Page 23 of Wilde and Deadly

She tugged at the zipper of her jacket, peeling it off and tossing it into the backseat. Next came her boots, her shirt, and her jeans. She stripped down to her bra and underwear, methodically running her hands over every inch of fabric.

Nothing.

“Dammit,” she muttered, tossing her jeans onto the passenger seat.

She moved to her body next, skimming her hands along her arms, legs, torso… and then between her legs because Davey’s hand had been there just hours ago.

And there it was.

A tiny patch clung to her skin at the crease of her inner thigh.

She remembered his hand sliding down the front of her pants, stroking her through the thin fabric of her panties, driving her insane with need. At the time, she’d been too consumed by the heat of his touch to realize his true intention.

“Son of a bitch,” she hissed and peeled the tracker off, the adhesive tugging at her skin. She held it up, the device nearly invisible between her fingers. Of course, Davey would have the audacity to put ittherein the most intimate of places.

She stared at the tracker for a long moment, fury, shame, and something dangerously close to hurt roiling inside her.

Jesus, why was she hurt?

Trust had never existed between them and the rest…

Well, she just had to lock down the rest of her messy emotions. She couldn’t afford to feel anything when it came to Davey Wilde.

She crushed the device between her fingers like a bug, then rolled down the window and flung the tracker as far as she could into the murky waters of the Hudson.

Good riddance.

She shouldn’t have let her guard down. Davey was too smart and too focused, and she… dammit, she was slipping. Letting all those messy emotions make her sloppy.

No more.

She dumped the clothes she’d been wearing out the window—she wasn’t going to trust anything she’d worn around Davey—and grabbed a fresh set from her backpack. She dressed fast, her mind already on her next moves. She had to get out of the city. But she also still wanted to know whatever intel Benji had dug up for her. She’d have to reach out to him again and convince him another meeting was in his best interest. Which meant she’d have to up the price.

The thought made her groan. She wasn’t low on funds, but she also couldn’t keep this up indefinitely. Eventually, she’d have to take another job. If anyone would offer her one.

A worry for another time.

Right now, her focus had to be on keeping her family safe and Davey alive.

Just as she pulled on her favorite leather jacket—thank God she hadn’t been wearing that earlier; she’d have been pissed to lose it—the sound of tires screeching shattered the quiet.

No. No way.

Her pulse spiked. He couldn’t have caught up already.

Rowan’s head snapped up, instincts screaming danger. The air felt different now—thick, electric, the way it did right before a storm hit. Headlights bore down on her, too fast, too direct. A black SUV, its engine snarling like a predator closing in.

Not Davey.

And that SUV wasn’t going to stop.

She leaped aside a half second before metal crashed into metal. The impact was deafening. The sedan jolted violently, skidding across the pavement with a tortured screech of steel. If she’d hesitated for even half a second?—

Shit.

She hit the asphalt hard, rolling to absorb the impact, but pain lanced through her shoulder. No time to dwell on it. Adrenaline drowned out the sting as she sprang to her feet. Her eyes flicked to the SUV. The doors swung open in near-perfect sync. Two men, dressed in black, masked. No hesitation in their movements. No wasted energy.

Mercenaries. Trained. Armed. And here for her.

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