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Seduction Under Fire
Melissa Cutler


Cop Camille Fisher can’t believe she’s daring to escape with her too-hot nemesis, Aaron Montgomery.But once she outsmarts their brutal captors, the danger’s just beginning. With cartel hit men closing in, she tries to ignore her needful heart – and resist the temptation threatening to do them both in…












“Aaron, stop.”


Her voice was breathy, aroused.

“Don’t try to tell me you don’t want me, Camille.

I know you better than that.”

“You don’t know me at all.”

What a load of crap she was feeding herself. He’d spent every moment of the past week memorizing her—from her body to the cadence of her speech, every sigh and every look. He’d lain awake each night listening to her breathe, drenching his senses with her. He knew Camille Fisher as well as he knew himself, better perhaps. “What have you convinced yourself of? What’s going on in that sharp mind of yours?”

“I …”

As she searched for words, he cradled her foot, warming it.

“I don’t want this between us.”

He tipped her chin up until she looked into his eyes. “Baby, it’s already between us.”

The torment in her expression spoke of a battle raging within her. She knew he was right.




About the Author


MELISSA CUTLER is a flip-flop-wearing Southern California native living in San Diego with her husband, two children and a nervous Siamese cat. She spent her teenage years on the floor of her local bookstore’s romance aisle making tough choices about which novels to buy with the measly paycheck from her filing-clerk job.

Her love for happily-ever-after stories continued into her job as a high school English teacher, and in 2008 she decided to take her romance-novel devotion to the next level by penning one herself. Halfway through that first book, she thought, This is what I want to do every day for the rest of my life, and she never looked back. She now divides her time between her dual writing passions—sexy small-town contemporaries and edge-of-your-seat romantic suspense.

Find out more about Melissa and her books at www.melissacutler.net. She loves to hear from readers, so drop her a line at cutlermail@yahoo.com. You can also find Melissa on Facebook and Twitter.


Dear Reader,

Luck is one of life’s big mysteries. Some people believe we make our own luck, while others seem cursed with bad luck their whole lives. We all know people who seem to skate through life with golden tickets. Not that they don’t earn their successes, but they seem flat-out luckier than the rest of us. One such person I know became the inspiration for the hero in Seduction Under Fire, park ranger Aaron Montgomery.

Aaron’s life is one golden opportunity after another. He’s on the fast track at work and, to top it all off, he’s gorgeous (and knows it). Anything he’s ever wanted, he’s gotten … except the attention of his best friend’s sister-in-law, Camille Fisher—and this ticks him off.

Camille is the unluckiest person she knows. All she ever wanted was to be a cop, but a freak accident has relegated her to a desk job—permanently. Nothing ever goes her way, and Aaron, with his golden goodness and perfect life, irritates her like salt in a wound. These two can’t stand each other, but when they’re targeted by a cartel, they’re forced to rely on one another to survive. If they can find luck in love along the way, so much the better.

Happy reading!

Melissa Cutler




Seduction

Under Fire

Melissa Cutler







www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


To my two beautiful kids, who cheer me every step

of the way while I chase down my dreams.




Chapter 1


Camille Fisher stood in a bathroom stall wearing the navy blue suit she’d picked out from a JCPenney clearance rack. The jacket buttoned across her chest, but it was a tight fit. With any luck, it would hold until after the press conference. She smoothed a hand down her skirt to make sure it covered her scar. It did, but she scowled at the streak of sweat her palm left on the polyester. Running too late to do anything more about the way she looked, she shielded her eyes from the mirror over the sink and reemerged into the bustling precinct.

Her boss caught up with her in the hallway, wringing his hands. “Look, I know public speaking isn’t your cup of tea, but I think it’s a good move for you. Gets you out from behind your desk for a change.”

Camille stopped short, reeling at the note of sympathy in his tone.

“I only agreed to this arrangement because a child’s involved. I happen to enjoy working the dispatch desk.” That was a whopper of a lie, but how dare Williamson pity her.

Five years ago, she was a force to be reckoned with, the youngest officer and only female ever promoted to the Special Forces unit in San Diego law enforcement history. As happened every time she thought about those days, the best six months of her life, she experienced a split second of exacting pain in her heart. Not a widespread pain like the bullet had been, but that of a needle. Worse than the pain, reflecting on her past left her feeling weak.

Above all else, Camille hated feeling weak.

“No need to get your back up, Fisher. We all appreciate you stepping up to the plate on this one. I’ll see you out front in five.”

Inside the lobby doors, Camille opened the three-day-old kidnapping file with trembling hands. She ran her fingertip around the edge of the glossy photo clipped to the front. If Williamson thought her involvement improved Rosalia Perez’s chance of being recovered alive, then she owed it to the five-year-old smiling at her to do everything she could.

She pushed the double doors open and froze, stunned by the scene before her. The space between the San Diego Central Precinct and the surrounding high-rises was packed with spectators and journalists. The odor of hundreds of people standing in the midday sun swirled with the stench of car exhaust and city grime. Already on the verge of losing her breakfast, she gagged a little as she took her place in the line of law enforcement officers and government officials.

Camille didn’t recognize the man dressed in civilian clothes who stepped to the podium. She tried to concentrate on his introduction of her, but she was working so hard to look confident that it took a nudge from Williamson for her to realize it was her turn to speak.

“Uh … I mean … welcome.” She cringed. So much for a smooth beginning. The stares and expectations of the audience bore into her and she shuffled her notes, dumbstruck. Then she noticed Rosalia’s photograph peeking out from behind some papers.

This one’s for you, Rosalia.

With a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and began.

“At approximately eight o’clock on the morning of Tuesday, February 10, Rosalia Perez boarded a school bus to Balboa Elementary. When class started at eight-thirty, she was marked absent by her teacher. Following the school’s unverified absence protocol, a phone call was placed to her home at eight-forty-five and was answered by Rosalia’s maternal grandmother, who is a non-English speaker. An interpreter at the school was summoned and a second phone call was placed at nine o’clock, during which the grandmother said that Rosalia had ridden the bus.

“The school bus driver confirmed that his bus dropped Rosalia off in front of Balboa Elementary at eight-ten. By nine-thirty, the girl’s mother, Maria Delgado, had arrived at the school. She, along with the school secretary, contacted the police to report her daughter missing. An Amber Alert was issued at nine-forty-five.

“Rosalia Perez is five years old, weighs fifty-one pounds and stands forty-four inches—or just under four feet—tall. She has shoulder-length brown hair and a strawberry-colored birthmark on her forehead above her left eyebrow. You’ll find a photograph of her in your press packet.

“Interviews conducted with adults present on the Balboa Elementary campus that morning yielded no information regarding Rosalia’s disappearance, but two student eyewitnesses report seeing Rosalia, before school, approach a brown two-door sedan driven by a dark-haired man.

“At this time, our main suspect is Rosalia’s biological father, Rodrigo Perez, aka El Ocho, a member of the crime organization in Mexico commonly known as the Cortez Cartel. He is suspected of being in the United States illegally. He is approximately five feet eight inches tall with light brown skin and short, black hair. In every photograph we’ve acquired, he’s wearing black leather gloves. He is considered armed and extremely dangerous.

“I will be conducting briefings at twelve o’clock each day in the main conference room of this precinct to keep the public as informed as our investigation allows.” She glanced around for the man who had introduced her. “Am I taking questions?”

He nodded and the entire throng of reporters stood at once, shouting.

Camille gestured to a woman wearing a red suit in the front row.

“How can the police be sure Rosalia hasn’t been taken to Mexico by her father?”

“The Border Patrol is immediately notified of all Amber Alerts, but with the nearly two-hour gap between the time Rosalia was last seen and when she was reported missing, we have no way of knowing whether she was taken out of the country, especially since the abduction site is only twenty minutes north of the Mexican border. We are working to gain permission from the Mexican government to widen our search to include Baja.”

Camille took a dozen more questions before gathering her notes and giving the podium over to the man who introduced her. Trembling with adrenaline, she nodded to her boss and walked past the line of officials and back through the double doors.

The relative silence of the precinct was a relief. Mostly, she couldn’t wait to change out of her suit. From the chair at her desk she grabbed her duffel bag and heard her cell phone ringing in her purse.

When she saw the text message, she smiled and snagged Williamson as he walked by. “I just got word my sister’s in labor. I’ll be back at work tomorrow in time for the press briefing.”

“Congratulations to your family. And give your dad my best. Remind him I still owe him for the burger he bought me last month.”

