City of Champions (49 page)

Their battle of wills turns quickly into a powerful need for one other, that makes them both rethink everything they ever wanted.

Will Trey be able to keep her alive long enough to give them an opportunity at something real together — a future that can survive the danger in their present, as well as the darkness of his past
?

And don't miss out on the Bonus Companion Novella to

A Steel Town
—

SHANGHAI WIND

(
Anticipated Release: February 2015
)
 

Now, an Excerpt from A Steel Town:

Claudia's boots crunched over a smattering of dried leaves and gravel. The sound was almost thunderous against the silent backdrop of the abandoned steel mill site to which her very first tip had led her, forcing her to pause briefly, as the echoing noise dissipated. The delay was also helpful in allowing her racing heart to slow, if only a small amount.

Shadows overtook the many nooks and crevices of this metallic wasteland, as the ribbons of violet and dusky orange, which had been streaking above the length of the Ohio River, were rapidly surrendering to the much more inky and dark shades of twilight. With a shaky breath, she took out her phone to look at the satellite map images she'd collected before leaving her apartment. Claudia relied on the glow from her phone and made a quick left turn between two small buildings. They appeared to have once been designated for storage, but after years of neglect, the decrepit metal structures had become merely broken-down artifacts of a way of life long since departed from her new home of Pittsburgh. It had been decades since generations of workers reported there every day to craft the metal that formed the backbone of this city's development. Now its only visitors appeared to be graffiti artists, and perhaps the occasional drunk hoping to find a peaceful spot for his escape. 

The entire scene was lonesome and anachronistic in a way that made her even more uncomfortable with the task she'd put upon herself. It also seemed like a damn fine place to get tetanus, so Claudia was treading carefully.

She put her phone away and zipped up her light leather jacket with slightly quivering fingers. The nighttime autumn air was crisp, seeping through her thin top, chilling her blood. It seemed to be so much colder down there by the river, the rusted out hulls of dozens of aluminum buildings creating a whistling wind tunnel that buffeted her small body with merciless cutting gusts.

This collapsing metal ghost town seemed a world away from the sparkling high rises of downtown Pittsburgh, and the tree lined brick streets of its historic neighborhoods. The beauty and quaintness of it all didn't make her frustration at her life being derailed by her brother any less suffocating. Yet, this evening jaunt was certainly making her appreciate the city's prettier face.

Calm down
, she chastised herself.
I'm the one that wanted to be tough and act like a real agent. That means I need to suck it up, find the box the tipster told me about, and then I'm out of here
.

Her private pep talk seemed to work, steeling her nerves to keep walking with more confidence. With another sure-footed step, she turned sharply to maneuver between two more buildings.

Her feet, and her pulse, stopped short when a shadow flashed across the corner of her vision. At first, she could almost convince herself it was just her imagination, but she whipped her head around and saw a form ducking behind a corner. She caught enough of the view to see it was a man, tall and broad-shouldered beneath his hooded sweatshirt.

Claudia made sure her
Glock
was quickly accessible but she wanted to do all she could to avoid using it. This unwelcome visitor could be a danger, or the person behind her tip, or both. Seeing as she wasn't even supposed to be there, discharging her FBI-issued weapon was not a good idea. She took advantage of her petite frame and maneuvered forward delicately, venturing toward a more open area of the mill.

When the light was bright enough, she caught his shadow move more closely behind her.

Perfect
.

With one quick motion, Claudia spun around with a roundhouse kick to his stomach. The muscles of his abs were firm beneath her blow, but she'd thrown him off balance, and had elicited quite a few expletives from him under his breath. Taking advantage of his distraction, Claudia threw herself on the ground. Supporting herself with her hands, she spun a low kick, taking him off his feet and landing him on his ass.

Worried he'd get back up, Claudia straddled him quickly and pinned his arms to the ground. It stunned her that he didn't fight her at all.
Perhaps he is still winded from my stomach kick?
she wondered.

Securing both his hands in one of hers as best she could, Claudia pushed his hood back from his face. Her breath skipped in her throat. The shadowy figure she'd just taken down was freaking gorgeous. 

Dark hair framed his tanned face. He looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn't quite place him. Especially when she was distracted by the way his teasing curve of a smile and his sparkling gray eyes made it clear he was laughing at her. Still not uttering a word, he grinned fully at her and began to move his large torso to sit up and face her.

Aw, hell no,
she thought. Moving her hands to his chest, she pushed him hard back to the ground.

"Hey, easy there, little tiger," he grunted out. "I let you have your fun, but this ground is starting to get uncomfortable. Even for a tough guy like me."

The smoothness of his voice, even through his clear annoyance, was almost hypnotic. His face held a few piercings and she could spy some tattoos peeking out from underneath his hoody, but he didn't look hard or dangerous — so much as intensely sexy. Finding a man this attractive was new to Claudia, and it was really pissing her off. Her eyes were too interested in his strong jaw and chiseled cheekbones, when they should be trying to determine if he was a threat. His face had a couple days of stubble, and she cursed herself for wondering what it would feel like on her fingers.
Would it be prickly, or smooth?

"Are you done?" he asked.

"Excuse me?"

"Done staring at me?" he teased with a smile that revealed perfectly straight teeth resting behind his distracting lips. 

"I-I'm not staring at you. I need to ascertain what kind of danger you are."

"Fine. Play it that way. You don't need to worry about me. I'm on your side."

"What? My side? Did Agent Jacobs figure out I was still going to follow up on this tip? Did he send you?"

"Agent Jacobs? Hell no. That dumb-ass wouldn't recognize a tip in a urinal."

"You're disgusting," Claudia snipped out, but his crass joke made a smile twitch at her lips.

"Besides, I'm not a Fed. Well, not really."

