Havoc by Shannon McKenna

8

“So, Arrow Fast Cash?” Mace said. “That’s the only digital wallet you found?”

“It looks like she opened an account just to sell that car,” Josh said. “There haven’t been any more deposits or payments after that. She looks squeaky clean. The only money coming into her bank account is her salary from Sebold. I haven’t found anything more than the general stuff I sent you a couple hours ago.”

“Okay,” Mace said. “Thanks, man. I appreciate the help.”

“Anytime, man. Later. Let me know what happens.”

Mace ended the call and got up from the chair to stretch, never taking his eyes off the gap in the hotel room curtain. He’d rented a room with a direct line of sight to Cait’s door. He wished she was someplace safer, but didn’t have the trust capital or the bully clout to force her. She was stubborn. It was a pain in the ass, but he liked it.

She hadn’t called anyone. Not yet, anyway. She’d done the exact online research that he’d predicted. She’d looked up him, then Trask Executive Solutions, then Eric and Erebus, then Anton and his nightclubs. She’d perused news articles about the events of Shaw’s Crossing, both older ones and the newer ones about more recent events. She’d downloaded a sensationalistic true-crime e-book onto her phone, and speedread it.

All of which, if it wasn’t staged for his benefit, suggested that she wasn’t reporting back to anyone about what she had seen or who she met. It suggested that all of this information was new to her.

He was cautiously optimistic. He didn’t want Cait to be one of Kimball’s stooges. He wanted her to be what she seemed to be. A bright-eyed, fleece-and-Gore-Tex-clad crusader for truth, justice and dear old Dad. That was a narrative he could get behind.

Too much, maybe.

That was the dangerous thing. Everything about Cait LaMott was attractive to him, and Kimball would be smart enough to know it.

If she was for real and sincere, then that made him a douchebag sleaze for hacking her phone and spying on her. Too bad. When it came time to pay for his sins, he’d pay.

He had to liberate his family from the fucking Prophet’s curse, and he seemed to be the only one willing to put all his energy into it. His brothers, and even his Marine buddy Nate, all had other priorities now. Which was to say, rolling around in bed.

Demi and Eric were blissfully married. Anton and Fi were following suit, and Elisa and Nate wouldn’t be far behind, judging from the way things looked. Mace strongly, vocally disapproved of this idiocy. But no one gave a fuck what he thought.

In spite of all the skulking and spying in the mud and the snow around GodsAcre, he’d made zero progress springing his trap. Now his brothers had decided to taunt Kimball with yet another wedding, this one an even bigger affair, full of Anton’s famous deejay friends and their entourages. Come on down! Kill us all in one blow!

The upshot was, he was here alone, making sure that this hapless woman didn’t get herself killed before he could figure out if she had any useful intel. Yet another reckless person, acting against her own best interests, like he didn’t have enough in his life.

He might as well be a border collie, racing around, trying to keep them all alive.

Something flickered in the shadows across the courtyard. Mace was on his feet in an instant, leaning close to the window. Three dark forms, running lightly up the staircase. They made their way around the second floor walkway of the courtyard and slowed down as they approached Cait’s door. One peered inside her window.

Fuck.He was an asshole for not calling backup. He hadn’t been ready to field his brothers’ strong opinions about Cait LaMott and her agenda quite yet, nor had he expected Kimball to move on her so fast. Wrong on both counts. Bonehead. If he didn’t believe his own hype about the danger, how could she be expected to believe it?

The shadows put their heads together briefly. Then they got into position, and kicked open Cait’s door.

Mace burst out his own door and sprinted toward her room.

The guy sitting on top of Cait let out a warning shout as Mace barreled through, too late. The goon closest to the door got Mace’s boot heel to the teeth and toppled back against the bed. Light spilling in from the courtyard showed blood on Cait’s face.

Ganging up on a girl alone in a hotel room in the middle of the night, three on one? Punk-ass bitches deserved to have their guts ripped out. And he was just the man to do it.

