Love Inspired Suspense October 2015 #1 (8 page)

Rikki could feel the heat from his body. If she moved a few inches closer, she could reach out and kiss Blain. He must have felt the same way. She saw a flare of awareness in his eyes and then—

And then the echo of a gun blast shattered the countryside and scared the horses into a frenzied dance. Blain did pull her close. He grabbed her and whirled her around behind the trunk of the big tree and held her there, his weapon trained on the woods.

EIGHT

B
lain heard another shot and watched as one of the guards hit the ground. The other one managed to get behind the golf cart.

“I knew this was a bad idea,” he said, his hand holding Rikki's head. “You're too exposed out here.”

“The horses.” She tried to turn but Blain held her tight.

“They'll be okay. You need to stay down.”

Daisy decided she didn't like the situation. She broke loose and took off toward the stables.

Rambo whinnied and snorted, his hoofs kicking dirt as if ready for battle.

“They've hit one of your men,” Blain said. He watched the woods past the fence line. Someone had to be up in a tree with a high-powered rifle.

Rikki gulped a breath, her gaze on the golf cart. “You're right. Bad idea. I thought I'd be safe here.”

“You'd think but someone is determined.”

He leaned around the tree. His Glock wouldn't do much except hold them off until he could come up with a plan.

The other guard motioned to him and pointed toward a stand of tall pines just past the fence line. Blain studied the woods and saw a glint, just a quick blink but enough that Blain got a bead on the shooter. Not enough to move in, but at least a location.

Had someone been waiting for such an opportunity?

He held Rikki and nodded. “Okay, I think I know where they're coming from but I need you to stay behind this tree for a minute.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“I'm going to cover your man who has a military-grade machine gun. And I'm hoping he'll cover us until I can get you back to the stables.”

She nodded, her eyes wide. “Okay.”

Blain nodded to the guard and managed to sign what he needed. “Call for reinforcements,” he mouthed.

The guard pulled out a walkie-talkie and spoke into it.

Blain waited until the call had gone out then pushed Rikki behind him. “If that doesn't work or no one comes soon, I'm gonna put you on Rambo and send you home.”

“Not without you,” she said.

“We'll argue about that later,” he replied.

Then he leaned out from behind the tree and was rewarded with a sharp ping that hit the trunk and scattered bark six inches from his head. Blain returned fire and so did the guard.

The woods went silent after that.

“He's not going to give up,” Blain said. “If we do get reinforcements, they could get shot, too.” He pulled out his phone. “I'll have to call in the sheriff's department and give them a location of the shooter or we could be pinned down all day.”

Blain had to make the call since they were outside the city limits, but his dad would hear that call on the scanner he still kept active by his recliner. Sam Kent might be retired but once a sheriff, always a sheriff.

“I'm sorry, Blain,” she said, her voice low.

“For what?”

“For not listening to you. For insisting on leaving the house.”

He gave her a forgiving glance. “And I'm sorry for not making you stay inside. So there, we're even.”

He tried to move again and almost got hit.

“Okay, he's settling in.” Blain pulled Rikki down beside him behind the three-foot tree trunk. “Which means we will, too.”

She shivered. “Maybe we should send Rambo back. It's not that far. He knows the way and besides, you kept me so close to the stables, I could make a run for it, too.”

“Daisy has sent out one alert, arriving without a rider,” he said. “Rambo seems okay. And you are not going anywhere, understand?”

“My brother won't like that I took out his horse.”

“Your brother? This horse belongs to your brother?”

“Yes.”

“Great.”

She shivered again and Blain tugged her into his arms to warm her. “You're determined to drive me nuts, aren't you?”

She looked down at her boots. “If you get me back home, I'll be a model citizen from here on out.”

“Right.” He nuzzled her hair and inhaled the spicy scent that always seemed to surround her. “We'll get you out of this, one way or another, Rikki.”

* * *

An hour later, the whole thing was over.

Rikki stood near the stables and held back yet more tears. One of her father's most trusted guards was dead. The other one was shaken but he'd managed to hold off the shooter until several other bodyguards found them and got Rikki and that guard into an SUV with bulletproof windows.

