Hide and Seek - Lara Adrian Page 0,21
me here? Why would you do that? I haven’t seen or heard from you in years, so how do you even know where I live? You two need to tell me what the hell is going on, right fucking now.”
John’s narrow glare stayed rooted on his former comrade. “Yeah, Alec. You start. What the fuck are you doing creeping after Lisa?”
“I told you. Last week I had a vision that she was in danger. Didn’t think I could live with myself if I just sat back and let it happen, so I decided to check things out. She wasn’t hard to find through public records, the DMV.” Alec glanced to Lisa. “Once I had the info, I went to your place just to make sure you were okay. I’ve been keeping an eye on you ever since.”
“Spying on me?”
“I prefer to think of it as stealth body-guarding,” he said, some of the wry humor she knew him for edging his deep voice. “I didn’t want to scare you, and it was crucial that you continued to act naturally in case anyone else was watching, too.”
She thought back to the past couple of weeks, and to one instance in particular, when she’d come home from work and couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had been there. No evidence at all to support it. Not a single thing out of place, but she just... knew. “Someone broke into my house last week. They must’ve spent some time nosing around in stealth mode, too. I suppose that was you?”
“No, ma’am,” Alec replied. He and John exchanged a look. “But if it was someone else...”
John blew out a curse. “Kyle texted her yesterday. Told her she needed to hide.”
Alec seemed surprised, and not pleased. “You’ve been in touch with your brother recently? Where is he? What else has he told you?”
She started to answer, but John did it for her. “We don’t know any of that yet. The communication cut off right after she got the text.”
Alec cursed, frowning as he considered. “I need to see her phone. It could be tapped. Or traced.”
“Already disabled it,” John said. His fist swallowed up the GPS tracker and he put it back in his pocket. “Obviously, she’s on the radar now. So is this mountain. Which means so am I.”
“It’s my fault,” Lisa murmured, hating that she was at the center of John’s problems. She was terrified for her brother’s wellbeing—her own as well, especially after realizing an armed assassin had come after her today—but that didn’t mean she had to put anyone else’s life in danger. “I shouldn’t have come here, John. I’m sorry. It’s not your problem to fix for me. I should go before anything worse happens.”
“You’re not going anywhere,” he said, stepping closer and pulling her under his arm. “Not without me. Got it?”
The intimate gesture and softly worded order sent Alec’s brows up a degree, but he didn’t comment. “You both need to get out of here,” he advised soberly. “The sooner, the better.”
“Agreed,” John said. His muscled arm flexed around Lisa as he met her upturned gaze. “Alec and I need to dispose of the body and take care of some other business out here. Be ready to leave when I get back, all right?”
“Okay,” she murmured.
“Take this.” He put his pistol in her hand, his voice quiet and deadly serious. “Don’t be afraid to use it if anyone shows up at the cabin before I come back.”
She took the gun, catching his meaning as he curled her fingers around its grip. If she needed to use the weapon in the next few minutes, then very likely the only person who would be on the business end of it was Alec Colton.
8
Twenty minutes later, Duarte stood next to Alec on a narrow curve of mountain pass where they had driven Lisa’s car and parked it. The dead guy was in the trunk, his nine-millimeter pistol in Duarte’s safekeeping.
“You still don’t trust me, do you?” Alec said as they walked around to the back of the Camry to pull the body out.
Alec took the corpse’s feet, while Duarte grabbed the arms. “Sheppard warned us to cut all ties with our pasts, not to trust anyone—not even another Phoenix operative—if the program ever got compromised. That advice has kept me alive these past three years.”
“Same with me,” Alec said as they hoisted the dead weight out of the trunk and carried it around to the open driver’s side door. “Yet here I