Forever Guarded Read online

  Forever Guarded

  Forever Bluegrass #10

  Kathleen Brooks

  Contents

  Also by Kathleen Brooks

  Family Trees for Keeneston

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Epilogue

  Also by Kathleen Brooks

  About the Author

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  * * *

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons living or dead, actual events, locale, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  * * *

  An original work of Kathleen Brooks. Forever Guarded copyright @ 2018 by Kathleen Brooks

  * * *

  Forever Bluegrass Series® is a registered Trademark of Laurens Publishing, LLC.

  Bluegrass Series

  Bluegrass State of Mind

  Risky Shot

  Dead Heat

  * * *

  Bluegrass Brothers

  Bluegrass Undercover

  Rising Storm

  Secret Santa: A Bluegrass Series Novella

  Acquiring Trouble

  Relentless Pursuit

  Secrets Collide

  Final Vow

  * * *

  Bluegrass Singles

  All Hung Up

  Bluegrass Dawn

  The Perfect Gift

  The Keeneston Roses

  * * *

  Forever Bluegrass Series

  Forever Entangled

  Forever Hidden

  Forever Betrayed

  Forever Driven

  Forever Secret

  Forever Surprised

  Forever Concealed

  Forever Devoted

  Forever Hunted

  Forever Guarded

  Forever Notorious (coming January 2019)

  * * *

  Shadows Landing Series

  Saving Shadows (coming October 2018)

  * * *

  Women of Power Series

  Chosen for Power

  Built for Power

  Fashioned for Power

  Destined for Power

  * * *

  Web of Lies Series

  Whispered Lies

  Rogue Lies

  Shattered Lies

  Family Trees for Keeneston

  Davies Family Tree

  * * *

  Keeneston Friends Family Trees

  1

  Piper Davies was alone in her laboratory in Lexington, Kentucky as she worked her way through the day’s mail. It was night and she’d put in a long day of work as a fall storm lashed out. Her nerves were frayed. Someone had broken into her lab a month ago and again at her home earlier that week. Piper was starting to think every shadow, every flicker of the light, and every man she passed on the street was a threat.

  Taking a deep breath, Piper put the electric bill in the pile of other bills and tossed her copy of Viruses Monthly into the trash after skimming through it. She pulled her long, unbrushed, dirty-blonde hair into a sloppy bun on the top of her head as she listened to the low hum of the refrigerator used to store some of her viral strands mixed with the deep rumble of the thunder from the storm pounding the outside world. Around her, the rows of black-topped lab tables and stools stood empty. Her employees had left for the night some time ago. Piper sat on her stool at a lab table, slid her finger under the envelope flap, and tore it open. She pulled the single piece of paper out and unfolded it. It took a second for the words to come to her as Piper stared at the note in her hand.

  * * *

  Give me your project or die. This is your last warning.

  * * *

  She knew who had sent it. Well, kind of. Piper had been getting mysterious “Caller Unknown” calls from a man for a couple of months now, asking to buy her secret project. No names were mentioned, no identifiers of any kind were given, and no number was available.

  Piper wasn’t used to failing. She’d flown through her undergraduate work, majoring in engineering and biology with a specialty in viruses before earning her Ph.D. in nanotechnology. She’d wanted to help people. And she’d received a massive grant to do just that. The grant was to use nanotechnology to stop virus pandemics, but she’d failed on her project named FAVOR, which stood for Fast Acting Viral Outbreak Response. And worse, someone not only knew about FAVOR, but also about her failure. And this wasn’t failure as in she would throw her project away and start years of work over again. No, this was a failure that could lead to the development of a bioweapon in the wrong hands. Instead of saving people from a pandemic, she could be the person who made it possible.

  But Piper was close to a solution. It felt like she was one tweak to a nanopartide or one adjustment away to the nanostructure, and then it could work. She just didn’t know the tweak or adjustment she needed to make. And that was messing with her mind more than anything. She really didn’t know where to start. So she’d sit in the lab late at night and review her procedure or run experiments.

  Piper looked over to check that the green light was on for the security system Nabi and Nash had installed. The alarm was also set. Nabi was the head of the Rahmi security in charge of protecting Prince Mo and Princess Dani Ali Rahman and their children and spouses. Nash, his second-in-command, had upgraded the system after the last break-in. The small island nation of Rahmi near the Persian Gulf was where Piper had started an international lab with Mo and Dani’s son, Prince Zain. She never called him prince. No one from Keeneston did. They were simply the Ali Rahman family: Mo and his wife, Dani, their son Zain and his wife, Mila, their son Gabe and his wife, Sloane, and their daughter, Ariana.

