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  “To stop you,” she answered. That seemed pretty clear to her. “You just killed Oren and his bodyguard, and you looked like you were going to kill me next.”

  Padilla inclined his head. “Very smart, Antonia. I did not get a chance to kill you that night.” And then the drug lord cocked the weapon he was holding. “But now is a different story. And once I kill you, I am going to kill that pretty little girl and that baby who are hiding upstairs.”

  Chapter 21

  Toni felt hot and cold at the same time and struggled not to allow either sensation to overwhelm her. Not to allow her growing fear engulf her. Above all else, she needed to find a way to distract this man, to keep her daughter and Lucinda safe.

  She couldn’t fail them.

  Toni desperately wanted to run, but she stood her ground.

  She had to.

  “That’s not fair,” Toni cried angrily. “You leave them out of this, you hear me? They didn’t do anything to you.”

  Padilla laughed, as if her protest was pathetic as well as ludicrous.

  “I am not in the business of being fair,” he told her. “Fair does not matter. Only winning matters.” He aimed his weapon at her.

  What happened next was one huge blur.

  Toni remembered hearing Padilla talk about killing her baby and Lucinda, and then suddenly it was as if she was watching some other woman reacting to the words, to the threat.

  Lowering her head, she came charging at the drug lord, acting like a woman possessed with only one thought in her head: saving her baby and her friend.

  “What the—” Padilla never had a chance to finish the angry sentence.

  Catching him by surprise, Toni tackled Padilla. His gun discharged, with the bullet whizzing by her before it hit the wall. Toni scrambled for possession of the gun, but Padilla managed to catch her by her leg, pulling her away from the weapon before she could get her hands on it.

  Twisting around, Toni kicked him as hard as she could with her free foot, her blow landing somewhere in his chest, temporarily knocking the air out of him.

  “You bitch!” he rasped, wheezing as he cursed at her.

  Struggling to catch his breath, he grabbed Toni in a vice-like hold. He began squeezing her as hard as he could.

  Gasping for breath, instead of pulling away, she moved into his grip. Her face against his, she sank her teeth into his ear, biting down as hard as she could. She could taste blood.

  Padilla screamed, letting her go. She instantly scrambled back up and ran to the kitchen. All she could think of was getting hold of a knife in order to protect herself.

  Meanwhile, Padilla had his gun back. “No, you don’t!” he shouted at her, firing.

  Again, he just narrowly missed her. If she hadn’t moved, the shot would have caught her dead center. However, when she’d jerked aside, she wound up against the cabinets.

  “Nowhere to run now,” Padilla laughed. Her blood ran cold. “Looks like your luck has run out, bitch!”

  “Not hers, yours,” Dugan shouted, appearing behind him. His weapon was aimed right at Padilla. “Drop your weapon and turn around.”

  Padilla did whirl around, but he fired his gun as he did so.

  Anticipating the move when he saw Padilla holding on to his weapon, Dugan shot back at him at the exact same moment.

  His finger on his gun’s trigger, Padilla reacted automatically, getting off one final shot just as he pitched forward. He was dead from a bullet to the head before he hit the floor.

  Her heart pounding wildly, for one second Toni was immobilized, looking up at Dugan. The next second, she flung herself into his arms, holding on as tightly as she could.

  “Are you okay?” he asked. “Are you hurt? Did he hurt you?”

  Dugan was all but tripping over his tongue as the realization that he could have actually lost her began to fully sink in.

  When her heart stopped racing, Toni was finally able to draw back and look at Dugan. “How did you get here in time?” was all she was able to get out.

  “By driving ninety miles an hour,” he answered. And then he told her, “Lucy called me.”

  Her eyes widened before Dugan could say another word. “Oh, my God, Lucy!”

  Breaking away from Dugan, Toni turned toward the stairs. It was at that point she realized that Dugan hadn’t entered the house alone. There were two other officers with him.

  Seeing the confusion in her eyes, he explained, “I called for backup on my way here.”

  Toni blinked, looking at the officers. Even in the midst of chaos, she was good with faces. “These aren’t the officers who are supposed to be guarding the house, are they?” she asked, hating what her question implied.

  “No,” Dugan answered quietly, keeping his arm wrapped firmly around her. “Padilla killed them. Executed them where they sat in their squad cars,” he told her. He was still beating himself up for not checking with the officers before he’d left, but he wasn’t about to voice that now. His focus was on her, on making certain that she was all right. “You’re safe, Toni,” he told her. “Padilla won’t be coming after you anymore.”

  She nodded her head, feeling numb and trying to deal with the aftermath of fear at the same time.

  Toni pressed her lips together. “It’s going to take me a while to stop shaking. I’m sorry.”

  He really wished he could have spared her this. “Nothing to be sorry about,” he told her firmly, tightening his hold. “You just went through a really traumatic event—and you didn’t fold up,” he pointed out. “You fought back.”

  She looked at him, blinking back tears. She hardly heard him. Her mind was still on her daughter and friend upstairs. Her relief was huge.

  “You saved Heather and Lucy,” she told him.

