Still The One (Family Stone #4 Jack) (Family Stone Romantic Suspense)
Read Still The One (Family Stone #4 Jack) (Family Stone Romantic Suspense) Online
Authors: Lisa Hughey
Tags: #romantic thriller, #romantic novella, #military romance, #romantic suspense
Stone Family Romantic Suspense series....
Still The One
by
Lisa Hughey
Copyright
February 2014
Lisa Hughey
ISBN:
978-0-9840428-9-0
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written consent from the author/publisher.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons living or dead, or places, events, or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are products of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.
Stone Family Romantic Suspense series....
Stone Cold Heart
:
Jess Stone, former FBI sniper, always felt like the kid who looks in the candy store window but could never afford to go in. But on a humanitarian mission to aid an earthquake ravaged country, finally she finds a place where she fits, in Colin Davies’ arms, and working for Global Humanitarian Relief, her big brother’s company. But can the former SAS thaw Jess’s stone cold heart?
Carved in Stone:
Connor Stone has always been odd man out in his family. Not the oldest, not the most charming, he’d had a lock on the youngest until another half-sibling came to live with them, so he raised hell in his youth. Con knows now the only way to redeem himself is with deeds, not words and sets out to prove once and for all he is worthy of the Stone family. When his older brother asks him to take care of business, Con finally will have redemption he craves. Except when Ava Sanchez, his brother’s assistant, is threatened, he must choose between saving the girl or protecting his family. Will his choice bring him love or break his heart?
Heart of Stone:
Riley Stone is the handsome brother, the charming one. Everyone who meets him compares him to his father, which in his mind is not a compliment. But he’s never met a woman he couldn’t charm, until he meets Di, an acerbic, smart-mouthed, passionate activist who has no time for him or his charm. On the run, in the midst of danger, the blistering passion they share explodes. Can these two opposites find common ground, or will Di smash Riley’s stone heart?
Still the One:
Jack Stone, former Navy SEAL, and oldest Stone sibling is determined to keep his family strong. Family is everything. So he starts Global Humanitarian Relief and Stone Consulting to do some good and keep his family together. But when he has to team up with his old flame, Bliss, on a missing persons case, an evil threatens him, his family and the one woman he could never forget and doesn’t want to let go. Can these two former lovers put aside past hurts and heal their hearts?
Acknowledgments
Huge thanks to my BIL Ed for giving the Stone Family the proper private jet.
I promise that Jack never complains about how much it costs to insure it.
As always, thanks to Kim Killion and Jennifer at The Killion Group for their expertise!!
And once again, major, major thanks to Adrienne Bell and LGC Smith for everything under the sun.
One
“I’ll be in DC in six hours.” Jackson Stone, Junior, slammed down the receiver on his office landline and cursed silently.
Nothing like the past coming back to bite you in the ass.
He rubbed his tired eyes and huffed out a breath. He had twenty things on his plate but two took precedence over everything else.
First, Jack called Shane and had him get the Bombardier Challenger 604 jet ready for a trip to DC. “I’ll be at the Monterey Regional Airport in two hours.”
One down
.
Second, he could make inroads with his brother Connor. Con continued to hold back and no matter what Jack said, he knew that his younger brother was still trying to make up for his hellish teenage years.
“Connor!” Jack yelled through the doorway of his office and waited for his brother to get from his office to Jack’s.
He didn’t know why Connor couldn’t just get over it and focus on now. That was how Jack handled life. The past was the past. But Jack was determined to get Connor comfortably in the family fold. This was the perfect opportunity to show Con he had complete trust in him.
At least this would solve one of his family problems. He’d have Connor run the office at Global Humanitarian Relief and Stone Consulting for the few days he’d be gone. Jack’s stomach cramped. Shit, he did not want to make this trip.
If only he didn’t have to see Bliss again.
Clearly, he needed to take his own advice. The past was in the past.
The thought of having to interact with her, to work with her, sent a dagger through his heart. He wasn’t sure whether the proximity would make him want to kiss her or kill her.
But he’d do neither. Jack had to hold on to his anger, keep it brewing and keep it high, because thirteen years ago when she’d told him they were over, she’d gutted him. He couldn’t go back to that dark, lost place again.
He’d never told a soul how much her rejection had hurt him.
Instead, he’d arrived at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center and thrown himself into being the best damn recruit and graduate of Basic the U.S. Navy had ever seen.
The loss of Bliss, and what they had, took years to get over. And if there were any way that he could have avoided this request, demand really, to work with her and her agency, he would have sold his soul to do it.
Anger was the only way he’d get through this assignment with his heart unscathed. He’d long since stopped thinking about her every day but there was no question that she was the measure of how he had judged every single woman he’d dated since. And after how long it had taken to get over her, he’d been determined never to let another woman have that kind of power over him again. And he’d succeeded.
He had casual relationships with nice, hot women who never touched any part of him except his dick.
Jack rubbed his hand over his face. He needed to focus on his assignment and not Bliss.
Con stomped into Jack’s office. “What the hell is your deal?”
