The Christmas Clue

“To all of it.”

She replayed that, as well, and it didn’t sound any better the fifth time around. “But what about Molly?”

He shrugged. “That’s what official channels are for.”

Cass could have pointed out all the pitfalls associated with official channels, especially since Dominic was now part of those channels. However, Matt Christensen knew what was at stake here. He knew that Dominic could hide the child so that no one could get to her—ever. He knew what could go wrong, and yet he was obviously willing to risk doing this the official way.

“Okay,” Cass mumbled. She took a deep breath and pushed her hair away from her forehead. “So, I guess this is goodbye. No hard feelings, I hope.”

With that, she started for the door.

She didn’t get far.

He snagged her by the arm. “You think you’re leaving?”

Since that sounded like a challenge, her chin came up. “I am leaving.” She tried not to sound hesitant.

But she was. Heaven help her, she was.

Special Agent Matt Christensen had been her best shot at clearing her name. Without him, she didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of doing that.

“It’d be suicide for you to try to break into Dominic’s estate alone,” he pointed out.

“I have insider help, remember?”

“Yeah, and if that were enough, you wouldn’t have come here in the first place.”

Touché.

Yes, she had an insider, Hollis Becker, Dominic’s head groundskeeper and the man in charge of external security for the estate. Because she was paying him well, he was good at eavesdropping, keeping track of Dominic and taking the occasional picture for her. But Hollis wouldn’t be able to get her past the internal security system there. No, the best he could do was get her a fake job as a seasonal helper, give her a temporary place to stay and tidbits of information as to Dominic’s immediate whereabouts. That would give her, perhaps, an opportunity to sneak inside the basement of Dominic’s estate.

Cass tried to move out of his grip, but he held on, latching on to her other arm as well. She really hated the idea of kneeing him in the groin, but if it came down to it, she would. If she stayed, she’d end up in jail and therefore, dead.

“Once I’m inside the estate, I’ll do everything within my power to get your daughter out of there,” she explained, even though it was hard to deliver a calm explanation with her emotions doing a foot race inside her.

He blinked. “You’d actually try to get the baby out?”

“Of course.” Cass watched the surprise on his face. No, not just surprise. Shock. She frowned. “What, you think I’d leave a child there with Dominic if I had a chance to save her? You must really believe I’m a selfish bimbo.”

The hold he had on her melted away, and he groaned and dropped back a step. Cass took it as the gift that it was. She retrieved both of her weapons, and she headed for the back door.

She made it two steps.

“Wait,” he said.

Cass stopped. Held her breath. And prayed. Because even though she’d been willing to walk out that door, she knew without his help, she’d fail. Slowly she turned back around to face him.

He opened his mouth to say something. What, she didn’t know. And she didn’t get a chance to learn because the phone rang again.

Like before, he didn’t answer it. He stood there. Waiting. It didn’t take long for the answering machine to kick in.

“Matt, it’s me, Ronald,” the voice said. She recognized it as the man who’d called earlier. Except his voice was a little different now. Not sleepy. Frantic. “I hope to hell you’re there listening to this. And I hope to hell I’m wrong.”

Matt reached over and hit the speaker function on the phone. “What’s going on?” he asked the caller.

“I don’t know exactly, but five minutes ago the communications guys at the central command post intercepted a Level Red threat.”

Cass looked at Matt, silently requesting an explanation.

He didn’t provide one.

“I take it this Level Red has something to do with me?” Matt asked his friend.

“It has everything to do with you. Your name is on it. So is a fugitive—Cassandra Harrison. They believe she’s there with you.”

That caused Matt to curse.

“What’s wrong?” Cass mouthed.

Again he didn’t answer.

“My advice is to get out of there fast,” Ronald McKenzie continued. “We’ve got backup on the way, but it doesn’t look like we’ll make it in time. These guys are five to ten minutes ahead of us.”

With that ominous-sounding warning, Ronald McKenzie hung up.

Matt didn’t waste any time. He snatched his weapon from the fridge.

“What’s wrong?” Cass demanded. “What does Level Red mean?” And she held her breath because she knew she wasn’t going to like the answer.

