Authors: Rebecca Zanetti
“PROTECT” on the glinting blade. The menacing nature of the form sent shivers down Audrey’s back.
“Did you draw this?”
“Yes.” The senator puffed out his chest. “You should see the charcoal drawings I’ve done of my ranch
at home. When I retire, I may paint.”
She nodded and slowly stood to hand him the bundle of papers, wincing as her leg protested. “What do
you make of the brand?”
“I’ve been researching it on the Internet.” The senator glanced around as if to make sure nobody
listened. He lowered his voice. “I haven’t found anything yet.”
Audrey bit her lip. The last thing she needed was a U.S. senator acting like Sherlock Holmes and getting
himself shot. “I suggest you leave the investigation to the FBI. Whoever sent those men to kill Darian meant
business.”
The senator shoved the mass back into his briefcase. “I know, but I’m so curious. The FBI agent said
Darian had recently been branded, so it had to have something to do with his death, right?”
“Maybe.” Audrey discreetly backed up to her desk to place the drawing behind her. “But we have work
to do, Senator.”
“Right.” The senator shook himself and angled his body toward the doorway. “I have a meeting with
the commander tomorrow morning, and I hope to get the information from him. Would you like to attend?”
“Yes,” she said, just as a resounding, “Absolutely not,” echoed in her ear.
She swallowed. “I would love to attend.”
Nate growled over the transmitter stuck in her ear. “You are not attending any meeting with the
commander.”
“What time and where?” Audrey asked the senator.
“He’s having a car pick us up at eight, and we’re having breakfast at the facility,” the senator said.
An instant flurry of threats and expletives poured out of the device in Audrey’s ear. She blinked several
times and tapped the device, clearing her throat. “That sounds lovely, Senator.”
“No fucking way,” Nate said.
The senator glanced down at his white dress shirt. “Should I wear a tie tomorrow?”
“Yes.” Audrey smiled as her ear finally went silent. “Maybe the blue and white striped one? It’s in your
top desk drawer.”
“Ah, good.” The senator grinned, suddenly looking years younger. “You’re the best.”
“Thanks.”
The senator reached the doorway and turned back around. “I’m quite curious to meet your mother. Are
you sure you don’t mind tagging along?”
“Not at all.” Audrey leaned back against her desk. “My mother is quite charming, if she wants to be. I
imagine you’ll see her good side tomorrow.” Not the real woman, without question.
The senator’s faded blue eyes filled with sympathy. “Don’t worry, Audrey. We’re gonna take them
down.”
* * *
chair squeaked loudly around the cabin when he moved. “The weak points are here and here,” he said,
pointing to the south and east of the area. “Though, it’s obvious those are the weak areas.”
Matt nodded and tapped an entrance to the west. “This one looks well manned, but I think we could get
through there the easiest. The other two are traps.”
“Yeah.” He reached back and rubbed the rock-hard muscles in his neck as Audrey hummed show tunes
in his ear. The woman probably didn’t even know she was singing. “Aud? I’m going to tune out for a few
minutes. Don’t leave your office,” he said.
“Bite me,” she answered cheerfully.
He removed the earpiece to toss on the table. “I’d forgotten how crazy she makes me.” Romance and
rosy glasses shaped his memories of Audrey. Now, having her in his world again, reality arrived with a bite.
The woman drove him insane sometimes.
Matt nodded, his gaze serious. “I have Shane out acquiring materials to wire Audrey tomorrow when
she goes into the facility. You need to decide right now if we’re taking this route or not.”
Nate’s temples began to pound. “If I say no?”
“We find another plan.” Matt’s voice stayed level. “I can’t make this decision for you, and I won’t. If
you decide we force her to Montana, then that’s what we do.”
“But the intel she could gather tomorrow might be invaluable.” Nate wanted nothing more than to force
Audrey to safety—and not only because of the baby. The idea of anything happening to the blue-eyed
smart-ass shot spikes of terror through his brain.
