Daddy Devastating Read online

  She touched his cheek with her fingertips. “I will be, because you’ll be with me.”

  “Right,” he growled, moving her hand away. He recognized that maneuver. She was trying to soothe him. The woman sure learned fast. “You noticed what a good job I did of protecting you today,” he mumbled, in disgust.

  “Actually, I did notice.” Unlike him, there was no sarcasm in her voice. “You shielded me with your own body. You put yourself in the line of fire for me.”

  Russ wasn’t comfortable with her gratitude. He damn well didn’t deserve any credit for reacting after the danger was right on them. If he’d done things right, if he’d anticipated better, he might have been able to get her out of there before the bullets started.

  She caught onto his face again, this time with both hands. “You can’t put me ahead of the Richardson baby,” she whispered. “And I can’t put my fears ahead of him, either.”

  He stared at her and thought of a lot of things he could say. Russ settled for probably the dumbest one of the bunch. “Who the hell are you? Are you the same woman I met in the bar yesterday?”

  “I’m Julia Howell, recluse heiress and occasional neurotic. Who the hell are you? Are you the same cocky guy who put his hand up my dress?”

  “Absolutely. I haven’t changed a bit.”

  “Liar,” she said, and her mouth came to his again.

  Unlike the other kiss, there was no desperation in this one. No unspoken need for comfort.

  Man, he was a goner.

  The air left the room. It left his lungs too, but he didn’t need air to feel. One kiss from her, one touch of his tongue to hers, and Russ was already thinking about stripping off her clothes and having sex.

  But it couldn’t happen.

  For one thing, Emily was sleeping just yards away. Sleeping, his body reminded him. On the other side of the room. Far away. With her head turned in the opposite direction. Not that she could see them from that far away anyway.

  Zoey was in the next room. The door is locked, his body reminded him. Besides, Zoey was packing, and he’d told her to stay in her room.

  A third argument came to mind—and it was a biggie—Julia was a virgin. If they ever did have sex, it couldn’t be something quick and dirty. Well, not the first time anyway.

  But the point was, they couldn’t have sex right here, right now. Even if his idiot erection had a different take on things.

  He started to get up from his kneeling position, but Julia apparently had other ideas, too. It didn’t help matters when she moved closer, her knees sliding against his lower chest. Her dress slid too, right up her thighs, but she didn’t stop until he was against the bed. And between her legs.

  The kiss got hotter. Deeper. He shaped her lips with his, the pressure much harder than he figured it should be. But Russ just kept on, and did his own share of making matters worse when he hooked his arm around and moved her closer still.

  With her dress hiked up, it didn’t take much effort for Russ to ease his hand into the back of her panties. Over her bare bottom.

  The woman had some curves.

  He was playing with fire, but Russ was quickly reaching the point where he didn’t care if he burned to death.

  He spotted more curves when she leaned down further, and he got a look down her dress. Mercy. He fumbled with the tiny buttons on the front and got enough of them undone so he could unclip her bra.

  Russ was sure he’d died and gone to heaven when her breasts spilled into his hands.

  He looked up at her to make sure she wasn’t about to panic, then he rolled his eyes. No panic. Just the face of a hot woman silently saying take me. Russ didn’t think that was his erection talking, either. Julia was sending out some serious sex vibes.

  “We can’t,” he reminded her. Russ wet his fingers with his mouth and brushed them over her left nipple. She moaned. What a sound. So Russ did it again, just so he could hear her. And then he pleasured both her and himself by taking that already damp nipple into his mouth.

  “We can’t,” she repeated. Her hands raced over him, as if she didn’t know what part of him to pull closer, and she wrapped her legs around him.

  “I’m not panicking,” Julia mumbled, sounding stunned and completely aroused. “I should be. I always do.”

  “Well, you’d better start panicking soon,” Russ countered, “because neither of us is listening to that ‘we can’t’ logic. And we really can’t have sex with the baby in the room.”