Guy Three came at him. Kept him too busy to pry the big bastard off of Cait. From the corner of his eye, he saw the big guy roll her over, smack her on the back of the head and wrench her arms back, but the guy he was fighting was too fast to divide his attention.

He danced back, ducking, blocking. Stabbed in a blow to the guy’s neck, took a punch to the ribs that left him gasping. Cait was jerked up and dragged toward the open door. She braced herself in the door frame with her feet. The guy clutching her wrenched her arm up until she yelped. He jerked her outside.

Guy Two darted out after them, clutching her backpack.

Fuck this. Guy Three came at him again. It burned his ass that he was still dealing with this bozo while those assholes dragged Cait off to Kimball’s tender mercies.

So finishhim. The directive in his head had Jeremiah’s rough, barking voice.

Mace opened himself up, inviting a blow. Seized the guy’s wrist when he took the bait, torqued it brutally hard, and jerked him out the door, helpless and twisted. Swung him out over the railing…and out into the open air. A long arc, a shriek of terror…

Splash.Damn. The shithead had cleared the concrete decking and hit the pool.

Better luck than the prick deserved. Mace would have enjoyed crossing one of them off the list. With his peripheral vision, he saw the fucker moving down there in the water, as a pinkish, bloody cloud spread around him in the backlit blue.

To her credit, Cait was making it difficult for the man holding her to drag her along the railing. She’d hooked her feet into the cast-iron bars of the staircase handrail, and her captor was struggling to pry her loose. The one holding her backpack kicked her in the thigh. She gasped in pain. The one holding her wrenched her away from the handrail.

Mace dove for the one who’d kicked her. They tumbled down the stairs, smashing into the guy holding Cait. They all hit the ground together in a grunting, struggling pile.

He tried to engage both men, to give Cait time to run, and someone kicked him in the ribs, fuck. He stabbed his fingers into ski mask eye-holes. Got a strangled howl for his reward. Dripping pool guy reappeared, and piled back on. Three on one again.

Mace landed an upper-cut that sent one reeling against the wall. Whipped a hard kick to the side of another guy’s knee. Cait scrambled loose, but instead of running, she leaped onto one of their backs, clawing at eyes and throat. He was sorry he was too busy to admire her hellcat moves. He blocked a front punch, caught the attacker’s wrist, twisted until he screamed and buckled, twirled the fucker around, and bashed his head into the wall.

The guy with Cait on his back had rammed her against the wall. Mace came at him with an uppercut to the jaw, knee-jab to the groin. He spun to face whoever was next...

No one. Two down, half-crawling. The third guy backed away, eyes darting in ski-mask holes. He grabbed Cait’s backpack, dragged one of the others to his feet, and turned tail. Out of the corner of his eye, Mace saw the guy behind him stagger upright and lope unevenly away into the dark. He crouched down by Cait, who was curled up on the ground, struggling with her gag, and helped her loosen the knot. She spit it out, coughing.

“Hey, are you okay?” he asked. “Are you hurt?”

“They’re getting away!” She coughed, pointing at the guys disappearing into the darkness. “They’re getting away, with my backpack! My dad’s journal, his notes!” She struggled to her feet, using him to steady her. “I’ve got to get them back!”

“Cait, stop! Are you hurt?”

“I need my backpack, Mace! It’s all over without my backpack!”

Shit.If he’d put the trace in her pack, instead of her coat, he could have gotten a bead on Kimball this very night. But no. He hadn’t thought it through. But it would suck if Kimball got Cait’s info.

He took off after them. Cait was a badass, and deserved to get her stuff back. Kimball got no wins tonight. Just a few fucked up goons to punish and scold.

He caught sight of them soon enough. They were headed for a nearby parking lot, slowed down by the one who limped. His pals were dragging him along.

Mace kept to the tree-shadows, silently gaining on them until he was almost parallel, staying low. He could hear them cursing and whining.

“…just the backpack! He needs the bitch along with it! What if we can’t use the info without interrogating her? He’ll skin us! We’ve got to go back for that fucking bitch!”

“Fine. Go back and get her, tiger. Be my fucking guest.”

