Leah's Triplet Mates (2 page)

Leah slid her arms through the straps of the mesh bag, turning it into a sort of backpack, and tiptoed from the room. She hurried down the hallway and into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. Climbing out of the window was more difficult than getting in because she couldn’t see the fucking drainpipe and had to reach for it with her foot, shove her foot behind it, then slide most of the way out of the window, grip the pipe with one hand, and close the window with the other.

Finally she managed it. The back of her sweater was damp with sweat dripping down her spine, and she hoped it wouldn’t hurt the fabric binding of the stamp albums. But at least she had them, so it was all good.

Leah slid down the pipe, jumped onto the grass, raced across the backyard as fast as she could, and vaulted over the fence.

In her desire to get the hell out of there, she forgot to look over the fence before she jumped, and when she landed on the ground, it was to see a big, dark-haired man staring at her.

Fuck!

Leah took to her heels, running with all the speed the adrenaline rush of fear had given her. She wasn’t stupid enough to head back to her car, sprinting left at the end of the street instead of right, and going as fast as she could toward the mall, which was the only place she could think of to lose the man.

She didn’t want to look behind her, as she knew that would slow her down, but she thought she could hear him running. He wasn’t stomping or panting or anything that would definitely prove he was there, but the area between her sweaty shoulders itched with the knowledge the man was after her.

She raced around another corner and up ahead of her were two more large men standing, staring at her. Damn! He must have phoned a friend. Two friends.

Leah cut across the road and bolted toward a side street, but the men moved damn fast, and she was starting to tire. She wasn’t a distance runner or a sprinter unfortunately.

And then two strong arms wrapped themselves around her waist tugging her backward, and she would have fallen if not for his tight hold of her.

Desperately she wiggled in his grasp. She was so close to retrieving her father’s stamp albums. There was no way she was letting this man take them from her. The fucktard had already stolen them once.

The big man gripped her arms and turned her to face him. Instantly, she slammed her knee with all her strength up and into his family jewels.

He let go of her and dropped to his knees, but she was already running back the way she’d come.

Unfortunately, she didn’t get far. Another man grabbed her from behind, and this time something crashed into her head, and the world went black.

Well fuuuuuck.

* * * *

“Jeez, Saxon, I can’t believe you fell for the old knee-in-the-nuts trick. No one’s done that to me since middle school. Hardy, go get the car right now. Any minute some well-meaning Good Samaritan is going to offer to dial 9-1-1 for us. Get the hell out of here and get the car, now.”

“You’re always so bossy, Bram. You’re the youngest, remember, not the oldest. I’m on my way, but you’d better think of a good lie about why you’re holding an unconscious woman and standing next to a man about to upchuck on the sidewalk.”

“Upchuck? Shit, Saxon, act your age and stand up.” Bram Stewart pulled the woman into his arms more comfortably and tried to pretend he was walking beside her, rather than carrying her across to a low brick fence. Saxon did look pasty-pale and as if he was going to puke.

“If you have to vomit, do it in the garden, not on the sidewalk,” he advised his brother.

Saxon just grunted and hobbled, bent over like a very old man, to the fence. He made no attempt to sit but sort of leaned over it.

“If anyone speaks to us, you’re both drunk and Hardy’s gone for the car, okay?”

Saxon nodded slightly. Bram hoped drunk would cover any questions. He wanted to laugh at Saxon’ predicament, but no red-blooded male could help but feel the shared pain of having had his prized possession battered by a woman. He turned her slightly to look at her, sitting her over his knee and hoping he appeared like her lover, not a kidnapper.

She was wearing a hood over her head, but when he went to pull it off, he found it had been stitched tightly to the neck of her sweater. Bram wrapped an arm around her, holding her securely on his knee while he leaned her forward and examined her sweater, finally working out how to slide the hood off her head and tuck it back down inside her collar. Her hair was brown and cut short. It was also sweaty, likely from all that running. She’d moved damn fast for a human female.

