Safe and Sound (The Safe House Series Book 3) (4 page)

Lola all but dove behind the shower curtain. She felt vulnerable enough without getting naked in an unfamiliar house, with a man who may or may not be as noble as he seemed to standing guard behind the door. She shampooed her hair, careful to shake any residual glass fragments down her backside, not her face. He didn’t have conditioner. She didn’t know if that was typical of guys or not. There had only ever been two—much to her mother’s dismay—and she had never shared a shower with either. Something about being in Max’s private shower felt deliciously domestic, but she knew she couldn't let her guard down. She was still a prisoner, even if she was about to be a slightly better-scented one.

She moved onto lathering and cleansing her body with his bar soap.
Sweet McGinger hottie
, his masculine soap fragrance was perfection. But for all the tropical, cabana-boy, musky scent-gasm hitting her olfactory system, it did little to make up for the white-knuckle pain pulsing through every bruise and open cut on her skin. She rinsed lightning-fast, shut off the water, and listened.

For what, she couldn’t say. Max could at least give her a gentlemanly cough to assure her he remained at a safe distance on the bed. But no, her abductor had to be stealth.

Lola plastered the curtain to her boobs and hunted the bathroom for trespassers. Coast clear, she stepped out, toweled herself down, and pulled on the spare clothes. She left her floral print school dress crumpled in a pile by the waste bin.

It shouldn't have felt heavenly to slip into a stranger's clothes. It did. Lola had longed to be someone else since she overheard her father tell her mother in the heat of a charged argument that no man would ever want Lola with
that
body, which also happened to be the body of her mother
and
her Nona. To hear that at fifteen had been a one-way express ticket to men who dated her only to brag to their friends about the size of her chest and late nights with the only men who comforted her—Ben and Jerry. Six year olds didn’t judge. They simply accepted and loved. Maybe that’s why she had chosen her career. Somehow, in a flannel shirt that covered her biggest assets and jeans that might have to be jackhammered free, clothes about which she had no say, she felt liberated.

She pushed open the door to the bedroom. Max sat in the same spot in which she had left him, although the bed had been made. He rose to his feet upon seeing her—almost like the
McGinger
she had crafted in her mind: gentlemanly, courteous, unequivocally gobsmacked to see her enter a room. Her imagination had gotten his mouth right. Max forgot to close his once his lips parted. No doubt because the tight denim made her rear end look like baby wombats fighting in a gunnysack.

His lingering gaze made her feel as if her desirability wasn't
that
far out of the realm of possibility. Certainly not the sentiment of her father, whom her mother had kicked to the curb not sixty seconds after
that
comment. Still, if Max Sterling intended to make up for his rough treatment of her before, he had a lot of ground to cover. A woman didn't just forget being tied up to a kitchen chair.

"Thank you," she muttered as she took a seat on the bed. “For the shower.”

The crisp lines and sharp angles of the straightened sheets beneath her added to her growing profile of the former military man. She moved to sit with her back against the headboard and hugged her knees to her chest, taking up as little space as possible in the unfamiliar room. Max moved to the arm chair at a diagonal to the foot of the bed and laced his fingers loosely.

"So what now?" she asked. "I assume I can't go home."

"You can go home," he replied calmly. "Just not now. Worst case scenario, my organization finds accommodations for you for the next few days."

"
Few days
?" Lola’s voice pitched unnaturally high, so unlike her. Her bent knees shot out from the enclosure of her arms as if she intended to make her escape right then and there. "I can't be gone for that long. What about my students? What about my neighbor?"

"Eugenia?”

“Yes.”

"Are you telling me your neighbor can't be without you?"

"You don't understand," said Lola. "I can't just
vanish
from the real world without an explanation. I have responsibilities. Who's going to look after my cats while I'm away?"

“Eugenia?”

“She can barely turn on
Wheel of Fortune
.”

"I’ll make arrangements," Max responded without missing a beat. "My organization can see to the upkeep of your household. We have an entire division that specializes in caring for the animals of our clients."

