Page 67 of Turn the Tide
Logan stroked her cheek, sliding his palm down to cup the side of her neck. The silken caress seemed to touch her everywhere, and the wiring in her taut muscles slackened.
Yes, Logan knew her like no other.
For a surreal second, the bittersweet ache left no room for anything else.
She stepped closer and sagged against him, but that sense of relief disappeared faster than a cry in the wind when the uncanny timing of his arrival registered.
“We have to go.” His hand curled around her wrist, his calluses rubbing her skin. He led her down the stairs before she had a chance to voice the questions spinning in her head. “Knox is out front. He’ll create a distraction in a minute.”
Something in her chest sank to her toes. Knox and anyone from the Agency were a bigger threat than BGA. She would never allow herself to fall into the CIA’s hands.Never. The grim, gruesome things they’d do to her to get the thumb drive sent a shudder through her.
“And he’ll take care of the guards in the van,” Logan said.
“There are at least three of them. Maybe more.”
“It’s Knox. He can handle it.”
They passed two BGA guards limp on the floor by the door leading to the alley.
“Did you do that?” she asked.
“Yes. But there’s someone else, sitting in a car at the end of the alley. Strange. He didn’t do anything when I took out these two and dragged them inside. Just watched.”
“What did he look like?”
“Horn-rimmed glasses, close-cropped hair.”
A flurry of curses flew from her. “Glasses tracked me from Munich, where he tried to kill me at the safe house.” No conversation. No hesitation. Relentless. “He’s not with BioGenApex.”
Who was he? Why was he hunting her? And why did he want her dead?
Logan opened the door. Moonlight illuminated the passageway between the two buildings. As they stood close together in the doorway, he pointed to the car at the mouth of the alley. Glasses was nowhere to be seen.
“When Knox gives the signal, we’ll make a break for it and meet him near the front of the building. At the dead end of the alley, above the wall, is a fence. There’s a street.”
She glimpsed the five-foot brick wall with a chain-link fence connected to the top. On the other side of the fence, the street ran along a hill.
Logan ducked back inside the entrance, squiring her with him. His presence swallowed the space, hijacking her thoughts. She looked at the strong column of his neck and higher at his face that was mostly shrouded in shadow. But she saw the tightness of his frown. She pressed her forehead to his wide chest, glad he was there. He curled his arms around her, cupping her head. The dread inside her dissolved for a moment. The darkness ceased to exist. There was only Logan’s heat and the shelter of his sturdy frame.
“Ashley, why are you doing this?” His deep-timbered voice whispered over her skin.
She raised her head, meeting his gaze, and there was an instant charge in the air. Tension stretched between them like a cord, heavy and thick, reeling them closer. It was a miracle he was beside her—as though her prayers for help had been answered—but it was also hard to believe.
The old Logan before the car bomb, the one she’d been madly, secretly in love with, would’ve taken a bullet for a friend, gone to the ends of the world to get her out of trouble. But the Logan she was furious with had turned his back on her at his cabin.
She traced the perfect line of his mouth with her fingers. “Why on earth are you here?”
He clutched her shoulders, bringing her flush to him, and she leaned against his big, steely body.
“I’m here for you.” His voice was strained with emotion, chasing a shiver up her spine.
Their bond still existed in defiance of time and distance. It was as real as he was now.
“Ash—”
A boom shattered the quiet. The ground shook beneath them, sending her pulse skyrocketing. An explosion out front. Car alarms shrieked in a series of beeps.
They jolted apart and dashed from the building to the end of the alley. Logan gave her foot a quick boost with his cupped hands, propelling her up. She gripped the edge of the wall, her gloves scraping the stone, and hoisted herself to get a foothold. Giving thanks for her hours spent in the gym, she climbed over the chain-link fence.