Camille’s father was retired, but his years on the force were legendary. She was constantly asked by her superiors to give her father their regards or forced to sit patiently through retellings of his most heroic moments. There had been a time Camille dreamed of following in his footsteps. The familiar needle of pain pierced her heart, but she refused to dwell. No more thoughts of dying dreams, not when she was about to become an aunt.

Juliana was two years Camille’s junior and as different from her as a sister could be. A lifetime of strained relations had finally given way to friendship two years ago, after Juliana fell in love with Camille’s former partner, Jacob. That he was the man responsible for Camille’s accidental shooting was immaterial. She’d known the risks of her high-stakes job when she signed on.

She grabbed her duffel and kept moving. She’d change out of the uncomfortable skirt and flats after she checked in with her sister.

Aaron Montgomery’s eyeballs hurt.

He could barely see the sun through the heavily tinted windows of the meeting room, yet it was still painful. Not even his special hangover energy drink helped when his head ached this badly. Sure he’d wanted to celebrate Tuesday’s big arrests, but what in God’s name made him down those last three tequila shots instead of calling it a night?

The answer, of course, was a petite college senior—at least, that’s what he thought she said—with long chocolate-colored hair and a waistline so tiny that when she ground against him on the dance floor, her little black skirt kept sliding down to reveal her thong.

Ah, good times.

“Something funny, Montgomery?” barked Thomas Dreyer, the ICE Field Office Director, who stood at the head of the table.

Aaron mashed his lips together in an effort to stop smiling. “Just thinking about how those cartel runners almost crapped their pants when we caught them, sir.”

“Add those two to the ten we expedited in December and we’re starting to send a clear message that these lowlifes can’t move guns through our country’s deserts and get away with it. If the cartels want to wage war against each other in Mexico, I’ll be damned if they’re going to do it with American firepower.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more, sir.” Staying on Dreyer’s good side was proving to be a tricky act—the man had no sense of humor—but Aaron was an expert at being a team player. And this was a team he was determined to rise to the top of.

As was usually the case in his life, Aaron had been handed the opportunity. His best friend, Jacob, referred to his luck as Aaron’s Golden Ticket. The label was fine for a joke, but Aaron knew better. He didn’t wait for luck to strike him where he stood, but instead kept his eyes open, ready to move into the path of the bolt at the first sign of a spark. So when, a year ago, the Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, better known as ICE, handpicked him to participate in a regional joint task force to combat drug, guns and human trafficking through the Southern California desert, Aaron seized the opportunity.

And he had a goal for himself. A big one.

He had no interest in being a boss man, standing at the head of the table as an administrator like Dreyer. His ultimate goal was to prove his worth as an ICE field agent. Maybe undercover. Definitely abroad.

As one of two Park Rangers on a unit comprised primarily of Border Patrol officers and ICE intelligence agents, Aaron was in ambitious company. Although he came to the unit with thirteen years’ experience as a Backcountry Park Ranger, he’d invested months of rigorous field training in weaponry and combat tactics and countless hours of classroom time to understand border policing laws so when the opportunity to transfer from Park Ranger to ICE agent presented itself, he’d be ready.

The challenge couldn’t have come at a better time. The diversions that used to satisfy his wanderlust had lost their flavor. Though he still thought his Mustang Shelby GT 500 was the best money he’d ever spent, he no longer took it for day trips simply for the thrill of the drive. Even the club scenes he frequented felt like a waste of time. Rock climbing, speedboating, skydiving—nothing he tried could take away the restless dissatisfaction that had settled into his bones.

Last night, he’d stayed out way too late with Little Miss Thong because she was exactly the type of girl that got his blood pumping. But sometime during the night, the pointlessness of what he was doing dawned on him. Time and youth were slipping away from him at an alarming rate, a revelation he counteracted by drinking and dancing more than usual.

Since Jacob’s wedding a year and a half ago, Aaron felt off.

At first, he thought it was because Jacob no longer had much time to spend with him, but it was more than that. Maybe he was subconsciously jealous of Jacob’s marital bliss or maybe Aaron was bored, but the discontent that had dogged him since his friend’s wedding was damned annoying.

“As I was saying,” Dreyer said with a hard glance at Aaron, “the latest intel is that the Cortez Cartel’s weapons distribution operation is being headquartered near the Baja capital city of La Paz, along the Sea of Cortez.” He pushed a button on his laptop and a satellite image of the Baja peninsula projected onto the wall behind him.

“As we already suspected, the Mexican government’s crackdown on cartels within Baja’s border cities has spurred them to move to obscure locations and utilize more creative means to smuggle weapons into their country.”

With another push of a button, Dreyer projected a grainy photo of a Hispanic man with jet-black hair and a round, oily face. “This is our next target, Rodrigo Perez, Alejandro Milán’s second-in-command. Perez has been running the weapons-smuggling division of the Cortez Cartel for approximately one year and manages a crew of at least thirty men.”

Aaron felt the vibration of his cell phone in his shirt pocket. He flipped it open to find a short text message—Jul n labr.

“Look at that,” he muttered to himself. “I’m about to be a godfather.”

He caught the eye of Nicholas Wells, the other Park Ranger in the unit, and held up his phone. “Family emergency,” he mouthed, scooting out of his chair. He opened the door and slipped into the bright afternoon, his headache forgotten.

She should have known he’d be at the birth of Juliana and Jacob’s child—he was her brother-in-law’s best friend, after all—but Camille’s stomach still lurched when she heard the deafening rumble of Aaron’s obnoxious car pull into the hospital parking garage behind her.

Unwilling to park on the same level as him, she drove past whole rows of available parking spots, waiting for him to choose one first. To her chagrin, he passed every open spot, too. In her rearview mirror, she saw Aaron chuckling behind his wraparound sunglasses and knew he was onto her plan. Even in the dim light of the garage, his dimples sparkled. The man was like a barbed thorn in her side—irritating and impossible to dislodge.

Finally he conceded and pulled into a space on the fourth level. Camille drove to the roof.

Then it occurred to her that in a matter of minutes, she’d be sitting in a waiting room with the man she’d successfully avoided for over a year. She thunked her forehead on the steering wheel and groaned.

She first met Jacob’s best friend two years earlier, and it had been a miserable experience. Simply put, Aaron was the most arrogant man she’d ever known. Handsome to a fault, with wavy blond hair and a body so meticulously ripped it was the perfect advertisement for his bloated ego, he’d made her feel like a piece of meat from the moment he introduced himself without raising his eyes higher than her chest.

When he figured out she wasn’t going to drool all over his showy muscles, lame jokes and expensive car, he’d been equally put off by her.

At Juliana and Jacob’s wedding, Camille put on her game face and tolerated Aaron for the single dance required of the maid of honor and best man, then spent the rest of the reception watching him hit on all the young, single women in attendance. She couldn’t believe how easily they fell for his boyish good looks and perfect body. They didn’t even notice he was treating them like interchangeable objects. She made a game of predicting which one he’d invite to his room that night. Because the wedding party had rooms on the same hotel floor, it was an easy mystery to solve.

And her prediction had been correct.

She knew Aaron thought she was a killjoy, but unlike the girls falling all over him at Juliana’s wedding, Camille didn’t require the validation of a man. And it was a good thing, too, because being a young female cop with a statuesque figure was like being an island in a sea of chauvinism. Why this particular chauvinist rubbed her the wrong way, Camille wasn’t sure. Frankly, she tried not to think about it—ever.

She grabbed her bag of clothes and purse and locked her car. When she got to the stairwell, she paused. Which would Aaron be less likely to take—the stairs or the elevator? She decided to take the stairs, even though her dressy shoes were beginning to rub, because it would preclude any chance of being stuck in the tight confines of an elevator with him. If he chose the stairs, she could hang back and let him go first.

As she turned the corner onto the fourth level landing, Aaron materialized in the stairwell.

“Camille, what a … pleasant surprise,” he deadpanned, falling into step beside her.

“I see you’re still compensating for your shortcomings with that offensive car.”

He chortled. “It’s good to know time hasn’t softened your icy heart.”

Narrowing her eyes, Camille picked up the pace. So much for hanging behind; she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. She motioned to his dark glasses. “Are you hungover again? Funny how every time I see you, you’ve been drinking too much. Maybe I’ll send you an AA pamphlet.”

With her skirt and shoes slowing her down, Aaron paced her effortlessly.

“Gee,” he said, “that’s a nice suit you’re wearing. Borrowing your grandma’s clothes again, are you?”

“You’re such a pig.”

“And you’re still a shrew, so we’re even.”

That was enough for Camille. “Out of my way,” she snarled. Elbowing him in the chest, she propelled herself into the lead.

