The Heart of a Renegade

THE HEART OF A RENEGADE — the next thrilling installment in Loreth Anne White’s Shadow Soldiers series coming in March 2008!

Luke Stone is a born protector who failed to protect what he loved most – his family.

Now a rough-around-the-edges Aussie renegade unable to form emotional attachment to person or place, Luke works for the FDS on condition he is never given another close protection assignment.

But when Luke becomes the only man in the Pacific Northwest who can save British Foreign correspondent Jessica Chan from certain and immediate death at the hands of a diabolical Chinese Triad, the reluctant bodyguard faces the biggest challenge of his life.

Not only is he once again forced head-to-head with a lethal and familiar foe, but being close to Jessica breaks Luke, and he comes to love again. And then once again he must face failing the woman he loves.

EXCERPT:

Vancouver, B.C.

Luke Stone hunched over his shopping cart, black wool hat pulled low over his brow, eyes trained on the woman.
       A blast of steam roiled from a vent in the sidewalk, disappearing with a white hiss into the frigid February night, but not for one instant did his focus stray from the woman standing alone outside the phone booth.
       She was underdressed for these temperatures, shivering as she rubbed bare hands and checked her watch. He noted the heavy camera bag slung over her shoulder.
         It was definitely Jessica Chan, ex-BBC foreign correspondent, Shanghai Bureau. Here in Gastown at the appointed booth, at the allotted hour. His principal.
        Luke no longer accepted close protection gigs. Not since he’d failed to protect the most important thing in his life – his wife and unborn child. It was written right into his contract with the Force du Sable, and he’d refused this job point blank. But they’d told him he was the only person who could reach Jessica in time. Without Luke’s help, she would die.
       Tonight.
        Luke hoped to be rid of her in a matter of hours. Then he could get back to life the way he liked it. Alone.
        The nearby steam clock released a sharp whistle and she jerked round, her straight, waist-length hair shimmering under the neon of the store sign behind her as she spun to face his direction. Her skin was pure porcelain in the eerie light, her exotic eyes glittering. Even from his position he could see they were the color of fine single malt whiskey. With a small punch to the gut Luke realized the lady was startlingly beautiful. And very, very frightened.
       She had reason to be.
       Not only were the cops after her, she was being hunted by one of deadliest Asian gangs in existence. Now the CIA wanted her, too — ever since she’d placed a call to undercover CIA operative Giles Rehnquist based at the CNN bureau in Shanghai two days ago.
        That phone call had cost Rehnquist his life.
And that’s why Luke was here now, to bring her in and to hand her — and the film in her camera — over to the CIA before she died, too.
         She didn’t know yet that her ‘journalist’ friend would not be there to take the call she was about to place. To the best of Luke’s knowledge, Jessica Chan had no idea Rehnquist was CIA.
        It was almost eleven p.m. now, the time Rehnquist had told her to phone him from this booth, and a dank fog was crawling up from the docks, fingering through the historic brick alleys that led off in all directions.
         Luke tossed a can into his cart as he inched closer. The sound caught her attention and she shot a look directly at him, missing what had just snared his interest – an Asian man in a leather jacket lingering just beyond a pool of light that spilled from a restaurant window.
         The Asian quietly signaled another man in a dark doorway down the street. Both were watching Jessica, closing in on her from either end of the alley.
         Luke pushed his cart faster towards his principal, head bent low as he mumbled to himself.
         The Gastown steam clock shot out a powerful blast and began the hourly Windsor chimes. It was eleven o’clock. Jessica Chan stepped into the booth, picked up the receiver and rapidly began to punch in numbers.
          A car drove by, tires crackling on slick cobblestones as tiny flakes of snow began to crystallize in the frigid air. By the time the vehicle had passed, Luke had lost visuals on both men.
       His pulse quickened, and he unholstered his weapon ……