Closer, page 18
She’d been ordered to kill him, of course, but she would need to be absolutely sure it was the right thing to do.
Napier had no such compunctions.
No conscience. No morals. No principles, other than to protect his own skin at all costs.
He would not hesitate.
And so neither did I.
I raised an arm across my chest, bent it at the elbow, and swung, with all the strength I possessed.
The point of my elbow struck him hard in the chest, just below the shoulder.
Just where Wilson’s bullet had hit him the day before.
He cried like a squealing pig, his gun hand flew up, and the pistol went flying away across the grass.
He managed to stay upright, one hand clutching at the injured shoulder as a new flow of red stained the bandages and the shirt that covered them.
There was a moment when everything seemed suspended. Napier stood, twisting to clutch his shoulder, peering up at me with a look of shock mixed with absolute rage.
I held that look, wanted him to read in my own look that I wanted him to understand that finally the time had come for me to stand up to the bullies on my own terms.
And then I swung my arm back again before stabbing forward, my fist bunched tight, and I struck him hard – so very hard – in the face.
He collapsed to the ground.
I turned to Cassie, and she looked more surprised than I’d have thought possible. And then I realized just how much my hand hurt, and then she was in my arms and crying with pain and relief and I don’t know what else, because the emotions we both felt then were not of the kind you would normally feel, let alone be able to describe in words.
§
“What now?”
She looked at me. “I thought you were the one with the answers?” she said.
She clearly still couldn’t believe what I had done, and neither, in truth, could I.
Already, they’d come running from the main house, as Cassie and I had hastily retreated into the trees.
We hadn’t stopped yet.
Now, the shock of events was starting to hit. Not just the horror of what we had been through, but the reality that we were still on Napier’s territory, and he had an armed security team here.
We moved as fast as Cassie could go. She was limping, and in a lot of pain. I didn’t know what she’d been through to get here, and now was not the time to ask.
“We need to get away,” I said, stating the obvious.
“And I need to call my team,” Cassie said. “Napier’s little fantasy is over. It has to be.”
“But how...?”
She paused then, and smiled.
“I have an idea,” she told me, before turning and leading the way through the trees once more.
§
We made it to the main road by where Auldbrigg Haw’s main driveway emerged through the forest, and that was where I saw where Cassie’s thinking was leading.
A small group of cars had pulled up by the road here. What looked like hire cars, and a TV van.
Immediately, we were the center of attention. Men and women gathering around us, cameras clicking.
I recognized a face then, the guy who’d given me his business card.
I smiled, nodded at him, and said, “You told me once to call you if I ever wanted to talk.”
He nodded. “And has that time come?” he asked.
“Oh yes. I’m ready to talk. I’m ready to tell you everything about my old pal, Stewart Napier, and the way he tried to hoodwink an entire nation, if you’re ready to listen?”
That was when I realized Cassie had disentangled herself from my arm and slipped away from the cameras.
She’d secured a cellphone from someone and, as I paused, she looked across at me and nodded.
“Go on, Matthew,” she said. “Tell them. Tell them everything, while I make a few calls. And when you’re done I’ll be here waiting for you because I promise you one thing: I’m never going to vanish on you again.”
Afters
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About the author
PJ Adams is a bestselling writer of erotic romance and suspense – love stories with that added heat and adventure. Her most popular titles include two other Section Eight novels (Stolen and Rebound), the Bailey Boys trilogy (Trust, Hit Me and Ruthless), and the standalone novels Winner Takes All, Damage, Let’s Make This Thing Happen, and Black Widow. Writing under other names, PJ is a successful novelist, with several titles published by major publishing houses and optioned for movies.
You can find out more about PJ and her writing on her website, on http://www.facebook.com/pollyjadamswriter and on Twitter as @PollyJAdams.
More from PJ Adams
Stolen
A Section Eight novel
Sometimes, when you can have whatever you want, all that remains is what you can never have...
A missing girl caught up in a vicious family feud, two lovers thrown together after ten years apart, and an estranged brother who finally has everything he wants except revenge...
Jimmy Lazenby could have had it all. A bad boy born into a bad family, he could have inherited a share in a crime empire. Instead he took a different path, determined to redeem himself - to become one of the good guys whatever that might take. But how big is the difference between bad boy with a heart of gold and good guy with a heart of darkness?
All Mel Conners wants is to find her missing friend. But when the trail leads back to her home town she must confront the demons of her past - and all the mistakes she's long since put behind her. Mistakes like Jimmy Lazenby...
Stolen: a novel of second chances, kidnap, and dark family secrets. A gripping and steamy romantic thriller from the author of Trust and Rebound.
Stolen is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
Extract
She came down. Blue jeans, black t-shirt, gray suede jacket. Swollen nose, grazed chin, and something new in her eyes.
Her landlord took one look at her and left the room. This was shit he didn’t want to be involved with – not so much the gun, the bruises, the blood on the shirt, but the look on her face.
“I can’t do this,” she told Jimmy. She spread her hands as if to indicate the scale of this thing she couldn’t do. “This. Us. Whatever it is. I can’t fall. Not again. I won’t let myself.”
