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“Yes! I’m here!” She tore back the tarp and reeled back at the sight of fat rubber bulge right in her face, the leading edge of some kind of boat. And it was significantly larger than her tiny dinghy.

A man peered down at her over the edge of his boat.

“Who are you?” she asked cautiously.

“The United States Navy at your service, ma’am.”

“Ohmigod, am I glad to see you.”

“Folks usually are, ma’am. If you’d give me your hand, I’ll help you into our vessel.”

She clambered over the edge of the bigger inflatable boat and envied the guy his wetsuit. A second man was seated in the back of the craft at the controls of an outboard motor. This fellow tossed her a wool blanket which she eagerly wrapped around herself.

“You wanna save your dinghy?” the first guy asked.

“Not particularly.” She flinched at the speed with which he whipped out a huge knife and slashed her little lifeboat to ribbons. God. Had her life depended on something so fragile? After-the-fact terror rattled through her.

As her raft, now a floating pile of rubber debris, disappeared into the murky darkness, the rescue craft made a sharp turn and accelerated toward another vessel. A honking huge gray ship. She recognized the lines of a destroyer. Wow. André had sent the no kidding U.S. Navy after her, huh? Cool.

Not surprisingly, the crew aboard the destroyer gave her plenty of curious looks as they opened a water-line hatch and helped her aboard. She was hustled up to an infirmary not unlike the one on the Caelum, but much larger.

The corpsman who examined her declared her unharmed by her adventure. She was given a dark blue hoodie sweatshirt and matching sweatpants and led to a small cabin somewhere in the belly of the ship.

The sailor who led her to her room informed her that a helicopter would airlift her to Miami in the morning. Thank God. She was ready to be done with boats and water for a good long time. A sailor she wasnot.

Alex gave a mental sigh of relief as the Customs agent handed his passport and visa back to him. Normally, he would never travel on such hasty documents, but he was in a hurry to eliminate the last obstacles to a clean break with his past life.

He’d lost two days to travel: one to waiting for the passport to be made, and then another one flying south to Caracas. There were no direct flights between Cuba and the United States, which had necessitated the intermediate stop. He’d had to spend the night in Venezuela before he caught a morning flight to Miami. He would go on to Washington in a few hours.

The sharp knives of his paranoia were dulling slightly, but certainty that he was being watched—and that his watchers meant him harm—remained.

Soon.

Soon all the loose ends would be tied up, and Alex Peters would be no more.

He supposed it was a little extreme, but what other choice did he have? Until everyone stopped chasing him, he would never be safe. And until he was safe, he couldn’t reach out to Dawn. He was going to miss her something fierce. Thankfully, she was very young and wouldn’t miss him?—

He swore into his bourbon. Was that what his mother had thought when she’d abandoned him and his brothers? He knewall too well that the wounds caused by her departure cut deep and had never really healed, regardless of how young he’d been at the time. Losing a parent sucked no matter what age a person was.

He dawdled in a bar, considering clandestine ways to bring Dawn to him wherever he ended up settling down, until his flight was ready to board.

He slid into his window seat, buckled in, and closed his eyes.

Katie. How was he going to deal with Katie? His initial plan had been to kill her. But now he wasn’t so sure about that. It would draw a lot of attention to him. And her brothers could be a problem if they decided to come after him. There were a lot of McCloud boys, and they were a dangerous bunch. He would hate to have to kill them all.

And what about Dawn? He could take her with him, now, but establishing a cover would be exponentially harder with a toddler in tow. His father had often said that the three boys had provided the perfect cover for him, but Alex disagreed with his old man. Besides, he and his brothers had been older than Dawn and extremely independent for their ages.

No, it was better for him to run alone, set up a new life, and retrieve her later.

But that left the question of Katie still looming. To kill her or not to kill her?

14

Katie cautiously let herself into Alex’s penthouse apartment, where she and Dawn had lived for the past year. The interior was dark and cool. Silent.

He’s not here.

Not only could she tell by the deep stillness, but she felt his absence in her bones. She let out the breath she’d been holding.