Sheltered

Chapter Four

For the first time since throwing in with the Corcoran Team, Holt seriously considered not showing up at the prearranged time for a meeting the next morning. This one took place two towns over. He’d lost his tail easily and doubled back, circled around. Now he stood in the storage room of a hardware store with his men, waiting for them to snap out of their joint stupor.

He’d known the crap storm he’d wade into the second he opened his mouth and filled them in on what had happened last night, including the part where he camped out on Lindsey’s couch. He stuck to the facts and rapid-fired his way through them in his oral report.

Fallout time.

“You did what?” Shane Baker, Holt’s best friend and the man he trusted most in the world, looked as if he couldn’t fight off his smile.

The openmouthed staring had given way to smirks, which meant Holt needed a new topic of conversation. “Let’s move on.”

“When do we get to give you a hard time for picking a woman over the job?”

Holt reassessed his decision to lay out all the facts. He should have skipped right over the Lindsey piece, but Shane was about to walk into town playing the role of an old military buddy. For the fake romantic relationship with Lindsey to work, Shane needed to play along. That meant coming clean...unfortunately.

“Never,” Holt said, wondering how to regain control of the conversation. Taking on two of them made it tough.

The snorting sound came the second before Shane’s response. “Wrong answer.”

Cameron Roth, the team’s flying expert, shook his head. “Sorry, man. It’s happening.”

Holt thought he’d at least have an ally in Cam. The guy had run into a similar situation with a woman and a mess followed by a rescue three months before. “Should we talk about you and Julia and how you had us all racing through an abandoned shipyard to save you?”

“Huh.” Cam made a face. “That’s not how I remember it.”

Shane held up a hand. “Wait, are you comparing your situation with Lindsey to Cam’s sad lovesick whining over Julia?”

Cam shook his head again. “I don’t remember that either.”

“Oh, please.” Shane took a seat on a stack of boxes balanced against a wall. “You fell in love and got stupid.”

Holt felt a punch of relief when Shane and Cam went after each other and jumped over him. Comparing his relationship with Lindsey to the one shared by Cam and Julia, a couple on the verge of getting engaged, did not amount to a good strategy. But he’d dodged that disaster.

Now he needed his men back on track, and fast. “We’re on limited time here.”

Fully engaged now, Shane crossed one ankle over the other and leaned in. “Then let’s get back to your cover.”

Not exactly where Holt wanted to take the next round of conversation. “What about it? It’s intact.”

“Do we know that or are you going to get called in to see the boss at the camp and get shot?” Cam asked.

“The thing with Lindsey makes me more interesting to management.” Being followed ever since he left Lindsey’s house clued Holt in. He’d gone from being one of the many faceless men roaming around the campground handling odd jobs to a person they watched.

Not that the person following him could be called an expert. No, the guy closed in too fast and showed too much interest. He also managed to pick a vehicle Holt recognized as regularly being parked in Simon Falls’s private garage. Not a New Foundations company vehicle but one Holt had already staked out during his late-night recon on the property.

Shane frowned. “Which is the problem, since the point was to blend.”

“This is better.” Every minute Holt became more convinced and he’d get Connor on board in the next hour or so.

Lindsey’s intel placed a target—whatever it was, and he’d get that out of her soon enough—on her forehead. That put Holt in the middle, and if he was going to sit there he might as well use the position.

The system worked like a circle. He wanted the information Lindsey possessed, and now someone at New Foundations would want to know what he knew. Either that or eliminate him, and Holt had no intention of letting that option happen.

Shane’s frown deepened with each question. “How can the impromptu plan you’re using now be better than the one we worked out for a week, taking all contingencies into account?”

All contingencies except Lindsey. Nothing prepared Holt for her, but he didn’t volunteer that piece of information.

“Because under his new plan he gets to sleep at Lindsey’s house.” Cam twisted the top off the water bottle in his hand. “She is the prize here.”

“It’s not like that.” And Holt would work very hard to keep it that way. He was not a dating guy and he never fooled around on a job.

Cam saluted him with the water bottle. “Yet.”

The man-to-man look from Cam made Holt worry they’d never stay on task, so he looked to Shane for help. “I need you on this.”

“What’s the ‘this’ you’re talking about?”

“Watching over Lindsey when I can’t.” Holt had to keep up the job at the camp. That meant leaving her without protection. Enter Hank Fletcher’s old friend in town for a few weeks.

