Eight dead men. Eight grieving widows…
After a series of particularly nasty home invasions, Blackwood Security is hired to catch the killers. With the company’s reputation at stake, everyone on the team is desperate to solve the mystery, unaware that there’s a traitor in their midst.
Cade Duchamp’s eager to help, but a minor indiscretion with the wrong girl leaves him banished to undercover duty. He’s always liked motorbikes, but he doesn’t like being a biker. Uncomfortable leather, an itchy beard, oil and grease—need he say more? Cade wants to be back at head office, hunting down the real bad guys. At least, he does until five-year-old Scarlet turns up. The daughter he never knew he had.
Taylor Hancock likes to fade into the background. As an office cleaner, she can come to work, do her job, and avoid those dreaded social interactions. But nobody says no to Emmy Black, and as Scarlet’s new nanny, Taylor’s forced way out of her comfort zone into a world of shopping trips, parties, and playdates.
The only problem?
She’s the traitor.
The Scarlet Affair is the tenth book in the Blackwood Security series but can be read as a standalone – no cliffhanger!
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Excerpt 1 – The Beginning:
The first of July. Thirty days since I left my old life, and twenty-nine days since Taylor Hancock came into the world.
But nobody lives forever, right?
Glowing white letters spelled out the date on the plasma screen behind the reception desk as I ran a duster over the surface, then the display switched to eight clocks showing various times around the world and finally to the shield-and-halo logo of Blackwood Security, the company I worked for.
Two weeks into my new job, and my days had changed beyond all recognition. Back home in California, I kept our beachfront home spick and span, but with only two of us living there, it didn’t take much effort. And now? Now I had two floors to clean in an office home to hundreds of people. Somebody else did the basement and the other restricted areas.
Behind me, reflected on the screen, the glass doors of the atrium slid to the side as an employee stared into the retina scanner that provided security after office hours. Another man hovered at his shoulder, awaiting his turn. The external security system was a little over the top, but it didn’t bother me. Why? Because I’d already gotten past it. No, my problem came from the scanners to get up to the third floor, because those were causing me difficulties.
The men walked past, talking softly as they headed for the stairs. Nobody took the elevator here. Rumour said that one of the bosses made anyone caught using it do twenty push-ups so they realised the error of their ways, although that was possibly why all the employees were so fit. Coming to work was like walking into a fantasy world where Magic Mike met the Navy SEALs, but while most women might see that as a perk of the job, I only had eyes for my husband.
Other than a brief glance in my direction and the merest flash of a smile from the blond guy on the left, the newcomers didn’t acknowledge the woman doing her best to fade into the background, and that was the way I liked it. I wore Taylor’s anonymity as a cloak, a cloak that kept me safe and cocooned me from the evils in the world, like the ones lurking on the top floor. The ones trying to ruin my husband’s biggest client.
The door slid open once more and a flame-haired lady walked through, her heels clicking on the floor I’d just polished. Mackenzie Cain. I recognised her from her picture in the staff directory. With the added height those stilettos gave her, she had to be close to six feet tall.
“Hey.” She raised a hand as she opened the door to the stairwell.
“Hi,” I mumbled, but she’d already gone.
At any other company, the amount of foot traffic at ten o’clock in the evening might have been considered unusual, but Blackwood Security worked twenty-four seven, and even at this late hour, the place gave off a quiet buzz that made me nervous. When I agreed to help Dean out with this project, I’d expected it to take a week, two at most, and I hadn’t planned on there being so many people around. He’d made it sound so simple, but every time I walked through the front door, I wanted to throw up.
“You just need to find their mainframe and upload a file onto it, that’s all,” he’d said.
“But what if there’s a password?”
“Doesn’t matter. As long as you can get the USB key into the port, the code I’ve written will do the rest.”
The idea of plotting something so underhanded didn’t sit well with me, but neither did the prospect of Blackwood destroying Dean’s career, which was what they were trying to do.
“Can’t you go?” I’d asked.
