His to Protect: A Fireside Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

out.
    This hotel was so old it didn’t use plastic key cards, but regular locks. Yesterday, I went for ice and didn’t lock my door.
    Perhaps I had done the same thing again.
    Yanking my hand back from the door, I stayed out of sight and closed my eyes, trying to remember how I’d left it earlier.
    But no, I vividly remembered turning back to lock the door. Boomer had caught sight of a pigeon at the end of the walkway and tugged so hard on his leash that I had to yank him back.
    “Okay,” I whispered, wishing that Boomer had a mean streak to him. Something more akin to an angry rottweiler than a dopey boxer.
    His tongue hung out of his mouth and he slobbered.
    I shook my head. “Some guard dog you are,” I muttered and pushed against the door with my free hand. It creaked as it opened, and I stood against the outside wall waiting for any sign of life inside.
    With my heart pounding in my chest, I took one large step and stood directly in the doorway, quickly surveying whatever I could see.
    I gasped as I took in the room. It could have been declared a disaster area.
    The mattress had been flipped over and all the bed coverings were thrown on the floor. My duffel bag, which had been at the side of the bed, was now emptied, and my clothes and meager belongings had been tossed all over the place.
    Little hairs stood up on my arms and the back of my neck as I took a slow step inside the room.
    “Hello?” I called out, glancing behind the door and then toward the bathroom. The door was open and the light was off.
    Someone could still be hiding, so I left the door to my room wide open and took another step inside. If someone came out of the bathroom, I wanted to be able to escape quickly.
    Dropping Boomer’s leash, I moved toward the small table at the side of the bed.
    His ears perked up as he sat, back straight, and my lips twitched. The crazy dog must have sensed my tension because he was as alert as I’d ever seen him.
    “It’s okay, Boom,” I whispered and watched his left ear twitch in acknowledgment.
    With another look at the bathroom, I slid open the drawer.
    My heart sank straight from my chest, down my body, and into the horribly worn shag carpet beneath my feet.
    “Crap,” I muttered, feeling tears well in my eyes.
    They spilled down my cheeks before I could wipe them away. My hands shook as I opened the cover of the Bible in the drawer. I already knew what I would find.
    Or wouldn’t.
    I never should have been so stupid as to leave my things inside the room.
    Because where I had stored my passport and my remaining cash except for the twenty dollars I had in my wallet, there was nothing.
    —
    “Ugh.” I flipped down the front visor and cringed at my reflection. A night of sleeping in the car, if you could call all the tossing and turning I did sleeping, left my eyes red and swollen.
    It also could have been from the tears I shed off and on throughout the night.
    After realizing that everything I needed to get to Canada was gone, I quickly threw the rest of my belongings in my bag, and took off from the hotel. I drove around the Detroit area for hours, alternating between tapping my thumb on the steering wheel and chewing the side of my thumbnail.
    Eventually, I pulled into a park near Latham Hills and flicked the business card I removed from my back pocket.
    Declan James.
    Owner of The Fireside Grill.
    One helluva decent cook.
    And hopefully, the decent man I assumed him to be.
    Although my ability to judge someone’s character was highly questionable, given who I had married.
    It didn’t matter now, though.
    With the sun beginning to rise, I was now parked outside the Fireside Grill, debating what to do for the next several hours until it opened.
    I barely had enough cash to get breakfast, and there wasn’t enough change in my cup holder for a decent cup of coffee.
    Without a shower, my hair was soon going to be a greasy, tangled mess, and no amount of dry shampoo, which was packed in my duffel