“I’m not bringing my danger to your family.”

  “It’s our best chance, Joe. We’ll keep our distance from them, so if anyone does find us they don’t also find them. The land is outside town central, off a dirt road. Dad has a cabin out there, so we’ll have electricity to hook up to. The biggest problem is going to be dumping and filling the holding tanks, but we’ll figure that out...”

  Mind buzzing with details—like how she was going to alert her family—McKenna kept her eyes focused between mirrors, the terrain on both sides of them and the road ahead. Energy sluiced through her as she sat poised to fly into action at any provocation. Her gun was loaded. Her seat, higher up than any other vehicle’s would be, gave her a better vantage point for shooting.

  “You have brothers.”

  Seemed so long ago that she’d told him the little bit about her private life she’d been willing to share. Hard to believe that she’d been so closed off to him that he didn’t know about Jackson and Kierland.

  “Two,” she told him, wanting him to know on a far more personal level than because he was heading toward their hometown. It felt wrong, Joe not knowing her as she knew him.

  “They’re biologically my half-brothers,” she continued. Their old way of driving in total silence wasn’t right anymore. They’d become a team, the two of them.

  A professional, working team.

  One with enough trust between them to share certain confidences.

  Like partners on the police force, putting each other’s lives in each other’s hands every day. Living in such close quarters, as they’d been doing, you get to know someone more quickly.

  And if maybe her life wasn’t in his hands, only his was in hers, the difference seemed minimal out there in the dark of the middle of nowhere...

  Silence had fallen again. He hadn’t asked any questions.

  Which bothered her, where before, she’d have been appreciative.

  “My dad was a widower when he met my mom,” she said. It was fair that Joe know some of what he was getting into. “He owns a small construction company, but back when Mom and Dad met, he worked as a framer. My grandparents were adding a small garden cottage to their property, and Dad was foreman for the job. That’s when he met my mom.”

  “And your grandparents didn’t approve,” Joe said then, understanding in his voice. “They gave her an ultimatum, and when she chose him, they disowned her.”

  Like she’d known, he understood that world.

  “Thinking, of course, that she’d eventually come to her senses,” she added. “Instead, she married my dad, moved to Shelter Valley, and adopted Jackson and Kierland.”

  “How old were they when you were born?”

  “Seven and nine,” she told him. “They’re both married, with kids, and in business with my dad, Meredith and Sons Construction.”

  He’d settled back in his seat, had one hand on the wheel, one on his thigh.

  For a second there, with a brief flash of memory of what she’d thought would be going on that night, she was jealous of that thigh.

  But mostly, as they traveled alone through the night, she welcomed the easy talking between them.

  In a strange way, the conversation seemed almost as intimate as having sex.

  * * *

  As much as Joe disliked being on the run, having anger and the threat of death constantly at his back, as unsure as he was about his reception in the town McKenna loved, about the rightness of him even agreeing to go there with her, he wasn’t hating the drive.

  They’d gotten far enough away from any cell tower they might have pinged that it would be anyone’s guess where they’d gone. And with the twists and turns McKenna was having him take on various winding back roads, he didn’t even think he would be able to follow their tracks. Meaning, it wasn’t a route anyone would expect to find them on.

  Or be looking for them on.

  “So technically, your brothers are your grandparents’ step grandchildren,” he said, trying to absorb as much of McKenna’s dynamics as he could in their short time together. To figure her out enough that she didn’t linger as the mystery she’d been to him since the moment she’d pinned him at his own front door.

  “Technically.” The one word spoke volumes. None of them good.

  “I take it they didn’t welcome them into the fold?” He understood why moneyed society had to remain closely protective. There were always people out to bilk you out of it. And if they’d gotten bad vibes from Kyle Meredith, thought he was out to use their only child for her money...

  “That was my second hard lesson in life,” McKenna told him, still diligently watching their surroundings.

  The woman didn’t ever stop—which would lead to her expert status, he recognized, trying to take a step back from the pain he’d just heard in her voice.

  They were mind and body mates for a brief time.

  Not heart-to-heart mates, ever.

  He didn’t ask for details.

  But couldn’t stop himself from listening, or ask her to stop, when she started telling him anyway.

  “Jackson was always really artsy,” she told him, filling in more blanks for him. “He got involved in a modern dance company in high school and won an opportunity to spend the summer in New York, training with one of the greats. He was eighteen at the time...”

  “Making you nine?”

  “Yeah.” Glancing over her right shoulder, she was silent for a moment, then turned back.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Just a coyote.”

  Because she checked out every single movement.

  “Anyway, Kierland was only sixteen, and in baseball, and Dad just didn’t have the money to pay for New York room and board for the entire summer. To me it was a no-brainer. I was so certain my grandparents would at least loan him the money—they never spoke poorly to me about Dad or my brothers when I was little—that I told him they would.”

  Joe took a deep breath, knowing where the story was going. “They refused,” he said.

