With a stealth that came from a whole lot of years getting himself in and out of situations he shouldn’t have been in in the first place, he got to the deck.
Tested the door.
The sliding glass door was, indeed, locked.
Not a problem. Old habits died hard, and sticky fingers never forgot how to be sticky.
Chapter 4
Maddie leaned out her bedroom window so far that Leena let out a terrified squeak and raced forward, grabbing her legs. “Don’t jump! Ohmigod, don’t jump!”
“I’m not!” Maddie pushed Leena’s hands away. “Are you kidding? I’m not crazy.”
“Okay.” Her sister gulped in air with a hand to her chest. “Okay, that’s good. You scared me.”
“I just wanted to see if he was really gone.”
“Is he?”
“Yes,” Maddie lied. She’d lied more today than she thought she’d ever have to lie again. She sure hoped Karma wasn’t paying attention because she could be a vindictive bitch.
Leena took a peek out the window as well, still breathing unevenly. “Sorry. I might have overreacted.”
Maddie shot her a look. “Really?”
“I’m nervous, okay? The Plan and all.”
Yes, The Plan.
They’d first hatched it when they were young, getting serious on their sixteenth birthday-run away and start a new life.
Only on the fateful day of execution, Leena hadn’t gone with Maddie.
Nope, it’d taken her ten years to decide to catch up, ten years during which Maddie had made a new life for herself. Now here Leena was, petrified, finally ready for The Plan, and Maddie was going to have to do it, have to start all over because she’d promised.
“It’s just that he’s so…” Still staring at Brody, Leena shrugged helplessly.
Big? Bad? Gorgeous? Pick one.
“Intimidating.”
“Not when you know him,” Maddie murmured.
“He was scowling at me. Like he wanted to eat me for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”
Maddie had seen that look from him before. Only, she hadn’t found it scary, but unbearably erotic. “He wouldn’t hurt you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
“How?” Leena took a deeper look at her twin. “How do you know that for sure? Are you into him or something?”
Or something. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“You are,” Leena breathed, shaking her head in disbelief. “You’re totally into him.”
“Trust me,” Maddie said with a laugh. “The two of us can’t even be in a room together without riling each other up. I drive him crazy. He drives me crazy. We both drive-”
“Each other crazy. I get it.” Leena continued to study her thoughtfully. They hadn’t spent much, if any, time together in years. Maddie lived in LA, Leena in Florida and the Bahamas. Maddie supported herself and kept her distance from her past. Leena clung to their past…
Or had.
Until now, when she’d come to Maddie for help.
“I thought you gave up men.” Leena was looking at her in surprise. “Back when-”
“I did,” Maddie said quickly, not wanting to go on a trip down memory lane. “Mostly.”
“Good. Because he’s…” She gave a helpless shrug.
Yeah. When it came to describing Brody, words failed Maddie, too. “He’s actually very nice.”
“Seriously?”
“Okay, not necessarily nice, but he’s a good man.”
“I thought good and man were oxymorons.”
“Not all men are assholes, Leena.”
Unable, or unwilling, to believe, her sister shrugged. “It doesn’t matter anyway, right? We’re leaving?”
“Yeah.” Maddie rubbed the ache in the center of her chest. She understood her sister’s fears about needing to vanish, but Maddie hadn’t lived in that world in a long, long time.
She intended to never live there again and hoped to make sure Leena didn’t either. “Listen, why don’t you go take your shower and that nap you wanted? Everything’s going to be okay.”
“Everything’s never okay.”
“A little positive thinking here, Leen. It goes a long way.”
“Okay.” Leena managed a smile and feigned a toast. “To positive thinking. To our plan.”
Maddie returned the smile, pretending for both of their sakes that it was real. She realized nothing about The Plan was the smartest thing, at least not for her, but she didn’t have a choice. A promise was a promise, with her sister’s life on the line. “To The Plan.”
Looking relieved, Leena nodded and grabbed her cell phone off the nightstand, sticking it in her pocket as she headed to the door.
Maddie waited until she was gone before turning back to the window and letting out a long breath. Lying… making promises she couldn’t keep… Yeah, she was on a roll today.
Because everything was not going to be okay, not by a long shot. Not unless she personally made it so. And it looked as if maybe she’d have no choice but to do just that or live in constant fear again.
Not going to happen.
Still, she had another, more immediate problem. Brody had left, yes, but she hadn’t been born yesterday, and neither had he, damn him. And suddenly, she knew. She left the bedroom at a run, skidding to a stop at the top of the stairs, craning her neck to peek out the high, rounded beveled glass window that allowed extra light to beam down the steps and into the living room.
Yes, there. The glint of something not natural parked in the woods.
A Camaro.
Driven by an avenging angel in tough guy clothes with tousled hair and a badass attitude.
Her heart skipped a beat, and she got goose bumps. He was coming for her.
Damn it. Damn him.
She went running down the hardwood stairs, racing through the living room to the sliding glass door she’d kept locked since she’d gotten here, the door she’d been double-checking ever since the moment her sister appeared out of the blue after several years of no contact. Locked, but the shades hadn’t been pulled. She needed to get to them before-
Too late.
Breathless, she gripped the shades as if they were a lifeline, staring at Brody standing on the other side of the glass.
He slowly arched a daring brow at her. Really? his expression and stance said. You really think a locked door can keep me out if I want in?
“I’ll call the police,” she said through the glass.
He let out a half smile and shook his head. She wouldn’t. She knew it, and so did he. And as he stepped closer to the glass, there was a deceptive and unnerving quietness to his movements, to the way he looked at her, which told her that she wasn’t getting out of talking to him until he’d gotten whatever answers he sought.
Damn it! She should have just dealt with him, answered the front door herself and taken her paychecks, told him whatever he needed to hear, and he’d have been long gone by now.
Instead, he was on to her-not knowing exactly what he was on to, but on to her nevertheless. His smile might
