Shirlee McCoy - Running for Cover

“Home.”

“It might be best if you stay in the hospital,” he said.

“That’s what the doctor keeps telling me, but I’m feeling well enough to leave.”

“It’s not just your physical condition I’m worried about, Morgan. The men who attacked you are still loose. Until they’re found, the hospital is the safest place.”

“They’ve got no reason to come looking for me again.”

“They didn’t get what they wanted, did they?”

“No.”

“That’s more than enough reason.”

Morgan sighed. “Look, I’m grateful for everything you did tonight, but I really am fine.”

“And I can go back to wherever I came from? Sorry, I don’t work that way,” Jackson said.

“What way do you work, then?”

“I stick with what I start. I started protecting you from two men who wanted you dead. I’m not going to walk away until I’m sure I’ve achieved that goal.”

SHIRLEE MCCOY

has always loved making up stories. As a child, she daydreamed elaborate tales in which she was the heroine—gutsy, strong and invincible. Though she soon grew out of her superhero fantasies, her love for storytelling never diminished. She knew early that she wanted to write inspirational fiction, and began writing her first novel when she was a teenager. Still, it wasn’t until her third son was born that she truly began pursuing her dream of being published. Three years later she sold her first book. Now a busy mother of five, Shirlee is a homeschool mom by day and an inspirational author by night. She and her husband and children live in Washington and share their house with a dog, two cats and a bird. You can visit her Web site at www.shirleemccoy.com, or e-mail her at shirlee@shirleemccoy.com.

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I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love; I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them.

—Hosea 11:4

To my fifth treasure, Qian Annalise— I am not your first mother or even your second, but I will be your last. It is true that you were not born from my body, but you have always lived in my heart—first a thought, then a prayer and now a reality that fills me up to overflowing.

You are mine, my cheeky girl, and I am yours. Forever and a day, to the edges of the universe and beyond, I love you.

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

Pain.

It pulled Morgan Alexandria from silky blackness, slammed her into reality. She groaned, levering away from cold tile, crimson blood dripping from her lips and staining the white kitchen floor. More blood pooled in her mouth, the metallic taste of it making her gag. She wanted to sink back down, let whatever was going to happen happen. Images flashed through her mind—blond hair, deep blue eyes, chubby cheeks; dark hair and a solemn, thin face. Morgan’s sister and brother as they’d been twenty years ago.

What were they like now?

The question drove Morgan to her knees. She blinked, trying to clear her vision and her head. Sounds were coming from the den. Soft thuds and thumps. Rumbling voices. Morgan could wait for the two armed men who’d come into her gallery an hour ago to return to the kitchen or she could run. Either way, she’d probably die.

She staggered to her feet, her jaw and head throbbing in time with her racing heart. Just a few yards and she’d be at the door of the apartment. One flight of stairs down and she’d be in the small gallery she’d opened nearly a year ago when she’d foolishly believed she could cut her ex-husband Cody out of her life forever. She should have known that the trouble and heartache he’d brought to their marriage would follow her.

A loud crash startled her into action, and she ran, broken glass from the upended coffee table crunching under her feet as she raced through the living room. Her fingers brushed the doorknob, her hand closing around cool metal.

Almost free.

Hard fingers dug into her shoulder, yanking her away from the door and escape.

“You don’t get to leave until we get the disk. Just tell us where it is, and you can walk out of here.” The voice was as hard as the grip on her shoulder, and Morgan knew it was full of lies. There’d be no leaving. Just a slow, painful death or a quick, brutal one. Terror gave her strength, and she swung around, slamming her fist into the man’s eye.

He cursed, his grip loosening, and Morgan wrenched her shoulder from his grasp, grabbing the doorknob again and yanking the door open. She took the stairs two at time. Praying. Begging. Hoping God heard.

The gallery at the bottom of the stairs was dark, the room silent. No evidence of the violence that had taken place there in the minutes before Morgan had been dragged up to her apartment.

If she died, how long would it take for anyone to notice she was gone?

Her footsteps echoed through the large room as she raced for the front door, her heart pounding harshly in her ears. Just a few more feet. Just a few more seconds.

Please, please, please. I’m not ready to die.

The prayer caught in her throat, a barely formed scream dying as she was jerked backward. Her sweater tightened around her throat and stars danced in front of her eyes, darkness beckoning again. It would be so easy to give up. To give in. But there were too many things left undone, too many words left unsaid.

Too many regrets.

She clawed at the fabric of the sweater, fighting for air.

“Cool it. You kill her and we’ll never get what we came for,” a man said.

And suddenly Morgan could breathe again.

She collapsed onto the floor, coughing and gagging as one of the men leaned down, stared into her face. “You shouldn’t have punched me. We could have made this easy on you. Now…well, maybe it won’t be so easy after all. Come on. Get up. We’re going back upstairs and you’re going to tell us what you did with the disk.”

“I already told you I don’t have it,” Morgan managed to say, the words as dry and brittle as old bones.

“That’s not what your ex-husband said.” The man grinned, the hot, ugly look in his eyes making Morgan wish she could sink back into unconsciousness.

“Whatever Cody told you—”

The chime of the doorbell interrupted her, and Morgan froze, her gaze jumping to the gallery door. The sound came again, soft but insistent.

“You expecting a visitor?” Her captor hissed the words as he pressed a gun to her temple.

Morgan nodded, lying. Praying it would save her. Praying that the person on the other side of the door was someone she knew. Someone who would see the fear in her eyes, the bruises on her face and go for help.