Wicked Intentions (Steele Secrurity Book 4) Read online

  Wicked Intentions

  A. D. Justice

  Contents

  TITLE

  COPYRIGHT

  PROLOGUE

  1. CHAPTER ONE

  2. CHAPTER TWO

  3. CHAPTER THREE

  4. CHAPTER FOUR

  5. CHAPTER FIVE

  6. CHAPTER SIX

  7. CHAPTER SEVEN

  8. CHAPTER EIGHT

  9. CHAPTER NINE

  10. CHAPTER TEN

  11. CHAPTER ELEVEN

  12. CHAPTER TWELVE

  13. CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  14. CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  15. CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  16. CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  17. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  18. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  19. CHAPTEN NINETEEN

  20. CHAPTER TWENTY

  21. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  22. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  23. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  EPILOGUE

  BOOKS BY A.D. JUSTICE

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  TITLE

  Steele Security, Book 4

  A.D. JUSTICE

  WICKED INTENTIONS.

  Copyright © 2016 A.D. Justice.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, resold, or transmitted in any form without written permission from the copyright holder, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. If the location is an actual place, all details of said place are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to businesses, landmarks, living or dead people, and events is purely coincidental.

  The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of a copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to five years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  All copyrights are held by A.D. Justice and have not been transferred to any other individual. Sharing or posting of this material in any group is considered copyright infringement and will be reported to the authorities. Criminal and civil charges will be pursued for damages.

  Cover designed by Cover Me, Darling.

  Cover photo by Eric Battershell Photography/FITography

  Cover model Alfie Gordillo

  ISBN-13:

  Created with Vellum

  PROLOGUE

  June 22, 2001

  Heather,

  I’ve watched you sleep for the past few hours, and I’ve racked my brain trying to remember what my life was like without you in it. We’ve known each other as long as I can remember, and I can’t recall a time when I didn’t love you. There hasn’t been a single day gone by I didn’t know exactly how much you meant to me. You’ve never kept secrets from me. Your heart has always been an open book, reserved only for me to devour every word, thought, and feeling.

  When we first met as kids, I was only looking for someone to play with after school. The day I knocked on your front door changed me forever. You became my partner in crime, my best friend, and the love of my life. Remember how we were inseparable? Every day, we rushed to do our chores or homework, so we’d have more time to spend together. You were, and still are, the coolest girl in the world. You could hang with me on the bicycle. You’d hold frogs and touch snakes. Every other girl would run away screaming, but never you. Nothing could make you leave my side.

  As we got older, those things weren’t as important to me anymore, and I saw you in a whole new light. You still had just as much spunk about you. Remember the time at the middle school dance when you punched that girl for flirting with me? I still laugh about that to this day. As if she was ever any threat to you. You said I belonged to you, even if I didn’t realize it yet. You said you wouldn’t put up with another girl disrespecting what we had. There are no words to describe how turned on I was when you said that. I knew I loved you then, but an awkward thirteen-year-old me didn’t know how to tell you.

  Then came the high school years. Yes, you remember those well, don’t you? Our class schedules separated us, so I didn’t see you as much during the day. The first semester of our freshman year, I thought I’d die from being apart from you for so long. Every day after school, I waited for you outside so we could go home together. Absence really did make the heart grow fonder, and I knew without a doubt it was time to tell you exactly how I felt. That day, I waited in the rain for you to come out of the school. I had my speech memorized down to the last syllable.

  Then you walked out, and I watched in horror as David Richards put his arm around you and announced to the school that you were his girlfriend. You know me…there was no way I could let that stand. So I decked him. Punched his lights right out. The look on your face was priceless—you were shocked, awed, and dumbfounded all at once. You were shocked that I had finally admitted my feelings for you. Awed that I did it in such a public display. And dumbfounded that it took me so fucking long to realize what you’d always known. When I kissed you that day, you changed me again. You ruined me for any other woman. Your kiss, your taste, and your sweet scent—no one else on earth could compare to you.

  So began our dating experience. We defied the odds, didn’t we, babe? We showed everyone in this one-horse town that our love was real and lasting. Neither of us has ever even been on a date with anyone else. Never kissed another person in the intimate ways we kiss. Never made love to another and shared the special bond that we have together. Even after more than four years of officially dating, I can honestly say that I don’t regret one minute of the time I’ve spent exclusively with you. Four years of football games, school dances, junior and senior proms. Weekend dates, weeknights sneaking out my bedroom window just to make out with you. Making plans and dreaming big—together.

  Sometimes I look back and miss the “us” we used to be, even just a short year ago. The things we’ve been through have taken a hard toll on you, and I blame myself for that. You can blame me, too. I can take it, and I deserve it. More than anything, I wanted to be the one to always protect you, love you, and provide for you. Our life together was supposed to be perfect. Wonderful. Magical. Beautiful.

