Crossfire Christmas. Julie Miller

toward independence. “I need to pick up some groceries. And I was planning to do a little Christmas shopping.”

      “Teresa—”

      “Then I’m going straight to my apartment to bake cookies for Laila and the other pediatric patients to decorate. What kind of trouble can I get into buying baking goods and Christmas gifts?”

      Emilia arched a dark brow. “Gamberro—” aka Troublemaker “—is your middle name, Teresa.” She tempered her skepticism with a smile and a hug. “Just remember you can call any of us if you have a problem with your car or the roads. I don’t want you stranded out in the cold.”

      Were any of her older siblings getting the same lecture? Of course, they all had spouses and children at home expecting their arrival, who’d worry if they didn’t show up at a certain place at a certain time. Teresa didn’t even have a cat waiting for her at her apartment. She should be more appreciative of their concern.

      “I won’t be. But just in case, I’ve got an emergency kit in my trunk, complete with blankets and flares, and I’ll keep my cell phone in my pocket.” Teresa tightened her arms briefly around her sister, then pulled back to touch Emilia’s distended belly. “Now you go home and get off your feet. Hug Justin and my nephew and get yourself and this little one some rest.”

      The tension in her sister’s face eased as she placed her hand beside Teresa’s. “I think this one is going to be like her tía Teresa.”

      “Pretty and smart?”

      Emilia laughed. “A handful. I swear this one tosses and turns twenty-four hours a day. Not at all like when I was pregnant with her big brother.”

      Teresa sobered with concerns of her own. “Do you need me to drive you home? Is your blood pressure spiking again?”

      “No, no.” Really? Her family wouldn’t even let her do this little thing? “Justin is coming by the hospital to get me after he picks up Joey from day care. I’m fine. You just take care of yourself. Unless you want Justin to drive you home, too?”

      Teresa bit down on her frustration and summoned a smile for her sister. “No, thanks. I’ll be fine.”

      Emilia cupped Teresa’s cheek before turning away. “Have you decided what you’re doing for the holiday yet?”

      “I’m planning a Christmas party for the children here the afternoon of the twenty-fifth.”

      “I mean Christmas morning. It would be fun for all of us to help with your party later in the day. We could make extra food and bring gifts. Joey and our nieces and nephews would have fun playing with the boys and girls here.” Teresa knew that look—the one that said I love you and You’ll need our help at the same time. “But you’ll be joining us all at AJ and Claire’s to unwrap presents and eat brunch, right?”

      Teresa understood mixed emotions all too well. Just as much as she loved her family, she wanted them to respect her skills and maturity and desire to be who she needed to be. But that battle was for another time. Not the holidays.

      Her answer was sincere. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

       Chapter Two

      Nash couldn’t remember how long he’d been driving, and he had no clue where the highway was taking him.

      Shaking off the fogginess in his head, he pulled off the next exit ramp and drove through some cookie-cutter neighborhood mecca. The front yards were dotted with wire reindeer and giant inflatable lawn ornaments. The snow and suburbia were as foreign to him as the need to find an ally who could help him.

      He blinked away the frost forming on his eyelashes as his brain skipped from one random thought to the next. It was freaking cold here in Missouri; he had no driver’s-side window to roll up and he’d lost his hat. He loved that hat. It was a sentimental homage to the boys ranch where he’d lived and worked and gone to school after his parents’ deaths at the hands of a pair of drugged-up teenagers who’d invaded their home. Nash had grown up and taken a job with the DEA to combat the flow of drugs into Texas and other parts of the U.S., to stop another tragedy like his parents’ murders, to help troubled kids like he’d been find a healthier way to deal with the crap life threw at them.

      He usually oversaw or handled undercover operations where an agent infiltrated a gang or cartel or independent meth lab to gather information to stop the drugs being made, trafficked or sold. But two of his agents had been exposed as cops and killed. So he’d gone undercover himself to find out how and why and who and had ended up with too many suspects and too little concrete evidence.

      Somehow, Berto Graciela had found out he was a cop, too.

      He was driving in circles.

      Tommy Delvecchio was dead.

      “Ah, hell.” A moment of painful clarity put the brakes on Nash’s rambling thoughts.

      He’d come to Kansas City with one desperate plan in mind. Without knowing who’d betrayed him in Houston, he’d gone elsewhere to find a sanctuary where he could lie low long enough to safely figure out his next move.

      He reconsidered calling Jake Lonergan, who’d left the DEA due to a nearly fatal head injury that had robbed him of his memory. Jake probably didn’t want any part of the violence chasing Nash to enter his happily-ever-after life. But, sitting in a pool of his own blood and panting for nearly every breath, Nash knew his luck was running out. It might cost him a friendship, but Jake was all he had left.

      Taking his hand off the reloaded gun at his side, Nash brushed the snow off his lap at the next stoplight and reached inside the bag Tommy had brought him to pull out the untraceable phone. Even that subtle shift in his seat renewed the pain like a stab in the back. Thug One had winged him in the leg, creating a discomfort he could simply throw a bandage over. But Thug Three had got him good. He still couldn’t tell if the bullet had gone through or if it was lodged inside him somewhere. All he knew was that he was hurt. He was bleeding. And he wasn’t going to get any better on his own.

      The light changed. A horn honked behind him before Nash stepped on the accelerator and moved along with the traffic past a busy shopping mall and a modern hospital. He debated whether or not to turn off into the hospital’s E.R. But if the men after him were smart—and clearly they were or they wouldn’t have tracked him to K.C.—they’d be checking E.R.s across the city looking for him. Besides, a gunshot victim showing up in a hospital was an automatic call to the local police and a subsequent alert to the DEA office in Houston. That was the kind of publicity he didn’t need. Until he knew who had set him up, trusting anyone, even a cop, wasn’t a good idea.

      When he reached the next crossroads, Nash spotted a narrow two-lane road leading away from the suburbs and turned. He needed to get someplace without all these cars and people—someplace where he could put the first-aid kit in his bag to good use without anyone trying to help him or ask any questions. He needed a place where he could pull off and make sense of the dancing letters and numerals on his phone as he tried to recall Jake Lonergan’s number, which had been programmed into the phone he didn’t want to reactivate.

      The truck wheels spun on a patch of snow-packed road and he dropped his phone to grab the wheel and keep the big Ford from skidding across the asphalt. Coming from Houston, he wasn’t used to driving in weather like this. Of course, if the world outside his cracked windshield hadn’t been such a blur, and he hadn’t been shivering from the icy wind blowing in through his busted window, he might have been able to handle the treacherous stretch of winding road he’d pulled off onto.

      But he was hurt. He was bleeding. He was cold.

      When he crested the hill and hit the next patch of black ice, Mother Nature finally did what a half dozen thugs in two different cities hadn’t been able to do.

      She took him out.

      Nash’s truck sailed