Vicki Hinze - Torn Loyalties

“You want to explain what you’re doing out there?”

Madison’s heart rocketed. A man in her car. Oh, no. She’d been caught!

* * *

Madison squinted in the half-light, trying to identify the deeply shadowed silhouette of the man in her passenger seat. She recognized him.

Grant Deaver!

Her heart rate shot off the charts, and she inwardly groaned. Given the choice of a firing squad of the guards or this man, she’d take the firing squad. Them, she knew she couldn’t trust. But Grant? The jury was still out on him. “You want to explain how you got into my car?”

He held up a key. “I used this.”

She should have picked up on his cologne as soon as she opened the door. But she’d been so lost in thought that she’d missed it. Bad mistake. “Funny, I don’t recall giving you a key to my vehicle.”

“We’ve been dating since October, Madison,” he reminded her. “Totally plausible you did and forgot it.”

She hadn’t forgotten a thing. He’d found the spare key she stowed in a magnetic case under the back bumper. “For the record, while you’re endearing, your being here is not.” He’d scared ten years off her, though she didn’t mention it. She’d learned the hard way that exposing vulnerabilities was often interpreted as giving others a license to use them against you. Yes, they were dating. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. But she strongly suspected he was under orders to spy on her and her staff. Of course, she kept him close. How else could she protect her staff or herself? That she found him attractive anyway, well, that was a challenge she just had to fight. “Why are you following me—and where’s your car?”

“No car.”

“You walked all the way out here?” It was ten miles into North Bay proper. Why would he do that? And how had he known where she’d be? Fair questions she needed answered after she got away from this facility. She cranked the engine and pulled over the deep shoulder and onto the road.

“My transportation is insignificant.” He frowned at her. “And gauging by what I’ve observed—you pulling surveillance on an off-limits, highly classified military installation—you’re hardly in a position to ask anyone questions.” He lifted an irritated hand. “Dressed in covert operation gear with greasepaint smeared all over your face.” She passed him her binoculars. “What are you doing out there at all, much less dressed like that? Are you trying to get yourself shot?”

She lowered the mask, let its strings loosely loop her neck and braked to a stop at the traffic light. The office or home?

Definitely not home. Not with him in the car. She’d shower and change at the office. It’d be hours before anyone else arrived. She hung a left and cruised past the sign to North Bay. “Since this is my car and you’re in it uninvited, I’m perfectly positioned to ask whatever questions I want.” She spared him a glance. “Why are you following me and how did you find me?”

Concern and anger feuded in his eyes, shone in the reflective light from the dash. “You were edgy all day—even more so than usual, which is saying something. You denied anything was up, so I had a friend drop me off.”

So now two people had followed her and knew where she’d gone. Oh, definitely not good. “So because I chose not to answer you, you have the right to shadow me?” She slid him a mild frown. “If I wanted to disclose, I’d disclose.” Inside, a part of her felt pleased he was concerned and wanted to protect her. Not surprising; he was a Christian, but one in an awkward position. She buried her emotional pleasure under the real facts. No way did she dare trust him. “Who brought you out here?”

“Mrs. Renault.”

Her assistant. Pins of betrayal pricked and peppered her skin. “You’re kidding me.”

“She knows the danger, Madison.”

She did. She’d been married to the former base commander. Still, telling Grant where Madison was and bringing him out there? What had Mrs. Renault been thinking?

“Don’t get knotted up at her. I was worried about you and so was she.” He paused and lowered his voice, not bothering to remove the sarcasm lacing it. “Worry. That’s something normal people do when they care about someone—in between the times they’re questioning their sanity for caring for someone as stubborn as you.”

She opened her mouth to object. Before she got out the first word, he cut her off.

“You know what? Don’t even bother. This has gone on long enough.” He sighed irritably and dragged a hand through his short brown hair. “What’s it going to take for you to trust me, Madison?”

That trust question had simmered unspoken between them from the start. She’d wished a hundred times in the past four months she could just drag the matter out into the open. But now that it was in the open, all she wanted to do was shove it back into the shadows.

Instead, she clicked her blinker with her pinkie, signaling a left turn. Trust was hard for her, maybe impossible, and for just cause. Once betrayed, twice shy. Still, he deserved an answer, so she gave him the only one she could. “I don’t know.”

“Since I hired on with you at Lost, Inc., you’ve put me through test after test—and you’ve poured on even more of them in our personal relationship.” He lifted a warning finger. “This is not the time for you to say we don’t have a personal relationship.”

She’d like to deny it, but she couldn’t. First, it wasn’t true. They did have a relationship. A mostly adversarial one, but after four months under horrific conditions, she had to admit there was also a spark between them that promised they could be very good together...maybe. Eventually. And, keeping it real and fair, she had tested him to the max professionally and personally. Every single time, he’d passed with flying colors. Yet even that hadn’t removed her doubts and resolved her trust issues.

“Not disputing the relationship,” he said. “That’s progress. Yet you don’t know what it’s going to take to trust me. And if you don’t know, then obviously I can’t know.” He sighed again. More deeply. “So let’s try a different question. How about keeping it simple—just tell me about this jaunt of yours tonight?”

Boldly stated, and a fair question. Right after the agency’s open house during the annual Fall Festival back in October, she’d been invited to the military installation and quizzed about a security breach at the Nest. It had been easy to see they were after someone to blame. She’d countered by hiring Grant. He’d just left active duty working in the Office of Special Investigations for the very commander and vice commander who had questioned her, and she needed to keep an eye on him. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Commander Talbot and Vice Commander Dayton were also the reason she was watching the Nest. She strongly suspected those two men had links to two civilian murders that unfortunately everyone except her deemed solved. The cases had been officially closed.

That was her initial connection to Grant Deaver. And while he hadn’t sold her out—yet—he had reported Lost, Inc., events back to Talbot and Dayton, purportedly defending her agency. Still, the commander had a security breach at the Nest, and he and his vice commander were trying their best to blame it on someone at her agency. With Grant reporting to them, how could she trust him?

Tempted to blast that question at him, she fingered the Purple Heart medal in her jacket pocket to steady herself. This would be a dangerous time to lose her temper. Trust him with the truth? Oh, how she wished she could. “I can’t answer that, either.”

He grumbled under his breath. “How can you be attracted enough to me to date me but not trust me at all? I don’t get it, Madison.”