The Shaughnessey Accord by Alison Kent Read Free Book Online Page B

her shoes.
    "Dude, hey. Would you get the gun out of the lady's face?" Tripp surged forward, purposefully awkward—only to have the Beretta shoved against his Adam's apple until he choked.
    He continued to cough and gag as Vuong backed him into the wall. "You, Mr. Shaughnessey , are on the verge of becoming my biggest liability to date. Don't move. Don't speak unless you are spoken to. I would hate to mar this operation by killing you, but I won't hesitate if you give me reason."
    Giving the kid reason would mean endangering Glory further. Tripp had yet to meet a killer who had qualms about removing all human roadblocks to his goal.
    Once Vuong released him, Tripp dipped his head, working to clear what felt like a permanent constriction in his throat. He watched the kid return to Glory and this time run the gun barrel underneath the curves of both her breasts.
    Her nipples tightened, a response to the stimulation that was all about the same fear widening her eyes.
    "Very nice." Vuong moved the gun barrel higher, circling one of the taut peaks now pressing through both bra and tank top. "Very nice. Tell me, Mr. Shaughnessey . Does she respond this nicely to your touch? Or is she only turned on by the idea of losing her life?"
    Fucking bastard. Talking about Glory as if she didn't exist. Still, Tripp didn't say a word. He'd been spoken to, asked a direct question. It didn't matter. His voice was stuck in his damaged throat, his words battling in his head to be heard.
    Vuong turned his gaze in Tripp's direction. "Feel free to answer, Mr. Shaughnessey . In fact, I insist."
    Tripp cleared his throat with a grunting sort of cough. "That's fear, man. Not arousal."
    Vuong nodded thoughtfully, his eyes waking from the dead. "Our bodies are so complicated, yes? Yours, for example, is as tight as a wenched cable unloading cargo from a ship. While mine is . . . what do you think, Miss Brighton?"
    "About what?" she asked softly, her voice steadier than Tripp would have thought.
    But that was probably because he was back on the strange idea of a cable unloading a cargo ship. A background piece he filed away.
    "About my body language. What emotion am I broadcasting?"
    When Glory raised a brow uncertainly, he nodded once. Whatever the intent of the other man's question, Tripp wanted to see Vuong's reaction to Glory's response.
    "Uh, I think you might be a bit nervous or upset since things haven't gone the way you were expecting."
    Vuong silently considered her words before stepping close enough to drag the gun barrel along the waistband of her skirt. She gasped, trembled. Tripp seethed, steam bellowing from his nostrils, but he stayed where he was.
    He needed to get to the knife he'd left with the security equipment after cutting into the coaxial cable. To do that, he needed the bastard out of the room.
    But launching himself forward and driving his shoulder into Vuong's gut wasn't the way to get it done.
    "She is right, you know, Mr. Shaughnessey ." Vuong had obviously sensed Tripp's barely controlled fury since he swung the gun toward him in warning. "At least about me being upset. But then, who wouldn't be after having a plan foiled by an unforeseen circumstance."
    "What circumstance?" Glory whispered.
    Vuong glanced back at her face before dropping his gaze the length of her body and nuzzling the gun along the zippered fly of her skirt.
    "One of your customers. An off-duty police officer managed to dial 9-1-1 on his cell phone and leave the connection open as we were seeing to his safety. Had he simply left well enough alone, we would've been long on our way."
    Glory nodded. Tripp waited. Vuong pressed his body into Glory's side and slipped his gun hand beneath her skirt.
    "I hate John Waynes ," he said as tears rolled silently down her cheeks.
    Tripp's gut knotted with the furious boiling of his blood. He twisted his wrists this way and that, shifted a step to the side and fingered the shelving, looking for an edge or protruding bolt