Donny’s gaze flickered nervously. “When Brogan showed up he got real interested in this motorcycle touring club we have. The dude said who they were lookin’ for was there. They just don’t know who he is. But he can read some files they have, and they think Brogan has the other files. He said Brogan was the only one with the background and experience to steal them, too. He said this dude they want can read them. Then, when I was in Fort Knox a few weeks later, there were these dudes at the bar I went to, they was talkin’ ’bout Dawg and Eve’s daddy. They said there was talk circulatin’ heavy that there were files their daddy worked on while he was in some federal agency he worked for that hid the location on somethin’, and those files were stolen. Talk was maybe Dawg would know what that somethin’ was, and the only way to find out would be to use his sisters to scare him, but no one can go after a Mackay, ’cause if they did, then whoever that dude is that can read those files also has lots of information on that Freedom League and if any Mackay, or anyone that any Mackay loves is threatened, then he’s gonna talk. And he’s gonna tell all these secrets he has on that Freedom League. And they don’t want him talkin’ ’cause word is, he knows everything. Who wasn’t caught, who’s still hidin’, and lots of other stuff.”
Bingo. So that’s why Doogan wants Eve.
“Anything else, Donny?” he questioned softly. “Come on, anything else?”
“I swear that’s all.” He whimpered. “I swear that’s all. I swear.”
Brogan lifted the knife from Donny’s neck and released him slowly.
Donny stepped back quickly, his gaze seeking his lover’s.
“You hear anything else, Donny, use the number,” Brogan growled. “Don’t make me come back.”
Donny gave a quick, short nod.
Hell, Brogan expected both of them to be gone within hours.
“One more thing, Donny.”
“No one will know you were here,” he promised, then gave a bitter, mirthless laugh. “Trust me; I don’t want anyone to know.”
Brogan strode quickly from the room, Eli and Jed following close behind as they left the house and disappeared into the trees.
The four-wheelers they’d used to get into the mountains were still waiting where they’d left them. Brogan mounted the rugged machine as Eli and Jed did the same, and they started the engines and headed for the enclosed trailer several miles down the mountain and the pickup it was attached to.
The night—or morning, he should say—had yielded far more information than he had ever expected.
Pulling the four-wheeler into the covered trailer as Eli and Jed pulled in behind him, Brogan knew he finally had a direction to move in. Something other than just a list of files currently under review by the military for destruction. Brogan hadn’t seen a location for anything when he’d gone through the files, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there. It meant he was going to have to go over them much more closely. According to the information Donny had, the files were evidently encrypted, if whoever he’d overheard talking that night, was right. So it made sense Brogan hadn’t found it. What he needed was someone with the ability to read and crack military code.
Otherwise, there would be no keeping Eve out of this.
His director thought they had one asset no one else could touch.
That asset was Eve.
Because whoever cared enough for Eve that they would only come out if Eve needed them or would only trust whoever she was with, evidently had the ability to not just decode the encryption, but also had information on a militia that Homeland Security believed had been disbanded more than five years before.
He’d been trying to find someone Eve was close to in his search for this informant. Maybe the way to go about this was to see whom Eve and her father, Chandler Mackay, now had in common.
That was where the answers lay.
To get those answers he would have to make Eve break a promise and betray the brother she loved.
He would be risking his soul, but he knew the plans the Freedom League had when it had been disbanded. They had been only months away from assassinating the president and ensuring the vice president, who had been a part of the militia, took his place. From there, they would have ensured the government officials they’d been amassing information on, would fall in with their plans. If they succeeded, the world as he knew it would be over forever. The Freedom League’s ultimate plan was the destruction of free enterprise, freedom of speech, and race equality. The nation would have been broken apart from the inside out, and before the American citizens even realized the danger they were in, it would have been too late.
According to Donny, the League was still in place, and that meant their plans were still in place as well.
And that, he couldn’t accept.
EIGHT
Eve often helped not just at the bar, but also at Janey Mackay Jansen’s restaurant, Mackay’s Fine Dining. She helped Natches at the garage and in the office, and sometimes at Dawg’s lumber and building supplies store, or, if needed, on the farm he had bought.
When she wasn’t working for various cousins or their friends, then she worked for her mother.
Fortunately, John and Sierra had hired two experienced waitresses within a few nights of her confrontation with Sandi Mikels. Unfortunately, that left Eve at loose ends for a few days—until her sisters learned she was currently jobless.
They saw that as extra time off from the inn to enjoy their summers more. Before she knew it Eve found herself working two straight twelve-hour days until she managed to put the skids on Piper and Lyrica.
Eight hours she didn’t mind. Twelve hours she had a bit more of a problem with.
On the third day she found herself on cleaning duty after Zoey disappeared to “paint” again. Piper and Lyrica had made plans, leaving her mother without the extra help at the same time that dinner preparation began.
There were eight guest suites, four to each wing at the side of the converted two-story farmhouse. The suites weren’t overly large, though Eve’s was smaller than the others. Each suite consisted of a bedroom, bathroom, and small sitting room with a reasonable-size flat screened television.
