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16

County Road 628, Traverse City

You’re a damned idiot, Jules.

The refrain had circled in Julia’s mind for the last hour. As the minutes stretched on, and as they’d taken so many turns down backwoods roads that she was completely turned around, it’d dawned on her that she was, in effect, putting her faith in a complete stranger.

Yes, she’d read Britt’s file—what little of it was left. Yes, she’d spent months fantasizing about jumping on him like a bouncy house. Yes, she’d spoken to him several times, had flirted with him on half a dozen occasions, and had kissed him once. But what did she really know about him?

Jack shit, that’s what.

Now here she was, driving through the middle of nowhere without any way to call for backup all because…what? Because he’d asked her to? Because he’d appealed to her natural nosiness? Because he was a baddie with a body?

You’re a damned idiot, Jules.

If she’d been an actress in a movie, and had she also been in the audience watching that movie, she’d have thrown popcorn at the onscreen actress version of herself because who goes with a perfect stranger into the middle of the freakin’ Michigan wilderness with no way to get help ?

Casually, she slipped her hands into her jacket pockets. The fingers of her left hand curled around his multitool, and the fingers of her right hand curved around the butt of his Berretta.

When she chanced a glance over at him, she wasn’t surprised to find his expression as alert and as focused as a hawk. Despite the casually expert way he guided the old farm truck along the rutted roads, he had a way of sitting perfectly still that was unnerving.

Special forces? Spies? Mercenaries? Those jobs attracted a certain kind of man. The duplicitous kind. The devilish kind. The dangerous kind. And just because he was currently being paid to turn a wrench, that didn’t mean he’d forgotten all the diabolical things he’d been taught while being paid to play the heavy for Uncle Sam.

Fear fisted around her stomach as doubt continued to squeeze her heart.

“H-how much farther?” she asked, not caring for the hitch in her words.

“Not much.” His deep voice filled the cab’s interior. And when his icy-blue eyes cut toward her, a shudder of awareness tripped down her spine.

But was that awareness a result of the danger he posed? Or was it because he was so manfully enticing that, back when he was wearing the Army’s uniform, he probably just melted his enemies’ bullets before they could hit him?

“What’s up?” He frowned, making the jagged scar across his temple pucker. “The look on your face says you think I’m taking you out into the woods to eat you whole.”

She shuddered slightly, her finger curling around the trigger of his gun. “Are you?”

Talk about silence. That’s what met her question. But it wasn’t just silence. It was bigger than silence. It was like a yawning black hole of complete conversational void.

She instinctively thumbed off the safety on his Berretta.

Then he flashed her a grin. But not just any grin. It was the kind of grin that said he’d left behind a trail of vanquished foes and satisfied women. The kind of grin that romance novelists wrote about in steamy sex scenes. The kind of grin that had her nipples instantly tightening and her stomach feeling like it did that time they took a family vacation to Six Flags Great America and she rode the American Eagle roller coaster.

“Would you like me to eat you whole?” His voice had gone soft and low, and she would swear something inside her was pulling her toward him, tugging her in his direction.

He was right. Their connection wasn’t a lie. It was real, tangible. But she refused to give into it, to let it muddle her mind. She needed all her wits about her.

Thumbing the safety back on his weapon, she pulled her hands from her pockets and crossed her arms. “I feel like we discussed this just this morning.” She adopted a prim tone. “Did we or did we not decide there’s no use in exploring this”—she made a gesture between them—“because I am on the hunt for a Mr. Right, and you are on the hunt for a Mrs. Right Now?”

“I’m not sure we put it in those specific terms. But, yeah. That was the gist of it.”

“Good.” She nodded. “Great. Glad we came away from that lovely little conversation with the same interpretation.”

He said nothing to that. However, the glow of the dashboard lights showed a muscle ticking in his jaw.

For long minutes, they drove in silence. Then he turned off the narrow country road onto an even narrower country lane, and she sat up straighter as limbs from the trees on either side of the track scraped against the windows.