While she'd watched Blain out the window trying to cover them.

“We can't leave him,” she told the driver. She could hear gunshots echoing over the woods.

“I got my orders from your father,” the man shouted.

“Then stop and let me out,” she screamed, her hand on the door.

The men looked at each other and then back to Rikki. “We have our orders.”

“I will not go unless you help Detective Kent, too,” she said. “And if I get out and get shot, you'll have to explain that.”

They circled back for Blain. He managed to send Rambo home and then he hopped in beside her without a word. So much for going for a peaceful horseback ride.

By the time they arrived back at the house, her brother Santo was waiting, raging at anyone who'd listen.

“You are something, you know that?” he shouted to Rikki before she could approach Blain. “I get a call that it was like a war zone out here. What's the deal with you, Rikki?”

Blain managed to materialize beside her. “The deal is that your sister is being stalked by a killer,” he said, pulling Rikki behind him. “Why won't anyone around here take that seriously?”

“Then why did she leave the house?” Santo asked, his dark eyes flashing fire. He was a younger version of their father but he had not married a woman like her mother. His own wife hated him. So he was always growling and raging at someone.

Before Rikki could speak, Blain put out his hand. “It's my fault. I...I told her I'd go with her and keep her safe.”

“Well, you didn't do a very good job,” Santo said, pointing a finger at Blain. “Typical of the Millbrook Police Department.” He nodded toward the hired help. “This is why we have to pay people to protect us.”

Rikki came around Blain. She wanted to tell her brother they had to hire guards because they might be involved in criminal activities. But she didn't say that since she didn't have any proof.

“He's doing everything in his power,” she told Santo. “I wanted to go for a ride and he felt obligated to go with me.”

Santo's scowl grew. “Aren't you two just all cozy?”

“Enough.”

They all turned to find her father standing there with a man Rikki recognized as the former sheriff. She couldn't remember his name since she'd avoided any friend of her father's whenever she was in this house. But he looked familiar.

Blain and Santo both glanced toward her father.

“Let them alone,” Franco said. “Rikki, go inside and calm down.”

Santo shut up but he stood with his hands on his hips.

Blain stared at the sheriff. “Sir.”

The older man looked as angry as her father and brother. “We caught the shooter. He's being held in the county jail if you want a go at him.”

“I do want a go at him,” Blain said, his expression grim.

Her father stepped forward. “Rikki, do you remember Sheriff Kent?”

“I believe so.” Rikki looked at the sheriff and then she looked at Blain. “Kent?”

“He's my father,” Blain said, his tone level and full of resentment.

“Your father.” She couldn't believe this but it made sense now. “I see I'm not the only one who's been keeping secrets.” Giving Blain one last glance, she turned toward the house.

She should have known she didn't need to trust a determined detective.

* * *

An hour later, Blain found Rikki in the kitchen staring at the microwave. When she heard him come in, she glanced up at him and then opened the microwave to pull out a bowl of soup.

“Rikki—”

“I have to take this to my mother,” she said. “Daphne had to run some errands.”

He braced his hands against the granite counter. “I'll wait for you, then.”

“You don't need to do that.”

“I'll be here, waiting,” he said.

She ignored him and carried a tray down the long hallway toward the back of the house.

Blain stood in front of the fireplace. The afternoon had turned chilly and windy and all he wanted was a hot shower and his own bowl of soup before he went to sleep on his couch. But it would be hours before he could get any sleep.

When he heard a door slamming, Blain turned to find his father with Franco and Santo Alvanetti. The three men each gave him a pointed stare.

“I'm going to check on Mama,” Santo said, his black-eyed frown clearly blaming Blain for this latest turn of events.

“Would you and your son like something to drink, maybe some coffee?” Franco asked Sam after Santo stalked away.

“I'm fine,” Blain said, eyeing the hallway to the other wing of the house. He hoped Santo didn't start in on Rikki.

“And I have to go,” Sam said. “I'm sure my son will want to get to the sheriff substation to question our shooter. Sorry about your man, Franco.”

