Mint saw the fight leaving her, the second her body slumped against the ground. He dived out the front seat of the SUV, while the engine was still running. His feet touched the ground, already sprinting toward her.
Beyond Emma and the man choking the life out of her was another guy, watching. His gun came up.
Before Mint could lift his own weapon and fire first, a shot rang out from behind him. A red dot blossomed on the man’s forehead and he hit the ground.
The man on Emma looked up. Didn’t let go of her.
Mint dived.
He tackled the man’s head and shoulders at full speed. They hit the ground, rolling end over end. He let go of his gun and grasped the man’s head. In one short, sharp move he snapped the man’s neck. Crack.
The man slumped. Mint planted one hand on the ground, finally acknowledging the pain in his chest where he’d been hit in the vest by a bullet. Then he pushed off and turned back to Emma. He scooted to her, his legs not quite moving as they should. He pushed aside the pain and stumbled to her side.
“Emma?” He touched the sides of her face. “Emma, talk to me.” Dark bruises had already formed on her neck. Had he crushed her wind pipe? “He’s gone. No one’s gonna hurt you.” Her chest moved, shallow breaths that jerked her torso. Like she was struggling. “Breathe, Em. Please.”
“Mint?” Steve and Bradley stopped close to him. He didn’t know which one spoke.
“She needs an ambulance.”
“It’s two minutes out.”
Those two minutes felt like an hour. He watched while they stuck a tube down her throat and got her breathing normally. When they loaded her into the ambulance, he turned back to his boss.
“Go. We have this.”
Mint nodded, and climbed in. Held her hand all the way to the hospital, where they were separated while she got checked out. Mint paced the waiting area. Twenty minutes later, the doors flew open and a familiar woman raced in, followed by a man moving at a more sedate pace.
Emma’s mother.
She ran right to him and demanded, “How is she?”
Mint couldn’t form any words.
The woman’s hair was styled perfectly, not a hair out of place. Designer clothes. When her daughter went on the run—a situation caused in large part because of the secrets she’d kept—this woman had gone on the internet, calling for her to come home. Not because of her innocence, or the fact she’d been in danger. Because she needed to turn herself in.
Emma’s mother had displayed more emotion in that two minute post than most people do in ten years. Now? Her eyes were completely dry.
The man behind her, dressed in a suit with his tie loosened and his top button undone, stepped forward. “Frank Burroughs.”
“Davis Malone.”
“Is Emma okay? They said there’d been some kind of attack.”
“She was choked.” Kidnapped. Chased. Shot. Lied to. Jerked around. Blackmailed. And how much of that had been after he’d entered the picture? Mint hadn’t done a good job of protecting her, despite his intentions.
He sank into a chair and ran his hands down his face, unable to face Emma’s parents. Unable to get the mental picture of her struggling to breathe out of his head.
“Well.” Emma’s mom huffed out the word. “I’ll go speak to a nurse. I need to see my daughter.”
A few seconds later Mint heard a rustle, and the seat beside him creaked. Not one near him. The one beside him.
He opened his eyes and looked over, the last few words of the prayer whispering from his lips. Emma’s father—her mother’s husband and the man she’d grown up calling “Dad”—was sitting beside him.
“Marines?”
“Army.”
The man nodded. “Navy.”
Mint glanced at the desk where Emma’s mother was in heated discussion with the nurse.
“She means well.”
He glanced at the man beside him.
“Likes things the way she likes them, sees the world the way she wants. Coping mechanism, her therapist said.” He sighed. “We do what we need to so the people around us are happy. Doesn’t always go perfectly, but we do our best.”
Mint looked at his hands in his lap. Squeezed his fingers together.
“Did everything you could to help her. Still wasn’t enough.” The man’s stare was a tactile thing. “Am I right?”
Mint nodded.
“I saw you at the memorial service. Got in my wife’s face, stood between her and Emma, trying to protect her. Saw the kind of man you were then, knew I didn’t have to step in. Someone telling my wife she needed to back down and think it through, instead of flying off the handle in a gut reaction?” He shook his head. “Not going to get in the way of that.”
Because he didn’t have the guts to do that himself? Mint wasn’t sure what to say or think about any of it.
Emma’s dad said, “She got hurt, but it wasn’t your fault. You know that, right?”
No. Mint didn’t know that.
“He came to me, first. Showed me pictures of my wife with that man.” He shifted in the chair. “Knew it. Didn’t want to believe it was true. Coping mechanism. Purging those demons out of her past, so they didn’t rear their heads. It isn’t right, but it is what she needs.”
Mint couldn’t look at Emma’s mom. Not now. “It put Emma’s life in danger.”
“And that’s on me. Because I refused, and he picked her instead.”
“Do you know who he is?” Mint had to know. And he didn’t want to talk about that other stuff. He had enough guilt to carry without adding this man’s to it. They didn’t need to share that. He wasn’t going to be kindred spirits with anyone except Emma. And, coping mechanism or not, that was the way it was going to stay.
“Someone high up.” Her dad paused. “He knew things. Deals I was involved in.”
“But you pushed back.”
“And Emma is the one who paid the price. Again.”
A screeching voice cut into what Mint had been about to say. “I DEMAND TO SEE HER. NOW!”
Her dad let go of an expletive and got up. Mint was right behind him. Emma’s mother stormed past the nurse and down the hall to a room. She elbowed an orderly and brushed off the nurse’s attempts to stall her.
“Emma! Emma!” She barged in the room.
Her dad and Mint both followed.
“Honey—”
She rebuffed the dad as well.
Mint couldn’t take his gaze off Emma. Tube still down her throat. Pale face, dark bruises. Eyes open and locked on his.
She’d never looked more beautiful.
And more overwhelmed.
