One Night Standoff - By Delores Fossen Page 0,10

would have to learn to live with that, but she hadn’t had much luck doing it so far. The nightmares were still there. Every night. Unrelenting.

“So, you’re an agent,” Clayton said almost like a challenge.

“Former agent. I resigned shortly after Jill was murdered. But before the justice department, I worked in Dallas for a man who was a world-class money launderer. And I helped him.”

Lenora nearly choked on the confession, but it was true. She had indeed helped him, unknowingly, but she darn well should have known what he was up to. She’d played with fire and had gotten burned.

Now Lenora was trying to make sure that didn’t happen again.

Yes, Clayton was fire, all right.

Fiery trouble in a black Stetson.

All of her experience and training told her that he was off-limits. As if on cue, the baby kicked, reminding her that the hands-off rule had been broken months ago. Still, that didn’t mean she couldn’t do something to stop more bad things from happening. She didn’t include her baby in that “bad things” department. She desperately loved and wanted this child. But the baby’s father was a different matter entirely.

She couldn’t live with another death on her hands. Especially his death.

“And you were a criminal?” he mumbled. He shook his head, put his back to the sidelight window and shucked off his glasses so his gaze could meet hers.

Yes, it was a glare, all right.

Lenora nodded. “When the feds started investigating the money-laundering scheme I was involved in, I was taken into custody and cut a deal to help them with an investigation to collar my boss.”

“Sounds dangerous,” he pointed out.

She settled for a shrug. “My boss and his business partners were bigger fish that they wanted. So, because the situation could have turned, well, more than dangerous, they trained me like a regular agent. But I was technically just a criminal informant assigned to the deep-cover task force. Then, after my boss was arrested and convicted, they asked me to stay on in the department and work on the Riggs case.”

Clayton made a sound of displeasure. “And as a dupe, my own people assigned me to two women that I was told needed protection.”

“Obviously, we did need it, because one of us was murdered,” she reminded him, then paused. “I’m sorry I had to lie to you.”

“Not as sorry as I am. I hate being lied to, especially by people that I’m supposed to trust.” However, he immediately added a sound of dismissal. “Old baggage rearing its head. But it still comes into play here.”

She knew a little about his old childhood baggage, from the notorious Rocky Creek Children’s Facility, which was now closed. Had been for sixteen years. She also knew his mother had died giving birth to him and that his father, Melvin Larson, had literally abandoned him at the facility when he was eleven. All of that had come out when they’d talked in bed after their fast and furious bout of sex.

Too bad her memories of that were crystal clear.

She could remember every last detail of that night. The raw pain from losing a friend and fellow agent. The comfort she’d found in Clayton’s arms. The pleasure, too. Pleasure should have been the last thing on her mind that night, but she’d felt plenty of it anyway. Thanks to Clayton.

“Lies like that are usually unnecessary,” he tossed out to her.

“You lied to the minister to find me,” Lenora tossed right back at him.

He gave her that riled look again, like the one he’d given her in the diner. “I didn’t lie to deceive. I lied to find you so I could help. Maybe now’s a good time to ask if you were planning on telling me any of this?”

No, it wasn’t a good time to ask, but Lenora would answer it anyway. “I was waiting for you to heal and for the danger to die down.”

He lifted his shoulder. “How the hell was the danger going to die down? You know who was responsible for putting that bullet in my head?”

She couldn’t deny it fast enough. “No. I assumed that Riggs hired someone to do it, but I don’t have any proof.” Lenora stopped, met his gaze. “Do you?”

Clayton didn’t answer her for several moments, but his stare continued to stab at her. At least it did until the baby kicked her and she winced a little. It wasn’t a hard kick, but she’d only been feeling movement for a few weeks and wasn’t used