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“What?” He took his eyes off the road for a moment and watched in horror as she unbuckled her belt and lowered the back of her seat so she could twist around fully.

“I want to see if I can get a picture.” She sounded like nothing was wrong at all. “This phone has an excellent camera and it’s got a flash. It’s dark enough out here that the light might surprise the bugger. Get ready. He’s closing in again.”

JT braced as the truck was bumped again. “You need to be in your damn seatbelt.”

If he lost control, she could get thrown out the front windshield, and at these speeds she wouldn’t survive it. His heart threatened to pound out of his chest at the thought of what could happen to her.

“Just a sec.” She cursed under her breath as she was jostled again. Her shoulder hit him hard. “Sorry.”

He managed to stay in his lane. “I think you need to get back in your seat.”

She was still moving, her back now somehow to him. “How far did you say we are from the highway? I bet he’ll break off there. He won’t want to get caught on traffic cameras.”

“Two miles.” The way he was going it wouldn’t take more than a minute or two to get there. “This road flows into that one. It’s a yield. No hard stop.”

“Excellent. Just keep her on the road for me. I don’t know how he’s going to react to this.”

There was a flash of light and then he heard brakes squealing.

“Got him.” Nina was smiling as she popped back into her seat and brought it to its original position.

“Put the belt on,” he managed to bite out.

She did as he asked. “Fine, but I think we’re all right now. Even if he only stops for a moment, we’ll lose him from here. Now we see if I got a face. Or a plate.”

In his rearview, he saw red lights come on and then race away. “He made a U-turn. He’s driving away.”

“Excellent,” she said, looking down at her phone. “Tech might be able to get something off this.”

“That was dangerous as hell,” he said, starting to breathe again.

“It was fine,” she replied, not looking up from her phone. She’d started typing. “I’m in my belt now and the bad guy’s going the other way. You did a great job. You kept us on the road, and I might be able to figure out who that was.”

“We nearly died.”

“But we didn’t and now everything’s fine.” She finally looked up. “Ian’s still awake. He’s going to meet us at the hotel and hopefully he’ll have some news for us.”

Excellent. His night was far from over.

CHAPTER 8

“The truck is stolen,but then we really should have expected that especially if we’re dealing with a pro.” Ian Taggart paced the big suite, still dressed in the button-down and slacks he’d worn to the party. “According to the police report, it went missing earlier this evening. I had Derek contact the local police. They believe it was someone who stole it and was driving drunk. It’ll get buried really fast. You two did a good job talking to them. I don’t think they’ll follow up.”

“Adam will see if he can do anything with facial recognition.” Alex had been waiting with Ian when JT had handed off his truck to the valet downstairs, who hadn’t said a thing about the dents and deep gouges to the back. “The police out in Parker County have already found the vehicle. We’ll let you know if they find any prints, but I suspect they won’t.”

Nina had been relieved to have a distraction since the hour-long drive to Dallas had been almost completely silent.

Silent, and not comfortable. She could practically hear the wheels in JT’s head grinding, and they weren’t coming up with anything Nina thought they should. She was afraid she was about to be introduced to the JT who’d lost his closest femalefriend. She understood, but she couldn’t allow it to derail the mission, and she worried that’s exactly what JT would try to do.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t get a better shot of him. My impression from the brief glimpse I got was of a male. Not that it tells us anything. I would assume this person was hired.” She stood by the window where only days ago she’d been with JT, letting the night cradle them, pretending nothing in the world could get to them.

She’d known it was a pretty lie even before she’d realized who her new lover was. She’d known her time with him was probably short.

They’d stolen a few days, but now she wondered if it was coming to an abrupt end. She was surprised at how far she might be willing to go to not allow that to happen.

JT stood across the room from her, still quiet, but she could sense the boiling emotions threatening to bubble over. His tension was etched in the hard line of his expression. He might have faced down pirates before and lots of scary situations, but she doubted he’d done it when he was with someone he deeply cared about. It was a different kind of anxiety, and she didn’t think he was handling it well.

“I’m happy you thought to try to get us a picture of the asshole at all. That was quick thinking,” Tag said. “Also it gave me and Alex the rest of the night off. We were pulling into Alex’s driveway to drop them off when we got the call.”