  “They gave me a lecture about the kind of life I was born to live, about being responsible to the wealth, about how I’d be a target, that there’d always be someone wanting handouts and that it was my first lesson in how to be strong enough to say no. I was so shocked, I went to my room and refused to come out until the next morning,” she said, her reminiscence laced with sadness. “By that time I had a plan,” she told him. “I’d already emptied all the piggy banks on my shelf—I got one each year for my birthday—and for the next couple of months saved all of my allowance, and went without lunch at school so I could save all of my lunch money, and then, with the help of our housekeeper, I took it all to the bank and cashed it in. I collected enough that Jack could come up with the rest. He took a custodial job and worked nights and weekends after dance classes.”

  Joe smiled, admiring her innovativeness, her sacrifice, at such a young age. “Your dad and brothers knew what you’d done?”

  “Of course not. Neither Dad nor Jack would have taken the money if they’d known. They still think my grandparents sent the money home with me.”

  “Didn’t they thank them? And find out then?”

  “Jack sent a letter. I never heard about it arriving.”

  If it were possible for Joe to hold her in any higher esteem, picturing the nine-year-old girl who’d found a way to live two lives with an open heart, did it for him.

  Just as he sometimes ached for his eight-year-old self, the hard lesson he’d learned that year, he ached for little McKenna.

  There had to be a reason they’d been thrown together. Two kids who’d lost their mothers young.

  Who’d learned tough life lessons a year or two before they’d turned double digits.

  Maybe, just maybe...

  “I later realized that they’d been scared to death about my exposure in Shelter Valley, a young girl with a big heart. And they’d also been bitter. They blamed my dad for taking my mother away from them. It was either that or blame themselves for disowning her when it was too late to do anything about it...”

  And...there was the rub. His world, her eschewing it.

  It had to have been impossibly difficult for that little girl, living and loving in both lives. Had to have taken a huge toll. One that had culminated in the restrictions put on her time with her grandparents. They could see her but no longer expose her to their society. Their lifestyle.

  She’d reached a point where she’d no longer been able to live two lives.

  And she’d chosen the one she wanted.

  With a resigned acceptance Joe had mastered far too young, he saw more clearly than ever why he and McKenna would never, ever have a life together outside their shared moment in time.

  She was working for him.

  And when the job was done, they were going to part ways forever.

  Chapter 20

  McKenna thought she’d be a lot more nervous driving into Shelter Valley with Joe. While on edge due to the danger, she was feeling fine about introducing him to her dad and brothers. They were proud of her abilities, respected the work she did, and if ever she was going to bring a client to meet them, it would be Joe.

  Because he was a client, not her man, that made it much easier.

  They’d been so overtly pushy in their grilling of any guys she’d brought home during high school and college that she’d made a point of keeping her dating and family lives separate.

  She had a lot of practice at it—living separate lives, and keeping the various sides of herself apart.

  Where she got edgy, oddly enough, was in Joe’s reaction to the town that she loved like none other. Directing him straight toward her father’s cabin, rather than through town, given that it was after midnight and her number-one goal was keeping Joe anonymous, she found herself chattering.

  “Shelter Valley is known for acceptance. No matter who you are or what your past might have been, if you want to live an honest life, among people who help each other out, this is the place to be. Our sheriff, Greg Richards, he’s taken on mountain men, thieves, a kidnapper, a member of the mob, you name it, and he manages to rally troops and keep everyone safe. Greg’s wife, she just showed up in town one day with a child, and without a single memory as to who she was, who the child was or why she had a little one with her...and one of our college professors came to town on the run from her abusive ex. She pretended to be her older sister, taking her sister’s new job, after he’d killed her sister...”

  Why should it matter to her what he thought of them? Or how his wealthy eyes would view them by light of day?

  They passed a mansion softly lit in the distance, an estate that could easily rival any that McKenna had ever been in, and she quickly pointed that out to Joe, as though she needed him to know that even by his standards, her town could measure up. “The Montfords live there,” she told him. “They founded Shelter Valley. Their daughter-in-law, Cassie, is the town’s vet. She was their son’s high school sweetheart, but before they were even engaged, he left her pregnant and went to join the Peace Corps. She subsequently miscarried their baby. He had a lot of nerve, coming back years later with a child in tow, but he’d grown up. Learned about life and begged everyone to give him a chance to make amends. Turned out the child belonged to friends of his who’d been killed, and he’d adopted her. He’s now on city council. And married to that high school sweetheart.”

  She could go on and on about the lost and hurting souls who’d been welcomed and healed in her hometown. “Becca, our mayor of more than twenty years, is married to the president of Montford University,” she told him, remembering that he’d asked her about the school. “They had miracle babies in their forties, and those kids are now students at Montford.”

  All the while she talked, she kept every single thing in the immediate vicinity outside their rig on her radar. Knowing the area like she did, she’d notice anything out of place.

