Shelter in a Soldier's Arms Read Free Page A

his attention to the plans on the table without acknowledging the truth of Zane’s words. Jeff was having trouble concentrating on the work at hand. He knew the cause—he couldn’t get the woman and her child out of his head and he didn’t know why.
    Was it their circumstances? Yet he’d seen hundreds in worse trouble. Compared to a war-torn village with its winter food stores destroyed, Ashley Churchill’s plight was insignificant. Was it the child? The girl? Maggie’s bright smile, her foolish trust, her pink pajamas and stuffed, white cat were so far from his world as to belong to a distant universe.
    Did it matter why they haunted him? Better the living than the dead who were his usual companions. There were no answers to any of the questions, so he dismissed them and returned his attention to the diagram of a luxury villa overlooking the Mediterranean. The private residence was to host a secret gathering of several international business executives who were responsible for the manufacture of some of the world’s most deadly weapons. The threat of industrial espionage, terrorist attack or kidnapping would be high. He and Zane were to provide the security. Step one: learn the weaknesses of the location.
    Jeff pointed with his pen. “All this has to go,” he said, indicating a lush tropical garden creeping down a hill.
    “Agreed. We’ll use the latest class-ten sensors, hiding them on what’s left.”
    The new high-tech sensors could be programmed to ignore the movement of the security team, yet pick up the wanderings of a field mouse at fifty yards.
    “What about—”
    The buzz of his intercom interrupted him. Jeff frowned. His assistant, Brenda, knew better than to bother him and Zane while they were involved in tactical planning. She would only do so if there was an emergency.
    “Yes,” he said, as he tapped a button on his phone.
    “Jeff, I know you’re busy but you have a call from a downtown shelter. About a Ms. Churchill and her daughter. I didn’t know
    ” His normally take-charge assistant sounded fairly flustered. “Is she a friend of yours? Or should I take a message?”
    All of his senses went on alert. “Put the call through,” he instructed.
    There was a moment of silence, followed by Brenda’s voice politely saying, “Mr. Ritter is on the phone now.”
    “This is Jeff Ritter. How can I help you?”
    “Oh, Mr. Ritter. Hi. I’m Julie, a volunteer at the shelter. Ashley and Maggie Churchill are here. The problem is Ashley is very sick. Too sick to stay, but she’s refusing to go to a hospital. As she only seems to have the flu, I can’t blame her. But we don’t have the facilities to take care of her. We found your card in her jacket pocket and I was wondering if you’re a friend of the family.”
    Jeff knew what she was asking. Would he take responsibility? He reminded himself that Ashley Churchill had already refused his offer to pay for a hotel. Then he remembered the defeat in her eyes when she’d seen the ruin that was her home. She was sick, she had a child and nowhere to go.
    It wasn’t his problem, he reminded himself. He didn’t get involved. Not ever. According to his ex-wife he had the compassion of the devil himself and a heart made of stone. Telling the shelter volunteer he wasn’t anything to the Churchill females was the only thing that made sense.
    “Yes, I’m a friend of the family,” he said instead. “I’ll be right there to pick them both up. They can stay with me.”

Chapter 2
    Ť^ť
    Ashley tried to remember when she last felt this horrible. It wasn’t just her unsettled stomach, the pounding in her head or even the weakness that invaded her body. She’d reached the absolute low point of her life. In one morning she’d lost her job and her home, and now she and her daughter were being thrown out of the temporary shelter. In her head she knew that it was wrong of her to stay and expose everyone to the flu. There were several elderly residents, along