He quickened his steps to match hers. “Always such a bully. When’re you going to figure out no one likes a bully, Blondie?”

“When’re you going to figure out I hate you, you misogynist prick?”

“Sweetheart, I figured that out the day we met, and I dropped to my knees, thanking the Lord for small favors.”

They broke into a sprint, their feet flying and their knees pumping like football players running a high-step drill. Camille knew she was acting immature, but she simply had to be the first person to the bottom of the stairs, the first person through the hospital doors, the first one to reach Juliana’s bedside.

As they traversed the last flight of stairs, Aaron shouldered past her, taking the steps two at a time. When Camille tried to match his stride, one of her shoes flew off. She grabbed the railing to keep from pitching headfirst to the ground.

Aaron reached the bottom level of the parking garage and scooped up Camille’s shoe. He turned to face her with a smug smile. “I’m sure your grandmother will want this back.”

Gasping at the insult, she yanked her other shoe off and hurled it at him.

He ducked, but his laughter was drowned out by a revving engine, its echo thunderous in the confines of the garage.

A white minivan screeched to a halt behind Aaron as its side door opened. Two masked men armed with fully automatic assault rifles were staged inside. Aaron whipped his head around, but it was too late. The men pulled him in and pointed their guns at Camille.

“In the van, puta. Now!” one of the men shouted at her.

Impossible. This couldn’t be happening. She was there for the birth of her niece.

“Camille, run,” Aaron called from within the van.

Run? Where? The only route was back up the stairs and then she’d still be trapped in the garage. Her eyes settled on the rifles, AK-47 knockoffs, probably Romanian. Wherever they were from, the guns made her only choice perfectly clear. Numbly, she got into the van.

Aaron sagged against the floor with half-closed eyelids as though he were drifting to sleep. “Aaron, what …? Why are you—” She yelped, turning toward the pain in her upper arm. An unmasked, baby-faced man with slicked-back hair was plunging a needle into her.

“Oh, God, no.” Then her tongue, along with the rest of her body, grew heavy, and she crumpled over Aaron’s limp form.




Chapter 2


Body odor. Not the occasional whiff of someone who forgot to apply deodorant, but the cloying, inescapable stench of people who, as a habit, did not bathe. The smell was so pungent, Aaron tasted it in his mouth as it hung open, slack and drooling due to the drug he’d been injected with.

Time passed indeterminately. Perhaps they drove for an hour, maybe longer. He couldn’t see anything except the booted feet of his captors, nor feel anything except the weight of Camille sprawled over him. No one spoke except for comments in Spanish said in whispers too soft for Aaron to translate, though he was adept at the language.

When the van stopped moving, the kidnappers stirred.

“Ustedes dos llévense al hombre.” You two take the man. “Cuidado, Perez lo quiere ileso.” Careful, Perez wants him unharmed.

Rodrigo Perez.

With the mention of that name, Aaron knew why he’d been taken and what they were going to do to him. As the man who arrested two of Perez’s operatives, Aaron was going to help the cartel send a message to the U.S. government. Today he was going to die. Probably beheaded. Most likely paraded around the streets of Tijuana on a stick. And Camille, poor unlucky Camille, was going to die, too.

He was dragged from the van to a small plane on a cracked blacktop runway in the middle of a lettuce field. Camille was slung over the shoulder of a short man, her legs dangling and her skirt bunched, revealing the white of her panties. Another man walked to her, chuckling, and pulled her skirt higher.

Realization of his powerlessness crashed over Aaron. These men could do whatever they wanted to Camille—rape, kill, anything—and Aaron couldn’t protect her. It was one thing to die as a result of his dangerous job. It was something much worse to watch another suffer, particularly a woman, for no reason other than her close proximity to trouble when it struck.

He was shoved through a side door in the plane and dumped on the floor. Camille was dropped at his side. With much effort, he turned his head to see her. Her eyes were not glazed over from the drug, nor did she look afraid at all, which threw Aaron off. He’d been prepared to console her. Instead she met his look with a sharp, confident gaze, as though she was trying to give him courage.

The plane taxied, then angled into the air. Aaron shifted until the back of his arm touched Camille’s hand. She wiggled her fingers against his skin. Of all the people in the world to be the last each saw before dying, that they were stuck with each other was definitive proof that God had an ironic sense of humor.

When the plane reached cruising altitude, someone moved between Camille’s legs. Aaron could tuck his chin enough to see the man’s slim form, but not what he was doing. He had a pretty good idea, though. Against the back of his hand, he felt her skirt being raised. Someone Aaron couldn’t see laughed and whooped. Aaron took Camille’s hand firmly in his and looked into her eyes. For the first time, she seemed afraid.

Don’t think about it, Camille. Look at me and turn your mind off.

After a minute, her look of fear evolved into confusion. The man above Camille smacked Aaron’s hand away and rolled her to her stomach. Then Aaron saw the harness.

Black straps looped around her thighs and shoulders, meeting in a rectangle of material against her back with attachments for the master jumper. Camille was being fitted with skydiving gear, the kind used in tandem jumps. When her harness was on, the man left her on her stomach. She turned to Aaron, her expression questioning. Aaron tried to speak, but his words came out distorted beyond understanding.

The same man moved over Aaron, lifting his legs and putting his tandem harness in place. Aaron had enough experience and skill to be a solo jumper, but like most people, he’d started with tandem jumping, where the novice is strapped to the front of an experienced jumper—the one with the parachute.

Aaron’s master jumper began the process of binding them together. Aaron had read reports of instances where this hadn’t been done correctly and the results were as gruesome as one might imagine. Hopefully these guys knew what they were doing.

The door of the plane opened and the howl of air moving at a hundred miles per hour eclipsed all other sounds in the cabin. The kidnappers heaved two wooden crates fitted with chutes through the opening. Too bad Aaron would never have the chance to tell his team about the Cortez Cartel’s method for smuggling weapons into Mexico.

Goggles were put on Camille and Aaron, which seemed like an odd bit of caring for hostage-taking narco-terrorists, and they were hauled to standing on weak but functioning legs. With the press of the master jumper’s belly nudging him, Aaron dragged his heavy feet toward the open door. He remembered how intimidating that opening, with the scream of the wind, looked on his first jump, and turned, seeking Camille to bolster her courage.

She stood behind Aaron, lining up for her jump. Though he was pretty sure she’d never been skydiving before, he shouldn’t have been surprised by the look of steely determination on her face. She might be the most grating woman he’d ever met, but he had to admire her fortitude. Camille was one tough broad.

She dipped her head in a terse nod, then shrank away with the rest of the plane as Aaron fell into the infinite blue horizon.

Camille’s heart pounded in her ears as she fell to earth. The fear of not knowing if the chute would open or if her harness would hold overrode all other thought during the free fall that seemed to last an eternity. Finally, the force of the unfurling chute jolted her back. Cold air whipped at her bare legs and feet. She was probably the first woman in history to skydive in a business suit, which was an honor she could have done without—and a perfect example of her rotten luck.

Camille used to believe she had fantastic luck. Five years ago, while lying in a hospital bed, she felt lucky to have cheated death, lucky that when Jacob misfired his gun, the bullet ripped through her thigh and not her head or an artery. In the days following the shooting, she felt lucky to keep the leg with the promise of walking again.

But as weeks and months passed, luck abandoned her. Oh, she could walk—for a little while before the throbbing pain became unbearable. And she could run—for a minute or two at a time. Soon, her recovery stalled.

What crushed her the most was the damage to her right hand, even though the bullet hadn’t come close to it. No matter how diligently she worked in rehab, her right hand shook uncontrollably when she held a gun. She discovered that little nugget of joy four weeks after the accident, her first time back at the firing range. She tried to load the magazine of her Glock 23 and her hand shook like there was an earthquake inside her body. She couldn’t even get a round off.

Her mandatory, department-issued therapist called it post-traumatic stress disorder. That sounded pretty official and all, but giving a name to her problem didn’t magically fix her.

Nothing could fix her.

Just like that, Camille’s temporary assignment to the dispatch desk took on the horrible stench of permanency. Her family encouraged her to pick a different career—if she ever heard the saying When one door closes, another opens again, she’d hang herself—but being a top-rate police officer was all she’d ever wanted. It was her one thing, her only thing.

She knew why she’d been kidnapped. Her image was splashed on the news naming Rosalia Perez’s father as a suspect, and a few hours later she was snatched by a group of Spanish-speaking thugs with the financial resources to own a private plane and an arsenal of assault weapons.