The nurse said, “You all need to leave. Now.”
Emma’s hand shot up and she held it out. Mint moved, placing his hand in hers. She gripped his fingers.
“Emma, darling.”
Emma turned her face away from her mother and shut her eyes. But not before a tear rolled down her face.
“You,” the nurse pointed at her father, “and you,” she motioned to Emma’s mother, “out. Both of you.”
Emma’s mother sputtered. The nurse got them both past the door and then shut it in their faces.
Mint shifted so their faces were close. Emma made a sound. “Don’t try to talk.”
“Good idea,” the nurse said, moving to the other side of the bed. “Let’s get the tube out. Then you can have your heart-to-heart with the hot guy.”
Mint stared at her.
“What? She was hurt. This is a hospital. You wouldn’t believe the love stories I could tell you. Makes me believe again.” She swiped an imaginary tear from beneath one eye.
Emma’s body shifted as she stifled a laugh.
“One big deep breath, and then push it out.”
Emma did as instructed, still holding onto Mint’s hand. She didn’t ever want to let go of him. The tube slid up her throat and out. She coughed even before it left her mouth. Then she coughed more, holding back the gag. She did not want to puke in front of Mint.
He stood beside her, holding the one hand she wouldn’t let go of, the other rubbing up and down her back.
“You okay for a minute if I leave you with your guy?”
Emma nodded. “Yeah.” The word was scratchy and barely audible, but the nurse nodded.
“I’ll be back.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “I want the scoop.”
Mint’s body stiffened. The nurse sauntered out. When the door shut behind her, he said, “I’ll talk to her. Make sure she knows she doesn’t tell anyone what she sees or hears in here. Or anything about your family.”
Emma tugged on his hand. “Sit.”
Mint shifted but didn’t sit.
She tugged again. “Please.”
He settled on the edge of the bed, because she gave him no other choice. And he didn’t meet her gaze.
“Are you going to make me talk?”
He looked up then, surprised. “Hurts?”
She gave him a look like, What do you think?
He winced. “Sorry.”
“Not your fault.” But he didn’t look like he believed her. Emma reached up and touched both sides of his face. She leaned close and mouthed, Not your fault.
He touched his forehead to hers, and shut his eyes. “You nearly died.”
Emma stroked both sides of his face and into his hair. He groaned and touched a hand to his chest. After a minute or so of silence—who cared how long it was when Mint was with her?—he said, “No one has ever touched me like this.”
She leaned back. Barely an inch. Just so she could look at his eyes.
“Not one single time in my life has anyone. Ever. Touched me like this.” His gaze scanned her face. “How is it that you can be so strong—and so soft—at the same time?”
Tears filled her eyes. They were the sweetest words she’d ever heard in her life. But still, she shrugged. “I’m a woman,” she whispered.
“Not just any woman,” he whispered back. “My woman.”
And then he sat back. Suddenly, like he didn’t meant to say that. Or like he didn’t know how she would react. Like it’d slipped out, and now he wondered if he should take it back.
“Mint—”
“I didn’t protect you, and I should have.” The pain that washed over his face was staggering.
“I didn’t let you do it. I thought I could handle everything myself when I should have been trusting you to help me instead.” She took a breath. “I was trying to make things better, and I made them worse. He has the device.”
Mint nodded.
“He’s an FBI agent.”
Mint blinked. “Seriously?”
“Show me pictures, I’ll tell you who he is.”
“He tried to have you killed so you wouldn’t say.”
Emma had plenty to say.
“I love you.” She didn’t let him say anything, just forged ahead. “I know it’s early, and we barely know each other, but I figure familiarity will come later. But it’s like…I just saw you, and I knew.”
Finally, he breathed. Nodded. “Like everything clicked into place.”
“Like it’s finally right.”
He nodded again. “I’m not leaving. Not ever. And I won’t let you leave, either. We do this together. But one thing you’re not going to worry about is that man getting his hands on you again. He won’t hurt you. He won’t ever get near you. Double Down will take care of him. He isn’t even on your radar. You don’t give him one single thought or second of worry.”
She didn’t know what to say. There was a lot there. She settled on smiling, appreciating his concern even though he chose to say it like that. She snapped straight and lifted her hand to salute him. “Yes, sir.”
It was weak. She sounded awful. But she knew he got it when he smiled. “I’m laying my heart out, and she’s giving me sass.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t frame it so much like an order.”
“It’s a tactic and I’m trying it. Because if you think it’s an order, then you might actually follow it.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, unable to keep the smile from her face. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Being here. Understanding. Saving me.”
“Falling for you?”
She nodded. “That, too.” She was all the way gone for him. And if he needed more from her—to win him over—she was okay with that. It would be a pleasure to do. Every bit of it. The mundane, everyday. The special and the romantic. She wasn’t going to miss one single second of it.
She said, “So, what now?”
“Protection is number one. I’ll call Steve and get it figured out.”
She nodded. “Okay.”
“You want to see your mom?”
Emma thought about it for a second. “Maybe later.”
Mint touched her cheek. “Whatever you want.”
She knew what she wanted. Emma touched his shoulders and leaned in. He met her halfway, touching his lips to hers.
“Have I said thank you?”
Mint’s torso shook as he chuckled. “Not sure it’s you that needs to be thanking me, but I’ll take it.”
“This isn’t over, is it?”
“Now that you’ve seen him, we can get things rolling. Bring him down once and for all.”
She said, “Before he uses that device.” Mint nodded, his face now sober. She said, “He can kill a lot of people with it, right?”
“We find it, we find him.”
Emma said, “You make that sound easy.”
“Double Down is up to the task. Your job is to stay safe.”
“Only if you’re there.”
He touched his lips to hers again. “I’ll always be there.”