Reckless Read online

  He started the car and, bracing his arm on my seat, backed up and then drove through the lot. As we pulled out onto the main road, I swore I heard him say, “Can’t improve perfection.”

  I had to be mistaken.

  After weaving through enough back streets to confuse whoever might’ve picked up our trail, he drove the vehicle onto NW 7th. About half of his attention remained focused on the road, forty percent on the mirrors, and the last bit on me.

  “Where are we going?” I asked, hoping he had a plan, because mine had consisted of get me out of here before someone kills me.

  “Since you’re a princess, thought we’d go to the ball.”

  “Sure.” I was anything other than royal. Being the sole child of a Navy admiral had brought me a considerable amount of grief during my time in the Seabees. Princess was one of the nicer names I’d been called. “But really. Any ideas?” I assumed a hiding spot, perhaps where he’d drop me off then speed away.

  He glanced at me before returning his attention to the road. “You trust me?”

  “You can talk.” I flapped my hand toward the thin hospital gown scrunched up to my mid-thighs. “I doubt I’m bugged.”

  His snort of laughter rang between us, and he darted me a shy smile. “Always did enjoy your sense of humor.”

  Interesting comment, considering he’d cringed whenever I tried to make him laugh in the past. And, attracted to him as I was, I’d tried a lot. “I guess you don’t have to tell me where we’re going. I’ll find out eventually.” Maybe he was winging it. “Somehow, I don’t believe shopping at a box store and driving around Miami was on your agenda today, however.”

  “Nope.” But his lips curled down as he stared into the mirrors.

  My heart thudded once. Twice. Then picked up to race double time.

  Carefully easing forward, I scooted around to peer out the back window. If I braced myself right, I could almost breathe. Pant. Whatever.

  Traffic surrounded us but that was to be expected in a city. “Do you think someone’s following us?”

  “Maybe. Not quite sure yet.”

  “You’ll ditch them.”

  “Yep.”

  “I might not be bugged, but what about you?” Inching around to face forward again, I took in the immaculate, dust-free dash and the floor mat beneath my feet that was clean enough I could eat off it. Messy might be my middle name but it sure wasn’t his. “This isn’t a rental. It’s your SUV, isn’t it?” He must’ve driven it from Maine or had it shipped.

  It didn’t mean anything. He’d needed a vehicle, and I’d been sick for a while.

  “I’m clean,” he said.

  There were so many ways I could take that, but I was one hundred percent certain he wasn’t implying anything sexual. Unfortunately.

  “They must’ve followed us, then,” I said.

  “Likely.”

  “I saw someone watching us in the parking lot.” I described the man and his actions.

  “Light blue car, you said?”

  “Yes.” To think I’d dozed off when I was alone in the parking lot. My hands stilled on my lap and horror rose inside me like a gnashing beast. Someone could’ve crept up on me while I’d slept, maybe even the blond guy. Stupid moves like that would get me killed.

  “Don’t be too tough on yourself,” he said, as if he’d read my mind. “You’ve been through hell.”

  “And come back alive.” I wasn’t sure about coming back whole, however. That had yet to be decided. “I’ll be more careful.” My voice shook more than I liked. “I won’t let us down.”

  “Never dreamed you would.”

  “Are you taking me to a safe location?”

  “You asked for help, and I’m giving it.”

  “Back at the hospital—”

  “Rehab.”

  “Okay, at the rehab place, someone tried to kill me.” Terror edged into my words. I’d woken to find Jax standing over me while someone I didn’t know thumped across my body and onto the floor. The guy bolted, and it didn’t take my former career in the military to tell me something horrible had nearly happened. “I think they’ll keep trying.”

  “Trying’s not doing, and I’m here to make sure it doesn’t happen.”

  Tension eased from my body, and I slumped in my seat. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

  “Welcome. I’m just grateful you’re awake. That you’re still you.”

  What wasn’t he saying? “You had doubts?”

  “We all did.” His sigh whistled from between his teeth. “You were out of it for a long time.”

