LITMIR.BIZ

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piece of music came on. Over it, she heard the rattle of ice cubes in fine crystal. She felt another jolt of concern. Lorenzo was making himself a drink? Something was definitely going on.

      Moving silently along the thick carpet, she crept to the landing at the top of the stairs that overlooked the living room. She gripped the gun tighter in her hand as she held her breath and peeked over the railing.

      Lorenzo stood in front of the fireplace with his back to her. He held a drink in his hand, his gaze apparently on the fire, an anxious set to his shoulders.

      He was a large man. Just the thought of his big hands on her made her stomach roil. Her finger skittered over the trigger of the gun as she raised it and sighted down the barrel, pointing it right where his heart should have been.

      You can’t kill him. Not in cold blood.

      She wasn’t so sure about that. Not after five years with Lorenzo. Not after everything he’d done to her.

      She thought about him turning and seeing her, seeing the gun. She could imagine the smirk on his face, could imagine him taunting her. He wouldn’t believe she could kill him.

      Even with a gun in her hand, he wouldn’t see her as a threat. He thought he knew her so well, figured she would be too afraid to come after what he’d taken from her.

      But she also knew him. Maybe better than he knew her. She knew his one weakness: arrogance. He’d been so brazen to come back here—to not even try to hide from her. Because he had the courts and the police where he wanted them. Jenna had learned the hard way that she couldn’t beat him through the system.

      And because of that, he thought he had Jenna where he wanted her, as well. That was her edge. That’s why she had to move fast.

      She lowered the gun, sliding it back into her jacket pocket, and turning, stole down the hallway again. As she started past the master bedroom, she noticed once more that the door was open. Lorenzo’s suit jacket was lying across the bed. She slipped into the room and moved to the nightstand on Lorenzo’s side.

      Reaching into the space behind the table, her fingers brushed across duct tape and cold steel. She ripped Lorenzo’s gun off the back of the stand and peeled the sticky tape from the grip.

      She didn’t need to check if it was fully loaded; she knew it was. Lorenzo was meticulous about that sort of thing. But she looked, anyway. Tonight she wasn’t taking any chances.

      The gun was loaded. She slid the safety off with a soft click. Pointed it at the open doorway, slipping her finger through the guard, caressing the trigger, getting the feel of the larger, heavier piece.

      Then she lowered the gun, snapped the safety back on and stuck the weapon into the waistband of her black jeans, so it was covered by the tail of her jacket.

      As she started to leave the room, she saw something that stopped her cold. When Lorenzo had thrown his suit jacket on the bed, something had fallen from the pocket. At first all she saw were the passports.

      With trembling fingers she picked up the top one and saw Lorenzo’s photograph, but with an entirely different name.

      She began to shake harder as she picked up the second passport and opened it. Tears of fury sprang to her eyes at the sight of the photograph.

      Bastard. He was planning to skip the country. That’s what was up. That’s why he was feeling vulnerable tonight. His “associates” must not know his plans, because Lorenzo belonged to an organization that knew only one type of retirement program: death.

      Unless he had made some kind of deal to buy his way out.

      But the passports weren’t the only things that had been in his jacket pocket, she saw. She pulled out two airline tickets and had to steady herself when she saw the date Lorenzo had booked for a one-way flight to South America. Tomorrow.

      Shaking furiously, she ripped up the tickets and threw them into the wastebasket beside the bed. Then she pocketed both passports and hurried down the hallway to the smaller bedroom. As she opened the door, she could see the slight rounded shape under the covers in the glow of the nightlight. Her heart lodged in her throat at the sight of her sleeping child.

      Jenna eased the door closed behind her and tried to stop shaking, angrily fighting back tears.

      She moved quickly to her daughter’s side. She couldn’t let Lexi see her anger. Or her fear.

      The silky dark hair was spread out on the pillow, the little face that of a cherub. Lexi had one arm around her beloved rag doll, Clarice. The other was looped around the neck of her cat, Fred.

      Fred looked up as Jenna stepped deeper into the room, and let out a loud meow.

      Jenna hurried to the baby monitor and shut it off.

      Fred blinked at her with huge golden eyes.

      “Lexi,” she whispered as she knelt over the bed. “Wake up, sweetie.”

      Lexi’s lashes fluttered, then suddenly flew open. Her dark eyes widened in surprise. “Mommy? Daddy wouldn’t let me see you.” Her lower lip pushed out into a pout. “He said you had gone away.”

      Jenna hushed her. “It’s you and me who are going away, sweetie. But it’s a secret. We have to be very quiet, okay?”

      Lexi nodded and threw back the covers as she sat up. She was wearing the little yellow ducks pj’s Jenna had bought her. The same ones she’d been wearing last night, when Lorenzo had broken into her apartment and taken Lexi.

      “I need you to be very quiet,” Jenna told her daughter. “We don’t want to wake up Daddy.”

      Lexi nodded and put a chubby finger to her lips. “Shh.”

      Jenna picked up her daughter, hugging her tightly as she breathed in the sweet smell. Lexi felt solid in her arms. Safe. At least for the moment.

      “Come on,” Jenna whispered. “Remember, we have to be really quiet, okay?”

      Lexi nodded, clutching her rag doll. “Is Daddy coming with us?” she asked in a small voice.

      Jenna looked at her daughter’s face. “No.” She saw the instant relief and her heart broke. “Did Daddy hurt you?”

      The child shook her head, her lower lip pushed out again. “He yelled and made me cry.”

      Jenna hugged her. “Well, he won’t make you cry again.” She stepped to the door of her daughter’s bedroom and started to open it.

      “Fred!” Lexi cried. “I can’t leave Fred.”

      Jenna groaned inwardly. She’d never been a big fan of cats. Lorenzo had bought the kitten for Lexi, knowing Jenna wasn’t allowed to have a cat in the apartment where she’d been living with Lexi since the divorce.

      “Alexandria will have to come over to the house to see her cat,” Lorenzo had said.

      Which meant Jenna would have to come as well, since Lorenzo only had supervised visitation. He’d gotten the cat to force Jenna back to the estate—a place she had grown to abhor.

      Now she stepped back into the room and, with her free hand, picked up Fred from the bed. He complained loudly as she hooked him into the crook of her arm.

      She waited until he settled down before she opened the bedroom door and glanced down the hall. Empty. She could still hear the classical music.

      She crept along the back hall, then down the stairs. She was almost to the back door when she heard an approaching car coming up the service road. Was it possible Lorenzo had called for a delivery this late at night?

      Moving to the window, Jenna peered out as headlights flashed. The whine of an engine rose, then died as the car pulled in directly behind hers.

      No! Whoever it was had blocked her car in.

      The police? Or some private patrol?

      But

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