“I’d get her, no problem, if we could just put down that fucking gorilla!”

“The boss said no guns,” one of them hissed. “He said, low profile, in and out. Do not fuck with the boss. Have you seen what happens to people who fuck with him?”

“I’ve seen what happens to people who don’t deliver, too!”

Mace leaped up out of the shadows, and smashed the guy’s face down against the hood of a pickup truck. The guy slid down, the truck’s hood dented and smeared.

A baton dropped from his hand, rattling as it rolled on the asphalt. Mace grabbed it just as the guy with the bloodied, fucked up mouth leaped at him. Mace blocked the punch, and spun, stabbing an elbow into the guy’s ribs and knocking him against the side of the next car. He hit it with a grunt. Mace whipped the baton around and smashed him in the face, breaking his nose. He snatched Cait’s pack away.

Bam.Glass shattered. Asshole number three was shooting at him. Fuck.

Mace hit the ground, scrambling behind the pickup truck. Car lights flicked on. An engine roared. Mace peeked around the car...

Bam.Another bullet hit the asphalt. He flinched back as bits of gravel peppered his face.

He popped his head cautiously up over the hood. Black Mercedes SUV. Mud-daubed plates. It clipped the curb at the parking lot entrance, lurching and bouncing, and sped away, tires squealing. It rounded the curve that led to the highway.

Running back to Kimball, tails between their legs. They were in for a fun night.

And he was alone, in the midst of a lot of damaged cars, one with a dented, bloodstained hood, two with windshields shot up. All with their alarms shrieking and beeping and whoop-whoop-whooping.

He loped away swiftly, before anyone could roll up and try to pin this mess on him. Not his damn fault. Those scumbags had come here looking for a fight.

And he needed to make sure Cait was okay.

Besides, he’d be fielding some strong opinions about his choices tonight when tomorrow dawned. Explanations would have to be made, to Chief Bristol, to his brothers and Nate and their respective ladies. There was no need to anticipate that ordeal.

True to form, Cait had thrown caution to the wind and walked right out in front of the hotel to look for him. She saw him approach, holding her bag, and clapped her hands over her mouth, eyes shimmering. Her nose, mouth and hands were smeared with blood.

He lifted the pack. “Here’s your stuff back.”

“Oh my God.” She took it, wrapping her arms around it. “Thank you so much.”

“I’m sorry they all got away. I wish I could have questioned them. But one of them started shooting, so I couldn’t follow up.”

“Sorry?” She let out a breathless huff of laughter. “Sorry, he says! You saved my ass, and my dad’s journal. I heard gunshots. I was so scared that they’d hurt you.”

“Yeah, they lost their shit when I came at them in the parking lot. Fucked up some of the cars out there.”

“But they didn’t shoot you? You’re okay?”

“Fine,” he assured her. “They missed. I’m more worried about you. Are you hurt?”

But Cait would not be sidetracked. “How did you happen to be right there?”

Mace braced himself for the potential weirdness. “I booked a room at the Mountainview,” he admitted. “With a clear sight-line to your door. It was just a matter of time before Kimball’s goons moved in on you. But they still surprised me, showing up so quick. He must be getting impatient.”

The bag dropped, dangling from her hand. “Kimball?” Her voice was small.

“Yeah, I heard them talking. I should have insisted on taking you home, but it was just too soon to convince you. You would have kicked my ass to hell and gone.”

Cait’s eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s a compliment,” he told her. “I respect tough people. They survive longer.” He paused. “Unless their stubbornness gets them prematurely killed, of course. That’s the dark side to that ass-kicking quality.”

Cait hugged herself, shivering in the cold wind. “I guess you’d know,” she said. “Being a big ass-kicker yourself.”

“Guilty as charged. I have been known to kick some ass in my time. I’ve also been known to get into trouble for it. But I’m still here. And still kicking.”

“So you were spying on me,” she said.

“Guarding you,” he corrected.

“I didn’t ask you to guard me,” she said. “On the contrary.”

