Secret Seduction (Secret Series Romance Novels) Read online

  Every time she had had some downtime over the last year, she had always reverted back to thinking about the betrayal, about her mother, her friends, and most importantly, Jason. She tried not to think about her problems too often. She wasn’t really wallowing in pity, more like taking a break from reality.

  Looking around her, she felt a little relieved that she’d hit the main pathway back into town. Here the wood planks of the walkway creaked under her feet. She could barely see the path leading to the lights and safety of the small city and couldn’t even see her own feet in front of her, causing her to stumble a few times on uneven planks jutting out from the path. She thought she heard a board creak behind her and turned quickly to look. Seeing nothing, she quickened her pace. Was someone following her? She felt like she was being toyed with. In all her time being alone in Europe, she’d never felt threatened or scared. Now, however, she would have done anything to have a friend with her.

  She could feel her fear vibrating throughout her entire body. Her hands shook as she held onto her backpack, and her breath was coming in quick bursts. She felt like running, but didn’t want to seem like one of those crazy women who went running and screaming because of a small noise.

  When she reached the clearing of the first street and could finally see her own feet in the light, she started to relax and released a large sigh of relief. She had no time to scream as a black bag was tossed over her head, and she was grabbed by several large hands.

  Chapter Two

  As Katie watched the sun sink lower over the waters at Alimos, Jason watched her from the shadows of a small cluster of trees a few yards away. It was a quiet, peaceful night and the warm day had finally cooled off, leaving a slight chill in the air. He had been curious when she’d walked right through the town and straight to the beach. When getting into a new town, she normally would get a hotel room before she went exploring. This time, she had walked to the beach almost like she had a purpose. He had wondered if she’d spotted him several times during the short bus trip there.

  He’d been only a few seats back. Since leaving Denmark, she’d been too preoccupied to even look around her. If she had, she would have easily spotted him on the trains and buses.

  He remembered last year when he’d arrived back at her dorm room. Her place had looked like someone had broken in and gone through it. Katie was a huge neat freak and he knew instantly that something was wrong.

  Her television was laying on the floor in pieces, her closet was ransacked, with some clothes missing and others tossed about the room. Half of her drawers were opened and empty.

  They had been roommates two years ago and he had never heard the end of her complaints about his stuff lying around. Finally, she had just given up on him and started picking everything up herself. She had eventually moved back into the dorms because of his messy life style. But shortly after she had left, he had become somewhat of a neat freak himself. He supposed it had taken her not being around to realize how sloppy he was, so he changed.

  When he had walked into her dorm room that first day, he had been sure that something bad had happened to her. Then the girl that lived down the hall had walked by. The busty blond had been trying very hard in the last two years to get his attention. He’d never given her any, which had only made her work harder.

  “It’s too bad Katie left. We’ll sure miss her around here.” She leaned against the open doorway, and when she smiled at him, Jason almost felt his skin crawl.

  “Left? What do you mean left?”

  “Oh, yeah. She was watching you on TV and then went a little crazy and did that.” She pointed to the shattered set and continued, “Looks like she didn’t like seeing you get some of her spotlight. She packed her bags and left less than ten minutes later.”

  When the girl finally left, he stormed out of Katie’s room and headed to her parents’ house just outside of Boston. No one was there and their live-in maid told him that she didn’t know where Katie was, or where she was going.

  It had taken him less than a day to call both of her parents and her brother. When a month had gone by and no one from her family had heard from her, he started to panic. He remembered hearing her tell him once that she wanted to travel to England, but he didn’t know if she would actually do something like that.

  Before he could make a decision about what to do, he received a call with some important information on her whereabouts, which had helped him make up his mind. So he had purchased a ticket and set off to chase her across Europe.

  When he had finally tracked her down, he had been only three days behind her. He had been so close, but then, she had dropped off the face of the earth again.

  How could someone who had failed geography in high school -- twice -- move around a foreign country like she was born there?

  He had known her forever and not once had she said anything about being interested in traveling like this. When she had talked about traveling, she had mentioned five-star hotels, the best restaurants, and expensive shops.

  But instead, he had been following her through small towns, country roads, and small hotels. He had noticed she was keeping away from the larger cities and staying away from too many people, most likely trying to avoid the spotlight he knew she had hated in the states.

  It had been just under a year since he’d followed her across the big pond, as the locals liked to call it. He’d spent nights in hotels, dives, and bed and breakfasts. Sometimes he had ended up sleeping in the small tent he had purchased.

  But now he had finally followed her to Greece, where he knew her biological father, Damiano, was visiting one of his many business offices. He followed her south to Athens, always keeping out of sight on the train. If she’d known he was there – well, he didn’t want to think of what she would have done. She might have run, she might have been mad. He didn’t know, but he knew he couldn’t chance it yet.

