A Time To Protect. Lois Richer
be avenged.
The car engine roared, the town disappeared, for now. But not for long. Justice must be done, retribution paid. They thought they were so smart, self-righteous and smug. They thought they were immune, just as he thought it. Little did any of them know they were merely cogs in a wheel of reprisal that would crush them.
Only then would Alistair be avenged.
Maybe, then, this horrible aching pain would subside.
Chapter One
Chole Tanner checked the mayor’s vital signs once more, noted them on the chart, then walked out of the room to collect a new IV drip bag from her cart in the hall, intending to exchange it for the nearly empty one. A hand reached around her, fingers clamped over her wrist.
“You’re not a nurse. What are you doing?”
A man appeared in front of her and he was not the middle-aged guard named Sid who’d been seated by the door of the mayor’s room. This man was tall, at least six feet, with the kind of hair she privately labeled “beach boy”—mussed, light brown with golden streaks that reflected the light and made him look as if he’d just left his surfboard and the sand behind.
Mostly it was his green eyes that fascinated her, frozen bits of emerald that echoed the frost in his voice. “I asked you a question.”
A reporter trying to get a story? She glared at him.
“This is an intensive care unit, sir. You are not authorized to be here. I’ll have to ask you to leave.” She stood her ground, her fingers still gripping the bag of fluid, his hand still clasping her wrist. “Now.”
“I’m not going anywhere and you’ll have a tough time throwing me out, honey.” He grinned, a slow easy smirk that annoyed her intensely.
“You think so?” Chloe assessed him. Look for the weak spot. In two seconds she’d brought down her other hand in a crack across his wrist and broken his grip. A quick twist of her foot against his knee and he was on the floor.
“Now, if you don’t mind,” she said quietly, staring at him spread-eagled on the hard white tile, “I have a job to do and the mayor needs new fluids. So please leave or I’ll have you removed.”
She thought he’d be embarrassed. Most men would be. But this one rose to his feet lithely, his eyes sparkling with excitement.
“Hey, you’re good!” He dusted off his pants with a chuckle. “But that doesn’t explain what you’re doing here. Who are you, anyway?”
“Chloe Tanner, nurse.” She pointed to her name tag, but realized it wasn’t attached because she was wearing scrubs. “A patient was sick on me and I didn’t have time to do much more than pull these on.” She waited for him to leave. “Visitors are not allowed in Intensive Care. Not today.”
“I know.” He pulled out his badge, showed her his ID. “Brendan Montgomery. FBI. Can you tell me how the mayor is?”
“No, I can’t.” She hung on to his badge when he would have pulled it away and gave it a thorough scrutiny. Sid’s police presence in the ward had made her edgy. “Nice badge, I suppose. But it doesn’t say you have any authorization to be on this floor, Mr. Montgomery. We were specifically warned by the police not to allow anyone up here who isn’t on their list. I’ve memorized that list—you’re not there.”
“Anything wrong?” Sid had risen, laid one hand on his holster.
“Everything’s fine, Sid. You weren’t expecting anyone else, were you? FBI, maybe?” Chloe saw his negative response and handed back the badge. “I didn’t think so. You, sir, will have to leave. For information about the patient talk to the doctors or the front office. Now if you don’t mind?”
“Oh, but I do mind, Miss Tanner.” He stood in front of her—tall, muscular, disturbing. A tiny smile flicked up one corner of his lips. “I certainly do mind.” One hand stretched out, then retracted as if he were afraid she’d grab it again. “What color do you call your hair?”
“My hair?” Without thinking, she touched the top of her head, felt the ponytail still securely tied. “Auburn, but I can’t imagine why it matters. And it’s Mrs. Tanner.”
“Mrs.?” He frowned as if he’d come upon something smelly and distasteful. “Tanner. For some reason that sounds familiar. What does your husband do?”
“Not visit his family,” she muttered without thinking.
“Sorry?” That quizzical look covered his suntanned face again.
Chloe regrouped.
“I’m sorry, too, Mr. Montgomery. I’m divorced, so I no longer know nor care what my ex-husband does.” She couldn’t believe she’d told him that. To regain her composure she bent over and retrieved the IV bag. “Much as I’d like to continue this discussion, I have other patients to see to, and an IV to change.”
She turned her back on him, made the transfer and walked back out to the hall with the empty bag, slightly relieved that the mayor’s guard was there. If anything happened that she couldn’t handle, at least Sid had a gun.
Her nemesis waited outside the room, watching.
“Look, buddy, I don’t care if you’re the president, you’re not permitted to be here until someone tells me differently. You’ll have to leave. Now.”
“I’m not leaving. I’m checking into what happened to the mayor. It’s my job. You can call the administrator and you’ll find I have clearance to come and go as necessary, which means that it’s okay for me to be here.”
“You need to understand that looking after this unit is my job and I’m not going to let anyone who’s not supposed to be here on my ward. I’m calling security.” Chloe strode to the desk, called and asked about her stubborn visitor. A ripple of frustration washed over her. He was who he said he was. And he was allowed to be on her floor, guarding her patient. “Thanks,” she mumbled into the phone. She felt like a fool.
She was tired and grumpy because someone had called in sick and the ward was shorthanded again, but most of all she was embarrassed that she’d harassed him—and she’d knocked down an FBI agent! Why hadn’t he told her the truth to begin with?
Not that Chloe needed the answer to that. After all, she’d already dealt with a father who’d lied, a cheating husband to whom truth was whatever was convenient and now a supervisor who didn’t know reality from his own fiction. She could handle this guy with one hand tied behind her back.
“Everything check out? Did I make your list?” He loomed over the counter, his smile just itching to break free. The ice had melted and he was a gorgeous sight.
“You’ve been added.” Chloe sucked in a breath and ordered her blood pressure down. “You can stay. You can look around. But you cannot touch anything. Understand?” She ignored him, smiled at Sid and returned to the mayor’s bed once more before moving on to her next patient. When she’d completed her rounds, she returned to the desk. He was still there.
“How is Max doing?”
Chloe found herself repeating the official version.
“Mayor Vance is currently unresponsive. He has a bullet fragment lodged in his brain which the surgeons feel would be detrimental to remove at this time. The other gunshot passed completely through his body missing his heart by centimeters. At the moment, the mayor’s condition is listed as stable but critical. He has not regained consciousness since the incident.” She raised one eyebrow. “Anything else?”
“I guess not. If he hasn’t spoken then that’s no help.”
He frowned, making her think of a little boy who couldn’t grasp what he’d done wrong.
“Why so hostile, Mrs. Tanner?” he asked. “I’m just trying to do my job.”
“As