Page 30 of Ace
Still not sure that Savannah was completely safe, Keller alternated between listening to her and surveilling the open yard around them. Dogs barked from the rear of the house. Must be where the kennels were. But the rest of the wide lawn was clear and trimmed. Crystal blue water sparkled from the inground swimming pool to the east of the house. A row of lilacs bordered that entire side of the yard, while a simple dirt drive connected the gated road out front to the lawn in back. A riding lawnmower parked alongsidethe house testified she had help. Or not. Keller wouldn’t put it past Savannah if she ran this place by herself.
“Mind if we move inside?” he asked, needing to get her out of plain sight. His Spidey senses were still tingling. They’d just survived an ambush. Those guys in the truck had meant to kill her. They obviously knew where she lived and worked. They knew her schedule. They’d come looking for her as soon as they knew she’d escaped the alligators.
“No can do,” she replied as if she were ambushed every day. “I’ve got dogs and cats to feed. Come, I’ll show you.”
With the swamp still squishing in his waterlogged dress shoes and his clothes uncomfortably sticky and wet, Keller followed Savannah around the house, past the riding lawn mower, and into a long narrow barn. Barks and yowls escalated when Savannah stepped over the threshold, and he was glad when she shut the door behind them. Finally, she was out of sight. But she was still only semi-safe. Not good enough.
He moved swiftly down the wide lane between the kennels, taking stock of Savannah’s rescues as he assessed a strategic exit plan and cover. There were two points of egress he could see, the door they’d just come through and one at the extreme opposite end of the building. A screened channel ran the length of the roof under the eaves, letting light in. Twelve kennels lined each side of the barn, and all were filled. One large breed dog stood behind every gate, barking, whining, or howling. Some stood on their toes, dancing to see their pretty savior.
A firefight inside here could get messy, but that wasn’t going to happen. Like Savannah, Sanctuary would be protected.
As he passed the kennels, one pure white Pitbull hit his already concave chain-link gate like a freight train—a whining, drooling freight train. His powerful body wiggled as if he were a baby, and he wanted Savannah to pick him up. Not what Keller expected from that notorious breed.
She had several other Pitbulls, all in separate kennels. A gray muzzled bloodhound that looked like a stack of wrinkles on legs. Three labs, two black, one white. A couple mixed-breeds with telltale Airedale coloring and whiskers. A long-legged Irish Setter. A Saint Bernard. A coon hound. But not a single Chihuahua or poodle in sight.
Savannah left Keller’s side to enter the wooden door at the far back of the barn. She hit the light switch, illuminating a storeroom stacked high with what had to be over fifty large bags of pellet dogfood.
He hurried to catch up with her as she uprighted the wheelbarrow leaning against the wall and angled it alongside the stacks of red bags. “Here. Let me do that,” he said as she tugged a hundred-pound bag off the stack and slid it into the wheelbarrow. “After we feed your rescues, we’re going inside and calling for backup. Understood?”
Savannah dusted her hands together as she retrieved a pair of well-worn gloves from the shelf behind the door. “Darn, I forgot my gloves. You want a pair? I’ve got plenty.” She had a way of ignoring him.
He shook his head, not planning on getting any dirtier than he already was, at the same time wishing he could grab a quick shower and get her the hell out of there. Time was not on their side. Those guys knew her schedule. They’d be back. “Let’s just get this done. I don’t want you exposed any longer than you have to be. How many bags do you need?”
“One will do for the dogs, one for the cats.” She nodded toward the smaller green bags. “Grab one of those, would you? I feed everyone once a day, but I left so quickly when Gran Mere called that I… I…” Her voice trailed off.
Keller busied himself opening the mammoth red bag, curling the lip so Savannah could scoop the kibble, while giving her time to collect her emotions. It was maybe one or two o’clock. She’d had one helluva day, but he grew more anxious by the second.
“I left my cell phone in my car this morning,” she whispered, her back still to him. “I forget that she’s gone now, you know. Everything happened so fast.”
