LITMIR.BIZ

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about cars, and I thought...well, I guess I didn’t think at all.”

      “The conversation’s over,” Wade said to his uncle, but his eyes locked on Lacey.

      “I’ll just go in and see if Veronica and Cora need some help with dinner.” Clay escaped the room without a reply from anyone.

      “Hey, Secrets, you didn’t have to be so rude,” Lacey spouted. “Your uncle was just trying to take my mind off my pain. What are you so hushed up about anyway?”

      “The walls have ears, and you never know who’s listening. You want to know what happened to Jeff? That’s what happened to him.”

      Her first clue had come when she least expected it. Lacey snapped to attention, nearly sputtering when she asked, “What was he saying? Who was listening?”

      Wade’s eyes jumped from window to window as though he was trying to see out into the darkness beyond the glass. If Lacey hadn’t been shot at and nearly pushed over a cliff tonight, she would say this man was paranoid and uttering conspiracy-theory nonsense. But under the circumstances, she looked out the windows, too.

      “I’m sending you home on a plane tomorrow,” he said. “You are not to come back. Ever. Live your life. It’s what your brother would want you to do.”

      “Shows you what you know. My brother left me something with a note with your name on it. That tells me I’m doing exactly what he would want me to do. Find the answers.”

      “What’d he leave you?”

      “This.” Lacey reached into her blouse and pulled out a long chain with the small key dangling from it.

      All in the same breath, Wade yanked her arm toward him as the glass around them shattered into millions of pieces.

      Lacey landed on a thud and realized it was Wade’s hard chest. He’d brought her down with him in a maneuver that had saved her life. It was as though he knew she’d made herself a target...again. She looked up to see the shattered windshield of the British roadster behind her, right where she’d been standing.

      Another blast and more shattering deafened her ears. Lacey covered her head with her arms as Wade moved her to the floor. He dragged himself along the concrete on his elbows to the wall and a safe. After a few turns of the lock, the door opened to show rows of keys. He grabbed a set and shimmied back to her as Promise came through the door, crouched low on her haunches, as well. As soon as she saw her handler, she took up her post beside him.

      “Stay low and get to the Ferrari,” he ordered.

      Lacey followed without complaint.

      Bullets came from both the front and back. Car windows exploded around them. Whoever the goons were, they had the house surrounded and didn’t plan on leaving anything or anyone in one piece.

      Wade opened the door and Lacey crawled through, keeping her body down as she crossed over the driver’s seat. Promise found her place on the floor of the front seat, and Wade got behind the wheel. As soon as he had the car started, he had it in gear and flying out through the broken glass.

      Bullets hit the car, but he tore down the driveway and out onto the road in a flash. He couldn’t have picked a better vehicle, Lacey thought. It went sixty miles an hour in 3.9 seconds. They would be out of these woods in no time.

      Except when they hit the road, Wade actually slowed down.

      He reached into one of the many pockets on his army combat coat and pulled out a cell phone. One tap of a number dialed someone, and immediately Roni could be heard yelling.

      Wade stopped her and said, “We’re okay. Stay in the safe room and call the police. Don’t worry about us. You got this, Roni.” He clicked off and pocketed the phone.

      He drove in silence, obviously not willing to elaborate about what a safe room was...and why he had one. Lacey could only figure it was one of those secret passages Clay had mentioned to her. At least Roni, Clay and Cora would be safe, if the room lived up to its title. That only left her and Wade out in the open.

      She searched through the rear window, but it remained dark and empty. Even still, she asked, “Can’t you go a little faster?”

      “It’s not always about speed,” he replied.

      She sputtered. “Yes, it is.”

      After a quick, tacit look her way, he went back to giving the road his full attention, conversation over.

      As they passed through the quiet little town of Norcastle, Lacey noticed the sparkling colored lights strung from some of the old storefronts and homes. In her nervous ride into town earlier, she hadn’t paid much attention. Now she speculated with the huge factories along the river that Norcastle had once been an old mill town. The mill buildings looked to be lit up as apartments now. The town obviously had seen some reconstruction after a period of low economic times, but they seemed to be flourishing better now. Before Lacey could ask about it, Wade took a turn for the interstate.

      “Where are we going?”

      “Virginia,” he answered, short but not sweet.

      “What’s in Virginia? Is that where the musclemen are from?”

      “No. It’s where I’m from. And it’s also where the locker is that your key, or I should say my key, belongs to. Buckle up. We have a long drive.”

      Lacey peered over at the speedometer and rolled her eyes. “At the speed you’re going, you’re right. This could take forever.”

THREE

      “Merry Christmas.” Wade pulled away from the drive-through doughnut shop, passing over a steaming paper cup to Lacey. Her long dark lashes blinked over her sleep-fogged eyes as she roused from her slumber with a wide yawn. She looked at the cup in his hand quizzically. “Coffee,” he said. “Black. I figured that’s the way you liked it.”

      She arched a dark eyebrow at his presumption of her drink tastes, but quickly unhooked her arm from his uncle’s makeshift sling so she could grab the warm cup in both hands. She averted her gaze to the passenger window while she sipped. Her deep sigh proved he’d been dead on about the not-so-dainty Lacey’s coffee tastes.

      “Thank you,” she mumbled after another sip, her deep Southern voice resonating through the cabin. Such a strong voice for a small woman, he thought. But it was good that she was small. As it was, her legs were plastered to the door because Promise and her seventy-pound frame took up most of the confined space. Wade was glad to see Lacey give the dog room, even if that meant an uncomfortable ride for herself. “And I guess I should say Merry Christmas to you, too. I suppose this is not how you planned on spending the holiday, or your military leave, for that matter. Not that I care.” She turned his way, her chin lifted. “Because I don’t.”

      With his view to the road, he hoped she couldn’t see him suppress a smile. “Of course not. Why would you? But let me set the record straight, just so you don’t lose any more sleep over my missed holiday, while you’re not caring, of course. They’re not my plans. They’re my sister’s. I’d just as soon have stayed on base. So my plans didn’t work out anyway this year.”

      “I always say making plans is useless,” she said, taking another sip. “Just go unless God tells you no. That’s my motto.”

      Wade huffed at her silly remark. “No offense, Lacey, but I don’t think your motto’s working for you.”

      “Offense taken. You don’t know anything about me.” She took off the handkerchief and tossed it at him. He picked it up off his lap and stuffed it into his combat jacket’s bottom-right pocket. Apparently, he’d touched on some nerve, but why stop there?

      “I know all I need to know about you. You came north on Christmas Eve with nothing but a key and not a thought to what you might be venturing into. You

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