  Once, in a small cafe just outside of Barcelona, she had almost seen him. It had been the first time he’d been that close to her in almost a year. She’d looked good, very good. She’d cut her dark curly hair shorter and had short spiky bangs that accented her face and highlighted the fact that she’d lost a few pounds since the last time he’d laid eyes on her.

  He had watched her walk across the street and purchase a few items in the small boutique. He swore to himself he’d never get that close again. It was too hard on him, seeing her, hearing her, smelling her. So he’d kept his distance from then on, following her farther back.

  Until the night before she was supposed to meet her father. He’d been watching her from the darkness of the trees that sat a few yards away, as she sat on the beach. She looked so lonely, he had thought for a few seconds about going over there to comfort her. He’d thought about doing that a lot over the last few months. He knew her, she needed her space to work things out on her own. It was just killing him not to spend time with his best friend. He missed talking to her, missed being with her, missed her laugh.

  Then he had heard something. He listened as two men approached slowly, whispering as they watched her, and he knew he had to come up with a plan quickly. So he’d done what he’d been training his whole life for, and acted as quickly as possible to save her.

  The bag smelled of rotten potatoes. The hands were rough and grabbed her in places she’d never let anyone touch her before. Screaming had been met with a mouth full of dust and cobwebs, so she’d quickly shut her mouth. She decided instead to try kicking out blindly, which she hoped would give her a chance of fighting them off. She was satisfied when she heard a loud grunt as her foot connected with something solid.

  She was thrown down on the rocky ground and when she landed on her backpack, her head snapped back and hit a rock. She could taste blood in her mouth. Someone was sitting on her chest and she found it hard to breath. Her hands were yanked above her head while someone tried to tie her feet with something, possibly a rope. She kicked out with renewed energy, making sure to never put her legs too close toget
her so they couldn’t get a rope around them. The man above her had slipped something cold over her hands. Were those handcuffs? When she heard the small click of them sliding into place, she knew she was in trouble.

  The cold metal dug into her wrists and she was finding it harder to breathe through the dusty bag. She kept her eyes closed because grit was getting into them, causing them to tear up. She was panicked, and she could feel her heart beat so hard that she could hear it in her ears.

  Suddenly the man’s weight was lifted and her hands were freed from above her head. She could hear grunting and shouting, but didn’t stop to figure out what was happening. Removing the bag with her cuffed hands, she threw it on the ground. Sitting on the cool ground, she could see three figures fighting. One man stood in the middle and was kicking out at two larger men. She got up and started to run towards the lights, screaming at the top of her lungs.

  She made it several feet when arms came around her from behind, grabbing hold of her shoulders and spinning her around. She didn’t have to think, she spun around and struck out. Catching the man off guard, she watched as he stepped back a full step, holding his chin in his hands. Then he stared at her with the lightest blue eyes she’d ever seen.

  “Damn it, Katie,” he rubbed his jaw and stared at her.

  “J – Jason?”

  He recovered quickly and grabbed her hands, then started pulling her towards a darkened side street.

  “We need to get away from those two men. Damn it, Katie, pick up your feet and run.”

  Several people had come out of their small houses on the outskirts of town to see what was going on. Katie just stared at them as he pulled her down a dark alley.

  “I am!” At least she was trying to. It must have been the lack of oxygen that was causing her head to swim. She felt like she couldn’t really focus on anything. It seemed to her that they had been running for miles through the streets and she started having a hard time keeping up. They had passed all the houses and entered the main part of the city. Here the buildings were taller and closer together, and the street lights lit up the darkness. She looked at Jason’s back as he pulled her down street after street. His hair was longer and it looked like he’d gained a little muscle since the last time she’d seen him. He had always been skinny, but now he looked like he was built.

  Finally, after they had gone over a dozen more blocks, she pulled her hands free of his hold. They were standing a few feet away from the corner of two streets in a busier section of town. Cars zipped by and she noticed people walking all around them. The night life of Alimos was busier here.

  “Jason, stop! W-what are you doing in Greece?” She looked down and realized she still wore the shiny pair of handcuffs.

  “It appears as though I’m saving your ass, again,” he said, smiling down at her.

  A memory flashed in her mind. It had all started the summer when she turned eight and had gone to the country club swimming pool with her mother and brother, Ric, something they did almost daily during the hot summer days in Boston. This particular day, she’d been stuck swimming in the kiddie pool because her mother was too preoccupied to watch her in the larger pool.

  If her mother would just let her take swimming lessons like her brother had, she could enjoy the large green slide that twisted in loops and sat on the large side of the deep pool.

  The slide was something Katie had always wanted to try out. Ric was constantly going down it or jumping off the diving board. That day it had been easy to escape her mother’s attention. She was flirting with the lifeguard and wasn’t keeping a close eye on Katie.