The cover gave Shane an excuse to hang around. Cam could continue to fly tourists around on the helicopter while really conducting aerial searches of the campground and surrounding areas.

“Does she know she’s about to get a second roommate?” Shane asked.

Since she barely wanted one man in the house, Holt hadn’t exactly jumped at offering details between coffee and cereal at the kitchen sink this morning. “No.”

“Can I be there when she finds out you plan to spring me on her?” Shane’s smile could only be described as annoying.

Holt hid a wince. “Go away.”

“Make up your mind.” Shane dragged out the sing-songy voice. “You want me to stay. You want me to go.”

“To the public we were in the military together. Met there, served and remained friends through everything.” Connor and Joel had set up the cover. “Now you’re out and looking for a place to land, but you were there when I shot the locals in Afghanistan. You think I got a raw deal.”

New Foundations sought out disgruntled men with skills. That meant Holt had needed a story that fit the type. And since he had a horror story of his own in his past, it wasn’t all that hard to call up those feelings of frustration.

The difference was he didn’t blame the army for what had happened to him. In real life, he’d been the one left to die by someone he trusted. In his cover story, he did the killing. He hated both end results, but he’d lived with the realities of one of them for years now.

“You said that’s the story to the public. Interesting word choice.” Cam and Shane started talking at the same time, but Cam rushed to finish first. “Are you saying you’re going to tell Lindsey who I really am?”

Didn’t matter who spoke up, because the answer didn’t change. “She already knows my real name and about Corcoran.”

“How did that happen again?” Cam asked.

And that brought them right back to where the conversation had started. Instead of staying on the ride, Holt jumped off and started doing what he did best—issuing orders.

He looked at Cam. “You keep up the flights. Take photos. Send them back to Joel and Connor and see if they can make sense of what you’re seeing.”

Joel Kidd took the lead on Corcoran’s tech needs. He could make sense out of nonsense better than anyone Holt knew. And Connor was just about the most competent man on the planet. Holt trusted them to help all the way from Maryland.

“And what about Lindsey?”

“What are you talking about?” But Holt got Cam’s point. Connor led Corcoran by a few simple rules to get the job done—collect all the information you can before going in, trust your team and know that Connor would come behind you and clean up the mess.

“The Maryland office, Joel in particular, needs to rip her life apart. Investigate her.” Shane slipped into protocol-speak. When no one said anything, he looked around the closed-in room. “What, am I wrong?”

Cam shook his head. “He isn’t.”

Not in the mood for an argument, Holt conceded. He’d planned to conduct some research into Lindsey and her past. He’d just hoped to do it on a limited basis, without the entire Corcoran Team watching. Apparently that was not going to happen. “Fine.”

“She’s going to love it when she finds out we’re digging into her past,” Shane said.

Holt knew the easy answer for that. “We’re not going to tell her.”

“Yeah, I’ve found that’s not the best strategy with women. You think it’ll be fine, but it never works out that way.” Cam clapped a hand against Holt’s shoulder. “But you keep living in your fantasy world and thinking you control this thing with her.”

“I can.” Holt was impressed with how strong his voice sounded.

Cam shook his head. “I almost feel bad for you.”

* * *

LINDSEY SLIPPED OUT onto her porch later that evening. The sun had started to set and a stray cool breeze kicked up. Summers this close to the water and tucked into the base of the woods meant still needing a sweater some nights.

For as long as she could remember, she’d loved sitting outside, watching the sun go down. After years of living at the campground and adhering to all the rules, she enjoyed her freedom. No early morning rising for chores and gun practice. No lectures.

But tonight the air carried a chill and it cut right through her. She’d spent the day making contingency plans if she had to move out without notice. She’d contacted the former New Foundations members she helped place in alternative living situations and gone over the go codes and emergency evacuation drills.

Somewhere in there she’d done some research on Holt and the Corcoran Team. Not that there was much to find on him, but she’d had some luck on his group.

She walked over to where he stood by the edge, staring out into the yard and across the black water of the small lake fifty feet in front of it. He leaned with his palms resting against the railing. The move had him bending slightly, showing off those shoulders and his very impressive backside.

The faded jeans balancing on those hips. The muscles rippling to the point she could see them through the thin fabric of his T-shirt. She’d never noticed a man’s clothes before, but on him she noticed everything.

She stood even with him and listened to the sound of animals scurrying in the dark and the steady brush of leaves blowing in the wind. “So you’re always going to be hanging around here when you’re not working.”