"I am
not
your client."

His relaxed and assertive posture tensed. The chiseled lines of his face gathered like a circling storm, although it wasn't rage that Lola saw brewing. It was remorse.

Good.

Max Sterling had seemed like an immovable entity to her, more of a lifeless, inert obstacle to her freedom than he was a flesh-and-blood man with real human motives. Watching the shift in his expression re-shaped her stomach into an unwelcome, Playdoh-sized ball of guilt.

Lola sat back and blinked. It was possible she almost felt sorry for her words, but any regret on her part was absurd. So what if he felt bad?
She
was the one who had been stolen away from her life, her family, and everyone else who might need her. If Max Sterling found himself in a morally-compromised position, she was under no obligation to sympathize with him.

"I'm a
victim.
You've
kidnapped
me," she continued.

They lapsed into silence once more. Lola tucked a damp curl behind one ear because she didn’t know what to do with her hands.

"I wish you didn't see it that way," Max said finally. "But I can't fault you for it. If you can, try to imagine yourself in my position. You have a duty to protect and foster the minds of the children you teach, just like I have a duty to protect Baudin. Even though you believe you're doing the right thing, I'll bet there are days you don't want to go to work. Imagine that for me, this is shaping up to be one of those days."

It was more than she had expected to hear from the taciturn man seated across from her. She had been resisting an attraction to Max, with varying degrees of success, since she had first glimpsed his striking face. His explanation of his actions, and a hint of honesty on the subject of Baudin, had her revisiting her feelings.

It was nonsense, she argued with herself, to feel anything for Max but a desire to escape from his presence. Not only was she probably still suffering the effects of her earlier concussion, but she was familiar with the concept of Stockholm Syndrome, thanks in part to many late-night marathons of crime dramas and police procedurals spent with her lonely old neighbor, Eugenia. Lola was in very real danger of her mind betraying her in Max's presence. She couldn't let any foolish inclination of her body follow suit.

"I've just thought of something," she said.

"Another escape plan?"

He sounded tired, but even fatigue couldn't conceal some of his amusement at her expense.

"No. I've resigned myself to my situation." She was lying through her teeth, but soldiered on and tried not to dwell on how inauthentic she might sound. "It's just that, my brother being a cop and all… if he doesn't hear from me, he's going to worry."

"And set the entire police force on your trail," Max provided the conclusion of her story for her. "So you've said."

"It's not just that," Lola was quick to respond. "Given his joint occupation of older brother and civil protector, he's naturally paranoid. The reason I have an older model of phone is because none of the newer ones have the easy backdoor he needed to install a tracking device."

The bedroom fell silent as her implication sank in. Lola's throat tightened, and her heart pounded so loudly that she was certain Max would hear it and call her out on her nervous pulse alone. Had she provided enough details to back up her lie? Had it been too much? God, she hoped
McGinger
wasn’t a
McTechGuy
.

Max studied her. His eyelids tightened; his blue eyes raked her intently, likely gauging her body language for any sort of tell. Lola minimized her blinks and waited.

Their impasse ended when a buzzing sound resonated from his front pocket. Max held off for a breath longer before withdrawing her commandeered cell phone with a sigh of defeat. She didn't think it was possible, but her heartbeat doubled, maybe even tripled its pace at the sight of her brother's name lighting up the screen. They spoke daily, often multiple times per day. She never thought the day would come when she desired a conversation with Jack as intensely as she did now.

"If what you're saying is true, you need to tell your brother you're okay," Max instructed her slowly. "Put his mind at ease. Convince him that you'll be away from your phone for a bit, at least for the next twenty-four hours. If you don't act up or raise suspicion, I'll let you check in with him again in the morning. Agreed?"

"Yes." She could scarcely breathe the word. She was so close now… so close…

"I broke your trust when I tied you up," Max continued. "And I want to regain it now, but that means I'm placing my safety and the safety of my client in your hands. I hope you understand what this means. I'm making the first overture here to rebuilding trust. Please don't make me regret it."