Her remorse was solely for Aaron, whose only offense was arriving at the hospital at the same time she did. At least he had the good fortune to be taken hostage with a former Special Forces officer. If even the smallest opportunity for escape opened, Camille would try to get Aaron to safety. She might hate the guy, but no one deserved to die this way. She had a vague recollection of Jacob gushing about Aaron’s assignment as a Park Ranger to an ICE task force, but she had no idea if he possessed skills that could aid their escape. The only Park Rangers she’d ever met had been a pair of granola-eating trail guides.

During the five-minute descent, she focused on determining their location. The ocean sat to the east and a long range of foothills sprawled over the west and south. What really struck her about the landscape was its desolation.

Save for a large city to the south along the shoreline and a highway running north and south, there wasn’t much to see. No suburban developments and few signs of life. The ground, from the shoreline to the tops of the foothills, was blanketed with rocks, tall-reaching cacti and scruffy desert plants. This had to be Mexico. Nowhere in America would such a large stretch of land abutting the ocean be free of people.

Before Camille touched down, she saw they were met by six mangy horses, one of which had a rider, a stout middle-aged Latino man with a thick mustache and a wavy shock of black hair. Two horses were strapped to a wagon laden with the wooden crates. The remaining horses were riderless and saddled.

She landed hard and grunted in pain when her knees hit gravel. The jumper attached to her toppled over her and shouted something in Spanish, then detached their harnesses and hauled her to her feet. Aaron stood nearby, a rifle pressed to his back. Despite it being February, the desert sun blazed against Camille’s fair skin. She licked her dry, cracked lips and tried unsuccessfully to swallow.

When someone shoved her toward him, her jelly legs lurched and she tripped over a rock. She would have fallen except Aaron reached out and caught her. With an expressionless face, he pulled her to his side and maintained a steadying hand on her elbow.

Mr. Mustache gestured to a chestnut-colored horse. With tentative steps, Camille approached it. She wiggled a foot into the stirrup and tried to hoist herself on, but her muscles refused to comply.

Aaron’s hands encircled her waist. “I’ve got you,” he whispered.

As he lifted, Camille hefted her leg over the saddle. Aaron swung behind her. It was the closest she’d been to a man in a long, long time. Check that—ever. She squirmed, desperate to put an inch or two between them.

“Easy there,” he muttered. To Camille’s mortification, he grabbed her hips and pulled her onto his groin. “Sorry.” His breath on her skin sent an involuntary shudder through her spine. “This saddle’s too small for the both of us.”

No kidding. “Just keep your hands to yourself.”

He responded with a quiet snort. “We’re going to die, Camille, and even if we weren’t, you’re not my type.”

“Believe me when I say that’s a relief.”

With Mr. Mustache holding the reins of Camille and Aaron’s horse, the caravan began a slow trot into the foothills, away from the city she’d seen in the distance.

As they rode in silence over an endless expanse of shrubs and sand, Camille caught a whiff of Aaron’s scent for the first time—clean, like freshly laundered cotton. Discreetly, she turned her face toward his neck and inhaled. No doubt about it, despite their ordeal, the man smelled like laundry straight out of the dryer. She squeezed her arms down, certain she didn’t smell as nice.

She’d learned the hard way that when men were as good-looking as Aaron, they were used to getting whatever they wanted. Aaron, in particular, oozed entitlement from his every pore. As though being born beautiful was anything more than lucky genes.

It irritated Camille to be the foil to his physical perfection. She neither looked nor smelled as good as he did. She felt awkward and unnatural on the horse while he was graceful and practiced. It was not an exaggeration to say he made being taken hostage look elegant and easy. No wonder she’d avoided him the past two years. His very existence felt toxic to her own.

When the trail turned steeply upward, Camille was forced to lean into his chest. He tensed in response. She turned to find him scowling.

“Don’t worry,” she growled, “it’s not a come-on. You’re not my type either.”

Not that it mattered in these last few minutes of his life, but no way would Aaron embarrass himself by sporting an erection while sharing a saddle with Camille Fisher. There would be no masking it since she was sitting on his lap, a position only slightly more comfortable than enduring the constant wiggling of her derriere.

Somehow, he had to figure out a way to stop his body’s reaction. First, he needed to quit smelling her hair, which was difficult because it was the most exquisite head of hair he’d ever seen, hanging in thick tresses down her back, inches from his nose. As the trail turned steep, Camille reclined into him and it took all his mental wrangling to not bury his face in it.

The second key to his success was not looking at or touching her long, perfectly toned legs to see if her skin was as soft as it looked. He remembered those legs from Jacob and Juliana’s wedding, how they looked holding up her red dress. What a waste, he’d thought at the time, to give such a body to a foul-tempered harpy.

The moment they crested a hill and a compound came into view, nestled in a narrow valley, Aaron began searching for a weakness in the layout he could exploit as an escape route. If there was one, though, he couldn’t find it. The towering cinder-block wall surrounding three squat, houselike buildings was topped with thick ropes of barbed wire. The iron-barred entrance gate on the east side, currently guarded by two men with rifles, was the only break in the wall.

The horses were led to the south of the compound, under a lean-to that served as a stable, where a pudgy man with wide-set eyes and a long, thin mouth like a frog took the reins. Aaron hadn’t seen a single car yet, which meant they would have to flee on horseback. With that in mind, he made damn sure he knew where the tack and saddles were stored before he and Camille were dragged from the horse and marched toward the entrance gate.

Barefoot, Camille stumbled along the inhospitable desert terrain. Aaron kept a firm hand on her elbow, steering her around the worst of the rocks and prickly cacti blanketing the ground, but her lack of footwear was one more strike against the probability of a successful escape, as if the odds weren’t impossible already.

By the time they reached the courtyard created by the buildings’ U-shaped layout, his hope for freedom had evaporated. The barbed wire-topped fence looked even more ominous up close and, with every step he took over the bullet-casing-littered ground, he counted another man and even more guns. They didn’t stand a chance of escaping this place with their lives.

They were prodded past an unmarked white delivery truck and a table loaded with what looked like satellite communication equipment and into the largest building that seemed to serve as the living quarters. Halfway down a dim hallway, they were muscled into a room that was empty save for the rusty metal chair Aaron was shoved into.

With a half dozen armed men surrounding him and a gun nudging Camille’s back, he didn’t put up a fight. Not even when a man with heavy acne scarring, holding a white rope, stepped forward to bind his hands behind the seatback and his legs to the legs of the chair. Within minutes, a second chair appeared and Camille was similarly bound.

Aaron met her gaze. The toughness he’d come to admire was still there, but shadowed by a hint of fear. As if maybe she’d done her own assessment of their odds and found them as bleak as he had.

From behind the cluster of men, a little girl with round, fearful eyes shuffled forward.

A tall, wiry man knelt next to her, whispering. She looked as though she was ready to run, but the man gripped her soiled red shirt tightly. She looked at Aaron and two tears rolled down her cheeks.

With a push from the man, she spoke in a mousy whisper in English. “We will send your picture to the American government.” After more prompting in Spanish, she continued. “Your government has one day to free the prisoners you took this week.” She paused and shook her head as more tears fell.

The man grabbed her frizzy black hair and shook her hard. “Habla ahora o no comerás esta noche.” Say it right now or you will not eat tonight.

For the first time in his life, Aaron wanted to hurt another human being. His nostrils flared as he struggled for self-control.

“Or … or …” the girl continued softly, “you will die.”

A man stepped forward with a camera and clicked twice. Aaron was certain he was captured in the picture displaying a sneer that matched the rage he felt. He wanted to shout at these men for defiling the girl’s innocence, but it would be stupid to reveal his understanding of their language. So he held his tongue as the man dragged the girl from the room. The rest of the crowd filed out and multiple locks clicked into place.

The atmosphere was heavy after the men left, punctuated only by the sound of Aaron’s labored, anger-fueled breathing.

“I know that girl,” Camille said, staring vacantly at the door. “That was Rosalia Perez.”




Chapter 3


Camille was looking for a flaw in their captors’ plan, an opening in their defense—anything to take advantage of. Now that the drug had worn off and her mind and body could work in harmony, she began to think in earnest about escaping.

Almost a perfect square, the room showed little promise for their freedom. Though it had two doors, the one they’d entered through and another that opened to the courtyard, judging from the barred window adjacent to it, she felt safe in assuming both were locked. The concrete floor was barren except for their chairs. Not even a nail hung from the cracked cinder-block walls. No electrical outlets, no lights—nothing.

She squirmed, testing the knots, and felt a stinging pain in the side of her right hand. She groped with her fingers and found the source, a sharp barb where the rusty metal of the chair had eroded. That, she could work with.

Aaron’s voice cut through the silence. “I’m sorry I got you into this mess.”

