Running Scared (Mercenaries) Read Free Page A

you to hide from a squad of enforcers?”
    She nodded. “Not all that uncommon back then. Or now, for that matter.” She sounded defensive.
    “You must have heard the stories about the lost children. Did it ever occur to you that you might be one of those children?”
    She stared at him as if he’d grown a second head. “Don’t be ridiculous. You know those stories have been exaggerated beyond belief. Lab rat kids with super abilities? Sure, I can hack all kinds of information, but there’s one tiny glitch that makes it so very not useful. You see, I can take the information out of the computers but then it’s stuck inside my head. Besides, you know if even a fraction of what they say is true the government would never let those kids out of their sight. They certainly wouldn’t have butchered them all.”
    “Jackson.” Kaeden turned to face him. “Sounded to me like you know a thing or two that you might want to share with your buddies. What can our little princess here do that she shouldn’t be able to?”
    Jackson shrugged. Saralyn may consider her abilities to be quirks but there was no way she came by them naturally. The lost children fable was the only plausible explanation. “She told you the truth. I saw her mine info out of Trace’s computer with a touch of her fingers. I believe she is one of the lost children, which brings up two very important questions.”
    “Which are?” Kaeden cocked one eyebrow
    “Who is the person she thinks is her brother, and where is he now?”
    “Well.” A familiar grin creased Kaeden’s rugged face. “I guess we’re going to have to help her find the answers to those questions. Are you all in?”
    Heads nodded around the room, and Jackson strode over to Saralyn, dropping his arm across her shoulders. “When this bunch decide to do something, it gets done. We’ll find that brother of yours ASAP.”

Chapter Two
     
    “Are you sure we shouldn’t be down there helping Trace?” Saralyn paced the width of the common room, feeling the tension in every muscle of her body. “What if he needs to know something and he can’t find me to ask?”
    Jackson chuckled, reaching out with one arm to pull her up against him. “Trace doesn’t appreciate anyone distracting him while he’s working, and just having you there would qualify as a distraction. He’s actually very antisocial.”
    Saralyn considered breaking free of the circle of his arms. She opened her mouth, tilting her head back to tell him to keep his hands to himself but the look in his eyes made the words melt away unspoken. Pure sensual heat blazed from their depths, igniting a matching flame deep inside her. Combine that look with the arousing male scent rising from his hard body, and she had to make a real effort not to melt against him like some pathetic doxy from the local bar pool.
    She pushed ineffectually against the iron band of his arms. “I promise I won’t go upset your antisocial buddy, so you can let me go now.”
    A spark of humor curved the corner of his sensual lips. “Relax. I’m not going to bite you. Unless you want me to, of course. It’s going to take Trace some time to get a line on your brother so we might as well kill the time exploring the spark between us.”
    Sunlight flooded through the window behind her, highlighting the rugged line of his jaw and the muscular line of his shoulders. Damn! Now that she was so close to solving the mystery of her past, the last thing she needed was some muscle-bound mercenary distracting her from her goal.
    She fixed him with a steely look. “While I appreciate you letting me ask your team for help in finding my brother, that does not give you any kind of rights to my body. So, if you don’t get your hands off me I’m going to have to hurt you.”
    Jackson stared at her in disbelief for a long second before he snorted out a laugh. “You’re going to hurt me? That’s cute.”
    Okay, that was the last straw. Drawing in a deep breath, she