Chased by Heather Ashley

It'stimes like this I miss my fucking siren.

"Move!" I yell at the slow-ass driver doing ten below in the fast lane. My heart pounds out a frantic rhythm against my ribcage as I try to stay calm. My pulse has to be approaching near cardiac arrest levels, but I only push down harder on the accelerator, forcing my Charger to its limits. Nothing will stop me from getting to Montana and making sure she's safe.

Flashbacks to when I was seventeen threaten to overwhelm me and I push them back, ignoring how my hands tremble where I grip the wheel. Montana isn’t Makenna, and this time I won’t be too late.

At the moment, I don't care that she's been avoiding me for the last couple of months—not that we saw each other all the time before that—or that she's been distant ever since that Shadow Phoenix release party. Whatever distance she's tried to put between us just went up in a fiery explosion as far as I'm concerned because there's not a force on this Earth that could keep me from getting to her now.

The fingers of my right hand drum the steering wheel, and my left leg is shaking. My adrenaline is sky high and needs an outlet that it's not going to get for a few more miles yet. My jaw aches from grinding my teeth together. I've been into Montana since the first time I laid eyes on her at a Shadow Phoenix concert, a week after I joined up with Connor's team. Who could blame me when she’s smoking hot and looks like the sweetest sin you’ll ever commit?

She's never looked at me as anything other than a professional acquaintance, but I've been dying to get into her bed for what feels like forever. I took her keeping me at arm's length as a sign she wasn't interested, and even if she was, I couldn't offer anything more than one night.

I’ve been in pursuit of a madman for years, and he’s always been a step ahead. It’s why I quit my job with the Seattle Police Department and started with Connor, and it’s where my focus needs to be right now—especially with girls disappearing again. The last thing I need is to fuck up my spot at Hollywood Guardians to get my dick wet.

That doesn’t make it any easier to resist her, though. My dick isn’t exactly the most logical part of my body.

I can't take the asshole in the car in front of me slowing me down anymore, so I swerve into the next lane and cut someone off. They honk their horn, but I don't give a shit. Something is twisting uncomfortably inside me, knowing someone nearly took her tonight, and what if they'd done it? Grabbed her and dragged her off into the night to do fuck knows what with like he had Makenna? My fingers clench the steering wheel until my knuckles turn white, and I step down harder on the accelerator.

It’s like I’m seventeen all over again, only this time I’m not helpless. This time I’ll keep Montana out of his clutches and make sure she stays safe. It doesn’t hurt that Montana's the kind of gorgeous that makes everything else drop away when she smiles at you, but it's not like she belongs to me in any way. Just the thought of claiming any woman makes a cold sweat break out across my body and my stomach churn.

No, when you love someone, it’s only a matter of time until you lose them. It’s one road I'll never walk down again.

My tires let off this harsh squeal as I slam on the brakes outside of Montana's high-rise apartment building in downtown LA. I'm not supposed to park here, but I'll deal with it later if they tow my car. Right now, I need to see for myself that she's okay.

Anyone would want to do the same in this situation with a work acquaintance that's hot enough to make my dick take notice whenever she's around and also sort of a friend, right? It doesn’t mean anything.

I don't have time to dwell on how I'm acting, only to carry on the way I have been, letting instinct guide me. The front door of the building slams against the wall as I fling it open, desperate to get inside and upstairs. I've thought about showing up on her doorstep so many times over the past few months. One drunken night I actually had an old cop buddy look up her address, that’s how hot I am for her.

Since that day, I've had to stop myself from stopping by uninvited to see if she wanted to have a night of fun at least a dozen times, but right now, I've never been happier to have memorized Montana's location.

I'm sure Connor will have a thousand questions for me later, but none of that matters at the moment.

The security guy at the front desk jumps into action, glaring at me and hurrying over. "Sir, what are you-"

I level him with my best don't fuck with me, or you'll really have a problem look and then push past him to the elevators. Lucky for me but shitty for building security, you don't need a passcode or a key, so I hop inside and ride up to the sixteenth floor.

My fingers itch to wrap around the handle of my machete, but I left it in the car. At least my mind is working enough to realize that stalking into an apartment building wielding a fucking blade as big as my forearm is a bad idea. That doesn't mean I wouldn't feel better with the heavy weight of it resting in my palm.

The elevator dings as the doors slide open, and I step into the hall, scanning the empty space for any threats, but there's no one here. Number 1622 is halfway down the hall to the right, so I make my way over, knocking twice before accepting that Montana isn't home and I'm going to be waiting for her out here.