  Nabi and Nash had set up a state-of-the-art alarm system at both her Lexington lab and the secret lab her father, Pierce, had helped her set up in Keeneston. No one but her father, Nabi, and Nash knew about its location. Her father had ordered her a pre-constructed steel modular cleanroom, and they’d put it on a piece of land they’d bought under a company name far out of the way in Keeneston. And they didn’t just put it on the land. They’d buried it. And that was where she spent long hours every night working. And where she’d go that night after she finished her administrative work.

  But now she stared down at the threat and knew she was on a timeline to solve the issues plaguing FAVOR, for her life was in the balance. It was an easy choice for her to make. She’d given her life—one life—for the billions she could save by not handing FAVOR over to this man. Whoever he was, she was sure he wasn’t going to use it to save people. Instead, he could mix it with Ebola, influenza, or one of the many other deadly viruses and spread it across the globe. In its current setup, FAVOR would deliver the virus to the healthy cells instead of protecting the cells and capturing
the virus.

  Piper slipped forward on her stool so her feet rested on the ground. She had to get to Keeneston and check on her project. When she stood, she instinctively looked at the door. The green light of her security system was no longer green—it was red.

  Piper stopped breathing. She was no longer alone. She wasn’t trained in combat like many of her cousins. Her uncles were former Special Forces, law enforcement, and even a former spy. Aunt Paige could shoot better than anyone and Aunt Annie was also a badass former undercover agent with the DEA. They’d all taught their children how to fight, how to shoot, and how to kill. But Piper’s father, Pierce, was a farmer and inventor. He’d taught her how to engineer things, not how to throw a punch. And her mother, Tammy, was a little fairy of a woman who, while feisty, was one of the least violent people Piper knew.

  Piper moved to stand behind her stool as her hands squeezed the seat of her metal stool while she began to slowly scan the room. There was a back door, a connecting door leading to the lobby with large windows overlooking the street, and a front door. If they came in the front door or lobby windows, she could race to the connecting metal lab door and lock it. But if they came in through the back . . .

  The question was answered on a yelp as a leather-clad hand slammed against her mouth from behind, pulling Piper’s body tightly against his own. The leather hand imprinted on her face as the fingers squeezed her cheeks. Piper struggled, but the arm imprisoning her around the waist was very strong.

  “I see you got the boss’s note,” the husky foreign voice hissed into her ear. He sounded amused by her panic. And panic was definitely what Piper was feeling. Her heart was pounding and her lungs were burning as she struggled to drag air in through the sliver of space left open from the gloved hand over her mouth.

  “Give it to me now and the boss says you can live.”

  His accent struck her as European, but it wasn’t easy to place. It didn’t matter because she was going to die. It was strange the things that went through your head, like trying to figure out the nationality of the man who was going to kill you, because one, you didn’t have the project with you and two, Piper would never hand it over.

  Piper had a decision to make as the fingers tightened painfully against her cheek and jaw. She could just let him kill her as she stood there crying, or she could die fighting. She might not be trained like her cousins, but that didn’t mean she didn’t understand the physics of fighting. Such as the pain a metal stool could inflict when smashed into a man’s head.

  The man screamed and dropped his hands from Piper as she slammed the stool into his head. Not sparing even a glance at the man, she brought the stool back over her head, dropped her hands down the legs, and then spun around, swinging the stool like a golf club right into the man. He was dressed in black jeans and a black jacket. His face was large, square, and covered in a thick beard. And that was all she saw before he fell to the ground, cursing her in whatever his native language was.

  Piper looked at her assailant and over at the nearest door behind her. She decided to make a run for it and scream for help. She grunted as she hefted the stool back and threw it at him. The stool caused a cringe-worthy sound as it banged against his arms that he’d crossed into an X to protect his head.

  Piper ran then. She heard the stool clattering to the polished concrete floor and the man scrambling to his feet as he continued to threaten her in his native language. She didn’t need a translator to know he was going to kill her regardless now.

  Her hand slammed into the chrome metal bar as she flung the door open. The lobby was small. There was room for a receptionist’s desk and a loveseat with a small coffee table in front of it. Colorful artwork from local artists hung on the walls, and two large plate glass windows framed the dead-bolted front door made from matte steel.

