Christmas On The Run. Shirlee McCoy

darted to the door, shoved the bag through the mail slot and ran back the way she’d come, lungs heaving, sweat cold on her forehead and cheeks. She glanced back at the path. Still nothing. She was almost in the clear. She just had to keep moving.

      Across the road, a dark shadow moved out from behind an old tree. Her heart thumped, one hard terrible jolt of acknowledgment. They’d been a step ahead of her after all, and now they knew that she’d tried to pass information to someone.

      “What were you doing?” the man said.

      Fear shivered through her, made her legs tremble so much she had to stop. Right at the edge of the yard. Nothing separating her from him but a few feet of paved road.

      “Back off, buddy.” She bit the words out, making sure they dripped with confidence.

      “What were you doing?” he asked again, his tone conversational rather than accusatory.

      “Running.” Her watch beeped again, and she jumped.

      Two minutes gone.

      Not that it mattered. She’d been caught, and now she had to escape.

      She dodged to the left, but he must have anticipated the move, because he was there, blocking her path. Taller by nearly a foot. Muscular. Quick.

      She’d grown up fighting. She could still fight when she needed to.

      She swung hard with a right hook.

      He grabbed her wrist, pulling her arm down with so little effort she knew she’d never escape him.

      Not before his buddies made it to her place, found a way in and took her son.

      She swung again. This time with her left fist, wildly. She had no plan but to free herself. She connected with his shoulder and heard him mutter something before he pulled her right arm up behind her back. Almost to the point of pain—but not quite.

      She stepped toward him, using her body as a weapon, her shoulder aimed for his solar plexus as her watch beeped again.

      * * *

      Dallas Morgan didn’t know who the woman was. He didn’t know what she wanted. He did know that she’d been running past his house every morning for three weeks. He’d seen her on his security monitor, racing along so close to his front yard that the camera, which had been set up to turn on when there was movement at the edge of the grass, caught her grainy image. Twice she’d jogged to his porch and back, always looking at her watch while she did it. The watch that was beeping.

      A warning?

      He glanced at the front of his house, expecting an explosion, a fire, something that would make any one of his enemies very happy. And he did have enemies, most of them in foreign countries or in prison. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t get to him—maybe the scrawny runner was working for one of them.

      “Cool it!” he commanded as she tried to hook a leg around his, pull him off balance and free herself.

      “Let me go,” she growled, wrestling against his hold. His instinct was to do what she’d asked. She was shorter, lighter and weaker than he was, and from the age of twelve on, he’d been taught good manners, good morals and fair rules of combat.

      Those things flew out the window when it came to protecting family or staying alive. He tightened his grip. Not enough to be painful, but enough to make her think long and hard about continuing the fight.

      “Tell me why you’ve been running by my place every morning for three weeks, and I will,” he said, and she stiffened.

      “Dallas?”

      “You sound surprised.”

      “I...am.”

      “Because you didn’t expect to be caught?”

      “Because things don’t usually turn out that great for me.”

      “Me being out here is great?” He released his hold and took a step back, trying to see her face in the predawn light. Gaunt. Deep hollows beneath high cheekbones. Dark shadows beneath light-colored eyes. That was about all he could see.

      “It’s better than the alternative.”

      “Which is?”

      “I put something through the mail slot. That will explain.”

      She started jogging, heading away from the house. He could have let her go, but there was something about her that worried him, a kind of desperate energy he often saw in clients who were looking for help.

      He snagged the back of her running vest, pulling her to a stop. “Save me a trip to the house. Tell me now.”

      “I’m Carly Rose,” she said, as if the name should mean something to him.

      “If this is a test, I’m going to fail it, because I’ve never heard the name before.” He cut to the chase. She obviously knew him. She’d obviously been casing his house. He wanted to know why. He wanted to know who had sent her. He wanted to move on with his day, because he had a boatload of physical therapy to get through before he returned to HEART. Five weeks recovering from a torn meniscus, and he was almost cleared to return to work.

      He was counting the days, because the house was too quiet, the days too long, the nights even longer with nothing to occupy him.

      “Kelley,” she added, then he knew, and a half dozen memories of his brother filled his mind.

      “Josh’s widow,” she continued, as if he might be too dense to put it all together.

      “I get it.” He released her vest, stepped back. She wasn’t anything like what he’d have expected. Josh had always gone for blonde, voluptuous. Fake. “What do you want?”

      “To leave.” She glanced toward the dead-end street. He’d chosen the house because of the privacy and the park that butted up against the yard. Plenty of room to run, hike and bike.

      “You looked me up for a reason.”

      “I...need your help, but I can’t explain. There isn’t time.” Her watch beeped again, and she took off, sprinting into the street and heading toward the end of the road.

      He should let her go. Josh had only ever been trouble. Even before they’d entered foster care, before they’d been adopted, before he’d stolen from the only two people who had ever loved them, Josh had been all about getting what he could however he could from whomever he could. Dallas had some regrets about their relationship, but not enough to make him want to connect with his widow.

      So, yeah, he should let Carly Rose Kelley go, but he was at loose ends, and Christmas was coming. His parents did their best to get his mind off the season. For the past six years, they’d invited friends and family over to their place for a loud and loving Christmas exchange. Dallas always attended, and then he’d return home to his silent, empty house that should have been filled with the excited squeals of the twins, his wife, maybe another child or two.

      Lila had wanted a big family.

      He liked to pretend he’d have agreed to that. He wasn’t sure, though. He’d never thought he’d be that great of a husband or father. He hadn’t planned to be, either, but then he’d met her, and he’d fallen hard and fast. They’d married four months after they’d met, and she’d been pregnant three months later.

      If they’d lived, the twins would be turning seven on Christmas Eve.

      He shoved the thought and the memories away. He needed distractions this time of year. Carly was the perfect one.

      He could still see her, slowing as she reached the end of the street, apparently less frantic now that she’d put some distance between them. There was another entrance to the park in that direction. Maybe she was heading there.

      Whatever the case, he planned to follow. At his own pace, because even if he lost sight of her, he could find her again.

      That