Love or Money: An Enemies to Lovers Suspense Romance (Imperium Book 1) by Michelle St. James

Author:Michelle St. James [St. James, Michelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackthorn Press
Published: 2021-06-28T18:30:00+00:00

25

He jerked awake with a start, instantly on alert. He’d been drifting through the depths of a deep sleep, his body loose and relaxed after making love to Laurel.

And then. Something…

He tensed, his body and mind suddenly alert, instinct telling him something was wrong.

“What is it?” Laurel sat up, the sheet falling from her naked body. He had about two seconds to appreciate her beauty all over again before shattering glass sounded from the ground floor.

The alarm system pealed through the house.

He was on in his feet in an instant, pulling on his jeans and silently cursing himself: he’d left his weapon in the cabinet in the living room where he normally slept.

There had been no reason to have it at the beach — he didn’t usually carry when he was with his family — and he’d been singularly focused on taking Laurel to bed when they’d entered the house.

More glass shattered downstairs.

“Barricade the door,” he said to Laurel, now pulling on her own clothes. “Don’t open it for anyone but me and call 9-1-1. Do it now.”

He started for the door.

“Hawk…”

He turned back to find her on her feet, hair tumbling over her shoulders, eyes wild. “It’s okay.” He was glad his voice was calm, glad it didn’t betray his shame at leaving her so unprotected. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

He listened at the bedroom door for a couple of seconds, then eased it open. The alarm was ear-splitting, echoing through his bones like sonar. He forced himself to focus.

The upstairs hall was empty, but there was a roar coming from the ground floor, something familiar that he couldn’t quite place. He was halfway down the hall when a second set of alarms joined the first and he caught the whiff of a scent that made his blood run cold.

Smoke.

Something was on fire.

He hurried down the stairs, scanning the entry on the way down, alert for danger. Someone was in the house, and they were in the power position — taking him by surprise, without a weapon.

He swore.

By the time he hit the floor in the entry, smoke was visible in the air, the sound he’d heard now clear as the crackle of flames eating through wood and plaster. He followed the heat and smoke to the living room and found it empty, the glass in the windows broken, the portrait of Laurel on fire over the fireplace.

His mind was processing the details — the window, obviously broken for entry, the portrait on fire when the rest of the room was mostly intact — when he sensed a presence behind him.

He turned just as a black-clad figure reached him. A ski mask hid the person’s features, but it was obviously a man.

A man with a gun.

Hawk’s body and brain initiated autopilot, years of training doing the work for him. Knocking the weapon out of the man’s hand wasn’t even a thought. It just happened, his mind making the calculations, his body executing on the answer.

The man was

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.