  That stopped her. Her breath was gusting, her breasts reacting to those gusts and tempting his mouth with each little movement. Russ had to close his eyes to keep from pulling her back to him.

  “You’re right,” she conceded.

  But Russ didn’t celebrate the victory of finally getting one of them to back off. It didn’t feel like a victory when he could barely walk, but he did manage to get himself off the floor. Once he’d accomplished that, he fixed her bra and buttoned her dress. He then pushed her legs back together so he couldn’t see her lacy panties.

  “You think this was a danger response?” she asked. “Maybe because we came so close to dying, we needed to feel a human connection?”

  Russ wanted to agree with her, but he didn’t want to lie. “No. I think we just have the hots for each other. It doesn’t make sense. Everything about my investigation is going to hell in a hand basket, and I keep thinking about getting you into bed.”

  “I keep thinking about that, too,” she mumbled.

  He gave her a flat response. “That didn’t help.”

  Because this had to end now, Russ took out his phone and went into the sitting room so he could get some updates. He scrolled through his contacts and found the one labeled Pizza Delivery, and he called it.

  “Cheesy Jack’s Pizza,” the man answered. It was Special Agent Chris Soto, the man who’d driven them to the hotel. All the numbers in Russ’s phone were coded in case someone like Milo got their hands on it, and the security detail’s number had been listed as a pizza place.

  “It’s me, Russ.” He gave them a code word to prove who he was. “Tell me you have good news.”

  “Some good, some bad. Some very bad.”

  Russ mentally cursed and tried to brace himself for the “very bad” news.

  “No luck getting in touch with Milo,” Soto explained, “but the safe house is nearly ready, and we’re using a place that’s local, just on the edge of town. We just have to put a few more things in place. Oh, and the surveillance disks from the park are on the way over. We don’t know if they’ll have anything on them, but as soon as they arrive, I’ll figure out a way to get them to you.”

  “Deliver them in a pizza box,” Russ suggested. “And what about the shooter?”

  Soto’s hesitation said it all. Russ groaned. Was this the bad news? “He got away?”

  “For now. But we have a description, and we know which direction he was headed when he got into a dark green compact car. The description doesn’t match Milo or anyone else who’s been involved in this case, so we believe it might have been a hired gun.”

  That was not what Russ wanted to hear. He wanted the man in custody so they could get some answers.

  “Silas lost him,” Russ mumbled.

  “Maybe.” And that was all Soto said for several seconds. “But maybe not. You know that very bad news I mentioned? Well, it’s about Silas.”

  Chapter Nine

  Julia sank down onto the foot of the bed to watch and wait as Russ finished his call. She could tell from Russ’s side of the conversation that he was talking to a fellow agent. She could also tell that he’d just learned something disturbing. He cursed and stared up at the ceiling for a moment, before coming back into the room with her.

  “Silas Durant is missing,” Russ told her.

  Julia had braced herself for him to say that Silas was dead, that the shooter had killed him; or even worse, that the shooter was on the way to the hotel, but this was news she hadn’t expected.

&nbs
p; “Missing?” she questioned. “You’re sure he’s not dead?”

  “We’re not sure of anything except that he’s not answering his phone, and no one has seen him since he went in pursuit of the gunman. No shots were heard after Silas left the park area on foot. An eyewitness saw the gunman drive away and was able to give us a description, but the witness didn’t see anyone, including Silas, anywhere near the guy.”

  Julia shook her head. “Maybe the gunman had a partner? Or Milo took Silas?”

  Russ eased down on the bed next to her. “Well, we know Milo wasn’t the shooter, so there really wouldn’t be a logical reason for Milo to take Silas, even if he’d learned that Silas was a federal agent. If Milo knew that, he’d simply leave. After all, his boss and he have the ultimate bargaining tool—the baby. Kidnapping an agent would be a complication neither would want.”

  That made sense, but then it still didn’t explain why Silas was missing. Russ hadn’t completely trusted the man, so therefore, neither had she; but she hoped he wasn’t injured, or worse, and was lying somewhere just waiting to be found.

