Kara was a whirlwind of emotions as Blake parked the truck in the hotel garage they’d left earlier, to be near the pier. There was something happening between them, something she wasn’t going to want to walk away from. She kept telling herself it was her using him to hide from the heartache she feared her mission was going to bring to her. But if that were true, it was only true because deep in her soul, she connected with Blake. She felt his pain, too. To believe he was one of them tore her apart. Yet she had every reason to believe he was, and nothing but what he made her feel to believe otherwise.

Blake reached under his leather jacket and gave her gun back. Her gaze lifted to his at the sign of trust that reached so much further than her purse he’d already returned. “You stay in the truck and lock the door,” Blake ordered. “But use that if you need to.”

“Why not let me introduce you to Ignacio?”

“I don’t want you attached to this. I can introduce myself.”

“Blake—”

He leaned in and kissed her. “You might be playing with your life, Kara, but I’m not.”

She grabbed his arm. “Don’t get killed. I’m not done with you yet.”

His lips lifted. “Sweetheart, I’m not done with you either and I don’t die easily. You’ll figure that out soon enough.”

He was out of the truck before she could stop him and knocking on the window to tell her to lock up. She did as he wanted and sat there, watching him saunter away, relieved he’d had someone drop weapons at her door. He’d armed himself to the hilt. Oh, how a day changed things. She went from him being a threat to her worried about the threat to him.

“He’s still a threat, Kara,” she whispered, warning herself not to forget something so important.

She spent the next twenty minutes reminding herself of that fact, and that twenty minutes turned to forty. She was nervous. What if something had happened to Blake because of her information?

Kara ran her hands down her black jeans, trying to contain her nervous energy. She’d had enough of the sitting-duck routine. She grabbed her purse, and slid the gun inside. She found a piece of paper in her purse and left Blake her cell number. Next she snatched the truck key and put it in her black leather jacket, for easy access if she needed to get out of here quickly.

Once she was out of the truck, she headed toward a building she’d found that offered good coverage for photos just across the street. Five minutes later, she’d squatted behind a wall and removed her binoculars to check out the pier and hopefully locate Blake.