“I need you,” Jack said and watched unexpected happiness roll over Con’s face.
“What for?”
“Close the door for a sec.”
Con shut the door and raised his blond eyebrows. He stood in front of Jack’s desk, military stiff, feet apart, hands clasped behind his back in parade rest.
“At ease, soldier." Jack chuckled. "While I love the fact that you consider me like your commanding Lord and Master—“
Con snorted.
“You’re out of the Army now,” Jack continued. “There’s no need for military protocol in the office.”
“I’m comfortable with it,” he said simply.
Jack’s moment of amusement was gone, replaced by a somber frown. “Okay. I have to be out of the office for a few days. Unfortunately.” He shifted in his massive desk chair and his mouth flattened into a grimace as he thought about why he needed Con.
They had a little over a week to find a missing witness. The only living proof that José Fernandez was a dirty fucking bastard. On the surface, Fernandez looked totally clean. He was the poster boy for promoting safe conditions for workers and making the lives of the working poor better. He’d made his career by protesting the treatment of the immigrant and migrant communities in regards to law enforcement, after the police hadn’t given enough priority to the unsolved abductions of four teenage Mexican immigrant girls eight years ago.
Fernandez had shined a spotlight on the inequities in treatment of crimes against the poor and in the process made a name for himself politically. Since that horrible tragedy—none of the girls were ever found—he had worked tirelessly to make things better and earned a reputation as a vocal champion of the poor. He’d parlayed that original protest into an eight year career culminating in his nomination for Deputy Secretary of Labor.
Congress seemed poised to approve his appointment without much fuss. The guy had almost unheard of bi-partisan support.
“So do you need intel for your trip?”
“No." Jack’s frown got deeper. Bliss’s agency was handling the intel. “That part is taken care of.”
Jack stared off into the distance. Fuck him, he really didn’t want to see her again. He rubbed a hand over his mouth and shook his head. He needed to get back to Con.
“Muscle?” Con asked with bemusement.
Another smile quirked Jack’s mouth. “Pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?”
Con shrugged.
“It’s a Stone Consulting job,” Jack clarified. “Classified.”
Recently new evidence had been uncovered that indicated José Fernandez may have actually had a hand in the abduction of the girls and what happened to them.
They had found one living survivor. She’d been imprisoned in a house not even ten miles from where she’d been abducted eight years ago. Somehow, she’d escaped and gotten from rural California farm country to Washington DC. But Jack was sketchy on the details regarding how she got from one end of the country to the other.
Adams-Larsen International and Associates, Bliss’s agency, had given Maria Torres new papers, a new place to live, and money to hide until authorities could gather additional evidence and Fernandez could be revealed as a corrupt fake and guilty man before the Senate voted on his confirmation. However, law enforcement needed all their ducks in a row before they went after Fernandez. And the execution of revealing the details had to be handled carefully. So the plan had been to keep her sequestered and safe until the time was right. Only Maria had taken her new documents, all the money, and disappeared. Again.
They had one week to find her before the confirmation hearing.
Right now all they had was Maria’s deposition testimony, and the depositions of the people who’d helped hide her once she escaped. Only a handful of people knew that Maria Torres was alive and her accusation that José Fernandez had been behind her abduction and imprisonment.
But without Maria, they were dead in the water. No body, no person, no proof. Jack wondered what the hell she’d been thinking when she ran.
Had Fernandez somehow gotten wind that not only had she escaped but that she’d told someone about her ordeal? As far as they knew, she was the only person who could identify Fernandez as being involved in the eight-year-old case.
They needed to find her before Fernandez did.
While Jack and Bliss were looking for Maria, Jack would have Con working another angle. Jack wanted Connor to dig into Fernandez’s background.
“I really need your help on a separate job.” Jack stared out the reflective glass window, the view of the Monterey Bay obscured by lingering morning fog. Wisps of clouds drifted lazily in the gray sky. He loved being back home. Loved living near the ocean again. Loved that he was making a go of the company with his siblings.
When Connor just waited patiently, Jack finally said, “You can get so quiet it’s freaky. How are we even related?”
And shit, as soon as it came out of his mouth he realized his mistake. Con stiffened but didn’t say a word. Hopefully his faith Connor’s computer abilities would make up for Jack putting his foot in his mouth again.
“Can you run an intensive background check on José Fernandez?”
“Sure.” Connor said, “Am I looking for anything specific?”
“I don’t know.” Jack rubbed his finger along his scarred eyebrow.
If there was something there, any other hint of Fernandez’s complicity in the old crime or even a newer one, Con would find it. They could use whatever Con could dig up in case they couldn’t find Maria before the confirmation hearing.
The scandal was going to be crazy.
“I need anything and everything you can find on the guy. There’s got to be something there, even if no one has found it yet. I don’t want to influence your search, so I’m keeping it vague.”
Jack had given him a puzzle and he knew Con’s interest was piqued. “You got it. Anything else?”
It was extremely important that they didn’t tip Fernandez off. “Don’t tell anyone what you’re working on.”
Con shrugged as if that wouldn’t be a problem.