  Russ’s phone rang again, and Julia immediately glanced at the crib, figuring the sound would wake Emily. The baby stirred but went right back to sleep. Still, Julia got up so she could check on her. It was amazing, but just looking at the little girl could tamp down Julia’s nerves. Right now, she needed all the help she could get.

  Thanks to the Milo situation—and Russ.

  She considered berating herself for the kissing session on the bed. Here she’d hung on to her virginity like some deep, ugly scar that wouldn’t fade, and now she seemed more than willing to surrender herself to a man she barely knew.

  Except, she did know him. She’d learned a lot about Russ when he’d insisted on raising his dead brother’s child. Many men would have just stepped back rather than stepped up. He’d stepped up all right, and was willing to change his life for the baby. She wasn’t sure she’d ever met anyone like that.

  And she was falling for him.

  Julia wanted to dismiss her feelings as pure sexual attraction, but unfortunately it was deeper than that. Maybe it was their crazy, dangerous circumstances that had created this bond between them. Maybe it was Emily. Either way, the bond was there, and when this investigation was over, Julia was going to have to decide what to do about it.

  “The safe house is ready,” Russ told her, when he ended the call. “It won’t be too far away, so that when this ends, you’ll be able to see Emily almost right away.”

  “But what about Milo’s man, the one who was watching the hotel? It won’t be safe for Emily to leave if he’s still out there.”

  “He won’t be out there much longer. Someone from the San Saba PD is about to arrest him. The charge will be bogus, of course, but it’ll get him away from the hotel long enough, and there shouldn’t be enough time for Milo to get another man in place.”

  “Good.” That was something, at least. She wanted every possible advantage for Emily.

  “The agents are on their way up to get Zoey and Emily,” Russ explained. “You, too, if you’ve changed your mind.”

  “I haven’t changed my mind.” Though she wanted to. She didn’t want to be away from Emily for even a few hours, much less days. But this was something she had to do.

  Russ just stared at her a moment, as if he might try to change her mind, but he didn’t. He picked up Emily’s diaper bag from the nightstand and began to pack it with the spare diapers and wipes that were next to it.

  “You need to get Zoey,” Russ let her know.

  Julia nodded, gave Emily one last look and went to Zoey’s room. The nanny was already packed and waiting at the door. “Remember,” Julia reminded her, “don’t tell anyone where you’re going.”

  “I won’t. You’re not coming with us?”

  “No.” Julia didn’t get into her reasons why. The less Zoey knew about the missing baby, the better. “Just take care of Emily, please, and I’ll get to you as soon as I can.”

  There were tears in Zoey’s eyes, probably because the young woman was scared out of her mind. Julia had thoroughly screened Zoey when she’d employed her, and according to the nanny agency, she was supposedly one of the best. But Zoey certainly hadn’t counted on the job that included staying at an FBI safe house.

  When Julia went back into the bedroom, Russ had already picked up Emily from the crib. The baby was awake, her forehead wrinkled as if objecting to the abrupt end to her nap. Russ kissed both her cheeks, whispered something to her and then passed the baby to Julia. Just as there was a knock at the door.

  Julia’s heart dropped. She didn’t think this was another threat, and she was right. It was the two agents who’d driven them back to the hotel. One was a thin Asian man, and the other was heavily muscled, with blond hair. They were dressed in casual clothes but wore baseball caps with Cheesy Jack’s Pizza stamped on them.

  One of them handed Russ three large pizza boxes while the other set two thick cardboard carriers filled with cups of soft drinks on the floor. The pair of agents had apparently brought along such a big order to help maintain their cover. It was enough food that it would definitely take two people to deliver it.

  “We’ll do this fast,” the Asian man said. “There’s a car waiting at the service entrance at the back of the hotel. There are two decoy cars, too, because we don’t want anyone to know which vehicle the baby will be in.” He motioned for Zoey to take Emily, and she did, but not before Julia grabbed a quick kiss.

