Read Online Lover Beware by Christine Feehan, Eileen Wilks, Fiona Brand, Katherine Sutcliffe - Free Book Online Page A

while Sarah told him the events that had taken place the night before. His dark features hardened perceptibly while she talked. He flicked a smoldering glare toward Kate and Abbey. “Why wasn’t I called last night? I might have been able to do something last night. Damn it, Sarah, where’s your head? You could have been killed!”
    “Well, I wasn’t. I saved the rifle for you, hoping you might get prints off of it, but I doubt it.” Sarah smiled at him.
    Jonas shook his head. “Don’t do that; you’ve been giving me that same smile since kindergarten and it always gets you out of trouble.” He gestured toward her face. “Take a long look at her, Damon, because that’s going to be her answer every time she does something you don’t like.” He leaned forward in his chair, his eyes slashing at her. “What about your sisters? Did it even occur to you that you might bring these people down on your own house?”
    Furious, he rose, a big man, moving like a jungle cat, pacing restlessly through the long living room. “These men are professionals. You both know that. Whatever you did to bring this on…”
    “He worked in a high-security job, Jonas, nothing illegal. It isn’t drug related so get that right out of your head.”
    Damon leaned back in his chair, torn between worry that he’d placed the Drake family in danger and feeling pleased that Sarah had turned protective. She immediately had become a fierce tigress ready to spring if the sheriff continued to cast aspersions on his character.
    “I want to know what we’re up against. And don’t start throwing words around like security clearance to me. If we have a couple of men willing to break into a house with a high-powered rifle—”
    “They had a tranq dart in it,” Sarah interrupted hastily.
    “I was kidnapped, along with my assistant, nearly a year ago. My assistant was killed and I barely escaped with my life.” As Damon spoke, a dark shadow fell across the room. Outside, the ocean waves thundered and sprayed into the air. “They wanted information that could have affected the security of our nation and I refused to give it to them.” Damon passed a hand over his face as if wiping away a nightmare. “I know that sounds melodramatic, but…” He slowly unbuttoned his shirt to expose his chest and the whorls and scars left behind. “I want you to know what these people are like.”
    The shadow lengthened and grew along the wall behind Damon. The shadow began to take shape, gray, translucent, but there all the same, growing in form until a faceless ghoul emerged with outstretched arms and a long thin body. The mouth yawned open wide, a gesture of greed and craving for the addiction Death had developed. The arms could have been reaching for either Jonas or Damon.
    Damon hunched away from Jonas, pain flickering across his face, his shoulders stiffening as if under a great load.
    Alarmed, Hannah reached out and jerked Jonas halfway across the room out of harm’s way. Jonas swore under his breath and planted his feet firmly, thinking she was attempting to throw him out of the house.
    Sarah adjusted the blinds at the window, filtering out the light, and returned to Damon’s side, touching him gently. That was all. The lightest of touches. She simply laid her hand over his, yet peace stole into him as he buttoned his shirt. The terrible weight that always seemed to be pressing him into the ground lightened.
    Kate’s eyes filled with tears and she pressed her fingers to her mouth.
    Abbey left the room to return with a cup of tea. “Drink this, Damon,” she said. “You’ll enjoy the taste.”
    The aroma alone added to the soothing touch Sarah had provided. He didn’t think to ask how she had managed to make hot tea in a matter of seconds.
    “I could use a cup of tea,” Jonas said, “if anyone’s asking. And a touch of sanity in the house would be nice, too. Baby Doll was going to huck me right out the door and you all just stood there