Beth Cornelison – Soldier's Pregnancy Protocol (страница 3)

Alec held a hand up and shook his head slightly. “Inside.”

“After you.” She stepped back and waved him inside. “So, moonlighting as an elf?”

His expression was hard and unamused. Erin’s grin faltered. She had known Alec was remote, but his lack of humor was unsettling. Once inside, Alec placed the poinsettia on her end table and fiddled a bit with the bow before turning.

Erin waved a hand toward her unpacked boxes. “Sorry it’s such a mess. I haven’t finished in here. I thought the kitchen was—”

Alec turned his back to her and walked down the hall, opening closet doors and casting a sweeping gaze into each room. She followed him, bristling at his rudeness. He may have lived here once, but this was her home now.

“Looking for something, Santa?” She didn’t bother to hide the irritation in her voice. “I have your letter out here—” she hitched a thumb over her shoulder “—if that’s what—”

He closed the blinds in her bedroom before he faced her. “Have you noticed anyone hanging around the area? Any weird phone calls or strangers come by here?”

This from a man wearing red velvet pants and a fake white beard?

Erin couldn’t resist. “You mean stranger than you?”

He scowled and moved toward her. “Just answer the question. Have you seen anyone watching the house?”

A tingle of alarm skipped down her back. “No. Should I have?”

“Not necessarily.” He peeled off the faux beard, which he’d apparently applied with some sticky gluelike substance, and rubbed the black stubble on his square jaw. “Can I see the letter now?”

Erin stared at him, puzzling over his peculiar demeanor before backing toward the hall. “Sure. In here.”

She led him to the living room and collected his letter from the coffee table. When she thrust it toward him, he hissed and winced.

“I asked you not to touch it again,” he grated through his teeth. He took the letter from her carefully, holding it by the edges.

She gave her head a little shake and drew a slow breath. “Sorry.”

He grunted and bent his head to study the envelope.

Just humor him a little longer. Erin shifted her weight and rubbed her palms on the seat of her jeans. “So … you recognize the handwriting or anything?”

He didn’t answer at first, but when he raised his gaze, she’d swear she saw a flicker of emotion in his eyes. Her pulse stumbled.

“Never mind that,” he said huskily. “Don’t tell anyone I was here or say anything about having seen the letter. Understand?” A muscle in his rugged jaw twitched.

“Well … yeah. But why?”

His stern demeanor had returned so quickly, she wondered if she’d really seen the flash of pain and vulnerability she’d imagined.

“Just keep quiet about it. Do you have a zip-seal bag I can put this in?”

“A bag?”

“To preserve it.”

“In the kitchen. I’ll be right back.” Erin hustled past Alec, bemused by his dictate of silence.

When she returned with a zip-sealing sandwich bag, Alec gently slid the letter into it and tucked it inside the fuzzy lapel of the Santa suit. Immediately he headed for the door with a long-legged stride. “Remember, you never saw this letter. Keep your doors locked, and if you think you’re being followed, don’t take any chances. Go to the cops. Got it?”

Erin’s pulse did a little two-step in her chest. “Alec, is there a reason you think I might be followed or in danger? If so, I think I have a right to know what—”

“No.” Alec grimaced and sighed heavily. “I … just think women like you, who live alone, should … be careful.” He quirked his mouth up in a lopsided grin that looked more like a wince. “Merry Christmas.” Quickly he replaced the fake beard and shouldered through the front door, changing his gait as he stepped out on the porch to an old man’s shuffle.

“Thanks for the poinsettia, Al—uh, Santa.” Rolling her eyes, Erin closed the front door. “Weird.”

Maybe she was better off not dating if Alec was the sort of fruitcake that the bachelor world had to offer.

Her stomach rumbled. Mmm, fruitcake.

