Page 55 of Impossible Rapids

The phone rang and rang. What was happening?

Please protect Julie, he begged.

Chapter

Sixteen

Julie was carried through the Japanese garden. She writhed, hoping to free an arm or leg, and continued screaming against the man’s hand.

No luck getting free, and nobody would hear her muffled cries.

She heard someone jump to the ground and prayed Paul had jumped out of the window after her.

They yanked her toward the low wall surrounding the garden. She could see the alleyway behind the restaurant. A black Cadillac SUV waited, and she glimpsed a large shadow in the driver’s seat.

No! If they got her in that car, she would be as good as dead.

“Stop!” a man commanded. Paul rushed from the restaurant and through the garden with his pistol in hand. Theo was two steps behind him.

“I will murder her,” one of the men holding her said in heavily accented English. Something cold and hard shoved against her side. A gun? Her body froze while her heart raced out of control. Cold sweats pricked at her neck.

“You’ll never get away,” Paul said, easing a step closer.

She heard the scream of sirens approaching and felt hope, but she’d be dead before they got here.

The SUV driver’s door popped open, and a man yelled, “Andre!”

Julie’s captor turned to look at the driver. The barrel of the gun moved away from her side. “Quoi?”

Guns discharged, and the driver slammed against the side of the vehicle. The man on her right slumped to the ground.

Andre still held her, and she feared with bullets flying he would just shoot her. But he dragged her away from the fight and toward the garden’s water feature. She screamed and swung at him, but it was no use. Suddenly he was yanked away from her and plunged into the water. Julie stuttered on her heels. She was free.

She spun and cried out, “Shawn!”

Her Viking hero shoved Andre under the water. The man gasped and flailed. Shawn, in his Brioni suit, looked like the Viking Warrior of her every dream. He was in his element, using the water to give him even more power.

Heaving the struggling man out of the water, Shawn was wet and strong and glorious. His blue eyes were fixed intently on her as he held onto Andre.

“Are you all right?” Shawn asked.

“Yes!” She clasped her hands together, praising the good Lord.

“Sir, let me take him,” Jerome said to Shawn.

“Thank you.” Shawn released the drenched, panting Andre.

Jerome pinned him to the ground with a knee in the center of his back, then yanked an arm behind him, leveraging the man even more securely to the ground.

Paul was checking the driver from the SUV for a pulse and clearing the interior of the vehicle. Theo stood guard while Brett checked the other man Paul must’ve shot.

Shawn rushed to Julie. She flung her arms around his neck. His wet suit clung to him and dampened her dress.

“You saved me.” She kissed him. Fiercely.

Shawn responded, then pulled back to frame her face. “I had to come for you.”

“How did you know?”