Sam placed his hand on her shoulder. "Why don't you stay put while I get you what you need?"

She nodded slowly. "Top drawer on the right."

The adrenaline that had surely kicked in had to be ebbing. Her eyes darkened with pain, and Sam's anger at the man who hurt her climbed another level.

Sam rummaged through her drawers, taking out clothing. At her direction, he chose shorts and a T-shirt. She added panties but tossed aside a bra when the band squeezed her rib cage too much.

When Paige was dressed, Sam put his arm around her and gently brought her to her feet. "After the hospital, I want you and Ivy to come back to my place."

He planned to do his best to talk her and Ivy into staying longer than just tonight. The fact that her home had been breached and Thames knew where Paige was were the most immediate reasons, but they weren't the only ones. Sam didn't know where this was going with Paige, but his heart was more than a little wrapped up in her. He wanted Paige and Ivy with him. Was he thinking long-term? Now wasn't the time to examine that, or to raise the subject of how long Paige and Ivy would stay with him. Paige was tired and she was hurting.

Paige looked up at him. "I'd rather not go to a motel tonight, but I don't want to bring this to your door. We don't know if tonight's attack was random or . . . something else."

Sam took her chin in his hand. No, now wasn't the time to discuss their relationship, but there was something that couldn't wait to be said. "You have to know I'd do a h.e.l.l of a lot more for you than offer you a place to sleep for the night."

She leaned into him. He kissed her softly, mindful of her bruises, then under her direction packed the suitcase he found in her closet.

Sam went with Paige and Ivy to Kirk County General Hospital, and Harry remained at the apartment with the crime scene team. While they were waiting for Paige to be treated, Sam asked her about the attack.

As Paige filled him in, Sam's anger sparked again. When she was finished, he asked the question that was burning a hole in his stomach. "Do you know the man who attacked you?"

Paige shook her head. "While I was waiting for Kirk PD to arrive, I looked in his wallet. His DL gave his name as Daryl Johnson."

"Doesn't ring a bell?"

"Not at all. It's not like there's a long list of people looking to hurt me. I haven't worked enough cases or put enough people away yet. Johnson is a local. I know Harry and the Kirk PD will put him through the paces, but I want to be there to observe the questioning."

"Let them talk to him tonight. He'll be waiting for us tomorrow."

The man was in one of the Kirk PD holding cells. Sam had to curb the urge to haul a.s.s down to the cell and have at the man. But he would wait. Paige's attacker wasn't going anywhere, and Sam wasn't going to leave Paige.

Paige was barely able to remain vertical. A doctor diagnosed Paige's ribs as bruised but not broken. She would be moving without any discomfort in a day or two.

When the three of them were back at his house, Sam showed Paige and Ivy to the spare bedroom on the main floor next to his workout room, with its adjoining bathroom. He would have liked to have Paige in his bed, where he could hold her and rea.s.sure himself that she was safe in his arms, but he knew Paige would want to be close to Ivy. Sam's home office was one room away. He had a couch in that room and would spend the rest of the night there.

Ivy looked a little overwhelmed by the night's events. Sam's heart lurched. He crouched beside the girl, and despite the fact that it was a warm spring night, he asked softly, "How about a gla.s.s of warm milk?"

Ivy hesitated. Sam tapped her chin and smiled. "You're not worried about imposing on me, are you? We know each other a lot better than that by now."

Ivy lowered her eyes, then raised them and met his gaze. Slowly, she returned his smile. "Warm milk would be really nice."

Sam warmed milk for Ivy, and while she drank it, he changed the sheets in the spare room. Paige settled Ivy in the queen-size bed.

Instead of getting into the bed with her sister as Sam expected, Paige followed Sam out to the living room. He watched her check her Glock at her hip, her fingers lingering, and felt an anger he'd never known before at the h.e.l.l she'd endured.

On their way home, he'd picked up pain pills prescribed for her, and had intended to bring them to her when she was in bed. Now, standing at the couch, he offered them to her with water. Paige took them but held them in her hand and did not swallow them.

"You need to take those," he said gently. "You have to be hurting, baby."

Her hand closed around the pills. "Not yet. I want to talk about what you found out about Thames."

"Harry didn't tell you?"

"I haven't had a chance to speak with Harry alone since he arrived at my apartment."

She looked ready to drop, but Sam could see she needed to know about Thames as much as she needed sleep. He dragged a hand back through his hair. "I need to make a couple of phone calls first. I want more security tonight, and then we'll talk."

Sam called Mike, Riley, and Dom. Though the man who'd attacked Paige was in custody, Sam didn't know if the man had acted alone. Sam wanted eyes on his place tonight. In the morning, he would make other arrangements. Shortly after, the men arrived. Sam filled them in on Paige's attack. The agents were fiercely protective of each other, and like Harry had done earlier tonight, they rallied to protect Paige.

"No one will get by us," Dom said.

Sam had no doubt of that. The men took up positions around the house.

When they were alone again, Sam faced Paige. "I didn't speak with Mary Emerson."

"Why not?"

