Still The One (Family Stone #4 Jack) (Family Stone Romantic Suspense) (2 page)

“Stay here a sec.” Jack pressed the intercom on his phone and called his assistant, Ava Sanchez. “Ava, my office now.”

Finding Maria Torres would be the ultimate coup, for many reasons. But the best of all would be easing Ava’s guilt.
Ava would be over the moon to find out that her best friend from high school wasn’t dead. Ava was more than his employee, she was like a little sister, and Jack was thrilled that he would have a hand in helping Ava put the guilt behind her. He couldn’t wait to see the reunion of Ava and Maria.

Reunion. Ugh. That reminded him of what he’d have to do in order to make that reunion happen. He’d have to have a reluctant reunion of his own.

If only he didn’t have to see Bliss again.

Two

Bliss Lee rubbed her damp palms over her navy blue, Federally-approved pantsuit, and forced herself not to pace the elegantly appointed CEO’s office of Adams-Larson International and Associates, lovingly and humorously dubbed ALIAS by the employees. She was the ‘Associates’ part of the agency. Which was fine by her. She didn’t want the responsibility of running the whole shebang. She’d rather concentrate on their special clients.

“Relax,” Jillian Larson, her boss, friend, and co-chairman of Adams-Larsen directed and threw up hands. “He’s just a guy.”

But Jack Stone wasn’t just a guy. He was
The Guy
. The one who got away, even though she’d initiated their break-up. The one who, despite her attempts to find another guy, ruined her for every other man she’d ever been intimate with. Except that had been their problem. Jack Stone didn’t really know how to be intimate.

Sex, yes. Emotional intimacy, no.

He’d been excellent at the sex part. But he’d never bared his private self to her. Although she’d had her own issues with being completely honest, she’d tried as much as she could. Her lack of honesty was more omission than lying. But her awkward half-attempts and Jack’s inability had been too much strain for their young relationship. And once he’d joined the Navy, she’d been done.

Unfortunately, Bliss had never found another bond close to what she’d had with Jack, flaws and all. Even her ex-husband couldn’t measure up to Jack Stone. And after a long two years of trying to make their marriage work, they had, less than amicably, decided to end it. Her ex-husband had accused her of hiding things. And she had been. Most of all she’d been hiding the fact that she was still in love with a man she’d kicked out years earlier.

Bliss’s throat tightened. “Keep telling me that.”

Jillian raised one exquisitely-groomed blond eyebrow and smirked. “Gladly.” Her friend was perfectly put together in her signature pencil skirt in black and a fitted black jacket with a flirty peplum accent.

Bliss couldn’t pull off that outfit in a million years. Jill looked sophisticated, sexy, and in charge. Bliss stuck to borderline masculine suits and darted white or blue broadcloth shirts.

The intercom crackled. “Your appointment has arrived,” Marissa said pleasantly through the communication system.

Bliss’s heart boomed in her chest, furious and nearly out-of-control.

Jill’s hand wrapped around Bliss’s wrist tightly, grounding her, reining her in. Bliss took a deep breath, gathered her scattered composure, and nodded. “Ready.”

“Show him in,” Jillian said calmly to Marissa.

The perfunctory knock was quick and then the door swung open. Bliss forced herself to turn, braced for the impact of seeing Jack Stone again.

Jack strode into the office like he owned it. Dressed in khaki cargo pants and a black t-shirt, the cotton strained across his forty-six inch chest, his huge biceps tested the hem of his short sleeves. He had a canvas duffel slung over his shoulder and a multi-dial watch strapped to his solid, thick wrist.

He didn’t falter when his gaze connected with hers, but she was pretty sure his shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly. They locked gazes, his ever-changing hazel eyes appeared almost pure green today and mesmerized her with their intensity.

The shock of his penetrating regard held her immobile. She damned her extreme visceral reaction as stunning emotions and images from years ago waterfalled through her brain; Joy, Jack laughing as he picked her up and swung her around like she was a kid; Love, Jack lying in bed, sheets tangled around his legs, his large chest bare, arm propped behind his head, eager smile on his face, as he waited impatiently for her to join him; Lust, Jack with water droplets running down his body and disappearing into the wrap of his towel, the bulge of his erection a sign of his passion; Pain, Jack’s stunned expression when she told him goodbye; and finally despair, the stark, unrelenting ache that gripped her for weeks and months after he’d left.