Camille blinked. “I’m the one to blame. Whatever prisoners they want released, they must think I’m a good pawn since I went on national news today implicating Rodrigo Perez in the kidnapping of his daughter. He’s a major player in the—”

“I know who he is. He’s the next target of my task force because he’s running weapons through the desert. I’m the one who arrested the prisoners they want released.”

“Oh.” She pulled her face back, shock rendering her momentarily speechless. “Jacob said you’d joined a task force, but I didn’t know you had the authority to make arrests.”

“What did you think I do for a living?”

“You’re a Park Ranger. I figured you were cataloging cacti and leading hikes. How was I to know you were in the field hunting international fugitives?”

Aaron huffed. “You had no idea Park Rangers are fully sworn-in peace officers, same as you?”

“Er, nope.” And you can shut up about how ignorant I am, Mr. Perfect.

“I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but you don’t get to take credit for getting us killed.”

She wiggled the rope. “Hey, we’re not dead yet. You can only take credit for getting us kidnapped.”

“We’re tied up in a barbed wire-rimmed compound in the middle of the Mexican desert, surrounded by men with assault rifles and God knows what else, without any money or transportation. Excuse me for not feeling very optimistic.”

Camille shrugged noncommittally. “Any idea where we are?”

“The Cortez Cartel has a stronghold in La Paz. Given the orientation of the water and the sparseness of the population, that’s my best guess.”

“I’ve never heard of La Paz.”

“It’s not very touristy, not like Cabo. ICE thinks the cartel works it like a mafia, with their fingerprints everywhere, even in the local police.”

“Is the Cortez Cartel Mexico’s most powerful?”

“Not by a long shot. That would be the La Mérida Cartel. Before he was arrested, their leader, Gael Vega, started his own militia that rivals the Mexican military in power.”

They were warned of their captors’ return by the sound of boots in the hall followed by clicking locks moments before the door opened. The man who had taken their horses entered holding a bottle of brownish water and a bowl of rice, followed by an armed guard who stopped in the doorway.

He held the water to Camille’s lips. She turned away, not about to let it pollute her body. The man chased her mouth with the bottle and nudged at her closed lips a few times. Poking her with a spoonful of rice, he shouted in Spanish and gestured to the window. When she didn’t relent, he moved to Aaron, who also refused. Only two minutes after arriving, the man and his guard left.

“Wish I’d paid more attention in my high school Spanish classes,” she grumbled.

“He said this is your last chance for food until he returns tomorrow morning. And that you would be stupid to refuse.”

Of course the Golden Boy spoke fluent Spanish. But she had to admit, the skill might come in handy when they escaped. And they would escape, she thought as she wiggled her wrists, teasing the rope against the barb.

Hours later, long after the room had gone dark and Aaron was only an outline as he sat in silence a few feet away, Camille felt the rope finally give. Her hands bore the evidence of her effort with countless scrapes and puncture wounds from the rusty barb. Thank goodness she kept up with her tetanus shot.

Once free, she bent to work on the ropes binding her feet.

“What the …?” Aaron said.

“Those idiots shouldn’t have used such old chairs. Mine had a sharp edge perfect for sawing rope.”

“Good thing, too, because the clock’s ticking, Blondie. We don’t have time—”

Camille’s first order of business as an escapee was to make one minor but vital point with Aaron. “Let’s get something straight—don’t ever call me Blondie again. Or Sweetie or Doll or any of those derogatory nicknames you’re so fond of. I hate it. Understood?”

“Okay, I got it.”

Satisfied, Camille began untying the rope around Aaron’s wrists.

“Like I was saying,” he continued, “we don’t have much time before frog man and his bodyguard bring us breakfast at gunpoint.”

Camille looked out the window at the first glow of predawn. If they were lucky, they had maybe an hour or two to devise a plan. “As far as weapons go, we’ve got this rope and these chairs, but that’s not enough. I’ve got another idea, but it’ll take some time to prep.”

“Care to explain?”

“Not yet.” What she had in mind would open her up to all kinds of ridicule, so she decided to keep mum until she was certain it would work. While Aaron freed his legs from the chair, Camille slipped to the darkest corner of the room and took off her bra.

Aaron’s heart pounded so loudly, he was surprised Camille couldn’t hear it. Without weapons to defend themselves, they were as good as dead. And what weapon could they find in this room that would be any match for automatic rifles?

The chairs were too ungainly. The guard would have plenty of time to react if he saw a twenty-pound metal chair coming at him. He tested the individual spokes and chair legs, hoping to break one off and use it as a club or knife, but no such luck. He could wield a shard of glass from the window, but if anyone were in the courtyard, they would hear it break.

“Camille, I’m running out of ideas.” He glanced in her direction.

What he saw was so at odds with what he expected that words died in his throat. Trying to ignore the taut points of her nipples beneath her thin white camisole, he watched her bite a hole in the beige bra she held.

“You got a weapon stashed in there or something?”

She ignored him and pulled a long, thin wire from inside the bra cup, then snapped it in half. “Bet you didn’t know underwire is flat like a screwdriver.”

“No, can’t say I’ve thought much about bras except how to get them off as quickly as possible.”

Rolling her eyes, she turned away and put her bra on. Still confused, Aaron gaped at her back. Once she’d righted her clothes, she knelt before the door that led outside. Using the blunt end of the underwire, she loosened the doorknob’s screws.

“Throwing a doorknob at them is better than nothing, but hardly game changing, MacGyver.”

She glanced sideways at him. “You’re a dense man. We’ve been over this already. I hate nicknames. Take off one of your socks so we can put the doorknob in it. We can do serious damage to someone’s head that way.”

Aaron grinned, genuinely impressed. Even so, he couldn’t stem the urge to tease her. “I didn’t think a chick would be so handy to have around.”

She jumped to her feet and rushed him. With fiery eyes, she poked him hard in the chest and waved the underwire beneath his nose. “You ought to show more respect to the person who’s saving your life.” She poked him again. “I’m not one of those helpless cupcakes you waste your time with. I graduated head of my class at the police academy and was the first female Special Forces Officer in San Diego. Those sons of bitches have no idea what a mistake they made messing with me.”

Aaron held up his hands in surrender. The gesture lost significance by the fact that he was chuckling. For some sick and twisted reason he didn’t care to analyze, he liked her when she was all riled up this way. “Cupcakes?”

Camille snorted and went back to work on the doorknob screws. “Yeah, well, that’s what they look like to me with their poofy hair and fake nails and fluffy clothes—little pink frosted cupcakes with sprinkles. Completely free of substance.”

Aaron gawked at her. Not for the first time since their ordeal began, she’d rendered him speechless.

She was right. Most of the women he knew were a bunch of cupcakes compared to her, a woman so self-sufficient and physically capable that she was the one planning to save his life. She was the one fashioning tools out of her bra and improvising weaponry. He supposed he hadn’t noticed sooner because they’d never been in a clinch situation before, but the lady was a badass.

He was fascinated … and irritated as hell to realize it.

Well, he had no intention of standing around and letting Camille be the only hero. While she finessed the external doorknob to stay in place, he removed his sock, slid the interior knob inside and took a few practice swings. As far as bludgeons went, this one would do nicely.

“The guard’ll have a gun, so the trick will be to catch him unaware,” he deliberated.

Camille stood and adjusted her skirt. “I thought of that, too. That’s where our rope will come in handy.”

Their animosity forgotten, they scooted their chairs together and hashed out a plan. Stripped of sarcasm and defensiveness, Aaron was surprised by how similarly their minds worked. Within minutes, they knew how to proceed and the role each would play.

They took positions on either side of the hallway door and waited. Feeling more confident than he had since being taken hostage, he smiled at Camille, who responded with a sly grin of her own.

In the two years he’d known her, this was the first time he’d ever seen her smile. He liked the effect it had on her features. It didn’t soften her but made her look more powerful and capable and all those things Aaron was discovering this extraordinary woman was beneath her cold exterior. He studied her, mesmerized by her complexity, as she stood with a rope in hand, ready to spring at her enemy.

They had plenty of warning when it was showtime. Boots in the hallway, a lock rattling. With the click of the second lock, Aaron’s muscles tensed. Camille crouched, leaning toward the door, the rope tight in her hands.

This was going to be fast.

The whole choreographed sequence would take less than a minute. The placement of their footfalls and the timing of their moves had to be exact. He and Camille would have to work as though they were breathing in unison.

The door swung wide, hiding Aaron behind it. Holding his position, he gripped the bludgeon and prayed.

