Inescapable (Men of Mercy Novel, A) Read Free

attending their personal-protection-training courses and corporate-team-building events.
    They’d received the news the week before that the building and land they occupied were up for sale, and they had the option to buy. They had to decide to stay or relocate. The business side of his brain said that staying in Mercy was a no-brainer; the property was cheap, they’d avoid the relocation costs for both the business and his staff, and his clients liked the quaint, charming town.
    Axl, the third partner in Caswallawn, who spent even less time in Mercy than he did, had voted to stay where they were. Since he was even more nomadic than Kai, the move didn’t affect him at all. Kai’s was the only dissenting voice.
    It made no sense but, three years later, Kai still wasn’t used to the town, didn’t understand it. All he knew was that the moment he drove into Mercy a spot between his shoulder blades started to itch—one of those frustrating prickles in a place he just couldn’t reach. It pissed him off that this quaint little town made him feel angsty in a way that various missions in hostile places had never managed to do.
    On the plus side, he didn’t live in Mercy on a permanent basis and, as per normal, he’d be leaving in less than a week. He rented a house here—apartments made him feel claustrophobic—and the business was here, but he spent his life on the road, leaving the day-to-day running of Cas to Sawyer. Sawyer was calm, decisive, clear-thinking, and, unlike Kai, had the patience and charm to deal with civilians. They’d defined their roles years ago: Sawyer managed the business side of Cas, overseeing the personal-protection-officer training and the teams of PPOs they hired out to whoever needed their ass protected and, more important, could afford their services.
    He got paid to pass along his hard-earned-in-crappy-places combat and military skills to teach personal-security-detail tactics to SWAT officers, trainers, some military personnel, and security contractors. Most of his training was done overseas, for companies outside of the US. He trained mid to large groups of guys—sometimes sprinkled with a few woman—and taught them how to keep their colleagues, civilians, and themselves from becoming human sieves in the many hellholes of the world.
    Axl, the third spoke in their wheel, was in charge of Morrigans, their Kidnapping and Ransom Crisis Response division. They each had their space in the business and it worked. Rather well.
    Movement under a shrub to his right brought Kai back to the here and now. He watched, amused, as a wide-eyed kitten eyeballed him. He carefully stretched out his hand and eventually felt tiny whiskers brush his hand and the rasp of a surprisingly rough tongue on the pad of his index finger.
    The kitten cocked its head as his finger made contact with the area just below its ear and he heard the rumble of its purr, tough-sounding for such a little guy. He’d never had much to do with animals—not many kids raised as he was did. It had been hard enough feeding, raising, and looking after himself. He hadn’t the time or the resources to look after anything else.
    Kai rubbed the kitten’s back, his hand longer than its spine. Scooping it up, he held the tiny body against his chest, then looked up at the sound of the front door opening down the road. He turned his head to see a young woman with a toddler on her hip walk out onto her small porch, a cup of coffee in her free hand. Her blond hair was mussed and her bare legs beneath her belted robe were long, slim, and tanned. She turned as a man stepped into the space behind her, ready for his morning run, and placed his hands on her hips, turning her around to kiss her mouth. He said something, and she laughed. He grinned before kissing the child’s head and walking away from the house to do some stretches next to the shiny Lexus that sat in the driveway. His branded T-shirt stretched across his paunchy stomach and his