“And after what happened, you’re complaining?”

“No,” she said. “Absolutely not complaining. Just trying to understand.”

“You didn’t believe me about the danger. And I really don’t blame you. It sounds batshit crazy. Any rational person would think I was a paranoid lunatic. But I know what I know, so I felt responsible, and this was my imperfect solution. It’s not illegal to rent a hotel room, or to stare out my window across the courtyard at your door all night. It’s creepy as all fuck, sure, but it’s not a crime. And I wasn’t doing it to bother you or perv on you, Cait. I just really, really didn’t want you to die tonight, okay?”

She moved closer to him, examining his face. Reaching up to touch the cuts on his cheek. “What happened to your face?”

“A bullet flipped up some gravel at me,” he said. “No big deal.”

She laughed. “No big deal? You’re nuts, Mace Trask, you know that?”

“Yeah, maybe, but not in a dangerous way. Not for you, at least. But if I ever get my hands on those assholes, I will rip their guts out for hitting you.”

Cait blinked at that. “Oh. Um…thanks, I guess. I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“Whatever. Look, it seems like this kerfuffle hasn’t attracted any attention yet. Which means that we have a few different options. Depending on how you feel.”

“Yeah?” Her chin rose, but she was actually smiling. “Can’t wait to hear them.”

“Staying in this hotel is not one of them,” he told her, and was relieved when she nodded reluctantly. “I’m glad we’re on the same page about that. First option, I take you to the hospital, get you checked out. You got really roughed up.I vote for that option.”

But she was already shaking her head. “No. I’m fine. Just some strained muscles.”

“Didn’t you just get whacked in the head? I saw that guy hit you. And bash you against the wall, when you were on his back.”

“It’s not that bad,” she assured him.

“What about your nose? Your shoulder? Did he dislocate anything when he wrenched your arms back?”

She rolled her shoulders back, wincing. “I’ll be all right.”

“And your face?” He touched her scraped cheekbone with a gentle fingertip. “That bastard slugged you in the nose.”

“It’s not broken,” she assured him. “I’ll have two black eyes, I expect, but they’ll heal. I really don’t want to go to the hospital.”

“Okay. Option two is the cops. We should file a report.”

Cait looked around, back at the squalling cars. “Do I have to do it right now?” she asked. “They’re gone. No one can chase them. Did you see the license plate?”

“Covered it with mud. Late model black Mercedes SUV. That’s all I know.”

“Let’s deal with the police report tomorrow,” she said. “It’ll take forever, and I’m exhausted. If we had one of those guys to lock up, it would be different. But as it is…”

“Yeah, I know. Big shame, about that. Option three is, we collect your stuff, and I take you to my place.”

Her gorgeous hazel eyes looked startled. “Your place?”

“It’s the safest option,” he assured her. “I’ll give you the bed. There’s a couch I can use. It’s not luxurious, but it is absolutely safe.”

She hesitated for a moment. “But…doesn’t Kimball know where you live?”

“Of course he knows, but we’ve created a fortress there,” he told her. “We wanted to be able to actually sleep from time to time, so we’ve worked out a system, between the four of us. My two brothers, and my buddy Nate. We have a block of three row houses. My brothers bought up the one on either side of Demi’s house, and we’ve secured the living shit out of them, with lots of hardware and a big crew of highly-trained personnel. We’ve got four professionals, two on each ground-floor apartment, guarding us at all times.”

Cait looked cautiously impressed. “They bought two whole houses?”

“Pocket change for those guys,” he said. “I told you, Eric owns Erebus, Inc., and Anton has his Hellbound nightclub chain. I could’ve contributed, I guess, but they beat me to it, and they’re both totally loaded, so what the hell. Anton and Fi took the top two floors on one house, and Nate Murphy and his girlfriend Elisa have the second-floor apartment of the other. Which left the attic apartment for me.” He paused. “And you. If you want to come. I urge you, strongly, to come there, and be safe with us. Please, Cait.”

Her gaze slid away. She looked lost and nervous.

