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Just like he had commanded. Everything in her focused on keeping the baby alive.
“That’s better. You wouldn’t want the baby to get hurt in the scuffle,” he growled, yanking her away from the office. Several nurses were racing toward them, one of them yelling into a cell phone. A doctor barreled around the corner, eyes wide with shock as she saw what the commotion was about.
“Everyone just stay cool,” Martin said, the gun still pressed into Katie’s abdomen. “I’m not here to hurt anyone. I’m just here for my wife.”
She stiffened at the word but was too afraid to argue.
“I’ve called the police,” the nurse with the cell phone said. “They’ll be here any minute.”
“Good for them,” Martin responded. “Everyone get out of our way.” He pushed open the stairwell door and dragged Katie down two flights of steps. She was stumbling, trying to keep her feet under her, terrified that she’d fall and hurt the baby, that the gun would go off, that he’d get her outside and take her wherever he intended.
“Stop.” She gasped, panicking as they rushed into the lobby on the lower level of the building. “I can’t breathe.”
“You’re breathing just fine, my love,” he murmured, smiling tenderly into her face as he pressed the gun more deeply into her stomach.
“Martin, really. I can’t.”
There were people all around, shocked, afraid. Watching but not intervening, and she couldn’t blame them. Martin was armed and obviously dangerous, his eyes gleaming with the fire of his delusions.
“Hey! You! Let her go!” A security guard raced toward them. No gun. Nothing but a radio and a desire to help.
Martin moved the gun, and Katie had seconds to shove him sideways, to try to ruin his aim, save the guard and free herself.
The bullet slammed into the wall, and a woman shrieked.
For a split second, Katie was free, running back to the stairwell, clawing at the doorknob, trying to get back up the stairs and away from Martin.
He grabbed her jacket and dragged her backward, nearly unbalancing her. She felt the barrel of the gun against the side of her neck.
“Don’t make me hurt you, Katie,” he whispered, his lips brushing her ear.
She froze again.
“That’s my girl. Now, let’s go.” He grabbed her hand, the gun slipping away from her neck, and dragged her outside.
Tony Knight had been a police officer for enough years to know how to stay calm in the most challenging of circumstances.
The current situation demanded every bit of the discipline he had learned during his years on the force.
He watched as Martin Fisher dragged Katie across the crowded parking lot. She wasn’t fighting or protesting, and Tony couldn’t blame her. Martin was swinging the firearm in the direction of anyone who dared to call for him to stop.
Katie had to be terrified.
Katie.
His best friend’s widow.
The word still made his chest tight and his jaw clench. Jordan should be alive, getting ready to celebrate the birth of his first child.
Martin Fisher was responsible for his death.
That was reason enough to take him down.
But, Tony came from a long line of police officers. He believed in the criminal justice system. He believed in due process and trial by jury. He did not believe in vigilantism. To get Katie safely away from Martin, Tony would use whatever force was required. But, he also didn’t believe in risking the lives of innocent civilians—Katie and the big crowd watching. The moment Tony pulled the trigger, so would Martin—with the gun pointed at Katie’s heart.
Tony also didn’t like the idea of firing his weapon when he was aiming at a target so close to Katie.
“Let her go, Martin,” he called, his service weapon aimed at the killer’s head, his police dog, Rusty, by his side. The chocolate-colored Lab growled quietly. Trained in search and rescue, he had a powerful build and split-second reaction time. If asked to, he’d go after the perp and attempt to take him down.
Tony didn’t want to ask him to. Martin would shoot Rusty and have the gun aimed back at Katie in a heartbeat.
“Or what?” Martin asked, his yellow-green eyes focused on Tony.
“I don’t think you want to find out,” Tony responded, trying to keep him talking and buy some time. Backup was on the way. A 911 call had been placed moments before he had arrived at the medical center. He had been running his regular patrol route through Queens, detouring past the four-story brick building every few minutes. Worried, because he knew that none of Jordan’s brothers had been available to accompany Katie to her appointment.
“You’re a big talker, Knight,” Martin snapped, yanking Katie backward. Of course, he knew Tony’s name. He was obsessed with everyone and everything that had anything to do with Katie’s life.
“I’m also big on action. Let her go.”
Martin scowled. He was moving Katie to the edge of the paved lot. A few feet of lush grass separated the medical clinic’s property from the edge of Forest Park. Tall oak trees marked the eastern edge of the public area.
“But, you won’t risk Katie’s or the baby’s life,” Martin said. “For the sake of your buddy Jordan, if nothing else.”
He was right.
Tony couldn’t take a chance. He was confident in his ability to hit his mark, but if Katie moved, if Martin yanked her at just the wrong moment, she or the baby could be injured.
Or, worse.
He couldn’t allow that to happen.
“Put your gun down, Martin. Let her go. We’ll get you the help you need.”
“I don’t need help. I need my family.” He pulled Katie into his chest, pressing the gun against her side. The barrel was hidden by the soft swell of her abdomen, but Tony could see her face, her blue eyes and her blond ponytail snaking over her shoulder.
“Please, Martin,” she said, her voice shaking. “Just let me go. We can talk things out after you’ve gotten treatment.”
“Treatment for what?” Martin asked coldly, his eyes blazing hot in his impassive face.
He was delusional and dangerous, and he was stepping into the grass, dragging Katie with him.
