“You saw him?”
“Yes.” She walked toward him, her legs long and slender in cutoff jeans, her arms well muscled and too thin, her tank top clinging to slender curves and a flat abdomen. She looked like a dancer—long, lean lines and graceful, upright carriage, but her eyes were wide in a too-pale face, her breathing shaky.
“You okay?” he asked, and she nodded.
“Fine, but he had something in his hands when he got out of the car. It wasn’t there when he got back in. I think it’s under the tree.” She gestured to the edge of the yard and towering pine that stood there.
“Wait here. I’ll take a look.”
“You’ve done enough already, Darius. I’ll look.” She started walking as if she really expected him to fall in line with her plans.
He snagged the back of her shirt, his fingers skimming over warm flesh before slipping into the belt loop of her shorts. “I don’t think so, Cat.”
“I told you not to call me that.”
“Let’s not waste time dancing around the real issue.”
“Which is?” She raised an eyebrow, her hair tawny in the moon’s yellowish glow.
“You don’t want me involved in your life, and I’m not. I just happened to hear a car pass my house, and I happen to have the kind of training that makes me more suited to dealing with danger than you are, so I came over. It’s as simple as that.”
“I don’t think there’s anything simple about you, Darius,” she responded.
“That isn’t the point, either. Stay here. I’ll go take a look.”
“But—”
He walked away, ignoring her protest.
Sirens split the night as Darius crossed the yard. Good. The police were on the way. The more people moving around, the less likely the perp would return. Since he didn’t think Catherine was going to hide in the house while he looked around, he’d rather the guy stay far away.
The pine tree sat close to a whitewashed fence that nearly glowed in the moonlight. He surveyed the ground, searching for signs that someone had been there. Wilted grass, a thick layer of pine needles, a few pine cones. Nothing that looked out of place.
Darius eased closer, watching his steps, studying the ground carefully. One jerry-rigged explosive device had taken his lower left leg. He wasn’t in the market to lose the other one.
Pine needles rustled, and Darius caught a hint of soap and something indefinable and feminine. Not flowery. More like rain on a hot summer day. Fresh and clean with just a hint of sweetness.
Catherine.
He frowned, glancing over his shoulder. “Stop.”
He barked the command, and she froze, her eyes gleaming in the bright moonlight. “Do you see something?”
“No. But it’s not what I can see that I’m worried about.” He studied the ground near his feet, crouching low and tracking a line of tamped-down pine needles to the base of the tree. The trunk was thick and rough, the bark flaking off, and at first, he thought that was all he was seeing. Old flaking bark, slightly darker than the wood. He let his eyes adjust, sirens screaming in the driveway behind him. Doors closing. Someone calling out, and he just kept staring at the trunk, his brain seeing what his eyes couldn’t.
A too-regular shape a foot up from the base of the tree, nearly hidden by the lowest boughs. Sharp edges that didn’t occur in nature. Something that shouldn’t be there, but was.
What?
“See anything?” Logan Randal crouched beside him.
“Maybe. Do you have a light?” He took the flashlight Logan offered, shone it on the tree trunk, his pulse jumping as the strange shadow came into full focus.
Wires.
Explosives.
Set on a timer? A remote?
“Back off. Now!” he ordered, but Logan was already moving, jumping back from the bomb, words spilling out as he called into his radio.
“What is it?” Catherine moved forward, heading in exactly the direction she shouldn’t be. Darius snagged her waist, hauled her up and away, her body stiff and unyielding, her skin soft and pliant.
“Put me down!” She panted, fighting his hold as if he were a stranger taking her to certain doom rather than a neighbor trying to keep her from it.
“Gladly,” he responded as he crossed the threshold into the house, set her down in the foyer, his hands sliding along the smooth skin of her abdomen, heat spearing through him.
“Go get your grandmother. We need to get out of here.”
“What did you see? What was it?”
“Enough explosives to blow that tree down and take half this house down with it. Get Eileen, or I’ll do it.” He started down the dark hall, knowing the way to Eileen’s room, and ready to carry both women out the back door if necessary.
Catherine could fight him all she wanted, but he’d have his way in this.
They were going to his place until the police cleared the explosive.
Maybe for longer.
Obviously, a security system hadn’t deterred Catherine’s attacker.
“I’ll get her. If you walk in there, she’ll be mortified.” Catherine brushed by, her body sliding along his. He felt every touch, every sigh of breath, every trembling muscle.
And he knew he was in trouble. Knew he was being pulled deeper than he wanted to go.
He’d come to Pine Bluff to settle in and settle down, and that was all he wanted. Not a relationship. Certainly not a relationship with someone like Catherine. Someone who had trouble seeping from every pore.
She walked into Eileen’s room, her gentle whisper carrying through the silent house. Outside, men and women shouted warnings and directions, but here, in the dark old farmhouse, time seemed to stand still, the scent of illness and cigarette hanging in the hot air.
He’d give the women ten seconds, and then he was going in.
Ten.
Nine.
Eight.
“It’s not going to matter that your hair is a mess if you’re dead, Eileen.” Catherine’s words carried clearly this time, her exasperation obvious.
Six.
Five.
“We need to go. Now. Not in a minute.”
Four.
Three.
Bed sheets rustled. Footsteps padded across wood flooring.
Finally, the two women appeared, Eileen tottering a little, drowning in an oversize night dress, Catherine a step behind her.
“So, the hunky hero has returned to take us to safety, huh?” Eileen put a hand on his arm, her skin cool and dry, her fingers trembling.
“I’m not sure hero is an accurate description. I’m just a neighbor trying to help out,” he responded, moving as quickly as her frailty would allow them to. Down the hall, into the gutted kitchen and out onto the back deck.
It took too long to get her down the deck stairs. He wanted to pick her up and carry her, but she swatted his hands away. Finally, they were down, and she paused for breath, her narrow shoulders heaving as she shivered in the moonlight. He pulled off his jacket, wrapping it around her, expecting Catherine to be right beside them.
Or maybe he didn’t.
Because,