“I hate to push,” he added. “But I don’t like being out here in the dark, with no backup and no gun. Those are your options. If you don’t want my bed, you get the hospital. Or the cops.”

Cait let out a snort of laughter.

“What?” he demanded.

“Hard talk,” she said. “Listen to yourself, tough guy.”

He replayed his own words in his head, and had to laugh at himself. “Sounded pretty bad, I guess. But I just want you safe. No one will touch you there. You know that.”

But Cait couldn’t seem to stop laughing. He was about to tell her impatiently to pull it together when he realized, with alarm, she wasn’t laughing. She was crying.

Fucking fuck. This was way outside his sphere of competence. He gaped at her helplessly, feeling like a stick-stiff asshole. The classic move was to offer comfort, of course. Something at which he personally sucked, having never gotten much of it himself.

Also, touching that woman did something dangerous to his body.

Too fucking bad. Suck it up. Won’t kill you. Don’t be a wuss.

Mace advanced cautiously, and pulled Cait into a very gentle, very careful hug.

Thump.The backpack thudded onto his feet, and her arms came up and wrapped around his waist. She shook with silent sobs, her hands trying to dig into his coat.

It hit him, all at once, like a torch bursting into flame. He was hyper conscious of every detail of her body. Her soft tits, squashed against his chest. His skin ablaze with hunger to feel all the soft, delicate details. Her back, smooth and lithe. No bra, as he stroked from collarbone to waist. Her tight nipples prodding her fleece shirt.

Stop.The woman had just been attacked, savaged, almost abducted. He had no business prodding her with a huge erection, but there was no reasoning with his dick.

The hug was charged with energy. A shimmer of intense awareness. Their bodies were so close, there was no way she couldn’t feel his hard-on.

The second she shifted, he forced himself to let go.

She looked up at him, eyes wet, sniffing. “I think I got blood on your sweatshirt.”

“It’s okay,” he’s assured her. “Totally fine. My car is across the street. Shall we?”

She looked down. “I’m still barefoot. And in my sleep clothes.”

“So we run up to your room and grab your stuff. The sooner you’re home with me in my fortress, the happier I’ll be.”

“You make it sound really good.” She wobbled as she picked her way across the ground on her bare feet, so he swept her up into his arms, and loped toward the stairs.

“Hey!” she said, alarmed. “Dude! You’ll throw your back out!”

“My back’s fine. We’re in a hurry. You don’t want those guys to gather reinforcements, do you?”

She gave him a stern look. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Try to terrify me into behaving. I’m convinced now, okay? I promise.”

Mace set her down outside her open hotel room door. Good thing the place was deserted. Spring was a low season for Shaw’s Crossing. The ski slopes were deserted, and summer activities hadn’t wound up yet. He’d awakened the desk clerk from a sound sleep to rent the room. And from what he’d seen through the window as he ran by, the guy was still asleep even now. Neither gunshots nor car alarms disturbed that guy.

Lucky him. Mace’s own sleep was very light. A shitty, violent childhood, a military career spent in dangerous hot zones. Add in a homicidal maniac trying to wipe out his entire gene pool, and there you had it; a recipe for a big-ass sleep disturbance.

“Don’t bother to get dressed,” he said. “Grab your stuff. Let’s blast out of here.”

“You don’t have to tell me. I’m on board.”

Cait emerged from the bathroom after moments, tossing her toiletries case into her bag. She gathered up the muddy clothes she’d worn today, and shoved them into the outside pocket of her trolley, letting Mace zip it closed while she shoved her feet into her hiking boots. She tossed on the lavender jacket.

“That’s it,” she said. “I’ll follow you in my car.”

“Never mind the car. I want you with me. I’ll come back and pick your car up for you tomorrow. Please. I just can’t hold my breath any longer. I’m going to pass out.”

“Okay, okay, tomorrow for the car,” she conceded.

He got her into the passenger side of his Wrangler, and tossed the suitcase in the back. At long last, they sped away from that deathtrap of a hotel.

