Lisa Childs - Single Mum's Bodyguard

Everyone but her. She couldn’t get beyond the past, beyond what had happened to her all those weeks she’d been held captive without her son. Maybe that crying she heard was her own.

She felt like crying now, as her world began to crumble around her. If she lost her job...

How would she support herself and her son?

If everyone considered her an incompetent wedding planner, would they also consider her incompetent as a mother?

Was she?

She shivered as she allowed the thought to cross her mind. A chill passed through her body along with it. No. She would do anything for her son—even get help. Most of her life she’d turned to her brother when she’d needed help, except for when she’d discovered she was pregnant. He’d been deployed then and unavailable. While he was in the country now, he was equally unavailable.

Of course if she called him, he would rush immediately to her aid. But she couldn’t do that to him. He’d already worried about her enough. For weeks he’d thought she was dead. She didn’t want him to worry about her ever again. So to whom could she turn?

Not Nikki. She couldn’t expect or ask the newly engaged woman to keep a secret from her fiancé. She would have asked her boss, but Penny was gone now for a long honeymoon.

Penny had trusted Emilia to keep the business running while she was gone. She probably shouldn’t have done that. Undoubtedly she wouldn’t have, if Nikki had shared with her how much the maid of honor had had to step in to make sure the wedding ceremony ran smoothly.

Emilia glanced down at her phone again, but she couldn’t see the screen through the tears blurring her vision. She wasn’t crying because she was sad or scared, though. She was crying because she was mad. There was no way she would have called and canceled those wedding services.

Sure, the numbers were on her phone. She couldn’t see them now—through her tears—but she had seen them. Just because her phone had been used didn’t mean she had used it, though. Someone else must have.

But how?

How had they used her phone in the middle of the night? She would have seen them—would have known. Unless...

She heard a noise, one she barely heard over the sound of the crying. But it was there—the telltale creak of a door opening. Someone was breaking into the house. Like they had broken in before?

* * *

Nightmares?

What the hell had Lars been talking about? Dane didn’t have nightmares. Sure, sometimes he woke up in a cold sweat with his heart pounding so hard it felt like his ribs might break.

But he was never able to remember what he’d been dreaming about, or if he’d been dreaming at all. He’d probably just been reliving some of those missions. Or maybe even things that had happened before that.

Like identifying his adoptive parents’ bodies in the morgue after the terrible car accident that had ended their lives. He’d barely been eighteen at the time.

He hadn’t thought about that in years, until that day he’d gone to the morgue to identify Emilia Ecklund’s body.

But it hadn’t been Emilia’s. Just as he had that night, he expelled another ragged breath of relief that it hadn’t been her. He had been relieved for Lars. His friend had already been in agony worrying about her. If he’d lost her forever...

Lars would have never forgiven himself.

But Dane had also been relieved for himself. He’d wanted to meet the young woman whose photo he’d been using as the screen saver on his cell phone. Of course he’d only been doing that so he would recognize the person for whom he’d been looking. Once she’d been found, he’d deleted it...

As his screen saver.

And yet he hadn’t been able to force himself to send her photo to his recycle folder. He still had it on his phone—in its photo album.

Even though he’d seen her that day, looking beautiful in that pale blue dress that matched her eyes, he needed to see her again. So he reached out in the darkness, fumbling around for the cell sitting on the crate next to his king-size bed. Usually he loved having the extra space to sprawl out, like he hadn’t been able to sprawl out all those months spent sleeping on cots. If they were lucky, they’d had cots. Sometimes they’d just had a hard floor or dirt.

Tonight his bed felt especially empty. He felt alone like he hadn’t since he was kid. But he knew now that it was better to be alone like he’d been back then—with nobody to worry about, nobody to care about...

He’d already spent too much time worrying about Emilia Ecklund. Now he was worried again, especially after the newly engaged Nikki Payne had caught him alone.

Her concern furrowing her usually smooth forehead, she’d said, “Something’s going on with Emilia.”

“I know,” Dane had readily agreed. “Lars is worried, too.”

“Should we be worried?” she’d asked.

He’d shrugged then because he wasn’t certain. Maybe she hadn’t seen anything outside that window. Maybe she’d only banged into that doorframe like she’d told her brother because it had been dark and she’d been tired.

Nikki had told him about the other things—about her slipping up on her job—a job in which she had seemed to be taking pride. He doubted she would have messed that up purposely.

What the hell was going on with her?

He’d followed her when she’d left the chapel. He’d made certain she’d gotten safely inside her house with her son. But then he’d forced himself to drive away. She was fine.

Wasn’t she?

He needed to see that picture. Not that seeing her smiling face would make him feel any better. It usually made him feel worse, made his pulse quicken and his heart flip. But he didn’t pull his hand away; he kept reaching for his phone. His fingers skimmed over cold metal, his gun. He always had it within reach, which had saved his life more than once.

That weapon wouldn’t save him from Emilia, though. But how dangerous could she be?

She was his friend’s sister. And unlike Lars, that meant something to Dane. That meant she was off limits.

And she had a baby.

Dane had no intention of being a father to anyone. He wouldn’t make the mistake his adoptive father had. He wouldn’t take on a responsibility he really didn’t want. He wouldn’t do to a kid what had been done to him.

No. Emilia Ecklund was no danger to him. But was she in danger?

The crate began to vibrate beneath his phone, and he finally found it. His screen lit up with the photo he had of her—because she was calling him. Lars had put her number in Dane’s phone—just like he’d put his in her phone—in case she ever needed help and Lars wasn’t available.

Feeling like he’d been sucker punched, he expelled a gasp of air. Then he pushed the button. “Hello?”

“Dane?” she asked in a raspy whisper.

A chill raced down his spine. “What is it?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

“I—I think someone’s in the house,” she whispered, her voice cracking with fear. “I heard the door open...”

He shivered again but kicked off the sheet that had tangled around his body. “I’m on my way,” he promised. “Stay on the phone with me.”

But the line clicked. Maybe she’d just been afraid that the intruder would hear her. Or maybe the intruder had already found her.

When he arrived at her house, Dane couldn’t find her. Not that many minutes had passed since she’d called, but she was gone.

Maybe someone had dragged her through the front door that stood open. Or maybe she was hiding somewhere.

He hoped like hell she was hiding.

“Emilia...” he called out softly, not wanting to alert her intruder to his presence. But was his voice too low for her to hear him?