Page 4 of When He Fights (Protector & Defender #3)

Chapter One

Prison escape.

Ana’s heart slammed into her ribs as her gaze got trapped by the TV screen. Or, by the reporter’s words as the perky blonde stood in front of the penitentiary and looked intently, soulfully, into the camera.

“Five days ago, convicted killer Logan Catalano escaped custody during a psych transport. Authorities are still searching for the murderer, a man with long ties to the mob and believed to have been linked to as many as fifteen mob hits over the ? —”

The chocolate milkshake fell from Ana’s fingers and hit the floor, sending the once delicious shake pouring across the tile.

“ Authorities consider Catalano to be armed and dangerous. If you have any information on his whereabouts ? —”

“Butterfingers!” A child’s excited voice.

Ana blinked. She looked down at the mess around her feet, then over at the grinning redhead with freckles on her face and an adorable gap where her front teeth had previously been.

“You have butterfingers!” the girl exclaimed again. The tiniest hint of a lisp tagged on her words as she pointed at Ana. And the milkshake. The grin faded from the girl’s features. “So sorry.” A long sigh. “That is a waste of ice cream. Are you sad now?”

Ana’s heart shoved hard into her chest. The pounding felt like a jackhammer as she grabbed for napkins and began to clean up the sopping mess.

It was a hellishly hot summer day in Gulfport, Mississippi.

She’d stopped by the ice cream shop for a sweet treat and, instead of enjoying her favorite shake, she’d just gotten terror shoved down her throat.

Logan is out. The authorities don’t know where he is. I am going to lose my mind.

By the time Ana tossed away the dripping napkins and the remains of her shake, the teen behind the ice cream counter had already changed the TV channel.

A big, flat-screen TV filled the wall to the right.

The shows typically kept customers entertained—or just distracted—while their milkshakes were being prepared.

The shakes could be truly colossal affairs, with candy bars and even full cupcakes stacked on top of them.

It took a while to make such cool perfection, and the little kid with the missing front teeth was correct. A total waste of ice cream.

Normally, Ana would be severely mourning that ice cream loss, but, at the moment, she was too utterly terrified to mourn. “I’m incredibly sad.” A response to the girl who stared at her with unblinking eyes. Sad, terrified, about to lose my mind. All of the above.

The kid went back to licking her triple-scoop ice cream cone while Ana beelined it for the door.

The bell over the door jingled happily as she rushed outside.

The killer sun momentarily blinded her even as the humidity hit her like a punch to the gut.

With her breath choking in and out, Ana yanked her phone from her bag and made her way down the sidewalk at double-time speed.

She dialed a number that she was only supposed to call in emergencies.

A number she’d memorized long ago.

This is totally an emergency.

The line rang once. Twice.

She paused at the edge of the sidewalk. Checked the road. Bounded into the crosswalk when she didn’t see any oncoming cars.

“Hello?” His crisp, cool voice. No identification, but then, he didn’t need to identify himself. She recognized FBI Special Agent Grayson Stone’s voice.

Since he hadn’t bothered to identify himself, she didn’t bother to identify herself, either. “He escaped?” Ana cried out. “He escaped and you didn’t think to— ah!” Her words ended in a terrified scream.

“Anastasia!” Grayson thundered.

She ignored him, for the moment, and glared at the truck that had just come to a stop, missing her by inches. Her left hand slammed down on the hood. “Walking here!” Ana snapped. She hit the hood again, for good measure.

Oh, crap. Had that sounded too New York?

It felt too New York. And she wasn’t supposed to be New York any longer.

She wasn’t Anastasia Patrick. She was Ana Marie Wayne.

She lived in Gulfport, Mississippi. She loved crawfish and gumbo.

She belonged to a book club, she taught yoga and music therapy sessions, and she was not the same woman any longer. Not.

“Ana, are you okay?” Grayson demanded.

The teens in the truck shouted apologies to her.

She hurried out of the crosswalk even as her right hand kept gripping the phone to her ear.

As if she’d needed that extra terror right then.

Her poor heart couldn’t take much more. “No, I am not okay.” Though she had made it to the sidewalk on the other side of the road.

Her rental house waited up ahead. A true beauty of a house, right across from the beach.

Big, twisting oak trees—limbs decked out with Spanish moss—shaded the sidewalk.

“I just had to learn in a freaking ice cream shop that my ex has escaped prison!” Hushed and rushed words.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you call me?

” A courtesy call would not have killed the man.

