Not This Time (6 page)

“Understood.” They could best assist from a distance—and maybe stay alive.

Joe walked the last twenty yards to his Harley, then drove off into the night, dialing Sam.

From behind a twisted oak, Karl Masson watched Joe go. When he was out of sight, Karl fished out his own phone and hit speed dial.

A woman answered. “Yes?”

“Raven?” It sounded like her, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Who is this?”

“Gray Ghost.” He studied the spiderweb tattoo on his right hand between his forefinger and thumb.

“Mission?”

“Dead Game.”

“Code?”

“A72777.”

“You’re late reporting in.”

It was Raven. “Yes ma’am. Unavoidable.”

“They’ve picked up on you, then.”

“Yes ma’am.” How high up the chain, he wasn’t sure. But having a Shadow Watcher on his back for two days proved word he was active was no longer secret. Masson broke into a sweat. With Raven, the truth or a lie could get an operative killed—even if he was the best go-to cleaner in the entire organization. Truthfully, she worried him more than Homeland Security or the Shadow Watchers. They weren’t ruthless. “He’s departed the fix, which means he’s probably en route to Seagrove Village.”

“We’re ready.”

Her local operatives were in jail, tied up, or campaigning for mayor. She needed someone stealthy who could actually do her some good. “What are my orders?”

“Leave the car and RV in place and get down here as soon as you can.”

Great. Just great
. Mark Taylor and Benjamin Brandt would be looking for him on every corner. Their women, Lisa Harper and Kelly Walker, would be too. Raven knew that, so why was she bringing him—a possibility struck hard. “You’re not suffering any ill effects?” He started walking. It was six miles to the nearest town.

“No, I’m fine. Having me at the club during the attack was a stroke of genius.”

“Thank you.” His idea and, since it was successful, his glory. What better cover for Raven than to be one of the victims? “Where should I go when I get there?”

“Call half an hour before arrival for further instructions. Raven out.”

The line went dead.

Masson shivered. When he’d contacted Raven about Harvey and Roxy’s ceremony and suggested the Dead Game operation, he figured his odds were fifty-fifty. Raven would either welcome him back or kill him. She had bought into the FBI claim he was dead. He tried, but he couldn’t stay hidden. Not with authorities turning over every rock to find him. They’d gotten too close to his kids. That’s when he had to move, take the risk, and hope Raven brought him back into the fold. Fortunately, she liked his plan.

It was brilliant.

But whether or not it was brilliant enough to keep him alive, Raven alone would decide. And what she decided, he suspected, would depend on that nosy computer whiz at SaBe.

5

I
t was a hard night to be alone.

A few hours before midnight, Beth sat on the back porch of her Gulf-front home with her laptop balanced on her knees and ran an update on NINA and today’s incident. Waiting for her security clearance to kick in, she looked over at the Towers. Nora’s apartment was still lit up. Poor thing likely wouldn’t sleep a wink tonight.

Few knew Nora worked as a housekeeper for Ben because he needed her and not because she needed the job. She and Nathara had learned business at their dad’s knee, and on Nora’s eighteenth birthday, she’d bought her first store. Over the next fifty years, she built an empire. Beth hadn’t known that—few did—until she’d started SaBe with Sara, and Nora made it her mission to help Beth successfully navigate business’s shark-infested waters. She’d saved Beth’s hide a million times, celebrated her every accomplishment, and somehow always knew SaBe’s exact status.

Sara and Beth had been born to average middle-class families, spent four years as roommates in college, and after graduation started SaBe Inc. They’d worked hard, built a sterling reputation, and in a gutsy move had formed a strategic business alliance to do the software for the patent owner of a semiconductor doping process that revolutionized electronic devices. In five years, their little software business had exploded. They had licensing agreements for their software with every major electronics firm and thousands of feeder firms—enough that SaBe was up to twenty-eight employees, most of whom were attorneys, security, and support staff. They were well paid, and Beth and Sara were beyond rich. Robert Tayton III wanted a big piece of that—Sara’s piece of that.

For nearly a year, Nora suggested Beth hire a new software developer, but since the lab was Sara’s domain and the one place she seemed like the woman she was before marrying Robert, Beth hadn’t done it. The look in Nora’s eye proved she knew exactly why, and she never uttered a single reprimand. Beth loved that. She was too soft for cutthroat business, but Nora was tough. It took a secure woman to be that comfortable and confident being tough, and no one understood that better than Clyde Parker. How many times had Beth told him if she could find him in a thirty-year-old model, she’d marry him? Dozens. Beth choked up. So hard to believe he was gone.

He and Nora were there when Max humiliated Beth. They’d nudged her toward Jeff, but when Beth said the x factor just wasn’t there, that was that. They trusted her judgment—even after the Max debacle. That meant a lot to her—and she considered having them lecture her parents. They’d been bad after Max, but after Sara married, they’d been single-minded in their goal to get Beth married so they could live their dream of moving to Europe for a few years. Her mom denied that, of course.
“You can take care of yourself, but life gets lonely. It’s nice to have a partner to ride out the storms.”

Nora’s take was more Beth’s style.
“Ain’t but one reason to get married, dearie. Because the idea of not marrying the man makes you want to crawl in a hole and die. Don’t fret. God’ll send the right man to you. Just watch for the signs he’s arrived.”

That resonated. So until he arrived, Beth was hanging on to single life without remorse, and if Joe made her feel a little wistful, well, she’d just get over it. She didn’t even know his last name—or any of the Shadow Watchers’ last names, except for Mark Taylor’s. Was Joe even Joe? She had no idea. But he was gorgeous and had an easy, laid-back charm that made Beth melt. Frankly, that was too reminiscent of Max—unnerving. Not even a stand-up guy like Joe should have that kind of power over her. Was that a sign? Or just chemistry?

