Her Last Goodbye (Morgan Dane #2)(3)

“Who are you?” he asked her breasts. He dragged his eyeballs back to her face.

“I’m Morgan.” She smiled, ignoring the giant ick in her belly.

“Hel-lo, Morgan.” Staring at her mouth, he licked his lips, slowly, deliberately.

Slimily.

Was that a word?

“Who are you?” she asked.

He leered. “Whoever you want me to be.”

What. A. Sleeze.

She tilted her head as if she wasn’t very bright and didn’t understand.

He grinned. “I’m Patty’s cousin, Tyler.”

“Oh. Great. These are for Patty and the kids.” She held out the tray of brownies and smiled wider. She batted her eyelashes a few times, a clichéd but effective maneuver.

“Oh. OK.” He took the tray in both hands.

Morgan pulled an envelope from her coat and set it on top of the brownies. “This is for you.”

“What the fuck?” His body tensed. The leer slid off his face, and anger twisted his features.

Morgan stepped away, not willing to turn her back on him. But Tyler moved faster than she expected, his posture shifting from lazy to lightning in an instant.

He tossed the brownies into a bush and lunged forward. His hand closed around her throat, the pressure on her windpipe forcing her onto her toes. Morgan grabbed his wrist with both hands to break his hold. Gasping, fighting panic, she tried to peel his fingers off her neck.

But his grip was an iron collar. He was taller and stronger and furious.

“You fucking bitch. How dare you trick me.” Tyler pulled her closer. “You can tell my ex-wife if I see her again, I’ll kill her. That ungrateful slut won’t get a nickel from me.”

Stars blinked in front of Morgan’s eyes as his grip around her neck tightened.





Chapter Three


Morgan!

Lance dug his feet into the grass and sprinted toward the man who held Morgan by the neck. She twitched like a rag doll, rising onto her toes. His vision tunneled down to the two bodies on the stoop. Fury added fuel to his legs.

If Tyler Green hurt her . . .

He watched as Morgan raised one arm over her head and spun in a quarter turn. She windmilled her arm forward and used the inside of her shoulder to break Tyler’s grip on her neck. Then she drove the back of her elbow into his face. His head snapped back. Blood spurted. His hands went to cup his mouth and nose just as Lance hit him with a midbody tackle.

Lance and Tyler rolled in a tangle of limbs on the front lawn, coming to a stop with Lance on top. Flat on his back on the ground, Tyler swung out with a wild and weak punch. Lance swatted the fist out of the way like he would a gnat.

In the end, there wasn’t much of a struggle. Tyler acted tough when he was attacking women but didn’t know what to do with an opponent his own size. He was also bleeding profusely, and Lance wasn’t at all ashamed to enjoy the sight. Tyler was a bully and a coward.

Lance rolled Tyler onto his face, pulled his arms behind him, and planted a knee in the small of his back.

Leaning close to the deadbeat’s head, Lance said, “You wife beaters have one thing in common. You can’t fight someone who fights back.”

“Bitches all stick together,” Tyler spat over his shoulder.

“She kicked your ass.” Lance glanced at Morgan. “Nice shot.”

Morgan was on her knees, one hand on her neck; the other held her cell phone. Lance assumed she was calling 911. After giving the dispatcher the address, she slid the phone back into her pocket, sat on her heels, and wheezed, “The police are on the way.”

“Get off me,” Tyler screamed into the grass.

Lance shook his head and shifted a little more weight onto his knee. The air—and the fight—went out of Tyler like a deflated tire.

“You just assaulted a lawyer, dumbass,” Lance said. “She’s going to put your sorry butt in jail.”

With Tyler immobilized, Lance turned to Morgan. “Are you all right?”

She rubbed the base of her neck and swallowed. “Yes.”

“You sure handled him.” Lance massaged the achy spot on his thigh where a bullet had ended his police career the year before. The wound had healed as well as it was going to, but his sudden sprint had pulled at the scar tissue.

Morgan climbed to her feet and brushed off her knees.

Five minutes later, a sheriff’s department cruiser arrived, and a deputy got out. Scarlet Falls was a small town. Its modest police force frequently relied on the county sheriff or state police for backup.

She showed the deputy the legal paperwork and summarized the incident.

The deputy handcuffed Tyler and hauled him to his feet. Blood smeared his face and soaked the front of his white T-shirt. The deputy loaded Tyler into the back of the cruiser and took brief statements from Lance and Morgan.

“I’ll need you to sign formal statements.” He nodded at Morgan. “I’ll want pictures of those bruises too, but first I need to take him to the ER.”

The deputy drove off.

Lance was quiet as they went back to the Jeep, but the residue of anger and worry rolled through his body as he steered her to the vehicle and opened the passenger door.

Turning to face him, she placed a palm in the center of his chest. “I’m all right, Lance.”