The ball of guilt began to shift upward and reshape around her heart—
too tender
, her mother always said. She wiggled it back down past her hardened resolve as he passed her the phone. This wasn't the time to mourn trust or tentative friendships lost. This was the time to act, to save herself.

Lola flipped open the phone and raised it to her ear. "Hello? Jack?" Her voice quivered when she spoke his name.

"Lola? Jesus, I've been trying to call you all day. You really had me worried for a second there—"

"Jack!" she exclaimed, darting a panicked look at Max before she could stop herself.

The man froze in his chair. It was possible he recognized her intention then, but his half-second paralysis at her betrayal was all she needed to see it through to completion.

"Jack, I've been kidnapped! I'm being held against my will! The address is—"

Max dove for her.

Lola squeezed her eyes shut.

Max wrenched the cell phone from Lola’s grasp. In one swift movement, he snapped it in half at its hinge.

"Hey!" Lola clambered off the bed as he strode out of the room and into the adjoining bathroom. "Don't!" she shrieked as she threw herself at him.
"No—"

But her efforts were in vain. Max flung the broken remains of the phone into the sink and wrenched the tap on, drowning the device in a deluge of scalding hot water. He snatched Lola by the wrists to prevent her from burning herself as she reached for it.

"No! No!" she sobbed.

He hated everything he knew would come next—the revised plans, dealing with Baudlin’s
I-told-you-so
French tirades—but she had forced his hand. He turned away from the sink and caught Lola around the waist, hauling the woman up and over his shoulder as he carried them both out of the bedroom. She beat her fists against his back as if he had lugged her straight out of the Neolithic Era and into the present day. He brought the sole of his boot up and kicked the door of the bedroom open, almost hard enough to splinter it.

"Baudin!" he hollered.

Baudin’s room light switched on. His door swung open. The French man stood naked in his emaciated, free-balling glory, scrubbing his eyes in an exaggerated show of having been woken from a deep sleep.

A reflex of nausea bubbled in Max’s stomach. He looked away to prevent it from developing into a full-blown hurl.

"Oui?
Already on the sex games?"

"Ohmigosh!"

The exclamation of shock had barely cleared Lola's lips when Max angled himself between them to spare her the sight of Baudin's junk. Hands she clapped over her eyes to screen her vision were a welcome improvement from the fists that had been pulverizing his back a moment before.

"We've been compromised." His words were articulate despite Max's inability to relax his jaw. He should have known better than to trust the woman he had unwillingly taken hostage. He would not have acted differently had he been in her situation. It had been arrogant of him to assume that she might feel inclined a truce now that they had a rapport.

"Ah." Baudin did not sound at all surprised by this. Max filed away the other man's tone of voice to examine more in-depth later.

"Get some clothes on," Max ordered. "I'll grab the bug-out bags. Meet in the driveway in five."

"Let go of me!" Lola shouted as he carried her with him into the hallway.

Max threw open the closet with one hand and dragged out his reserve bags.

"Please," said Lola. "Think this through. You don't have to take me with you. End this cycle of hostage-taking here and now."

"That's a hard
no
from me," Max said as he looped the bag straps around one burly arm and yanked them out the front door. "You've forced my hand here. I still don't know if your story checks out. Even if I trusted you enough to let you out of my sight, I have no idea who will show up here now. You could be in danger."

"What are you
talking
about?" Lola moaned in partial defeat as he deposited her, along with the bags, to the sedan in the driveway. "How is being
forced
to flee with two men I don't know any
less
dangerous than waiting here for my brother and the police?"

"
Monsieur
Sterling is afraid of what they might do to you if it is revealed you have seen me." Baudin manifested as a tall, gangly shadow in the darkness.

