Liz Johnson - The Kidnapping of Kenzie Thorn

Kenzie’s face went white, and she slowly slipped to the floor, as though her legs would not hold her one more second. “What do you mean?”

Myles did not want to have this conversation. But she had to know. Or she’d up and leave and be in more danger than ever before.

Oh Lord, I’ve really messed this whole situation up. But YOU know I only want to protect Kenzie. Please show me how to make her understand. I haven’t been doing a good job of that lately. Give me Your words to explain everything to her.

When Myles glanced back at Kenzie, he saw that her face was still turned up to him in expectant hope. She was actually soft and tender, a far cry from the feisty redhead she often portrayed. He couldn’t decide who he liked better, sweet or spicy Kenzie. Both fascinated him.

After graduating from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff with a degree in public relations, Liz Johnson set out to work in the Christian publishing industry, which was her lifelong dream. In 2006, she got her wish when she accepted a publicity position at a major trade book publisher. While working as a publicist in the industry, she decided to pursue her other dream—being an author. Along the way to having her novel published, she wrote articles for several magazines.

Liz lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where she enjoys theater, ice skating, volunteering in her church’s bookstore and making frequent trips to Arizona to dote on her nephew and three nieces. She loves stories of true love with happy endings. The Kidnapping of Kenzie Thorn is her first novel.

But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love…We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield.

—Psalms 33:18, 20

To Mom and Dad.

You are amazing parents, cheerleaders

and most of all friends. Thanks for setting

an example of loving God.

To the rest of the Johnson/Whitson Clan:

Micah, Beth, Hannah, John and all the kids.

Thank you for helping me leap those first obligatory

hurdles and making me laugh along the way.

I’m so thankful to be part of this family.

And to my Monday night writing buddy

Jessica Barnes and my first editor Kelly Blewett;

the first draft (and every subsequent version) of this

story would never have seen the light of day without

you both. I treasure our friendship.

A special thanks to Elizabeth Mazer, who took a

chance on me and saw something worth her time.

I’m a better writer because of 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

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

Mackenzie Thorn looked up just in time to see two men walk into her classroom. One of them, a guard, nodded at his coworker stationed inside the door, and kept his hand at the elbow of the taller man beside him. This man, clad in an orange jumpsuit sporting the initials ODOC—Oregon Department of Corrections—swaggered into the classroom, head held high, windswept brown hair falling over his collar. The intensity of his blue eyes struck Kenzie immobile for a moment as they approached.

“Ms. Thorn,” the guard began.

Kenzie shook her head to clear her thoughts before holding up one index finger to the guard. “Just a moment, please.” Turning to the two men sitting at the first table on her right, she said, “Mr. Ramirez, Mr. Chen, please pass out workbooks to everyone.” The two men began their task while she moved to meet her new student.

“This is Myles Parsons. The superintendent’s office said to put him in this class.”

The guard made no apologies for bringing in a new student five weeks into their six-week GED session. Decrees from Superintendent JB Ryker’s office were law inside these walls. The inmate would just have to try to keep up.

The man’s piercing blue eyes bore into her face, seeming to study every crevice. She knew for a fact that her face was not that interesting. Mr. Parsons’s face, on the other hand, was well worth studying. The crooked bridge of his nose had been broken at least once, but the imperfection was intriguing rather than off-putting. His wide mouth and pink lips pulled into a smirk, exposing his arrogance. Running thick fingers through his shaggy brown hair, he continued staring back at her, something few of her other students had ever dared to do.

Suddenly she realized how incredibly inappropriate she was being and ripped her gaze away from his handsome face. “Welcome to our GED prep class, Mr. Parsons.”

“So you’re Ms. Thorn?”

“Yes, I am. You seem surprised.”

“I am.” The man certainly did not mince words. “I expected someone more…” He stretched to his full height, which was at least a foot taller than her. “The way the others talk, I expected someone more intimidating.”

Despite her skittering pulse, she quirked the corner of her mouth into a partial grin. “Trust me, Mr. Parsons. My tests are plenty intimidating. You may take a seat now. Third row on the left.” Effectively dismissing him, she turned to the rest of the class and began teaching the basic fraction lesson.

Myles Parsons gazed at Ms. Mackenzie Thorn. Obviously frustrated by her wild, curly hair, she shoved it behind her ears, giving herself streaks of white where the chalk from her fingers lingered in her curls.

Her passion for the mundane principles of fractions astounded him. Her voice, like a melody, rose and fell as she singsonged through adding and subtracting the tricky numbers.

He shook his head to clear away the distractions of her intense gray eyes. He chastised himself for his own bad luck to end up inside these walls. Her pretty face wouldn’t be enough to make his current mission worth it.

Somehow, he’d let his FBI supervisor, Special Agent in Charge Nathan—Nate—Andersen, talk him into taking this assignment. An assignment that could be summed up in two words: Kenzie Thorn.

When Nate received a tip two weeks before that the governor’s granddaughter was in danger working inside the Oregon State Prison Complex at Evergreen, Myles had wondered about the validity of the tip. But Nate believed it, and he’d assigned an agent to the inside to protect her. As the youngest special agent stationed in the office, and one of the few without a family, Myles was the obvious pick to go behind bars to protect Kenzie.

Protect her from what, he wasn’t sure.

But as long as he was on this mission, he’d keep an eye on her. He’d do his job and do it well.

Kenzie—Ms. Thorn, as he was going to have to think of her—turned around at the front of the class and flicked another streak of white through her hair, rambling on about finding the lowest common denominator. His mouth quirked up at the corners of its own accord at her spunky head bob, and he had to fake a sneeze in order to keep from laughing out loud.

“You’re smiling awfully hard for a man who is five weeks behind the rest of the class, Mr. Parsons.” Ms. Thorn’s voice was soft, and she leaned closer to him, suddenly at his side. She smelled like citrus, like lemon and lime mixed together. Relishing the crisp scent in a room full of mostly unwashed bodies, he looked up into her stormy gray eyes. A row of freckles at the top of the bridge of her nose softened her hard glare, and he physically had to fight a smirk in response to her childlike cuteness.