Sam told her about his visit to her house and his discovery that Mary Emerson had not been heard from in a week.

"Thames got to her." Paige's voice was thread thin.

Sam had had that same thought when he learned of Emerson's disappearance. He cupped Paige's shoulders and rubbed them with his thumbs. "We now know how Thames found you in New York and Denver." Paige's head darted up. Her gaze on him sharpened. He could see the pulse in her throat beating rabbit-fast. He added what he'd learned about how Thames had tracked her and that Thames had also sought out Janet Lambert.

"When did Emerson's sister say he'd last checked on me?" Paige asked.

"One week ago."

Paige went another shade of white. Alarm shot through him. Fearing she was going to pa.s.s out, he tightened his hold on her.

She stepped back from him. "I've been afraid of him finding me via the media or the activists, but he's known where I am all along." She was breathing so fast, she choked on the words. "And Janet Lambert. Why her? How does she fit into all of this?"

Sam reached for her, and ignoring the stiffness of her posture, he drew her against him. Her first instinct, he'd come to know, was to distance herself and protect herself, a behavior she would have learned since New York, but what about before then?

She hadn't told him what her life had been like growing up, but by the way she drew into herself, Sam believed she'd been distancing herself for a very long time. Had she always been made to feel separate? No one in the New York office had fought for her and made her feel like she belonged. What about her family?

No way in h.e.l.l would Sam make her feel as if she didn't belong. She belonged, all right. More and more, he was starting to feel she belonged with him.

He drew back slightly and looked into her eyes, willing her to see the conviction in his. "No, don't back away from me. I won't let you back away, and I sure as h.e.l.l am not going to back away from you."

She clutched his arm, her fingernails sc.r.a.ping his skin. "You don't need this in your life, Sam. You don't need me."

He held her face in his hands. "I'm thinking you're exactly what I need. All I need."

He lowered his head and kissed her. She circled his wrists with her fingers, gripping him tight, and kissed him back. He deepened the kiss, and her response, as desperate as his, fired all of his protective instincts. Everything in him shouted that she was his.

He wanted to show her with his body everything he was feeling, but she was injured, and he wouldn't risk hurting her more. A kiss was as far as they were going to get tonight. But he could hold her. It would be enough. More than enough. Tonight, it was everything.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

Despite Paige's suggestion that Ivy stay home from school and rest at Sam's, Ivy insisted on going to cla.s.s the next day. Glad that Ivy wasn't traumatized by having her home invaded, Paige conceded, although she decided that she would drive Ivy to school from now on. That morning, she and Sam drove Ivy to the school where Riley would take over and keep an eye on her.

After they dropped Ivy off, Sam headed to the Kirk PD station. Sam had gotten reports on her attacker, Daryl Johnson, from both the Kirk PD detective, Millhouse, and from Harry. Kirk PD had already interrogated him and had enough to charge him, but Sam wanted to question Johnson as well.

On the way to the station, Sam told Paige what he'd learned. "Johnson has a long rap sheet. He did time for a.s.sault three years back, for beating a man almost to death over a game of pool. He was paroled a few months ago." Sam's lips pulled tight, forming two white slashes. "He's a violent a.s.shole who is going to go down hard for what he did to you."

Paige would be glad to see this man off the streets, but right now all she could think about was if Johnson was connected to Thames. She wanted to be in on the questioning, but she understood the reasons why she could not, and that's why earlier she'd told Sam she only wanted to observe. She wasn't a skilled interrogator, but she knew that wasn't the reason Sam would keep her from questioning Johnson. Agents weren't usually involved in investigations that were personal to them. Paige knew that Sam wanted this to stick against Johnson and that he was going to play it by the book.

This interrogation was personal to Sam as well. In the last few days, he'd shown her in so many ways that she mattered to him. She'd never truly mattered to anyone. As possessive and protective as Sam had shown himself to be, she was no less protective and possessive of him. She would safeguard his life as fiercely as he guarded hers.

Inside the Kirk PD station, Sam gave their names and showed his ID to the woman working reception. A moment later, Millhouse, the detective who'd questioned Paige last night at her apartment, met them in the lobby.

They exchanged brief greetings, then Sam said to Millhouse, "I appreciate you setting this up."

Millhouse's thick jowls wrinkled in disgust. "I'm happy to help with anything that will add more time to this a.s.shole's sentence. By the way, he waived his right to an attorney. This way. He's waiting for us behind door number three."

Millhouse showed Paige to the room next to the one Johnson was in. She stood in front of the observation window. Inside the interrogation room, Johnson sat at a rectangular table. Paige took satisfaction in the thick tape over his broken pug nose, and the large, dark racc.o.o.n-like bruises around his tiny eyes. His full lips were split and, at the moment, curled in scorn.

"Here comes the police d.i.c.k and the federal rat," Johnson said.

Sam gave the man a full-on glare and taunted, "That the best you can come up with, Johnson?"

There were two chairs at the table opposite Johnson. Paige noticed that Sam took the seat directly across from Johnson. Sam continued to glare at him. Sam's expression became so hard it appeared carved from rock. Millhouse took the remaining seat.

