I was right, and yet, all of this feels really damn wrong. I pull the table into place. “Let’s eat and then try to get some rest.”
“Rest? How do we rest with a dead man downstairs?”
“With the guns by our sides in the living room by the fireplace.” I turn on the oven and walk to the freezer, grabbing the pizza. “Pizza and sleep, baby. We need to be fresh when the storm ends.”
She sighs and opens a cabinet, digging around. “No cookie sheet. So I guess we eat frozen pizza baked on the rack and pretend we might not die at any moment, right?” I open the box, and she grimaces. “Seriously? Frozen pepperoni pizza and a dead man in one night? I can’t take it.”
I laugh. God, I love this woman. “I promise to kiss it and make it better.”
“The pizza or me?”
“You, baby. Always you. Dig around and try to find us some extra blankets and pillows, will you?”
“You think you can handle that pizza on your own?”
I wink. “I might eat it on my own if you leave me alone too long, and this is one lonely pizza.”
“Luckily, it’s still frozen. You won’t eat it that way.”
“Want to bet on that? I’m fucking starving. You do remember how much I can eat, right?”
Her eyes soften, emotions flickering in their depths. “Yeah, I remember. I remember everything.” She turns away before I can respond and rushes into the living room. I sigh and shove my hands on the counter. Everything is a loaded word. Everything includes lies and a stupid fucking marriage proposal that should have waited, but I can’t fix any of this until I ensure she’s safe.
I place the pizza in the oven and wait for Ashley’s return. When that doesn’t happen, I don’t push her. I give her room to breathe on her own when what I want is for her to walk back into this room and tell me she gets it, that she understands everything, but that doesn’t happen. When the damn pizza is done, I pull it from the oven, silently vowing to make this cardboard dinner up to her, right along with everything else. I grab the food and two bottles of water before heading to the living room.
Ashley is on the couch, facing the fireplace, her gun in front of her on the table as the wind whistles angrily outside the cabin. She chose to stay here rather than help me in the kitchen. That’s not her. That’s not us, but that’s the problem, I decide, thinking about that interaction in the kitchen. She’s afraid to relax into us, and how can I expect her to here and now?
I sit the pizza down on the table next to her and eye the bed of blankets and pillows she’s made for us in front of the fireplace, but it’s her that I’m worried about. “You okay?”
“Are you?”
In other words, no, but she’s not a complainer. “Not until you are, baby.” I don’t wait for her reply. I load up the fireplace with more wood before walking to the window, eyeing the perimeter and high level of snow now blocking the door. “No one can get in now, that’s for damn sure,” I say, but what I don’t add is that we can’t get out either. We’re trapped, and being trapped is dangerous.
I rejoin her, and we eat, drink, and settle on the floor, where I set my gun on one side of me, and pull her close, under my arm, on the other side. To my relief, Ashley curls into me, wrapping her arms around me. I have everything I need to rest. Her. My gun. My vow to shoot anyone who comes in that door first and ask questions later.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ashley…
A loud crashing sound has me gasping and jerking to a sitting position, my gaze shooting around the cabin and settling on Noah—no, Aaron—throwing logs on the fire. “Easy, baby,” he murmurs, quickly standing and walking to my side where he kneels. “The storm is over. I made sure the fire will keep you warm while I go scout out our route before we leave.”
“You’re leaving me alone?”
“Not for long,” he promises. “But a safe passage out of here is critical.”
“Can’t we just scout as we go?”
“If I was alone, I’d do just that, but I’m not taking you out there and making you a target. I’m taking you out of here to ensure you’re not one.”
“What if someone tries to come in here while you’re gone?” I ask, concerned that I’m not equipped to handle anyone of his skill set alone.
“Shoot them and kill them,” he says, taking my hand and helping me to my feet, picking up my purse and sliding it over my head across my chest, before slipping my gun inside. “Keep it at your hip at all times, just in case, but this is just a precaution. I’ll get to them before they ever get to you.”
