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He ran his hand over his hair and let loose a breath. “Then let me crash on your couch.”

The ice melted from her eyes and the lines of her face softened. “I appreciate the offer. But I’ll be all right.”

Joe and Officer Jacobs exited her house and came across the lawn, they slipped their weapons into their holsters and stopped short of Riley. “All clear. I don’t see any sign of forced entry or anything suspicious. We’ll have a couple cars circling the neighborhood all night, so sleep easy.”

Riley smiled, but the corners of her mouth faltered. Ethan’s blood bubbled to a low simmer. Goddammit, she was being hardheaded. He wasn’t surprised she hadn’t taken him up on his offer, but how the hell was he supposed to sleep knowing someone was trying to hurt her?

Riley thanked Joe and the officers said good night and headed to their cruisers. She turned to him, dark circles lined beneath her lower lids and red streaks cracked the usually bright whites of her eyes.

“I’m going to bed now.” Her gaze flitted down his body to his slack hands at his sides and slowly came back up. “Thanks for…everything, Ethan.” Her tone was soft, almost regretful.

He stretched his hand out and caught her elbow.

“I’ll have my windows open all night.” He reached into his back pocket and fished a loose card from it.

“If you change your mind about me crashing there, I can be over in a second. If you hear anything strange or just want me to have a look around, call me.”

Her fingers closed around the white cardstock paper and her shoulders relaxed.

“Thanks. I’ll sleep easier just having you next door. G’night.”

And just like that, her armor had cracked. Not enough to let him in, but enough to make a spark of hope spread through him.

“Good night,” he said. He watched her turn away and enter the house. One of the lights flicked on inside and he climbed the stairs of his porch. Inside, he opened all the windows and took up camp on his couch where he’d be at closer proximity to the windows that faced her property.

A break-in last week, a note on her windshield yesterday and an attack today…

something was going on. There was no way in hell the incidents weren’t connected.

He just hoped to hell Joe was doing his due diligence.

Riley had been a closed book since he’d moved in and he couldn’t help but wonder what the cause of her impenetrable armor was.

Did she have a stalker? A deranged ex-boyfriend maybe?

He needed answers and he was determined to get them.

***

“Where the hell are you at now, bro?” Cal’s voice boomed in his ear. Ethan groaned and threw back the covers and glanced at the clock. It was eight a.m. Seattle was three hours behind him.

“Don’t you have anything better to do than call me at five in the morning?” Ethan snapped.

“You were sleeping? But you’re three hours ahead. Are you sick or something?”

Cal had been one of his best friends since their military days. Before meeting Lana, Cal had been a Freelance Security Contractor—a life with no boundaries or red tape. He’d changed his entire career since his last job had been to kill Lana, and instead, he’d saved her.

Ethan yanked on a pair of jogging pants that he’d discarded on the floor last night and shuffled to the kitchen.

The muscles in his back ached from sleeping on the too-soft couch cushions two nights in a row.

He hadn’t talked to Riley yesterday, but when he’d come home from the gym there had been a security system company van in her driveway.

He flicked on the coffee maker and scratched his beard. The breeze that blew in through the open windows was already warm, warning him it was going to be another scorcher today. He moved the curtain and scanned Riley’s house, her car gone from the driveway.

“No, I’m not sick. But I was up late last night.

” Checking out the window at every slight noise.

Aside from that, he couldn’t get Riley’s drunken act at the bar last week out of his head.

With the recent threats being made on her, that strange behavior kept spinning in his mind, raging at him that it was the answer to the missing link.

“Hi Ethan,” Lana’s cheery voice sounded next to the phone.

Ethan grinned. “Say hi to your beautiful wife-to-be. Tell her I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” Cal’s voice was playful, undoubtedly because Lana was distracting him.

“I’m sorry if her kid comes out looking like you.”

“Ha, ha. You’re so funny.”

“I mean it. You’d better pray that little baby takes after his or her mother. How is she feeling?”

“She’s great. Just got done doing yoga and is dragging me out of bed to finish decorating the nursery.”

“I can’t believe you guys aren’t going to find out the gender. The suspense would kill me.”

“Hell, I want to know. But Lana refuses. A little more than three months until the due date, I hope you’re home in time to meet baby Hart.”

“He’d better be,” Lana growled in the background.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world, and I sure as hell don’t want to piss Lana off.”

“You and me both, dude.” Cal said something to Lana, and then came back on the phone. “Where are you now?”

“Beaufort, North Carolina. When are you going to stop checking up on me like you’re my damn mother?

” Cal had been worse than his mother, or his sisters for that matter.

If Cal was this watchful of a friend, Ethan felt damn sorry for his kid on the way.

The coffee maker beeped, appeasing his caffeine withdrawals.

He took a mug from the cupboard and filled it.

They finished chatting, and Cal finally let him go with a loud grumble about painting the nursery.

Ethan wasn’t fooled. Since Cal and Lana had announced their engagement and pregnancy, Cal had changed.

Well, he’d changed the moment he’d met Lana, but this was more substantial.

He was happy and at ease, and Ethan was really jealous of that.

Happy for them—but really jealous.

He shook all thoughts of marriage and kids from his mind, downed the rest of the coffee, and got in the shower. It was Saturday, and Riley would be working. He was going to get some answers.

The second he walked into the diner, disappointment sank through him.

She wasn’t here. His body sensed her absence without a doubt.

“Morning, Ethan.” Jenny’s warm welcoming smile lit her crisp blue eyes.

“I have fresh coffee on for you; have a seat and I’ll be there in a minute.”

“Thanks, Jen.”

Where the hell was she? Her car was gone and she was scheduled to work.

Distaste settled in the pit of his stomach.

The closer he got to Riley, the more his suspicion grew.

