Page 17 of Ex-Military Biker’s Bride

We stand facing each other and I don’t drop my eyes.

“Give me the name of your contact,” he says gently. “Not because Prez told me. Doc’s the smartest guy I ever met, he’ll work out a plan. We can get her safe before this gets any worse.”

I open my mouth but nothing comes out.

“I can't.”

“Olivia.”

My hands are shaking. “You remember I told you I trusted my colleague with the name of my source when I started out? He had a good reason; he knew people and he was going to protect her better than I could. He was right about everything except the part where it wrecked her life.”

“I'm not him.”

I press my palms against my eyes. “I know. But I made her a promise.”

He crosses the kitchen and puts his arms around me, I put my face against his chest and breathe in his scent.

“You don't have to decide all this alone anymore,” he says into my hair.

I stay holding him tight, flooded with the awareness that I love him. Then I lie awake next to him all night and think about the phone call from the Lodge.

Lucky’s plane went up that mountain and inside a day they let him go, with a settlement and their sincere thanks. They’re onto him.

And every page of my investigation is a map straight to his door.

If I publish, they’ll move location and start up somewhere else. Even worse, my source will vanish.

I'm not going to publish an article. I decided that when he rescued me, and I've been certain since he told me what he was. I get up and text my editor, asking to meet her. To my surprise she asks to meet me, at a diner a couple of hours drive from here.

But I’ve been publishing for ten years with the same magazine and I owe Nancy, my editor, an explanation. She has some of my preliminary findings, so I’ll need to ask her to destroy them. And then there’s my source; she needs to be brought to safety before somebody up there works out what she's been doing.

And I need to fix it.

Lucky sleeps deeply, one arm around my waist. Near dawn I lift it off, an inch at a time. He doesn't stir.

I get dressed silently in the dark. I pack my laptop and the memory card from my camera, then grab the keys for Savage’s truck from the hook.

I get a pen from the counter and a piece of paper. I need to leave him a note.

Luke.

That's as far as I get; if I write one more word I won't be able to go down those stairs.

One of the prospects is asleep in his car at the bottom, mouth open, snoring a little.

I ease off the parking brake and roll the truck down hill out of the lot with the lights off. I start the engine once I’m on the road and I don't breathe properly until I'm past the last streetlight in High Vale.

Chapter Eight

LUCKY

Before I even open my eyes, I know she’s gone.

Olivia’s side of the bed is cold, with no warmth left. She’s been gone for hours. I curse myself for being such a heavy sleeper. I got into the habit of being able to sleep anywhere, anyplace in the field.

I lie there a while anyway, listening to the birds out on the strip and the tick of the water heater, refusing to believe it. Her scent is still all over my pillow; green and clean, like rain on cut grass. Yesterday keeps coming back to me in pieces; the sound she made when I lifted her onto the counter, the softness of her thighs under my hands, the way she kissed her way down the whole ruined side of my body like it was nothing to be scared of. My cock stirs at the memory and I want to punch myself.

Then I get up and check properly to make sure I haven’t made a mistake.