Franco nodded. “Comes with the territory.”

Blain wanted to punch the wall. The territory? A way of life that involved illegal activities and possible killings—and blaming his only daughter for being in the wrong place at the wrong time?

Any reservations he'd had about helping Rikki dissolved right along with the ash floating up from the fire. No wonder the woman had gotten away and no wonder she couldn't trust anyone.

Especially anyone like him.

He glanced toward the hallway again then looked at his father. Sam stared at him with that smug, condescending expression he remembered so well, growing up.

“I'm going,” Blain announced to the room. He'd talk to Rikki later. “Sorry about what happened, Mr. Alvanetti. But maybe we can get the shooter to talk.”

Franco's frown deepened into a craggy rock face. “If you don't make him talk, I will.”

Blain shook his head and pinched his nose with two fingers. “Getting a suspect to talk is my job, Mr. Alvanetti. Not yours.”

“I'll sit in, if my son will allow me,” Sam said.

Blain started for the door. “Your jurisdiction, your call.”

Franco chuckled at that. “I knew who you were the day you showed up here,” he said to Blain. “But you're different from Sam here.”

Blain looked from Franco to his father. “Yeah, I am.”

Then he turned and left the room.

* * *

“Mama, you need to eat some soup,” Rikki said, her mind in turmoil. She wanted to get away from here, to leave and never come back but Sonia needed her. And today of all days, her mother was lucid and willing to sit up.

“I'm not that hungry,” Sonia said, a skinny hand patting her bun.

“But you're sitting up today,” Rikki replied, holding the tray so her mother wouldn't tip the hot soup over on herself. “That's a good sign.”

Pebble ambled into the bedroom and jumped on her mother's bed. Sonia giggled and reached out a hand to pet the cat.

Santo stomped into the room. “Hey, Mama. I see you're wearing your pretty bed jacket.”

Sonia's smile widened. “Santo, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at work?”

Santo glared at Rikki and then gave Sonia a kiss on the cheek. Pebble protested and hissed then leaped off the bed. “I'm just checking up on y'all. I worry.”

Rikki heard the condemnation in that statement. She would never understand why her best friend being killed had somehow brought more shame on this family than any of her brothers' or even her father's shenanigans. Did they all know something she wasn't aware of?

“Everyone here is fine,” Sonia said. She obediently took a spoonful of soup. “Rikki is home for Christmas, you know. I'm gonna get out of this bed and we'll bake and decorate and listen to Christmas music, won't we Rikki-pie?”

Rikki swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded. “We sure will, Mama. But right now, you need to take your medicine and rest. You did pretty good on the soup.”

“I am a bit tired,” Sonia replied. She winked at her son. “Y'all are so darlin', always fussing over me and checking on me. I'll be better tomorrow.”

“Yes, you will,” Rikki said, praying for that to be so.

Her sweet mother said this almost every day or at least on her good days. Today was a good day for Sonia even while it had turned out to be a bad day for everyone else.

Rikki cleaned up her mother and after moving the tray she gave Sonia a kiss. “I'm going to the kitchen. Santo is still here.”

Her brother gave her another look of dismissal. “And I'll always be right here.”

And another biting comment that hit Rikki right through the heart. She hoped Blain had left by now. She wasn't ready to deal with him again today.

His father was a retired sheriff. The man who used to hang around her father like a puppy, always smiling and waiting for handouts. How could she have forgotten so soon?

But she reminded herself that she'd tried to avoid her father's cronies and she'd only seen the imposing sheriff from a distance most days.

But she knew he must have taken kickbacks and bribes from her father since he hadn't made any arrests when she was growing up. It had been obvious today that Sam Kent and his son didn't see eye to eye.

Blain was so different from most of the men she knew. He was good. She could see that. So why did it hurt so much to know he hadn't told her who his father was? Especially when he'd criticized her for withholding her real identity from him?

No wonder he hated her family. His father and her father, together, doing who knew what. She and Blain had grown up in much the same way, but on different sides of the fence. It was enough to make her sick to her stomach.