Glancing at her watch, she realized she was already five minutes late for her first class of the day. “See what you made me do, you…you…blue-eyed man,” she grumbled to herself as she hurried from the car to the security checkpoint. “You made me late!”
The rest of the morning and the first part of the afternoon sped by in a blur.
When three o’clock arrived, she said goodbye to her second class and began preparing for her advanced class, which would arrive in just thirty minutes. Myles would arrive in just thirty minutes. Her heart gave a telltale flutter at the thought of his grin. That sometimes-teasing, sometimes-kind, sometimes-devastating grin.
Devastating? Are you kidding? Kenz, what is wrong with you? Too many romantic daydreams. Get your head in the ball game!
Pushing aside her own inner monologue, Kenzie began doing the physical chores to prepare for the class. Scooting chairs behind desks and wiping off chalkboards required little mental activity, and for the time being she thought it might be best to wipe everything from her mind.
Especially Myles Parsons.
But her heart betrayed her when the inmates in her third class began walking into the classroom. It leapt excitedly, as she anticipated seeing Myles’s face. She watched each man intently as he entered. Nineteen orange jumpsuits, nineteen men, nineteen faces. But no piercing blue eyes.
Where could he be, just a few days before the exam?
A body slammed Myles out of line as he walked toward Ms. Thorn’s classroom. He had managed to maneuver his way to the very end of the line. If he was completely honest with himself, which he really did not want to be at that moment, he had finagled his way to the end of the line of prisoners, hoping to have some opportunity to connect with Ms. Thorn.
As he hoped every day during class. Only because of the mission, of course.
He knew the rules, knew that breaking them meant solitary confinement. And while he had no desire to spend a week alone in a hole—that would defeat the purpose of keeping an eye on Kenzie—neither could he deny the strange effect she had on him when they were in the same room. He knew he needed to keep his contact with her in check, but she made it awfully difficult to keep his mind on his assignment.
Now bright spots flashed before Myles’s closed eyes. He rested his aching head against the block wall, leaning the rest of his body heavily there, too. He felt like a bulldozer had just rammed him into a brick wall.
Peeking out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the rest of his class was already in the classroom along with the new guard. He and the bulldozer were alone in the hallway.
Venturing a peek at the other man’s uniform shirt and brown pants, Myles mumbled, “Did I do something wrong, boss?”
The guard—what was his name?—Whitestall, didn’t say anything for several seconds. He just smacked his open palm with the enormous flashlight that doubled as a nightstick.
“Do you think I’m stupid, Parsons?”
“No, sir!” Myles jumped. Whatever this was, it was not going to go in his favor.
“Did you think I wouldn’t notice you cozying up to the teacher?”
Myles bit his lip and kept his mouth shut. Nothing he said would improve this situation. He wanted to know what Whitestall was after, what he was trying to hunt out. Silence was usually the best provocateur.
“You know that if I turn you in to the superintendent for inappropriate conduct with a female state employee, you’ll be spending the next six months in solitary.”
“Yes, sir.” It was best to agree with anything the guard said, though six months seemed a bit extreme. Likely he was just trying to intimidate Myles.
“Do you want to spend six months in solitary?”
“No, sir.”
“I didn’t think so.” Whitestall leered and let out a long, putrid breath. Sweat beaded on his jaw, and his greasy hair fell in front of his beady eyes. He stopped beating his flashlight against his palm for a moment. “I’ve seen you and Ms. Thorn in her classroom, when you think I’m not watching. The way you look at her—sidle up to her. You want to get closer, don’t you? You wish you were outside these walls, so you could really get to know her.”
Myles was stunned. How could he possibly respond? Silence was his only hope, so he bit the inside of his cheek viciously to keep quiet.
“I knew it,” Whitestall snarled. “I can see it in your eyes. You’ll be in solitary for a year if I turn you in.” A slow, cruel smile shaped his lips. “But…I might be willing to help you. Get you what you want and let you have a little fun with her…if you do something for me. You’ve got nothing to lose now.”
Where was this going? “What did you have in mind, sir?”
The guard held up what looked like a silver car key.
“It’s simple enough, really. I want you to make her disappear. For good.”
The silver car key in Myles’s pocket poked his leg as he stretched out on the back floor of Kenzie’s car. He ran a hand over his new jeans, supplied by Whitestall, and tipped his head, angling for a view out of the enormous windows in the bus barn. Late afternoon, he guessed.
It would probably be at least a couple more hours before she would leave for the day. Whitestall had told him that she usually didn’t leave until it was dark.
That meant he had some time to make plans and think through this crazy turn of events.
He’d never even considered that this would be a possibility of the job. That he’d be forced to kidnap his mission. To be honest, he hadn’t even been convinced she was truly in danger. But he knew better now. Someone wanted her dead.
Number one rule of protection: Don’t let your assignment die.
As soon as they made it out of the prison, he could take care of that.
Rule number two: Find out who wants your charge dead, and why.
Certainly Whitestall wasn’t the man in charge, but Myles at least had a good place to start. That guard could and would point him in the right direction.
While he was investigating, he needed to stash Ms. Thorn in a safe location. There was an FBI safe house less than a hundred and fifty miles away. That would work. Get her there, touch base later with his supervisor. Then the really exciting stuff started—following the clues from Whitestall to the perpetrators. Who knew where that trail might lead?
He loved the unknown about this job.
Normally, at this point in a case he’d be running scenarios, figuring out angles, making plans. Yet, for some reason, his mind kept wandering back to his last interaction with Ms. Thorn.
He really had meant to compliment her on the lesson the day before. She was an excellent teacher and had a great rapport with the inmates. She provided easily understood instructions and taught with so much passion that it seemed possible she could teach the entire prison.
But he just hadn’t been able to keep that smirk off his face. The force of habit was too strong. He’d used it all his life to keep the people around him at a distance. And it came in especially handy in prison. It was much easier to be guarded by other men when he kept himself emotionally removed from the situation.
As soon as Kenzie had seen his sneer, he recognized the fire in her eyes and flare of her nostrils that told him she was spitting mad. And his immediate reaction was to soothe her. But by grasping her hands, he hadn’t soothed her, he’d crossed the line. He knew it. She knew it.
So why had she stepped closer to