Love Inspired Suspense April 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 by Laura Scott (free e reader .TXT) 📕

The army’s Criminal Investigative Division was one of the world’s elite law enforcement agencies. “I want to make a difference. The Marshals Service has been after me for some time. The head honcho seems to think my computer skills will come in handy.”

“So you’d be riding a desk?”

“Well, that and other things.” Now it was his turn to be cautious.

Paige circled the room, came back to face him. “If this is what you want, then I’m happy for you. I really am.”

The but hung so loudly in the air that he could all but see it forming a barrier between them. “But?” He reached up to cup her jaw and felt the resistance there. More than resistance, though, was distance.

She took a step backward. Another. The actual distance involved was small, but the emotional chasm it created was deep enough to drown in. “But I don’t know if I can be a part of it. I don’t know if I want to be part of it.”

All at once, the distance grew and loomed in front of him, a void filled with unanswered questions, unbroken silences.

“I don’t understand.” That was the truth. He didn’t understand. “You just said you loved me.”

“I do.” She paused, one of those pauses that made you wonder if it would last forever. “You almost died a couple of weeks ago. I was there with you, praying with everything I had. Begging the Lord to keep you alive.”

“I know.” Her prayers had likely saved his life. But even before that, he’d recognized that he needed the Lord in his life.

“What do your parents think?”

“About what you’d expect. They’d feel better if I stayed with the software company, but they want me to be happy.”

“How about safe? Do they want you to be safe, too?” Her voice took on an accusing note. Apparently she heard it as well for she took a deep breath. “Of course they do. I saw how much they love you.”

“They know I’m not going to do anything foolish.” This wasn’t going the way he’d planned.

“You almost died.”

“You said that.”

“I lost Ethan.” Her voice caught, and she turned away.

He placed his hands on her shoulders, gently turned her around. When she avoided his gaze, he put a finger beneath her chin and lifted it so that their eyes met. His heart bumped up to his throat, and he yearned to take away all the pain harbored inside her. He recognized it as pain because he had experienced the same sense of loss, of grief.

She lifted her gaze. “Sometimes I think I’m over the heartache of his dying, but then something happens. A memory trigger, I call it. And it all floods back. The grief, the bewilderment, the wondering why.” She brushed at the tears that ran down her cheeks. “Then there’re the questions. Could I have stopped it? If I’d been better at my job, could I have stopped the lowlife who took that shot?”

“Paige.” He wanted to wipe away the tears. To hold her and promise nothing would ever hurt her again. But such thoughts were futile, and so he held his tongue. The temptation was strong to take her in his arms, but this wasn’t the time. Or the place. “You’re smart enough to know that none of that is true. I know you—I know you did everything you could to save Ethan. It isn’t in you to do less.”

“How can you know? I don’t even know.” She sounded lost, so unlike her usual confident self. “The past has a way of reinventing itself,” she said. “Just when you think you’ve made peace with it, think you’re over it, something happens and you realize you’re not over it at all.”

“I know. But I’m not Ethan.” By force of will, he refrained from shouting the words, even when he’d wanted to roar them, such was his frustration. He took her hands in his once more and gentled his voice. “I survived two tours in Afghanistan. I think I can handle being a marshal here in the States.”

“Don’t you dare downplay it.” The words cracked through the air, an indictment of his attempt to do exactly that—downplay it. “I’ve worked with marshals in the past. They handle WITSEC. They also escort high-value prisoners. It’s not a day in the park.”

“No, it’s not. But I need it. After everything we’ve been through, I thought you’d understand. You put your life on the line. I’ve seen you do it.” It would be all right, he told himself. She just needed time to get used to it.

Her voice turned defensive. “That’s not typical for me. I usually sit behind a desk playing geek.”

“Geek is good, and I’ve done it for a number of years. Maybe I will again. But right now I want more. I need more. Can’t you understand?” He heard the pleading in the words. Since when did he beg?

“No, I don’t understand at all. What about Jonah?”

“Jonah doesn’t care what I do, only that I love him.”

“And if something happens to you? What then?” Accusation rang in her words, and he found himself reacting to it.

“It won’t.” The snap in his voice caused him to pull back, to try to understand where she was coming from. “It won’t.”

“I can’t be with another man who puts himself in harm’s way.”

“I’m not Ethan.” He kept his tone even, though he was beginning to resent being compared to a dead man. In an attempt to hold on to his temper, he drew in a sharp breath.

There was that distance again. And with it, he feared, an impenetrable wall between them. Paige wanted a guarantee that he wouldn’t be hurt, and he couldn’t, in all honesty, give that to her.

“You want to deny what we have because you can’t see past your fears.” Now he was the one who sounded accusing.

“That’s not fair. I love you. That’s not going to change. But I can’t lose you like that. I can’t go