Matt Christensen latched on to her arm and got her moving toward the kitchen door. “It means we leave now. Someone sent assassins to kill us.”

Chapter Four

“I hate to say I told you so…” Cass grumbled under her breath.

Yeah. Matt hated it, too, but hindsight wasn’t going to get them out of this situation.

“Help is on the way, but I doubt they’ll arrive in time. And I’d rather not get involved in a shootout,” he said more to himself than her.

“Then you’d better have a plan to avoid one.”

She added something else equally obvious in that on-the-verge-of-panicking tone, but he shut out whatever she was saying. He had to concentrate if he was going to get them out of this alive.

Matt grabbed the black leather jacket that he kept next to the back kitchen door. He shoved his cell phone, a small supply kit, her tranquilizer gun and some extra magazines of ammo into his pockets. The supply kit had money, matches and just in case, tools for picking locks. While he was at it, he crammed some ammo into Cass’s front jeans pocket, as well. Not the best idea he’d ever had.

His fingers went places they never should have gone. Cass let him know that with a huff.

Matt mumbled an apology and eased the back door open an inch, but he didn’t step outside. He paused and lifted his head a fraction. Listening.

“Won’t the assassins use the street out front?” Cass asked. She slid her smaller gun back into her holster.

“Maybe. But they might come at us from several directions.”

She sucked in her breath. Yeah. The severity of their situation had obviously sunk in.

Matt opened the door farther and did a situation assessment. He heard the vicious winter wind. But there was no indication that there were assassins about. But then, a hired gun probably wouldn’t give many indications before he aimed and pulled the trigger.

Still, they’d have to risk it.

“Let’s go,” Matt ordered her.

“Let’s go?” She didn’t move, even when he clamped on to her arm. “How could it possibly be safer out there than it would be in here?”

“Those assassins are going to riddle this house with bullets. There’s no place we can hide in here where we can’t be shot.”

Obviously not convinced, she frantically shook her head. “But—”

“They probably have explosives or some other heavy artillery they can use to turn this place and our vehicles into fireballs,” he interrupted. “We’re leaving now.”

Matt didn’t wait for an argument. He pulled her out the door and headed for the first cluster of oaks at the back of the house. It wasn’t far, less than twenty feet away. But every step felt like a mile.

By the time he hauled her behind the largest of the trees, his body was already in full adrenaline mode. His gaze whipped from one side of the woods to the other, and he braced his weapon in case he had to fire. But Matt saw no indication that anyone had trespassed—yet.

“Keep your gun ready,” he instructed. He pointed toward another cluster of trees just to the east of where they were. “Let’s go.”

Cass cooperated. Without hesitation or questions she ran, hurdling over a fallen cedar before she ducked into the next barrier of trees.

“Where are we going?” she asked, her breath heavy with every word. Like him, she kept a vigilant watch around them.

He knew the answer, but he didn’t think she’d like it. “To a bunker of sorts. We’ll wait there until it’s safe for us to leave.”

“And what will keep the gunmen from finding us there?”

“Nothing.”

Her breath got even heavier. “This doesn’t sound like much of a plan.”

And at the moment it didn’t sound like much of a plan to Matt, either. He had an old truck stashed back beyond the bunker, but it’d be a bear to get to it and then get out without drawing attention from the assassins.

Which meant he might have to kill them.

Of course, Matt had known that from the moment he’d first heard about the Level Red threat. Those men had almost certainly come to murder them, and since Matt wasn’t ready to die, he was prepared to take them out first.

Matt surveyed the area, then pointed toward a pair of cedar elms with an ankle-deep stream ribboning around them. Just like before, they raced toward cover.

It was winter all right, not that that was news to Matt, but he became brutally aware of just how cold it was when he felt the slushy, partly-frozen water seep right through the leather in his boots.

Matt heard something. The back door to his house. No doubt opened by one of the assassins. The men had probably come in through the front and already searched the place—and now they were ready to look outside. Cass’s and his tracks wouldn’t be that hard to follow.

