Mine to Take (Mine 1)

The car stopped.

“All or nothing, Skye. Make the choice.”

Then he pulled away from her. Shoved open his door.

She sucked in some much needed air. A frantic glance to the left made her realize—definitely not the penthouse.

Her door opened. Only Reese wasn’t standing there, holding said door. Trace was.

She scrambled out. “What are we doing here?”

And here was—the airport?

“Taking a flight. My jet’s waiting.”

He had a jet? Right, of course, the mega-wealthy guy he’d become would have his own jet.

Skye didn’t step away from the car. “Where are we going?” Why was this like pulling teeth with him? “I have my studio opening, I can’t just—”

“You want this SOB caught, don’t you? Well, to do that, we need to head back to the beginning. If he started following you in New York, then we can try to learn more about him there.”

He seriously thought she was just going to jump on a flight to New York? Right then? “I’m not going to—”

“You can make the people in that city talk to me. The dancers, your old neighbors. By you being with me, they’ll share more. Maybe someone saw something. Maybe someone saw him.” His fingers still gripped the door. “I need you to come with me. We’ll be back before the studio opens, I promise you that.”

Once upon a time, she’d loved New York.

But she’d run from it, so desperate to get away.

Only…now she wondered…had she been running from the city? Or from the man who’d been after her? The dark shadow that seemed to stalk her, with every step she took?

Before the accident, she’d started to become so nervous. Jumping at the slightest noise. She hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that her actions were being monitored. Watched. Always watched.

And he’d been in her home. She knew he had broken inside, even though there had been no indication of a forced entry.

“Let’s end this,” Trace urged her. “Come with me to New York. Let me do the job that I know how to do. I’ll find him, and I will stop him.”

She glanced toward the waiting airport. A plane had just taken off, and the rumble of its engines filled the air. “All right. I’ll come with you.”

Reese slammed the trunk. Her head jerked toward him, and she saw that he was carrying two bags. One bag had to belong to Trace, but the other bag—

It’s mine.

“I thought you might see things my way,” Trace murmured.

Confident, cocky bastard.

He took her hand. “Not still afraid to fly, are you?”

Yes, she was. Terrified.

But she wasn’t about to admit that fact to him. He already thought she feared too many things in this world.

I do.

She’d first started to fear when she was eight years old. When her parents hadn’t come home from their dinner. When she’d heard her babysitter whispering about an accident. When she’d stood in a graveyard and watched as flowers were put on two caskets.

She’d feared when she went to the first foster home. When she’d gone to the second. To the third.

She’d feared when hard hands had reached for her during the night. When she was hurt. Pain that came again and again. Her only escape had been to dance.

A social worker had introduced Skye to dancing. She’d taken her to a community center, and Skye had gotten lost in the music, in the dance.

She’d danced. Day after day after day.

And she’d feared…

Until she’d looked up and into a pair of bright, angry blue eyes.

The fear had stopped then, for a time.

But it had come back all too soon.

It always returned, eventually.

***

Alex Griffin watched as the private plane taxied down the runway. Jet-setting away…that seemed to fit with the image that was developing for Trace Weston.

He’d been digging into the man’s background for most of the day. A kid who’d grown up poor, Weston had entered the Army at twenty. His past had been easy enough to discover up until that point, but after he’d enlisted with Uncle Sam, Trace Weston’s records had vanished. There was a four-year hole in the man’s past. Four years of seemingly nothing.

Then Weston had appeared again in Chicago. He’d appeared and suddenly had deep ties with foreign dignitaries, government agencies. His security company had skyrocketed to the top of the field.

Weston had become a millionaire. No, a billionaire, according to his tax reports.

So why was a guy like that taking such a personal interest in a stalking case? That wasn’t even the type of security Weston handled. He worked with corporations, not individuals.

Alex pulled his hands from the pockets of his jacket. He’d already used his badge to gain entrance to the back area of the airport, and he was about to use the shield to help him again. People always talked freely when a badge was involved.