Free Wicked Pleasures by Tori Carrington

to mind were the boxing techniques she’d learned most recently. To keep from hurting herself, she silently removed her rings and stuffed them into her front jeans pocket.
    She stopped to the side of the doorway, gathering her wits about her and drawing in a silent breath. Then she peeked around the side, trying to make out shapes in the other room.
    A figure stood near the window apparently going through her books.
    Linc? No. This person was shorter, smaller, but obviously a man.
    She eased back against the wall and closed her eyes. What to do, what to do, what to do…
    Her cell!
    She stared at the bedside table where the phone lay. She ordered her legs to take her to it so she could call 911. But the limbs refused to cooperate.
    Then, as she watched, the instrument lit up and gave a shrill ring.
    Regina’s heart nearly leaped from her chest.
    She charged the nightstand even as noises grew louder from the other room. She fumbled with the phone, noting Linc’s name in the display before hearing her front door slam.
    “Hurry!” she shouted upon answering. “There’s someone in the house!”
     
     
    L INC WANTED TO PUNCH something. He didn’t care what. Just so long as he could experience the satisfaction of his fist hitting a hard surface.
    He’d been three blocks away when he’d made the phone call to Regina to check if she still wanted him to come over, but it might as well have been three miles. He’d stepped on the gas, but by the time he arrived, whoever had been in her apartment was long gone and she was on the phone with 911.
    Now, an hour later, the responding officers had just left and Linc was so upset he didn’t think he could sit down.
    “Thanks for coming so quickly,” Regina said quietly from where she stood leaning against the doorway to the kitchen rubbing her arms.
    He hadn’t come quickly enough, to his way of thinking.
    In fact, he should have never left.
    He glanced around at the mess the intruder had made. Books were strewn over the floor, her sofa had been slashed, two plants had been turned over.
    “I wonder what he was looking for,” she whispered.
    He knew what the guy was looking for, namely, the money from the bank robbery. Moreover, he knew exactly who the guy was.
    He searched her spooked face, wishing he could erase the fear there.
    He didn’t need to ask her any questions. The police had done that while he listened. Even if he hadn’t heard her answers, he wouldn’t have needed to say a word.
    She’d left the door unlocked for him.
    Instead, Billy Johnson had used it to gain access to her apartment…
    He was thankful she didn’t appear to know it had been Johnson. A thought that left him with mixed feelings.
    “Do you keep any valuables in the house?” he asked. “Anything anyone would know about?”
    Her hand fluttered to the side of her throat. He followed the movement, wanting to place his mouth where her fingers touched. “I don’t have any valuables.” She gestured toward the small LCD television that was no larger than a computer monitor. “He didn’t even touch the TV.”
    Of course “he” hadn’t. Mostly because “he” had been looking for the money he was convinced she’d taken from him.
    Linc moved toward the door.
    “Where are you going?” she asked, pushing away from the wall anxiously.
    “The applicable question is, where are we going?”
    “And the answer?” she asked as she gathered her purse, which had been rifled through.
    “To Lazarus to pick up some security equipment I can install.”
    “Tonight?”
    “Tonight.”
    Her smile was faint, her gratitude evident as she preceded him through the open door.
     
     
    I T WAS WELL after 3:00 a.m. She’d sat in Linc’s SUV while he’d gone inside an impressive compound just outside town and then they’d returned to her place. While she cleaned up, he installed a dead bolt on her door, some sort of complicated locks and sensors on her windows, and an alarm system with a security code she