Strategic Engagement (Wingmen Warriors 5)

"Because he's a sick bastard who enjoys tormenting me. God, I could go on forever. Regardless, he's a nut case, Danny. And I'm so, so sorry for bringing him anywhere near the boys. I didn't think there was any way he could know where I was. Even if he'd tracked me to Rubistan, it's not like my leaving the country was exactly out in the open."

"You went to Rubistan to get away from him?"

"I'd have gone to the moon to get away from Kent McRae." She pushed out the words she'd told her parents, only to be parted on the hand and ignored by them. "Danny, my ex-husband was more than just a mistake. He's dangerous."

"The bastard hit you?" Daniel's eyes flamed.

He canted forward, already on the offensive just as she'd predicted. As much as her heart cheered his ready acceptance, she also feared his reaction.

With her own anger building by the microsecond, how would she stay calm enough through the rest of her explanation to keep him from going ballistic? She forced herself to sit still when her feet wanted nothing more than to pace out the edgy bite of emotions.

She shook her head. "No. He never raised a hand to me. He's much more subtle than that, like with leaving this old medication bottle. You can call the police, but what are they going to do? Unless we can prove he broke in here, they'll just issue another restraining order, all the while looking at me like I'm a hysterical woman because I don't have bruises to show for proof."

Sometimes she wondered if things might not have spiraled down so if only she'd left sooner, once Kent started changing from the charming man she'd married into a manipulative control freak. Easy to second-guess now with hindsight, but at the time she'd let guilt blind her to the signs. Deep in her heart she'd been certain the fault was hers because, God help her, she didn't love Kent as much as she'd once loved Daniel.

The guilt had torn her. She'd chosen to marry Kent, after all. She owed him better than she'd given him, half of herself. Now from the clearer perspective of distance, she wondered if he'd somehow sensed her feelings and manipulated them all the more to persuade her to give him whatever he wanted.

Daniel shoved to his feet, pacing enough to wear tread marks in the carpet with his boots. "We'll get another restraining order. I'm here to help keep space between you and the jerk before things turn violent. Mary Elise, you can't just keep running."

"It's too late for that. I know this may be difficult to take in. There are certainly plenty of people out there who think I'm only out to tarnish his reputation. But Kent went off the deep end when I left him." She closed her eyes and sucked in air to keep her voice steady. What would she do if Danny didn't accept her story?

Mary Elise rose to her feet. She didn't have a choice but to make him believe her. He stood with his back to her, which seemed the perfect time to tell him. She wouldn't have to see his skepticism. Not right away.

"Danny, I moved to Rubistan because Kent hired a hit man to kill me." Even the words chilled her. She tamped down the images and concentrated on reading Daniel.

Tension rippled the muscles along his shoulders in visible waves under his flight suit, but still he didn't turn. Thank God, because she wasn't sure she could keep talking if she found disbelief on his face. But she would talk, had to. Damn Kent straight to hell, she wasn't the wounded woman who ran to Rubistan anymore.

"Shortly after I left him, I suspected I was being followed, but I thought it was just Kent and more of his hurtful messages, like the bottle or the plant. Then a man with a gun caught me getting out of my car in front of my apartment. He planned to fake my suicide." The remembered cold press of the gun to her temple pushed through her concentration. "He told me Kent had sent him. Even gave me a message from Kent no one else could have known."

Her secret name for their last child, a name she hadn't dared share with anyone except Kent because she couldn't take the hesitant looks from people if she dared be hopeful.

"I realize it sounds crazy. God knows the cops and even my parents were skeptics." She winced. Great. Way to go giving him the idea if he hadn't already thought of it himself. "I never dreamed something like that could happen to me. It seems the sort of story you only hear about from celebrities or in tabloids. But it happens. It happened to me."

She waited.

And waited, reassuring herself that no matter what his reaction, she would hang tough. She would be strong and walk out the door today despite Danny's offer to help. The time had come for her to deal with the shambles Kent had made of her life, but she couldn't do it here. She'd leave to protect the boys. To protect Danny.

Slowly he pivoted on his boot heel with military precision. Fury vibrated through him, so tightly reined the low hum of rage reached to her from across the room. Not at her, but for her.

He believed her.

She reached back for the arm of the sofa and let herself sit. Relief rattled her teeth for three blessed seconds. Until she realized that yes he believed her, and planned to right the wrong done to her.

Any veneer of civilized niceties peeled away from him in strips, leaving behind raw man. Man at his most elemental protector self, a primal essence that centuries ago enabled him to charge into, battle with only a sword in his hand or a knife between his teeth.

To protect.

What should have brought her breath-stealing relief instead chilled her. Daniel—she couldn't think of him as Danny right now—yes, Daniel would throw away his life to keep her safe. Looking deep into his eyes, she knew without question.

Kent was a dead man.

Chapter 11

Daniel deadened his emotions.

His brain assumed control, assimilated information. Video chirps and blasts reverberated from behind the boys' closed bedroom door. Two little boys he was almost certain had come inches away from Kent McRae in the parking lot earlier. A sick son of a bitch who'd dared to walk into Daniel's apartment. Who'd dared breathe the same air as Mary Elise.A tic twitched the corner of Daniel's eye. Yeah, deadened inside was better. Otherwise the molten rage bubbling deep within him would melt his logic with a burning need to take out the bastard.

Damn straight Kent McRae had tried his scare tactics before with that junk-mail brochure. Coincidental that it landed in the mail this week? Not a chance. And he would pay.