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  Books by Fern Michaels

  Spirit of the Season

  Deep Harbor

  Fate & Fortune

  Sweet Vengeance

  Holly and Ivy

  Fancy Dancer

  No Safe Secret

  Wishes for Christmas

  About Face

  Perfect Match

  A Family Affair

  Forget Me Not

  The Blossom Sisters

  Balancing Act

  Tuesday’s Child

  Betrayal

  Southern Comfort

  To Taste the Wine

  Sins of the Flesh

  Sins of Omission

  Return to Sender

  Mr. and Miss

  Anonymous

  Up Close and Personal

  Fool Me Once

  Picture Perfect

  The Future Scrolls

  Kentucky Sunrise

  Kentucky Heat

  Kentucky Rich

  Plain Jane

  Charming Lily

  What You Wish For

  The Guest List

  Listen to Your Heart

  Celebration

  Yesterday

  Finders Keepers

  Annie’s Rainbow

  Sara’s Song

  Vegas Sunrise

  Vegas Heat

  Vegas Rich

  Whitefire

  Wish List

  Dear Emily

  Christmas at

  Timber woods

  The Sisterhood

  Novels

  Safe and Sound

  Need to Know

  Crash and Burn

  Point Blank

  In Plain Sight

  Eyes Only

  Kiss and Tell

  Blindsided

  Gotcha!

  Home Free

  Déjà Vu

  Cross Roads

  Game Over

  Deadly Deals

  Vanishing Act

  Razor Sharp

  Under the Radar

  Final Justice

  Collateral Damage

  Fast Track

  Hokus Pokus

  Hide and Seek

  Free Fall

  Lethal Justice

  Sweet Revenge

  The Jury

  Vendetta

  Payback

  Weekend Warriors

  The Men of the

  Sisterhood Novels

  Hot Shot

  Truth or Dare

  High Stakes

  Fast and Loose

  Double Down

  The Godmothers

  Series

  Far and Away

  Classified

  Breaking News

  Deadline

  Late Edition

  Exclusive

  The Scoop

  eBook Exclusives

  Desperate Measures

  Seasons of Her Life

  To Have and to Hold

  Serendipity

  Captive Innocence

  Captive Embraces

  Captive Passions

  Captive Secrets

  Captive Splendors

  Cinders to Satin

  For All Their Lives

  Texas Heat

  Texas Rich

  Texas Fury

  Texas Sunrise

  Anthologies

  Coming Home for

  Christmas

  A Season to Celebrate

  Mistletoe Magic

  Winter Wishes

  The Most Wonderful

  Time

  When the Snow Falls

  Secret Santa

  A Winter Wonderland

  I’ll Be Home for

  Christmas

  Making Spirits Bright

  Holiday Magic

  Snow Angels

  Silver Bells

  Comfort and Joy

  Sugar and Spice

  Let It Snow

  A Gift of Joy

  Five Golden Rings

  Deck the Halls

  Jingle All the Way

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  FERN MICHAELS

  HOT SHOT

  ZEBRA BOOKS

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Books by Fern Michaels

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  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

  Epilogue

  Teaser chapter

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  SWEET VENGEANCE

  DEEP HARBOR

  SAFE AND SOUND

  ZEBRA BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2019 by Fern Michaels

  Fern Michaels is a registered trademark of KAP 5, Inc.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  Zebra and the Z logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4201-4602-8

  ISBN-10: 1-4201-4602-5

  ISBN: 978-1-4201-4602-8

  I’d like to dedicate this book to a very special lady—the real Frances Gossett and her beloved companion, Sawdust, both featured as characters in this book. I hope you enjoy the book, Frances.

  Fern

  Prologue

  Cosmo Cricket turned the key in the lock, hoping his father hadn’t put on the deadbolt, and entered the house he’d grown up in. He winced, wrinkling his nose as every ugly scent in the world enveloped him. He called out, “Pop! It’s me, Cosmo. Where are you?”

  “Where do you think I am? I’m right where I was the last time you came uninvited to my house. What do you want this time? How’d you get in here, anyway?” came the snarling reply.

  Cosmo sucked in a deep breath, then wished he hadn’t as he headed to what his late mother had called the family room, where his father basically lived. Cosmo had always loved the room because his mother had made sure it was a real family room. Everything was homemade, warm, and cozy. Was being the operative word, he reminded himself.