Cass must have heard the door, as well, because she dropped to the ground, using the mound of frozen dirt and rocks as cover.

She aimed her gun in the direction of the house. “We don’t have time for this,” she whispered. “We need to get out of here so we can get that equipment and leave for Dominic’s.”

So, she did appear to have that mountain of resolve even in the face of assassins. Matt admired that. But that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Because he had a really bad feeling that camaraderie and admiration were not going to be assets where Cass Harrison was concerned. The less he felt about her, good or bad, the better.

He was about to repeat to himself when a flash of movement captured his complete attention.

One of the men, dressed head to toe in black, darted behind an oak. Matt automatically took aim. So did Cass.

It was too little too late.

A bullet came right at them.

FROM THE MOMENT she’d seen those gunmen, Cass had braced herself for the possibility that she’d have to dodge gunfire. What she couldn’t have planned for was the deafening blast that sent that bullet their way. The sound ripped through her, spiking her adrenaline and sending her heartbeat racing out of control.

“Stay down,” Matt barked.

Just as another bullet slapped into the dirt mere inches from her head.

Cass flattened her body right against the frozen ground, and she tried to find out where the shots were coming from. The angle was all wrong for the bullets to have come from the gunman behind the big tree.

“He’s on the roof,” Matt informed her, as if reading her mind. He levered himself up and fired.

Cass hadn’t braced herself for that, either, and if she’d thought the shooter’s rifle was loud, it was a whisper compared to the sonic boom that came from Matt’s gun a couple of feet from her ear.

“Did you get him?” she asked, unable to spot the guy who was obviously trying to kill them.

“Not a chance. He’s out of range, and he knows it. That’s why he’s up there.”

Oh, mercy. So, they had one shooter out of range and another likely creeping his way through the woods toward them.

“Turn around,” Matt ordered her. “And watch our backs.”

Cass hadn’t thought it could get any worse until he said that. Her heart was no longer just racing, it was banging against her ribs, and she could feel her pulse pound in her ears.

Forcing herself not to panic, she rolled over so that she was on her back. The trees that’d given them so much protection to get to the bunker were now obstacles. Each one could hide a potential killer. Even worse, if she managed to spot him, Cass wasn’t even sure she’d be able to shoot. Simply put, her aim had never been tested in a real situation, only at a firing range.

She might die right here, right now. And all because Dominic wanted to make sure she couldn’t testify against him.

Those words flashed through her head and fed the adrenaline. They also fed her determination. They had to survive this. They had no other choice. Because if they died, they would never get Matt’s child away from Dominic.

Fueled with her new motivation, Cass readjusted her position and her gun so she’d be better ready to fire. And she waited.

Next to her, Matt fired two more shots.

“You said the guy on the roof is out of range,” Cass whispered.

“He is. The guy behind the oak moved.”

Oh, God. More heart-pounding adrenaline. But Cass stayed focused on her own task. There was no movement in the back of the woods. No sounds, other than those that should be there. So all she could do was wait and pray that Matt was as good a shot as she thought he was.

It didn’t take long, mere minutes, for the winter to stake claim to her body. She was bone cold, and her butt had likely frozen. Oh, and her teeth were chattering. Audibly chattering. Cass clamped her teeth over her bottom lip and hoped it would help.

Matt fired yet another round and then almost calmly readjusted his arm. “The guy behind the tree is injured. I shot him in the right hand, so he probably won’t be shooting at us anymore.”

He’d said that so calmly that it took a moment to sink in. Cass hated that she felt nothing but elation over the injury of another human being. But it seemed appropriate, considering this man, this stranger, had been willing to kill them.

“What about the one on the roof?” she asked.

“Still there.”

Wonderful. They couldn’t get him, but he could certainly do some damage to Matt and her.

There was a cracking noise. A sound that caused both Matt and her to scurry to re-aim. But Cass saw no gunman. Instead, a dead tree limb swooped to the ground.

Matt immediately went back to his original position so he could keep an eye on the roof. “We need to get to that clearing just to your right.”