  “No,” he contradicted. “You did. If you hadn’t fought Padilla off, all three of you would have been dead by the time I got here, even though I was practically flying,” he said.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lucy coming down the stairs. Turning, she saw that Lucy had Heather in her arms and there was a young police officer with her. The latter seemed to be very taken with Lucy’s safety as she made her way down the stairs.

  The second Toni hit the landing, Lucinda was at her side, concerned. “Are you all right?” she cried, searching Toni’s face.

  “Yes, thanks to you and Dugan.” Toni let out a long, shaky breath, turning toward Dugan. “So, it’s really over?” she asked him. “His people aren’t going to retaliate, are they?”

  “Padilla wasn’t the kind of leader who inspired that sort of loyalty,” Dugan told her. Smiling, he added, “Although, just to be on the safe side, maybe I should stick around for a while.”

  And then his eyes narrowed as he looked at her more closely. Taking Toni’s chin in his hand, Dugan turned her head so that he could get a better look at her left temple.

  “You’re bleeding.” Moving back her hair from her face, he saw the thin line of blood that was only now appearing to grow thicker. “One of Padilla’s bullets must have grazed you.”

  She shook her head. “I guess I didn’t feel it in the heat of the moment.” She looked over her shoulder, down the hallway. “I’ve got a first aid kit in the bathroom.”

  “First aid kit nothing,” he told her heatedly. “I’m taking you to the hospital.”

  She put her hand on his shoulder, hoping to make him change his mind.

  “Oh, please, I don’t want to leave the house,” she cried, looking toward Lucinda and her daughter. “Let’s just stay here. I’ll put a Band-Aid on this.”

  But Dugan was not about to be talked out of getting her to the hospital. He shot down any argument she was inclined to raise. “Lucy’ll stay here with the baby,” he told her. “And the officers will stay with them until we get back,” he added.

  Toni tried again. “B
ut—”

  “Don’t argue with me, Toni. This isn’t like the last time when I let you talk your way out of going to be checked out. You’re going,” Dugan insisted. “Even if I have to carry you there.” Taking out his handkerchief, he wiped away the blood and then showed it to her, as if that should seal the discussion. “You’re going.”

  “You wiped it all up,” she told him, hoping that might get him to stand down.

  He sighed, shaking his head. “You are probably the most infuriating woman I have ever met—and there are a lot of infuriating women in my family,” he added. Dugan glanced at the officer standing next to a very concerned-looking Lucinda. “Miller, you and your partner stay here until I get back.”

  “Not a hardship, detective,” Officer Miller replied with a wide smile.

  “She’s going to be all right, isn’t she, Dugan?” Lucinda asked nervously.

  “Don’t worry. I’m not bringing her back until the doctor gives her a clean bill of health,” Dugan promised the younger woman.

  Just then, Heather began crying.

  Toni looked up at Dugan. “My baby needs me.”

  “Yes, she does. But she needs you alive,” he pointed out. There was no arguing with his tone when he said, “You’re coming with me to the hospital.”

  “They’ll just put a Band-Aid on it and charge me five hundred dollars,” Toni told him, still attempting to get him to change his mind and let her take care of the wound herself. “I can do that and it won’t cost five hundred dollars.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he told her sternly. “I’ll pay for it. Now, if you’re out of excuses—” he took her hand in his “—we’re going to the hospital.”

  “Who says I’m out of excuses?” Toni protested as he drew her along in his wake.

  He never even turned around to look at her. He simply said, “I do.”

  * * *

  “Well, there’s three hours of my life I’m never getting back,” Toni complained when she was finally able to get back into his vehicle.

  Dugan closed the passenger door and then rounded the hood to the driver’s side. Getting in, he told her, “Better safe than sorry.” He buckled up, glancing to make sure she had done the same. And then he paused to take a closer look at her bandage. “That’s a lot bigger than a Band-Aid,” he commented.

  She frowned, shrugging. “I guess that they had to do something to make it look worth all that money they’re charging.”

  His eyes swept over her. “You can drop the act now, Toni,” he told her softly.

  Toni seemed to pull into herself as she stuck her chin out, looking almost defiantly at him. “What act?”

  Dugan didn’t bother answering her retort. Instead, in a low voice he quietly admitted, “I was really scared, too.”

  Caught off guard, Toni wasn’t sure how to answer him or what to think. “What?”

  Because he wanted her to know exactly how he had felt, Dugan went into detail. “When Lucy called me and said that Padilla had gotten into the house—”

  “But she didn’t know that,” Toni protested. “I sent her upstairs to the nursery and told her to lock the door. She couldn’t have seen him—he would have taken her prisoner if she’d crossed his path. And I never told her it was Padilla.”

  He smiled. “Lucy’s a smart girl. She figured it out. She called me the second she got into the nursery and locked the door. Told me to come right away because you were in danger.” He let out a shaky breath. “This was right after I had tried to reach the officers I left on your block. I don’t even remember starting up the car.”

  Dugan took in a deep breath, as if to fortify himself against what he was about to relive. “When I got to your house and saw Padilla pointing his gun at you, I stopped breathing.” His eyes met hers. “I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to get him before he got you.”

