by Michele Hauf
Gliding over the headrests and into the backseat, I frantically mined for the small pocket of air that blessedly remained near the back window. My nose emerged into the sweet spot and I tilted my head back to gasp in air through my mouth. Pushing my feet against the driver’s headrest, I held there, taking in as much air as I could. But the water rose mercilessly.
I’d once watched an episode of the American TV show Fear Factor where one of the contestants had held his breath for more than two minutes in an underwater coffin. Much easier done when one is lying there peacefully.
When only three inches of air remained, I sucked in a deep breath. Pushing my body down, I groped about the murky backseat. As the car sank, the sunlight receded, and it was becoming more difficult to see.
I ran my fingers along the seam of the seat. It had to be here. This model definitely had one—yes! My fingers landed on the tag to pull the seat forward. I found the tag on the other seat as quickly, and soon had the backseat open to the boot.
A pair of bare feet slipped through the opening. My fingers glided over the sodden velvet jogging suit. She wasn’t struggling. I attempted to pull her out, but after a few tugs, I realized that wasn’t going to work.
Feeling as if I had gulped in the entire algae-green river, I realized my lungs were filling. My eyelids fluttered. It was difficult to keep my mouth closed, because I impulsively wanted to gasp for air. Tired, so tired. Shivers trickled up my arms and over my shoulders.
Pushing the princess’s body to the right, I nudged my head through the opening and into the boot. It was a tight squeeze. My back skimmed along the upper cage of the boot, but I spied what I was looking for. The good old glow-in-the-dark release tag.
One would think if a thug were serious about kidnapping, he’d cut that puppy off.
Thankful for the low IQ level of thugs, I grabbed it and yanked. The muffled sound of the boot catch releasing sounded like heaven’s angels from above. Shoving hard, it opened, but I had to push against the pressure of the water. Oh yes, angels. The white glow beaming from above beckoned with an imagined heavenly chant.
I felt the swish of silken hair upon my lips. Reaching over, I weaved my fingers under her arm and, using my own head, pushed against the boot lid. It opened, and my body began to float upward.
My passenger weighted us down. Bubbles trickled from my nose. I hadn’t much more than a whisper of air left.
I lost my grip on the prize. It was too dark to see. A flash of something glinted. Jewelry. I grasped for the glint, but in the process let out my last bubble of air. It was a bracelet, and attached to that, an arm. Gripping her forearm, I kicked for the surface, fighting the urge to scream, and the strange compulsion to surrender and let go.
Thank God for the body’s ability to float. With all my breath gone, I had little struggle left, yet managed to kick. Kick for life. The sky glittered in a wavery silver sheen. Just a few more kicks.
I want to touch the angels.
As my head broke through the surface, I panted for air. The princess’s weight tugged me back under. I swallowed water and slapped at the surface. With a few backward thrusts of my shoulders, I managed to tilt to my back and float. Staring up at the sky, huffing, I gasped in life-saving air.
Feet kicking madly and wishing for solid ground, but only swishing through murky nothingness, I had a hold of the woman beneath her chin. I shifted my grasp to hold a clump of hair and an arm. I didn’t want to hurt her, but I didn’t want to drop her, either.
The river was walled with stone, and there was a cobbled walk that stretched most of the way—but I didn’t see that right now, only an imposing wall.
“Jamie!”
An angel in a dirty white bathrobe and galoshes waved to me.
And the next sound I heard was the plop of a rescue ring landing a blessed three feet away from me.
An ambulance arrived, and as medics loaded the princess into the back, I made way to the other side of a line of shrubbery, a hundred metres away from the scene.
The police had also arrived to tote the thugs out in body bags and arrest Kevin. Yep, still alive, that bastard, but not looking so good being carted out on a gurney. Whether or not the Faction had special privileges when it came to police investigations, I’d never know. I don’t know who had made the call to the authorities. Must have been Sacha. I wasn’t hanging around to ask. No sense in giving them another suspect by walking up and introducing myself. I had developed a healthy need for distance from law enforcement over the years.
