[B.S. #1] Tied Up in Knotts Read online

  Braden Security

  Tied up in Knotts

  Ten years ago, James Braden was the leader of an elite covert unit of men that was involuntarily discharged from the army after receiving faulty intelligence. At loose ends, the men pool their resources and start Braden Security.

  James Braden is hired to get close to Avery Knotts. She is the only clue to $2 million worth of missing drugs. A known drug lord wants them back, the Feds want them off the streets. At first glance, James knows in his gut she is innocent and decides to claim her as his own. While keeping her out of danger and staying one step ahead of the drug lord’s henchmen, James becomes too intimately involved with Avery.

  The other members of the firm step in to keep him on the straight and narrow as they try to ferret out the information. A charm bracelet gives them their first clue.

  Can James protect and keep her safe from everyone, even himself?

  Genre: Contemporary, Romantic Suspense

  Length: 65,035 words

  TIED UP IN KNOTTS

  Braden Security

  Dale Cadeau

  EROTIC ROMANCE

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  ABOUT THE E-BOOK YOU HAVE PURCHASED: Your non-refundable purchase of this e-book allows you to only ONE LEGAL copy for your own personal reading on your own personal computer or device. You do not have resell or distribution rights without the prior written permission of both the publisher and the copyright owner of this book. This book cannot be copied in any format, sold, or otherwise transferred from your computer to another through upload to a file sharing peer to peer program, for free or for a fee, or as a prize in any contest. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. Distribution of this e-book, in whole or in part, online, offline, in print or in any way or any other method currently known or yet to be invented, is forbidden. If you do not want this book anymore, you must delete it from your computer.

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Erotic Romance

  TIED UP IN KNOTTS

  Copyright © 2014 by Dale Cadeau

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-62741-031-1

  First E-book Publication: January 2014

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All art and logo copyright © 2014 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter to Readers

  Dear Readers,

  If you have purchased this copy of Tied Up in Knotts by Dale Cadeau from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

  Regarding E-book Piracy

  This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

  The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

  This is Dale Cadeau’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. Cadeau’s right to earn a living from her work.

  Amanda Hilton, Publisher

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  To my mother, who always said there was nothing better than a good book. To my daughter Keri, who one day said she was writing a book and I thought what a great idea. And finally to my husband for listening to all the different plots in my head and saying the book sounded like something he would read (also his spelling expertise was greatly appreciated).

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  About the Author

  TIED UP IN KNOTTS

  Braden Security

  DALE CADEAU

  Copyright © 2014

  Chapter One

  Avery slid the top of her raincoat protectively over her head. She was glad she’d worn it this morning, when it had been sprinkling lightly. She knew she was being childish thinking the hood could hide her in the same way ducking under the covers reassured her when she was young, but it did. Too bad it didn’t take away her feeling of being watched. Avery was surrounded by empty shops and apartment buildings. Walking down this lane after work always gave her a creepy feeling, but tonight she could feel a difference. It didn’t make any sense. She had walked this route many times and always felt somewhat uneasy, but this was the first time she felt like she was being watched.

  Rounding the last corner, she took a quick glance back and noticed a dark figure skirting between the town houses about a block down. That was enough for Avery. She ran the rest of the way to the front door of her apartment and in her haste, promptly dropped her keys. Picking them up with shaky hands, she finally opened the door and reached the safety of the front hallway. Pulling the top of her raincoat off, she breathed a sigh of relief. Telling herself that she was seeing things, Avery stood with unsteady legs and hurried up the stairs to her third floor apartment. Once inside, she leaned against the door and finally felt safe.

  * * * *

  James stood leaning as far back as he could against the brick wall of the townhouse. Shit, she had seen him tonight. James had tried to keep his distance from Avery after spotting her at the diner where she worked. She seemed too naïve to be living and working in this area. Crime was high and drug deals were everyday occurrences.

  Every protective instinct in James screamed out at him when he first saw her serving customers at the diner. Really, it was more of a leftover dive from the fifties with food than an actual diner. The only reason James was in the area was at the request of the Feds to find and get close to the woman he was now following.

