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His eyebrows flew up. “You’re a what?”
Dani puffed out her cheeks and expelled a breath of exasperation. He was looking at her as if she had sprouted two heads. She reached inside her pocket for her badge and whipped it out, letting it dangle about a foot from his nose. “Danielle Sweet, HSA Intelligence, federal agent.”
But Ben Michaels was already shaking his head. “That’s pretty damn convenient.” Then he squinted at her. “So you were already on to this guy, and led him into my bank, endangering my employees?”
She laughed bitterly. “Oh, yeah, I was on to him the instant he stuck his gun into my back in your bank’s doorway.”
Special Agent’s Seduction
Lyn Stone
LYN STONE
loves creating pictures with words. Paints, too. Her love affair with writing and art began in the third grade when she won a school-wide contest for her colorful poster for Book Week. She spent the money on books, one of which was Little Women. She rewrote the ending so that Jo marries her childhood sweetheart. That’s because Lyn had a childhood sweetheart herself and wanted to marry him when she grew up. She did. And now she is living her “happily ever after” in north Alabama with the same guy. She and Allen have traveled the world, had two children, four grandchildren and experienced some wild adventures along the way.
Whether writing romantic historicals or contemporary fiction, Lyn insists on including elements of humor, mystery and danger. Perhaps because that other book she purchased all those years ago was a Nancy Drew.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Epilogue
Chapter 1
“Feel the gun?”
Danielle Sweet froze in the doorway.
Earlier that morning the old familiar feeling of unease had shot up her spine. She would pick today to ignore it. She had figured, “what could happen here in lazy old Ellerton, Safety City itself?” Well, hey, now she knew.
But even now, caught in the act of pushing open the bank door with a gunman behind her, the feeling didn’t seem quite sharp enough to warrant panic. She could handle this. More than fear, she felt anger at herself for having lowered her alert level.
Assess the threat. Make a plan.
This man behind her had parked next to her, greeted her as she got out of her car, and asked politely if it was nine o’clock yet. She had sensed him walking nearby as they reached the portico of the small Beresford First National Bank.
He looked to be in his early thirties, weighed around two hundred, moved with confidence, no hesitancy. He spoke with a slight accent, looked professional, unremarkable. Even with their contact she hadn’t thought much about him at first.
At least he wasn’t some scruffy, unpredictable druggie hell-bent on grabbing some fast cash and ending it with a killing spree. There had been no flashes of imminent bloodshed along with the niggling little premonition she had shoved aside earlier. Of course, that might or might not be reliable.
The pistol prodded her spine. She imagined she could feel the roundness of the barrel right through her coat. “Go in. Smile,” he ordered. “Act normal. Behave as though we are a couple, if you wish to survive.”
Okay, survive was a good word. As soon as they entered the front door, he halted. “Remove your coat,” he ordered.
Dani shrugged out of it when he released her arm. Hurriedly, she tugged off her gloves to free her hands for combat if that became necessary.
She would have already risked taking him down if it were just the two of them, but there were others in the bank. Better wait to see how it played out. He immediately clutched her again, his ungloved fingers and thumb biting painfully into her bicep.
Her service revolver lay locked in her briefcase in the trunk of her car for the duration of her visit with her sister. There was nothing she could do at the moment but comply and silently curse the fact that she was unarmed.
She had decided to stop at the local bank to set up a savings account for her brand-new nephew and present the parents with it as one of her baby gifts. The decision, almost a compulsion, had been with her since she’d woken up this morning: insure that baby’s future. God, she wished she’d bought the little fellow a teddy bear instead.
But maybe it was better that she had come here. Maybe she’d been meant to be in the bank for this.
The barrel of the weapon nudged her again and she heard the man’s satisfied grunt. No wonder he was pleased. There were only three other people inside.
One young woman was humming along with the soft lobby music while she worked on the bins of deposit slips, forms and pamphlets at the counter in the middle of the room. A teller, Dani guessed.
A skinny, older man of around sixty lounged in the doorway to one of the two glass-fronted offices within the lobby. He wore a mud-brown off-the-rack suit and black patent shoes. Not exactly the type who would be meeting the public much. She would guess accountant. He chatted with a younger man who stood propped against the desk. Now this one looked the part. They were both sipping from coffee cups. Smiling. Shooting the breeze.
In a small town like Ellerton, Virginia, even with traffic severely curtailed by ice and snow, surely there ought to be more people minding the store. Of course, anyone with good sense would be home today, snuggled by their fires. The streets were a mess. The guy had chosen the perfect time for a bank heist.
She shifted position and even tucked her shoulders in a little, hoping the hand that clutched her arm would ease its grip.
“Interfere and I will shoot you first,” her captor whispered. He squeezed her arm harder, hugging her closer as he led her farther into the lobby.
The blonde turned to them, smiling. “Good morning. What can we do for y’all?” The men across the room continued talking, drinking their coffee, offering only a cursory glance.
Suddenly a hard twisting motion almost cracked the bone in Dani’s arm. She cried out sharply, trying to jerk away, but the pain nearly sent her to her knees.
She sagged against him to keep from falling. She dropped her coat and purse.
At her cry, the men rushed out of the office to see what had happened and the blonde hurried over ahead of them.
The man’s gun hand flew up, the weapon near the side of Dani’s face. “Stop! Move and she dies.”
They stopped in their tracks, all three now within six feet of Dani and the man who held her, well away from any alarm buttons. That was the point to the distraction, she figured.
She looked up at the bank employees, expecting expressions of shock. Only the younger man showed none. No fear, either. His glare rivaled the ice on the streets