If she was human. She sure felt nice in his arms, her soft breasts pressed against his forearm. He sniffed behind her ear, but there was no scent of a shape-shifter about her. She was human. A lovely, warm, soft human woman. It was a fucking shame she was working against them.

Bram wiggled the straps of the backpack off her arms, catching it before it fell and balancing it on her legs so he could open it one-handed.

“What the fuck?”

“Huh?” Saxon voice was weak and high-pitched, but at least his brain was starting to work again. Likely he’d have bruised balls for a while. It wasn’t as though he could pack them with ice in the middle of a public road.

“She’s stolen a couple of old stamp albums.”

“If Lutterworth’s involved, they’ll be worth a shitload of money.” Saxon voice was still high-pitched, but he was obviously recovering fast. That was a complete coherent sentence.

His brother was right. Lutterworth moved in the mid-to-upper echelons of society and only offered to sell items he could resell for a hell of a lot more than he told his clients. Apart from the stuff he stole outright. That was one hundred percent profit for the conman.

Saxon picked up one of the albums and opened it to the first page. Written in faded old ink on the inside of the red leather cover was a childish signature and date. “John-Paul Crawford. Christmas 1953.”

“Fifty-three? That’s more than sixty years ago.”

“And that’s why these albums will be worth money. I bet there are stamps in here that haven’t been available in stores for forty or fifty years.”

“Very likely. Put them back in the bag and carry the bag yourself. It’s all very well knowing what she stole, but why she stole them would be even more useful,” said Bram, glad Saxon was functioning again.

“I wish Hardy would hurry up. I need some privacy.”

Bram snorted. “I bet you do. You can stick a packet of frozen peas on your balls when we get home.” Then he thought a bit more. “Actually going home would be the wrong thing to do. We need to get back to Lutterworth’s and finish the job. Once he finds out what Little Miss Trouble here has done, likely he’ll install decent security, and we’ll never achieve our aims.”

“Fuck.” Saxon’s reply was halfway between a groan and a sigh. That was pretty much how Bram felt as well. The woman in his arms was soft and sweet, and her body was doing interesting things to his dick. But she was also Trouble with a capital T. She’d ruined the week of work he and his brothers had spent organizing this hit on Lutterworth’s house. It had to be tonight or tomorrow while the Lutterworths were in D.C. for a fundraising ball for some charity or other that Mrs. Lutterworth sponsored. And that meant, despite Saxon’s damaged dick and the woman, they’d still have to go ahead and retrieve the stolen jewelry. Tonight.

The woman in Bram’s arms stirred and wiggled. “Fuck. She’s waking up. Where’s Hardy and the damn car?”

Saxon stepped in front of Bram and pulled the woman’s arms behind her back, gripping her wrists in his hands. Bram pressed her face into his chest, effectively blindfolding her and muffling her mouth in case she decided to scream. He gripped the back of her head, holding her face still against his sweater.

She started to fight him, and he leaned over her, his mouth beside her ear. In the harshest tone he could manage, he said, “If you want to live, you’ll remain still and silent.”

Just then Hardy drove up and stopped the car beside them. He jumped out and popped the trunk, pulling out some rope and efficiently tying her hands behind her back where Saxon held them.

“Put her in the trunk,” said Saxon.

“What?” Hardy and Bram both turned to their oldest brother.

“We can’t take her with us, and we have work to do.”

Bram sighed and picked her up, dumping her in the trunk and putting the stamp albums in there with her.

Hardy slammed the lid, and Saxon was already climbing into the car. Bram followed them. He’d already figured out that they had to finish the job tonight. He didn’t like putting her in the trunk, but really, they had no choice.

* * * *

Saxon Stewart grabbed the packet of frozen corn on the passenger seat, unzipped his jeans, and gratefully stuck the packet inside his jeans and over his boxers. That should give the perfect relief. Putting them directly on his skin might be too harsh, but he welcomed the cold seeping through his aching equipment.