  How did a woman looking like her end up in a place like this, James wondered. He knew the Feds suspected her of keeping the last of the drugs her father had been selling, but seeing this area, James could not believe that. No one that had any money would knowingly move into this neighborhood. Detroit had been going downhill for a long time, but this area looked like all the rejects had decided to converge on this side of to
wn. As it was, he had skirted a few drunks and prostitutes as he followed her home tonight. He had noticed that she kept a brisk pace and didn’t slow down until she reached the steps leading up to the apartment building. Her hurried walk told him she was nervous of this area and she wouldn’t have moved here willingly.

  Slipping back into the alleyway, he watched her enter her apartment building. Knowing she was safe, James turned around and slowly made his way back to the diner, the one lighted building in the distance, surrounded by boarded-up derelict shops where he had parked his beat-up sedan. On his first trip down, he learned this wasn’t the area to bring anything of any value, like his Jag. He had suffered the loss of tires, radio, CDs, and everything else that was of any value. It had taken James a large bribe to even get a tow truck down to pick up his vehicle. A group of wayward youth watched him walk to his car. In the middle of town there was no hiding from the gang’s view.

  Sliding into the old brown sedan, he contemplated the situation. The Feds wanted him to get close to her, but all he wanted to do was get her out of this neighborhood. He couldn’t keep coming every night to watch her walk home from work. That kept her safe, but didn’t solve the problem of getting to know her.

  Avery wasn’t the stupid type and would soon realize that someone was following her. James really didn’t want a stalker charge attached to his name. He could just see it. James Braden, President and co-owner of one of the top security firms in the city, charged with stalking.

  Tonight told him his mind wasn’t in the game. He was usually able to follow anyone and not get caught. If they found out, the team would have a great time razzing him and would never let him live it down. Starting the car, James put it into gear and started the long drive back to his office on the other side of town.

  Avery finally got her shaky legs to hold her and she took off her raincoat and hung it on the hook on the back of the door. Walking over to the small kitchen, Avery grabbed a glass from the draining board and reached into the old beat-up fridge that came with the apartment. Pouring herself a large orange juice, she hoped it would help, since she didn’t keep anything stronger in the apartment.

  Orange juice always reminded Avery of the summers when her family traveled to the cottage in Florida and sat on the beach. God, how she missed those times.

  How could a year make such a difference? Avery had always assumed that her family would be there for her. How wrong had she been? One car accident down in Florida caused by a drunk driver had wiped out her entire family and her sense of security with it.

  Looking back she could see that she had been naïve in her thinking. Her father had never worked at anything long-term, her mother always seemed to be nervous, and money was never a problem. Their house, while not a mansion, was in a good family area, vacations were spur of the moment, and she was frequently taken out of school to be carried away to exotic places. She always liked Florida the best. At the cottage her family seemed to relax more, and laughter and smiles were frequent.

  God. Twenty-five and feeling sorry for herself. Looking back, Avery told herself, wouldn’t change anything. It just made her depressed. Pulling herself together, she opened the top freezer and pulled out a frozen dinner, a luxury for her, but with the day she had, she felt she deserved it. Unwrapping the frozen dinner of mac and cheese, she popped it in the microwave. Not exactly four-star fare, but a treat for her now. Making her way over to the other side of the small room, she sat on her thread-worn couch and laid her head back against the back of it. Taking a deep cleansing breath, she tried to think of all the good things that had happened since the accident.

  1. She was still breathing. Thank God her family had decided on their last Florida vacation that she didn’t have to go with them everyplace. She was old enough to have a job back home in a small real estate agency and was grown up enough to be left alone. Her family—she could still see their faces as they pulled away in the family car waving back at her that last time. They seemed to be in a hurry to leave, but Avery thought nothing of it. They were always in a rush most of the time.

  2. Money. Her family had just enough money in the bank to cover all of the bills following the accident once the house and cottage were sold.

  3. She lost her job. Well, that wasn’t a blessing, but with nowhere to live and no prospects in the area when the house was sold, Avery had to make some quick decisions.

  One of those decisions included selling her mother’s small collection of jewelry that she had hid from the Feds. That money had kept her fed for a small time, but now she was bankrupt just like her precious home town of Detroit. Avery had just enough to rent the small apartment in the seeder side of Detroit and later obtained a job at the local diner on 5th Street without needing a reference.