Each image and the emotion behind the remembrance pierced her heart, until she was sure she must be bleeding out onto Jill’s intricately woven, twenty-thousand-dollar Persian carpet.

Jack stopped in front of Jillian, dropped his duffel to the floor, and held out his solid, wide palm. “Jack Stone.” His hands were big and scarred and tough, just like the rest of him. Those hands had caressed every inch of her body and brought her to heights of ecstasy that she hadn’t climbed since he’d left.

He looked good. Damn him. Better than good, great. He had some new lines around his eyes, and his hair was a little longer. His face had matured, the softness of the young adult he’d been was now honed to a sharpness that only ramped up his attractiveness. A thin strip of hair was missing from his right eyebrow, a white scar creased the arch, and her heart stopped as she recognized that the missing strip was likely from a bullet graze.

He’d almost had his head blown off.

She swallowed down the fear that mushroomed through her. Based on the faded whiteness of the scar, the damage had happened a long time ago.

He’d filled out since she’d last seen him, and he’d already been big to begin with. His physical size had been comforting and engendered a feeling of safety and security for a girl who’d had far too much upheaval and violence in her early life.

Not that Jack knew anything about that, of course. She’d never told him about her childhood. She wasn’t supposed to tell anyone. Ever.

Jillian introduced herself, then said, “This is my associate, Bliss Lee.”

Jack nodded briefly at Bliss, but didn’t offer his hand. Instead he propped his hand on his waist. “We’ve met.”

We’ve met?
We’ve met?
That’s it? That was how he was going to acknowledge their history to her boss? “Jack,” she said firmly, refusing to let him see the pain his presence and his casual dismissal of their past relationship brought. She couldn’t bring herself to say it was nice to see him.

Jack kept his focus on Jillian and barely acknowledged Bliss’s presence. “Let’s get down to business.”

“Would you like a cup of tea or coffee?” Jillian offered politely.

Bliss was still stuck in the same spot, rooted to the floor. He’d spoken of the most influential and impactful relationship of her life as if it were a random, accidental encounter in a crowded cafeteria.
We’ve met?

“What I’d like, is to find Maria Torres.” His abrupt shift from observing niceties to cold, hard soldier was just what she needed.

That jolted Bliss and she realized it was time to take over this meeting. Enough of the old memories and the old Bliss. She wasn’t the same girl she’d been when they’d ended and it was time Jack Stone figured that out.

“Agreed.” Bliss gestured to the brocade wing chair in the grouped seating off to the side of Jillian’s desk. “Have a seat.”

She marched over to the other wing chair and sat down as elegantly as possible. She picked up the dossier that held all the information they had about Maria Torres. Everything that Bliss had used to relocate her to a safe house where she didn’t have to worry about being found by José Fernandez. And yet Maria Torres had blown out of that safe house, and almost guaranteed safety, within hours of getting settled there.

Bliss hadn’t ever lost a client this way and the fact that she hadn’t realized that Maria intended to rabbit from the safe house—as soon as Bliss left—rankled. Maria hadn’t given any indication that she was skittish or worried about her safety. Maria had listened and absorbed everything that they had told her. Promises to keep her safe. Assurances that José Fernandez would not find her. A guard close by in town if she needed anything.

Maria had seemed to accept their reassurances. But then she’d left.

Bliss understood the fear. Better than most. But Maria was less safe wandering around the country without the protection of Adams-Larsen than she had been tucked in that little Iowa farm town, and Bliss still couldn’t understand why Maria had felt the need to bolt. But Bliss had to put aside her ego and find Maria damn quick before José Fernandez did.

They knew that her prison guards would have learned of Maria’s escape from her confinement in Salinas a few days ago. They visited once a week to drop off food and pick up garbage. Maria had left the moment they had departed her prison last week. But they would have been back this week and discovered that she was gone.