“Definitely.” Matt leaned back, stretching. “If Audrey didn’t want to go, it’d be a done deal, and we
would come up with plan B. But Audrey wants to go. So the ball is in your court. Does she go or not?”
“I don’t think she’d appreciate our deciding for her—or even our thinking we had a right to decide.”
Nate wondered again why he couldn’t have fallen for a nice, compliant woman.
“Definitely not.” Matt snorted. “When she went after Shane this morning, even after almost fainting, I
almost laughed my ass off. I always knew she was tough, but the woman has no clue how delicate she is. I
really like that.”
“I like that, too.” Nate shook his head, trying to uncover the fine line between protecting someone and
making them want to kill you. “While Audrey was raised by Dr. Madison and knows the commander, she
truly doesn’t realize who he is. She spent so much time in boarding school and then college abroad that she
doesn’t realize what he’s capable of.”
“I know.” Matt’s gaze shared remembered horrors of being trained by the monster. “So your point is
that Audrey can’t really make an educated decision based on her knowledge of the situation?”
Man, that sounded good. Too bad Audrey wouldn’t fall for it. “While that’s true, I don’t think Audrey
will care.”
Matt leaned forward. “She’s trying to save you and now this baby. You can’t blame her for taking
risks.”
“I don’t.” But that didn’t mean he had to allow her to take the risk. While she’d probably hate him, he
did have the strength and the determination to get her out of town against her will. But something in him,
something deep, wanted her to work with him instead of against him. “What would you do?” Nate asked
Matt.
Matt exhaled and rubbed his eyes. “Fuck, I don’t know.”
Yeah, that about summed up the shit-storm going on.
The door burst open, and Shane lurched inside. “You guys watching the news?”
Nate sat straighter. “No. Why?”
Shane hurried over to flip on a flat screen he’d bought the day before. The scene filled with reporters
outside of Audrey’s apartment building.
“What now?” Nate stretched to his feet.
“Dead body.” Shane turned toward Nate, his eyes wide. “Found inside Audrey’s apartment. Some guy
named George Fairbanks.”
Audrey sat at the senator’s conference table with him protectively flanking her right. Two FBI agents sat
across from her, one gently asking questions and the other staring at her as if measuring her for a prison
jumpsuit. Obvious interrogation tactic.
“As I was saying,” Agent Clacker said, elbows resting on the table. A kind smile lifted his lips, making
him appear about thirty years old and earnest. Very earnest. “We agreed to this interview at the senator’s
office because of our respect for him and his office.”
Audrey nodded, noting that any respect for her wasn’t mentioned.
“Tell me about your relationship with George Fairbanks,” Clacker said.
Audrey shrugged. “The senator and I have had several meetings with George Fairbanks regarding
TechnoZyn and its possible building of manufacturing plants in Wyoming, which as you know, is the
senator’s home state.”
“Have you met George Fairbanks alone?” Clacker asked.
“No.”
“Unlike your relationship with Darian Hannah.” Clacker slipped a picture of Darian across the table. A
dead Darian on an autopsy table.
Audrey swallowed, nausea rising up. “Not true. I had a business relationship with both men.”
“Both men?” the up-to-now silent Agent Farland asked. He frowned down a hawklike nose, his gray
hair curling over his collar. Definitely the more seasoned of the pair.
Temper flared at the base of Audrey’s neck. “We weren’t having a devil’s three-way, Agent. I knew
both men in a professional capacity, as did the senator.”
Senator Nash leaned her way. “What’s a devil’s three-way?” he whispered.
On all that was holy. She kept her face bland and turned toward him. “Kind of like an orgy with one
woman and two men. It’s the rage in erotic romances right now.”
A bright red crawled up the senator’s weathered face. “For goodness’ sake, Audrey.” He cleared his
throat and faced the agents. “I can vouch for Audrey, here. She wasn’t romantically involved with either
Darian Hannah or George Fairbanks, and I believe I attended every meeting she had with them.”