  She remembered focusing on the large slide as she walked over to it. She can’t remember making it up the stairs or what she had thought about while sitting at the top. But she did remember the thrill of falling and spinning as she jetted down the slick surface towards the cool, clear water.

  Jason hadn’t been much older or bigger than her, but he had been an avid swimmer already. His light blue eyes had been the first thing she had seen as she lay on the side of the pool.

  Her mother and the lifeguard had also hovered over her, but she paid them no attention and just looked at the boy who had saved her. His worried eyes focused on her and when he noticed she was okay, he smiled the nicest smile Katie had ever seen. His sandy dark hair was slicked back away from his tan face, and he had the cutest dimple right above his mouth on the right side.

  Jason’s mother had rushed through the growing crowd at that point and a dramatic scene had ensued. Everyone pawed and oohed over Katie, but her mind was totally focused on Jason, much like it had been focused on the slide just a few minutes earlier.

  Finally everyone had settled down, and Katie was forced to sit in the shade the rest of the day while her brother played in the cool water and her mother went back to socializing. Jason had sat next to her for a while, and she had fallen in love right there, under a large oak tree by the kiddie pool at the country club.

  For the remainder of the summer Katie trailed Jason around at the pool. She spent every moment of her time at the club hunting him down and following him, until finally, instead of trying to ditch her like he’d been doing, one day he started looking for her instead. He taught her to swim and she enjoyed the game of sneaking away from her mother to be with him.

  After that summer, Katie didn’t go anywhere without Jason; they were inseparable. It was the same all throughout school as slowly they became best friends. If anyone dared hint that they were anything but friends, they would set them straight quickly. And for years and years, Katie had kept her infatuation to herself.

  “Not that again.” She blinked her mind clear and frantically started to pull at her wrists, trying to get the tight cuffs off. “I’ve told you a million times, I was swimming just fine. If you hadn’t jumped on top of me, I would have made it to the side of the pool all by myself.” It was an old argument that no one ever won.

  He grabbed her wrists and quickly unlocked the handcuffs, then dropped them and the key on the ground. Katie wiped her face and eyes clear, but she felt like she was covered with dirt and was beginning to feel as if she was in shock. Her mind was foggy, almost like she’d spent the whole day running. Her breath was still shaky and she tried to level it by taking deep breathes.

  “Where did you get the key?” She walked over to retrieve the keys and cuffs, looking at them with wonder. She was trying to keep her mind off the fact that she’d almost been kidnapped.

  “Leave them, Kat.” He reached for her hand again. “We better keep moving.”

  “No, I’m not going anywhere until I get some answers.” She pulled her hand out of his warm fingers as she started to shake. “Why are you in Greece? Have you been following me? How did you get this?” She held up the key and looked at it.

  She watched him look around and then he shook his head in frustration. She finally got a good look at him. His face was scruffy with a few day’s growth, giving him a more dangerous, mysterious look, something she had never thought about him before. He was almost unrecognizable.

  His faded jeans hung low on his hips and his dark jacket had sand all over it. He had a dark pair of running shoes on and she noticed the dark straps of a backpack hanging on his broad shoulders.

  She hadn’t seen him in a year and looking at him now was like seeing heaven. She’d missed him, but looking at him also stirred questions deep inside her. She wondered how their relationship would be now. Would it be changed? Had she changed too much? Had he changed too much for her to recognize?

  When he ran his hands through his hair in frustration, she saw her old Jason and was very glad.

  She was relieved that he had come along when he had. She’d been in trouble, a lot more than just getting in too deep at the swimming pool. She dumped the handcuffs and key and waited until he focused on her face again, thinking about what could have happened if he hadn’t come along.

  How much more could he take? He’d been punched in the gut and his fists hurt from kno
cking one of the guy’s teeth loose. Then Katie had given his jaw a good whack, and she might just have given him a loose molar for all his trouble.

  Looking at her standing in the dark alley, he was actually proud that she’d knocked his jaw loose. She must have paid a little attention to some of the self-defense classes he’d forced her to take in junior high. Now he could see her starting to shake and her face looked paler than normal. What they needed now was a place to stop and think, so he could regroup. Looking around, he saw a cafe a few blocks away and tried to pull her in that direction.

  “I grabbed the keys from the guy I left spitting out his teeth back there,” he said, nodding in the direction they had come. “I’ve been trailing you since Bristol, and it appears it was a good thing, too.”

  She stopped dead in her tracks. “Bristol?” He could see her mind working, calculating.

  She’d been in Bristol for the New Year’s celebration. He’d lucked out when he had caught up with her there. It had only taken him five months to track her down after she had left her dorm room