Relentless Protector. Colleen Thompson

room somewhere in Oklahoma, a woman picked up a newspaper left behind by the last occupant. No shock there, considering the general state of this dive, but the face staring up at her sent the room whirling around her and nausea squeezing in her stomach.

      It was her, a brat in her arms, a brave smile on her face. A face the woman in the motel room would know anywhere, no matter how many years had passed. Because she never forgot any of those who had destroyed her.

      Most of them, she’d paid back in spades already: the sadistic bitch who’d called herself a mother; the foster father who had raped her, brutally and often; even the juvenile detention officer who’d been such a hard-ass later—every one of them lying in an unmarked grave. But not the one who’d set it all in motion, the one she’d sworn on the memory of all she’d lost to repay—if she could ever find her.

      A glance at the photo’s caption gave her the bitch’s married name, and a line in the article revealed the town where she was living.

      The town where she would die—but not before she’d learned what real suffering was all about.

      Chapter One

      Lisa Meador was running late again, ridiculously late thanks to the passive-aggressive front office manager, who had scheduled her for yet another dental cleaning way too close to school dismissal.

      Still in her scrubs following her long afternoon, she was wound up in knots and already thinking about her next errand when she swung into what ought to be the line of parents waiting in cars at her son’s elementary school.

      Except there was no line. She was the last and only car. The last parent, picking up the last and tiniest of students, who stood with an impatient-looking teacher in attendance.

      I’m so sorry, Lisa mouthed before her older-model silver Camry slowed to a complete stop. But the knot of tension in her stomach loosened as five-year-old Tyler came dashing toward the car, his huge smile seeming to run ahead of him.

      It was the smile Lisa lived for, the one thing that had kept her breathing, putting one foot before the other, in the thirteen months since her husband, Devin, had been killed by a suicide bomber in Afghanistan.

      Only twenty-eight when she was widowed, Lisa was determined not to dwell on the unfairness of her loss. Instead, she focused on the five good years she and Devin had had together and the tawny-haired boy whose antics kept her scrambling to keep up.

      The teacher on duty, a plump, graying woman in old-fashioned cat-eyed glasses, did some scrambling of her own to beat tiny Tyler to the back door of Lisa’s car and hold it open.

      “No running into the circle, Tyler, or you’ll have to miss next recess,” she warned as the boy clambered into his booster seat like a spider monkey. “We don’t want anybody getting hurt, now.”

      “Yes, ma’am, Mrs. Davies, ma’am.” Tyler’s back straightened, and his right hand shot stiffly to his brow in his best approximation of a soldierly salute. His dad’s salute, remembered only from Skype calls and home videos. Duty done, Tyler snapped the buckle and hugged his plush stuffed octopus in his arms before tacking on a worried “Sorry I forgot again. I’ll do better next time.”

      Mrs. Davies flicked a pointed look toward Lisa before her stern pretense dissolved into a smile. Lisa understood, since it was hard staying angry, even for a minute, at the smallest boy and biggest live wire in the kindergarten class.

      “I’ll remind him, too,” she told the teacher. “And I promise, I’ll be here earlier tomorrow.”

      She swore she would keep that promise, even if it meant a showdown with the most vindictive office manager in all of Coopersville. Because as important as Lisa’s job was to her and Tyler’s well-being, she refused to give in to the reign of petty evil.

      Once they left the school, she turned onto the town’s main drag. Her heart constricted as she noticed that most of the businesses had put out both American and Texas flags, along with a host of cheerful signs and banners welcoming home the heroes of the nearby base’s returning combat unit.

      Devin’s combat unit, or what was left of it.

      Swallowing back grief, she drew a deep breath and gave a silent prayer of thanks for all those who were coming home to happy families. Walking into their arms instead of being carried in a grim, flag-draped procession.

      “I’m really hungry, Mommy,” said Tyler. “Can we stop for a kid’s meal? Please?”

      “Sorry, sweetie,” she said, glad for the distraction. “We have to go get Rowdy—the groomer’s closing early today. And then we’re heading straight home for the good stuff.”

      Tonight she was determined to cook her son a healthy dinner with some actual vegetables in it, no matter how stressed she was or how tempted by the idea of an easy drive-through pickup.

      “But kids’ meals are the good stuff,” he argued. “They have toys inside.”

      Sighing, Lisa mentally cursed whatever marketing genius had dreamed up putting kiddie kryptonite inside the cartoon-covered boxes. Tyler sulked, refusing her attempts to talk about his school day. Choosing to ignore the behavior, she soon pulled into the parking lot of a small gold bungalow, sliding into a space between a beat-up white panel van and a bright yellow Beetle with a

      Buttercup’s Cuts-4-Pups bumper sticker.

      “Come on, champ,” Lisa said with as much cheer as she could muster. “Let’s go bail out Rowdy. He’ll be so glad to see you.”

      For a moment, Tyler looked as if he meant to balk, but apparently the thought of seeing his beloved dog—a rescue puppy she’d adopted on impulse two days after Devin’s funeral—was enough to get him moving.

      Five minutes and fifty dollars later, they emerged with Rowdy, freshly shorn of much of his cream-colored hair. Once he reached the grass, the little dog rolled and peed and jumped and barked and spun like a deranged wind-up toy on the end of his leash. But at least the Lhasa apso mix’s excitement had Tyler laughing again.

      It had Lisa laughing, too...right up until the moment she felt something hard and unyielding shoved against her lower back.

      She didn’t know it was a gun at first, not until she heard the hiss of a woman’s voice in her ear. “Stay very still, and don’t scream. Not unless you want your brat to watch you die.”

      Lisa’s eyes widened, and her muscles froze. Shock waves detonated through her; she couldn’t move or breathe or think.

      But her eyes instinctively found Tyler, squatting beside Rowdy and rubbing the wriggling animal’s belly. Worthless as a watchdog, the animal remained as oblivious as the boy.

      “That’s such a good girl,” the woman praised her, the menace clinging to the words redefining the word “evil” in Lisa’s mind forever. “Now get him in the car. We’re going for a ride.”

      Never let an attacker take you to a second location. The advice floated up from memory, one of her police officer dad’s grim lessons from her younger years.

      “You can have my purse. My paycheck’s in it.” Her voice trembled. “I’ll even sign it for you and give you the PIN for my bank card.”

      The barrel ground painfully against her backbone. “One bullet in your spine, another in your head. And then I start on him, if you don’t follow my directions. To the letter. ”

      “Tyler, honey,” Lisa croaked. “Tyler, in the car, please. Take Rowdy with you. Quickly.”

      Tyler looked up sharply, his blue eyes huge and worried as his gaze moved from her face to whoever was standing behind her. “Hi?” he ventured, his voice very small.

      “Better do as your mom says,” the stranger advised, and something lurking behind the iced-sugar sweetness of those few words had Tyler scurrying to comply without a word of argument.

      As the pressure on her