  I was still half out of it. The realization that I was weaker than a kitten hit me like a ton of cinder blocks. I couldn’t breathe. Though it would make me shiver, I directed the vents to blast myself with frigid air. I gulped it in and tried to regain control, but telling myself to get over it wasn’t working. My shakes wouldn’t stop.

  A few stray strands of my hair fluttered in the breeze. The rest of it hung in knots around my shoulders. My mouth tasted like I’d been sucking on a plastic tube for a month. Who knew when my teeth had last been brushed? Hopefully Jax had thought of floss and toothpaste while he was in the store.

  Pulling his gaze from the mirrors, his hands that had been white knuckling the steering wheel loosened, telling me he believed he’d been mistaken about the tail. So far. “After the accident, Flint asked me to keep an eye on you.”

  Ah. So I was a job. I wasn’t sure why I’d thought—started to believe—there was something more to all this than work. “How long did you say it’s been?”

  “Didn’t. I assume you mean since the accident. Four weeks. Three days.”

  “And twenty minutes?”

  He blinked, and his hands tightened again on the wheel. “Huh?”

  “Nothing.” Had the job watching over me been that awful? Why else count the time?

  I slowly eased around to face him and propped my back into a stable position with the seat and the door. “How could I be out that long?” I could swear only hours had passed since… Gray mist filled my mind when I tried to remember.

  “It was touch and go there for a while. Thought your dad would lose it.” He peered at me briefly before his gaze returned to the road. “Why not ask him to help you now instead of me?”

  “You mean other than the fact that you were in the room when the guy tried to kill me and Dad wasn’t?”

  “Sid could raise an army to protect you in about ten minutes.”

  Five minutes, if I knew my dad. “I don’t want to endanger him.”

  “It’s okay endangering me, though, right?”

  My sigh chugged out. “You know what I mean. Dad’s…” I shook my head.

  “Retired doesn’t mean he’s ready for the nursing home yet.”

  “I guess that would be me.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “Rehab you said?”

  “Yep, they called it skilled rehab, though they admitted there wasn’t much skilled stuff they could do beyond range of motion until you woke up.”

  “I’ve been in a coma?”

  “Pretty much. EEG said you still had full brain activity, though.”

  “That’s reassuring.”

  “You had a bad concussion, which meant you weren’t doing anything for yourself for too long. Though lately, there were signs you were coming around. Purposeful movement, they called it. Your dad was thrilled.”

  What about my stepmom? She hadn’t been thrilled about anything I’d done in years, if ever. It would be best not to ask, however, since Jax hadn’t mentioned anything about her hovering at my bedside. If I knew her, she’d made a brief appearance then flown home.

  “Lay it out for me, Jax,” I said. “What am I dealing with here?”

  “You broke seven ribs on your right side, multiple fractures to each rib. Flail chest, they called it. They put you on a breathing machine.”

  No wonder my chest felt like it had been hit by a boulder. I’d fractured ribs in the past and knew it took about thr
ee weeks before I could take a deep breath without believing I’d die. “Seven ribs.”

  “Then you got pneumonia. They said it’s real common, but it set you back. Took a bunch of antibiotics to clear it up.”

  Huh.

  “Then there was your right femur. Open compound fracture. You lost a lot of blood. They took you to the OR and plated your leg.”

  I traced my finger along the sharp, pink incision line on my thigh.

  “But the worst was your head. At first, they thought you were out of it due to pain because, hell, it had to hurt like a bitch, but when they lightened the drugs, you didn’t wake up.”

  He laid it all out in a dispassionate tone, but an edge of something I couldn’t define came through in his voice. Not anger, but…

  Had he been worried about me?

  I studied him like I had so many other times when I was confident he wasn’t watching. Solid, sure hands gripping the steering wheel. Shoulders wide enough to support the world. Sharp eyes intent on everything around us. So tall, his tight haircut almost brushed the ceiling when he moved. He’d been out of the military almost as long as I had, yet he still kept it high and tight. A good look on him, but I imagined he knew that.