Adams-Larsen and the U.S. Marshals were confident that Fernandez was now looking for Maria based on a cryptic phone conversation between Fernandez and two unknown accomplices. Adams-Larsen was pretty sure that Fernandez had panicked and was trying to tie up loose ends.

They still had no proof, besides Maria’s officially documented and audio-taped testimony, that Fernandez was guilty of kidnapping and false imprisonment. And they couldn’t bring those facts to light until they had their only eyewitness in hand.

No court of law would convict or even allow the taped evidence without the actual witness live and in person. Or without some other authority to validate the credibility of the witness. Otherwise everything was just hearsay and could be thrown out of court and Adams-Larsen left themselves open to a slander charge.

As far as Fernandez’s reputation, there might be a blip on the political meter, but without any proof, without Maria, they were screwed. He’d get off scot free.

José Fernandez was the scum of the earth and Bliss wanted to nail him to the wall and watch him bleed. Watch his life be crushed, just like he’d crushed Maria’s spirit for the last eight years. Bastard.

“This is her last known location.” Bliss pointed to the small farming town on the map as Jack seated himself in the delicate chair. His shoulders were nearly as broad as the chair back and his large frame dwarfed the feminine lines of the chair, causing a tingle deep inside at his sheer size and dominating presence. Until he opened his mouth.

“Iowa?” Jack frowned. “What the hell was she doing in Iowa?”

Bliss stiffened. She’d worked tirelessly to get Maria to a place where she’d be at ease and could try to reintegrate into the world. To a place where she would feel comfortable enough to actually have a life and not just hole up in a new, different prison.

“Are you an expert in witness relocation, Mr. Stone?” Jillian asked graciously, a pleasant and almost vacuous smile on her classically beautiful face. Thank God for Jill.

Jack was zipping through the contents of the file Bliss had handed him, absorbing information. Even while he responded and questioned the contents, he was assimilating. She’d forgotten about his innate ability to multi-task. Jack had a brilliant mind. Which had made his decision to go into the military and use his brawn an even odder choice to her. A more heartbreaking choice. He could have been anything. Done anything. And he’d chosen to put his life on the line. And while his intentions were honorable, Bliss had not been able to handle even the potential for any more violence and loss in her life.

But she couldn’t tell Jack that. She hadn’t told him that the thought of him in danger left her with nightmares. She’d started waking up in the middle of the night sweating, her fight or flight instinct triggered, her heart tripping like she’d been discovered. The nightmares had brought back all the fear and sadness she’d spent years trying to overcome.

He’d never even noticed that she’d been totally freaked out. Either that or he hadn’t cared enough to ask what was wrong. After weeks of worry and stress, she’d realized that she wasn’t going to be able to do it. To be able to live with the fact that Jack would be under constant threat of danger. Just the thought of him in peril brought too many of her own demons screaming to the forefront of her mind.

And he may have been shocked when she’d told him they were done. But he’d never tried, not once, to talk it out with her. He’d just packed up his stuff and left. She may have verbally ended their relationship but he’d physically ended it by walking away. By not fighting for them like he’d planned to fight for their country.

“No.” He fingered the papers in the file. “But I would have thought you’d place her somewhere with at least a decent amount of Spanish speakers.”

“Her English is better than her Spanish now,” Bliss informed him. “She spent the last eight years alone with a television set that only received three English speaking channels. She hasn’t spoken Spanish in a very long time.”

Bliss hesitated. She hated to explain herself but since he was here and needed to work with them, needed to work with her...he needed a firmer grasp of the oddities of this situation.

Maria’s placement was radically different from their usual ‘special’ clients. Normally the client came to them and wanted to disappear. They had already come to terms with the realities of taking on a new life to be safe. They knew if they followed the rules, they could escape the threat that plagued them.

Maria Torres was a completely unique case.

She’d been imprisoned below ground, in a dank basement, for eight years. Her only contact with the outside world had come from three television channels and the pigs who checked on her once a week. They shoved bags of food and clothing in through a small cat door and retrieved her garbage bags using a long metal trash grabber. She rarely even saw their faces.

At twenty-three, she’d basically been in isolation for one third of her lifetime.