  “You know what, Pop, I’ve had enough of your attitude. You need to give up this ‘oh poor me’ crap. I get that you don’t want me coming here, but you promised to answer the phone when I call, which is three times a day. I’m here because you didn’t answer the phone. And let me tell you something else. If you’d had that damn deadbolt on, I would have kicked the door in. Mom’s been gone for almost two years. She’s not coming back. You’re still here, and I don’t want to lose you, too. Now, having said that, I’m here to make some changes, whether you like it or not. From here on in, it’s my way since your way didn’t work. Look at you! You should be ashamed of yourself. Mom has to be spinning in her grave at what you’ve become.”

  Without another word, the giant who was Cosmo Cricket trundled on feet as big as canoes into the family room, where he picked up his frail, scrawny father, who used to be as big as Cosmo, and headed for the bathroom. He turned on the shower and pushed his father, clothes, shoes, and all under the hot, streaming spray. “Take off your clothes and use soap. If you don’t, I’ll come in there and soap you up myself. Do not forget to wash your hair. Three times will be good. I’m going to lean up against the door, and you are not getting out until I decide you smell like a flower. Do you hear me?” he roared.

  “Half the state of Nevada can hear you. The other half has to be totally deaf,” Henry Cricket roared in return. Cosmo grinned to himself. What he just heard was music to his ears, the most emotion he’d heard from his father since his mother’s passing.

  “I’m taking you out of here, so think about that as you soap up. I’m going to have this house fumigated and rent it out.”

  “Like hell you are! This is my house, not yours. You don’t have any say where I am concerned.” To make his point, Henry Cricket pushed his weight against the shower door to no avail.

  “You should have thought about that before you signed over your power of attorney to me. Remember you did that when you told me you were going to die? So, yes, I can do what I just said.”

  “I hate smart-ass lawyers. Your mother and I must have lost our minds when we sent you to law school. Oh, right, you’re the head of the Nevada Gaming Control Board these days! Well, la-di-da and
all that. How could I forget something so important?” Henry roared so loud that, as a result, Cosmo stuck his fingers in his ears. When he decided it was safe to remove them, his arm shot upward as he pumped it in the air. He continued to grin in pure joy. The old man was actually talking, communicating. They were arguing, which was even better. Progress. Real progress.

  “Okay, I’m ready to come out. Move away from the door.”

  “No, no, no! Soap up a couple more times. You smelled like three-day-old roadkill. I mean it, Dad. Stop dicking around and do what I tell you.”

  Twenty minutes later, the old man had calmed down enough to say, “Okay, you win. I’m shriveled up to nothing. I smell like gardenias. You happy now?”

  “Yep!” Cosmo reached for a towel that he knew had last been washed when his mother was still alive. It smelled musty. Out of respect for his father, he turned his back so the older man could dry off and wrap himself in the towel, giving Cosmo time to find a set of clean clothes. “We need to do some clothes shopping,” he muttered.

  “I heard that! I don’t need any new clothes.”

  “Yeah, Dad, you do. You haven’t washed anything since Mom died. When you walk out of here, you are going with the clothes on your back.”

  “Where are you taking me, Cossy?” his father demanded.

  His old nickname from when he was a little boy punched Cosmo in the chest. “To a great place. A place that needs you. You have great organizational skills, and you are going to be running the place. Mom would approve. And just for the record, Dad, Mom would be pissed to the teeth to know how you’ve spent these past two years. And you know it!”

  “I needed to mourn. Your mother was the love of my life. I’m nothing without her. You saw that for yourself. I’m sorry if you feel like I let you down, Cossy,” the old man whined.

  “You are one wily, crafty son of a gun, you know that! You’re trying to sweet-talk me, and I’m not buying it. You are going with me, and you are not coming back here. I have big plans for you. And the first thing is a shopping trip, after which we’re going to stop at a florist, buy them out, go to the cemetery, and have a talk with Mom before I take you to your new digs.”

  “What are my other options?”

  In spite of himself, Cosmo laughed out loud. “You don’t have any options. When was the last time you ate a good meal?”

  The old man shrugged. “At my age, food isn’t all that important. If you were so worried about my meal planning, why didn’t you bring me food? Aha, see, I got you there.” He cackled.

  “I did bring you food, but you wouldn’t let me in. You had the deadbolts on all the doors. I left the food outside the door. Don’t go trying to throw this back on me. You screwed up royally, Dad, not me. Mom would definitely not approve. Most definitely not.”

  “And you’re a smart-ass too,” the old man said, finally giving in. “Cossy?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you really mean it when you said I wasn’t going to be coming back here ever again? Or were you just funning with me?”