  Hot. That was clear the second I met him.

  While I felt like I’d been run over by a train, my body still stirred, responding to his appealing presence beside me.

  Muscular, hot men had been common in the military. We all worked out to stay in shape and to remain combat-ready. And there was something about being in danger that heightened attraction. I’d dated enough of those guys, too. But none had screwed with my insides like Jax did just by existing.

  He was too hot. I needed to remember he wasn’t interested in me.

  “CTs, EEGs, and MRIs of your brain,” he said. “All your tests came back normal. No head bleeds. Neurologist settled on a concussion for your diagnosis. Bad one, Haylee.”

  “I don’t remember much of anything after Gabe and I flew from Maine to Cancun except…” Gabe. “He was in the car with me!” My words echoed like a horn inside the tight space. “Is he… Did he…” Tears smarted behind my eyes. “Is he okay?” Please, tell me he was okay.

  “His family shipped him to D.C. They…did all they could.”

  Fuck, fuck, fuck.

  “Gabe—is dead?” I bleated. As if someone had reached inside my chest and clamped their fingers around my heart, it spasmed. I curled forward in protection, but it was too late. Slumping fully against the seat, I pinched my eyes closed, willing myself not to break down. Once I started, I’d never stop. “It’s my fault.”

  “How can it be? You weren’t driving. Someone shoved your vehicle off the road.”

  “I’d…” I shook my head and my lanky hair flopped past my shoulders.

  “You’d what?”

  “Nothing.”

  His sharp gaze pinned me in place. “What aren’t you saying?”

  I growled. Should I tell him? Withholding the information could endanger us both.

  “I… It’s worse than me not saying something, because I can’t. I don’t remember.” I sorted through my mind, but my brain felt like it had been replaced with cotton. Each synapse refused to connect with another.

  “What do you remember?”

  “Flying to Cancun. Checking into the resort. Playing around in the pool for a day before slinking out of the hotel after midnight and out into the city. A long, dark gap after that.” A black hole where memories should be. “Then the car roaring through the streets. Gabe yelling something about…”

  A blank wall rose in front of me.

  This was horrible. My brains had been scrambled. What if I never remembered?

  I gulped and shook my head. “After that, the only thing clear is the crash and then nothing.”

  “Your contact?”

  “Did we connect with one?” Even that detail wasn’t clear in my mind.

  A swear ripped out of him. “Haylee, I’m sorry. The docs said, if—when—you woke up, we weren’t to push it. Don’t worry about all that right now.”

  “Except someone tried to kill me. They killed Gabe! The missing details…” I swallowed past the solid mass in my throat. “Someone must be worried I’ll talk. And the worst part about it is that I don’t remember.” My laughter snorted out but this was anything but funny. “They want to permanently keep me from talking when I have absolutely nothing I can say.”

  “Can’t exactly put the word out on the radio that you don’t remember.”

  “We’ll hide, then?”

  “For now. I’ll get in touch with Flint once we’re safe. Fill him in on the situation.”

  “The thing that surprises me most is that no one tried to kill me before today.”

  “Your dad and I didn’t leave your bedside until they moved you to rehab. And the government sent someone—Clyde—who stayed in the room whenever we couldn’t be there…” He frowned.

  “What?”

  “Where was Clyde? When I came back with to your room, he wasn’t there.”

  “The bathroom?”

  “Not without telling us first.”

  “I hope he’s okay.” Had the guy who tried to kill me incapacitated Clyde?

  “I’ll fill Flint in on that, too.” He swore. “That guy in your room must’ve been waiting for us to lower our guard. Your dad and I had stepped away this morning, gone for coffee. He stayed in the cafeteria to take a call while I returned to the room.”

  “We should let Dad know I’m okay, too.”

  “While I’m confident I’m clean, I’m less certain about my phone. Once we’re secure, I’ll use a phone in a hotel or wherever we end up to notify everyone.”

  Dad would be freaking out, but there wasn’t anything we could do about it until we hit a secure location.