“Not and keep working. Looking after the Draupnir contract is a full-time job, and getting into Blackwood’s system will take time.”
I hadn’t managed it yet. The comms room was in the basement, secured by not only biometric security but a key as well, and constantly monitored by security cameras. And I wasn’t a spy, I was a freaking housewife.
Excerpt 2 – Scarlet:
Scarlet wiped her eyes while Emmy patted her awkwardly on the back. A few of Emmy’s friends had children now, but so far she’d managed to avoid any involvement that went beyond the superficial—buying gifts, attending the occasional birthday party, pretending to gush over photos.
Except now there was a small child needing assistance, and no responsible adult around to supervise.
Okay. Deep breaths. Emmy could do this. All she had to do was find somebody who did understand children and call them for pointers, or better still, convince them to come and help.
But who? Emmy ran through a mental list.
Carmen was in Mexico with her son, visiting her family, so she couldn’t offer practical help. How about Georgia? Her daughter may only have been seven months old, but the fact that she had a child must count for something, right? Emmy was scrolling through the G’s on her phone when she recalled her husband’s comment yesterday morning—Georgia had gone down with gastroenteritis and was confined to barracks. Ana? Ana wasn’t in the country either, but surely she’d have some ideas…
“Da?” Ana answered almost immediately, letting her Russian accent come to the fore.
“I need help. What do I do with a child?”
Emmy left Scarlet sitting in the big leather chair behind her desk and stepped out into the main office, which was almost deserted since there was a raid going on in town as well as a brainstorming meeting in the big conference room. Only Logan sat in the Special Projects department, his head bobbing in time to the music playing from his headphones as he concentrated on the laptop in front of him. Emmy began pacing. Yes, the pacing was a bad habit, born out of stress, but if any situation called for her to wear a hole in the carpet, it was this one.
“You’re pregnant?”
“No! Hell, no. She belongs to Cade.”
“Cade? Since when?”
“Since some woman dumped her off at the office with a note.”
A bark of laughter escaped. “Eto pizdets.”
Yes, thanks, Emmy had already realised the whole affair was fucked up. “And Cade’s gone back to work on that undercover thing.”
Ana only laughed harder. “So you got left with the kid? Was there literally nobody else in the entire building?”
“It’s not bloody funny.”
“Yes, it is. When Tabby wanted a piggyback the other day, you went four shades paler.”
Tabby was Ana’s daughter. Three years old, and she’d already perfected a stare that could intimidate most grown men, just like her mother.
“I was worried about dropping her.”
Ana’s voice softened uncharacteristically. “For six months after she was born, I worried about everything, but it got easier. How old is the girl?”
“Scarlet. Her name’s Scarlet. Five, as best we can work out.”
“That’s not so bad. At least you can talk to her.”
“But I’ve got no idea what to say.”
“Start with the simple things—tell her that she’s staying with you while the grown-ups get their shit together.”
Ana’s boyfriend piped up in the background. “Try not to use the word ‘shit.’”
“No shit. Got it.”
“Has she eaten?”
“I’ve got no idea.”
“Okay, start by getting her dinner. Are you still in the office?”
“Yeah. And I’m supposed to be meeting with an informant in three hours then doing a little breaking and entering. When I catch up with Scarlet’s mother, it ain’t gonna be pretty.”
Emmy was already organising the search in her head. She may not have known how to care for a child, but she could plan a manhunt in her sleep. First, check the CCTV to find out the details of the woman’s vehicle. Next, run an in-depth background check and pass the details on to her ever-growing network as the information came in. Nobody could disappear completely—they always left clues. Always. And— Oh, shit.
Emmy glanced over into her glass-fronted office and saw the empty chair.
“Uh, I think I lost the kid.”
“Remind me never to ask you to babysit.”
“I don’t think there’s any danger of that. Besides, all of my time’s gonna be taken up looking for Cade’s ex so I can remove her ovaries and ensure she never has another child.”
“Emmy?”
“Yeah?”
“Stop talking and find Scarlet.”
