Secret Surrogate. Delores Fossen

for this official visit, there was no reason for him to stay.

      “I’ll be at my house if you need to get in touch with me,” Lucas advised. Not exactly standard procedure, but it was a courtesy he would have extended to anyone in his jurisdiction. “Since there’s no one at the office, don’t call dispatch or 911. Just ring straight through to the house. I can be here in fifteen minutes.”

      “Thanks.” It had a definite goodbye kind of tone to it. She turned, her bathrobe swishing like a gunslinger’s duster, and went back inside.

      Only after she’d closed the door did Lucas realize that at some point he’d stopped breathing. He slowly released the air from his lungs and forced himself to get moving. No easy feat. He felt raw and drained from their encounter.

      He stayed on the narrow gravel and dirt road that led from her house to the highway. Walking fast. Trying not to think.

      It didn’t work.

      Not that he thought it would.

      The cold darkness closed in around him, smothering him, and with it came the flood of memories. Because he had no choice, he stopped and leaned against a sprawling oak. Thankfully, Kylie’s house was no longer in sight, and that meant she wouldn’t be able to see him if he disgraced himself by completely falling apart.

      And it certainly felt as if that were about to happen.

      The adrenaline and the nausea crashed through him. As if the events of that day were happening now, at this moment, and not three years ago. However, three years wasn’t nearly enough time to diminish all the brutal details that’d stayed with him. Heck, a million years wouldn’t make him forget.

      Deputy Kylie Monroe had been on patrol that day when the call came in. A robbery at the convenience store on the edge of town. She’d responded and gone in pursuit of two unidentified armed suspects who were on foot. Even though Kylie had called for backup, she hadn’t waited. Instead, she’d begun a dangerous, unauthorized foot chase through the streets of Fall Creek.

      That had set off a deadly chain of events.

      One of the robbery suspects must have panicked because he stopped and fired at Kylie. He missed. Well, he missed Kylie, anyway. Instead, he’d hit Lucas’s pregnant wife, Marissa, who at that moment had stepped out of the grocery store.

      The one shot had been fatal.

      In the blink of an eye, Kylie had lost her best friend. And Lucas had lost his wife and the baby she had been carrying. Marissa had been only two months pregnant, barely enough time for him to come to terms with the concept of fatherhood. And it’d been snatched away.

      Everything had been snatched away.

      He’d known that the moment he had rounded the corner and had seen his wife lying on the sidewalk. Kylie, kneeling next to her. Marissa, nearly lifeless and bleeding, whispering the last words she’d ever say. Not to him. But to Kylie. Marissa hadn’t been able to say anything to him because she’d died before he could get to her.

      Another irony.

      Marissa, the woman he loved, hadn’t even been able to say goodbye to him. Yet, the person responsible for her death—Kylie—had been the beneficiary of those final precious seconds of Marissa’s life. Her last breath. Her final words. Lucas hadn’t heard those words firsthand, but in the minutes following Marissa’s death, while Kylie still had his wife’s blood on her hands, Kylie had repeated them like a mantra.

      Don’t let my death kill Lucas, Marissa had told Kylie. Look after him. Help him heal. Make sure he’s happy.

      Make sure he’s happy.

      Right.

      As if that could ever happen. Marissa had used her last breath to ask the impossible. Even if Kylie had ever had a desire to fulfill her best friend’s dying wish, he wouldn’t have let her try. There was no way he wanted Kylie Monroe to have any part in his healing.

      Lucas couldn’t bear the pain any longer, so he forced himself to think of his future. His baby. Being a father wasn’t a cure-all. It wouldn’t rid him of the gaping hole in his heart. But it would get him moving in the right direction. And he couldn’t wait for that to begin. Four and a half months, and he’d be able to hold his child.

      The sound snapped him out his daydream, and Lucas automatically aimed his weapon and turned in the direction of the noise he’d heard.

      A soft rustle of leaves, not made by a stir of wind, either. No. This was much more substantial. As if someone were walking through the woods. But not walking in just any direction.

      Directly toward Kylie’s house.

      That gave him another hefty shot of adrenaline. Not that he needed it. His body had already shifted into combat mode.

      Lucas stepped back into the dense underbrush and trees. He started retracing his steps, following the road. Quietly, so that he wouldn’t be detected and so that he could listen.

      He didn’t like what he heard.

      Definitely footsteps.

      Probably not just one set, either. At least two. Both heavy enough to belong to men. Big men.

      And that brought him back to the two possible suspects that Kylie had spotted in the woods.

      The trespassing duo had apparently returned for round two. But what did they want? Was this simply a case of trespassing, or was it something more?

      Did it have to do with that controversial article she’d written? If so, if they’d been sent there to intimidate her, it could turn ugly. Because he knew that Kylie wouldn’t intimidate easily. Even pregnant, she would make a formidable foe.

      Lucas eased deeper into the woods as he approached the house. No sign of the men, but the porch light was off again. Maybe because Kylie had also heard them and wanted the shelter of the darkness. If so, that meant she was probably terrified. Worse, she didn’t know he was still outside, still keeping watch.

      He stopped at a clearing and tried to pick through the sounds and the scents to determine what he was up against. There was a rattle of motion, the sound of a scuffle. Not good. So, he hurried forward, still searching.

      He didn’t have to search long.

      The side door to Kylie’s garage flew open. Milky, yellow light speared into the darkness.

      So did two armed men. Both were dressed from head to toe in dark clothes and were wearing ski masks.

      And they weren’t alone.

      They were dragging Kylie out of the house.

      Chapter Three

      Kylie had no time to react.

      The two men came at her—fast. Rushing across the kitchen straight toward her.

      Her only warning had been the soft click of her laundry room door. That was it. The lone indication that the two masked armed men had somehow picked the lock and had gotten inside her house.

      She turned to run to try to get her gun, which she’d left on the table in the foyer.

      She didn’t get far.

      One of them latched onto her, using his beefy hand to stop her. He curved his arm like a vise around her neck. Her throat snapped shut, clamping off all but a shallow scream. But that didn’t stop her from reacting.

      Her instincts cried out for her to escape. And she tried. She really tried. Kylie rammed her elbow into the man’s muscled stomach. He staggered back, just slightly, but not nearly enough for her to break free of his fierce grip.

      Refusing to give up, she pivoted and went for his eyes using the heel of her hand.

      It didn’t work.

      The man was huge, well over six feet tall and heavily muscled. Literally overpowering her, he grabbed her and shoved her forward into the waiting arms of the