That morning after the guests left, she went through each room that had the service tag hanging on the outside of the door to clean or just refresh the rooms. On the back of each tag the guest had written what services were required. Changing the bed, extra towels, or a variety of other services listed to check off on the back of the card.
Armed with cleaning supplies, clean sheets, pillowcases, and towels, she made her way from the rooms on the opposite wing from her own and worked her way around to the side she shared with Brogan, Elijah Grant, and Jedediah Booker.
Her plan was to finish in her room and sneak in a nap. Her evening was free, and she intended to keep it that way. She’d worked two weeks straight without a day off, and she was determined to make certain she had a break.
When she reached Brogan’s room, nerves began to attack her normally calm demeanor.
Her hands were shaking as she unlocked the door and slowly stepped inside. The butterflies were beating at her stomach while her pussy decided it was a fine time to go from aching to all-out clenching in need.
And all it had taken was stepping into his suite.
She was pathetic.
Carrying the clean bedclothes to his bedroom, she was happy to see he wasn’t a slob. There wasn’t so much as a stray hair in the bathroom.
The same for the sitting area of the small suite. All it really required was a quick run across the floors with a vacuum and dusting the furniture before she returned to the bedroom to make the bed.
She had every intention of making the bed quickly, too.
Pulling the first pillow from the neatly straightened blanket, Eve stared at it for long seconds before slowly pulling it to her and burying her face against the ultrasoft cotton of the pillowcase covering it.
His scent was there: a clean, midnight scent that forcibly pulled the memory of his touch to t
he forefront of her mind.
Once again she could feel the heavy weight of his body against her own, his lips traveling down her neck, moving steadily closer to her hard, aching nipples.
She hadn’t slept worth anything since that night. She tossed and turned, aching for him, and too wary of his warning of what would happen if he heard her masturbating again to risk it.
It was so tempting, though. The need for release was like a hunger she couldn’t assuage. She couldn’t forget it, and even if she could masturbate, she wouldn’t be able to satisfy it.
Been there, done that, she thought wearily. She couldn’t allow herself to take Brogan as a lover.
She had to get over it. This hunger for him was going to make her crazy.
Getting over it would be easier said than done, though.
For the first time in nearly eight months she had finally accepted one of the numerous invitations to dinner that she received. While picking up her check from the bar the night before, one of John and Sierra’s friends had come into town from Boston and stopped by.
Before the evening was over he had invited her to have dinner with him that night, and with a sense of desperation she had accepted.
Chatham Bromleah Doogan III, tall, dark haired, and dark eyed. He had a steady, confident aura about him, and John and Sierra both really liked him.
She was thankful that Brogan had left with the motorcycle touring group he was a part of that afternoon and wasn’t due back until sometime in the hours before dawn.
The group went most weekends sightseeing on the bikes. A group of over a dozen couples, riding their motorcycles along the scenic mountain highways and byways of Kentucky, West Virginia, and Ohio.
Plenty of time, she thought to herself, to have dinner with Chatham, or Doogan as he’d told her to call him, and to figure out whether she truly was ruined for another man.
Not that she intended to do more than have dinner, because she didn’t. But there was always the chance her body would see the error of aching for Brogan and decide to ache for someone else instead.
It was a long shot, she admitted, but worth trying.
Tossing Brogan’s pillow to the bed, she quickly stripped the blankets while laying the pillowcases carefully aside before making the bed. Gathering the bedclothes together, she moved first to her own room and tossed the pillowcases to her bed, then took the bedclothes to the laundry room at the end of the hall.
Throwing the blankets in the wash, she moved back to her own room, locked the doors, then placed the pillowcases on her own pillows before returning to the shower.
Since walking from the shower to find Brogan in her room, it seemed she now expected him to be there each time she stepped into her bedroom.
Disappointment assailed her when she realized he wasn’t. Even though she had known even before she entered the room that he wasn’t there, still, the regret ached inside her.
The motorcycle touring club Brogan had been leading for the past year had been used to taking weekly trips several times a summer. They toured the States on their motorcycles, often riding to scenic, out-of-the-way areas, where civilization still hadn’t marred nature’s beauty. This last summer, they’d stuck closer to Pulaski County, though. Their trips usually lasted no more than twelve to sixteen hours between leaving then returning.
Oh, civilization was creeping closer by the day, she admitted, even in Pulaski County.
Removing the towel she’d wrapped around her and climbing onto her bed for a nap, she was surprised she fell asleep as quickly as she did.
A deep, luckily dreamless sleep.
No dreams of Brogan and sex, or the dream that often visited her of watching him, aching for him, only to see him leave with one of the local women she’d known him to see in the past.
Today, though, there was only peaceful sleep.
Something she hadn’t had in far longer than she could remember.
* * *
Brogan pulled into the rest stop, parking the Harley in front of the concession building as Eli and Jed pulled in to one side of him.
The two other agents, despite renting suites at the bed-and-breakfast, were only rarely seen in his presence. The only time they spoke or even came in contact with one another was during the rides the touring club made.