He nodded without looking at her. “For now, pretty much.”

Even though his stance appeared relaxed, something about him seemed to be on high alert. She could feel the energy pulse off him. Watch his gaze as he scanned the area from one side to the other.

With him around she felt safe, and that was new. She’d learned early to depend on herself. Not expect anything. Hide and run and adapt. That had been her mantra to the day she found her way back to Justice, Oregon, only a few miles from the place that defined so much of who she was and how she saw the world.

As the months ticked by, exhaustion settled in. She helped other members of New Foundations get out. Laid the groundwork and found them new living arrangements. Through her past had the contacts to change identities and keep them safe.

She’d only worked with a few because breaking the silence barrier at the compound proved almost impossible. She had to wait until someone said something to someone and it filtered through contacts back to her. Then came weeks of secret meetings as she built trust.

The whole strategy could be tedious and never amounted to enough. The campground still loomed.

But last night, for the first time in years, she slept without moving and jerking and waking up every few hours. She wanted to think handling the two armed men who stormed her house had something to do with it, but she knew a large thank-you went to Holt. He’d stayed on her couch and kept his promises. Harm did not come knocking and he did not do anything to scare her.

And now they’d arrived at night number two. “I’ve decided it’s okay for you to stay.”

He threw her the side eye before going back to his visual tour of the property in front of them. “You just figured that out now?”

It was amazing how she could start thinking good things about him and working up a warm fuzzy feeling and then he’d talk and—boom—the goodwill fizzled. Communicating did not appear to be where they excelled. “I looked into the Corcoran Team.”

He turned then. Stood up and gave her his full attention. “Okay.”

“I’m thinking I saw a sanitized version, like the version you and your people were okay with me seeing, but I was able to find some references.” After an internet search turned up bland and unhelpful results, she’d called in some favors to help her get through a firewall or two. She had a bit of inside information on the group.

“That’s kind of the point. It’s hard to work undercover, which we sometimes need to do, if everyone can find your face all over social media.”

“Makes sense.” And the information she’d found bore that out. The group had taken on huge companies and small governments, the NCIS and government contractors. The only allegiance the members appeared to have was to each other. “Even confirmed your existence on the team with your boss.”

That had been an interesting exercise. She’d seen a few references to Connor Bowen, the owner and leader, and to one other member of the team, a former NCIS agent, but no one else. There could be two guys on the team or two hundred and there was no way for her to tell just by searching around.

The wall of secrecy extended to the team’s location and exactly what they could do and how much the government knew about their work. There had been exactly one photo, an older one of Connor Bowen. He had the tall, dark and handsome thing down. Looking at Holt, Lindsey wondered if “speech-stealing hot” was some sort of job requirement for this group.

Connor’s deep and reassuring voice had matched the confident look he wore in the photo. He hadn’t sounded all that shocked about Holt giving away his identity, but Connor had made her repeat three times the part about Holt playing the role of her fake boyfriend. She’d swear he’d laughed.

“Wait a minute.” Holt shook his head as if trying to assess what she’d just said. “Connor actually talked with you?”

“Well, finding the number proved impossible. I had to call other agencies and do a bunch of internet searches, all which pointed to the fact the Corcoran Team didn’t have a number I could access. To the extent anyone admitted Corcoran even existed. Then right when I gave up, the phone rang and Connor was on the line.” The whole thing had a Big-Brother-is-watching feel that freaked her out. “Spooky, by the way.”

“Joel tracks all searches for Corcoran. He lets people see only what he wants them to see so he can monitor and do some looking of his own.”

She had no idea who that was, but her mind went to a bigger question. “Searches where?”

A faint smile crossed Holt’s mouth. “Everywhere.”

“The information lockdown is a bit intimidating.” She could think of a few more words, but that seemed like the nicest.

“Just as Connor wants it.”

“Well, he didn’t seem happy about me bugging him, but yes. He answered my questions...sort of.” The man had sounded downright stunned when she insisted she needed some sort of verification of Holt’s identity. She could only assume other people saw Holt’s imposing form and I’m-in-charge swagger and capitulated without a fight.

Not her. If he wanted that kind of woman, she was not his type...not that he served as anything other than a bodyguard for her.

“I filled him in on the status of the assignment an hour ago.” Holt started to say something else, then stopped.

“He must have called me right after that.” Or at least that was what he’d told her. “Apparently you told him you broke cover.”