  “Well, luckily, you did,” Toni said. She paused for a moment, trying to find the right words. “I didn’t thank you for that, did I?”

  He shrugged. “You don’t have to.”

  “Oh, yes, I do,” she insisted. “Thank you,” she told him. Turning all the way toward him, she looked at Dugan for a long moment before saying, “Thank you for saving my life.”

  He laughed to himself. “Well, I kind of had to,” Dugan admitted.

  Toni nodded, thinking she understood what he was telling her. She didn’t want to draw this part out. “Because it’s your job.”

  “No,” he told her quietly, “because I couldn’t have gone on living without you.”

  Her mouth nearly dropped open, but she collected herself just in time. Her throat was raspy as she said, “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me,” Dugan answered. “If anything had happened to you, if that worthless piece of garbage and human misery had managed to kill you, I couldn’t have gone on.”

  No, she wasn’t going to set herself up just to be disappointed, Toni told herself. He didn’t mean it the way it sounded.

  “Sure, you could have,” she told him, refusing to allow herself to get carried away.

  “Maybe I didn’t make myself clear—” He stopped, then laughed. Not at her but at himself. “Hell, I know I didn’t make myself clear. I just took it for granted that since you were so smart, you’d figure it out without my having to say a word.”

  “Figure what out?” she asked.

  He took her hand, his eyes on hers. “That I love you.”

  “That you...”

  Her voice trailed off as she stared at him. It was one thing to kind of hope that her suspicions had a chance of being right. It was another thing entirely to hear the words.

  “That I love you,” Dugan repeated. He searched her face, waiting for a reaction. She looked as if she was completely numbed over. “Is that so terrible?” he asked her.

  It took her a minute to find her voice.

  “Well, yes,” she finally said, “if this is some kind of elaborate joke on your part.”

  He supposed that he didn’t blame her for being skeptical. In her place, he would probably feel the same. He’d never given her a reason to feel otherwise.

  “I kid about a lot of things,” Dugan admitted. “But joking about falling in love with someone has never been one of them. Love’s too special,” he told her. “To be honest, I really never thought it would happen to me. I watched my cousins find that certain someone to complete them, but I figured that the odds were pretty much against me doing the same.”

  “Why?”

  “Because finding someone to love, someone who makes you glad to be alive, that’s something that happens in the movies and once in a rare while in real life. But that doesn’t mean it has to happen to me. And it didn’t—until now,” he told her. He saw the expression on her face. She looked like she was beaming. “What?”

  “You know, for a police detective, you have got one silver tongue.”

  Dugan laughed. “No one’s ever accused me of that before.”

  “Then I guess I’m the first,” she told him.

  “The first for a lot of things,” he readily admitted. “The first woman whose baby I delivered. The first woman I ever fell in love with.”

  She felt a smile warming her as she nodded her head. “I think I can handle that,” she told him. “Especially the last part.”

  His mouth curved. “You’re sure?”

  “Oh, very sure,” she told him. And then she looked around outside of his vehicle. They were still parked in the rather small ER parking lot. “Don’t you think that maybe we should start the car so you can get out of this spot?”

  “In a minute,” he told her. “But I’ve got something else to do first.”

  She wasn’t sure she understood. “Like what?” she asked.

  “Like this,” he told her. And then he took her into his arms and kissed her.

 
; Neither one of them came up for air for a long while.

  Epilogue

  With the threat to her life over, Toni was allowed to come back to work with the team. However, her job description had changed. She was there now to document the takedown of a branch of the newly flourishing American segment of the Juarez Cartel.

  After several more weeks of following up on tips, a number of lower-end workers and one higher-end drug lord were finally caught utilizing one of the cartel’s supertunnels, originally made famous by the Sinaloa Cartel. The supertunnels were used to transport huge shipments of drugs to destinations so that they could be flown to other parts of the Southwest.

  “This haul has got to be worth at least several million dollars,” Toni marveled that evening after the takedown had happened.

  “It’s admittedly a drop in the bucket,” Dugan allowed. “But at least it is a drop and every shipment that doesn’t hit the streets is a victory for our side.”

  She nodded, clearing away the dishes. Bringing over a bottle of wine, she sat down again. Dugan did the honors and poured them each a glass.

  “So now what?” she asked.

  “We celebrate,” he said, nodding at the two glasses. “And then we hit the streets tomorrow to hopefully do it all over again.”

  “Sounds exhausting,” she freely admitted, taking a sip from her glass.

  He smiled at her. “It has its rewards.”

  She had a feeling he wasn’t talking about drug busting any more. “You know, Lucinda’s pretty taken with that police officer.”

  Dugan already knew that. “Well, between you and me, he’s pretty taken with her.” Lucinda had left with the officer earlier to have dinner out. “What is this, their second date?” he asked.

  “Third,” Toni corrected. She toyed with the wine in her glass, smiling. “I’ve got a good feeling about this,” she confided. “Lucy needs someone like Patrick in her life.”

  “Patrick?” he questioned.

  “Officer Miller,” she told him. “They actually come with first names, you know.”