  Which was good, because references were just another thing she didn’t have anymore. Her reputation went down the drain along with her family’s once her father’s job as a fence for the local drug lord was revealed. The papers had eaten it up. A well-to-do family from a great neighborhood that had been living a lie and preying on the addictions of others and making a lot of money at it. Her face had been spread on the front pages with her family and no matter how many times she told everyone—the police included—that she didn’t know anything about her father’s dealing, they couldn’t or wouldn’t believe that she was that blind to all the things going on under her nose.

  The ding of the microwave took her from her musings and she slowly got up. Dinner, shower, then bed. Hopefully the water would be lukewarm tonight. Too many times she went to bed freezing from the ice water in the taps.

  * * * *

  James entered the fifth-story office a half hour after leaving the diner. All was quiet as everyone had left for the day. Walking to his large office at the left of the reception desk, James took off his leather jacket and flung it onto the couch on the back wall. He knew his frustrations were starting to show and it was starting to affect his day-to-day life. He had to get a grip.

  Rounding the corner of his large desk, he picked up the phone and called a meeting of his best friends and cohorts in their security business. He had to get this out. He couldn’t keep going every day watching and doing nothing. Anxious, he ran a hand through his thick black hair. He knew his friends. No matter what they had on their plate at the moment, they would be a good sounding board.

  Clay arrived first and found James in his second glass of Scotch, bottle at his elbow, sitting at his desk with his tie askew and feet up.

  “Well it looks like you started the party without the rest of us,” said Clay while nodding toward the bottle.

  James sat up, his feet thudding on the floor. “Party? I wish. Come on in. Want a drink?”

  Clay rethought his first impression of James. He had looked like he was tying one on and wanted company. But with a second look, Clay could tell something was bothering James.

  “If you think a drink would help. I’ll have one, even if it’s only the damn Scotch you seem to love. The rest of the unit should be here any second now. I called them before I left.” Walking over to the desk, Clay filled one of the empty glasses beside the Scotch bottle James had laid out for the others.

  Sliding into the chair in front of the desk, Clay asked, “Did one of the current jobs derail? I thought at the last meeting that things were going smoothly?”

  James took a long swig of his drink and put the glass down on his desk. Looking across at Clay, James ran his hand though his hair again. How do I explain this without sounding like a mother hen? Might as well start at the beginning.

  “You know the Knotts job? The one I have been working closely on with the Feds?”

  At the sound of footsteps approaching his office, James stopped his train of thought. Might as well tell the story only once. Looking up, he saw the rest of the unit file in. Brad was in the lead with Grant and Angel bringing up the rear. They were all intimidating men, each over six feet. Some with tattoos, some with scars, mentally and physically, but they were th
e best of friends and the most loyal group that he knew from their time in the army.

  They had formed a close-knit group, having gone through the worst life could throw at them and come out the other side sane, for the most part, and in one piece. A lot of that could be attributed to Angel and his uncanny sense of knowing things ahead of time. Perhaps it was his Native American heritage—he sure looked like a warrior with his long black hair and piercing black eyes. He had earned the name Angel when he had been right too many times for it only to have been instinct.

  Clay always looked like a hardcore biker with tattoos covering both arms, and since he always wore his black, lucky leather jacket, he usually dealt with any drug-related cases when they arose. But since he had just come off an assignment in the Middle East, James had taken this case on. Their firm had a reputation for surveillance expertise and the ability to ferret out information that the FBI couldn’t within their legal operational restraints, and that’s why they had been picked for this job. Avery Knotts was being closely watched by him, but also, he suspected, by goons hired by a drug lord.

  Glancing over at his odd assortment of friends, James stood up from the chair behind his desk.

  “As you know, I have been working on the Knotts case. What you don’t know is that neither the Feds nor Carlos Casteel, the major drug-running kingpin in the city, believes that Avery Knotts, the daughter, has come clean and told everything that she knows. They still think she might lead them to the last stash of drugs her father hid. They didn’t find any when they went through the family cottage in Florida or their city house. It would mean millions to Carlos if these drugs can be found and the Feds want them found and destroyed so no further lives are lost from this last batch Knotts was peddling. I have been able to locate Knotts’s daughter in South Detroit. She is currently living in an apartment on Fifth Street and works at the local diner as a waitress. From what I have been able to uncover so far, I don’t think she had anything to do with her father’s dealing activities. It looks bad for her, though, because she was always on the scene or around when the drops took place. The Feds think the vacations the family took every three months were just covers for the drops, and I concur.”