Camille let the man get both feet in the room and register that the chairs were empty. She dropped the rope over his head and pulled him against her, strangling him as she moved backward three steps.

The guard played his part perfectly. He ran into the room and faced Camille and her hostage, his finger on the trigger of his rifle, shouting at her in Spanish.

“In,” Camille said.

At her cue, Aaron kicked the door closed. With unflinching purpose, he brought the bludgeon down on the guard’s head, felling him instantly. Then, working in perfect synchronization, Aaron straddled the guard and swung the bludgeon as Camille pushed her captive toward him. It took two thumps with the doorknob before he crumpled atop the unconscious guard.

Aaron stood over the two fallen bodies looking the part of a victorious warrior, surveying his conquered foes. Camille tried to be subtle about it, but she couldn’t take her eyes off him. He gripped the bludgeon in his hand, and her gaze followed the sinews of his arm to his massive biceps and broad shoulder—muscles that no longer seemed like a sign of his vanity, but weapons in his arsenal. Despite all they’d been through, the shadows of his dimples remained and his wavy blond hair still looked boyishly carefree, but the planes of his jaw were rigidly set and the expression on his face was one she’d never seen on him before—hard and dangerous.

He raised his eyes and caught Camille staring. She wrenched her gaze to the window, her whole upper body flushing hot.

The guard moaned, snapping Camille back to the moment. She lunged for his gun at the same time Aaron did, but he reached it first. The guard moaned again before Aaron knocked his head with the butt of the rifle, sending him out cold once more.

Camille searched the men for weapons and discovered a short-barreled .38 Special. She spun the cylinder to check for bullets, which was no easy task given the way her hand shook. Here we go, she thought, snapping the fully loaded cylinder in place. The last thing she wanted to do was reveal this weakness to Aaron.

You see, I have this condition called post-traumatic stress disorder …

She cringed. Then she had an idea. “Aaron, you mind trading guns?”

He tsked in protest, but held the rifle out. “I guess size really does matter to a lady.”

With the rifle, Camille felt better. She could hold it with both hands instead of one and steady it against her shoulder when she fired. Besides, one didn’t need to strive for accuracy with an M16. She slung the gun’s strap over her head and pushed the rifle around to her back. Squatting, she removed the guard’s shoes and black jeans.

“What are you doing?” Aaron asked.

“I hate wearing skirts.” She unzipped the offensive garment and pushed it down an inch before remembering her audience. Aaron’s face was frozen in a grimace. So she disgusted him, what else was new? She couldn’t escape shoeless, wearing a skirt. “Do you mind?”

“Do I mind that you’re about to put on those nasty pants? Hell, yeah. They look like a biological superweapon.”

“No, wise guy. Do you mind giving me some privacy?”

He faced the wall. Ignoring the foul odor wafting from the pants, Camille donned them and folded the waist to help with the fit.

“You can turn around now.”

She tried on the other man’s sneakers and was grateful they were a near fit.

“That’s quite a look you’ve created.”

She brought the rifle forward, gripping it tightly with both hands to keep the shaking to a minimum. “Yeah, I’m a real fashion maven. I’m calling this look Cartel Chic.”

Aaron chuckled and Camille surprised herself by joining in. She did look pretty awful.

Too soon, the moment passed as they remembered where they were and what they’d done. Both sets of eyes returned to the unconscious figures on the ground.

“That was almost too easy,” Camille said.

“We’re not done yet, Blondie. We still have to escape from the compound.”




Chapter 4


Camille was ready. She rolled her shoulders and felt the slide of her muscles against her camisole. Maybe it was only the effect of the adrenaline surging through her system, but she felt her position of power all the way to her toes. This random fate that had befallen her, to die at the hands of a bunch of criminals for a cause that wasn’t her own, was about to get the shaft.

She walked to the door. “Ready?”

Aaron stood behind her, the .38 Special brushing her shoulder. “Let’s do it.”

She opened the door a crack, listening. A television set blared from the direction she and Aaron had been brought into the building, with a woman shouting in Spanish like a game show announcer might, against a background of hooting and cheers from an audience. Unable to hear anything above the din, she nosed her head through the doorway.

Somewhere nearby, a door banged closed. Camille flinched and pulled back, listening until she picked up the barely audible sound of a man’s voice amid the television’s noise. Then a second person spoke. A child. At the sound of Rosalia’s pixie voice, Camille ached. She wanted to scoop the little girl up and run with her back to California, straight to the loving arms of her mother. But instead of acting impetuously and getting them all killed in a firefight, the best she could do for Rosalia was escape and tell U.S. authorities where to find her. Still, it was heart wrenching to leave her behind.

They crept into the hallway and turned right, toward three closed doors. It felt like Russian roulette, picking a door to open not knowing who or what was on the other side, but they had no other options.

Camille turned the knob of the first door. Aaron placed a hand on the small of her back and the barrel of his gun on her shoulder, angling it through the opening. She scanned the darkness. Someone slept on a cot along the wall. He stirred and rolled on his side. Holding her breath, she closed the door.

They tiptoed to the next room, though the blaring television program masked the sound of their movement. Aaron placed his hand on the doorknob. Camille wasn’t tall enough to aim her weapon over his shoulder, so she slid it along his side, under his arm. The knob turned; the seconds ticked by. Aaron stuck his face through the crack. He smiled at Camille and stepped inside. Camille followed, closing the door behind her.

This room was not as dark as the first. The window was uncurtained and unbarred. A row of wooden crates identical to those pushed out of the plane sat along one wall, stacked two high. On another wall stood a table weighed down with piles of American cash.

Camille walked to the crates and tried to lift one. “Help me with this.”

“What are you doing?”

“These guys are weapons smugglers, right? So what do you think’s in these boxes, donations to Goodwill?”

“You guard the door. I’ll look inside.” He tucked the gun into his waistband. Camille tried to ignore the zing of desire that hit her at that maneuver. What a stupid thing to think about when their lives were in danger. On second thought, it was a stupid thing to think about at any time. She had no business ever thinking about Aaron’s pants or what he put in them.

He lifted a box to the ground and dumped packing peanuts on the floor.

“This was the best idea you’ve ever had, Blondie.”

With her rifle aimed at the closed door, she walked backward until she stood over the box. Aaron was right. This was the best idea she’d ever had. She didn’t even care that he’d called her that terrible name again because in the box, nestled in a black nylon bag, were ten Smith & Wesson M&P 9 mm pistols. With silencers. And boxes of ammunition.

Aaron moved the .38 from the front of his waistband to the back. He screwed a silencer on to a 9 mm and loaded the magazine. Repeating the process with a second pistol, he handed it to Camille. She tucked it into her jeans.

“Don’t you want to trade up for the silent model?” Aaron asked with honest surprise.

Camille wasn’t about to admit her gun-handling defect. “Like you said, size matters.”

He snorted and moved the bag to the table. “I’ll look in the next box. You load this with cash.”

They set to work. Within the span of a few minutes, their luck had improved tenfold. Instead of two guns with limited ammunition, they now had two AR-15 assault rifles, four 9 mm pistols with silencers, countless rounds of ammo, four grenades and—by Camille’s hasty count—two hundred and fifty thousand U.S. dollars.

The grenades were an interesting find. Camille would have had no moral qualms against blowing up the compound and everyone in it if Rosalia hadn’t been present. Then she had another idea. It would be extremely risky, but still, it might work.

“Aaron, are there any more grenades in those boxes?”

The woman had balls, figuratively of course. Aaron was sure he couldn’t have come up with a better plan if given a week to think about it. He rummaged through the boxes until he found another grenade, which he handed to Camille. Replacing the lid, he moved the box under the window to use as a step.

“I’ll be right back,” she whispered.

Her destination was across the hall, to the room that had been their prison. They were about to kill two people and Aaron couldn’t find it in his heart to be upset. He was more disturbed that it didn’t bother him.

Rifle in hand and the game-changing bag of booty slung over his shoulder, he stood on the box. From the looks of it, the rear wall of the house ran parallel to the western wall of the compound, with about three feet between the two. Plenty of room to jump and run.

Camille returned, sprinting through the door and kicking it shut as the grenade detonated. The explosion was earth-rattling. Aaron’s ears rang and the door nearly came off its hinges. He slammed the rifle butt into the glass. He couldn’t hear it break over the din of the explosion but felt the pane give way. After sweeping the rifle across the window to clear it of glass, he moved out of Camille’s way.

In a flash of golden mane and lithe limbs, she jumped out the window. Aaron landed behind her and they ran, staying low under the windows along the north side of the building. Aaron peered around the corner at the crowd in the courtyard surrounding the crater that used to be their hostage-holding room.