She glanced in that direction, and it was obvious that Matt and she did not share the same definition of a clearing. At best, it was a path. A narrow one. To make matters worse, there weren’t nearly enough trees or underbrush, and it’d be easier for the roof shooter to see them and gun them down.

“Why do we need to be there?” she asked.

“I have a truck parked at the end of the clearing.”

Cass glanced in that direction. “How far can the roof guy shoot?”

“Five hundred meters, give or take a meter or two.”

“My butt and brain are too frozen to do the math. How far do we have to make it down that so-called clearing before we’re safe?”

“About halfway.”

This time Cass attempted the math, and she figured that was at least thirty running steps. In other words, it was way too far. “And how many bullets can he fire in thirty seconds?” she asked.

He gave her a flat look. “You don’t want to know.”

Cass groaned softly. “We can’t just lie out here. We’ll freeze to death. So, what do we do?”

“The clearing,” Matt repeated. “First, though, scoop up those dead leaves and twigs around your feet and toss them on top of the makeshift bunker.”

It seemed a strange request, but since there was nothing nonstrange about any of this, Cass did as he asked.

Immediately, bullets came hailing down on them.

“Keep moving those leaves,” Matt instructed. He returned fire with one hand and did some leaf arranging of his own.

While keeping a grip on her gun and watching their backs, Cass hurried, scooping and tossing, until she’d gathered up everything that was gatherable.

“Now, put your coat up there,” Matt added.

Heck, she didn’t question that, either, even though once Cass had stripped off the jacket, she went from teeth-chattering to downright freezing. But she didn’t forget to remove the picture of Matt’s baby. She shoved that into her jeans.

“Take the small black case from my pocket,” he continued. “And then help me out of this jacket so you can add it to the leaves.”

Cass did that, too, and it required a lot more body touching than she’d anticipated. Specially, touching Matt’s chest, abs and arms. It wasn’t easy to get a man his size out of a jacket without her practically crawling all over him.

When she’d finished removing his jacket, Cass opened the wallet-size case and found some small tools, cash and a book of matches. “I’m going to set fire to the leaves and coats?” she asked, not believing that was a good idea.

He nodded, then shot at the guy on the roof, ejected the empty magazine and reloaded. “Literally a smoke screen.”

Oh. It might work.

But since Cass couldn’t come up with anything better, and since the guy was still shooting at them, she used one of the tiny tools to rip off the bottom of her cable-knit sweater to use as kindling. It wasn’t easy because of her shaky hands, but she struck the match, and she sheltered the tiny flame until she managed to get the wool-blend fibers to light. She tossed the lit hunk onto the leaves, twigs and coats.

The cold wind actually helped. It fueled her scrawny fire and quickly whipped it into a pile of gray billowing and suffocating smoke.

Cass coughed and turned her face from the fire.

Matt didn’t turn his face, and he began to peel off his shirt. “There’s not enough smoke.”

She disagreed but then realized the guy on the roof wouldn’t have much trouble seeing down past the smoke and flames. Matt was right. They needed more.

Cass yanked off her sweater and immediately felt the harder sting of the cold. Her white silk camisole wasn’t much protection, and it wasn’t the best of days to be braless.

Matt tossed his shirt onto one end of the fire; Cass added her sweater to the other end. Both garments caught fire, and both produced a slightly different-colored smoke. It was enough to create a six-foot-high wall that would hopefully conceal them if Matt didn’t stand up too straight.

“Let’s go,” Matt said, and he pulled her to her feet.

Cass didn’t even have time to catch her breath before they started running.

Chapter Five

Matt considered every step to be a victory. But of course the only victory that counted was for them to make it through the clearing without getting shot.

He pushed Cass ahead of him so he could shield her as best he could and catch her if she fell. Yet despite the thorny underbrush and the limb-riddled ground, she not only stayed on her feet, she ran even faster than Matt imagined she could. But then, she had a huge motivation to run.

A spray of bullets tore into the ground. They were close, but not close enough. Which told Matt one important thing—the smoke screen had worked. Because if it hadn’t, Cass and he would have been dead.

With bullets zinging around them, Matt spotted the crest just ahead. “Hit the ground,” Matt ordered. “Slide down.”