Leaning against the wall beside her door, I prop one foot up and pull out my phone to shoot a text to Connor to let him know I'm here. I slip it back into my pocket as soon as I'm done because I'm in no mood to answer all the bullshit questions he's going to have about the way I bolted from the office tonight.

I stifle a yawn. The adrenaline from the drive over is starting to wear off now that there's no immediate threat. I'm hoping Montana has coffee inside her apartment because it's going to be a long night without anyone here to back me up and take over the watch. Not that I mind.

Not that I’d want to share her.

The traitorous thought filters through my brain and I shut that shit down.

There's no fucking way I'm closing my eyes until I know more about what's going on, and that whoever tried to take her tonight isn't gunning for a repeat.

My mind reels trying to figure out what happened, but it's pointless until I see Montana and can hear from her exactly what went down and if she has any idea who the dead man is—or, I should say, the one who's going to be dead when I get my hands on him. Especially if he’s the one making waves with the recent disappearances in the area. If it’s the same guy… my mouth goes dry.

I’ve been waiting too long to get my hands on him, so I don’t give a shit what Connor might say or how Montana feels about me being here. I’m not going anywhere until I know for sure whether the guy who tried to take her tonight is the same one who took my sister, the same one I thought I caught only to watch him walk out of a courtroom with unjust freedom.

The same one I’ve been hunting relentlessly for years.

Other than thoughts of homicide, I don't have much to occupy the time I'm stuck waiting for Montana to show, so I drum my fingers impatiently on my thigh and keep my head on a swivel to make sure no one's going to be able to sneak up here, just in case.

When the elevator dings and the doors open a few minutes later, my heart races triple time, and a manic energy explodes through me. Outwardly, I'm calm and collected. It's something I perfected a long time ago, both on the battlefield and on the force. I've honed it so that no matter how much of a storm is raging inside, on the outside, I look completely unaffected and like I've got my shit together.

That's what it takes to be in control in the worst situations imaginable. It's what's going to get Montana through tonight with enough confidence in my ability to keep her safe so that she can sleep easy—or at least easier.

I blow out a breath when I see that damn fiery red hair before she even steps out of the elevator. When she brushes it out of her face, and our eyes lock, my heart stutters in my chest before kicking up into a frantic rhythm again. I scan every inch of her as she walks down the hall toward me, searching for injuries, and except for being paler than usual with redness on the side of her face like she got maced and dried tracks of tears running down her cheeks, she looks okay. Something loosens inside my chest, and I tell whatever it is to fuck off. I have a job to do, and that's all this is about.

"Hey," she says and gives me what I think is supposed to be a smile, but it's barely a quirking up of one side of her lips before she turns to her door and lifts a shaking hand to try and get the key into the lock. When her third attempt fails, I gently cover her hand with mine and pull the key out of her grip, ignoring the way her touch triggers a cascade of tingles down my arm and straight to my dick.

Montana is the kind of girl a guy like me could get lost in if I let myself—or if I didn’t know better. Every experience I’ve ever had loving someone has meant they disappear from my life, so I decided years ago I’m done with that bullshit. My purpose in this life is to protect—to hunt down animals like the one who attacked her tonight and make sure they can’t take other people’s loved ones away. It’s what lets me sleep at night—at least when I’m so exhausted the nightmares can’t even break through.

I’m good with it.

I hold the door open for her, and she brushes past me to get inside. She smells like roses and vanilla, and her scent wraps around me. I breathe in deep to fill my lungs with it. Apparently, I'm a masochist because being in her space, surrounded by so much temptation, is going to be next-level hard, but it'll be worth every second to make sure she's safe and hopefully finally learn something that’ll help me track down the sick fuck kidnapping women.

"Thanks for coming," Montana says as she drops her purse by the door, and I turn to lock it behind me. I grab her arm, stopping her from walking into the apartment. I might've stood outside for the last fifteen minutes, but before that, I have no way of knowing if anyone entered her place while she was out other than searching it myself.

"Wait here while I make sure no one got in while you were gone," I tell her. It comes out gruffer than I mean, but I'm all sorts of keyed up over what happened, and the shaken energy she's putting off isn't helping me calm down.

I've always had insane protective instincts; it's what makes me good at my job. I'll chalk it up to that and not dig too deeply into how my gaze lingers on her or how I want to distract her from what happened with my dick.

Fuck.

I rub my hand down my face feeling the rough stubble along my chin. It's been a long day already, and I'm too in my own head about this shit. I need to focus on the job, not on what my body wants.

The sweep of her apartment doesn't take long; it's not a big space, and once it's done, I relax enough to focus on Montana. "Why don't you sit down, and I'll make us something to drink?"

