Jackson's Woman. Maggie Price
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light her skin looked ashen, her eyes glassy with shock. She trembled outwardly. He set his jaw, wishing he had time to explain what was going on, but the danger was too great.
He did a quick surveil of the area. All the shops, restaurants and other businesses in the square were closed, so he couldn’t stash Claire in one of them while he checked her building. His rental car was parked behind her shop; he’d kept tabs on her enough to know she owned the SUV sitting at the front curb. He quickly nixed the idea of having her lock herself inside either vehicle and wait for him. If Ryker was around, it would take him only seconds to bypass any lock system. And then he’d have Claire.
And kill her.
Jaw set, Jackson leaned in, keeping his voice low. “I’m going to check your building—”
“You’re not leaving me here on the sidewalk,” she interrupted in a harsh whisper. “You’ve got the gun, I’m sticking with you.”
Even in the shadows he saw the determined glint in her eyes. Too bad she hadn’t been this adamant about “sticking with him” two years ago. Would regret, he wondered, ever fade?
“I’m not leaving you out here,” he agreed. “You’re going in with me. Behind me. Don’t make any noise. At the first loud sound, hit the floor.”
Her eyes widened, flicked to his automatic. “Loud sound, meaning gunfire?”
“Meaning anything. Don’t get too close in case I have to step back fast.” And so you don’t get hit by shots aimed at me, he added to himself. “Once we’re inside, I want you to stay in my line of sight so I’ll know where you are. Keep glancing over your shoulder to make sure no one sneaks up on us from behind.”
“All right.” Claire pressed a palm against the ache in her right side and pulled in a trembling breath. Her nerves were shimmering and her insides had tangled into a dozen frayed knots.
“Jackson, I don’t understand why you’re here,” she said in a shaky whisper. “Why are you even here?”
“To check on you.”
His gaze was unreadable, his tone as offhand as if he’d just driven across the city to get there when chances were he’d woken up that morning on some other continent. Every move the man made, everything he did was deliberate. She knew damn well his checking on her was far from casual.
“Stay close.” He gave her shoulder a squeeze, then stepped past her, holding the automatic against his thigh. Silently, he positioned himself at one side of the shop’s gaping front door.
For Claire, the whole night had turned surreal. Within the past five minutes she’d found her handyman murdered and literally run head-first into the man who’d once embraced her heart as no other had. The man she had never thought she would see again.
Had never wanted to see again. Because she’d known, in her heart, how much it would hurt to be reminded of what she’d sacrificed in order to obtain her one solid goal: A life with permanence, where people stayed in one place and put down roots.
She’d been right.
She met his grim gaze while her heart tattooed in her ears. “Jackson, be careful.”
One side of his mouth lifted. “That’s my plan.”
Gun clenched in both hands, he flattened his back against the door frame, then stepped inside.
Claire couldn’t stop pacing.
Left hand pressed against her aching ribs, she roamed the living room of her spacious, high-ceilinged apartment. There was too much tension racing through her blood for her to sit still. The horrific image of Silas Smith with his throat a bloody gash. Her grief over the dear, sweet man’s violent death. Her shock at running full-throttle into Jackson Castle.
Immediately after the surreptitious—and uneventful—search she and Jackson had conducted of her shop, her upstairs apartment and the storage room across the hall, he’d pulled out his cell phone and called 9-1-1. A patrol car had arrived minutes later. Claire’s friend, Oklahoma City Police Department homicide detective Elizabeth Scott, her partner and the crime scene investigators soon followed, and the medical examiner showed up shortly afterward.
With so much going on and so many people swarming her building, Claire had yet to find an opportune moment to talk to Jackson one on one.
Diverting around her couch that bloomed with small pink roses, she glanced across the room. He stood just inside the apartment’s open front door, talking in muted tones to Liz, who had already questioned Claire at length. And since her partner had sat in, Liz had held back from asking certain girlfriend-type questions, the most pressing being: why had the lover Claire walked away from two years ago suddenly shown up tonight?
Claire wished to hell she knew.
Sidestepping the pedestal table that held china cups on a silver tray, she continued pacing. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Liz jot on a notepad, then return a small leather case to Jackson. Claire knew the case held the badge and credentials that identified him as a Special Agent with the Diplomatic Security Service—the U.S. State Department’s law-enforcement division.
Had he shown Liz his ID because his presence here was official? Claire wondered. If so, what sort of business had prompted a DSS agent who mostly operated under a veil of secrecy in foreign countries to suddenly show up on the shadowy sidewalk in front of her building?
The building Claire had worked tooth and nail to own, along with the contents of the antique shop and the cozy apartment she and her aunt had once rented.
The apartment that was the only real home Claire had ever known.
Over the past two years, she had morphed Home Treasures to reflect her own personal stamp and was making a tidy profit. She’d met a man for whom she cared deeply, a man who loved her, who wanted a future with her. Brice Harrison had been ready—was ready—to give her the type of life craved by a woman who’d survived a rootless childhood that hovered one frightening step from physical abuse. Claire had nearly convinced herself to grab onto that life. To write off her growing uncertainties and her frustrating inability to totally forget the past.
And the man who’d played such a large role in it.
Dammit, why was he here?
Claire reached the fireplace—filled for summer with lavender hydrangea blooms—reversed and headed back the way she’d come. It was a wonder her sandals hadn’t worn a trail across the Multan rug that spread its muted colors over the hardwood floor.
She could understand Jackson’s being in Oklahoma City—they’d first met while he was on loan to a multi-agency anti-terrorism task force working out of the National Memorial Institute. So it was possible a similar assignment had brought him back.
But that didn’t explain why he’d shown up tonight. Especially since they’d agreed to sever all ties. So, why was he here?
And why did it have to be now, when she’d spent the past months feeling so unsettled? So unsure. So off-balance.
Slowing her pace, she shifted her gaze back to Jackson and for the first time allowed herself to study him. He seemed leaner and a little more rugged now. The dark stubble that covered his firm, square jaw enhanced the look, as did the black T-shirt that stretched over his broad shoulders and the black jeans that clung to his narrow hips and long legs. Though worn in the same sleek style, his dark hair was shaggier, the thick ends lapping just above his collar.
His incendiary blue eyes had undergone the greatest change. They stared out from a face baked copper by the sun of who-knew-what countries, their unfamiliar hardness lending their owner a rougher and even more dangerous look than Claire remembered. A paper-thin gash, still in the process of healing, sliced through his left eyebrow.
She pictured him as he’d looked earlier, searching the shop with measured care, moving like a ghost up the stairs, his gun unwavering in his grip, his gaze skimming,