Defensive Action. Jenna Kernan

      Her hysterical elation ebbed as the sedan’s red taillights flared. The vehicle moved back onto the road and turned.

      When she next spoke, she was surprised at the deadpan quality of her voice.

      “They’re following us.”

       Chapter Two

      Haley glanced back to the highway and the guardrail that cascaded past her window at dizzying speeds. Then she turned to the shirtless stranger, who was dressed in pants streaked with grease. Blood oozed from the road rash on his shoulder and she wondered if he was staining the upholstery.

      The ridiculousness of that worry forced a hysterical laugh from Haley. He glanced from the road to her and she covered her mouth to block out the worrisome sound of her panic-stricken giggle.

      He was clean-shaven with dark brown hair cut short enough for her to see the gash on his scalp above his ear. His sooty lashes framed deep brown eyes that took her breath away.

      “You okay?” he asked, scanning her with those arresting eyes.

      “I don’t think so.” She pointed to the blood that trickled down his forehead. “You’re bleeding.”

      His biceps flexed and his pecs strained as he turned the wheel. Haley’s ears buzzed, from fear, she told herself, but the tingling awareness that made her skin pucker was something else altogether.

      He had glanced at her for only an instant, yet she was breathless. His attention now on the road, she forced herself to look away from his athletic figure and the skin that glowed a healthy golden-bronze. Her attention landed on the speedometer. Was he going ninety miles an hour on this crummy, poorly maintained stretch of lonely highway?

      They spoke in unison.

      “That’s too fast,” she said, pointing at the dash.

      “Thanks for stopping,” he said, glancing to the rearview mirror. “Do you have something to clear away this glass?”

      Only then did Haley glance forward. How could he even see? The front windshield was a web of tiny bits of shatter-resistant glass held together by some clear film.

      “I don’t know. Golf umbrella?” She’d gotten it free when opening a bank account despite the fact that she did not golf and that it was miles too big for use on a city street. She had lots of bank accounts now, all over town.

      “Great.” He held out his hand. Duct tape still clung to the dark hairs on his forearm.

      She scrambled in the seat behind her, past the bags of groceries to the umbrella wedged beneath.

      “Is that food?” he asked.

      “Yes.” As if she’d travel four to six hours without food, a first-aid kit and a mobile-phone charger.

      “Do you have anything to drink?”

      She thought of the thermos half full of cold coffee and instead opted for something unopened. A moment later, she returned her backside to the seat holding the golf umbrella in one hand and a bottle of Snapple Grapeade in the other.

      He grasped the umbrella first in one hand and used the handle to pound. His muscles corded and relaxed again and again until he’d punched a hole the size of a basketball from the windshield before him. Now wind whistled through the cab.

      She held out the Snapple. He lay the umbrella between the seats and took the bottle, holding it for her to open.

      Haley tried one-handed, but of course couldn’t make the cap come loose. So she gripped his hand with hers and twisted, feeling immediately sorry because the heat of his hand and the long elegance of his cupped fingers made her insides tighten. The cap popped.

      The stranger brought the bottle to his lips and drank, draining the contents in three long swallows. Haley blinked in astonishment. Liquid clung to his lips and a droplet trickled over the shadow of a beard. He captured the escaping fluid with his pink tongue.

      A flame of unwanted desire flashed to life inside her. Haley swallowed hard and sat back in her seat clutching one arm around her quivering stomach.

      “Would you please tell me what is happening?” Had she just said please to the man who had hijacked her and her car? She squeezed her eyes shut. She had.

      “Kidnapped,” he said.

      Her hands went to her mouth. Her mother’s fears coming true. She was being abducted. “Oh, my goodness.”

      “Not you. Me.”

      She nodded, unable to speak.

      “I’m an undercover detective and those guys are the ones I’m investigating. They made me. Now they’re bringing me out here to kill me and dump my body. That’s after they tortured me to find out what we know. Said they’d tear my teeth out one by one with a pair of pliers.”

      Her skin went clammy. She glanced behind them. They were being pursued by mobsters.

      “You have a phone?” he asked.

      She pointed to the wheel well at his feet. “No reception.”

      He made a scoop and captured the mobile, checking for a signal and then dropping the useless thing into the cup holder.

      “What’s your name?”

      “Haley Nobel.”

      “Well, Haley, I’m Detective Howard Insbrook.”

      What did she say now? Certainly not a pleasure because this was anything but.

      “Nice to... Hi.”

      He cast her an odd look.

      “Where you from?” he asked.

      “Born in Albany, NY, now living in Brooklyn.” She answered as if under investigation.

      “I work on a joint task force on organized crime out of Glens Falls,” he said. “What is it you do?”

      She hesitated. “Uh, I’m a computer programmer.”

      “Who for?”

      “Independent. I take on contract work, here and there. Work from home. You know.”

      Her latest gig was an important client, the US Department of Homeland Security, but she wasn’t telling him that. She had a clearance level and everything. Unfortunately the job included not telling friends and family exactly what she was up to.

      “Hmm,” he said and his gazed flicked to the rearview.

      The sedan was just behind them. He swerved and braked, causing the other vehicle to appear to rocket up beside them. She glimpsed the passenger clearly through the collapsed window. He was pointing a handgun at them but their pursuers zipped forward until Haley’s front fender came parallel with the mobster’s rear door.

      Detective Insbrook turned hard into the side of the opposite car as he punched the gas.

      She pressed both palms to the ceiling upholstery and screamed but the sound was lost over the shriek of metal raking over metal.

      The sedan turned before her rental car, pushed into an involuntary spin that sent the opposite vehicle careening by her passenger-side window and into the guardrail as they whizzed on.

      “Where did you learn to do that?”

      “The academy,” he said.

      She craned her neck to see the pursuit vehicle piled against the guardrail, the hood crumpled like a crushed aluminum can.

      They wouldn’t be able to see over that hood, even if the car was drivable. She turned back to him.

      “I don’t think they can come after us now,” she said.

      “But