HelenKay Dimon - Lawless

She wasn’t in the mood for meeting people just now, but there was no reason to be rude. “Okay.”

“We work together,” Joel explained.

“At where exactly?” She’d tried to find out where Joel went when he left her dad’s company. One night, bored and feeling lonely, she conducted a search, hoping to locate him, and uncovered nothing.

Her father finally let slip Joel lived in Annapolis, less than an hour away from her place in Virginia, the same place he used to live with her but never bothered to visit now. Being ignored made her stop checking in on the guy. If Joel didn’t care enough to make contact, she wouldn’t either.

“Ma’am.” The other man butted in with a nod of welcome. “You can call me Roth or Cam.”

The guy looked about the same age as Joel, a few years older than her, and shared Joel’s used-to-be-in-the-military look. Broad shoulders with muscles peeking out from under the edge of his T-shirt. They both carried their bodies in a permanent battle stance, as if they could shoot or tackle at any moment, if needed.

Joel had the Tall, Dark and Whoa-He’s-Hot thing down. That hadn’t changed in their months apart. Cam’s lighter hair and blue eyes made him seem less intense, but knowing the male type standing in front of her, she doubted that was actually the case.

Joel clapped. “There. That’s settled.”

Looked like the menfolk thought explanation time was over. She disagreed. “Let’s go back to my question. Why are you really here? And skip the sat phone talk this time.”

“Your father sent me to look for you.” That smile widened. “Now it’s my turn to ask a question.”

“Did you really answer mine?”

Cam laughed. “She has you there, man.”

Joel nodded in the direction of her hand. “Is there a reason you’re carrying a knife, or is the plan to stab the helicopter?”

She glanced down, then back at Joel. “Are you worried it’s meant for you?”

“I take it you two know each other pretty well,” Cam said.

The conversation kept jumping around. She’d only remembered the knife when Joel mentioned it. The burning from where it pressed into her palm suddenly hit her.

Then Cam’s comment grabbed her attention.

“Joel didn’t tell you who I was to him?” She wanted not to care, but the hurt swallowed up her indifference.

Cam looked from her to Joel and back again. “Let’s just say I’m thinking he left out some important pieces about your joint past.”

“Hope.” Joel snapped his fingers and brought the focus back to him. “The knife?”

She stared at it in her hands. “What about it?”

“Why are you holding it as if you’re ready to attack?”

She couldn’t come up with a reason to stall and certainly had no reason to lie. Not about this. Not to him. “Someone was following me.”

Both men leaned in closer, all amusement gone from their faces. Cam’s mouth opened, but Joel was the one who barked out a question. “What?”

Now that she had their attention, she decided to spill it all. “And I think one of my executives might be dead.”

Chapter Two

Joel called up every ounce of his practiced control to stay calm. Before he’d joined the Corcoran Team, a private security organization out of Annapolis, Maryland, that specialized in risk assessments for companies and governments, this sort of thing would have had him spinning and drilling her with questions.

Connor Bowen and the rest of the Corcoran Team had taught him the importance of patience and holding still for the right opening. Without those skills, the high-priority, under-the-radar kidnap and rescue missions they conducted would fail. Because when you worked outside the legal parameters and without a safety net, mistakes couldn’t happen.

After a lifetime of kicking around in the intelligence field, Joel knew he’d finally landed in a place that felt right. He’d buckled down, used his tech skills to fill in after the last tech guy left and tried to forget about her. Hope, his greatest weakness.

Now he seriously considered telling Cam to get lost for a few minutes, though he doubted the guy would budge. Not when he was staring as if he’d never seen a woman before and was hanging on every word of the discussion.

Joel couldn’t really blame Cam on the gawking part. Hope looked as good as Joel remembered. Better, even. The long dark brown hair and near black eyes hadn’t changed. From the dimple and girl-next-door hotness to the tanned legs and smokin’ petite frame, he found her almost impossible to resist.

Add in her smarts, competency with weapons and near fearless determination when she wanted something and he’d had no choice but to dump his job and move to the next state to keep from falling deeper into her. Or that’s what he’d rationalized at the time.

But right now he worried more about the danger that appeared to be haunting her. “Say that again.”

She cleared her throat. “I have a missing executive.”

Joel had no idea what that meant. “You said dead a second ago.”

She shrugged. “I’m hoping that was an exaggeration.”

Well, that cleared up...nothing. He glanced over at Cam.

He shook his head. “Got me. I have no clue.”

“Hope.” Joel reached out to touch the hand with the weapon in it and felt the subtle tremor running through her. Yeah, forget how comfortable she looked hanging around outside, something bad had happened and she was throwing off the desperation vibe.

His protective instincts kicked into high gear. He folded his hand over hers and slid the knife out of her palm. Not an easy task since she had a death grip on it.

Moving nice and slow, he eased the blade back into its case at her waist as he rubbed his thumb over the deep creases on her palm. “Where is this executive?”

“His name is Mark Callah.”

“Okay.” Joel didn’t dig too deep for details. Not yet. “Where is Mark?”

“I have no idea since I lost him.”

Cam grunted. “She’s giving you a pretty logical answer, actually.”

“I got up this morning and he was gone from camp.” She tugged free of Joel’s hold and rubbed her hands together. “I headed for this clearing to use the sat phone and realized some guy was following me. Then your helicopter—”

“Hold up.” For the second time, she jumped right past the most interesting part. “Go back a second.”

“To where?”

Stray branches crunched under Cam’s feet as he shifted his weight. “I’m guessing to the ‘following me’ part.”

She spent a second frowning at both of them. “Blue hoodie. The guy stalked me, then started moving faster and came up the side until we were parallel. He didn’t look up and stayed close. Your helicopter scared him off.”

“Stalked?” Joel didn’t hear much after that word.

“Yes, Joel.” She didn’t roll her eyes, but she looked like she was right on the edge of doing so.

She could sigh at him all she wanted because he was not letting this conversation drop. Not until he assessed the level of danger. “Could this person be one of the executives you have out here on the team-building retreat?”

This time her face went blank. “Wow, my dad really did fill you in on this job.”

“Let’s stick to your story for now.” One more diversion and Joel worried he’d never be able to pull the tale out of her. And he knew from experience any talk about her dad and his protective nature would not make this exercise go faster.

“Except for Mark, most of the Baxter Industries management talk tough but are terrified of being out here. One guy jumped around demanding to go home because he found a tick on his upper arm.” She snorted. “I mean, come on.”

Joel bit back a laugh. “Very manly.”