She was as complex as a riddle and, unfortunately for her, he had the time and stamina to figure her out.

He couldn’t get past the events surrounding her.

None of it made sense, and he hadn’t forgotten her bizarre behavior at the bar last week.

He was going out of his mind with questions.

Jenny slid a steaming mug under his nose and set out a fresh creamer and sugar. She poised her pen to the pad in her hand. “What can I get you this morning?”

He scanned around the restaurant. It was still early, not even nine a.m. Only a few elderly people filled a couple of tables. “Can you sit for a minute? I’d like to talk to you about something.”

She glanced around the restaurant, then lowered the pad and slid into the booth. “I don’t want to get involved.”

His brow furrowed. “With what?”

“You and Riley.”

He took a deep swig of his coffee before zeroing in on her. “What makes you think there’s anything to get involved in?”

“You two are like oil and a match, waiting to combust. And I don’t want to be anywhere near when it happens.” She folded her arms across her chest. She was slight, but several inches taller than Riley.

His fingers toyed with the paper napkin. “I can assure you any combusting won’t happen in a public place.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “What’s your interest in her?”

He snorted. Where should he start? “You can stop looking at me like I have any ulterior motives. Nothing is going on, but I need to ask you something.”

She sighed. “Can you hurry please? I have things to do before the breakfast rush comes in.”

He nodded. “First of all, I saw her at a bar last week, with some random dude. He was feeding her shots and she was downing them. Something didn’t feel right.” Jenny leaned forward, her eyes wide and riveted to his.

He took a breath and continued. “I followed them outside, with the intent to intervene if I needed to. She fell in the parking lot, which alerted me to how intoxicated she was. I approached them and she got really pissed. She accused me of…er…interfering with her”—he cleared his throat—“sex life. Our argument got pretty heated. My biggest concern is that she seemed completely unconcerned about what was on the douchebag’s agenda.

Obviously I don’t know her well, but from what I do know, this kind of behavior seems out of character. ”

Jenny’s creased brow deepened. She flattened her palms on the table. “I can’t say I’m surprised by all this. You’re right, it is out of character for her, but there’s a lot more to it than that.” She straightened in her seat, her eyes bore into his.

“You’re a nice guy, but take my advice: forget about Riley Reynolds. She’s…troubled. It’s in your best interest to enjoy what time you have left here, and go home.” She stood up.

Ethan caught her wrist. “What do you mean she’s troubled?”

“I can’t talk about it. Especially here.” She brought her pen to the pad of paper and scribbled something. She tore it off and pressed it face down on the table. “I’ll be back to take your order.”

His hand inched over the piece of paper. “Sure, thanks.”

The door opened and people milled in. He slid the paper closer to him and tapped his fingers against it.

Whatever was on the other side of the paper would change the rest of his days here—that he knew for certain. It’d only further drive him deep into the rabbit hole that was Riley.

His senses prickled. He’d come here to soul-search, to escape the constant cycle of jobs he’d chosen for himself that didn’t fit.

He’d left the FBI because he couldn’t handle the cases.

If he was going to be completely honest with himself, it was why he’d left the military and recon too.

Watching people die, having a hand in human suffering…

he couldn’t do it anymore. He’d thought the FBI would give him more control, that he’d somehow be able to save people.

That hadn’t happened. Instead, he’d been bound by red tape and legalities.

He exhaled through his nose. He wouldn’t be able to walk away from the slip of paper if his life depended on it. Not when it held a clue to Riley and the jumble of puzzles that surrounded her. He flipped it over and read the blue ink scrawl.

Hanna Wilson.

Hanna Wilson… A bell sounded in his head.

He’d seen that name before. But where? He pulled his phone from his pocket and typed the name in the search engine.

His eyes scanned the screen as he scrolled from headline to headline.

His mind worked in circles, molding together a piece of the puzzle… the puzzle that made Riley tick.

Goddammit.

Christ, he hadn’t come here for this shit. Exactly the opposite. But he couldn’t look away. Who was Hanna to Riley? And how the hell did her self-destructive behavior tie in to the missing woman?

When Jenny brought his food out he met her gaze. One eye narrowed at him and her eyebrows bobbed.

“What now?”

“Isn’t Riley working today?”

“No, she took the weekend off.” Her eyes flitted to the ground, avoiding his eye contact. She gave him a tight smile and turned away, he touched her arm.

“Her car was gone early this morning.”

She took a deep breath. “Yeah, she said something yesterday about having a flat and needing to get a new tire.”

So she was sitting at home with no car? That made no sense. “Why did she take the weekend off?”

Jenny’s shoulders drooped. “She’s going to the Beach Bash. Didn’t you hear about it?”

He leaned forward, his elbows on the table, and the coffee untouched. He’d seen signs for the event around town, but it hadn’t crossed his mind once that Riley would go.

“Yeah, I heard about it. But why is she going?”

“Did you look into that name I gave you?” Her voice lowered, her eyes scanned over his shoulders as if she feared someone would overhear.

“Yes, but what does she have to do with Riley and the beach party?”

Jenny toyed with the notepad in her hands. “She would kill me if she knew I was talking to you about this.”

His heart stalled. He clamped his teeth together, forcing himself not to respond. He had to know.

She took a deep, shaky breath. “Hanna is Riley’s best friend from childhood. When she went missing, Riley moved back here from Boston.” She shrugged. “She’s determined to find her.”

Ethan’s senses prickled to life. “How the hell is she planning to do that?”

Jenny smirked. “You’ll need to ask Riley that. Look, I have to get back to work. Let me know if you need anything.”

His fist clenched so tight his knuckles ached. He’d talked to Jenny hoping to find answers, and all he’d succeeded in doing was getting a shitload more questions.

One thing was for sure, he couldn’t let her go to the Beach Bash alone.