Jimmy looked at her, only now understanding the levels of denial under which he’d submerged himself.
“Fall?” he said. “Me neither. I have nowhere left to fall. I fell ten years ago and I never climbed out.”
He shrugged, looked away, looked back at her, at the understanding in her eyes, the knowledge that, deny it all she liked, this thing between them had a momentum she couldn’t divert. It always had.
How could he fall, when he’d never stopped loving her in the first place?
“Breakfast?” he said.
She nodded. Breakfast.
(continues...)
Stolen is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
Rebound
A Section Eight novel
The past... it will always catch up with you in the end.
A retired secret agent with a dark and troubled past, a scientist who only wants to save the world, and a charismatic politician who might just want to stop her...
Alex Mitchell is a man tormented by a dark and mysterious past. Until a couple of years ago he worked for Section Eight, a select group occupying the murky hinterland between the security services and the limits of international law. But now, as his quiet new life at a provincial university starts to unravel and his past catches up, he gets called on for one last job. For one thing will always remain true: you can never truly leave the Section.
Sunita Chakravarti never meant to spend the night with him. That kind of casual thing never held any appeal for her, and even if it did, this is most certainly not the time: her own life is turbulent, and he's just split up with his girlfriend. The last thing Sunita wants is to be his rebound.
And then there's Bernard Bowler, a charismatic politician drawn to Sunita and her work. A man who always gets what he wants. He offers her liberation, but what does he demand in return? And what will he do if she refuses him?
Rebound: a novel of betrayal, kidnap, and possible redemption. A steamy romance, a topical contemporary thriller, and the story of three people thrown together even as they're torn apart.
Rebound is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
Excerpt
She should never have allowed herself to get into this situation.
The kiss. It was reckless. Insane. The element of surprise, of it just happening. The inevitability. The implications.
She couldn't process it right now. The madness of that kiss, the why and the what next of it.
She turned away from him, finally dipping her head against the relentlessness of the chill winter rain. Her face was numb. Her brain, too.
She started to walk, and didn't know if he was following or not, didn't know if she wanted him to be, or what she would do if he was.
And that last... that scared her more than anything.
(continues...)
Rebound is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
Trust
Never trust a man who says, "Trust me."
Jess.
As soon as I saw him, I knew I was in too deep. He's a gentleman criminal. A cold-blooded villain. Half the city's terrified of him and the other's on his payroll. Now his sights are set on me... but I can't let him have me, no matter how much I'm drawn to him. I can't let myself fall.
I came to London to put things right, not lose my heart to a dangerous crimelord. He says he won't hurt me... but how can I trust a man like him?
Dean.
I'm in the thick of the biggest gang war London's ever seen: Russian mobsters on one side of me, crooked police on the other. Then she appears and changes everything. She makes me feel things I've never felt before and can't allow myself to feel now. But already she's closer to me than anyone has ever been... and I'm starting to suspect she has a secret that could destroy us both.
From the moment I saw her I knew I needed her, naked and moaning under me, but I can't afford to give in to that need. Can't afford to care.
Too many lives depend on it, including hers.
Trust: A steamy, edge-of-the-seat romantic suspense thriller from the author of Winner Takes All and Black Widow.
Trust is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
§
Black Widow
Two years ago Eleanor Dryton lost her husband, her job and her friends.
She lost everything about her old life that ever mattered to her.
All she had left were her will and a burning desire for revenge.
Now, El has served her time for being an unknowing partner in her murdered husband's crimes. Her prison sentence has toughened her up and she's learned that she can be bad.
But when her search for revenge leads her to a man who takes bad to a completely different level just how far is she willing to go? If prison has hardened her, what effect will the man who killed her husband have? And does she even have any control over what happens next?
A dark and disturbing romantic thriller from the bestselling author of Winner Takes All and The Object Of His Desire.
Black Widow is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
§
Winner Takes All
When a guy in a tux walks into a bar in the middle of nowhere, dripping wet from the storm, and pulls out a sodden roll of hundred dollar bills, you just know he's going to be trouble.
Denny McGowan has lost his girl, his best friend and millions of dollars. All he has are the clothes on his back, the money in his pocket, an easy, wise-cracking charm that could melt the hardest of hearts... and two gangsters on his tail and out for revenge.
Cassandra Dane is down on her luck, and on the run from a father fresh out of jail. She's probably the last girl you'd expect to hook up with someone as hot and exciting as Denny - and she knows it. But things are not always what they seem and sometimes you're just on the tail-end of a string of bad luck and worse decisions.
When a one-night stand looks like becoming something more than that, Cassie must decide whether she can trust a complete stranger like Denny and work out what he's really after. As matters of the heart become matters of life and death, Cassie has some tough choices to make.
And foremost among these: just how many chances do you give a guy like Denny McGowan?
Winner Takes All: the explosive bad boy romance from bestselling erotic romance author PJ Adams.
Winner Takes All is available from: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon stores.
§
Published by James Grieve Press
© PJ Adams 2019
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Cover images © Kris Cole and ipopba
Cover design by James Grieve
This ebook is copyright material and no portion of it may be reproduced or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's and publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law.
P J Adams, Closer