Luckily, there were fewer rides this summer than there had been in summers past. After the former “president” was arrested for drug possession, it was learned that the club’s riding account was at nearly zero. They would be making a lot shorter trips until the monthly membership fees added enough for them to resume their normal summer schedule.
Dismounting the bike and hanging his helmet on the handlebars, Brogan watched as the rest of the group pulled in. Behind Eli and Jed, Poppa Bear and his wife pulled in, sharing a cycle the size of a small car. Their daughter rode her own Harley next to them and managed to make many of the trips her parents went on.
Behind them, surprisingly, rode and Donny and Sandi. They had been unusually quiet since their ordeal. Donny hadn’t gotten into any fights, and Sandi hadn’t instigated any. They were up each other’s asses like Siamese twins, impossible to separate. The one time Brogan had heard one of the club members comment on the change, Donny had replied only that he was getting too damned old to be fighting and carousing all damned night long.
The number Brogan had programmed into his phone hadn’t yet been called either. He’d hoped the happy couple would be eager to get some useful information, just in case. Not that he’d really kill either of them in cold blood, but he was fine with the fact that they believed he would.
“Brogan, I have to admit, you know some damned fine scenery,” Poppa Bear boomed as he helped his slender wife from the back of their cycle. “It’s nice to finally see something besides the interstates we were seeing when your predecessor was running things.”
“I’m glad you’re enjoying it, Poppa Bear.” He inclined his head in acknowledgment.
“When are you gonna invite that little Mackay girl to join us?” the Santa-looking Poppa Bear questioned him with a suggestive wink. “There’s nothing like having your gal sittin’ behind ya.”
Hooking his thumbs into his belt, Brogan grinned back at him. “Hell, her brother might shoot me.”
“Naw, ol’ Dawg loves his baby sisters. He might snap and snarl, but he’d not kill you over her.”
Brogan wasn’t so certain of that.
“Better claim that pretty little thang afore it’s too late,” Poppa Bear claimed. “There’s a lot of nice-lookin’ boys that’ll snap her right up ’fore you know it.”
“Yeah, like the one who asked her out last night.”
Brogan’s head jerked around to Donny’s unusually quiet tone of voice as Poppa Bear and his family headed to the restrooms.
“Do what?” Brogan asked.
He didn’t have to force the vein of surprise in his voice.
“There was a guy at the bar who asked her out to dinner last night.” Donny shifted on his feet, moving with a nervous rhythm that made Brogan want to order him to stand still.
“What did she say?” He frowned.
“Well, she accepted.” Donny scratched nervously at his cheek. “They’re having dinner at Mackay’s tonight at seven.”
The hell they were.
Brogan could feel the blood suddenly boiling in his veins.
Glaring at Donny, he wondered whether the little bastard would have the nerve to lie to him.
“Man, I wouldn’t lie to you about it.” Donny lifted his hands helplessly as Brogan silently cursed the other man’s ability to read him, if only for a second.
“How the hell would you know?” Brogan snapped. “I thought you and Sandi were barred from Walker’s Run.”
Donny shook his head and shrugged his shoulders uncomfortably as he cleared his throat. “Just Sandi. But I doubt I’ll be around much without her.”
Yeah, he felt real sorry for them. When hell froze over.
“Sorry, man.” B
rogan grimaced. “I guess it was more than I expected. Thanks for letting me know.” He gave the other man a short, tight nod before turning back to the Harley and jerking his helmet from the handlebars.
“Brogan?” Donny spoke again, his voice lower.
Turning to him with a frown, Brogan waited impatiently.
“I’m like Poppa Bear; I don’t think Dawg would kill ya because you’re sleepin’ with his sister. Break her heart, though, and Natches might.”
Yeah, yeah, yeah, he was getting damned tired of that refrain.
Securing the helmet beneath his chin, Brogan mounted the Harley, kicked the stand back, and turned the key. The engine purred instantly.
Ignoring the confused summons from the riders returning from the concession building and bathrooms, Brogan sped from the rest stop. Pulling onto the two-lane road, he pointed the motorcycle toward Somerset and the woman who just might have it in her head to see whether Brogan could be pushed from her life.
Brogan had no intentions of being pushed out.
He’d made a mistake in waiting. He should have never given some bastard the opportunity to slip in.
It was a mistake he would rectify.
NINE
He absolutely couldn’t believe Doogan would do something so damned underhanded.
Chatham Bromleah Doogan, director of special operations of the Federal Protective Service, had actually dragged his ass out of his D.C. office to come poke his nose into Brogan’s operation.
It was unbelievable.
As he drove the three hours back to Somerset, Brogan tried to figure out exactly what was in the director’s mind.
There was no figuring it out.
Doogan was known for his oddities, but Brogan had never known him to physically interfere in an investigation. Especially as he was now.
He was a known player when it came to women. The man had no heart and no belief in a woman’s tender emotions.
The son of a bitch would take Eve’s innocence as though he had a right to it. Then he would ride off into the sunset and never give her another thought. And there was no doubt of Eve’s innocence. Brogan knew from the investigation report Doogan had shown him that Eve had no lovers in Somerset since she had arrived. Brogan’s investigation into her life in Texas revealed there had been none there.