Her disquiet was back. Searching for something to say, some distraction , she blurted, “So what’s the deal with Black Knights Inc.?”

The look he shot her was sharp but shuttered. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, it’s owned by a former Navy SEAL and staffed by men who worked in every special operations outfit this country has ever put together. All your records are redacted out the wazoo. Most of you walk around armed to the teeth. And your computer setup on the second floor would give NORAD a run for their money.”

“Boss is a big believer in giving former fighting men a chance to reintegrate into civilian life by offering them a place to work amongst like-minded folks, guys who’ve seen the worst that humanity has to offer and get it .” He paused in consideration. “It’s a strange thing to be dodging bullets one day and then be dropped back home and expected to pay rent the next.”

She listened for lies and detected none. “And what about that computer setup?”

He slid her a considering look. “Becky and Ozzie are our top designers. They use all sorts of specialized software to draw models for the bikes long before we ever turn a wrench or fire up a blow torch.”

She opened her mouth to press him further because she knew there was more. But he beat her to the punch.

“Plus, Ozzie is a white hat hacker,” he confessed with a chagrined twist of his lips. “The best I’ve ever seen. He can break into any system and blow past any firewall.”

She blinked her surprise. “You realize you just confessed a federal crime to a federal agent.”

“Told you I’d never lie to you,” he countered, and the tension that had momentarily tightened her shoulders drained away.

She might be the world’s biggest fool—when it came to Sergeant Rollins, she probably was—but she believed him.

“You said he’s a white hat hacker.” She squinted at what appeared to be a break in the trees ahead. “Which means he only hacks to hurt the bad guys. Is this a job for him or simply a hobby?”

Britt huffed a laugh. “With Ozzie, the line is pretty blurred.”

She opened her mouth to question him further but snapped it closed when the trees parted and the truck’s headlights shone across the front face of a cozy cottage—red door, festive window boxes, climbing ivy that was turning colors for the seasons. Golden light glimmered through the front windows. A curl of smoke drifted from the stone chimney. And rain barrels sat at the corners, ostensibly to catch the runoff from the moss-covered roof.

It looked like one of those destination Airbnbs. The kind of place that appealed to couples who wanted the seclusion and the ambiance of the deep woods without having to pitch a tent.

“We’re here,” he announced, doing something under the steering column that had the old farm truck’s engine cutting off. “And none too soon. We were down to an eighth of a tank.”

She didn’t bother answering. She was too busy gaping out the windscreen and trying to come to terms with the quaint little setting.

She wasn’t sure what she expected when Britt offered to take her to meet his brother. Maybe something along the lines of a dilapidated warehouse on the waterfront or some smoky room in the back of an illegal gambling hall. But this was…charming. Cozy even. Definitely not what she’d call a clandestine destination for a federal fugitive and accused murderer.

Her hands automatically returned to the weapons in her pockets when the front door swung wide. But it was only Hewitt Birch who stood in the bright glow of the headlights.

“It’s me,” Britt called after he opened the driver’s side door. The hinges made an unholy complaint at the movement. “And I brought company.”

She figured that was her signal to exit the vehicle.

She pushed out of the truck just as the timer on the headlights shut off. Now, the little cottage was lit only from within. She tensed when Knox Rollins took up a position next to Hew. Of course, tension was replaced by a sharp sense of interest when the mystery woman she’d seen on the CCTV footage joined the duo on the little porch.

“Agent O’Toole,” Britt said as he gestured to her and then toward the gathered group. “You know Hew. But let me introduce you to my brother, Knox, and his lovely traveling companion, Sabrina Greenlee.”

Recognition sparked at the name. “Greenlee?” She arched a brow at Britt.

“As in Cooper Greenlee’s sister,” he confirmed her suspicion.

“Okay.” She dragged in a deep breath. “You have my attention, Sergeant Rollins.”