“Fuck, that bitch hit me hard.”

“Don’t worry. I hit her back, and she’ll have a nasty headache when she wakes up,” said Hardy.

“You didn’t give her a concussion, did you? How are we going to explain that at the Emergency Room?”

“Of course I didn’t. I know how to hit people and get it exactly right. Instant sleeping pill, but it comes with a hell of a hangover,” said Hardy.

“Both of you shut up and let’s get back there. Time is passing, and we still need to get those damn jewels, remember?” Saxon didn’t have much patience. The frozen corn on his dick was helping soothe the pain, but the night was still completely fucked up.

“So the plan is exactly the same as before?” queried Bram.

“There’s no reason to change anything.” Saxon heard the grumpiness in his voice, but after all, he was in charge here. He was the eldest, and it was his plan.

“Apart from the chick in the trunk,” said Hardy, pulling into a permit-only parking zone. Saxon took their permit pass out of the glove compartment and displayed it on the dashboard. Reluctantly, he pulled the frozen corn out of his jeans and zipped up. “Let’s go.”

Hardy and Bram hastened away from the car in one direction as he walked more slowly the other way. He spent a moment wondering where Hardy had found the frozen corn and the rope but shrugged his thoughts off. He needed to focus on the job now. That chick had jumped the back fence of Lutterworth’s brownstone exactly the way they’d planned to do. Except that he was to go over the fence first while Bram and Hardy checked out the area.

He waited not far from his target until his cell phone vibrated once and then again. Saxon pulled a pair of tight leather gloves out of his pocket and put them on. He jumped and grabbed the fence, pulling himself up and over easily, and then he walked silently across the lawn to the house. He scanned the ground carefully but saw no sign of where the woman had been. Then he looked at the house itself. It was silent and dark, just the way he wanted it to be. There were no broken windows or signs of entry that he could see.

Bram came over the fence and stood beside him. Saxon nodded and stepped quickly until he was below the second-story bathroom window. It was an old-fashioned sliding window and should be easy for Bram to open. He kneeled down, and Bram climbed up his body until his feet were on Saxon’s shoulders. Saxon braced his hands on the wall of the brownstone and stood up slowly. When he was standing firm, Bram let go of his head and straightened up.

Exactly as they’d planned, Bram could now reach the bathroom window to open it. There was a long pause until Bram hissed, “Yes.”

Saxon placed his hands around Bram’s calves and then gave him a boost upward. He couldn’t move his head to look just yet, but Bram’s weight left his body, and then he could watch Bram disappearing head first into the bathroom.

Hardy appeared silently beside him, and Saxon climbed up Hardy as Bram had done to him and was boosted through the window. Once there, he turned around and leaned as far out as he dared. He and Hardy grabbed each other’s wrists, and between him pulling and Hardy pushing his feet against the wall, Hardy climbed up and in.

Saxon heaved a sigh of relief. Getting out would be easy. They could jump if they had to. Getting in without a ladder or rope—both of which would leave marks on the wall—was a hell of a lot harder.

He spent a moment wondering how the woman had done it and then followed Hardy out of the bathroom and along the hallway until they came to the master bedroom.

Bram was to search the study, himself the bedroom, and Hardy the other rooms. They were looking for stolen jewelry, and since Lutterworth’s safe in his office building was seen by all his really important clients, they were certain it would be here in his house.

“The best place to hide a tree is in a forest,” Saxon reminded himself as he searched for a jewelry box or something similar. He looked through Mrs. Lutterworth’s side of the dressing table first and then the thief’s.

Plenty of jewels, but not the stolen ones he wanted to reclaim. Next he tried her side of the closet, a huge affair with mirrored doors and a vast number of gowns hanging in it. All the shoes were neatly lined up on racks on the floor of the closet, so that was another potential hiding place out of consideration.