Guardian Ranger (Shadow Agents #2)(36)

Right. The woman had seen all his scars. Kissed them. He still couldn’t believe that she’d done that. She hadn’t been repulsed or scared. She’d just been...loving.

Perfect.

He was so messing everything up with her. He knew it. His breath rushed out. He had to talk with Logan. Get permission from the EOD powers-that-be, aka Bruce Mercer—the bigwig Mystery Man who seemed to run Elite Ops—to brief Veronica fully on the situation with Cale.

She deserved the truth.

He couldn’t, wouldn’t keep lying to her.

Veronica was dressed now and staring at him a bit uncertainly as her smile wavered.

He walked toward her with slow, sure steps. She tilted her head back to look up at him. “You aren’t what I expected,” he told her.

“Is that good? Or bad?”

Both.

“Don’t hate me, okay?”

Her brows rose. “Ah, is this typical morning-after etiquette for you? You tell a woman not to hate you because—”

“There’s nothing typical about you.” That was a big part of the problem. If she hadn’t been getting under his skin, he could have kept playing his part, and he could have stayed the hell away from her last night.

But he’d wanted her too much.

A reckoning would come soon. He’d pay for that desire.

As soon as he got her to the main house, he was calling Logan and Mercer. No more secrets. No more lies.

Jasper pulled his gun and headed toward the door. He peeked through the blinds of the nearby window, searching the area outside. Then he moved to the other windows, scanning and checking.

“Do you think someone was watching us l-last night?” she asked him, voice suddenly hushed.

Giving a quick shake of his head, Jasper told her, “No, the storm was too bad. No one was out there.” And it looked as though no one was out there now. He went back to Veronica, took her hand and led her outside.

The ground was still wet, heavy with mud, while standing water covered much of the area. Driving back to the main house would be tricky, but the truck would handle it. He cast a quick, worried glance at Veronica. He didn’t want her to have any bad memories if the truck started to slide.

She climbed into the truck, buckled her seat belt and said, “I’m fine, Jasper,” in a determined way that told him she knew exactly what he’d been thinking.

He hurried around to the driver’s seat. He secured his weapon and cranked up the vehicle. When the engine growled to life, he gently pushed down the gas even as he swept the steering wheel around in a large circle. The driving would be slow going—so damn slow—but he wouldn’t take any risks with Veronica.

His gaze swept the area up ahead. The storm had knocked over trees, sent the stream to swelling and had pretty much ravaged everything in sight.

“It’s funny,” Veronica murmured. “Once we got together, I forgot all about the storm.”

He started to smile.

But then he saw a glint up ahead. A flash of the sun on metal, one big white line that shouldn’t be there. Swearing, he jerked the steering wheel to the right, but he made his move too late.

Gunfire exploded, and a bullet ripped through the windshield. Veronica screamed as the truck careened, rushing forward. The bullet had hit him, his blood was seeping out and he couldn’t control the truck.

Couldn’t stop it.

The truck slammed into a tree. Glass shattered and Veronica stopped screaming.





Chapter Eight

She was trapped in the car.

Mommy wasn’t moving. Why wasn’t she moving? Daddy?

The nightmare of her past tangled with her present.

Veronica’s hands were against the dashboard. Broken glass was all around her.

Mommy had been bleeding. She’d been so still.

The seat belt bit into her shoulder.

She couldn’t get out of her seat. She was strapped in and she screamed and screamed because something was wrong. She couldn’t get out.

Her fingers fumbled. There was a click, and then the seat belt slid free. Her body sagged forward. The truck was at some kind of angle—it had slid down a little ravine and slammed into a tree.

Her forehead was wet. Her fingers lifted. Blood?

Daddy had been bleeding.

Her fingers fisted. She shoved the memory back into her mind. She wasn’t a child anymore. And she wasn’t alone.

Her head whipped to the right. “Jasper?” He was slumped over the steering wheel, not moving.

Had he been hurt in the crash or...no, before the crash. The memory of those desperate moments flooded through her. That sound that she’d heard hadn’t been thunder. It had been a gunshot. One that had blasted through the windshield—and hit Jasper.

Carefully now, so very carefully, she pushed him back. The sunlight spilled through the broken windows so that she could clearly see his blood-soaked chest. “Jasper!” This time, her cry was desperate.

His lashes fluttered. “Ver...onica? What...happened?”

“Someone shot us.” You. She tried to find his wound, but there was so much blood. She needed to put pressure on the wound. She had to stop the blood. That was what people always did on TV shows. Apply pressure. Stop the bleeding.

His eyes looked bleary. “Get...out...”

She leaned toward him. She was so scared that her whole body shook. “What? What is it?” There was a huge gash near the right side of his forehead.