There was no kinship between them, then or now. Asher hadn’t come away from the lab with many friends. Or any, for that matter. In the two decades since he and this male had escaped the program, their paths hadn’t crossed until this moment.
Seeing a fellow former assassin now, here, and obviously employed by none other than Leo Slater made the killer in Asher tense for a fight. To the death, if necessary.
They squared off in silent challenge, Asher calculating a dozen lethal ways to open his attack while the other male’s scowl deepened in suspicion.
“What are you doing here,Asher?” He leaned heavily on the moniker, scorn in every syllable. “Wouldn’t have guessed you for the gambling type.”
“I could ask you the same thing.” He glanced at the shiny brass nametag pinned to the Hunter’s jacket lapel. “Cain, is it?”
The male grunted, those shrewd eyes gleaming like the sharpened edge of a polished blade. By now four other members of Moda’s security team had joined Cain outside the elevator bank. The men, humans all of them, looked to him and Asher in question.
“Everything all right, sir?” one of them asked Cain.
He gave a terse nod. “Get out on the floor. Make sure we’re secure. I’ll be right behind you.”
As the unit fanned out to do his bidding, Cain’s gaze swept the immediate area—including the path Naomi had taken only moments ago—before his attention swung back to Asher.
“Problem, brother?”
Cain’s mouth drew tight at the growled endearment. “You’d better hope there isn’t. Or I’ll be right behind you, too,brother.”
Asher smiled a cold smile, then gave Slater’s head of security a bump of his shoulder as he brushed past him without another word.
Everything animal inside him seethed at the threat this killer posed—not so much to him, but to Naomi. And, now, even to her friend Michael.
Asher exited the casino, inhaling the night air as he headed out to the bright lights of the Strip. She wasn’t hard to trace now. Two blocks up the sidewalk, she was rushing to the curb with her arm out, trying to hail a taxi.
She yelped as he hooked one arm around her midsection and hauled her away from the street.
“Keep walking and don’t pull away from me or turn around unless you want to call more attention to us both.” With his hand at the small of her back, he steered her alongside him and began walking briskly toward the garage where he’d earlier parked the truck.
Too smart to make a scene on the street, she fell into step beside him as instructed, her body trembling under his palm. “How the hell did you find me? And what do you think you’re doing?”
“Saving your pretty neck for the second time,” he muttered. “Come on.”
Although he would hardly call her cooperative, she kept quiet the rest of the walk to the pickup truck. He put her in the passenger side, then went around and climbed behind the wheel.
She shot him an irritated glance as he started up the truck. “Since I see you had no trouble retrieving this heap from where I left it this morning, I guess that means you know where to drop me off.”
“I’m not dropping you off anywhere.”
“You most certainly are.” She balked, pivoting to face him. “Take me home, Asher. Right now.”
“I am. To my home.”
“What? No! Dammit, let me out of this truck right now.”
“Out of the question.” When she lunged for the door handle beside her, he reached across the seat and closed his fingers over her hand. “If I let you go, you’re going to end up dead.”
“Didn’t we already have this conversation? I told you I don’t want your so-called protection. I just want you to leave me alone.”
“I can’t do that, Naomi. Especially not after the stunt you and Michael just pulled.”
Her face blanched, but her stubborn chin went up a notch. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He scoffed. “Really? I’m betting you’ve got about one-point-three-million ideas what I’m talking about.”
She fell silent for a long moment. “Michael won that jackpot, not me. There’s no reason for anyone at the casino to suspect a thing.”
