DONOVAN (Gray Wolf Security, #1)(3)

He knew in his gut that she was still alive.

He was going to find her. He didn’t know how or when, but he was going to find her.

“Ash, phone,” Rose called.

He sighed, closed the file, and placed it carefully back in the drawer of his desk.

Time to get to work.





Chapter 2


Donovan

“It’s your lucky day,” Ash said when he came to my desk and told me he had a case for me. However, he wouldn’t say a damn thing about it on the long ride from the office to the UCLA Medical Center.

“Are you going to tell me what this is about?” I finally asked, as we boarded an elevator.

“A new case.”

“I got that. What’s the case?”

Ash handed me a piece of paper that was a computer printout of a news story that was on the Daily News website that morning. I’d glanced at it but didn’t really read it.

Bank Security Guard Gunned Down, the headline read.

“This isn’t really our thing, is it? I mean, there wasn’t some executive involved was there?”

“No. But there was a witness, and her father has hired us to stay with her until the police get everything figured out.”

“A witness?”

“A young loan officer who works at the bank. Apparently, she was on her way out when the attack occurred.”

That caught my interest. I actually knew—or once knew—a woman who currently worked at a bank downtown. I’d caught sight of her a few times…Kate Thompson. We had history that was complicated. But again, life is often complicated, especially when you leave your hometown for eight years in the military and then come home again with no intention of rekindling old friendships. Needless to say, I kept to myself when I wasn’t on the job.

I scanned the article, but it didn’t say anything about a witness. Just that the security guard appeared to have been blindsided while doing a walk around, shot in the chest during a possible attempt to get inside the bank. However, a passerby reported the shots and police arrived within minutes. No one, as far as they could tell, made it inside the bank.

“This seems pretty open and shut for the cops,” I said, as the elevator doors opened and Ash strode into the hallway.

“Then it should be an easy one for you. Just a couple of days.”

That sounded good. I had a trip planned to Vegas. Nothing fancy. A hotel room, some cash for the blackjack tables. Maybe drag Kirkland along, see if standing next to the Louisiana charmer might rub off on me a little. It’d been a while. Not a lot of time to date when I was following around wealthy execs who’d pissed off the wrong employee or the wrong ex one too many times.

“You said that the father requested me specifically?”

Ash nodded, not even pausing as he moved quickly down the long maze of corridors. “Didn’t say why.”

“What’s the name?”

“Thompson. Daniel Thompson.”

I stopped dead in my tracks, feeling like I’d walked into an ambush. It took Ash a second to realize I wasn’t with him anymore. He turned around, impatience on his face.

“What is it, soldier?”

I shook my head, not at his term of address, but at my disbelief that this was actually happening.

“Are you sure about the name?”

“Of course.”

I shook my head again, all these memories flying through my head. Ash grabbed my arm, shook me a little.

“What is it?” he asked again, his tone a little kinder this time.

“Joshua.”

Understanding washed over Ash’s face. He knew me. We’d spent far too many nights in the desert together to not know everything there was to know about each other. So he knew why this was not an ideal situation for me.

“Can you put Joss on it?” I asked, hating that I could even consider backing out of an assignment. But this was the only assignment that I knew I simply could not do.

“No,” Ash said, glancing over his shoulder as if he was afraid someone would catch us loitering here, in this public corridor. “Joss is on a plane headed to Washington with her target.” He chewed his bottom lip for a second. “I could call Kirkland. Put him on this.”

“No. She’d tear him to shreds.”

Ash’s eyebrows rose because we both knew what a charmer he was with women. But he had no idea what Kate Thompson was like. I did.

“It has to be Joss.”

“There’s not enough time to bring her back. The target gets released from the hospital in an hour.”

Ash pushed me back a little, out of the center of the corridor, laying both hands heavily on my shoulders. “If you tell me you honestly cannot take this case, I will handle it myself.”

And I knew he would. Ash would do whatever it took to protect his people. It was that military mentality, that inability to leave a single man behind. A part of me was willing to let him do it, but the idea of going back to the office—like a child afraid of the dark—didn’t sit well with me.

“No, sir. I can do it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

Ash studied my face a moment longer, then he slapped my shoulder and nodded. “Okay, then. Let’s do this.”

He pushed past me and led the way down the corridor again. I hesitated only a second before I rushed to catch up.