Sacha walked by the police without a care. Though his attire should have drawn some suspicion, a few officers glanced at him but then turned their attention to their police radio.
“You’re going to start a new fashion, you know,” I said as he stepped around the hedge and stopped inches in front of me.
He tucked a clump of my wet hair behind my left ear. “It’s rather freeing.”
“Didn’t the police want to question you?”
“I told them I heard a ruckus and that I lived across the street, which explained my hasty costume. I work nights, you know. Was just getting ready for a shower.”
“Clever.”
“I thought so. How are you? Cold? You can have my robe—”
“No!” Then I giggled, because I’d said it so loud and quickly.
Sacha leaned back to scan the scene. No one had heard me.
“The pecs are great, Sacha, but I don’t think we need burlesque so early in the afternoon. I’m not cold, maybe, well…” A huge shudder traveled from head to toe, branding me a liar. “I wonder about that river. One hears stories. You think my ears will turn green and fall off?”
“It’s not as toxic as everyone makes it to be. The fish don’t mind.”
“Yes, but if you’re born to it…” I sighed and slumped against him. Not a planned move, more like a semicollapse. I was just glad I hadn’t fallen flat onto the sidewalk. A warm arm wrapped around my shoulders. My head fit neatly against his neck, which was also so warm he seemed like fire burning against my icy flesh. “She going to be all right?”
“I’m sure. Won’t know until the doctors take a look at her, but the emergency techs resuscitated her just fine.”
I had done it. Something good. I’d actually saved a life. And I hadn’t given a second thought to what it would mean for me, how much I’d get paid for the job or even if it would earn me a bit more.
And the male ghosts of my past joined hands and said in unison, Jamie MacAlister, you’re going to be just fine.
Sacha tilted my head to look at him. He stroked my jaw with his thumb as he silently gazed into my eyes. It was one of those silver screen moments where the audience stops munching popcorn and waits, open-mouthed, for the big kiss.
I fluttered my lashes and allowed my eyes to close. Expecting a kiss? You bet. But tired, as well.
“I, um, think I’m going to accompany her to Casualty,” Sacha said.
A shake of my head dismissed silly images of romantic endings and happily-ever-afters. “Of course.”
Sacha couldn’t let the princess out of his sight. There were things he needed to hear from her. Kevin made it clear he’d found out about Ava from the princess. I hoped Sacha could get the information.
“So I guess this is it.” I forced myself to push away from him. A glance around the shrub counted three police vehicles and the ambulance. The crane was currently hoisting the car from the river.
I didn’t want to look at Sacha. It was weird, but for some reason this felt like goodbye. Hell, it was goodbye. And why did saying goodbye to a man I’d known less than forty-eight hours bother me so much?
Because it isn’t ending the right way.
I paced a few steps widely around him, avoiding the heat of him that seemed to want to pull me back like filings to a magnet. Bare feet still left wet tracks on the concrete because my clothing was soaked from my dip in the Seine.
“If a man wanted to get in touch with you, could he contact Fitch?” Sacha asked.
<
br /> I shrugged, centering my gaze on the line of the hedge that neatly cut across the heads of the emergency personnel rushing about. It would be easier to make a clean break. Sever him from my life. Because he didn’t mean a thing to me. Could never—
I was making excuses for my new reality. Was it a better reality than I’d had up until now? What had happened to the journey? And my destination? Cripes, the map had been altered so thoroughly over the past few days. But I knew the destination remained. I would walk away from my past. I felt the power within me. It had never left; it had only been challenged.
And maybe the past few days had needed to happen. For if it hadn’t been worth working for, perhaps I’d never truly learn to appreciate the hard life.
“Jamie.”
I swayed my head toward the coaxing tone of his voice. But sensing him reach out to me, I curved my shoulder away from his grasp.
I didn’t have wanderlust. I wasn’t like my mother. I could accept new things and people into my life. All I had ever wanted was to feel safe and to be able to trust. I didn’t want to walk away.
