tied ropes around the cleats to hold the boats together. At seeing Tristan and Skylar, Duke barked his excitement and leaped into their boat, then bounced between the two of them, showering them with face licks.

“Your dog’s a dork,” he said to Harper as he took a seat next to her.

“But a lovable one.”

“I’ll give you that.” He was still processing what had happened between them last night, maybe the best night of his life. Correction. Nomaybeabout it. And that was his dilemma. He didn’t do relationships. He’d tried twice, once in high school, and the second time his first year in the Army. He’d been told by one that she couldn’t be with him because he didn’t share his feelings. He didn’t even know what his feelings were, so what was there to share? The other one had broken up with him because she claimed he didn’t let her in, whatever that meant. So he’d learned how to please a woman in bed since that was going to be the only time he spent with one.

Then along came Harper. Somehow, she’d become his best friend. He shared more with her than he had with anyone, including his brothers. She leaned against him, and he wanted to put his arm around her and tuck her next to him. He’d slipped out of bed early this morning after watching her sleep for a good twenty minutes and wishing she was his. She wasn’t.

Amazing sex with an incredible woman didn’t mean he was in love. But when she smiled up at him, sharing her amusement over Duke’s exuberance at seeing two of his favorite people, he cursed his treacherous heart for wanting more. More of her smiles, more of her hand on his leg, like she was doing now, and especially more nights with her in his bed. He’d get over wishing he was a different man—one who could be what she needed—as soon as he made sure she was safe and she left to live her life.

“You’re wet,” Skylar said, laughing as she tried to hide her face from Duke.

“Duke!” Kade snapped his fingers. “Go swimming.” The dog didn’t have to be told twice.

“Here’s Harper’s laptop,” Tristan said, handing over a canvas tote.

“I don’t want it.” She looked at the tote the way one would a rattlesnake.

---