“It’s easy to forget,” Keller lied. He hadn’t forgotten one detail of the nightmare he’d lived through the day he’d lost Carol Marie.
“I broke all speed limits to get to her on time. I parked my car. I ran as hard as I could, but in the end…”
In the end, you’re always too late, and they leave you behind anyway. You can’t make them stay, and you can’t go with them.
Keller steeled his heart and his fingers, not going to hug Savannah, comfort her, or lead this young woman where he had no intention of going. He refused to takeadvantage of her. Not now. Not ever. He didn’t seduce women, much less vulnerable victims who were under his protection.
The morning had already dredged up enough tender memories from the deepest pits of his soul. The drive here had been the peaceful reprieve he’d needed. For a moment there, it had been enough to just push back in the Camaro’s leather seat and feel the car’s power at his fingertips. To know that, with the slightest pressure of his foot, he could accelerate to racing speed and leave his problems behind. He could be free.
Almost.
But he was wrong and that truck crashing into him had proved it. Simply connecting with Savannah, just touching her, was what made him believe the horrors from his past were exorable. Escapable. But they weren’t, and he knew better than to lie to himself. Life didn’t work that way. It was hard, cruel, and unfair, and he was a fool to think this quiet interlude with Savannah could turn into anything more. Those bastards in that truck, the gators, even this damned state proved life was no picnic. They were what was real.
Keller and Savannah were polar opposites. He operated on structure and discipline. A warrior’s code. She believed in magic rocks and voodoo, a practice he’d never accept again. She wore her heart on her sleeve. He wasn’t sure he had a heart. They were ships that passed in the night. If it hadn’t been for Isaiah, they never would have collided.
Even their losses were light years apart, different. He was a professional federal agent carrying a wholeworld of hurt and misery that she had no business getting involved in. She’d just lost her great grandmother, a good woman who’d truly cared for and loved Savannah, to old age—not violence. One natural death didn’t measure up to what Keller had seen and done and lost in his life. Mariposa’s passing was the well-earned rest from a long life well-lived. She hadn’t suffered like Carol Marie or any of the killers he’d put down.
Keller swallowed hard, assaulted all over again by the disaster that was his fucking life. Everything shouldn’t have to be so hard, but it was, damn it. He’d learned to deal with death before; he could do it again. He’d almost convinced himself that he didn’t care what happened to Savannah Church, that she was just a job, when a slender hand circled his wrist, holding onto him in its gentle, feminine way.
“Are you okay?” she asked softly, her big brown eyes dewy with unshed tears. Looking through him. Reading his mind like she seemed so easily to do. Needing comfort. Echoing back the same. But not needing him, and Keller was certain that her idea of comfort wasn’t the same comfort his body yearned to give her.
“They’re gone, Savannah,” he told her brusquely. Harshly. “Your great grandmother and my wife are both gone.”
The sooner she dealt with that hard fact of life, the better off they’d both be. Maybe then he wouldn’t feel the compulsion to gather her into his arms as if she was a lost little girl. To kiss her and whisper that everything was going to be okay, when it would never be okayagain. This wasn’t a fairytale. To emphasize his intention, he pulled away from her grasp.
Letting him go, she tipped her head to the side. The beads around her neck mimicked the sway of her long straight hair brushing over one shoulder like an ebony waterfall he didn’t dare touch. But oh, how he wanted to.
“No, they’re not, Keller,” she murmured softly. Sweetly. “The dead don’t leave us behind when they die, not if they truly loved us when they were alive. That’s not how the universe works. I thought you of all people knew better. They stay close, and they smile, and they laugh with us when we’re happy. They cry with us when we’re sad, and they stay with us when we’re scared. The energy of true love doesn’t evaporate into nothingness. It can’t because it’s the only thing in the universe that’s real. Better than any other force God created, He gave us love. And love transcends time, space, and the physical distance between where you are today and where you were when you last saw your wife. You are never alone, Keller. You never have been. That’s the point. God never wanted you or me to be alone. That’s why Gran Mere lingers, so does Carol Marie. Where do you think she would rather be?”