  “I’m not taking any chances, mind you,” she told him, uneasy about his continued silence. “I can’t vouch for every kid on social media, nor am I going to risk your life by making your presence here known...”

  So why had she just babbled about how the town protected those who came needing help? His personal opinion couldn’t matter to her.

  She couldn’t let it.

  It wasn’t even like she lived in Shelter Valley anymore. She’d moved to Phoenix when she’d joined Sierra’s Web.

  She didn’t quite breathe a sigh of relief when they made the turnoff to her father’s cabin without anyone on the road behind them. Or coming at them, either. There’d be no good reason for anyone to be out on the dead-end rural road that late at night.

  “Stop,” she told Joe just after he’d made the turn. Jumping down out of her seat, she went to the trash barrel that sat at the side of the road and put the ten-pound boulder that sat on the ground beside it up on the barrel.

  And that’s when she started to feel...a bit less worried. “My dad lives right down the road,” she told Joe. Because he’d need to know soon enough. “He bought this property after I graduated from college. He’s had plans drawn up to turn the cabin into his dream home but hasn’t had the money to make it happen yet. But he drives by it every day on his way to work. The rock on the barrel is the sign to him that someone is using his place.”

  “Meaning?” With both hands on the wheel, Joe was sitting forward, moving at about a five-miles-an-hour pace over the washboard road—and frowning.

  She was just glad that he’d finally spoken.

  “He’ll be knocking on the door at daybreak,” she told him, “which is when he generally heads into work. I intend to ask him to get to Phoenix, to the home of a friend of mine who works for the firm, someone he knows, and have that person let Glen know where we are. Unless someone is tracking my dad, no one will know about the contact. I’ll have him pick up another burner phone for us. There are several people here in town who commute to Phoenix daily. We’ll set up a communication chain from there—so that no calls will track from Sierra’s Web to Shelter Valley, but from people who work in Phoenix home to Shelter Valley. Except that they’ll be calling us, not home. There’s only one cell tower in the area, so it’ll all ping the same.”

  Driving around a small mountain peak, a hill by Arizona standards, they’d reached the cabin. McKenna rolled down her window, heard the creek flowing. “In the summer, the creek’s nearly dry, but after the monsoons, and through the winter, there’s water flowing...” she said, having a hard time keeping the smile out of her voice.

  Joe turned off the engine and was out of his seat, putting out the slides. Probably eager to get to bed and sleep. They’d been up since before dawn. He’d been driving for hours under tense situations.

  And she’d just told him her father would be there in what amounted to less than five hours.

  “We’re good with the generator until morning, right?” she asked. They’d be one night without access to the cameras. She’d need to do at least two perimeter checks and set an alarm on her watch.

  “We’ve got a built-in natural gas generator. We’re good for a few days, at least.”

  He’d said we’ve.

  Coasting off her we’re, but still...he’d gone with it.

  She’d liked hearing it.

  And then he moved toward the back. She’d known he would. Had been expecting it. Waiting for it so she could brush her teeth and get some rest, too. Her spirits still dropped.

  All day long she’d anticipated that they’d be sharing a bed that night...

  Probably best that fate had intervened.

  A sure sign that she’d been on the wrong path.

  And when the pocket door closed him in the small bathroom, as it had done every night they’d been together, she told herself she was thankful she’d been saved from making a grave mistake.

  Waiting for her turn so she could get to bed.

  The forward door opened, bathroom light still on, as Joe slid his own door open. She glanced up at him. Saw him standing there.

  Completely naked. And clearly not focused on sleep.

  “You coming?” he asked, his gaze boring into her.

  As though in a trance, her body flooding with desire and her heart floating somewhere outside herself, McKenna smiled and was already pulling her shirt off as she headed toward him.

  * * *

  The woman was every fantasy he’d ever had rolled into one and coming true. She’d said she had to come to him, and so while his hands yearned to help her undress, he remained at the door of his room, watching her strip as she approached.

  Her shoulders, soft–looking, slender, hid such strength, and the dichotomy aroused him. Mouth dry, he watched her reach back to unhook her bra. Waited. Aching so hard he started to spill.

  Stared.

  And stared some more.

  The soft mounds were...everything a man could want. Not huge, but more than a handful, which was as large as he liked them. Her nipples, hard for him, pointed straight at him, as though naming him as their pleasurer. He was right there, reaching, as she approached him, and he brushed those nipples, but his hands slid around her bare upper body, pulling her into him, warm skin to warm skin, as his mouth—starved since it had left hers at the tree—sought life-confirming sustenance.

  So much danger, so much hate and betrayal. Someone framing him. His father... None of it mattered when McKenna’s arms closed around him.

  She knew it all. She held it all. And wanted to take him into her, too.

  Pushing him down to the bed, she climbed on with him, her knees straddling one of his legs, those breasts moving toward him, but he staved her off. Wanted a level playing field. And reached for the waistband of her pants.