Holt switched to frowning. Something he excelled at to the point of being an expert. “You’re sounding sort of official there.”

“I borrowed his phrase.” If she could remember more, she’d throw them out, too.

“So now you know I’m legitimate and we can stop arguing about that, right?” Holt’s gaze returned to the yard and the shuffling of dirt in the distance.

She shrugged even though the gesture was wasted. He didn’t even give her eye contact. “For now.”

Without seeming to move, he angled his body. Stood partway in front of her, blocking her body from the quiet night beyond them. “I’m at a disadvantage here. You know about me and you’re not coughing up any details about yourself.”

“Noticed that, did you?”

He winked at her. “Don’t let the shoulders fool you. I’m not as slow as I look.”

That zapped the amusement right out of her. “You’re not going to forget I said that, are you?”

“No way.”

She rushed to fix her mess. “What I meant was—”

He pinned her in place with a quick glance. “I know what you meant.”

The guy could stop looking like that. So determined and...big. He crowded in on her on the large open porch without even moving. Something about the way he held his body and aimed that intense stare had her squirming.

“Clearly you don’t have a problem with ego.” She wished he taught a class in that, because she’d be in the front row.

“I know mutual attraction when I see and feel it.”

“Mutual?” That struck her as such a tame term for the need that had pulsed through her ever since he arrived in town.

She knew how many times a day her mind wandered and his face popped into her head. From the first time she’d seen him, picking out a muffin and ordering black coffee from the deli she helped manage, her common sense took a nosedive. One look at him and every vow she’d ever made about staying focused on her quest died a withering death.

He shook his head. “You are not going to derail this conversation.”

“I can try.”

“You might...” His head snapped back in the direction he’d been looking for the past few minutes. Far left behind the shed.

“What is it?” She dropped her voice to a whisper that barely carried over the sound of her breathing.

“Company.”

“Are you kidding?” She wanted to scream, shout...find her gun. She went with listening instead. Not her strongest skill, but at least it was something she could control while the world seemed to be bouncing around at random.

“I’ve been tracking the person for about fifteen minutes.”

The constant visual search and the thrum of awareness running through him made sense. Still, the fact that the guy could chat while conducting surveillance and not show any signs of anxiety confused her. “While we were talking?”

“Then and before.”

Well, sure. He acted as if that were normal. “You could warn a person.”

“Time to move.”

She almost didn’t hear the whispered comment, but she did see the change come over him. It was as if he switched from being on watch to back to normal again, which made no sense to her at all.

“I think we should call it a night and go inside.” His voice picked up a bit in volume. Not enough to be obvious, but a slight beat or two more than before.

She’d rather go with that gun idea. “Absolutely.”

She pitched her voice nice and strong even as her insides shook. The touch of his hand right before he wrapped an arm around her shoulders helped. He guided them through the front door and inside. She didn’t remember moving until he shut the door behind her.

He reached down to his ankle and pulled up with a gun in his hand. That was when she noticed he held two. His dark eyes flashed with fire as he morphed from the calm guy standing outside, getting some air, back to the fierce protector. She approved of the change. And she finally got it. The last part had been an act to let whoever lingered out there think he was safe.

He handed her a gun. “You know how to use it?”

“Yes.” A whole range of guns. Guns, knives, some explosives. The New Foundations leadership didn’t bother with subtleties back when she got stuck up there. You learned how to fight because weak people were useless to the cause. She just never really understood what the cause was supposed to be.

As soon as the gun hit her palm, she checked it. The magazine, the chamber. This weapon didn’t belong to her, but she’d be able to pull the trigger. She was not afraid to do what had to be done to protect herself.

Holt positioned her in the doorway between the kitchen and the family room. She had her back against a solid wall and a clear view of the door and a patch of the front yard through the window within her line of sight.

This guy was good. He knew exactly how to keep on the offensive. She didn’t think she could find him more attractive, but in that moment she did.

“Stay here.” He held out a hand as if to keep her in place even though he never touched her. “Shoot anyone who is not me. Aim for the leg to make him hobble or the hand to make him drop the gun.”

That bordered on insulting. “I’m a better shot than that.”

“It’s a risk to keep the guy breathing, but I need him alive for questioning.” Holt delivered his comment and then slipped away from her.

For a big man, he moved without making a sound. Even the floorboards that usually creaked didn’t. He shifted and stalked around her furniture and through the room until he disappeared.