Cass did. Just as the bullets stopped. She dropped onto her butt and began the descent down the remains of the banks of a ravine. The dark-green rust-eaten truck was there, waiting for them. It didn’t look like much, but Matt knew that it worked, and it was their ticket to safety. It was literally his backup, a vehicle he’d placed in the woods in case the worst happened.

“Don’t slow down,” Matt warned her when they reached the bottom. By now the gunman was probably off the roof so he could come after them.

Cass raced toward the truck, jerked open the passenger-side door and jumped onto the seat. Matt got behind the wheel and used the key that was duct-taped beneath the seat to start the engine. He slammed his foot on the accelerator and got them out of there.

“Stay down,” Matt insisted.

She did, sort of. Cass slid lower into the seat, but she kept her attention focused on the side mirror. She also kept a solid grip on her gun. Matt kept watch, as well, and then he got them the hell out of there.

Kicking up ice and dirt, he plowed through the ravine and exited onto a path that would eventually take them to a back road and then the highway.

Matt dodged some scrub oaks, barely scraping past them, and he checked the rearview mirror. No gunman in sight. That didn’t mean there soon wouldn’t be. He had to make it past the next rise and dry creek bed before he could even start to level his breathing.

Next to him, Cass was doing her own share of heavy breathing. He could see every muscle in her body knotted, the pulse on her neck pounding. The adrenaline was no doubt still pumping through her. It wouldn’t last long, and she’d soon have to deal with the inevitable crash.

“I don’t see him,” Cass announced. “Do you think he’ll come after us?”

“Not easily he won’t. By now he’s probably rushing back to his vehicle. Maybe calling for reinforcements. If we’re lucky, he might be making arrangements to get his comrade to the hospital.”

Matt knew he should call headquarters. He should report this, especially since he’d discharged his weapon and injured a man. But what if Cass was right? What if there was a breach in security? If so, his personal cell phone would be easy to track.

She checked the mirror again. Then she leaned forward and tried to turn on the heater.

“It doesn’t work,” he explained, turning off the cold blast of air from the fan. “There’s a blanket behind the seat.”

While still staying low, she draped her arm over the back of the seat and fished it out. “There’s only one blanket?”

He nodded. “Use it. Your lips are turning blue.”

Matt wasn’t sure she was going to follow his advice, but then she glanced down at the front of her camisole, noticing her very erect nipples. And that wasn’t the only thing. The camisole was short, and the shortness revealed several inches of her bare stomach.

He felt that slam of lust shoot through his body, and he silently cursed his brainless reaction.

“Cover up,” he snarled.

She did, finally, but she kept her shooting arm free by draping the fake Navajo-design blanket over only half her body. For some stupid reason, she seemed even hotter and more provocative than she did without the blanket.

“All right. I’m covered. Satisfied?” she asked.

Not even close.

Cass glanced at him, sat up in the seat, did a full 360-degree check of their surroundings and, apparently content that they were safe, she opened the glove compartment. “You have a first-aid kit?”

Alarmed, he looked at her. “Are you hurt?”

“No. But you are.” She pointed to the jagged slice across his left bicep. He hadn’t even been aware of the injury, but it looked to be from a bullet.

She extracted the small travel-size kit and scooted across the seat toward him. Very close to him. She brought with her the scent of the woods. The fragrant cedars. The leaves. The winter soil. The smoke. But she also brought the smell of flowers. Her shampoo, he discovered, when she leaned across him and her hair went right in his face. It was distracting. But not nearly as distracting as having her firm, small breasts pressed against his right arm.

“You saved my life back there,” she said, working quickly to clean the wound. “So, while I’m not thrilled about what just happened, I have faith in you.”

Matt winced, both at her comment and the poking around she was doing to his injury. “Faith?”

Cass’s gaze met his. So did her breath. “Yes. You know, as in confidence in your ability to keep us alive and get into Dominic’s estate.”

Matt leaned back to put some distance between them, and he took the ramp that led to Highway 281, which would take them directly into San Antonio. “Don’t have that kind of faith in me.”