Assumed Identity - By Julie Miller Page 0,46

just in time to see a dark-clothed figure scurrying across the sidewalk and jumping into a car parked in front of the shop.

Had he been in the shop? With Robin?

“Hey!” Jake shouted.

Just as the car squealed out of its parking space, the rental car he’d been watching jerked to a stop behind it and honked. The near collision didn’t worry Jake as much as the bad timing.

Breathing hard at the unexpected race he’d run, Jake swore and took off across the parking lot. Robin’s car was still here. And there was no mistaking it was hers because of the car seat strapped into the back. “Fool woman.”

He ran straight to the sidewalk when the car slowed down, making sure the driver could see him there waiting for him in case he was thinking about stopping. Damn those instincts. The car had slowed, but when Jake ran a few yards farther, the brake lights flashed and it jerked to a stop. Jake hustled his legs to catch up to get a good look in the window at the man he suspected was harassing Robin. But when he reached the glass and closed his hand around the door handle, all he saw was a camera flash. “Son of a...”

Blinded for a split second, he could do little more than spin away as the driver gunned the engine. It sped through the yellow light at the next intersection to the screeching protest of car horns and disappeared into the night. Right. Nothing suspicious about that.

“Robin.” Jake’s chest heaved in and out as he muttered her name, unsure whether he was voicing a hope or cursing himself for what he was about to do.

“Robin!” He dashed past the empty car in the parking lot and banged on the steel exit door. But one knock and the door bounced against his fist.

Unlocked.

Not a good sign. Every cell in his body screamed that something was wrong here. Every instinct told him Robin was in trouble.

Reaching down, he pulled the hunting knife from his boot. Then he took a silent, steadying breath, fisted his hand around the door handle and swung it open.

He slid inside to the glow of security lights and flattened his back against the brick wall beside the door, allowing himself a few seconds to acclimate to the eerie shadows. The only hint that anyone was still here was the sliver of light peeking out beneath the closed door of Robin’s office at the end of the hall.

Jake’s blood simmered in his veins. Working late with the back door wide open? A scan through the workrooms revealed the back of the shop was empty and that nothing seemed out of place. Maybe she wasn’t working at all. Maybe her attacker had come back to finish what he’d started. Maybe that Houseman guy outside the Shamrock was here to finish that conversation that had upset her so. Maybe the threat in the phone call she’d tried to tell him about had become a reality and she was lying in that office injured, unconscious again, or worse. How many times did this woman have to be hurt before she wised up and put her safety before her job? How many times did he have to come bail her out?

If stealth wasn’t vital to securing the place, Jake would be cursing up a blue streak. He was as ticked off about Robin putting herself in a position to get hurt as he was the fact that it made him sick to think she might have gotten hurt. Preparing for the worst-case scenario, Jake pressed his back against the hallway wall and crept through the darkness toward that light. He could just bet, too, that she was here alone, that she hadn’t told anyone she was working late. Maybe she was counting on Bow-tie guy to walk her to her car. She’d put her trust in some traitorous schlub who wasn’t coming back....

That’s when he heard the muffled shouts. Punctuated by a thumping that vibrated through the wall at his back, he pinpointed the source of the muted cries for help. They weren’t coming from her office. They were close by. Was there another locked room in here? A closet?

He flipped around to the opposite wall to use his eyes to search.

“Stay away from her.” Thump. Thump. Thump.

Robin? He zeroed in on the source of the sound and found the seams of a door, camouflaged to match the wallpaper around it.

And then he saw the steel pin wedged