“What if—”
He grabs and kisses me. “I got you. I got us. When I get back, though, we’re leaving right away. Be ready. I put your coat in the bedroom when we arrived, and you have basic toiletries in your bag if you want to freshen up. You don’t have time to shower. I don’t plan on being gone that long, and I don’t want you that disengaged from your weapon.”
“Because the one man who was here could have told another,” I say. “And we’re being hunted.”
He gives me a nod, no hesitation or fluffy feel-good stuff, which I actually appreciate. I want to ask where we’re going, but I’m smart enough to sense his urgency. He wants out of here. I want out of here. Conversation doesn’t make that happen. “Got it. Shoot. Kill. Bundle up.”
“That’s my girl,” he murmurs softly, leaning in and kissing my neck, but that little show of affection is quick.
He heads for the back door. “Come and lock up!” he calls over his shoulder.
I rush after him, and by the time I arrive in the kitchen, he’s bundled up and shoving a gun in his pocket. “Shoot and ask questions later,” he says, reaching for the door. “Understood?”
“Yes,” I say, joining him at the door. “I understand.”
He kisses me and exits the cabin into a cold morning and only then do I realize that the sun is just now climbing the horizon, but the snow is cleared; he was up long before I knew he was awake. I shut the door and lock it, turning to stare at the table that covers the basement door. There’s a dead body down there. I wonder now if Aaron killed him and didn’t want to scare me by telling me, but he vowed not to lie to me again. I want to believe that he won’t, even when the truth is difficult. It’s a conversation we have to have again, a bit more candidly than we have thus far, I think. Later. God, much later, when we’re safe. If that day ever comes.
I shiver and push off the door, rushing into the living room and digging through my bag. I find a toiletries bag and hurry to the bathroom. A few minutes later, my face is washed and moisturized, sans makeup. My hair is brushed. I even change clothes, fitting in a sponge bath. All that said and done, I’m packed up, my coat already on, and under it, my purse and gun are at my hip.
Now that I’m in the living room, all activity behind me, nerves start to kick in. I walk to the fireplace, sit down against the wall, and rest my hand on my gun inside my purse. Now, I can see who is coming and shoot first faster. Time ticks by long and heavy and my mind escapes the torture of the wait. I slip back into the past, something I can’t seem to avoid. It’s my only path to validating what was real and what was not. It’s my only way to judge myself for what I didn’t know and perhaps should have known about Aaron.
This memory is about a night when we were supposed to have dinner with my ex-boss and friend, Cole.
Cole and I are sitting at a table in the corner of an Italian restaurant. Cole is hot and rich, but he has never been even close to a romantic interest of mine. We’re like siblings, close siblings who are also friends. He matters to me; I matter to him, but not romantically.
“So I finally get to meet Noah,” he says, “after he put a ring on your finger. It’s about time.”
“He travels often, and you’ve had back-to-back trials these past few months.”
My cellphone rings, and I grab it from my purse to find Noah’s number. “It’s him,” I say, glancing toward the door. “He must be looking for us.” I answer the call. �
�Hey. Where are you?”
“Come outside. I need to talk to you.”
He needs to talk to me. My stomach rolls. Something’s wrong. I feel it. “Okay.” I disconnect and glance at Cole. “Give me a minute.”
His brow furrows, and when I start to get up, he grabs my arm. “What’s happening?”
“I’ll let you know in a minute.”
“Ashley—”
“I’ll be right back.”
He releases me, but it’s with obvious reluctance. I stand up, straightening the red dress I wore because Noah picked it and loved it this morning. I cross the restaurant and step outside into a muggy spring night that feels like summer. Suddenly, a hand closes down on my arm, and Noah pulls me to him and out of the path of the door.
He’s big, and so very handsome, a dark strand of hair caressing his brow. “I have an emergency. I have to fly out tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes. A client in LA is backing out of a deal that affects my clients here in Houston. I have to get him back in. My boss is losing his mind. It’s a billion-dollar deal.”
