Off the Grid Christmas Read online

  She was Jace’s sister through and through. If the black hair and blue eyes weren’t a dead giveaway, the stubborn set of her jaw certainly was.

  “Let’s take the FBI out of the picture for a minute. What are you running from?” he asked, his right hand still holding the shed door closed. His arm just above her shoulder blocked escape from her left.

  “Trouble,” she replied, glancing to her right as if calculating the likelihood of dodging out of his reach.

  “Better to face it with a support system than alone.”

  “I can’t involve anyone else. It’s too dangerous.”

  “You can explain that to your brother when you see him.”

  “Returning to Maryland isn’t an option.”

  Kane shook his head. “From where I stand, it’s the only option.”

  “Well, if you’d just back up about a foot and take a few steps to your left, my preferred option will become a little clearer to you.”

  He could have laughed if he’d let himself. Jace had said his sister was brilliant. He hadn’t mentioned her sense of humor.

  “Sorry. That’s not going to happen. I promised Jace that I’d find you and bring you home.”

  “You should never make a promise you can’t keep.” Her back against the door, she slowly edged her way toward the right corner of the shed.

  He grabbed her left arm just below the elbow, and stopped her in her tracks. “We’re wasting time,” he said. “I found you—it’s safe to assume someone else will, too. If you don’t want to tell me why you’re running, maybe you can tell me who you’re running from.”

  “I’m running from so many people, it would almost be easier to tell you who isn’t after me.” She tucked a few strands of hair under her hat, her gaze shifting from him to a point beyond his shoulder.

  “Go ahead.”

  “And leave? I was thinking about it, but it’s hard to do with you holding onto my arm.”

  “Go ahead and list the people who aren’t after you.”

  She sighed, tried to yank her wrist away. “Look, I know you’re trying to do what Jace wants, but I can handle this alone. I won’t drag him, Grayson or even you into this.”

  “We’re already in it,” he pointed out, and she frowned.

  “You don’t have to be. You can walk away and let me go back to what I was doing.”

  He was tempted to do just that.

  He didn’t have time for games. After twelve years of active duty, he’d left the army in August and spent the last three months getting his and Jace’s fledgling business off the ground.

  Shadow Wolves Security, named after their Army unit, was finally up and running. It had taken a lot of work. With Jace’s tour not up for another four months, the bulk of it had fallen on Kane. He’d spent countless unpaid hours making certain things were ready. He’d even managed to land their first contracts, set to start in less than a month.

  With that under his belt, he’d planned to leave the business in the hands of his other business partner and Chief Operations Officer, Silas Blackwater, and take a long, relaxing weekend. Jace’s phone call had changed his plans. When he’d asked Kane to help Grayson locate their sister, Kane couldn’t refuse.

  Yeah. He might be tempted to walk away and let Arden deal with her problem alone, but he wouldn’t do it. He owed Jace a lot. More than he could ever repay.

  “Let’s go.” He still had his hand around her wrist, and he started walking, dragging her along beside him, not caring that she was yanking against his hold.

  “You don’t understand the ramifications of me going back,” she muttered, digging in her heels and putting all her weight into trying to stop their forward momentum. There wasn’t a whole lot of weight to her, so it barely slowed Kane down.

  “Explain it to me then.”

  “The people who are after me are dangerous and they’ve got deep pockets. They’ll stop at nothing to get what they want. They don’t care who they hurt in the process.”

  “Grayson can work with the FBI to clear your name and protect you.”

  “I trust Grayson, but I can’t ask him to put his career on the line and take my side against the FBI. Besides, there’s no way to be sure they don’t have someone in the FBI on their payroll.”

  “Who, exactly, are these people, and what do they want from you?”

  “That information is need-to-know.” She tucked another loose strand of hair beneath her hat. A nervous tic? he wondered.

  “I need to know.”

  “You are an intermediary. You only need to know that I’m not returning home. Not yet. Tell my brothers—”

  A loud chirp interrupted her words. Two more followed in rapid succession.

  He didn’t ask what it was.

  He knew.

  She’d set up a perimeter alarm and it was going off.

  “What quadrant?” he asked as she pulled a cell phone from her coat pocket.

  “West. Looks like the same way you arrived. You’d better go—”

  The phone chirped again.

  “Sounds like they have an army coming for you.” He sprinted back to the shed, pulling her along with him. She’d been trying to get inside since he’d arrived.

  Now, she seemed determined not to enter.

  She tried to twist away, but his fingers easily locked around her slender wrist. He dragged her into the shed, easing the door closed and sealing them inside. It smelled like sawdust and gas fumes.

  “You have a vehicle in here?” he asked, keeping his grip on her wrist tight. He didn’t want to hurt her, but he wasn’t going to let her leave. Not on her own.

  “That would be a likely scenario, since I’ve been trying to get in here since you arrived,” she grumbled, jerking away and moving toward the center of the shed.

  “How about you show it to me so we can get moving?” he demanded, his gaze shifting to a lone window that looked out over the beach. It was too dark to see much, but a light bounced along the shore. He doubted it was a beachcomber looking for treasures.