She exhales, and her whole body shudders before she raises a trembling hand and tucks her hair behind her ear. "Yeah, okay. I'll take a gin and tonic. I'm just going to head in there," she points towards the bathroom, "and clean myself up."

I watch her walk away, my gaze dropping to the sway of her hips and the perfection of her curves before I tear my eyes away. The last thing either of us needs tonight is to get swept up in emotion and a post-adrenaline rush high and do something we'll regret in the morning. I'm not about to put it on her to do what needs to be done after what she just went through, so it's on me to keep things professional.

Ice cubes clink together as I drop them into a glass and mix her drink first. I'm on the job tonight, and there's no way I can drink. It'll be coffee for me—better to stay alert than lower my already questionable inhibitions when it comes to this girl.

The city lights catch my attention from across the room, and I grab her glass so I'll have it when she comes out of the bathroom. My coffee can wait; I want to check out if there's a potential for a breach on this end of the apartment. Sure, we're sixteen floors up, but some buildings have fire escapes or window washing platforms that could be used to get in. Montana lives alone, so she's vulnerable, and right now, all I've got to go on is a head full of worst-case scenarios.

Light spills out of the open bathroom door, and Montana steps out. I can see her reflection in the window in front of me, and she steals the breath from my lungs, even now with no makeup and messy hair dressed in yoga pants and a plain white t-shirt. It's the t-shirt that gets me, clinging to her tits so I can't help but stare.

It's a good thing she can't see my predatory gaze on her as she steps up beside me, and I say nothing as I pass her the drink in my hand. After she takes a long swallow, she sighs. "I'm sorry for this bullshit and pulling you away from your evening."

My eyebrows pull together. "Why the fuck are you apologizing to me for almost getting kidnapped?"

She lifts those hypnotic green orbs up to mine, and I'm ensnared even if I don't want to be. "Your girlfriend was pretty damn possessive of you the last time I ran across her path. I bet she's absolutely thrilled you're here in my apartment with just the two of us."

Her lips tilt up into a smirk then, like she's got some private joke going on in her head, and if I wasn't so relieved to see her able to smile at all right now, I'd make her tell me what she finds so funny.

Unfortunately for me, I'm still caught up on the idea that she thinks I have a girlfriend for some reason. Which, to be clear, I don't. The last time I did, well… I was deployed and it didn’t end well. "Girlfriend?" I ask, raising my eyebrow.

"You don't remember your own girlfriend?" She tilts her head up so she can look me dead in the eye as if she's daring me to pretend I'm that stupid.

I shake my head, wondering why the fuck we're even talking about this right now. "I'm sure I'd remember a girlfriend if I had one, but more than one night isn't my style." Her eyes flash with surprise, but she hides it almost as fast, lifting her glass and taking a sip. I watch as the liquid slides down her throat and swallow hard right along with her.

Hopefully, she didn't notice my sudden fascination.

"Well, you should probably tell the chick going around scaring other girls away that you're not that into her," she smirks over the rim of her glass, "because she gave off a little bit of a cute but psycho vibe that you're gonna want to watch out for."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Anytime I interact with Montana, she keeps me on my toes, but tonight is throwing me for a loop. Instead of discussing her very real kidnapping attempt, we're talking about my love life like it's at all important right now. I could never say being around this girl was boring, and that was all the more reason to keep my distance. It'd be too easy to become fascinated, and fascination might lead to wanting more, and that wasn't going to happen.

Even if it was depressing as hell, thinking about never sinking into her soft, lithe body.

She bites her lip, and her gaze goes far off. "Sorry, she never gave me a name, but she was tall and willowy and had that sort of mean girl glare and hair flip thing down to a fucking art form."

When all I do is stare at her blankly because what the fuck? she takes pity on me and explains. "At the Shadow Phoenix release party a couple months ago? Your whatever she is or was cornered me in the bathroom and told me to stay away." The last words she says all low and ominous, like she's telling a horror story before she cracks a huge grin and dissolves into laughter.

I can't help the chuckle that climbs up my throat and escapes right along with her, and with it, some of the tension melts out of my body. More importantly, now I remember who she's talking about. "Yeah, that was Caroline, and I only took her out as a favor I owed an acquaintance. She's a fan of the band, but I only saw her for that night." I shiver when I remember Caroline trying to blow me in my car when I dropped her off after, and I had to practically pry her off of me and throw her out of the car. No way was my dick going near her cold lips.

