Nightingale Way: An Eternity Springs Novel (2 page)

Today would have been Lauren Ann Davenport’s fifth birthday.

Cat remained beside the grave for almost an hour. She reflected on her memories, said a few prayers, and allowed the tears to fall as she mourned those things that she had cherished and lost. When the moment felt right, she laid the bouquet of yellow roses below the marker, pressed a kiss to her fingertips, then touched the raised letters of the name recorded there. “Happy birthday, baby. I love you.”

Cat Blackburn turned and walked away from the grave of her only child.

She never noticed the figure of the man who stood behind the shelter of a nearby evergreen, silently watching.

“She calls that security?” Jack Davenport muttered with disgust, watching as the idiot wearing a shoulder holster flashed Cat Blackburn a smarmy grin.

Moments before, Cat’s little Mercedes sports car had pulled in to the driveway of her home in a quiet suburban neighborhood. From inside her house, Jack noticed that the pretty-boy bodyguard hadn’t paid any attention to the pool service truck parked next door in the Wellses’ driveway. While it was true that the truck sported the same logo as the service used by the vacationing Wells family, any security guard worth his permit would check out the vehicle before allowing his charge to exit her car.

What surprised him was that Cat remained so oblivious. After all, she’s the one whose house had been firebombed earlier this week. She should be more careful! It was almost as if she were daring the culprit to have another go at her.

It made Jack want to wring her neck. Right after he made the bodyguard pay for his inattention.

Jack had followed Cat and her escort from her home, to the dry cleaners, then a pet store, and finally to an animal shelter where she picked up a dog. The security loser never looked at Jack’s ride twice. He was too busy checking out Cat’s chest and ogling her ass.

Jack wanted to shoot him on principle. He’d seriously considered breaking bones—a leg would be good—in order to demonstrate to the incompetent jackass that a career move was in order. Doing so would be a public service. Instead, once the bug he’d planted in her car picked up the order she’d made for takeout at her favorite neighborhood Italian restaurant, an indication that she was finally headed home, he’d postponed his contemplated punishment and made his way to her house ahead of her.

Now, the sound of Cat’s laughter drifted through the window he’d cracked open, and he set his teeth. She wore a flirty yellow sundress, strappy heeled sandals, and oversized sunglasses. She pulled a designer dog tote filled with a puffball of four-legged fur from the backseat of the Mercedes. Her wavy auburn hair was pulled up in a ponytail, and as she approached the house, she looked more like a coed than a woman in her midthirties who paid no more attention to her surroundings than did her sorry excuse for security.

No wonder Melinda had assigned this job to him. Cat Blackburn couldn’t bat her pretty eyes and turn him into a worthless blob of testosterone. No, he was immune to the woman’s admittedly significant appeal. He’d been vaccinated.

Beautiful, stubborn fool
, he thought as he watched her pause halfway to the kitchen door, hand the dog to the bodyguard, and dig in her purse for her phone. Blithely, she stood right there out in the open and
double-thumbed out a text message. He had thought the woman had more sense than to leave herself exposed that way, but maybe not. After all, she’d managed to stir up a hornet’s nest with her blog exposé about the dogfighters.

The piece had gone live on the Internet three weeks ago. The day before yesterday, someone had firebombed her house. True, it hadn’t been a big explosion, but fire was fire. Fire was serious business, and Jack knew that better than most. Luckily, she’d been sitting on the living room sofa when the Molotov cocktail sailed through the picture window and exploded in her dining room.

Imagining the moment, his stomach took a sick turn.

And what had been Cat’s response? To hire protection who was more bodybuilder than bodyguard. What the hell was she thinking?

As much as he wanted to teach Mr. Ass-gazer a lesson, Jack knew he had to restrain the urge. This operation needed to be slick and quick. Better he stick to his original plan.

Though when the security guy reached up and playfully tugged Cat’s ponytail, Jack reconsidered. Maybe one well-placed kick wouldn’t hurt anything.

She dropped her phone back into her purse and resumed her stroll toward her kitchen door. Silent as a ghost, Jack moved past the brand-new dining room window and into the kitchen, taking up position. Waiting for her to slip her key into the lock, Jack realized with a touch of chagrin that his pulse pounded in a way that it rarely had on missions. Honesty made him admit that he worried more about dealing with Cat than he ever did about dying on the job.

