Smokescreen. Jodie Bailey

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       FOUR

      There wasn’t one moment of hesitation. Ashley was up the hallway before Ethan could tell her to move, and he was close behind. The possibility it could simply be the police or her landlord didn’t matter. The risks were too great.

      Once he stepped into the room behind her, he slipped the door shut and clicked the lock. If it was their friend from the airport, the hollow door would buy them a few seconds, but those ticks of the clock might mean all the difference.

      Light flooded under the door as someone flipped a switch in the front of the apartment. “See? Nobody’s in here.”

      “I heard voices.”

      The French doors on the other side of the bedroom whispered open, silhouetting Ashley against the dim glow from outside. She waved him forward. “Drop’s a few feet if you can hang on to the rail and let your feet dangle.” Throwing a leg over the side, she gifted him a grim smile. “Pray my downstairs neighbors aren’t looking out the window. And be careful.”

      She was scared to death if she was this calm. Her emotional defenses drove her to a place where she felt nothing just to avoid the fear. He’d seen it on the battlefield, even experienced it himself. Ethan wished there was time to make sure she landed safely, but the lock jiggled behind him and a shout followed.

      Shoving his gun into its holster, he climbed the rail, ran his hands down to the bottom of the wood railing and let his feet dangle in space. The sound of splintering door covered his crouched landing in the bushes below.

      Their visitor was definitely not the landlord.

      He was safely around the corner before voices rained down from above. “Nobody’s here.”

      “So who locked the door?”

      “Maybe you did when we left? No way they jumped without breaking something.” The voice strained as though the man leaned over the railing to prove his theory.

      Ethan fought his muscles aching for a quick peek around the corner to see if one of the men was the assailant from the airport or if he and Ashley faced bigger worries.

      She tugged at his arm. “Come on. Before they figure out we moved furniture and start looking for us.”

      Tucking her behind him, a move he was sure to hear about later, Ethan reached for his gun but stopped. The way Ashley had reacted earlier, there was no telling what her response would be, and they needed all of her focus to get out of here alive. At this point, her emotional lockdown was their salvation.

      She pressed close to him as he edged along the brick toward the front of the building, so close her warmth telegraphed through the thin fleece of his jacket. The sooner they were safely in his truck and she was a couple of feet away, the better.

      At the corner he stopped and surveyed the grass-ringed parking lot. Not for the first time he hated the even spacing of streetlights that left few shadows in which to hide.

      Ashley’s words tickled his ear. “What now?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “There’s a small ditch along the back of the parking lot.” Her arm snaked in front of him, indicating a spot at their two o’clock. “If we can make it without being spotted, we can get low enough to avoid detection and get to your truck.”

      The pride he’d battled all of his life fought to take charge, to seize the moment and come up with the foolproof idea that would save the day. But he couldn’t. The route she’d laid out was the only way to safety.

      She shuddered against his back, snapping him out of his self-recrimination. They needed to move before the situation dug in and she dissolved into panic. As much as he wanted her to be well, to be his old Ashley, the little time they’d spent together СКАЧАТЬ