Max opened the trunk and threw their bags in the back; then, slightly more gently, he deposited Lola in the backseat of the car. The illusion of her complacency broke when she kicked out at him suddenly with her foot, but Max had anticipated a struggle. He caught her ankle firmly and forced her leg back into the car. One her limbs cleared the threshold, he slammed the door, folded his massive form in behind the driver's seat, and threw the child lock.

He glared at Baudin when the other man finally deigned to join them in the car. Not for the first time, he wished he could put a muzzle on the man. They hadn't had any guests at the safe house, obviously, so he had in no way anticipated how freely the hitman would dispense information.

"What do you mean?" Lola demanded. "I haven't seen anything!"

"On the contrary,
madame
, you have seen the infamous Adrien Baudin. Every glorious inch.”

Max rolled his eyes.

"Ew."

Despite his resolve to remain tough and focused, Max allowed an inward grin. No doubt being around a group of kids all day cultivated her outburst. He could almost feel Lola's shudder of remembrance from the backseat. And as much as Baudin's topic of conversation set Max on edge, it distracted Lola. He put the car into reverse and peeled out of the driveway. They shot off into the night, past the wreckage of Lola’s car and toward one of the hidden backroads.

"And who is
Adrien Baudin
?" said Lola. “Besides a hairy exhibitionist?”

Max smirked. If he wasn’t careful, he would fall in love with Lola Reyes right there.

Baudin looked genuinely affronted at her question. As far as Max was concerned, the French man’s reaction was further evidence of the man's affinity for pretense. Baudin placed a hand over his wounded heart and turned in his seat to look at Lola.

“Who is
Adrien Baudin
, she says,” Baudin repeated, as if she had questioned the Messiah at a pool party that served bread and fish. “
Madame
, I am the most famous—”

“Hitman.” If it was going to come out anyway, Max may as well be the one to deliver the news. “He’s a contract killer.”

Lola, who had been leveraging at the backdoor handle fruitlessly, froze.

"I am a
reformed
assassin of the highest caliber and integrity." Baudin drew his hand away from his heart. Max didn't miss Baudin’s black glare aimed directly at his temple. The hitman didn't like his dramatics cut short.

"So you're a snitch," said Lola.

Baudin went rigid in his seat.

This time, Max smiled outwardly. Definitely love.

"Why else would you need the services of a safe house?" said Lola. "What's more, who would offer to help a murderer like you, unless you offered up information that could prevent others from being harmed in the future?"

"This is not having the effect I anticipated," Baudin sank lower in the passenger seat and crossed his arms in a huff. To Max, he looked a little like an overgrown schoolboy who wanted his disapproval of time-out to be known to all outside observers.

"This is serious," Lola muttered to herself in the back. "If what you're saying is true, then I'm in serious trouble."

"More than you know." Max cranked the wheel to turn them out onto the highway. "If I had left you back at the safe house, who knows what sort of interrogation you might have been forced into, even by your guys in blue. Baudin has former friends on both sides of the police line that would love to get their hands on him."

"Why are you telling me all this?"

Max raised his eyes from the road momentarily to meet hers in the rearview mirror. Though her expression was hard, the overall symmetry of her round, pretty face compelled him to keep staring. Her full lips puckered, as if the news of Baudin's real identity was a bitter pill she had been forced to swallow.

Max could sympathize with her confusion, at least. Was he really still trying to earn her trust after her stint with the phone? Unless Rockwell had an answer for him, it looked increasingly like they would be spending the next few days until Baudin's testimony together. It would certainly make his job easier if she knew the basics of what was going on and agreed to let him keep her close.

“It benefits everyone in this car for you to understand the stakes."

“Death.”

Her word coiled hard in his chest. She was an innocent who had stumbled into a minefield. “I prefer to think of it as
life
.”

“
La Vie
,” muttered Baudin, as if he had earned a vote.

Lola sat back and threaded her hands. Now both passengers in his car looked resigned to their fates. Resignation, Max could work with. Maybe Baudin and Lola both felt dislike for him, but his time spent as an Army captain had given him a thick skin when it came to the opinions of others. Obedience to him, in this instance, would get them all through this night, alive.