Sacha had given me truth. He’d protected me in the warehouse when Kevin could have blown him away. He’d been unselfishly generous.
“Yeah, I should be going,” he said.
I still didn’t turn.
“A girl like you doesn’t need an asshole like me hanging around, steering her life off the road. I know you have plans to drive the straight and narrow. I wish you luck.”
All the muscles in my body tightened. I wanted to turn and protest. And I wanted to grab him and pull him into a hug, but instead I managed, “Right. Bye. Thanks, Vital.”
“No problem. All in a day’s…ah, you know. The ambulance is pulling away. I gotta go.”
I listened to the plodding thud of rubber galoshes against the cobbled walk. He was walking away.
Walking away!
My body turned. The white terry robe billowed as Sacha jogged and flagged down the ambulance. He was allowed to ride in the passenger side. As he got inside and closed the door, he didn’t turn to look at me.
“Bye,” I whispered, rubbing my hand up my arm to dispel the chill of his departure.
No one to blame but myself.
I’d be much better off not having the man in my life, anyway.
Right?
Chapter 26
Fitch felt the gun at the back of her head and quit typing. Fingers leaving the keyboard, she held her hands up near her shoulders. “Didn’t hear you come in,” she tried, but the nervous timbre of her voice gave away her fright. “Take your shoes off. Sit a spell.”
“Kennedy Fitch?”
A British accent. Male. Fitch couldn’t place the voice. Damn, she so frequently dealt with people who used voice-altering software when calling that she really had set herself up for this one.
“Maybe,” she said. “Who’s asking?”
The gun barrel impressed a perfect circle at the back of her skull. To her right, another person moved into her peripheral view. That person navigated the cluttered floor without nicking a single DVD or tossed empty coffee cup.
Fitch turned her head slightly to the right. A slender, gorgeous woman, with straight dark hair falling to her shoulders fixed a cool stare on her. “Do I know you?”
“You with the Network?” the Brit asked from behind.
“Never heard of ’em.” That was the practiced answer. “Seriously, set a spell. Get comfy. Remove the nasty gun from my head, and we’ll chat. Get to know each other.”
The trigger cocked.
“Or not.”
The woman approached, and the man behind Fitch pulled back the wheeled desk chair, with Fitch in it. Gun still firmly placed at her head, Fitch remained like a statue as the woman leaned over her keyboard and began typing.
She hadn’t been wise enough to shut down—hadn’t had time—so access to all her files was right there. Easy as apple pie. But she never kept sensitive information in easily accessible files. And all names and numbers were coded—
“Jamie MacAlister,” the woman said in a cool voice that didn’t sound foreign. At least not European foreign. Was she American? Who the hell? Why did they want info about the Network? And why Jamie?
“You’re la lapine’s handler, yes?” the woman asked.
The dilemma. Lie and risk blowing her cover, or tell the truth and put Jamie in trouble? The poor girl wanted freedom from her past. Hell, this morning after her swim in the river, she’d walked away from the best thing that had ever happened to her, only because she’d thought Sacha Vital couldn’t change. She’d been lying to herself, poor girl.
“Ever hear of Christian Lazar?” the man behind Fitch asked.
“I don’t…hmm…” Her connection with the Network was priority red. No one, but no one, knew how deeply she was involved. Not even herself, sometimes. “Maybe.”
The woman turned and sat on the desk beside the keyboard, crossing her long legs at the ankle. She tilted up Fitch’s chin with a finger. “I’m Rachel Blu. I used to be with Lazar. I’m looking for the other women in the Network, and I think you can help me.”
“Haven’t a clue, ma’am.”
“Ever hear of Ava Vital?”
“Nope.” Truth.
Maybe.
“We’re on her trail, and I need a driver.”
I’d gotten off the phone with Fitch about thirty minutes ago. And here I sat, on the city bus again. A humiliating step down for one who’d once thrived behind the wheel. But it would last for no more than the fifteen minutes it took to cross the river and skip on over to the chop shop. My sweetie waited for me. She’d be thankful I hadn’t gotten her involved in the ruckus of the past few days. Her new paint job would appreciate it.