Montana raises her eyebrow like she expects me to elaborate, but I'm not sure I want to. Finally, after a stare down that goes on so long it starts to get awkward, I sigh. "I dropped her off after the show with nothing more than a kiss on the cheek, and I haven't talked to her since. Yes, she tried to text me a few times, but I'm not interested." I decide to leave out the whole aggressively trying to suck my cock part since it’s not important.

Montana holds up the hand not gripping her glass, and something settles inside me when I see she's not shaking anymore. Maybe she needed to take the focus off what happened to her tonight to get her balance back. "It's not really any of my business what you do or don't do with your dick, Ronin," she says, but the mischievous look glittering in her emerald green eyes tells a different story.

At the very least, she's enjoying fucking with me, and at most… well, maybe she's imagining all the things I can do with said dick, which, to be clear, are a lot.

"You're the one who brought it up," I grumble, but my words don't hold any heat. If the adventures of my love life can make her smile, I guess I don't mind sharing a little. Not enough to scare her off, you know, in case she needs something else to take her mind off what happened.

"You're right. I guess it just bugged me, her getting in my face like that. You really can do better." She pushes off the glass and takes her drink to the kitchen, and I watch her walk away for the second time tonight. Her outfit isn't traditionally sexy, but Montana could make old sweats look good without even trying.

My fingers curl into fists, and my nails bite into my palms. I let the sting ground me while I breathe through the tension now rolling through my body as her words hit me. Caroline got in her face. Does that mean she threatened Montana? Hurt her?

I've about reached my limit on waiting for her to tell me what happened tonight, and knowing how bad things could've gone if she'd been alone in that parking lot has a whole new wave of agitation rushing through me. I need to do something to act and deal with the threat, but I don't know where to aim the reckoning I want to unleash without new information. All my old leads are dead.

She comes back into the room gripping a coffee mug between her palms and then stops in front of me, holding it out. "Thanks," I say as I take it from her and let the warmth seep into my hands and the bitter scent calm me down.

"I guess you want to talk about the clusterfuck that was tonight, huh?" she asks, plopping down on one of two sofas, and I follow her, sitting on the couch that faces the one she's on. My coffee's hot, so I put it down on the table between us and sit forward with my forearms resting on my thighs. All my attention's on the woman in front of me.

The smile she attempts is half-hearted at best, and any playfulness she was clinging to a minute ago is long gone. I watch as her face pales, and she tucks her unruly hair back behind her ear. My fingers twitch as if they have a mind of their own and want to slide through the silky strands themselves, and I clench them into fists even harder.

"Start at the beginning," I finally grind out. I realize I probably look like the world's biggest asshole, but my emotions are all over the place right now. I'm having a hard time controlling both the urge to go chop someone up into tiny pieces with my machete, and the desire to use my body to turn this night into one filled with pleasure instead of fear for the girl sitting across from me looking so shaken.

I’m selfless like that.

Her shimmering green eyes snap to mine as tears threaten to fall. I inwardly curse, hoping to any fucking god that's paying attention that they don't because that might just be what snaps the last bit of my control.

She lets out a shuddering breath and then starts talking. "I was at a girl's night dinner with Kennedy, Amara, and Moon. When we were done, we couldn't find the valet, so we went to find our cars ourselves. Jericho called Moon to come home because Benji had a fever, so we didn't want to wait for the valet to come back."

She's keeping to the facts, and I'm a little worried because none of her usual snark or sarcasm is coming out of her mouth. It's like she has to shut off her emotions to get through the story.

"We found Moon's car first, and she left, so it was just Kennedy, Amara, and I. We were walking around the parking lot, and the two of them were talking about something. I stopped to dig my keys out of my purse because I thought if I could click the lock button on the fob, the lights would flash, and I could find it easier. I was stupid and tossed them in there after I grabbed them from the valet stand." Montana sniffles like she's going to cry, but she doesn't. I wonder if when she gets the last words out, the reality of what could've been will crash down on her, and if that happens—if she has a breakdown—what am I going to do about it?

I don't think I can sit here and do nothing, but I don't want to give her the wrong impression.

Yes, she's hot as fuck, and I'd give almost anything to slide inside her body and get lost in her for a night, but that’s it. Giving emotional comfort to a girl who's just been traumatized? That's a straight line to boyfriend status, and I'm not about to cross it.

Visions of the day my sister went missing swim at the front of my mind, how my dad walked out on us after, my mom's face as she shattered and never was quite able to pick up the pieces, but I shove those memories back down into the lockbox I keep them in and throw another set of chains around it to make sure they stay buried.

It's a good reminder of why I can't get involved, why I need to stay focused and do my job no matter how tempted I am to see if Montana's interested.