The drive from downtown to the townhouses on Lakeshore Drive was just a few minutes, more than enough time for the tension to build again. There was an awkward silence when he pulled up in front of the house and killed the engine.

He cleared his throat. “Well. Here we are. Welcome. Mi casa es su casa.”

She gave him that sexy, mysterious smile. Oh God, those lips.

“Thank you,” she said softly. “You’re very sweet.”

He coughed. “Hardly. Come on up.”

She followed him in, and up three long flights. The row houses were old, with high ceilings. Clint was manning the cameras on this side tonight, but to Mace’s relief, he refrained from coming out to give him shit about rolling in at three AM, a woman in tow.

He was in no mood for that right now.

He unlocked the locks, deactivated the alarms, and opened the door, snapping on the lowest setting of the one floor lamp that the room had. A mercifully dim view of his extremely minimalist living space.

Cait looked around the big, empty apartment. “I see you keep things simple.”

True enough. Just the essentials. A couch, a TV, electronics. “It’s clean,” he assured her. “So are the sheets. I changed them before I went up to the Bluff.”

“Yeah. It’s so clean, I don’t want to track my muddy boots into it.”

“Leave them on that little rug by the door. That’s what I do. I’ll throw in a load of laundry tomorrow morning, if you want to wash your hiking stuff.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”

“No trouble. The machine does it. I need to wash my clothes anyway. Awesome invention, washing machines. We didn’t have them at GodsAcre when I was a kid.”

“Good God,” she murmured. “How did you do your laundry?”

“By hand. My foster father, Jeremiah Paley, thought that modern appliances made people soft, physically, mentally and morally. So it was washboards in the stream, once a week. Very old-school.”

“Bronze Age is more like it,” she murmured.

“Hell, yeah. Believe me, I’m in favor of household appliances,” he assured her.

“That’s fortunate,” she murmured, her lips twitching. She wandered around his apartment, peeking into the kitchen. “From the way you described it, I was expecting a bunker. But this just seems like a perfectly normal, attractive apartment. One that nobody has quite gotten around to furnishing yet.”

“I not much into nesting,” he admitted. “I’ve been in the military my entire adult life. Always on the move. And before the GodsAcre fire, I actually did live in a bunker. I wouldn’t ever go back to that vibe. You know, lots of concrete, big steel-reinforced doors, constant fear. Not my scene. My brothers, Eric and Anton, have made a whole science out of making maximum-security housing feel less oppressive.”

“I imagine you need a lot of money to make that work,” she said.

“You nailed it. Money is the secret sauce. But then, it always is.”

“True thing.” She gazed out the big bay window at Shaw Lake. “Nice view.”

“Yeah, it is nice,” he said. “Hey, Cait? Believe me. You really are safe here.”

She gave him a luminous smile that made his heart thud. “I believe you, Mace.”

He backed away, his face hot. “Would you excuse me? I need a shower. Ten days camping, doing all my bathing in the Kettle River—I could use a scrub.”

“Of course. Feel free.”

Mace retreated in confusion, and barricaded himself in the bathroom, stuffing his filthy clothes into the hamper. Tomorrow he would deal with laundry, or arrange for somebody else to do it. Anton and Eric, in the course of their super-wealthy professional lives, had gotten accustomed to hiring people to take care of things they didn’t feel like doing. Even Nate was getting comfortable with it. Mace never had. Maybe because he spent all that time out in the field, getting shit done whenever it needed doing. He ate what he could and smelled how he smelled, until the job was handled.

Now Eric had a foodie chef for a wife. Eric and Anton both had expensive designer wardrobes that required professional cleaning. Of all of the Trask brothers, he himself had tended the closest to the original vibe of their austere, hard-core survivalist upbringing.

Knowing himself, he would never have predicted that.

But for a woman like Cait, he would scrub off the grit. Even splash on some cologne. Damn, just the thought of her, and the beast reared up, hungry to be fed.

He took care of it with his own right hand, but he was keenly aware that jerking off was a fleeting, temporary solution.

If Cait LaMott was nearby, the flag would be flying high and proud all night long.