The Baby's Guardian

Ten minutes. Not much time at all. And judging from their other conversation, they’d be taking her with them. If that happened, they might kill her once they had what they wanted. Because of the ski masks, she hadn’t seen their faces, but she did know details about them. She was a loose end and a dangerous one.

The man appeared again, his ski mask still in place, and he carefully placed the shoes on the floor beside her. When she didn’t move to slip them on, he cursed at her, shoved them on her feet and walked away.

She waited until he was out of sight before she fought with the plastic cuffs again. No luck. So, she decided to try to chew her way through them, though she knew that would be next to impossible. The cuffs were designed to prevent such an escape. Still, she had to try. Those ten minutes were already ticking off.

There was a sound. Just a slight bump. It didn’t come from the men up the hall but from the window. Someone was outside.

Sabrina chewed even harder on the cuff, while she kept watch up the hall and at the shadowy figure on the other side of that murky glass.

There was a soft pop. And the window eased open. She got a good look at the dark-haired man then.

It was Shaw.

Relief flooded through her entire body. He’d come for her. Well, he’d come for the baby anyway. Now the question was, could he get them safely out of there?

Shaw glanced around the room and put his index finger to his mouth in a stay-quiet gesture. Sabrina quit struggling with the plastic cuffs and tipped her head toward the men up the hall.

“There are two of them,” she mouthed, and in case Shaw hadn’t heard, she held up two fingers.

Shaw nodded, climbed through the window, swung his legs over the sill and quietly placed his feet on the floor. He had his standard-issue Glock ready in his right hand, and he lifted it, aiming it at the door. If her captors heard Shaw’s entrance, they would no doubt come running.

But they didn’t.

The men continued to talk, and Shaw used the sound of their muffled voices to cover his footsteps as he made his way across the dusty floor toward her. Shattered glass crunched softly under his feet. He spared her a glance.

Barely.

That was normal. Shaw never looked in her eyes, which was probably a good thing. Even something as simple as eye contact between them brought back the painful memories of Fay’s death. But Sabrina knew that his eyes were multiple shades of blue. Cool and piercing when he was in a good mood. Dark and stormy when he was wasn’t.

She didn’t have to guess the intensity level tonight.

With his attention fastened to the hall and doorway, Shaw reached in his pocket, brought out a small knife and used it to slice through the plastic. He didn’t waste a second; he took her arm, got her to her feet and eased her behind him. His hand brushed against her stomach. An accident for sure.

Like eye contact, touching was out, too.

Shaw motioned toward the window. “You think you can climb out?” he whispered.

Sabrina glanced down at her megapregnant belly and then at the window. It’d be a tight squeeze, but the alternative was going out into the hall and then trying to make their way through a locked door at the end. That was far riskier than the window.

She nodded, and he maneuvered her behind him while he continued to face the door.

Shaw leaned closer and put his mouth to her ear. No peppermint and sweat smell for him. She took in the scent of his starched white shirt, the leather of his boots and the woodsy aftershave he favored. Not that he would have shaved recently. He had dark desperado stubble on his chin, but a hint of the aftershave was still there.

“Once we’re outside and away from the scene, SWAT will storm the building,” Shaw whispered.

Good. This had to end, and she didn’t want those gunmen to be able to hurt anyone else.

Thankful that she was wearing shorts so she could maneuver better, Sabrina somehow managed to get her leg onto the sill. But then, she heard the footsteps in the hall.

Oh, no. One of the gunmen was coming.

Sabrina tried to hurry, but Shaw clamped on to her arm to stop her from moving. Without the sound of her rustling, the room fell silent.

So did the footsteps.

They waited there. Listening. Sabrina prayed the men wouldn’t come closer. The last thing she wanted was a gun battle where the baby could be hurt. Obviously, Shaw felt the same because he moved protectively in front of her. Close. With his back right against her front.

As a cop, he’d perhaps been in situations similar to this where his life was on the line, but this whole ordeal was a first for her, and Sabrina hoped she didn’t lose it. Falling apart wouldn’t get them out of there, and it wouldn’t help the baby.

“Call him back,” the gunman finally said. It was the peppermint guy. “I’m getting a weird feeling about being here. We need to get out now.”

With her breath stalled in her lungs, Sabrina stayed still, and she finally heard what she prayed she would hear. The gunman went back down the hall away from them. At least she hoped that’s what he’d done.

Shaw nudged her to get moving, and Sabrina didn’t waste any time. She climbed through the window, trying to protect her belly from scraping against the sill. Her feet finally touched down onto the ground. Shaw was right behind her. While continuing to face the direction of the gunmen, he shimmied out the window and landed right next to her.

“Come on,” he ordered. Using his left hand, he grabbed her arm and started to move as fast as she could.

The baby kicked even harder, and her stomach started to cramp. Sabrina silently cursed the Braxton Hicks contraction.

False labor.

Her body was merely practicing for the real thing, but she didn’t need the distraction now. She had to keep moving and get to safety.

She saw the SWAT team then, on the building across the street. There were other officers crouched down behind a Dumpster and the gunmen’s SUV.

The baby and she were safe.

Or so she thought.

But then, the shots rang out.

Chapter Three (#ulink_51de1f3c-82a0-5105-8e69-c57981544a8b)

Shaw cursed and hooked his arm around Sabrina.

Despite the urgency that the deadly gunfire created, he tried to be careful with her, and he took the brunt of the fall when he pulled her to the ground. His shoulder hit hard, but he held on tight to his gun so that it wouldn’t be jarred from his hand.

Shaw didn’t stop there. He crawled over Sabrina, sheltering her with his body, and he came up ready to return fire.

This was obviously a situation he’d wanted to avoid at all costs. He didn’t want his baby in the middle of a fight with these armed fugitives, but when they fired that shot, they’d left him no choice. Now, the trick was to get Sabrina safely out of there.

There was another shot. It slammed into the rough brick wall just inches from Shaw’s head. Not close, a good foot away, but the sound and the impact allowed him to pinpoint the origin of the shot. It was coming from the window where Sabrina and he had escaped.

“Get down,” someone on the SWAT team yelled from the roof of the adjacent building.

Shaw did. He dropped lower, covering Sabrina as best he could.

She was breathing way too hard and fast, and he hoped like the devil that she didn’t hyperventilate. While he was hoping, he added that the baby hadn’t been harmed in all of this. Sabrina didn’t appear to have any physical injuries, but the stress couldn’t be good. She needed to get to a doctor so she could be checked out.