Rules In Deceit. Nichole Severn
NSA had thrown at her in those interrogations after he vanished.
Braxton Levitt had an entire arsenal of body language, stories and personalities to force his marks into believing he was who he claimed. That was all she was to him. All she had been to him. A mark. “Everything I knew about you turned out to be a lie.”
He straightened but kept her caged against the door. “I never lied to you.”
“Really? Up until four months ago, I thought we knew everything about each other. You recruited me for the NSA to build Oversight, became the only person I could trust, then took me to your bed, and that same night, you disappeared.” The last word hissed from her mouth. She lowered her voice in case the doors weren’t soundproofed. “Now you’re here, asking me to trust you with my life?” Elizabeth stepped into him, his clean scent surrounding her. It took everything she had—every last reserve of energy—to keep her control in place. “I don’t know a damn thing about you, Braxton. I don’t think I ever did. Now, let me go before I find a reason to reach for my gun.”
His expression fell as he stepped back, taking his body heat with him. “I would never hurt you.”
Her heart jolted in her chest from the sincerity in his voice. She studied him with a new mind-set. No emotion. No ties back to the past. Not as a spurned one-night stand but as an operative of Blackhawk Security. The creases around his mouth and the hollow circles under his eyes revealed the exhaustion he’d been dealing with since his disappearance. Worry lines, perhaps? A man on the run certainly became paranoid once stepping back into the spotlight. Every federal organization in the country had searched high and low for him since his disappearance. How had he managed to stay under the radar all this time? Whom had he relied on for help?
Not her. She locked her back teeth together. Didn’t matter. This was the last time they’d be in the same room together. He’d slide back under the radar, and she’d go back to doing what she did best: protecting herself—and their baby. She wasn’t heartless. She’d just taught herself how to use her heart less. Elizabeth’s short black hair slid out from behind her ears as she wrenched the door open. “You already have.”
A deep rumble reached her ears, claiming her attention a split second before Braxton shoved her into the hallway, and an eight-foot solid oak door rocketed into her.
BRAXTON LEVITT SLAMMED face-first into the nearest wall. Heat tunneled through his clothing as glass rained down around him. Emergency lighting cast the entire floor into shades of red as alarms kept rhythm with his pulse. He shifted his weight into his hands, flexing his jaw against the pain spreading through his ribs. Something wet slid down his cheek. He swiped at it as a gust of cold Alaskan air and rain rushed through what used to be an entire wall of windows. Blood.
“Liz!” Squinting through the rising smoke, he shoved to his feet. He blinked as a wave of dizziness tipped him into a fern still standing beside the one unhinged door. Yells punctured through the ringing in his ears. The sprinkler system fought to drench the sporadic fires clinging to the walls and the remains of the conference table. He stumbled through what was left of the massive door frame. “You better be alive.”
Pain seared through his rib cage. His temples throbbed in rhythm to the alarms. She had to be alive. If he lost her again… No. He couldn’t go there. Couldn’t think like that. A dull ringing filled his ears. Then a moan. Her moan. Braxton’s insides burned with an energy he’d learned to contain. A pair of familiar black boots registered in his peripheral vision. “Liz.”
Air stalled in his lungs. Not because he’d nearly died in the timed explosion but because for thirty horrible, mind-numbing seconds, he’d lost her all over again. The hollowness of four months and ten days’ separation from her vanished as he hauled an oak door and a few other pieces of debris off her with a guttural groan.
Brushing her hair out of her face, he lifted her into him, and the rest of the world fell away. Lean muscle flexed beneath her black leggings and leather jacket as her hand moved to her lower abdomen. Flames crackled around them, sirens already echoing off the surrounding buildings in the street below, but he didn’t give a damn. His body’s response to Liz had always been off the charts. She’d been the only woman who could make him lose control. Still was. Black smudges highlighted the sharp edges of her cheekbones and jawline. The steady thump at the base of her throat relieved the pressure in his chest, but that relief didn’t last long. The bastard who’d hijacked Oversight had set a bomb—for Liz. He was sure of it. That rumbling sound right before the explosion? Had to have been a cell phone on vibrate. A detonator. He should’ve known the SOB hunting her would’ve tried to get to her at work. The more casualties, the better chance he had of getting away with murder. More time, more evidence to sift through. Braxton fought the rage spreading rampant beneath his sternum. “Come on, baby, open your eyes. Can you hear me?”
“For once in your life, call me by my actual name.” A cough ripped up her throat. She jerked in his arms. Once. Twice. Brown eyes, as dark as chocolate, focused on him. “You do remember what it is, don’t you?”
A smile fought for release. He’d missed her fire. Her attitude. Missed her. They’d been a great team back in Fort Meade. Saving the country one line of code at a time. Back before he’d destroyed everything between them to keep her safe. The smile disappeared. None of that mattered now. Keeping her alive—that was all that mattered.
“We’ve got to go.” They had to get out of here before whoever had set that bomb realized he hadn’t killed his target. Her lavender-scented shampoo invigorated his senses as she wrapped both arms around him, raising goose bumps on the back of his neck. It’d been a long time since he’d breathed her in. He tightened his hold around her waist. Get her to safety. Find the man using her own program to kill her. Maybe convince her he wasn’t the man she believed.
“Liz!” Blackhawk Security’s founder and CEO, Sullivan Bishop, shielded his face from the flames as he ran toward them. Braxton had done his homework. He knew the former SEAL had a woman of his own—a JAG Corps prosecutor—but the use of one of his nicknames for her still grated on Braxton’s nerves. Liz didn’t let anyone give her a nickname. The two had obviously gotten close since she’d relocated to Anchorage, and his gut tightened in response. One of the other operatives followed close on Sullivan’s heels. Blackhawk’s disgraced NYPD officer, Vincent Kalani, studied the scene, ready for battle. “You all right?”
“I’m fine.” Liz wrenched out of Braxton’s grasp, struggling to her feet on her own, all contact between them severed. She brushed debris from her clothing and huffed a piece of hair out of her face. From the outside, it was such an innocent movement, but Braxton understood her tells. He always had. Despite her hard exterior, she’d been rattled. And with good reason. Someone had tried to kill her. But she refused to allow anyone to see vulnerability, especially those she worked with. “But I think it’s safe to say our conference room is not. Was anybody hurt in the explosion?”
“No fatalities. From what we can tell, most suffered only minor burns and scrapes from the blast.” The forensics expert—Vincent—checked a gash on his forearm, swiping the blood away against his long-sleeve shirt. The muscled, tattooed Hawaiian ran a hand through his shoulder-length brown hair. “Was anyone else in the conference room with you?”
Liz shook her head. “No. Just the two of us.”
“Good. As much as I’d like to scour through debris for evidence of who attacked us, let’s get to the street. Then you tell me who the hell detonated a bomb in my building.” Sullivan turned down the long hallway leading past several now-empty offices, a med clinic and the elevators and stairwell.
“Whoever it was targeted Liz,” Braxton said.
Liz rounded into his vision. “There’s no evidence proving that bomb was meant for me.”
Sullivan twisted around, lips thin, hands ready to tear into the person responsible. “You used to work for the NSA, right? Sold classified intel and disappeared?” The CEO