A five-foot gap loomed between the house and a shed. Though Camille’s ruse was working, it was still a leap of faith to zip between the buildings in plain sight. If only one man looked in their direction, they were dead. Aaron went first, holding his breath for the three steps it took to make the pass. They followed the path of the compound wall to the end of the shed, which still left them with a solid two car lengths of empty space to reach the entrance gate.

A burly man with a full beard and a rifle was standing inside the locked gate, yelling and gesturing to the men at the explosion site. Aaron knew what needed to be done and said a prayer for forgiveness. He’d never been a particularly religious man, but he was about to murder someone pointblank. At least with the grenade, Aaron didn’t have to watch anyone die. This time, though, he was going to look a man in the eyes and shoot him.

“I got this.” He picked up a rock and threw it against the wall, waiting for the guard to investigate. His heart pounded out of control and his hands were sweaty, but he wiped them on his jeans and manned up. Their lives depended on this and he wasn’t going to act like a sissy by getting all shaky and nervous.

The guard’s shadow gave him away first. His stomach came into view, then his arms and gun. Aaron fired two rounds, one into his head and the other into his chest. Though the sound of the shots was blunted by a silencer, the plunk plunk still echoed between the shed and the compound wall.

Aaron worked hard to ignore the significance of what he’d done as he frisked the dead man for keys, finding them in a pants pocket.

“Anyone onto us?” he asked Camille, who had chanced a look around the corner.

“We’re good. They’re putting out a fire on the roof.”

“Then we keep moving.” He sprinted to the gate with a key in his outstretched hand. Please let this be the right key….

It was not. He jerked the key out of the padlock. His fingers found the next key on the loop and jammed it into the lock. It gave way this time. The chain dropped to the ground and they were through.

Aaron’s and Camille’s feet slipped on the loose gravel, but they maintained their breakneck speed to the lean-to. While he ran, Aaron scanned the half dozen horses. The dark brown steed appeared to be the healthiest of the bunch, with muscular legs that looked ready to fly over the terrain. He skidded to a stop and dropped their cache to the ground.

Camille was right behind him. “Okay, you’re the horse expert. Go for it.”

He hunted through a crate for a saddle, blanket, bridle and harness, and made quick work of readying the horse to ride. The memory of Camille’s struggle to mount their last horse was still fresh in his mind, so he grabbed her around the waist and tossed her up.

She yelped in protest.

Aaron pushed the bag of guns and money onto her lap, then swung up behind her. “If I’m in charge, then we’re doing this my way.”

Camille must have thought better about arguing because she silently lifted herself from the saddle so he could get comfortable, then settled onto his groin as she had the day before. Aaron reached around her, grabbed the reins and spurred the horse into a gallop.

Their destination was east, to the ocean. Once the compound was no longer visible, he slowed the horse, setting a reasonable pace to conserve the animal’s energy in the stifling, midmorning heat.

Aaron loved to ride and had been doing so since he could walk. There weren’t many activities for desert kids like him in a one stoplight town, but he had the State Park at his door-step. His parents took full advantage of that fact and made sure he and his younger sisters could ride and hike like pros.

Miles of desert disappeared behind them. Their steed easily avoided the thick blanket of shrubs and giant cardón cacti, which stood with long, green arms reaching for the sky like an army a thousand strong. Aaron found no signs of human existence, just acres and acres of pristine wilderness.

Camille’s hair was as untamable as the land. It whipped and tickled Aaron like a cruel taunt. Unable to resist, he covetously gathered it in his free hand. He was such a fool to do that. A certifiable idiot. But he did it anyway, burying his nose in the locks before letting them slip through his fingers to blow in the wind.

Camille hadn’t noticed, and while he was relieved, her obliviousness made him greedier. He felt himself harden and hoped she was oblivious to that, too. He gathered her hair again and glimpsed the creamy skin of her neck. His mouth watered at the thought of kissing it, which was even more certifiably idiotic, given that Camille was heavily armed.

At that inopportune moment, their horse lurched and he accidentally tugged her hair.

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to get your hair out of my face,” he replied gruffly.

“Oh, sorry.” She twisted it and stuck it down her shirt. “That’s the best I can do for now.”

That solved the hair problem. Now how was she going to stop the friction of her hips rocking against him or the agonizing heat passing from her body to his?

She relaxed against him, wiggling her backside as she settled. Choking back a groan, he looked heavenward, hoping they’d reach the ocean soon. He needed to get off this horse before he did something he’d spend the rest of his life regretting.

Aaron would never forget his first time meeting Camille at Juliana and Jacob’s engagement party, though not for its pleasantness. Aaron had taken one look at her standing on his parents’ patio and targeted her as his next bedmate.

Like the fool he was around pretty girls, he cranked up his charm wattage, swaggering and openly praising her voluptuous attributes. And there was a lot to praise about Camille’s body. She was, without a doubt, one of the most beautiful women he’d ever laid eyes on, with legs that went on for miles, curves custom-made for a man to wrap his hands around and full, pouty lips. Then she opened them and it was all downhill from there.

Apparently, his charm was too much for Camille to handle because the more charismatic he was, the more pungent she became. After that party, they’d seen enough of each other to last a lifetime. Aaron decided that no woman, no matter how stunning, was worth battling with such a sour disposition.

He smiled at the memory and might have laughed except Camille would want to know what was so funny. He’d thought about it in the plane and it struck him again how ironic life could be. He was racing across the Mexican desert with the only woman he’d wished to never see again.

And he was more attracted to her than ever.

Finally, the horse crested a ridge overlooking the beach. A temperate ocean breeze puffed at them, cooling Aaron’s sunburned skin.

“We should ride in the surf to erase our tracks, in case they’re on our trail,” Aaron said as their mount picked its way down a canyon.

“Which direction do you think we should go?”

“If my bearings are correct, then the city we saw when we jumped is to the south. Let’s see what we find.” He tugged the reins.

Ahead of them stretched a pristine yellow-sand beach edged by cliffs and the endless ocean, which sparkled in the bright afternoon sun. It was lovely, really. Only a few hours earlier, he’d faced his own death, yet now he was riding horseback with a gorgeous woman along an empty beach. He closed his eyes and basked in the moment. Then the butt of Camille’s rifle poked him in the ribs.

“You know, when I fantasize about riding with a woman through the surf in Mexico, she’s not usually carrying a rifle.”

She twisted to look at him, wearing a wicked grin on her lips. “Sounds like you have boring fantasies.”

Aaron threw his head back and laughed. Leave it to Camille to surprise him again. He thought of a good comeback, something snarky and full of innuendo, but decided against voicing it. This is good enough for now.

He settled his arms more comfortably around Camille’s sides, took another furtive inhale of her hair’s magnificent scent and looked to the horizon, waiting for any vestiges of civilization to come into view.

Not five minutes later, he heard, then saw, an approaching vehicle in the distance. With a quiet curse, he turned their horse toward the cliffs lining the beach and found a concave section of cliff face. They dismounted, firearms ready. Besides the roar of the vehicle’s engine, Aaron heard voices whooping and hooting. Odd …

He tipped his face around the corner. “It’s a Jeep with at least four people.”

“Why are they shouting?” Camille asked.

“I have no idea.”

“I hear something else, too. What is that?”

Aaron shook his head. “I can’t quite make it out.”

They stood and listened. Aaron glanced at Camille’s hands, which had started to shake, but decided against asking her about it.

The sound that had been so faint over the thunder of the waves and the hollering and the Jeep’s engine became clearer to Aaron. “It sounds like … huh?”

He and Camille looked at each other, their faces screwed up in confusion.

“Bruce Springsteen?” they exclaimed in unison.




Chapter 5


“Hide the guns. No way are these people cartel hit men.” Aaron held the bag open and Camille wedged her rifle inside. She flexed her fingers, the weight on her chest lighter with the gun out of her hands.

The Jeep hurtled toward them, spitting sand in its wake and blasting Bruce Springsteen. Aaron grabbed the bag and the horse’s reins. Walking the horse behind them, they planted themselves in the path of the joyriders. The music went dead and the Jeep crawled to a stop a few yards in front of them.

The man behind the wheel looked about fifty, with gray streaks in his brown hair, a softened body and the laid-back disposition of a man embracing his inner-Jimmy Buffett. The two women in the backseat looked young and were exactly the type of cupcakes Camille had railed against that morning. Clad in bikinis topped with cover-ups that didn’t actually cover anything up, they were overdone in every way—too much makeup, too many artificial highlights in their hair and massive designer sunglasses.

“Hello there,” the driver said. “You two look like you might need some help. Am I right?”