She glanced at her watch and decided to have a snack before doing any more unpacking. On her way into the kitchen, Erin stuck her finger in the soil around the poinsettia. Bone dry. Carrying the plant to the kitchen sink, she gave it a drink from the spray nozzle. While that water soaked in, she opened a cabinet and took down a glass.

A floorboard behind her creaked, her only warning before a powerful hand was clapped over her mouth. She loosed a muffled scream, and the glass fell to the floor, shattering.

“Shut up, and do what I say!” a low voice hissed. The hand over her mouth was removed, and a cool knife blade pressed against her throat. In the tinted glass of the microwave, Erin caught a reflection of the paunchy man behind her.

Her knees trembled, but she fought not to let them buckle. Not with the thug’s knife squeezing her jugular.

Focus. Don’t let fear win, she heard Bradley saying as clearly as if he were still around, goading her into doing another daring stunt. She remembered steeling her nerves to launch her hang glider on her first trip with Bradley, calming her jitters in order to think clearly the first time she parachuted solo. She had to muster the same clearheaded thinking now, despite her fear.

“Where’s LeCroix’s letter?” the man growled.

Her stomach churned as she recalled Alec’s warning. He’d known she would be in danger, yet he’d given her nothing but a warning to deny seeing his letter. Damn him!

“Wh-what letter?”

Her captor shook her, and the blade nicked her neck. His grip around her waist tightened.

Erin gasped and slid a protective hand to her lower abdomen.

A second man appeared from behind her and began ransacking her kitchen drawers.

“Come on, sweetheart. I know you called Kincaid. Now where’s Daniel LeCroix’s letter?”

“I don’t know anything about a letter. Please let me go!”

“Lady, either you talk now, or I’ll cut you until you tell us what we want. Where is the letter that was delivered here this afternoon?”

Erin whimpered as the knife pressed harder against her neck. She was out of her league here, as well as outnumbered. Her captor knew she was lying, had clearly tapped her phone, probably had been watching her house. Alec had suspected as much, ergo the disguise and the drawn blinds.

Whatever Alec was involved in, she wanted nothing to do with it or the seedy men who were after him. Despite Alec’s warning, she refused to anger these men by lying. She wouldn’t risk her life for something she knew nothing about.

“I don’t have the letter. Not anymore.”

Even as Alec adjusted the tiny listening device in his ear, he heard the growling threats against Erin, heard her give him up.

Damn. They’d been closer behind him than he’d thought.

“I swear. The letter isn’t here anymore,” Erin said, the fear in her voice coming clearly through the microphone hidden in the poinsettia. Alec thought of the shadows that had clouded Erin’s wide dark eyes as he’d left. The doubts. The vulnerability.

He cursed the twist of fate that had put Erin in the line of fire.

“Where is it?” the male voice growled.

“Alec has it. He just left. In a florist’s van.”

So much for denials. Alec finished stripping off the bulky Santa suit and fled the delivery van Erin had just identified. Checking the chamber of his SIG-Sauer pistol, Alec crept from behind the van to the cover of a large holly bush.

Don’t jeopardize the mission. If things go south, it’s every man for himself.

The principle wasn’t complicated. Easy enough to understand. Just not so easy to follow through on. Not when the man involved is your partner, your best friend.

Or an innocent woman with wounded, puppy-dog brown eyes.

Alec bit out an expletive. He couldn’t abandon Erin to the thugs who had her. Not when he was the one they wanted. Him—and Daniel’s letter. Though he knew civilian casualties were sometimes unavoidable in counterterrorism, he wasn’t ready to write Erin Bauer off as a cost of war just yet.

Having parked the van out of sight a few blocks from Erin’s house, he now ran through his former neighbors’ backyards, listening closely to the exchange playing from his earphone as he circled back to Erin’s house.

“How long ago did Kincaid leave?”

“Just a few minutes.”

With a running leap, Alec hurtled the picket fence at 217 Hurley Street, dodged the garbage cans at 215 and raced through the lines of drying laundry behind 213.

“Did he read the letter before he left?”