Bodyguard Ken entered the kitchen ahead of her. “Idiot,” Jack muttered as he took the man down and knocked him out with a pair of smooth, practiced, lightning-quick kicks.

He’d be lying if he denied the pleasure it gave him, or the satisfaction he felt when he plunged the hypodermic needle into Cat Blackburn’s shoulder and she collapsed, unconscious, into his arms.

He used duct tape to secure the idiot guard, then lifted Cat over his shoulder and carried her to the garage, where he transferred her into the scroungy old SUV she used for hauling dogs as part of her work for the rescue group. As a precaution, he used the tape to bind her ankles and wrists and muffle her mouth. He’d gone heavy on the drug. The last thing he needed was to have her come to on the highway and cause a wreck.

He climbed into the driver’s seat, then hesitated. What about the dog? He hadn’t planned for that particular complication, but he liked dogs. For all he knew, Bodyguard Bozo would wake up angry and take it out on the purse pet.

He went back and got the dog.

They exited the garage and the neighborhood without incident. Once they’d gained the beltway, he phoned Melinda. She answered on the first ring. “Yes?”

“I have her. We’ll be wheels up within the hour.”

“Excellent. The guard?”

“Is a tool. I put him on the sofa in the den.”

“I’ll take care of him.” After a brief hesitation, she asked, “How is she, Jack?”

“Not a scratch on her. She’ll have a slight headache when she wakes up, but we knew to expect that.”

The relieved sigh was almost inaudible. “Yes. All right, then. Safe travels. You’ll be in touch?”

“Absolutely.” He hung up and made the rest of the trip to the airfield in silence. Though he concentrated on driving, he remained intensely aware of the woman slumped in the seat beside him and stole glances whenever traffic allowed.

She no longer looked like Coed Barbie. This was the
soft, slumbering Kitten he’d known and loved once upon a time.

Afternoon sunshine beamed through slatted wood blinds and woke Jack to the sound of the surf, the musty scent of sex, and soft snuffle of the naked woman lying next to him. He filled his lungs with air and a lazy grin stretched across his face. He couldn’t ever recall feeling so … pleasured
.

Rolling up on his elbow, he watched her sleep. Cat was an apt name for her, he decided. Two hours ago, he’d watched her stride along the beach, sleek and strong, confident and utterly feminine in her next-to-nothing bikini. He’d been in their room on a phone call—an important work call—and he’d completely lost his train of thought. She stopped outside on the room’s lanai and finished off her ice cream cone. She gazed into the room and licked her fingers, slowly, one by one
.

Damned if he remembered hanging up the phone
.

She was a tigress in bed—bold and adventurous and enthusiastic. When they mated, when he made her purr, she made him feel like the king of the jungle
.

Now, though, relaxed and sated and drowsing, Cat was a soft, cuddly kitten
.

Her eyes opened. Gorgeous soft green pools that he could drown in. She blinked once, twice, and when her gaze shifted and met his, she smiled. His heart swelled. My Kitten. My Cat
.

Not anymore
.

Driving the SUV, Jack took a corner a bit too sharply and her weight shifted. Her shoulder fell against him and he felt the heat of her like a brand. The truck cab was too small, his memories too big. He pushed her back where she belonged—far away from him—and returned his focus to the road.

Ten minutes later, she came to.

She tried to hide it, but he was too experienced to miss
the subtle signs of awakening. He wished he’d given her a stronger dose of the drug and kept her out until they’d left the city. Stupid of him to let his own dislike of the aftereffects of the drug guide him in this case. Even bound and gagged, she could cause him trouble. Hell, she’d caused him trouble when they occupied opposite hemispheres of the globe. Soothingly, he said, “Don’t be afraid. I’m doing this to help you.”

At the sound of his voice, her eyes flew open wide. Shock filled those familiar green eyes and color drained from her face.

Guilt slithered through him and sparked his temper.
What, she’d rather be abducted by a stranger?

Knowing Cat, yeah, probably.

He gunned the engine and zipped around a slower-moving car. “Believe it or not, I’m still one of the good guys, Catherine.”

This time, anyway
.

In reaction, she shut her eyes and slumped back into her seat.

