Page 1 of Her Last Hope
1
The clear night sky, filled with stars, cast a white glow across the water. A warm summer breeze rippled the dark-blue lake as the thick scent of dead fish lingered in the dense air. Nick Sarich put the zodiac boat in neutral and cut the engine in front of a two-million-dollar home on Lake Butler, in Windermere, Florida. A quaint little town outside of Orlando that attracted everyone from your average Joe to the rich and famous.
Not to mention a few criminals.
Darkness had been a good friend to Nick, both in the field and in his heart. Everyone told him that, in time, he’d be able to get past the loss of his wife and unborn child. Even his mother told him that someday he’d want to live his life again. He’d bitten his tongue every time he wanted to remind his mother that she’d never moved on after his father had died. No boyfriends. No dating. Nothing but work and sittingaround waiting for one of her four sons to settle down and have a bunch of little Sarich grandbabies.
However, if he dared speak his mind, his mother would grab him by the ear, giving it a good tug, and that generally hurt. Not to mention, he did have the best mother any man could hope for. Disrespect was not in the Sarich’ vocabulary, at least not the intentional kind.
He tossed over a fishing line as he scanned the front of the ten-thousand-square-foot home. A string of lights dangled around the fence separating the pool area from the lake. Lanterns glowed on the dock posts, illuminating a life-size statue of Batman. The dark knight’s cap flapped with the breeze.
Every detail seared unwillingly into his brain. The experts called it a photographic memory.
He called it a curse.
But this evening, sitting in the dark, peering into the few open windows of Moises Ramos’ home, watching Ramos and a few of his cronies smoke cigars and sip whiskey by the pool, his memory came in handy as he mentally pulled up the case file on Leandra Whitfield, his first official mission as a member of the Omega Team.
Bain Asher and Declan Griggs, the founders of the Aegis Network, had handed him this assignment right after his older brother’s engagement party, and while Nick didn’t begrudge the eldest Sarich, Logan, his happiness, he couldn’t bring himself to be truly exultant for the ecstatic couple.
Not knowing that Logan’s soon-to-be wife was also a soon-to-be mom.
He blinked the painful thoughts away, focusing on the picture in his head of Leandra from the file. Stunning woman. No. Dangerously sexy. Her long dark hair matched her wild, chocolate eyes. Her rosy lips offset her porcelain-like skin. He smiled at the image of her sitting on a Harley, sporting a white tank top and one badass tattoo on her right shoulder. It looked like some sort of infinity symbol with lettering, but the photograph was too small to make it out. She smiled in the picture, all sweet-like, but Nick saw one tough interior to match the woman on the bike. It screamed: don’t mess with me, I bite.
Oh, how he wouldn’t mind being bitten by a woman like Leandra.
Focus.
He mulled over the laundry list of information. She was a twenty-eight-year-old military widow, a pain he could understand, and from what he’d read, she’d done exactly as he had, tossed herself into her work. Smart girl.
She had her own private investigation firm located in Brooklyn, New York, her hometown. Her file said she’d moved back there from Jacksonville, North Carolina, two months after her husband had been killed, another decision he could relate to.
She’d recently been hired by a family to find their missing daughter, and then five days ago, Leandra went missing herself.
The fishing pole bobbed, and Nick snagged it from its holder and reeled in a not-so-impressive fish while eyeing the house. Thus far, he’d only seen the five men sitting outside along with four guards. Their laughter filled the night air like smoke in a closed chimney.
As he snagged the fish, preparing to take out the hook, a voluptuous woman stepped from the sliders.
The fish hook gripped the flesh on Nick’s thumb.
“Fuck,” he muttered, quickly sucking on his finger, staring at Leandra as she walked across the patio in what could only be described as fuck-me heels. Her wide hips swayed under the moon. Her toned legs flexed and captivated him from under her criminally short miniskirt. Nick let his eyes wander up the rest of her full-bodied figure, though full wasn’t the right word for it. She just wasn’t a bean pole. She was what women should aspire to look like, with her curves being in all the right places.
Nick tossed the fish back in the water, tossing his inappropriate thoughts with it, though the tightening in his groin hadn’t eased up at all.
An exotic woman with dark skin and flowing dark hair followed Leandra outside. He’d seen the tall lady a few times and figured she was one of the many women that dressed Ramos’ arm. Even Nick had to admit the man was attractive, but why any woman would want to be with someone who had a reputation like Ramos was beyond Nick.
He shook his head. Like he was any better just because his one-night stands knew that’s all they were.
Leandra leaned against the fence, laughing with the men at some perverted comment that degraded women.
Nick drew his lips in a tight line.
What the hell was Leandra Wakefield doing with the likes of a drug-pushing, underground casino ring leader?
And what did that have to do with a missing girl?
Everything he’d learned about her thus far indicated she always immersed herself too far into her cases, and she’d gotten herself into difficult situations.
Often with the potential of death.