Aaron answered. “You guessed it. We came down to Baja with friends to go camping and when we left on our horse for a ride along the beach, they ditched us.”

“They don’t sound like very good friends.”

“No kidding,” Aaron said.

The driver rubbed his goatee. “Tell you what. We’re pretty close to our camp. Would you and your girlfriend care to follow us back? I bet we could rustle up a cell phone for you to call your friends, and you can have a bite to eat and let your horse rest.”

“I think we’re done with those particular friends. Maybe we could borrow that phone to make other arrangements?”

“We can do that, too.”

“Thank you.” Aaron smiled wolfishly at the cupcakes. “Oh, and for the record, Camille and I are only friends. We’re not …”

“Friends riding together on a horse?” one of the cupcakes asked.

“Yeah, her horse took off. We didn’t have a choice.”

Camille shifted her gaze to the rusty brown cliff face, regrouping. It wasn’t that she cared about Aaron’s enthusiastic clarification that they weren’t involved—it was the truth, after all. And she didn’t mind that the girls were angling for a better view of him. He was the most magnificent-looking man she’d ever seen, too. It was just that she was disappointed to have been wrong about him.

Since being taken hostage, she’d started to believe he’d changed, that underneath his party-boy persona was a respectable man capable of so much more than preening and seducing women. She’d begun to think of the two of them as a team. But she’d been wrong and the misjudgment stung. But she had more important issues to worry about than a man so easily distracted by pretty girls.

Her thoughts returned to Rosalia, alone and frightened in the compound. Camille hadn’t considered it before, but maybe she’d been dropped in the middle of the Mexican desert for a reason. Maybe this journey wasn’t another case of her rotten luck, but a chance to redeem thirty wasted years. Maybe she needed Rosalia as much as the little girl needed her. A new plan began to take shape in her mind.

The driver offered his hand to shake. “The name’s Charlie. In the back we’ve got Ana and Sarah.”

“I’m Aaron and this is Camille.” He waved to the cupcakes, and added a wink for good measure.

Unbelievable.

Charlie must have noticed Camille’s discomfort because he patted her hand. “Would you like to ride with us? We have room.”

His palm was sweaty and his fingers bloated, but he might prove to be a valuable component to her plan.

“Thank you, Charlie.” And though she wanted to yank her hand away and wipe it on her pants, she gave his fingers a little squeeze. She even pulled off a convincing smile.

He wasn’t being manipulative—that was such an ugly word—but Aaron knew how to be persuasive to women. He knew what they wanted to hear, what little looks and touches would turn them to putty in his hands. Except for Camille. Nothing softened her, but that was beside the point.

As soon as Aaron saw the women in the Jeep, he knew they were his and Camille’s ticket out of Mexico. All he needed was a little time with them to parse out the details. He regretted Camille’s embarrassment when he distanced himself from her, but he needed the women to think he was available, not some letch trying to cheat on his girlfriend.

Charlie’s eyes had turned hungry at the revelation he and Camille weren’t an item. Aaron hadn’t counted on that. She’d already proved she could kick ass and take names, but it went against his basic instincts to throw any woman to the wolves, even a cop.

Not that she seemed to mind. She was laughing and making flirty eyes at Charlie while Aaron was forced to watch through the rearview mirror as he followed the Jeep on horseback. Charlie wasn’t remotely attractive and he was at least twenty years her senior. He seemed like a nice guy, sure, but as spineless as they came. A man like that could no more handle a woman like Camille than a child could handle a pet tiger.

The camp, though visible from the beach, was nestled into a valley between two foothills and demarcated by two palm-thatched palapas on the beach. One shaded a hammock. Aaron followed the Jeep onto a dirt road that wound among the homes, if he dared use such a polite word to describe the dwellings. Reeking of seaweed, the after-odor of bonfires and marijuana, the settlement was the housing equivalent of a pack of stray dogs. Of the twenty or so places, some were less flea-bitten than others, a few even looked rather domesticated, but the whole lot of them was a mangy bunch of misfits.

Charlie directed Aaron to the sea-green shack of some absentee neighbors who often brought their horse with them. Sure enough, a wood-and-wire fenced corral was sandwiched on the side of the property. No doubt the animal would be well cared for here. It didn’t seem to have any identifying marks that might prove dangerous if the cartel went on the prowl for their stolen horse, which was a small blessing. To repay this community with the wrath of a vengeful cartel would be unforgivable.

The hardworking horse had one task left before it could rest, though. Aaron tugged the reins and set off for the perimeter of the settlement to take note of all the paths leading to and from the camp, should they need to make a quick getaway. Jacob would’ve said it was Aaron’s Golden Ticket at work again, but nevertheless, Aaron was relieved to discover only one access point from the west, a steep dirt road leading out of the valley. Perfect.

He returned to the corral, found feed and grooming supplies and set to work tending the horse.

“You’re a sneaky man,” a heavily accented female voice behind him said. Ana, if he remembered correctly. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

Seducing these women would be a piece of cake if they were going to throw themselves at him. He kept scrubbing, to see how hard they’d work to get his attention. “Responsibility before pleasure, as they say.”

“How sensible of you,” she purred. A darkly tanned Latina, she was taller than Sarah and looked to be in her late twenties, with long black hair and a temptress’s body. Not too long ago, Aaron might have quit his job and moved to Mexico for the promise of this woman’s company. But his responsibility to Camille and his desire to make it out of Mexico alive superseded everything else.

“This horse worked hard today. It deserves a little pampering.”

“I think I’m jealous of the horse,” Sarah, obviously American judging by her voice, said. A pair of trim, tan legs came into view, complete with a Tinker Bell ankle tattoo. Aaron let his gaze roam over her body, hoping she couldn’t tell how artificial his perusal was.

“When you’re done here, would you like to freshen up at our place? We have a cell phone you can use to make those other arrangements you mentioned,” Ana said.

“That would be wonderful. Speaking of other arrangements, how far from the city are we?”

“We’re fifty miles north of La Paz, where we’re from.”

The women watched him clean the horse’s hooves. “Fifty miles isn’t so bad. I’m thinking my friend and I could hitch a ride with someone and come back for the horse with a trailer.”

“We’d be happy to give you and your friend a ride. We’re going home tomorrow afternoon.”

So far, so good. He put away the grooming supplies and gave the horse a second generous scoop of food.

“I’m ready to get cleaned up. Lead the way.”

Sarah and Ana took him by the arms. As they strolled, Aaron asked, “Which one of you owns the house?”

Sarah answered. “Ana’s brother owns it. He lets us use his place anytime we want.”

“What kind of work do you do?”

“We’re both high school teachers, English,” Ana said.

“I’m from Arizona,” Sarah explained. “I’m teaching here on an exchange program.”

“It’s a good thing I never had teachers like you two. I would have been a terrible student.”

“Why is that?” Ana asked, giving his arm an extra squeeze.

“Just so you’d keep me after class.”

The women giggled right on cue. At that moment, Camille came into view, standing by herself in front of Charlie’s powder-blue trailer. She tracked his movement with wary eyes.

“Here’s our place.” Ana led him to a cottage across the courtyard from Charlie’s house.

He glanced over his shoulder at Camille. A wrinkle of worry had appeared between her eyebrows. Reluctantly, he turned his back on her and climbed the rickety wooden porch steps. He sure hoped she was smart enough to figure out he hadn’t abandoned her.

Loneliness wasn’t a new emotion for Camille, but one that hit her hard as she watched the door close behind Aaron. Loneliness and betrayal. She stared at the door for a long time while she reined in her emotions and considered her next move.

A hand brushed her shoulder. Her reaction was instinctive and immediate. Angling her elbow at a point, she whirled to jab her assailant in the stomach.

“Whoa.” Charlie jumped back with his arms up in surrender.

“Sorry. I’m a little on edge today.”

“No harm done. Where’d you learn a move like that?”

“Self-defense class. A girl can’t be too careful these days.”

“Right you are. I came to ask if you wanted to get cleaned up at my humble abode.”

“Thanks. That would be wonderful.”

He pointed to the black bag at Camille’s feet. “I’m guessing you don’t have a change of clothes in there.”

“No. I wish.”

“Well, last year a lady friend came to stay with me, but she left in a huff.” He smiled as though recalling a private joke. “Didn’t take her suitcase. I bet you could find something to fit you.”

Camille nodded, grateful for the opportunity to shed the nasty jeans. “Thank you, not only for the clothes, but for giving us a place to regroup.”

“It’s not often a man stumbles on a lovely young lady in need of rescuing.” He draped an arm across her shoulders and guided her to his house.




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