All in all, if Sara hadn’t issued that bizarre warning to Beth a week ago—
“No matter what happens, don’t trust me. I can’t and won’t explain. Just promise me you’ll protect yourself from me
—
and if you can, protect me from myself”
—Beth
would love her life. But when your best friend puts that kind of monkey on your back … well, who could love life lugging that around?

Her phone rang.

Who’d be calling this late? She checked caller ID.
Sara
. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

“Robert still hasn’t called home. He’s not at the hotel, not answering his phone—Beth, something bad must have happened.” Her voice cracked. “Can you come over?”

No attacks. Please, no attacks
. Beth shut down the computer and slipped inside. “I’m grabbing my purse.”

“I’m scared.”

And likely reliving her parents’ deaths again. “It’ll be okay. He’s resourceful, Sara.”

“Just hurry over, okay?”

“I’m on my way.” Beth hung up, grabbed her purse, and locked the door behind her.

Twenty minutes later at Sara’s kitchen table, Beth focused on Sara’s crisis—because to have a friend you have to be one. “You haven’t eaten?”

“First the attack, now Robert. Who can think about food?”

Beth made them a salad and pulled out the crackers. “Eat.”

Sara frowned but picked up her fork.

On the phone, Sara had sounded frantic. Now she shoved lettuce around on her plate in silence. Beth debated. She should keep her mouth shut but didn’t. “You took your meds, right?” When Sara nodded, Beth added, “Then you better eat so you don’t get sick.”

“My stomach’s going to have to fend for itself.” Parking her elbow on the table’s polished edge, Sara wiped her face with her hand and covered her eyes. “I can’t swallow.” She looked over at Beth from between her fingers. “How can I eat when I can’t swallow?”

“Sounding really stressed there.” Tension had been building in Sara since she spotted the cake-topper bride with the groom ripped away. It didn’t take
much imagination to link that groom and Sara’s both being missing. “Stress kills” wasn’t an overstatement for Sara. She’d landed in the ER three times in the last year alone—and that was during a time she was supposedly well and happy. Asthma was a merciless wretch. Add anxiety attacks and being high-strung to it, and then toss in other medical complications Sara never discussed, and it made one wicked recipe for disaster.

Rocking her head back, Sara sought solace at some point beyond the ceiling and clearly didn’t find it. “Where is he?”

Robert. A smooth talker who had shown up at an electronics conference in Atlanta last year and swept Sara off her feet. He was handsome and suave. She was naive and sheltered—a vulnerable recluse whose first love was her work.

Sara and Beth’s differences made them perfect partners. Beth loved illogical and messy people, Sara loved creative computing, and they both had vision, drive, and more ambition than sense. They knew enough to risk anything and not so much that they feared failing. It was a recipe for success, and that they trusted each other implicitly gave them a little extra kick that impacted everything they touched in thousands of ways that couldn’t be measured or charted.

Stealing Sara’s heart had been disgustingly easy for Robert Tayton. He’d caught her up in a whirlwind relationship and a scant month later, he’d whisked Sara off to Las Vegas and married her.

You should have taken her to a remote cabin and nailed her feet to the floor until she got her head out of the clouds and her sense back. You knew Sara lacked experience
—
she had never been that close to a man in her life. She might have listened. Okay, maybe she would have listened. All right, all right. Odds were she wouldn’t have heard a word, but at least you would have tried. You should have tried
.

Oh, if only she could go back. Warn Sara away from him right off the bat. In the hotel lobby that night,
before
he sank his grubby manicured claws into her heart. Why hadn’t Beth done that? Why? Why? Why …?

Remorse turned her salad bitter, and Beth pushed her plate away. In Atlanta, she had been sure he was out for a diversion. But when he followed them back to Seagrove Village, claiming he lived in Destin and had fallen in love
with Sara at first sight, Beth had seen right through him, and she assumed Sara would know the truth at gut level—in that way women do, especially when they wished they didn’t.

Unfortunately, Sara hadn’t seen or known spit.

Logic had floated right out of her body and she’d bought into his bait—hook, line, and sinker. Robert Tayton III had fallen in love, all right—with Sara’s assets. And letting him know Beth knew it had been the first of Beth’s many mistakes. Sara paid the bill for that, which added interest to Beth’s guilt that had her minding her p’s and q’s and keeping her mouth shut when she really wanted to just smack Sara and say, “Girl, he’s using you. Grow a spine and kick him out on his social-climbing rump.”

Of course, southern women didn’t talk that way to southern women. It simply wasn’t done, and if it were, it would open a great divide between them that neither woman would ever cross much less close. The rules of friendship were finite when it came to their men. If he’s a louse, he’s her louse. Never forget it, or else forget her.

Trying not to sigh, Beth cast a sidelong look at the sheaf of papers tucked into the side pocket of her briefcase propped against the edge of the counter near the door. She and Sara had planned to sign the agreement today, but there was no way she could hand it to her with Robert missing. Not even if Beth wouldn’t enjoy a restful night’s sleep until the documents were duly executed and turned back in to Nick Pope in Legal. Only after he and then Henry Baines, who headed SaBe’s legal department, signed off on them would she be assured that if something happened to Sara, Robert wouldn’t be sticking his nose into SaBe’s business. Given a choice, Beth would exile the man to another planet, but since Sara loved him, banning him from SaBe would do.