  I failed you. I failed us. I’m sorry, baby. I’m sorry I couldn’t be the man I should’ve been, the man you needed me to be. Because of my failures, you’re all but estranged from your family, especially your dad. The stress of everything has just been too much on you, and my presence here is only adding to it.

  We fight every day now over things we’d normally laugh about. We’re slowly tearing each other apart, bit by bit, and I’m afraid there will be nothing left of the Heather I fell in love with before much longer. When he died, I think he took the best part of us with him. I can’t keep putting you through this hell every day, baby. It’s killing me to watch you slowly die right before my eyes. When you look at me, I know you blame me for not being able to protect him like I should have.

  Saying all this to you in a letter is a really shitty thing to do, I know. I openly admit that I’m a coward when it comes to losing you. On one hand, I’m afraid that if I tell you I’m leaving, you’d cry and ask me to stay. And I would. For you, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do. On the other hand, I’m petrified that you’d tell me to go, because then I’d know that your love for me has truly died. Love that has been alive and growing since the day we met. That means I’m taking the coward’s way out, so I can keep your love with me.

  I’m apparently also selfish, because I can’t stand to think of doing this any other way. But I’
m not so selfish that I don’t want you to be happy. I want you to find someone who makes you the Heather I once knew, before I brought so much pain and suffering to your life. Find someone who puts that spark in your eye, the spring in your step, and the smile on your face. Give him all of you, everything you possess, and hold nothing back so that you can be whole again. Put me in the past, where I belong, and don’t look back.

  Know that you have my love—all of my love, all of my heart, and all of me. Forever.

  Until death do us part,

  Braxton Reed

  Braxton placed the folded letter on the empty pillow beside his wife’s head and stared at her intently one last time. Over the years, he’d memorized every line, curve, and tiny freckle on her face. He knew her better than anyone else did. Better than her family members who’d done everything in their power to drive them apart. Better than her friends who’d tried to convince her to date other people before settling for him. Better than their teachers who thought they knew everything but had no idea how deeply Braxton and Heather’s love ran.

  Part of him wished they’d listened to at least one of the naysayers before they’d reached such a low point. Maybe if they’d broken up, dated other people, or just took a break from their all-consuming relationship, the sorrows they’d experienced wouldn’t have ever happened. Maybe if they’d actually waited until they were adults, instead of pretending to be grown-ups, everything would’ve turned out differently.

  But that wasn’t the way of things. Being young and foolish, they’d made mistakes and tried to fix them. In doing so, Braxton realized they’d only made their follies worse. In his mind, the only way either of them would make it out alive was if they did something they’d never tried before. They had to split up and never look back.

  In the weeks leading up to that day, Braxton had talked secretly to a recruiter about his choices and completed all the steps to enlist in the Army. By the time Heather awoke that morning, he planned to be long gone, far away from her so he couldn’t hurt her again.

  He paused at the door, and his hand gripped the knob as his heart shattered into a million pieces. “Eighteen, married, and divorced.” He shook his head in disbelief. “How did we come to this?”

  When Braxton walked out the door of the tiny, one-bedroom apartment they had briefly shared as husband and wife, he reflected on how it was the second hardest thing he’d ever done. He closed the door behind him quietly, ensured it was locked, and walked away from the woman who held his heart in her hands, who had been his best friend for as long as he could remember, and whom he’d failed in the worst way. He tried to block the visions of Heather waking and finding the letter on his pillow rather than seeing him lying there. He didn’t want to think about her reaction when she read his words, regardless of what it was. The thought of her crying, brokenhearted, and feeling abandoned hurt him as much as the thought of her being relieved that he was gone.

  As the bus pulled away from the station, he leaned his head on the seatback and closed his eyes. “I love you, baby. Until death do us part.”

  1

  CHAPTER ONE

  February, Present Day

  Heather Reed stepped out of the hospital and inhaled a deep, cleansing breath before starting her trek to her car in the parking garage alone. The long, twelve-hour shift had morphed into fourteen hours, thanks to a shortage of nurses and an abundance of patients, and she was more than ready to go home. Her feet ached after the constant rushing from one room to another all day. Her lower back was stiff from all the time she spent standing in one place to complete her charting. She was more mentally drained than usual because of her heavy patient load, but taking care of others when they needed her the most was her passion. Nursing wasn’t just a job she left behind when she left the floor.