“It’s all right, Ana?—”

“There is no world where this is all right!” She rushed around to the back of her house.

Unlocked the door. Barreled inside. Disarmed the alarm—then reset it because…

Logan isn’t in prison! She flew up the stairs, and, even as she kept the phone pressed to her ear, she grabbed her go bag.

Oh, yes, she had a go bag at the ready. A necessary precaution since she’d always feared this moment would come.

“I didn’t call you right away because I didn’t want to worry you.”

She came to a dead stop in the middle of her bedroom.

The room she’d carefully painted a sky blue.

The room she’d furnished with estate sale and thrift store finds.

The antique rocking chair. The hand-stitched quilt on the brass, four-poster bed.

The art she’d created and hung on the walls.

This was her place. She should have been safe here.

“Consider me very worried, Grayson. Very worried.”

“I thought he’d be picked up within a day or two.” Grayson’s halting response. She heard voices in the background behind him. “Didn’t want to risk exposing you unnecessarily.”

“The news report said he’d been out for five days. ”

“Yeah, the story has grabbed national headlines now.”

Her eyes squeezed shut. “He doesn’t know where I am.” That was something. That was what she needed to focus upon.

“I was…actually just about to call you.” A huff of breath. A sigh? “Someone hacked into my files.”

She shook her head.

“I have reason to believe your location has been compromised.”

Her eyes flew open. She threw the strap of her go bag over her shoulder and bounded for the bedroom door.

“I’m sending a guard for you,” he said, his voice all casual and unalarmed. Unalarmed. Like he’d told her takeout was on the way. “You’re going to be safe. You’re going to be protected.”

Her feet flew down the stairs.

“You don’t need to panic.”

Too late. She was in one hundred percent panic mode. “You just said Logan knows where I am!”

“He may know. I don’t have complete certainty that he’s aware.”

Bullshit. “He knows. I sent him to prison. He wants me dead. There is every reason to panic.” She bounded off the stairs and flew for the back door once more.

“Just stay put,” Grayson urged her in his flat, everything-is-under-control FBI voice. “Your guard will be there soon. He promised to arrive before nightfall. He has your address.”

Before nightfall? That was like—at least three hours away. He wanted her to sit and wait for three hours on a guard to arrive? Did he know all the horrible things that could happen in three hours?

“Lock your doors,” Grayson ordered her. “Set your alarm. Stay in your house.”

Impossible. She was already outside. She’d slung her go bag in her Jeep. “I’ve got a better idea.”

“ Ana… ”

“I get the hell out of my house. I jump in my ride.” She jumped in the Jeep. “And I run like a murderer is on my trail. Oh, wait, he is.”

“I have a guard coming?—”

“I’ll call you when I’m in a safe place,” she barreled over his words. “Or maybe I won’t. Because if Logan has someone hacking into the FBI’s system, perhaps it’s better if you don’t know where I end up.” Her fingers would not stop shaking as she cranked the vehicle. “Goodbye, Grayson.”

“Wait! I have a plan. Just listen to me for a second. I am in?—”

She didn’t listen. There were no more seconds to waste.

Ana was in full-fledge panic mode. She hung up.

She whipped her Jeep into reverse and shot out of her drive.

A moment later, she was zipping down the street.

Her Jeep bounced. She bounced. And the fear that had never fully let her go swirled in her veins.

She remembered—all too vividly—the last time that Logan had found her. The way he’d tossed her onto the bed. Pressed a knife to her. The threats he’d made.

And then…

Oh, God, and then she’d been in the courtroom. Testifying against him. His eyes—scary and soulless—had pinned her. She’d known that if he ever got free, then she would be a dead woman.

Now he’s out. And he’s coming for me.

She’d feared this would happen. For the last two years, she’d had nightmares. She’d woken up in a cold sweat countless times. She’d jumped and shuddered at every shadow or creak of sound in her house. Fear had never left her alone.

And now…

He’s coming for me.

Her ex had escaped jail, and he was coming to kill her.

Where in the hell was a hero when she needed one?

“She’s running.”

Kane Harte nearly crushed the phone in his hand. “What?”

“Yeah, sorry, but you really need to move faster.”

Kane straddled his motorcycle. He’d stopped for gas and a check-in with Gray, and he had not wanted this news to be what he heard. “I am hauling ass. You just told me about the escape yesterday. ”

“And Ana just found out about the escape because it made the national news, and now our girl is on the run. Move faster.”