LITMIR.BIZ

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red hair. Lacey saw glitz and glamour racing toward her, or maybe it was the crystal chandelier sparkling down on the lady. Either way, Lacey didn’t care who she was as long as she wasn’t Wade Spencer.

      Lacey pushed at the man still holding her in his arms. She moaned through the burn at her shoulder but kept her face averted, unwilling to give him even a glint of attention.

      “Roni,” he called over her head. “She took a bullet. I need to lay her down.”

      Surprise quickly washed away to efficiency on the fancy lady’s face. “It’ll be faster to use Cora’s room down here than to take her upstairs. Follow me.”

      They stormed through two living rooms and entered a huge dining room with more crystal bling. An older woman was setting the table with white-and-gold china. Her maid outfit said she wasn’t the mother of the house. She nearly dropped the plate when they stormed through.

      “Cora, we’re using your room,” Roni said as she passed down the long table. “Call 911 and tell them someone’s been shot.”

      A shocked Cora put the plate down and reached for her phone in her apron pocket. As Lacey was carried past her, she said, “God bless you, my dear.” Lacey could hear her talking to the dispatcher before they hit an enormous stainless-steel kitchen. She wondered where the bedrooms were if they deemed this course faster. The immensity of the place didn’t constitute a house but a mansion.

      It would appear her brother’s killer wasn’t hurting.

      “What’s her name?” Roni called over her shoulder.

      “Ms. Phillips,” Wade said.

      “Lacey,” Lacey answered in unison. “And I don’t need him speaking for me.”

      “Whoa.” The woman shot a glance over her shoulder, the arches of her red sculpted eyebrows nearly reaching the twelve-foot-high ceilings. “Did you shoot this woman, Wade?”

      “Of course not,” he answered.

      With a look of doubt, Roni led them to the next room. “Lay her on the bed. Gently. Good. Now, where’s your gun?”

      “I said I didn’t shoot her,” Wade retorted over Lacey.

      “And I said, where’s your gun?” Roni spoke clearly and forcefully right back at him from the other side.

      Wade clamped his jaw tight, but in the next second he reached behind his back and withdrew a .38 caliber from the waistband. He dropped it into the bedside-table drawer with an “are you happy now?” look.

      Lacey sensed the argument going on above her was a common one between the two of them. For some reason, Roni didn’t want Wade carrying. Did Roni know about Wade’s past offenses?

      Before Lacey could ask, pain exploded from her arm. Roni brought Lacey’s coat down the injured arm.

      Lacey hissed in response, then through gritted teeth said, “It doesn’t matter if he carries or not, you know. He goes for a more secretive and calculated way of bumping people off.” She sneered at the man on her right and got her first real glimpse of him in full light.

      Jet-black hair in a military cut, electric-blue eyes in a well-shaven face, a dimple on the right cheek even without a smile.

      “He knows it’s not other people I’m worried about,” Roni said, pulling Lacey’s attention back to her.

      Lacey grew quiet at her remark. If not other people, then who?

      Himself?

      She took in the six-foot-tall man. His face gave nothing away, but his muscles beneath his black T-shirt tensed and shook. Was it from more than adrenaline?

       Snip...snip...

      Lacey shot a look back at Roni. She was cutting the sleeve of Lacey’s cotton sweater, starting from the wrist up.

      “Hey! Can you make him leave first?”

      Roni cast her matching blue eyes over to Wade. “I’ve bandaged enough wounds. Why don’t you check on Cora.”

      “Not a bullet wound, you haven’t. I know what to do. You don’t. I’m not going anywhere until I’ve assessed the injury.”

      Lacey cut in, “Except I don’t want you anywhere near me.”

      He crossed his strong arms at his chest as his reply. His stolid face expressed no emotion as flawlessly as a Westminster guard on duty. The idea of the wolf guarding the henhouse nearly made her laugh. Then Lacey screamed out in pain as Roni’s fingers met wounded flesh on her upper arm.

      As Wade leaned across Lacey to inspect the area, his woodsy aftershave lingered in her face. She inhaled, then held her breath, partly to not smell any more of him, partly to keep in what she already had. She cringed at her softness. So what if he smelled good. It didn’t change the fact that he had blood on his hands.

      After a quick nod, Wade’s gaze dropped down from above her. Mere inches away, he said, “You’ll live.”

      “Don’t look so happy about it.”

      He didn’t even blink at her remark, but he did slowly pull away. “You said someone had been following you. When did you notice them?”

      Lacey sobered as she remembered her drive in. Roni’s opening of the first-aid kit became a focal point. “When I entered Norcastle. It was when they took the turnoff to come up here with me that I thought it strange two people would be traveling this far out at the same time. But they didn’t try to kill me until...” Lacey glanced at Wade. Maybe the incident had something to do with this man, and that was why he was so concerned. He was trying to cover his tracks.

      “Continue.”

      Lacey hesitated sharing any more while being unprotected in the man’s house. “Can’t this wait for the police?”

      “I’ll need to give them as many details as I can. They’ll need to know how to proceed.”

      “What other information would they possibly need other than someone took shots at me?”

      “Like why you think they took shots at you. Now tell me, they didn’t try to kill you until when?”

      Lacey lifted her chin. Since when did she hold back? “Fine. They plowed into me when I put my blinker on to turn into your driveway. Are you sure they weren’t friends of yours? Or rather, enemies? You must have a long list of them. I know I’m on it.”

      “Our driveway?” Roni piped up. “And what enemies? What is she talking about, Wade?”

      Wade raised a hand to silence Roni. “Just get her cleaned up. We’ll talk later.” He walked to the window and peered out.

      Or perhaps he was looking for those enemies he refused to talk about.

      He closed the blinds and stepped back against the wall. His folded arms at his chest exposed the strong, lean muscles that had lifted her with ease moments before, but now walled him off from everyone in the room.

      The man was hiding something.

      A stinging pain pulled Lacey’s attention back to her arm with a sharp inhale.

      Roni swabbed her wound with an alcohol wipe. “It’s a bad graze. It’ll most likely leave a scar. But I’ve always said there’s nothing wrong with scars.” She reached up with one hand in a latex glove that Lacey hadn’t even seen her put on. Blood covered the fingers.

      Her blood.

      As Lacey’s stomach dropped at the sight, Roni reached for the scarf at her neck without thought to soiling it. She pulled it free to reveal what lay beneath it.

      Scars.

      Puckered and mutilated skin gave way to a fiery incident that took Lacey’s mind off her own wound to question Roni’s.

      “What

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