Sam bared his teeth. "Johnson, you have to be the stupidest f.u.c.k I've ever come across to break into the apartment of a federal agent."

Paige tensed. This would be the point where Johnson could defend himself by stating he had no idea who the apartment belonged to, that it was a random break-in.

Johnson's mouth twisted. "Stupid like a fox. It's all part of a plan."

Paige's muscles tightened.

"Some plan." Sam goaded him. "You got your a.s.s handed to you. Broken nose. Broken lips. Chipped teeth. Your face looks like it was run over." Sam put his hands to his lips, mimicking a megaphone, and raised his voice. "Can you hear me okay with that busted eardrum?" Sam sneered. "And now, you're going back to jail. Whoever cooked up this plan didn't do you any favors."

Johnson's face reddened with anger. "I don't need n.o.body to do my thinking for me. I make my own plans."

Sam's eyes went as hard as flint. "If that's the case, then you'd better find someone else to do your thinking-someone who knows how."

Johnson leaned across the table. Sam's eyes glinted, and Paige could see he would have liked nothing better than for Johnson to make some kind of move so Sam could hurt him.

Johnson may have seen Sam's look, too, because he backed off. "You all think you can get away with making up evidence where there ain't none. Like you all did with the Thames case. We ain't gonna stand for it. You hear me, fed?"

"All this for Thames? You're gonna go down for Thames?" Sam's gaze sharpened. "He order you to do his dirty work?"

Johnson jutted out his chin. "I don't take orders from n.o.body! Last night was about payback on Little Miss Fed."

Sam got in Johnson's face. Teeth clenched, he said, "You paid Agent Carson back by landing yourself in jail. How's that payback working for you, Johnson?"

Johnson slid his chair back to put distance between himself and Sam. "You'll see. I'm going to shine a spotlight on this b.u.m rap Thames and others like us got. I heard that Doctor Prudence telling us to band together. Just 'cause we ain't New York City or DC don't mean we don't count." He struck his chest with a fist. "I started the Kirk County movement. You feds are gonna go down! I'll get me a book deal. f.u.c.k me, a movie deal!"

Sam straightened away from the table. "A movie deal, huh? That what last night was about?"

"I'm going to tell my story to the world."

Sam eyed Johnson. "How'd you find out where Agent Carson lives?"

Johnson tapped a forefinger against his temple and smirked. "I work dispatch at Happy Trails Taxi Service. One of our drivers picked up your girl fed all duded up in her FBI vest and s.h.i.t near the railway yard and drove her home."

The night she'd taken a cab home after the drug raid. Paige pursed her lips.

Sam kept at Johnson, questioning him relentlessly. Johnson remained consistent in his responses. Eventually, Paige saw by his expression that Sam was satisfied Thames had not sent Johnson to attack her. Johnson had latched onto the activists' cause and had acted on his own, wanting to get his own pound of flesh from Paige. That was what his attack had been about, revenge against the Bureau in general and not Paige in particular.

Finally, Sam looked to Millhouse. "We're finished here."

Millhouse nodded.

Sam gave Johnson one final lethal look. "The only camera taking your picture is going to belong to the US government. Practice that smile for your close-up."

Paige joined Sam and Millhouse in the hall outside the interrogation room. Sam thanked Millhouse again for his help, and they left.

Back at Sam's, in his office, Paige reviewed the notes and files from the Janet Lambert investigation and the Thames murders. The pile of paper these investigations had generated was spread end-to-end on the large desk.

Paige's thoughts went back to Johnson's interrogation. "Thames had nothing to do with the attack last night."

"No."

Paige's fingers tightened on the folder she held. "I never met Janet Lambert, and we certainly wouldn't have run in the same circles. I'm new to Kirk County. Lambert had lived here for years. It makes no sense that there would be any connection between us, that Thames would draw a connection." Paige gnawed her lip. "It makes no sense that Thames would change his MO and select Lambert." Paige tossed the folder onto the desk in disgust. "All this, and nothing ties Thames to Lambert."

"No one is infallible," Sam said. "He has to have messed up somewhere. We'll find where. We have one more piece of information than we did before, that Thames searched for both you and Lambert through the IRS. Let's set aside for the moment that we can't prove he conducted that search and see if we can leverage that information to gain something more."

She didn't know what that something more could be. All she could think at the moment was that Johnson was another dead end.

When she didn't respond, Sam came around from his desk, and leaning back against it, he took her hand in a loose grip.

"We need to get Ivy from school soon, then how about we get takeout for dinner?" Sam asked. "I'll call Ginny and see if Jonah can join us."

Paige nodded. "Sounds good."

They picked up Chinese takeout for dinner. Sam set the three bulging bags down on the kitchen table. Though it was a weeknight, it was Friday night. Sam would be picking up Jonah the next morning anyway for their weekend together. Ginny agreed to the sleepover. While Paige got dinner on the table, Jonah and Ivy settled in the living room to do homework.

Sam rolled his shoulder as if to relieve an ache or something heavy there. "I'm going to hit the shower. If you want to call the kids in and get started, I won't be long."