“Please don’t be mad at me,” she pleaded in a low, sultry voice. He wound one arm around her waist and dragged her willing body against his.
Deep breath in, then out. Think. She couldn’t give up if she wanted to survive.
“This could be a good thing, our chance to start over together.” The woman kept talking but lowered her voice. Gina just made out, “…enough with worth.”
The word clicked in her mind—that was it! WORTH was the acronym for the children’s charity she’d seen on his computer last year.
“You forced my hand,” Jackson accused, his jaw clenched.
“I’ll fix it. I promise. You know how much I love you.” Liz pouted up at him. “It’s hard sitting on the sidelines.”
With a firmer grip on her self-control, Gina’s brain started working even as she strained to catch every word of their exchange. Good news was, Jackson hadn’t searched her, so she still had her phone in her jacket pocket. And until she fixed the code in the software, they needed her alive. She could convincingly stall that process long enough to find an opportunity to dial 9-1-1 and wait for help.
Jackson’s expression softened the tiniest bit as he gazed down into Liz’s face, and then he crushed his mouth down on hers for a passionate kiss that turned Gina’s stomach. Based on what she’d heard, she guessed they’d been involved for quite a while. Wonder if the redhead knew about Grace?
She started to put her right hand into her pocket even as she cast a glance toward the door to gauge her chances of running.
“Don’t.”
Her whole body jerked at Jackson’s harsh warning. She rubbed her hand on her thigh and drew her gaze back to find his glacial blue eyes focused on her. Nausea rose in her throat. How had she ever thought he loved her?
“Is your laptop in your car?” he demanded.
She didn’t dare let him know Dean had taken it. “I left it at his house.”
His expression turned lethal again. “Fuck.”
“But he wasn’t even home when I left…” She trailed off, then regrouped. “Yesterday, I mean. He stayed at Mike’s last night because of the ice storm.”
“Perfect,” Liz exclaimed. “I can go grab it right now while she fixes the software. He’ll never know.”
No! Gina realized her mistake but bit back the denial even though the last thing she wanted was to be left alone with Jackson. Think, damn it.
“Except he could already be home,” Jackson pointed out.
“I’ll cooperate any way you want,” Gina quickly offered, letting her fear bleed into her voice. “My email is all online. I can access it from here and delete anything that would link back to you.”
Jackson was unconvinced. “There’d still be a trail.”
“You know I know exactly what to do to erase it all.” She gave the gun in his hand a pointed look. “Believe me, I’m not going to do anything stupid.”
Blue eyes narrowed in speculation. Then he used the weapon to point to the laptop in front of her. “Do it, but you damn well better not skip anything. You watch her,” he snapped at Liz.
The woman moved behind the couch as Gina logged into her account. Her eagle eye didn’t allow a quick email plea for help, and without knowing exactly how deep her knowledge went, Gina would have no choice but to delete every last link that could’ve been used against the both of them.
As she worked, her thoughts turned back to Dean. Mentally blocking out the pain of his distrust, she focused on the possibility that he had taken the evidence on her laptop to the police. Erasing the email trail would only take so long, but once she was working in the software, she would have more opportunity to stall until they arrived.
Please, God, let that be where he went.
Chapter 24
Dean shook hands with the officer who’d helped him, then slid his folded copy of the accident report into his back pocket as he returned to his car. He was anxious to get back to the house, but once behind the wheel, he braced his elbow on the door to his left. Rubbing his fingers back and forth along his jaw, he squinted toward the lot where his vehicle had been towed to be scrapped for parts.
That word stuck in his mind. Scrapped.
All the while he’d dealt with the aftermath of the accident, something about the situation with Gina niggled at the back of his head. Scrapped. Scrubbed. The words were similar enough that what was bothering him about her betrayal slammed home.
It had all been way too easy. The email right there in her sent file. The program saved on her hard drive.