  When she’d found her calling in life many years ago, she’d known immediately she wouldn’t be happy doing anything else. Her propensity to nurture and her desire to help others made her a natural in nursing school. Quickly rising to the top of her class, Heather insisted on taking the harder cases the other students shied away from. During her first clinical rotation in the oncology unit, she knew she’d found her niche. The work was hard and exhausting, but she knew her patients needed her more than the average.

  Her mind drifted back to the first time she accompanied the oncologist to deliver the dreaded news that the treatments weren’t helping and it was time to stop them. Her elderly patient was lying in the bed, watching TV like every other day. She remembered thinking how normal everything seemed, but within a matter of seconds, everything changed. The doctor sat on the edge of the bed and talked to the woman like an old friend rather than with the standard clinical distance.

  By the time the doctor finished imparting the unfortunate news, the patient was at peace with the decision they’d agreed upon, while Heather was the emotional wreck. She stood at the foot of the bed and listened to the conversation, admired how well the patient accepted the bad news, and felt her heart break because she knew it wouldn’t be long before the cancer ravaged the sweet lady’s body. Heather’s cries turned into muffled sobs, despite her desperate attempts to remain professional. When she and the doctor left the room, he stopped her in the hall and asked if she needed the sedative he’d prepared for the patient, trying to infuse humor into the situation.

  No matter how many times she’d delivered the news since that day, it was always the same. She left the hospital carrying the weight of her patient’s burden on her shoulders. Empathy was part of what made her such a good nurse, but it was also part of what brought all the memories flooding back. Along with the debilitating loneliness. The current patient who prompted the memories to resurface hadn’t received bad news yet, but Heather couldn’t shake the feeling it was coming.

  She also couldn’t shake the feeling she was being watched. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up at full attention. Anxiety filled her mind and a strong sense of dread filled her chest, squeezing her from the inside like a vise. Despite being tired, she quickened her steps and hurried to the safety of her car. Once she was securely locked inside, her eyes scanned the parking garage for anyone out of the ordinary. She knew just because she didn’t see someone didn’t mean he wasn’t out there.

  When she exited from the garage, she purposely turned in the opposite direction from the route she normally took home. She trusted the gut feeling that warned her she was in danger. On one hand, just the thought of it all threatened to shut off her rational mind and fill her with fear. On the other hand, her stubborn, determined side refused to be intimidated by anyone cowardly enough to watch from the shadows. Her drive took an extra hour longer than normal before she reached her house. Fortunately, the numerous stops at various stores, unexpected turns onto side streets, and a couple of double-backs revealed the car that had followed her continuously.

  Armed with that knowledge, she was able to evade the person following her and reach the security of her enclosed garage. Once inside, she intentionally left the lights off and watched for approaching headlights through the bow window at the front of her house. When the car lights illuminated the street, she stepped to the side of the window, completely out of sight, and kept her eyes glued to the car as it made its way around the cul-de-sac.

  The silhouette of a single occupant was visible from her viewpoint, and it had masculine characteristics. “What do you want, creeper?” she whispered to the darkness around her. “What the hell are you up to?”

  The car crawled at a snail’s pace back in the direction it had come from originally, before turning to continue the search on the next street over from hers. She was confident her exact location hadn’t been discovered; however, she wasn’t about to give up the advantage she had over him. Moving through her darkened rooms, she gathered the items she needed and showered in the hall bathroom, where the light wasn’t visible from anywhere else.

  She thought about driving her second vehicle instead, since he obviously knew her primary ca
r by sight, but decided against it. If he waited in the parking garage again, he could easily spot her walking to it. “I’ll park somewhere else instead,” she reasoned to herself. “Leave through a different door out of the hospital, move like a ninja, undetected, right to my car. Piece of cake.”

  With her plan for the next day in place, she crawled into the bed and welcomed the rest that would soon follow. As tired as she was after her long day, the events of the evening had her nerves keyed up and her mind racing. She picked up her cell from the nightstand and called the first number stored in her favorites. When the call rolled to voice mail, Heather listened to the familiar voice with longing before she disconnected.

  “I miss you so much,” she whispered.

  The next morning, Heather left for work earlier than normal, hoping to avoid giving away her exact location by beating her stalker to the punch. In her dark blue Land Rover with blackout windows, she navigated the streets with ease, taking more turns than required while constantly keeping her eyes on the traffic behind her. Rather than parking in the regular parking garage, she pulled into the lot behind the doctors’ offices across the street from the hospital.

  One of the benefits of working there for the past ten years was she knew every access point to gain entry. Once inside, she worked her way to the oncology floor undetected, using the secure hallways that required employee access codes to enter. But when she actually reached her unit, she knew she’d be vulnerable and completely exposed for her entire twelve-hour shift. With the substantial number of patients under her care, she didn’t have time to validate every visitor who appeared on the hall.