  “I appreciate it.” The words trembled out of me and reaction set in. Mourning Gabe and struggling to hold back my tears, I slumped against the glass and stared out the window as the world blurred by.

  Jax pulled up to a light and turned onto NW 20th Street.

  “By the way, I don’t hate you,” he finally said. His fingers tapped a rapid rhythm on the wheel.

  “Okay.” What was I supposed to say to that? I’d just been thinking he was hot. This comment wasn’t a hand reaching toward me, urging me to take it. He was just clarifying a simple point, contradicting what I’d said back at the rehab place. “For what it’s worth, I don’t hate you, either.”

  “Okay.”

  A long silence followed as we continued east.

  Jax had said more to me today than he had during all the months we’d worked together combined. Why go silent now?

  He’d called me sweetheart but he couldn’t mean it. He’d used the endearment with both Mia and Ginny on multiple occasions. It was a form of teasing, like something that would go on between a brother and a sister. But they were all friends. Me and Jax? Coworkers was as far as I could stretch it.

  A shadow of a memory skated through my mind, but I couldn’t see through to grab it. Something about the vehicle chasing us… The driver…

  I scowled, frustrated it wasn’t clear.

  My eyes stung as I remembered Gabe joking around with me, teasing me, just having fun. Kind of like Jax with Ginny and Mia.

  Gabe. I’d flirted with him more times than not, but we’d only been friends. He’d known I had a thing for Jax. Had Gabe had a thing for someone, too? If he’d liked someone and hadn’t told them, it was too late now.

  Pinching the bridge of my nose, I struggled not to break down. Do. Not. Cry.

  “I’m sure your memory will come back,” Jax finally said.

  “What if it doesn’t?” My voice came out shrill, filled with pain for my loss. Gabe had been dead for over a month, and I hadn’t known. I hadn’t been there with him when he’d passed away. I hadn’t been able to tell his family and friends I was sorry.

  So, so sorry. I—

  “Hey.” Lifting my hand from where
it lay beside my thigh, Jax squeezed it. “Trust me?”

  When he’d asked me earlier, I’d hesitated. This time, I squeezed back.

  Jax’s gaze darted to the mirrors again, and he swore. Dropping my hand, he slammed his palm on the steering wheel. His foot compressed the gas pedal, making the SUV leap forward.

  My left side was shoved against my seat.

  “Hold on!” Jax belted out.

  3

  Jax

  I lied when I told Haylee we weren’t being followed.

  Thought I’d ditched the black Mercury sedan while weaving through town, though. So much for that idea.

  My foot compressed the gas pedal, and the four hundred horses under the hood roared, blowing us back against our seats. I dodged through traffic, ignoring middle fingers and blasted horns. The vehicle behind us kept with me, riding so close to my back bumper, I braced myself for the hit.

  Dude wasn’t shoving me into a ditch.

  Haylee’s breath came in sharp spurts. She clutched her thigh, her other hand splinting her ribs. It killed me to see her hurting but it sure beat the alternative.

  I dashed around and between vehicles while the Mercury hugged my spine.

  We had to get away, but where? While in the store, I’d used a payphone at the courtesy desk to call a friend. I asked him to put an escape plan into action and gave him a list of what I’d need. First on the list was to ditch my vehicle. Second, take us far from here, to a place where no one would ever find us.

  An old Navy buddy, Dwayne would do all he could to make it happen.

  This entire situation was too organized, too planned out. First Clyde disappearing at the rehab place, then the guy being in the room one of the few times both of us had left the room.

  While I could activate government contacts, the idea made my spine itch—a sure sign something was going on I hadn’t yet figured out. And I sure as hell couldn’t sit around and wait for the feds to handle things, let alone Haylee’s father, whose connections were good but not that good.

  Haylee could barely hobble. I’d happily carry her from here to Alaska but, while doing that, we’d stand out in a crowd.

  She needed time to heal and time to get strong enough to protect herself. For that, we needed to disappear.