Hold on Tight by Stephanie Tyler Read Free Book Online Page B

have anything helpful to tell us?”
    The lawyer shifted and Chris knew the man hadn’t ever seen combat. Not that he couldn’t be excellent at his job, but for this … well, he’d have a tough time understanding. “Chris needs to get his story straight. It sounds … confused.”
    “Because he is confused. He was trying to keep the whereabouts of the men straight in the middle of a rebel coup and an explosion. I’d worry more if he knew, point by point, what happened. That would tell me he was lying.” Saint’s eyes blazed.
    Chris watched Saint arguing with the lawyer with a strong sense of disinterest, as if they were talking about another person entirely, as if he didn’t witness Mark being dragged off in order to be killed. “I can’t do this now.” He stood and walked away from the table and out the door, toward his motorcycle. He’d parked it here two nights before he boarded the plane to Africa—they’d had only forty-eight hours of prep, for going through every possible scenario of what could happen.
    He paused for a few seconds—out of respect for his CO, waited to see if Saint would walk out the door after him. Reprimand him. But no one came out and so Chris started the bike and took off, the wind buffeting him hard as he tried to pretend that the events leading to Mark’s death hadn’t ever happened, and fuck, he’d never had to regret anything about his career up until this point.
    He guessed he’d been lucky as shit and that was the only luck he’d concede to in this entire fucking disaster.
    It was well past midnight when he arrived at Jamie’s house, thanks to Max’s contacts at the DMV. Max was a captain in Naval Intelligence, the man who brought the teams home and did them more favors than they could ever hope to repay. Chris had never been to Jamie’s place before, but her car was in the driveway and all the lights in the house blazed behind heavy curtains.
    He slammed down the kickstand on his bike and eased his battered body off it and then headed toward her front door. It was time to tell her about a few things, to see if he could explain his gift to her … it was time to tell her she was pregnant.
    The door contained no glass and when he knocked, he noted it was made of heavy reinforced steel. Odd for an old house like this, but for an FBI agent, maybe not so odd. For a woman who’d grown up in witness protection, probably perfectly normal.
    He’d been haunted by what she’d revealed to him about her past, wondered what she’d lived through as a young girl.
    After two more quick raps, he heard her feet on the other side of the door. He stood back slightly from the peephole, the way he’d done in Africa so Jamie could see him. In seconds, she was opening the door, her gun in her hand, even though it was down at her side and not pointed at him.
    She was unapologetic. Dressed in a gray sweatshirt and dark blue FBI shorts, she looked young. Her hair was out of its usual ponytail, loose around her bare face. Her toenails were polished a bright blue and that made him smile. For a second.
    “What are you doing here?” she demanded, but he ignored the start of the tirade and pushed past her. She only offered the slightest resistance and he ended up in the middle of her living room, his boots probably ruining the white shag rug. Everything in the place was white—her couches, the chairs. The walls. There was a touch of color, thanks to some throw pillows, and shit, he never did understand much about design, but he’d be scared to touch anything in here.
    Well, anything but her, and he was pretty sure he’d get over worrying about messing something up once that happened.
    He wanted to tell her that he was here to see her, to take her to bed, to wake up with her in the morning, but fuck, none of that was an option. Not with the investigation hanging between them. “I can’t believe you think I’d kill Josiah.”
    With great reluctance, she closed the front door—locked it too