  “Keep her safe,” Julia whispered to Zoey.

  “I will,” the nanny promised.

  And just like that, before Julia could get another kiss or add anything else, they were out the door and gone.

  Russ stood there for several moments with the pizza boxes perched on his left palm, and he blew out a long breath. “The agents are experienced,” he told her. “They do this sort of thing all the time. And I trust them.”

  Those were all the right things to say, but it didn’t stop the tears. Julia tried to wipe them away but more came. When Russ spotted them, he locked the door and slid his arm around her.

  “I can’t believe this,” Julia mumbled. “Emily’s only been with me two weeks, and I feel as if my heart just walked out that door.”

  “Yeah.” And while the one-word response might have been simple, it was laced with emotion.

  Russ gave her a kiss on each cheek, as he’d done with Emily, and tipped his head to the pizza boxes. “You should eat something.”

  She eyed the boxes. “There’s really pizza in there?”

  “Smells like it.” He set the bottom boxes on the floor and the top one on the coffee table. He opened it. “Cheese, sausage and black olives,” he said. “It’s probably not your usual breakfast.”

  No, it wasn’t; and she wasn’t hungry, despite the fact she hadn’t eaten anything for the past eighteen hours. Still, it wouldn’t help Emily or the Richardsons’ baby if she starved herself. So she got some napkins from the bar area and joined Russ on the sofa. He grabbed a slice, took a huge bite and then lifted the pizza and the foil it was sitting on to extract something beneath.

  It was a thick, padded envelope.

  “A CD from the park’s security system,” Russ explained, taking it from the envelope. “This is a copy, and the San Saba PD and the FBI are likely already reviewing it, but I wanted to see if I could spot the shooter myself—or Milo, after he left the meeting.”

  Yes, she was interested in that, too.

  “I need to use your laptop,” he said, and headed to the bedroom to get it while Julia ate her pizza. She still wasn’t hungry, but her stomach was growling.

  Russ ate, too, as he loaded the CD into her laptop and started to go through the images that appeared on the screen. There were apparently multiple cameras, but Russ finally managed to locate the one at the picnic table. He saw Milo, Sylvia, Julia and himself.

  He sped up the surveillance, but slowed it again when Milo made his exit from the
meeting. Russ adjusted the feed so that it followed the man. Milo took out his phone, made a short call and headed for his vehicle—a black Mercedes that was parked not far from Julia’s own vehicle. He drove away.

  “You think that call was to alert the shooter?” Julia asked.

  “Could be. The lab at Quantico can try to enhance it to see if they can figure out the number he called. We might get lucky.”

  They watched until Milo was out of surveillance range, then Russ reversed the action on the disk. Next, he changed the camera shots to the one in the area near the trees.

  Both of them automatically moved closer, and their arms bumped into each other. Even though they were involved in something that could be critical, Julia wasn’t able to ignore the little jolt she felt.

  Russ must have felt it, too, because he gave her one of those smiles that made her feel as if she were melting. Oh, mercy. She was so in trouble.

  “Yeah,” he whispered. “We’ll work all that out later. Promise.”

  She stiffened. “Am I that easy to read?” she asked, wanting very much to know.

  “Sometimes. Don’t worry. I don’t have you all worked out and understood in my mind. Truth is, you’re driving me crazy. I can usually peg people, put them in the right category or box. But I’m not sure where to put you, Julia.”

  Unfortunately, she understood what he meant. “Maybe the attraction is because of Emily. Because subconsciously we’re trying to be parents to her.”

  Sheez, it sounded worse when said out loud than it had when it was stumbling around in her head. “Or maybe not,” she amended.

  While volleying glances between the screen and her, he leaned in and gave her a quick kiss. Quick and hot. It was a reminder that the attraction between them had nothing to do with Emily.

  However, his smile faded when he spotted something on the screen. “Silas,” he said, pointing to the man who was near those trees where the shooter was likely hidden. Silas appeared to be hiding, too.

  “He shouldn’t have been there,” Russ said.