  “It’s under the tarp,” she responded, motioning to the center of the room.

  “Then let’s go.” He crowded in beside her, blocking her path to the door. She had her reasons for continuing to run. He had his reasons for bringing her home. They could hash all that out, come up with a plan that would work for both of them. Later.

  After they escaped whomever it was she was running from.

  TWO

  Someone had breached her security perimeter.

  Someone else was on the beach.

  Through the shed window, Arden could see the light moving along the shore—a small dot of white in the blackness. She doubted it was just one person. And she doubted it was the FBI.

  Grayson probably told Kane to monitor the PetID database for a potential hit on Sebastian’s microchip, but there’s no way her brother would have shared that information with the FBI.

  Arden’s ex-boyfriend Randy Sumner was another story.

  He knew about Sebastian, and he’d have no qualms about tipping off GeoArray Corporation. He was in this deep and had just as much to lose if the company went down. And he, more than anyone, knew Arden could bring them all down.

  She hadn’t been exaggerating about GeoArray’s power, resources and reach. The corporation was an army of sorts, and it would send its best soldiers to bring her in.

  Soldiers? Thugs was probably a more accurate descriptor, and unless Arden missed her guess, they were trying to hem her in.

  But she’d be gone before whoever was on the beach managed to make it up the bluff. Kane would be with her. She wasn’t happy about it. It would be easier to leave him behind, but he had no idea what Arden was up against; what he was now up against.

  Arden knew. They’d
killed before. They wouldn’t hesitate to kill again. No, she couldn’t, in good conscience, leave Kane to face off against them.

  Sure, he was former Special Forces and looked like he could take care of himself. She’d seen him sparring with her brothers at the gym while he and Jace were on home leave one summer. She knew he was quick, sharp-minded and lethal, but GeoArray had money and power behind it. So did its CEO, Marcus Emory. They wouldn’t fight fair and could afford to hire the best fighters and trackers to hunt down what they wanted.

  At this moment, what they wanted was Arden.

  They were desperate to get their hands on her and the files she’d taken from their networks.

  She’d given them a golden opportunity, thanks to her love for Christmas and Sebastian. Now, she had to get out of their reach, and she needed to get Kane out, too.

  She dragged the canvas tarp off the motorbike her landlord had left in the shed. A 1952 Vincent Black Shadow. Admittedly, the bike had seen better days. But Arden appreciated the handcraftsmanship of the vehicle and the fact that, in its heyday, the model broke speed records. Very few had been made.

  Arden suspected the property owner had no idea of the value the bike would bring if restored. If he did, he might not be so quick to leave it in an unlocked shed for his renters to use.

  “A motorcycle?” Kane pressed close to her back, in her space again. Usually, she despised having people that close. Currently, she didn’t have time to worry about it or to tell him to back off.

  “Does it look like something else?”

  “It looks old.”

  “It is.”

  “Does it work?”

  “Yep. It came with the rental—it’s a way residents can get up and down the access path to the parking area more quickly.”

  “I’m afraid to ask how loud it’s going to be when you start it up.” He glanced toward the window. “There’s someone out on the beach. I can’t tell if he’s alone.”

  “It’s too far down with no easy way up. Anyone on the beach shouldn’t pose much of a threat. The bigger threat is whoever’s coming up the access path. The shed’s in clear view of it. Once we’re in the open, we’d be easily picked off by anyone with a high-powered rifle.”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  She turned her attention back to her phone, scrolled through the live video feed from her security system. “They’ve got no clue I know they’re coming. Logic says they’ll head for the house. As soon as it’s breached, we can start her up and head for the trail at the back of the property. We’ll be out of the line of fire before they can make it to the back door.”

  He glanced at the phone in her hand. “You’ve set up an elaborate monitoring system.”

  “Wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes, but I’m in the security business.”

  “I am, too. It’s just a different kind of security.”

  Kane cracked open the shed door, his broad back blocking her view.

  “See anything?” she asked. She’d have edged in closer, stuck her head under his arm to get a look, but Sebastian was getting restless. His fuzzy ears poked through the top flap of the carrier and bumped against her collarbone as he tried to figure out what was going on.

  “Just a lot of darkness, but I don’t like the way it feels.”

  “Darkness has a feeling?”

  “Danger does.” He grabbed the bike’s handlebars, tugged the motorcycle forward and out of her grasp. “We need to move.”

  She could have argued, but she’d heard her brothers talk about going with their guts so many times, she didn’t think it would be prudent to ignore Kane’s instincts.

  “The trail’s kind of hidden. It’s just behind the shed and winds toward the bigger path you walked in on.” She leaned past, poked her head out the door and pointed at what looked like driftwood and scrappy bushes covered with a fresh layer of ice-crested snow. She wasn’t sure if the owner of the property had meant to provide a quick escape, but she’d known as soon as she’d seen the narrow trail that she’d have one if she needed it.

  She hadn’t expected to need it.