“Except Audrey and Darian’s date two nights ago at Anchonies,” Clacker said, a gleam in his dark eyes.
“Wasn’t a date,” Audrey returned.
The door opened, and a man in a poorly cut beige suit stomped inside.
“Excuse me, but we’re in the middle of an interview,” Clacker said, rising to his feet.
“I know,” the man said, waddling around the table toward Audrey. “I’m Miss Madison’s attorney.”
Audrey frowned and looked closer.
Nate?
Couldn’t be. The man making his way laboriously toward
her weighed three hundred pounds—very soft pounds. He wore blond hair to his shoulders, with the
mustache and beard covering his face a slightly darker blond. Brownish eyes squinted out behind large
spectacles.
“Um, I didn’t call for an attorney,” she said, watching him closely.
“Yet here I am.” He reached into his pocket and took out cards. “Bubba Jenkins, at your service.”
Holy crap, it was Nate. Even though his voice was higher and carried a Southern twang, she’d know his
voice anywhere. He’d chosen the name Bubba? Her make-believe name for a dom who spanked him. Very
funny. What in the heck was he doing?
She nodded slowly, searching his ruddy face. How had he turned his complexion so sallow? “I barely
recognized you.”
He beamed a wide smile, showing several silver caps on back teeth. “Thank you for noticing. I just lost
seventy pounds.” Grunting, he tugged back a chair to wedge his bulk in between the armrests. “So, what are
we talking about?”
Her mind reeling, Audrey turned back toward the agents. “We were discussing the dead body found in
my apartment.”
“How did he die?” Nate asked, twirling the picture of Darian’s body around and around with one finger.
“Somebody slit his throat,” Agent Clacker said.
“At her apartment?” Nate asked.
“No. The lack of blood spatter in Miss Madison’s kitchen indicates George Fairbanks died elsewhere
before being dumped at her apartment.”
Her kitchen. Her bright, cheery, undecorated kitchen where she’d eaten breakfast with Matt that
morning. She eyed Nate. Would Matt have killed George Fairbanks? She crossed her legs, trying to get
comfortable. “How was George Fairbanks found?” she asked.
“Anonymous call,” Clacker said.
That was odd. Audrey eyed Nate. “Obviously somebody is trying to draw attention to me. Why?”
“Or maybe they’re trying to scare you,” the senator mused. “With Darian dying and now George
Fairbanks being found in your apartment, it seems like this is directed at you. Why?”
She shrugged. “I work for a U.S. senator and am easier to get to than you are. Maybe this is about you,
Senator.” Though something in her gut warned her the murders were all about her. She sat up straighter.
“What if—”
“No conjecture,” Nate cut in smoothly.
Her head jerked. He was right. Her thoughts had instantly gone to the commander and the myriad of
soldiers who’d escaped five years ago. Maybe one of the freed soldiers was going after the commander and
Audrey’s mother, and she was the best course to do so. The Dean brothers weren’t the only men out there
who hated the commander.
Audrey had almost said too much.
Agent Clacker leaned forward. “What were you going to say?”
“Nothing.” She clasped her hands together on the polished table. “I was wondering what Darian and
George Fairbanks have in common besides both meeting with the senator this week.” Darian worked as a
lobbyist for a military organization, and George Fairbanks was a top executive for a technology firm also
vying for military funding. “Do you have a connection?”
“Not yet, but we’re working on it. So far, you’re the only connection. Well, you and the senator.” Agent
Clacker’s tone made it all too clear he considered her the key.
Nathan hitched his created bulk around in the chair as if unable to get comfortable. “George Fairbanks
died earlier today when Miss Madison was meeting with the senator. Her alibi is solid.”
“We agree Miss Madison didn’t kill George Fairbanks, but she may have knowledge about the crime.”
Agent Clacker’s expression softened as he turned his attention toward her. “Lying to federal agents is a
crime, and I want to assure you, we’re here to help. Don’t be afraid.”