A Promise to Protect. Liz Johnson

car. They left the doors open; the petite blonde behind the wheel flew around the front of the car and hugged the other, a taller woman with dark hair.

      “You’ll be great, Carmen!” the blonde said, clutching the other’s shoulders. “Now, go knock it out of the park.”

      “Thank you. Thank you for everything.” Long curly hair flew behind her as Carmen ran to the door of the closest shop, offering the briefest of waves before disappearing inside.

      Matt’s gaze jumped back to the blonde. He caught the end of her wide smile, which sent his pulse skittering as if he’d just run five miles in the sand. The wind picked up a strand of her hair and the hem of her green skirt, but she wrestled them both back into place, never taking her eyes off the closed door.

      She blinked long lashes, her smile settling from pure joy into pride as he drew even with her and caught a glimpse of stunning blue eyes. Familiar blue eyes. It couldn’t be. There was no way this woman was Tristan’s little sister.

      Her eyebrows rose suddenly. “Matt?”

      He stopped in midstride, his smile growing slowly. “Ashley?”

      All of a sudden she threw her arms around his shoulders, hugging him as though she’d never quit. She must have been nearly on her toes to reach that high. He awkwardly patted her back. Ashley was the closest thing he’d ever had to a little sister, but he was out of practice. He hadn’t seen her in more than four years. In fact, the last time he’d seen her, she was more teenager than woman. And SEAL training didn’t include continuing courses in relating to your best friend’s kid sister.

      She rocked back on her heels, her eyes glowing. “I thought you were injured. Tristan called and said... Are you all right?” Her nose wrinkled as she squinted her eyes to narrow their focus on his.

      Could she see straight through him with that gaze? His stomach twisted, and he bit his tongue to keep from laughing at the way she looked at once very childlike—freckles still paraded over her nose—and all grown-up. Finally he replied, “I’ll live.”

      She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Have it your way.” She glanced down the sidewalk and then back to the door behind him. “I’m in town to run some errands. Can you join me?”

      “Sure. I’d love to.”

      She nodded to the pharmacy behind her. “I have to pick up a prescription.” As she led him down an aisle toward the back counter, she shot him a dazzling smile. “I’m so happy to see you, but what on earth are you doing here? Tristan made some joke about sending you here to recuperate, but I thought he was just kidding.”

      He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and prayed she wouldn’t be upset. He remembered a fight she’d had with Tristan during Matt’s first visit to their home. Tristan had tried to get her to break up with her boyfriend. Sixteen-year-old Ashley hadn’t appreciated Tristan sticking his nose in her business. But maybe that had changed in eight years.

      “Your brother did send me...but not to recuperate.”

      Her eyebrows pinched together as she turned to accept a bottle of pink syrup from the white-coated pharmacist. “Thank you.” She tipped a smile to the man on the other side of the counter, but when she turned back to Matt, her face was filled with questions, although she asked only one. “Why did he send you, then?”

      “He was worried. Said your mom called him, too.”

      She looked up into the fluorescent lights and crossed her arms before picking up a wire basket at the end of one of the aisles and tossing a bag of Christmas ribbons into it. “It’s really not a big deal. I wish you’d just called instead of wasting a trip up here.”

      “What happened?” His knee buckled as he took a step to follow her, and he silently chastised it, hating every moment that his body didn’t perform at its peak.

      “You first.” She picked up two tubes of antibacterial ointment but glanced pointedly at his leg.

      “Nothing.”

      “Liar.”

      He chuckled as she put her basket down on the counter and the cashier began ringing up her items. “Fine. I ran into a guy with a knife. Ended up with a few stitches.”

      The cashier shot him a curious stare, but Ashley only handed her the cash to pay for her purchases before leading him toward the door.

      “You make it sound like nothing, but I know it’s not.” She clearly had all sorts of questions, but he didn’t have any answers for them. That mission was classified, and even if it wasn’t, he wasn’t going to tell her he’d saved her brother from a guy with an eight-inch blade. She had enough on her plate without adding on more fears for her brother. He’d protected his best friend—that was what mattered. And now he was going to protect his friend’s sister.

      They stepped out onto the sidewalk, and she let him carry the bags as they strolled around the corner to a small secondhand clothing store.

      When it was clear that she wasn’t going to fill in the blanks in her own story without prompting, he figured that the best strategy would be to charge right in. “So what happened that has your mom so worried that she called and riled up your brother?”

      Ashley ducked behind a circular rack of sweaters, blocking her face by holding up a top that should have only been worn by traffic cones. “Nothing worth making this much of a fuss about.”

      “You’re bad at this.”

      The sweater dropped, revealing rows of parallel wrinkles on her forehead and shining eyes. “Shopping?”

      He didn’t back down from the intensity of her gaze. “Dodging the question.” The room was so full that he had to slide between the overstuffed racks like a sand snake to reach her side. Without drawing undue attention from the pair of women on the far side of the store, he leaned in so that she couldn’t look away. When she blinked up at him with ocean-blue eyes and tucked her bottom lip between her teeth, his stomach lurched. “Tristan is the closest thing to a brother I’ve ever had. He’s worried about you, and so am I. I promised him I’d check in on you. Let me help.”

      Fear flickered through her eyes, and she broke eye contact, taking the moment to hang the orange monstrosity back on its hanger, which seemed to take a lot longer than it should.

      Matt couldn’t do his job if he couldn’t read body language, and right now hers was telling him that she felt she was in over her head. Something had happened to put her in danger, even if she didn’t want to admit it. The direct approach hadn’t worked—maybe he could ease her into it, if he could get her talking.

      “Tristan tells me that you’re running a battered women’s shelter.”

      “That’s right.”

      He caught her gaze as she picked up several tops at least two sizes too big for her. “He brags about you all the time. Tells us how smart and talented you are.” She looked away. He’d stepped over the line. She may have been like a little sister, but it didn’t mean he knew her well enough to gush like he had. Time to get the conversation back on track. “But he says that not everyone is happy with the work that you’re doing. That sometimes the husbands and boyfriends of the women you’re helping get angry. Make threats. Maybe even...attack you directly.”

      Still not meeting his gaze again, she whispered, “Someone wasn’t paying attention and almost ran me over.” She ran her fingers over the hangers on the metal frame, studying the shirts as though there would be a test on them later. “It just rattled me a bit, but I’m sure it was just an accident now.”

      “Tristan said something about a letter,” Matt pressed.

      Ashley nodded, examining a stain on the front of one of the shirts. Frowning, she put it back and picked up another. “When I got home that day, there was an anonymous note saying that someone wanted his property back.”

      “You get a lot of anonymous letters?”