  “I’ll bring you back anytime you want, but not to stay. This place—and Pop, I love it as much as you do—it’s the past. Neither one of us can function here. Like I said, Mom wouldn’t want us to do that. This big old house, with all its warts, is now just a memory for us. I need you to tell me you understand before we walk out that door.”

  The old man took his time responding. Cosmo was about ready to put his fist through the wall just as his father responded. “I understand, Cossy. I really do.”

  “Okay, then. Let’s do what we have to do and hit up Longhorns for the biggest rib eye they can conjure up. You think you can handle a pitcher of beer with that rib eye?”

  “Do dogs have fleas?” Henry Cricket said, laughing. The sound brought pure joy to his son’s heart.

  Chapter 1

  Ten years later

  It was a room.

  But it wasn’t just any room. This room had no windows. Aside from a closet built into the wall and a small lavatory off to the side, it was just a square box of a room.

  What made this particular room different was the single hospital bed and the machines that beeped and pinged constantly along with the sound of a wheezing ventilator.

  And, of course, the second difference was the VIP patient hooked up to the ventilator and the machines that beeped and pinged every second of the day.

  The third difference, if you were counting, was the woman dressed in a blue paper gown who sat at the side of the hospital bed holding the patient’s hand. She’d barely moved, eaten, or slept in the ninety-six hours she’d been in the box of a room.

  Her eyelids drooped in weariness, but she forced herself to stay awake as she mumbled words she couldn’t even understand. Somewhere, a long time ago, she’d read that if you held the hand of a patient who was in a coma and spoke to him, he could hear you in the dark hole he was in. Because she wanted to believe that was true, it was exactly what she’d been doing since she arrived. She was hoarse from talking about the very first picnic they’d gone on, but she forced herself to keep speaking, leaning in closer to the patient so he could hear when her voice threatened to give out, believing the patient could still hear her whispered words. How many times had she recounted the picnic—a hundred, a thousand, more? She didn’t know. They were familiar words, and they came easily to her parched throat because it had been such a happy time in their lives. But when the words wouldn’t come anymore, she switched to their son, whose goal it was to become an Olympic swimmer.

  The room was quiet as a tomb except for the beeping of the ventilator. For some reason, she was able to block those sounds from her mind and concentrate on her own voice and the otherwise absolute quiet that surrounded her and the patient in the bed.

  Suddenly, her head jerked upright. What was that noise? Something different. Something . . . some noise . . . was invading the tomblike quiet. She stood up on wobbly legs, the paper gown making its own strange noise, and walked to the door. She looked around, panic and terror on her beautiful face. What was that sound? She reached out for something to hold her upright. Somehow she managed to get to the door and open it. She squinted in the bright overhead lighting, wondering if she was seeing a hallucination.

  She thought she shouted “Jack!” but it came out in a bare whisper as her weary gaze took in Jack and the rest of the guys all standing outside her husband’s door. She said his name again, and this time her voice was full of pain as she saw Harry Wong move to be closer to Jack Emery so they could both catch her when she toppled into their arms.

  “Lizzie!” the gang said in unison, their voices holding as much pain as her own.

  The men of BOLO, which stood for Be on the Look Out, had come immediately upon hearing the news. They had formed the group after years of working together, undertaking dangerous missions on behalf of those incapable of helping themselves. The group of friends never hesitated to help someone in need, and that went double when one of their own was in need. And they most definitely counted Lizzie as part of their surrogate family.

  Jack scooped her up into his arms, Harry at his side just as an ugly, fussy little man with a stethoscope around his neck and too much facial hair tried to shoulder the boys out of the way.

  “You people need to leave right now! How did you even get up here? Don’t make me call security! You need to leave right now. This floor is off-limits to visitors.”

  That was exactly the wrong thing to say to Harry Wong. Before he pivoted on the ball of one foot, he made sure Jack’s hold on Lizzie was secure before he reached for the ugly, fussy little man’s nose and tweaked it. “We walked up here. On our two feet. We came to see the patient in that room. Think carefully before you answer if there is any part of that you don’t understand.” The ugly little man dropped to his knees as he tried to figure out what had just happened to him.

  “I can stand, Jack, put me down,” Lizzie Fox said hoarsely. She turned as she struggled to focus on the ugly little man, who was still on his knees, sputtering and mumbling. “These people are my and my husband’s friends. That means they are family. They have every right to be here.”