Page 7 of Protecting Maggie
“I’m not going to steal this piece of shit,” Preacher told her. “I want to talk to my friends, and I have to make sure you won’t take off when we get out…if this thing even starts again.”
She wanted to continue to protest. To beg them all to just leave her alone. To tell them that she’d stop driving for the ride-share app. But she couldn’t. Unless she wanted to work for a strip club, which she definitely didnot, she needed to keep taxiing people around.
“Give him the keys, Maggie,” Kevlar ordered.
To her surprise, she found herself doing just that. What did it matter? These men literally held her life in their hands. If they turned her in, she was going right back behind bars. The last thing she wanted to do was piss them off any more than she already had.
Her fingertips brushed against Preacher’s palm whenshe dropped the keys in his hand—and to her shock, she felt a tingle shoot up her arm.
She snatched her hand back as if she’d been burned. She wanted to cradle her hand against her chest but refrained, barely. She’d learned through her time behind bars that to let anyone know what you were thinking or feeling was dangerous.
She did her best to wipe all emotion from her face…but she had a feeling she’d failed miserably when Preacher spoke.
“Breathe, Maggie. We just need to talk for a moment.”
Breathe. Right. As if.
She sat frozen as the three men got out and slammed the doors behind them.
Despair hit Maggie all over again. They weren’t going to believe her. No one did. They probably thought she was a master drug dealer or something. That she was using the Uber job as a cover for delivering drugs to people all across the city. She was screwed. She might as well prepare herself to put on the horrible jailhouse pants and shirt she’d been forced to wear for the last two years.
The tears she’d managed to hold back finally sprang to her eyes and fell down her cheeks.
CHAPTER THREE
Preacher stepped away from the vehicle and waited for Kevlar and Smiley. They huddled against the brick wall of the building near where Maggie had parked.
“I believe her,” Kevlar said without preamble.
“Me too,” Preacher agreed.
The two men looked at Smiley. He was the skeptic of the team. The guy who always came up with the worst-case scenarios.
To Preacher’s surprise, he nodded and said, “She’s not lying.”
“So what do we do?” he asked.
“I’m going to send a message to Adina’s commander, just to verify her story, but in the meantime, I’m thinking she’s not going to get far with that piece-of-shit vehicle,” Kevlar said.
Preacher looked over at the car in question andfrowned when he saw Maggie slumped over the wheel. He felt a pang of guilt for the way they had tricked her. Despite how bad it looked, she didn’t seem to have nefarious intentions in using Adina’s name and Uber license.
There was also something about the woman that made him want to hug her close and reassure her that everything would be all right.
Which was crazy. But that didn’t change how he felt.
“I’ll follow her home to make sure she gets there okay,” he blurted.
Both Kevlar and Smiley studied him intensely.
Finally, Kevlar said, “It might not be smart to get involved with a felon.”
Irritation swam through Preacher’s veins. “I didn’t say I was getting involved with her. And I’m just making sure she gets home all right, not planning on parading her through the naval base, shouting her criminal history to everyone I pass,” he said tightly.
To his surprise, Smiley chuckled. “I’d pay to see that,” he said under his breath.
“Right, sorry,” Kevlar said without hesitation.
“Besides…can you really see that woman as a drug dealer? We pressed her just a little and she caved. If she’s dealing drugs, I’m secretly a math genius who’s on the verge of solving the world’s most difficult equation,” Preacher said sarcastically.