She didn’t move or speak, and he said nothing more until he’d pulled the truck up next to the hangar and switched off the engine. “I’ll be back in a moment. Behave.”

He took the dog with him as he entered the hangar’s side door. His longtime pilot saw him and turned away from the Citation jet, clipboard in hand. “Everything’s ready on this end, Jack.”

“Good.” Jack handed over the dog and gave the man some last-minute instructions before returning to the truck and a fuming Catherine Ann Blackburn.

Had this been a real abduction he’d have carried her to the plane, but now that the time had come to hold her close, he found he didn’t want to do it. The drug had worn off, and he wasn’t ready for the intimacy. Disgusted
with himself, he yanked out his pocketknife and slashed the duct tape binding her ankles.

He took hold of her upper arm and when she went stiff, tugged her from the truck. The moment her feet hit the ground, the woman twisted in his grip, as slippery as an eel. Her eyes flashed. She made a growling noise in her throat.

Then she kneed him in the junk. Hard.

Pain radiated through him and only the force of will kept him from dropping to his knees. As his grip on her arm loosened, she yanked herself free of him. But instead of fleeing, she stepped calmly toward the Citation, her three-inch heels clicking confidently against the concrete floor. Once he could breathe again, Jack cursed. Once he could move again, he hobbled off after her.

Jack eyed her long, lovely legs and scowled. The shoes had worked against her, and she obviously knew it. Had she not been wearing those ridiculous shoes, she could have dashed toward the more public buildings at this private airport and perhaps found help before he pulled himself up off the ground. Those shoes were something else Security Guard Ken should have cautioned her against.

With that, his temper reached the boiling point. He was as filled with fury as he’d been since … well … since Melinda told him someone had firebombed Cat’s house. Gritting his teeth, he caught up with her. He scooped her up, threw her over his shoulder, and hauled her up the jet’s staircase in a fireman’s carry. Inside the fuselage, he tossed her into a seat with a curt “Stay!”

Her mouth said not a word, but the furious glare in her eyes spoke loud and clear.

Again, he drew his knife and sliced the tape that bound her hands. She could remove the tape from her mouth herself. “I sit up front during takeoff. After that, we’ll talk. There’s water there”—he pointed toward a
cabinet—“and the head is in back if you’d like to use it before takeoff. Be in your seat, buckled in, in five.”

He was halfway to the cockpit door when her voice stopped him cold. “Why am I not surprised to discover that you are still Melinda’s lapdog?”

Jack’s spine snapped straight and he stiffened. Melinda’s lapdog?

The barb struck that place deep within Jack’s heart where the doubts had always dwelt. Is that what she had thought of him, even when she professed to love him? Her mother’s lapdog?

Coldly furious, he glanced back over his shoulder and forced a smile. “You know, Cat, I don’t recall you being such a bitch when we were married.”

He slammed the cockpit door behind him with a bang.

Jack Davenport was back.

Cat sat buckled into her seat, a bottle of water clenched tightly in her fist, as the plane climbed. She couldn’t believe this was happening. And to think that she’d thought the day before yesterday had been crazy. Having a Molotov cocktail come smashing through her dining room window should have been the insane moment of the month, but oh no. That was just the beginning.

Now Jack Davenport was back.

She didn’t want to believe it. She’d never thought she’d see him again. She’d never
wanted
to see him again.

A little voice whispered in her head,
Liar
.

The nervous panic that had simmered inside her ever since she’d regained consciousness rolled to a boil. Maybe this man wasn’t Jack Davenport, she told herself, reaching desperately. Maybe she hadn’t recognized his voice, recognized the scent of him. Maybe this was all part of a nefarious plot against her and this guy was an impostor, an employee of the powerful senator she’d
ruined with her story or a crazed fan of the major league pitcher whose team had cut him loose after she’d proved he owned fighting dogs.

Yes. That’s it! Jack isn’t back. This isn’t Jack!

After all, this man was bigger than Jack. He outweighed Jack by ten or fifteen pounds. Ten or fifteen pounds of muscle. Jack’s shoulders weren’t that broad. He’d never been fat, but he hadn’t had a six-pack like this guy did, something she couldn’t help but notice when his shirt rode up as he dumped her into the airplane’s seat.