  Piper was almost there. Less than ten feet and she could flip the dead bolt and shove the door open. She never got the chance. Her body was hit hard from behind as the man tackled her. She screamed as the momentum slammed her onto the coffee table. Wood splintered as it gave way to their force. The air whooshed from Piper’s lungs as he fell on her. She panicked as she could no longer breathe. Her face was mashed against the rug and magazines that had flown from the table, now broken under her body. The weight of the man behind her kept her stomach pinned to the ground and her arms outstretched as he wrapped his hand around her bun and yanked her head back.

  He was breathing hard as he maneuvered himself to jab his knee into her kidney. “You bitch!” Piper didn’t have the breath to scream as he banged her head against the floor with enough force that she saw stars—stars that were suddenly red and blue.

  The man cursed again in the language she didn’t know as the sounds of tires screeching to a halt outside reached them. He wrenched her head back once again. Her neck protested as hair ripped. “I’ll be back, and I’ll make you pay. Not because I was ordered to, but because I want to.”

  He shoved her head forward, her nose smashing into the rug as the weight of his body against hers lifted. Police were banging on the door and lights streamed in through the window as Piper pushed herself onto wobbly knees and began to crawl forward. Blood dripped into her eye as she struggled to reach up and unbolt the door. As soon as she did, it was flung open. Piper collapsed onto her back with a strangled cry. Her whole body shook with fear and pain as police flooded her lab.

  “We need an ambulance,” she heard an officer order a second before a worried face peered over her. “What’s your name?”

  “Piper Davies,” she murmured as she wiped at the blood streaming from a cut on her eyebrow. “This is my lab.”

  “I’m Officer Edsel. You’re a brave woman,” the young officer told her as he grabbed a medical kit someone handed him. He pulled out a pair of latex gloves and slapped them on before pressing gauze to her cut.

  “It’s all clear. The suspect went out the back. We’re canvassing the area,” Piper heard someone say.

  Officer Edsel nodded his crew-cut head and looked back at Piper. “It appears you put up quite the fight. Can you tell me what happened?”

  “He broke in the back, wanting one of my projects,” Piper said, trying to be as vague as possible. There was no way she wanted the details of her project FAVOR to become public record.

  “Edsel, I found this.”

  The threatening note appeared in front of her as Edsel read it. “Want to tell me how long these threats have been going on?”

  “The EMTs are here,” another officer said from the doorway, saving Piper from having to answer.

  Edsel looked annoyed at the interruption, but he nodded and backed off the line of questioning. “Is there anyone you want me to call for you?”

  “Lord, no. If anyone from Keeneston finds out—”

  “Sir, there’s a helicopter landing in the middle of the street,” the officer who had told them about the EMTs arrival shouted over the sounds of helicopter blades. Piper groaned as she closed her eyes in horror.

  “Miss?” Piper opened her eyes as two EMTs looked down at her. One began hooking up a blood pressure cuff as the other lifted the gauze to check her wound. “What hurts?”

  “Overbearing family and friends,” she groaned as she heard Nash Dagher shove his way through the door.

  “Piper!”

  “No, no, no.” Piper almost cried tears as Nash came into view. “You brought the helicopter? Now the entire town is going to know something happened to me, and I won’t be able to do what needs to be done.”

  “I’m more worried about the fact that a clump of your hair is on the floor, your face is cut, and there are bruises forming on your face. What happened?”

  Nash bent down and slipped an arm behind her. Piper let him help her sit up as the EMTs worked. “We can glue this cut shut. It’ll heal on its own.”

  “Okay,” Piper said absently as Officer Edsel quietly observed her.

  “Is it the same threats as before?” Nash asked, not letting it go.


  “Yes, but can we talk about this later?”

  “I’d like this information for my report,” Edsel finally said.

  “Well, you can’t have it. No one can!” Crap. Piper felt off kilter as the adrenaline from the situation began to dissipate, leaving her feeling like a wet rag. Piper sniffed and Nash began to look uneasy.

  “Please tell me you didn’t tell anyone you were coming to my lab,” Piper begged Nash as the first tear trickled down her cheek.

  Nash grimaced and backed away. “Just Sophie.”

  Piper sucked in an unsteady breath as the world crashed around her. If Sophie, Nash’s wife and Piper’s cousin, knew, then the all her cousins would know by now and probably three quarters of the town. By the time she made it back home, the entire small town of Keeneston would be asking her what happened. And right now she couldn’t deal with that. Her life was in danger and the world was in danger, all because of her failures. And she didn’t know how to fix it.

  Tears flowed and Nash leapt up as if they were contagious. Officer Edsel leaned forward and clasped her shoulders in his hands as he leaned her toward him. Piper buried her head in his chest and cried all over his uniform as he patted her back. “Let me help you, Ms. Davies.”