Tony needed to stop him before he made it into the park.
“You were in the hospital,” Tony pointed out, stepping closer, his gun dropping to his side. He wanted Martin to be off guard and vulnerable, unprepared for what was going to happen. “And, from what I heard, you were doing well there.”
He hadn’t actually heard much, but Martin would do just fine locked up in a mental health facility for the remainder of his life.
“I didn’t ask for your opinion. Or, the opinion of anyone else,” Martin snapped, but the gun had fallen away from Katie’s side, and he was glancing back, eyeing the sparse growth of oaks that heralded the beginning of parkland.
The proximity of Forest Park might make it more difficult to apprehend Martin. Tony was determined to get Katie away from the guy, but if Martin managed to disappear into the park, there would be plenty of footpaths and several roads that he could use to make a quick escape.
“Get back in your car,” Martin said coldly. “I would never hurt Katie, but Jordan’s kid means nothing to me.” He jabbed the gun into Katie’s stomach, and she winced.
“You can’t hurt the baby without hurting the mother,” Tony reminded him.
“I’m not as stupid as people think I am. I know a lot of tricks.” Martin moved backward, away from Tony, his K-9 vehicle and the parking lot.
Tony unhooked Rusty’s lead from his collar so he could release him. Normally the chocolate Lab wouldn’t attack. He was a placid, easygoing house companion and a die-hard worker when it came to search and rescue, but he hadn’t been trained to unarm dangerous criminals. He did, however, have a fierce desire to protect his pack.
Right now, he was barking, sensing the tension and anxiety and ready to do what he had to in order to make certain his people were safe.
“And don’t even think about releasing that dog!” Martin screamed, the gun shifting away from Katie as he focused on Rusty.
Katie slammed her elbow into his stomach.
Martin gasped and dropped the gun from his hand.
“Go!” Tony shouted, releasing Rusty as Katie darted away.
TWO (#u25871cba-47df-5c4a-864a-ae6f4a390964)
Fight. Free yourself. Run.
Jordan’s words echoed through Katie’s head as she sprinted away. He had said them dozens of times when he had taught the self-defense class she had signed up for a few weeks after taking the job teaching in Queens. The neighborhood had been safe, but she had grown up in the suburbs, and the hustle and bustle of the city had been disconcerting.
Plus, she had been a young woman, alone.
She had wanted to know that she could defend herself.
She had not been thinking about defending an unborn child.
She hadn’t been thinking about being a wife or a mother. She had been thinking about living life on her terms. That was something she had not been able to do when she had been a teenager moving through the foster-care system.
Rusty growled and snapped as he dashed by.
She ran in the opposite direction, darting off the curb, her ankle twisting. She tried to right herself, but the pregnancy made her ungainly, her body front-heavy and cumbersome.
She tripped and went down, hands and knees skidding across asphalt. Someone grabbed her arm and pulled her to her feet. It had to be Martin!
She fought the way Jordan had taught her.
Elbow to the stomach, pushing back into his weight.
“Katie, stop. It’s me,” Tony said.
She knew his voice.
If she had not been so panicked, she’d have known his gentle touch—his fingers curving lightly around her upper arm.
He had done the same at the funeral, standing beside her as Jordan’s coffin was lowered into the ground.
Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust.
She stopped struggling and whirled toward the park. “Where did he go?”
There was no sign of Martin, but Rusty was nearing a copse of trees, still barking ferociously. He was trained in search and rescue and had no business going after a deranged and dangerous man.
“Rusty is going to get hurt,” she said, her voice shaking. “You need to call him back.”
“He’ll be okay,” Tony responded. He was tracking the dog’s movements as he relayed information into the radio.
If he was worried, she couldn’t hear it in his voice.
But, then, he was one of New York’s finest. Just like Jordan had been. He had great training, a good head on his shoulders and the ability to stay calm even in the most challenging circumstances.
He and Jordan had been best friends.
My fourth brother.
How many times had Jordan said that?
And how often had Katie set an extra plate at the dinner table? How often had she watched as the two men tossed balls for their K-9 partners in the yard behind the three-family house they’d shared with the Jameson clan? Countless times. She and Jordan had lived on the second level of the home. His parents just below them. His brothers and young niece above. They were the family she had longed for after her parents had died. They were the connection she had prayed she would have during the years she had spent drifting from one foster home to the next.
She had thought life would keep going in the same positive direction. She had thought—wrongly so—that the tragedy of losing her parents in a car accident when she was ten was enough for a lifetime.
She should have known better.
There was nothing in the Bible about life being easy.
There were no promises made to the faithful.
Except that God would be there. Guiding. Helping. Creating good out of bad.
The problem was Katie couldn’t see how anything good could come of losing Jordan. Or, of being stalked by a deranged man.
She shuddered, then her eyes widened. “Ivy! My mother-in-law. He hit her with the gun. Is she all right? I need to know that Ivy is all right!”
Word came over the radio just then that the building was secure, the suspect was on the loose and one victim, Ivy Jameson, had come to and was being treated for a minor head injury.
“Thank God,” Katie said, the breath whooshing out of her.
“It’s going to be okay,” Tony murmured, his hand still on her arm. “We’ll get him.”
“I hope so,” she replied.
His gaze dropped from her face to her belly.
There was a smudge of dirt on her shirt.