“Can you leave later? Can you come inside and—”
“Not tonight. I’m sorry, baby. I really am. I want to meet Cole. I know you care about him,” he strokes my hair, “but I need to go.”
“Just come in and let him see that you really exist.”
He holds up the ring. “I exist, baby, for the rest of your life. I’ll be back and with money in my pocket to take you anywhere you want to go.”
“I want to go inside with you.”
“Next time,” he says, cupping my head and kissing me, a seductive caress of his tongue against mine followed by another, drugging me to the point that when it’s over, I’m in another place. That place only he takes me.
“I’ll call you in the morning. You’ll be asleep when I land.” He kisses my hand right over the ring and then turns and walks away.
I stare after him, feeling weird about this, the way I do at random times with Noah, like I don’t know some of the secrets he keeps. I inhale and turn back to the restaurant, dreading the moment I tell Cole what just happened. He’ll ask if I really know Noah. He’ll make me question myself and the man I plan to marry.
I blink back to the present and understand now what had upset me then. Noah, Aaron, had a job for the CIA that night. He had to leave. If I’m honest with myself, something felt off with him at times, not quite right. It was that edgy, dangerous thing he oozes. I knew there was more to him, but I ignored it. I liked it. I can’t blame him fully for my own decision to know and ignore, but I do wonder if we will ever have a normal life together. Is that what I want? Normal? Banging starts on the front door, jolting me out of my own head, and then I hear, “Open up, Ashley.”
It’s Aaron, and I push to my feet, hurrying forward to unlock the door and pull it open. He stands in front of me with blood smeared on his face. I have my answer. No. I will never have a normal life with Aaron.
“Let’s go, now,” he says, taking my hand and pulling me forward.
“Our bags,” I say.
“No time,” he replies, pulling me outside and forward. I change my prior thought. Who cares about normal? I wonder if I’ll have a life to live at all when this is over.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ashley…
My feet sink into the snow, the deep tracks Aaron and I leave as he guides us to a wooded area with a map to our travels, while cold air turns hot with the adrenaline shooting through me. Aaron pulls me into the center of a cluster of trees and takes my gun, shoving it in my coat pocket, pulling me close, his hand on my head, lips at my ear as he whispers, “Move fast and say nothing.”
He pulls back to look at me, a question in his brown eyes, that damn blood on his face foreboding. I don’t know how I know Aaron isn’t hurt, but I know. That blood isn’t his, and I thank God right now for that fact. I nod my agreement. It’s enough for him because he doesn’t look for more. He takes my hand and starts guiding me toward the back of the cabin, stepping in his existing footsteps, at least I think they’re his. I really hope they’re his. Or maybe, I think, these are the footprints of whoever he killed on his way to pick me up again. All I can do now is run, ready myself to fight, and pray the vehicle we’re getting out of here in is nearby. Not that I know what vehicle that might be as I was drugged when I arrived, which isn’t really a thought that suits me well right now.
We charge forward, and I have no idea why, but as we approach the back of the cabin, my heart lurches, a sixth sense setting my adrenaline pumping. Aaron must feel it, too, as he grabs me, shoves me behind him, and the next thing I know, he’s throwing a punch at another man. One punch, a second punch, and then he’s twisting the man around, holding him from behind, and oh God, he snaps his neck and drops him to the ground. I’m still trying to process what just happened when he pulls his gun, leans around the cabin, scans, and then grabs my hand again, and pulls me forward.
This time we run and run hard, and there’s no obvious vehicle for our escape. We run for the wide range of woods, and I’m officially freaking out. How are we going to survive in the woods? Are we so desperate we have no other option? And my God, he just killed someone in front of me, snapping his neck. I shove that thought out of my mind. I shove everything out of my mind but surviving. We enter the woods, and Aaron doesn’t stop. He pulls me even with him, seeming to assess where I’m at and how I am, but he doesn’t speak and neither do I. We’re going to die today. I feel it in my blood, and I can barely breathe. I don’t want to die. I push harder, my hand sliding into my coat pocket, around my not forgotten gun.
And so I run.
We run.