"Then who are you? Tell me who you are right now, or so help me…"

"So help you what? You'll swat at me with those little mitts of yours, again?"

Claudia lifted a fist and went at him hard. She wanted nothing more than to show him how those tiny paws of hers could do some serious damage, but he grabbed it in one of his large hands before she connected. She shook her hand out of his, fury pumping through her.

"You son of a bitch. Tell me who you are."

"Calm down. I'm Trey," he answered, awkwardly moving his other hand from his supine position to shake hers. "Nice to meet you, Agent McCoy…I think," he added. "I'm one of Jenna's friends." Claudia leaned back, sitting fully on his midsection as she processed this information.

"Wait. Trey? Trey
Adler
? Are you the one that's in love with my brother's live-in
girlfriend
, Jenna?"

"The Adler part is right. But I'm not in love with Jenna. What gave you that idea?"

"That's what Wyatt says."

"What your brother is wrong about is a lot."

"That may be true, but you still haven't told me what you're doing here."

"Um, first, do you mind moving…I know you're just a little thing…"

"I'm not little!"

"If you'd let me finish, I was going to say, no, you aren't that small. But if you don't climb off me we're going to have a situation on our hands. Or in my lap, to put it more accurately."

"You're a pig."

"You're the one that won't climb off me."

Claudia huffed at him, pushing off his chest hard enough to hear him release a satisfying, "oof" sound. Trey lifted a hand to her to help him up, his crooked grin never leaving his face.

She stared down at him for a minute, almost paralyzed.

"What? Aren't you strong enough?" he teased.

With an irritated sigh, she finally grabbed his hand with hers and helped him up from the ground. His hand fully enveloped her much smaller one. It was rough and cool to her touch. As soon as he was standing, Claudia dropped it like she'd been bitten. Now that he was standing fully in front of her, she had to crane her head back fully to meet his eyes.

"Impressive," he said softly. "You really are a pint-sized thing, aren't you? It was quite a pleasure letting you take me down."

"
Letting me?
Screw you." He just laughed gently in return. Claudia tried to bring reason back to her mind. "Why did Jenna ask you to follow me? What did she tell you?"

Shame coated Claudia's throat at the memory of letting herself get so sick in front of her brother's girlfriend — a stunning and confident physician, that knew a diabetic who couldn't handle her shit when she saw one.

Trey looked down at her, his eyes turning warm and reassuring. Claudia decided she preferred his teasing manner to this much more unsettling caring demeanor. 

"Jenna didn't tell me anything. She didn't have to. She just asked and I said yes. I'm around the Pittsburgh FBI office a lot with the ongoing investigation into Jack Taylor's murder, so she figured I could keep an eye on you."

"I know that case. I've been trying to get on it. But they keep sticking me on the FBI equivalent of saving a cat stuck up in a tree. That's what…"

"This supposed lead is about? I know. I also know you were told not to follow up on it."

"Yeah. I get told 'no' quite a bit."

"I'm not a fan of being told what to do either, Claudia." It was the first time he'd said her name and it was like he'd poured warm honey down her body. "But that doesn't mean you shouldn't be careful. You were planning to follow up on a shady tip like that all alone?"

"I tried to get support, but they think it's a dumb idea."

"Instead you decided to come out here by yourself — a place that looks like Murder City, population of you? Forget the danger factor for a second, do you know how much trouble that'll get you into with your boss?"

"So? From what I hear about you, all you do is get in trouble."

He stepped so closely to Claudia that he towered completely over her. The heat of his body came over her in waves, almost overwhelming her. Trey stared down at her until she met his eyes fully.

"
You
aren't
me
," he whispered.

"Thank goodness for that," she huffed out, turning to walk away briskly. Claudia raised her chin, desperately trying to remember her original path before this tattooed pain in the ass interfered with her evening, but it seemed like her brain just wouldn't work. A sudden tug at her right arm spun her around, forcing her to look up again, straight into his chiseled features.

"All right, that's it. Your whole feisty thing is cute, and all. But I promised Jenna I'd keep you alive, so I'll tell you right now — this shit's going to get old really quick."

"I'm so sorry to inconvenience you. Here's a solution. How about you leave me alone? Win-win, for both of us."

"Oh no, you don't, little one. Trust me, babysitting a spoiled McCoy sibling is not appealing to me in the slightest, but Jenna is a good friend and I can't say no to her."

"That does a lot for your whole 'I'm not in love with Jenna' thing."

Trey pressed a hand at the small of her back, stilling her.

"Are you scared I'm in love with Jenna, or that I'm not, and that my heart is available?"

"Oh please. I know your game. You just want to torment me. Thing is, if I don't get going, it'll get too dark to find anything, and this whole night will have been a waste."

"Not a total waste," he answered with a smile, "you got to meet me."

"Ugh, no wonder my brother hates you."

"Trust me, my feelings toward your brother are mutual. That doesn't change why I'm here, or what I promised I would do. If you won't give up, then you're just going to have to get used to me going everywhere you do."

Claudia turned away from him, but her stomach turned when she realized night had almost completely fallen. The mill yard had seemed manageable before, but now all she saw was a vast archipelago of treacherous alleys and easy hiding places. She'd come too far to turn back now, but doubt had crept into her bones, as insidiously as the rust that had slowly overtaken the building in front of her. "What's that they say in the movies?" Claudia muttered to herself. "Oh right. I've got a bad feeling about this."

"Me too. Do you want to leave now?"

"I'm not giving up. I never give up."

"Me neither," he answered.

A loud bang in the distance made her jump. She swallowed hard before choking out, "Fine. If you really want to come, I guess I can't stop you."

"How kind of you, because unfortunately for both of us, you're stuck with me. And I'm not going to let anything happen to you, little one."

TO BE CONTINUED...