Chapter 39

CHAPTER 39

" M arkus! I know it's you!" Zoe screamed, stopping Connor in his tracks at the creek bank.

What the hell was she doing?

"Why didn't you just die?" The bastard asked her.

Connor got it. She was distracting Markus-Quintus. Getting him to stop his retreat and buying time for him to circle in behind. Switching paths, he started back in the direction her voice had come. The woman was trusting him to get the drop on the other guy and he wasn't going to disappoint her.

A gunshot rang out.

Her life depended on it.

Trying not to panic and careful not to step on any branches that would crack and warn the man he was coming, he worked his way closer to where they were talking.

Another gunshot sounded and something hit something solid.

Connor moved some low hanging evergreen boughs and stopped. In front of him, Zoe lay slightly behind a pile of rocks and branches. Between them the bastard who just tried to blow up the president had a gun pointed at her and was closing the distance.

He couldn't get there in time to stop him.

But a bullet could.

Taking the Glock out of his cargo pants pocket, he steadied his arm and fired.

The man's body jerked, his arm flying upwards just as he shot. Then he slammed down like a felled tree, hitting the ground. Dirt, leaves and dead branches flying in the air.

"Connor!" Zoe yelled his name.

Holding onto the gun, he moved as fast as he could through the bush, until he was kneeling at her side, holding her tight. Then he was kissing her, until something warm soaked through his shirt sleeve.

Breaking off the kiss, he leaned back to look at her left arm. There was a bullet hole in her jacket, two actually, since it was another through and through.

"Dammit, Zoe, you've been shot. Again." Dropping the gun beside him, he pulled up the edge of his t-shirt and ripped a strip of it and wrapped it tightly around the wound.

"I need your gun," she said staring at the body on the ground.

"He's dead," he said splitting the end of the material into two strips and tying off the make-shift bandage.

"Connor," she said, staring up at him with those deep blue eyes and holding out her right hand. "Give me your weapon."

Beautiful. But stubborn.

He heaved a sigh and handed it over.

Taking it, she wiggled into a half-sitting, half-kneeling position. Instead of aiming at Markus' corpse, she fired into a tree trunk beyond him.

"What are you doing?" he asked, confused.

She laid the gun on her knee and reached up to stroke his face. "I lost my weapon and never fired it. I needed gunshot residue on me."

"Why?"

"Because our story, yours and mine, is that I shot Markus. You never had a weapon."

He stared at her. "Why would you do that?"

"Because you are not going back to prison for saving my life."

"They'll figure out I did once they do a residue test."

A slow smile split her lips. "Then you'd best go do a dunk in the creek before anyone finds us."

He slid his hand behind her head and pulled her in for a deep, hard kiss.

"Zoe!" Luke called as the sound of crunching branches sounded behind them.

She broke off the kiss and pushed on his chest. "Go, before they get here."

He didn't argue, but turned and hustled back the direction he came. The woman was protecting him. Not since his grandparents had anyone tried to protect him. He wasn't going to waste her efforts.

Reaching the creek, he walked straight in, sat in the water, and made sure all his clothes and especially his arms were soaked, then for good measure, he dunked his head in then scrubbed his hands and face. Then he squeezed out as much water as he could from his hair and shirt as he climbed out of the creek and headed back to Zoe.

When he neared the spot where he'd left Zoe, she was seated on the pile of rocks, an FBI agent squatting by Marukus-Quintus' body and Luke digging around in the underbrush.

Before he could ask what the hell Zoe's cousin was doing, Luke stood with a gun in his hand.

"Found it," he said, taking the edge of his shirt to rub the entire gun from barrel to grip. Then he turned to Connor with a grin. "Have a nice swim?"

He shrugged then nodded at the weapon. "What's up with that?"

"Looks like our perpetrator had two guns on him," Luke said without blinking an eye. "Good thing Zoe's a great shot and took him out, isn't it?"

Connor nodded. Apparently, Zoe wasn't the only one planning to keep him out of prison.

"How're Katie and Matt?" Zoe asked, drawing Luke's attention. "Did they both get out? Why did the explosion go off?"

"They couldn't disconnect that last charge before your guy detonated it. Except for some cuts, bruises and possible concussions, they're all good," Castello said, joining the party with Ben right behind him. "You guys?"

"Zoe took a bullet to the arm and Connor took a bath," Luke said with a grin. "Got a bag for this?"

The FBI guy stood holding two bags, one with the gun Markus-Quietus had used. The other held the gun used to kill him. He pulled another clear plastic bag out of his pocket for Luke to drop the third weapon inside. "I'll stay with the body until the forensics team gets here."

Walking over to Zoe, Connor squatted down and checked the bandage on her arm. It was only half soaked. "Looks like the bleeding stopped."

"Still hurts," she said with a little narrow-eyed glance at him.

He fought the urge to grin at her little show of temper. "You really need to learn how to get out of the way of flying bullets."

"Yeah, I'll work on that. Help me up," she said, holding out her hand.

"Want me to carry you?" he asked, as she pulled herself up. He expected her to go all independent woman on him and refuse. Instead, she nodded and wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Please. My foot hurts."

Scooping her up in his arms, he held her there a few moments until she raised her eyes to meet his. "I'll carry you anytime you need me, too, beautiful," he whispered, then claimed her lips in a soft, tender kiss.

"You know we can all still hear you guys on our comms," Luke said, slapping Connor on the back, then stomping past them to get out of the brush. "The EMS people are waiting to check your wounds and Jake's acting like he's paying them by the hour."

Zoe broke the kiss with a little laugh. "He's become such a tightwad now he has to do budgets."

Connor carried her out of the woods, listening to the cousins and their friends banter back and forth like they'd just played a game of baseball and not saved the leader of the free world and the entire energy system. It hit him as they neared the make-shift trauma unit where people were being checked for any injuries from the gun battle and explosion that when he went back to his mountain, for the first time he was actually going to miss people. Well, just the Edgars clan.