Through snow and trees, through obstacles left and right, but there are no men with guns, and in that, there is survival.
We run for what feels like miles, and then finally, there’s a truck in a clearing: our ride, our escape. We aren’t going to die. We’re going to live. I can’t feel my feet, but it doesn’t matter. I look at Aaron, and I can see relief in his face. He believes that we’re going to live, too. I feel hope. I feel happiness. I can almost feel my feet just from the joy of it.
We clear the trees, and all that joy escapes me as two men step into our path. No three. Oh God. We’re dead. They charge at us, and I pull my gun, but even as I aim to shoot, I feel a thundering force to my head, and that’s it: everything goes dark.
***
I blink awake into darkness to the sound of a voice and a swaying sensation. A radio. A vehicle. I’m in the backseat lying down, I think. A storm of pain in my head. I groan from the pain and squeeze my eyes shut, listening as the radio says, “Tomorrow is sunny and warmer, at least for the mid-afternoon hours—”
Sunny and warmer?
What happened to the snow?
Wait. The blizzard was over, but something feels off. I tell myself to get up and move, but I can’t seem to do it. My head hurts too intensely. I squeeze my eyes shut, and darkness claims me again.
***
I gasp and sit up to find myself in a bedroom, a dim light splayed over white walls and thick navy blue curtains to my right. Where am I? I glance down and find that I’m in a red silk gown. Back when Aaron was Noah, he loved me in red and that thought is enough to jolt me back into reality. The cabin. The blood. The men who attacked us.
My hands goes to my throat. My God. Where’s Aaron? And who brought me here? I swallow hard, fighting the well of fear in my mind that Aaron is dead. That’s when I hear the sound coming from a door to my right and behind me. Water running? A shower? I want to believe that it’s Aaron, but I have no memory of anything beyond the cabin and this, I think, is a suite in a hotel. I throw away the blankets and stand up, rushing around the room in hopes of finding my real clothes, but there’s nothing but what I’m wearing. At least not in the bedroom.
I glance toward the bathroom. I desperately just want to walk into that room and confirm he’s alive to the point it almost hurts, but if
I go in there and it’s not him, I need my gun, which is in my coat pocket. Or it was. By the off chance that it’s still there, I have to find it. I can’t find my way back to Aaron, if we’re apart, without it.
I rush down a short hallway to bring a living area into view and confirm, yes, there’s a hotel room door. Somehow, I got from a cabin to a hotel, a fancy one at that, and I don’t even remember how. I don’t want to know what that means, but I’m pretty sure the kind of drugs I’d be freaked out to take by choice are to thank for my confusion. I also don’t want to think about what a red silk gown and a stranger means. I refuse to go there. That will not help me mentally survive this.
I spy several shopping bags by the front door and rush over to them. To my surprise, not only are there women’s clothes in the bags, but they’re my size. That says Aaron, or really Noah to me, but I just can’t be sure. What I don’t find is my gun. For now, I need clothes on my body to allow me to run if necessary. I quickly pull out jeans and drag them on, before I pull off my gown and slip on a black bra and a T-shirt. A pair of sneakers is next.
I debate running right now, going downstairs and calling backup to see if it’s Aaron in the room, but I have no money and no gun. I rush to a desk and open the drawer, and bingo, there’s my gun, lying next to another one. I grab mine, and since the shower is still running, I decide I have to risk it all and go back into the bedroom. I need money. Whoever is in the shower has a wallet, most likely in the bathroom. With the cold comfort of my weapon, I hurry down the hallway, and as my father used to say “now or never.” I don’t let myself linger. That shower will end any minute.
I walk into the bathroom and find a pair of jeans on the floor. With no wallet on the counter to be seen, I decide to take the jeans and run. I rush and grab them, and take off for the door. I’m about to exit when a deep, male voice says, “I liked you better in the red gown.”
I whirl around to find a man who is tall, sinewy-muscled, dripping wet, and naked standing in the open shower. And this man, this man is not Aaron.
Dirty Rich Secrets Part One Page 6