Susan May Warren - Point Of No Return

Why couldn’t she be the kind of woman who didn’t have to be on the front lines of trouble? The one he’d known for a crazy, romantic week in Seattle?

Or maybe he hadn’t known her at all.

She finally spoke, her words losing some of their heat, yet still stiff with anger. “If you knew anything about me, anything at all, Chet, you would know that I will not just go home and leave my teenage nephew here. I’m not built that way. I don’t know what’s going on with him—why he did this, or who this princess is—”

“She’s the daughter of a warlord.”

“Perfect. For all I know, he’s being held against his will. But I made a promise to my sister. And I keep my promises.”

He did know that about her.

He had four days to find a runaway princess and stop a love-struck teenager from starting an international incident, all while trying to keep up with the woman he most wanted to protect in the world.

Love Inspired Suspense

*Point of No Return

Steeple Hill

In Sheep’s Clothing

Everything’s Coming Up Josey

Sands of Time

Chill Out, Josey!

Wiser Than Serpents

Get Cozy, Josey!

is the RITA ®Award-winning, bestselling novelist of more than twenty-five novels, many of which have won an Inspirational Readers Choice Award, an ACFW Book of the Year award and been Christy and RITA ®Award finalists. Her compelling plots and unforgettable characters have won her acclaim with readers and reviewers alike. She and her husband of twenty years, and their four children live in a small town on Minnesota’s beautiful Lake Superior shore, where they are active in their local church. You can find her online at www.susanmaywarren.com.

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When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

The man asked him, “What is your name?”

“Jacob,” he answered.

Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.”

—Genesis 32:25–28

A huge thank you to my family—Andrew, David, Sarah, Peter and Noah, and my secret weapon Ellen Tarver for helping me craft a book that I pray brings glory to the Lord.

PROLOGUE

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

LETTER TO READER

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

Sometimes Chet Stryker could still feel Carissa’s muddy grip slide from his. He could still see those brown eyes, stripped of all mystery, pleading with him, could still hear her scream echoing through the chambers of his brittle soul. Tonight, the memory twisted him inside his bedsheets, tightening like a constrictor around his legs, lacing his chest, noosing his breath. Sweat slicked his body, despite the rattle of the air conditioner pumping out breath against the sweltering, polluted Moscow air. He hiccupped, and with a cry that sounded more animal than human, he lurched into a sitting position, ripping himself from the dream, blinking against the darkness.

It wasn’t real. Not real. Still, Chet pressed his hand to his bare chest, his heart jackhammering under his sternum, still smelling the cloying odor of bodies pressing him to the earth, his face ground against the loam of decaying leaves.

He closed his eyes, but of course, that only made it worse. His mind too easily scraped up the image, now twenty years old, of Akif Bashim pushing Carissa to the dirt, holding her there. Hurting her, even as his Ossetian tribesmen made Chet watch.

Taking Chet’s life apart, one blow after another.

“No!” He shook himself out of the nightmare and fumbled for the lamp, knocking over his water onto the carpet, his watch after it. The light switch slid under his sweat-slickened fingers, refusing to turn. He gave up, and for an agonizing, lost moment, fought with his tangled covers. Then, freeing himself, he lunged from the bed toward the bathroom.

He slapped on the light, braced his hands on the sink and simply breathed. One breath in, the next out. In. Out. Breathe.

He turned on the faucet, letting cold water trickle through his shaking fingers. Scooping it up, he splashed it on his face. The shock of the icy water against his skin loosened the last fingers of the dream from his mind, and he blew out another long breath. Stared into the mirror.

Water, caught in his overnight beard, glistened in the mean fluorescence, and his face seemed more brutal than he’d remembered. Or maybe he usually just refused to look too closely. He touched the spiderweb scar on his abdomen, running his fingers along the ridges, touching the hard knot of the scar tissue in the center. Sometimes he could still feel the instant, blinding burn of the bullet tearing through his flesh, see David’s eyes flash with horror. Could hear his own teeth-grinding grunt as he crumpled onto the cement, hands clutched over his wound. Chet had let his partner shoot him without a whimper. Because that was what patriots did when asked to sacrifice for their country, especially while working undercover. At the time, the pain seemed a reasonable cost to help David keep his cover in a Chinese triad.

But no one had told him about the residual suffering, the ache and sometimes sudden, sharp pain. As if the wound still might be healing, deep inside, even after more than a year. Thankfully, most of the time, it just felt numb.

How he cherished numb.

He ran his fingers through the water again and rubbed a thumb and forefinger against his cracked, blue eyes. It eased the sting, albeit momentarily.

Turning off the water, he grabbed a towel and scrubbed his face, glancing again in the mirror. He needed a haircut—should have gotten one before today. His nearly black hair curled past his ears and down his back. It was no wonder Viktor’s groomsmen David Curtiss and Roman Novik looked at him like something the dog dragged in. He wanted to explain that he looked a lot better with the mess tied into a ponytail, that it was a look fashionable with his most recent clients, but now it only seemed a pronounced departure from his once-tidy military life.

Although it had been years since his life had actually resembled tidy.

Still, his cousin Gracie—the bride—deserved better from him. Maybe he’d have time to visit the local barber before the ceremony.

Reaching over, he turned on the shower, running his fingers through the trickles of ice, waiting for it to warm. Sleep would be impossible even if weren’t foolhardy at this point.