Page 21 of Threatened

Nothing.

When she reached the diner, she was glad to see the parking lot full of cars. More people meant more protection, hopefully. She took out her phone and hit redial.

“I’m here,” she said when the thief picked up. “Where are you?”

“Around back, near the dumpsters,” the man said. “You better be alone. I’ll know if you’re not and you won’t like my punishment.”

Crap.She took a couple of deep breaths. Not ideal. Okay, bad. Very bad. Looked like she was meeting him in an alley after all. An image of Gage flashed in her mind again—so strong, so competent—and she almost called him, but stopped herself in the end. No. She could handle this. This was her problem. Besides, if he came, he’d have to bring the babies with them. She wasn’t going to be responsible for putting them in harm’s way.

Kylie exhaled slowly, then made her way down the side of the brick building, nodding to several patrons who passed her by on their way from their cars to the restaurant entrance. There must be a parking lot behind the building. Okay. That made her feel better. She wasn’t entirely alone here. People were close by. If there was danger, all she had to do was yell and they’d…

She rounded the corner and spotted a tall, strongly-built man leaning up against the dumpster. He straightened when he saw her, and her stomach nosedived to her toes as her mind whirled. Whoa. Wait a sec. She knew this guy. Or at least, she recognizedhim. He’d worked as a bodyguard for the husband of her client in Tokyo. But what the hell was he doing here in California? And why would he take her laptop?

The man snapped his fingers and pointed to a spot in front of him. She bristled at being beckoned like a dog, but went anyway, given the thug had a good one-hundred-fifty pounds of solid muscle on her.

“What do you want?” she asked, beyond caring that her voice was shaking at this point. “Who are you?”

“Who I am doesn’t matter. I’m here on behalf of my boss and your former employer, Mr. Hirohito.” With each word, he took a step closer to her, steering her away from her escape route and toward the brick wall of the restaurant. Dammit. This was not going according to her plan at all.

Think, Kylie. Think.

“Why would Mr. Hirohito send you here?” she asked, scanning the area as best she could. A large dumpster blocked one side and obscured them from view. On the other side was the thief. No. Not thief. Bodyguard. Crap. “What’s going on here? I don’t understand.”

“Where’s the footage?” he snarled close to her face.

“What footage? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her mind raced through her time in the Hirohito household. Mrs. Hirohito had seemed nice enough, if a little bit ditzy. She’d gone along with all of Kylie’s plans, and cost hadn’t been an issue. The one time Kylie had met the husband, he’d seemed a bit…off. Not in a weird way, in a “he’s hiding something way”. At the time, Kylie had brushed it aside as a difference in culture, but now…

Was Mr. Hirohito involved in criminal activities? They were rich beyond belief and the details had been sketchy as to exactly how he’d made his billions. Not that it was any of her business. Normally, Kylie gave her clients as much privacy as possible—it was a necessity in her line of business, with a clientele that insisted on discretion. But perhaps she needed to dig a bit deeper here, especially if it would keep her alive until she could find a way to get help.

“Where is it?” the bodyguard demanded as he loomed over her.

“You'll have to explain.” She was buying time to think and hoping to get something out of the brute. “What’s Mr. Hirohito involved in?”

“You know damned well what he’s involved in. You caught it all on camera, didn’t you? Said you were taking pictures for your work, but you were there spying on him.” He glared at her in a way that made her skin crawl. “Are you with the feds?”

“Uh.” The rough brick felt cold against her palms, and she scrabbled for the right answer. This guy thought she’d captured footage of some kind of illegal activity on her phone in Tokyo? With her sister’s death and things with Gage and the twins, she’d not had time to go back through and delete any of the photos or video she’d taken while in Japan. That would hopefully turn out to be good evidence for the feds if she got out of this alive.

Crap. Crap, crap. crap.

Bluff. She needed to bluff until she could come up with an escape plan. “Yes, I am with a federal agency, and my back-up is on the way. Unless you want to spend the rest of your life in prison, you better let me go—and return that laptop. It’s federal property.”

The thug narrowed his gaze on her, as if considering his options. Then a siren sounded in the distance, and he cursed under his breath. “Tell me where that footage is, or you’ll regret it.”

She had a list of regrets, but she had to keep going with this part she was playing.

“If you turn yourself in now, they might give you a lighter sentence,” she managed to get out before his hand clamped tight around her neck, pinning her to the wall. From the corner of her eye, she saw a metallic flash, and her already rapid pulse skyrocketed. Her mind whirled and flashes of scenes from all those stupid cop shows she liked to watch at night filled her head. “You don’t want to do that. The murder of a federal officer means life in prison without parole,” she gasped as his fingers tightened. She pulled her threat out of nowhere in her adrenaline-fueled terror. “Let me go.”

He chuckled, a sinister sound. “Mr. Hirohito sent me to take care of this, and I will—one way or another. I always get the job done.”

12

After nearly an hour went by and Kylie hadn’t returned, Gage started to feel uneasy. It seemed odd, especially after the night they’d spent together. But then, she had acted a little nervous that morning, a little flustered. Morning after awkwardness? That was probably it. She just needed time to think things through and sort it all out.

He'd certainly needed that. For once, he hadn’t minded getting up before dawn with the twins. He’d taken his time bathing them and getting them dressed then feeding them, all the while running through all the possible scenarios the morning after with Kylie could take.

Last night had been… Well, last night had been pretty damned amazing, truth be told. But he wasn’t the kind of guy to get carried away with his emotions. In fact, just the opposite. The guys on his SEAL team used to tease him all the time about being too cold and robotic. At the time, it hadn’t bothered him. Hell, it got him through the day a lot of times, when the work they did was just too horrific for words. But now, with the twins in his life and under his care, he wanted to be better. He wanted to showthem all the love and affection and belonging his uncle had tried so hard to give him as a kid.

And in order for things to be the way he wanted—for the twins and for himself—he’d begun to think over the past few days that maybe having help wasn’t such a bad thing. Kylie’s help, specifically. There was no one better than the kids’ aunt to be with them, and he…he cared for her.

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