Shaking myself out of that distressing minefield, I level my focus back on the enticing redhead in front of me. "When the girls had their backs turned and were a few steps away, and my head was down while I tried to see inside my purse in the dark, that was when he grabbed me."

Montana shudders and rubs at her chest underneath her collarbone and above her tits.

"How did he grab you?" I ask, watching her hand absently drift up to her neck.

She startles like she forgot I'm sitting here with her and drops her hands back into her lap. "One arm came across my chest like a band here," she explains, gesturing to where she was rubbing, "and the other hand gripped my throat. His hot breath was against my ear and not in the sexy I can't get enough of you way. It was so fucking creepy, and he whispered in my ear that I was his and he had big plans for me."

I reach for my coffee and take a sip for something to do with my hands. All I want to do at this point is either fuck or fight, and I can't do either, so coffee it is.

She holds up her hand. "Before you ask, no, I didn't recognize his voice. He sort of growl-whispered Batman-style, so it could've been anyone, but it was definitely a man. He was taller than me but not a lot taller."

That bit of information helps because Montana isn't one of those five-foot-nothing petite girls who nearly every guy towers over. She has to be at least five-seven, maybe more, so I pull out my phone and make a note of what I know so far.

Medium to tall height.

Male.

It's virtually nothing to go on, but it rules out half the population by gender alone, so it's a start.

"What happened after he grabbed you?"

Instead of the tears I expect, fire sparks behind her eyes, and her fair skin flushes as she gets more pissed off. "I fought like hell," she says, her chin lifting and her lips curving up into a feral little grin that makes my cock go half-mast.

"Good girl," I practically purr while I adjust how I'm sitting to accommodate the extra blood flow to my dick, and try to ignore how her eyes drop to my lap. When she drags her gaze back up, it's full of heat, and fuck me, I need to finish this up and get out of here to check the building and move my car if it hasn’t been towed. It's too tantalizing being in her space, surrounded by her scent, with only her and I and no buffer between us to minimize the sexual chemistry. I'm just now realizing the sex will be off the fucking charts if we ever give in.

I always thought the attraction I felt toward Montana was only one-sided, but the way she's looking at me right now says she'd be up for a whole lot of fun with my dick and me if we were game.

The air between us suddenly crackles with electricity, and I stand up and move back over to the window to get some distance. That seems to do the trick as she leans against the back of the couch with her shoulders slumped and that fire reduced to embers. "Anyway, I clawed at his arms and kicked my heels up to try and nail him in the balls, but before I could, Kennedy was there with her pepper spray. I closed my eyes half a second before she sprayed it, but I still got quite a bit of it on my face. That shit fucking sucks. My skin still stings."

I chuckle because she's not wrong. I went through it as part of my military training and again in the Police Academy, and even though it was years ago, I still remember the intense burn and how it makes you feel like you're gasping for air.

"Do you have any idea of who it might've been? Anyone new you've been talking to lately? Or anyone who's threatened you or you've pissed off?" I smirk at her with that last part because even though I don't know her that well, I do know she's a fireball, and I have zero doubt that she pisses people off, probably daily.

"Not anyone who'd get violent about it," she says with a shrug. "I started using this dating app a couple of months ago, and I've been on a few dates, but no one screamed pervert to me or didn't take no for an answer or any of that terrifying bullshit you hear about on the news."

I find myself clenching my jaw again, but I don't even know why at this point. The idea of Montana out on a date makes my stomach twist, but I have no right to feel that way, so I try and let it go.

"I'm going to need to see your phone and that app," I tell her, hoping I don't sound as pissed off as I feel at the prospect of having to look through messages from other dudes to this girl who's definitely too good for me to ruin. To be clear—that’s what would happen if we fuck. I’m amazing and not at all humble about it. The thought clears some of the agitation and I find myself smirking.

She gets up after eyeing my grin and goes toward the front door, hefting her purse up and digging through it until she finds her phone. "The passcode is zero-seven-zero-two," she tells me, like it's not a huge deal that she's trusting me with that kind of access to her phone. "My birthday," she says with a small smile like we now share a huge secret before she hands over the device.

"I'm going to shower and then go to bed. You're staying, right?" she asks with so much vulnerability it makes that protective asshole side of me perk up.

"I'm not leaving until we find the guy who attacked you, Spitfire," I promise, wincing a bit at the nickname that slipped out without even meaning to. Then I cut myself some slack. Friends call each other nicknames all the time.

Friends… that's what we are, and that's what we'll stay.

So, why the fuck does that piss me off so much?