Though I had minimal cash in hand, I did have a stash that would see me through a few months. Max had kept most of my money in a Swiss account. But how to access that was beyond me. I’d have to check with Fitch—yes, I still trusted her. After all was said and done, even if I didn’t have a home, I had a car—and that was all that really counted.
I’d taken a bullet to my right hip, which must have popped out while I was swimming. Surprisingly, there wasn’t much blood or pain. Either that, or the toxins in the Seine had numbed it and I would be dead within the hour.
The bus stopped at the courtyard before the hôtel-Dieu and, though my planned stop wasn’t for another few miles, I got off. An impulsive decision.
I couldn’t let it end this way.
Or maybe it was because I couldn’t let my new life begin this way.
I didn’t have to wonder if I should stroll into Casualty and start searching rooms. I’d been on the street no longer than a minute when a vision walked out from the south entrance of the hospital. Said vision wore a terry cloth robe and galoshes.
Instead of rushing to him and wrapping my arms around his bold shoulders and torso, I started to laugh. Couldn’t be helped. He just looked too goofy. Laughter segued to a belly rumble. I bent at the waist and gasped in air. But this lack of air felt a world better than a drowning breath.
“Come on,” Sacha said as he approached. He spread his hands out from his body. “I know you think I’m sexy.”
The robe slipped open to reveal the striped boxers and—had I not noticed those six-pack abs before? Foolish girl.
“You’re right. You are a sexy man, Sacha Vital.”
“And don’t you forget it.”
“Hard to when you’re flashing the entire city.”
“Oh, come on, the French embrace nudity. A half-naked man won’t even make them blink.”
I blinked, batting my lashes coyly.
The move earned me a devilish grin and a suggestive lift of brow in return.
“So, what are you doing here, Jamie? Come to get that bullet wound stitched up?”
“It’s just a graze.” I eased a palm over my hip. Nothing a Band-Aid couldn’t cure. “More blood than horror, really.”
“Not grim?”
<
br /> “Not grim,” I answered.
He knew things about me. Could he surmise that I stood here right now subtly shaking with nervousness? Because it hadn’t ended right.
“So if it’s not for emergency aid, then what?”
I cocked my head and assumed a casual pose, hands to hips—one of them crusted with dried blood—and unkempt hair, but I worked with it. Inside I was a mess, but the more I concentrated on looking the part, the more my body followed suit. “Thought you might need a driver.”
He made show of scanning the street behind us, then looking me up from feet to face. “You don’t have a car. And I thought we were through.”
“I do have a car. And we are through.”
He gave me a so-what’s-the-deal shrug.
“I…have some new information on Ava Vital.”
“You do?” His entire body changed to open, pleading. “How’d you get that? Where? Who from?”
“Another member of the Network has surfaced. She contacted Fitch an hour ago. Seems she’s determined to sniff out all the women in the Network and, well…set them free.”
“Sounds ambitious.”
“I’m in. It’s a good thing.”
“I’m in, too.”
“Sacha, I don’t…” Hell, who was I to tell the man what he could or could not do? We were in the same boat, as he’d made clear to me earlier. “You weren’t able to speak to the princess?”
He shrugged and shoved his hands into the robe pockets. “I hung around, close to her room, just to make sure she’d be all right. But I couldn’t bring myself to go in and talk to her. She’s been through so much. I made sure the nurses were aware she was the missing princess the papers had been talking about.”
“But if you showed her Ava’s picture…?”
“You know, I was thinking about that. There’s no way the princess could have known my sister’s name. It’s not like an assassin is going to introduce herself before attempting to kill you, right? So, Eight must have gotten that info somewhere else. Or he just researched me and tossed that morsel out, in hopes to get me.”
“Which worked.”
“Get me angry and…” He sighed, swiping a hand over his jaw. “I need to book a session with my therapist.”