If Max was being honest with himself, he was glad for the diversion switching locations provided. It gave him a mission, something to occupy his mind and distract him from the fact that he betrayed the trust of a woman who needed his help. When she recited Dr. Seuss, he wanted to slide beneath her teacher-like loafers and imprison himself in the treads like a used wad of gum, where he felt he should be after what he put her through.

Lola Reyes had told the truth.

Max needed a diversion to keep from wanting to make it up to her, in every conceivable way. His mind tracked back to her reflection in the mirror. He hadn’t meant to look, but the dash of milky curves had snagged his eye. Her hourglass figure—what little he saw of it—called to him in a primal way he hadn’t felt in a long time. Strict adherence to duty had a way of suppressing needs. But the bastards tended to come out at the most inopportune times. He shifted in the driver’s seat to ease the discomfort of his escalating hardness.

Baudin rolled down his window.

Max shot him a look, but the hitman only lit up another cigarette. It surprised him to see the man acting out of courtesy for a change. It was more like Baudin to hotbox those unlucky enough to be his fellow passengers until someone raised an objection, at which point he would loudly complain about American culture.

Max glanced into the rearview mirror. He wondered if Lola was the reason for Baudin’s behavioral change. She stared out into the night, occasionally trying the door handle to see if the lock had magically decided to give.

Baudin heaved a cloud of smoke and pulled out his Rosary.

At least he remembered the directive to pack light.

Max watched Baudin fondle his prayer beads until his thoughts drifted back to sixty alternate things he would prefer to touch. All of them occupying the back seat.

Silence ruled the drive.

Max stopped only once to refill the tank and to guzzle a high-octane stimulant that tasted like a diseased bastard’s mucus in a can. Despite orders to stay put, Baudin got out of the car as Max refueled. Baudin leaned back against the vehicle and jogging his leg, rattling off something in French that contained the word
pisser.

His first instinct was to tell Baudin to hold it. Max glanced up. Stars lifted. The horizon glowed orange. They
had
been on the road for almost seven hours.

"I'm not leaving her in the car while I babysit you."

“
Monsieur
, I do not need you to—how do they say?—shake the dew off the liver.”

“Lily.”

“American men name their
bite
after
une fleur
?”

“Never mind.”

"If you insist on coming,
wake
mademoiselle and make her come with us."

Lola dozed in the backseat. Max couldn't see her face, but from outside of the vehicle, he could see where the crown of her head lay nestled against the window. The day's ordeal had finally caught up with her.

At the same time, he didn't like the idea of leaving her alone and vulnerable inside the car. In fact, he flat rejected the notion. She was as much his responsibility now as Baudin was.

Max opened the driver's door and eased a knee onto the seat, his eyes trained on the occupant in the back. Lola breathed shallowly, but regularly. A fringe of dark eyelashes adorned each cheek. While it was Max's opinion by this point that the woman's concussion wasn't anything serious, he still intended to wake her, just to be safe.

He reached into the back, but something stalled his hand. Instead of jostling her shoulder, his fingers shifted her hair back from where it threatened to trail into her mouth. She didn't stir as he gently brushed his fingertips along her face. Why had he done that? Was he only taking advantage of a moment he knew would never come again? She saw him as the enemy, no matter his intentions. He didn't know how to express who he was to her without endangering his job and the life of the man he swore to protect.

Max backed out of the car and glanced over the hood at Baudin. The hitman watched him with a dull expression. Clearly he hadn't seen Max's covert caress of Lola's face, otherwise he would have had something annoying to say about it.

"You can use the restroom," Max said. "That's it. No other pit-stops or shopping sprees. We don't resupply until we make it to our destination."

"Oui, capitaine."

Max knew he would be hearing more on the subject of cigarettes within the hour.

He followed Baudin around the side of the car toward the bathroom. He posted himself at the gas station pump halfway between the men's room and the car, his attention evenly divided between the two.