On Midnight Wings

HEATHER HAD JUST TUCKED her fork into the sleeve of her cornflower-blue sweater, the steel cool against her skin, when James Wallace walked back into the dining room—empty now except for her—and slumped into the chair opposite hers, the sharp scent of his Brut aftershave wafting across the table. The line of his clean-shaven jaw was nearly white with anger.

“You were right,” he said, light from the overheads reflected in his glasses. “The RN just confirmed it. You are being transferred in the morning.” He shoved aside the plate containing his half-eaten meal, scattering a few kernels of buttered corn across the tablecloth. “Goddammit. No one contacted me about this.”

“I warned you,” Heather said, lowering her hand to her lap and folding her fingers over the heel of her sleeve, securing the fork. “Back at the club. The Bureau isn’t going to let me just walk away. Not with all the secrets I know.”

“That shouldn’t matter. You’re one of the Bureau’s finest—”

“Was,” Heather corrected. “Was one of their finest. Now I’m a major liability.”

“Because of that damned bloodsucker.”

“No, dammit, because I learned the truth, and Dante happens to be a part of that truth, a truth the Bureau never wanted to come to light. They’ll do anything to make sure it stays buried. Anything. Including burying me.”

And Dante, but that was a thought she kept to herself.

“I’m beginning to think you’re right,” James said. “After all, they used me to get to you. Must’ve put a tail on me or a GPS tracker because I took extreme care in covering my tracks.” He raked a furious hand through his gray-flecked blond hair. “I took an official leave of absence to tend to family matters. This is none of their business.”

“The secrets I carry are.”

“Christ.” James pulled off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose.

Heather pushed her plate away, the food untouched, her appetite dead, despite the savory fragrance of pork chops baked in rosemary and spicy brown mustard. The strain of being in the presence of the man who’d shot Dante in cold blood and left him to burn, the man who’d drugged and kidnapped her, kept her stomach twisted into hard knots.

Just a little while longer. . . .

Scraping her chair back, Heather rose to her feet. “Dad”—the word tasted like ashes in her mouth—“If I stay here, they’ll take me. And if they take me, you’ll never see me again.”

“I’m not going to let that happen,” James slipped his glasses back on, then looked at her. A familiar stubborn light glinted in his hazel eyes. “I checked you in and I paid for your treatment. I can check you out, as well.”

Mingled exhilaration and relief flooded Heather’s veins, goosed her pulse. Her gamble, based on her father’s need for control, was paying off in spades. Clamping her fingers tighter over the heel of her sleeve, she said, “Where will we go?”

“Where they can’t find us.” James stood, then grabbed his tan trench coat from the back of the chair and shrugged it on. “I brought you here to be healed, restored. And if the powers that be in the Bureau are too ignorant to grasp that, well, then, that’s their loss. But they’re not getting their hands on you.” He swept a glance over Heather, tallying her sweater and jeans, the black Skechers on her feet. “Anything else you need in your room?”

“Nope. This is everything.” Everything she’d been wearing, that was, when the self-absorbed, lying bastard had broken into the club, then shot her full of tranks out of so-called fatherly concern. Hardly time to pack a suitcase.

“Good. Let’s get you checked out.”

ONCE THEY WERE OUTSIDE the building and heading for James’s rented Lexus in the parking lot, Heather’s relief was so intense, her knees nearly buckled.

It had gone so damned smoothly.

Sue Bieri, the RN in charge of the night shift, had protested of course.

She’d voiced concerns about Heather’s treatment and how interruption might affect her progress, had worried about how the FBI would react to her absence, but in the end, she’d had no choice but to print out discharge papers for James to sign.

“Don’t worry about the FBI,” James had said, offering Sue a grim smile. “I’ll call them myself. Thank them for the thought.”

Just like that, Heather was free—well, almost. And that almost-freedom smelled like green woods and cooling pavement, car exhaust and sage. She sucked in a deep breath, savored the uncanned air.

James unlocked the Lexus’s doors. “In the back seat, pumpkin, passenger side,” he murmured, yanking the door open. “Strap yourself in.”

Heather arched an eyebrow, but said nothing. The request didn’t surprise her. She got into the car, sliding into the backseat as requested, knowing that James had put her there to make it more difficult for her to interfere with him while driving.

She was his daughter, yes, but he was no fool.