  Maybe that was part of her problem. She trusted in her intelligence a little too much. She relied on herself more than she relied on anyone else. She’d been one of the guys for as long as she could remember—the ultra-capable younger sister of four ultra-capable men. She’d never been in a situation she couldn’t handle on her own, and she hadn’t expected to find herself in one. She’d expected to go off the grid, get the proof she needed to take GeoArray down and go right back to her life. That wasn’t how things were turning out.

  She found that more irritating than alarming.

  “You’ve ridden a motorcycle before, right?” she whispered, pocketing her phone as Kane pushed the vehicle outside, putting the shed between them and the access path to the cottage. The wind stole her words, but he must have heard.

  “Not one this old,” he responded.

  “The age of the vehicle is irrelevant,” she said, ignoring his sarcasm. She loved old vehicles and had restored several of them with her dad while helping out in his shop during the summers. She’d ridden this one enough to know it was in good working order. It was also fast. That was going to be an asset.

  “Its working condition is not irrelevant.”

  “It works.” They’d reached the brush, and she skirted past him. Not an easy feat considering his size, but there was no way she was letting him drive them out. She knew the trail. She knew the bike. She’d be the driver.

  She brushed his hands from the handlebars and climbed on, balancing the bike as she scanned the dark path and the beach below. The light was still there. Farther away and moving at a steady pace, parallel to the shore. Whoever it was wouldn’t find a way up from there, but night vision goggles and a long-range rifle could make a long-distance kill easy.

  GeoArray wanted her alive. For now. That was one thing she had in her favor.

  Kane, on the other hand, was simply in the way.

  Her phone chirped, the sound chilling her blood.

  “They’re in,” she muttered.

  Kane climbed on the bike, wrapping his left arm low around her waist. “Just be careful,” he warned. “The temperature’s dropped and the snow’s crusted over with ice. If we wreck, it’s over.”

  “Warning duly noted.” Arden zipped her jacket up to her chin, completely covering Sebastian. She didn’t need Kane to tell her to be cautious. Wrecking the bike and getting herself caught was not on her agenda. Seeing her brother’s business partner—one of his closest friends—killed wasn’t, either.

  She was sorry Kane had been dragged into this, but she wasn’t surprised her brothers called for reinforcements. Grayson and Jace were cut from the same cloth, both willing to do anything to help those they cared about. It would be hypocritical to fault them for that. After all, that’s how she ended up in this mess in the first place. Of course, Juniper Westin wasn’t just anyone. She was Arden’s best friend, the sister Arden had never had.

  They’d met halfway through first grade. Juniper had walked into the classroom, and Arden had known they were kindred spirits—two oddball mavericks sitting in a room filled with average Joes.

  The whispering had started right away, and Arden had felt the overwhelming need to stand up for the new girl the way she’d always had to stand up for herself. It wasn’t Juniper’s glasses or curly black hair that had all the kids talking; it wasn’t her light brown skin—even though there hadn’t been many kids of color in their elementary school.

  No, it was the dark purple bruise on her cheek that accompanied the healing split on her lip. And the too-big sweater she’d had on with well-worn jeans that were almost too short. Jeans that had bright red patches with pink hearts carefully sewn on the knees. During recess, Robby Dixon had laughed at her f
or those hearts, and Arden had done the only thing she thought she could. She’d punched him right in the middle of his smug face. She’d earned herself a three-day suspension, the respect of every kid in the school and a life-long friend.

  Since then, she and Juniper had been through good times and bad times together. There was nothing Arden wouldn’t do for her friend—including hacking into GeoArray’s secured network—which, unfortunately, had led to this.

  Kane leaned in, his breath tickling her ear. “I just saw a light go on in the house. If we’re getting out of here, now’s the time to do it.”

  “Right.” She cranked the engine, the sudden roar drowning out the sound of the surf. No doubt everyone within a mile radius had heard. She gunned the motor, and the bike charged forward, speeding through the narrow space between old shrubs, bits of leaves and branches breaking off as she raced along the trail.

  To Kane’s credit, he had no problem holding on and keeping his balance. He didn’t shout instructions or tell her to watch out for the rocks and debris that littered the narrow trail.

  And he’d been right about the ice. It coated everything. The bike’s nearly threadbare tires barely held on as she sped around a curve.

  She thought she heard shouting, but she couldn’t be certain. The engine was too loud, the wind too wild. They’d be at the parking area soon. It was a small lot used by a few seasonal residents whose cliff-side cottages weren’t easily accessible by car. It was mostly unused this time of year. Her Jeep was there. Kane’s vehicle must be, too. She wasn’t sure they’d be able to get to either of them. GeoArray’s thugs probably had the area staked out.

  “Pull off here,” Kane shouted.

  She almost ignored him.

  She wanted off the trail and on the open road. The more distance they put between themselves and their pursuers, the better. Then again, if guys with guns were waiting in the parking lot below, she’d have to drive straight into their trap before she could get out on the road.

  She coasted to a stop and cut the engine, her pulse racing.

  “Is there another way out?” Kane asked, his voice tight.