Hotter Than Wildfire

by Lisa Marie Rice

  “But then you ran her down again.”

  Montez squinted suspiciously. “How the fuck did you know that? No one knows that.”

  “It only stands to reason. You wouldn’t have called me in now if you hadn’t. You found her and then you lost her.”

  Put like that, it made Montez’s blood pound heavily through his veins. She’d slipped right through the fingers of two of his guys in Seattle. And it was a good thing his three guys in San Diego were already dead because he wanted to kill them all over again for letting her get away. Again.

  “Yeah. There’s this singer who became real popular, only no one knows her real identity. She goes by the name of—”

  “Eve,” Piet said, and raised his eyebrows slightly at Montez’s expression. “Music travels the world, Gerald. And there’s only one singer in the world whose identity is a secret. Most of them are—how would you Americans put it? Very out there. How did you connect the two?”

  “Sheer chance.” Montez felt the bile rise up in his stomach and swallowed it back down. “There was a radio on in the background at a restaurant about ten days ago. I heard a voice, a song. I’d heard them before. Ellen was singing that song in her office one day. It turned out that the song was written by this Eve, and I recognized the voice and the song, so I put two and two together.”

  “I understand she’s been pretty good up until now about keeping her identity a secret,” Piet said thoughtfully. “I heard she recorded in a separate room from the musicians. And she’d have the money now to buy herself a lot of privacy.”

  “Uh huh. But she didn’t think to protect herself against the one guy who knew her identity.”

  “The agent.”

  Montez nodded.

  “Where’s the agent now?”

  “Bear bait in the Cascades. He was in Seattle. So was she. She’d been there nine months.”

  “What did you get out of him?”

  Montez ground his teeth. “Not much. He didn’t know her real name, he never found out where she lived. She’d tell him where to meet him—some café or park bench. She never gave him zip.”

  Piet narrowed his eyes. “Except, I’m guessing, her cell number.”

  Montez nodded. “Yeah. It was a prepaid job, but we got an address from that. We were waiting outside her apartment. Bitch never showed and then the cell was turned off. The next ping we got was two days later, in San Diego, of all places. Had to really scramble to get men there. Luckily, three of my men were working in Tijuana, so they left that job and came up. The phone was in a hotel room. My men called and the front desk said she was out. So they laid out an ambush.” He ground his teeth. “My men are good. They all know what they’re doing. I wasn’t anticipating any trouble. In fact, I’d flown back here from Seattle because they had orders to bring her here. I’ve got…business with the bitch and wanted to be ready for her. But something happened and three good men are dead and she’s still in the fucking wind.”

  “She had protection,” Piet said.

  “Oh yeah.” It still burned. “One guy. One gun, one guy.” He met Piet’s eyes and saw that he understood completely. “Wherever she is, she’s got protection.”

  Piet went silent for a full ten minutes. Montez couldn’t stand it. He poured himself another whiskey. He’d puzzled this long enough. Let someone else work it out, goddammit.

  Piet suddenly stood up. “Let’s go.”

  “Yeah? Where to? San Diego?”

  “No, Seattle.” He pronounced it See-ehttel. “Nose around. We’ll dig up your bear bait, stake it out, rattle her, make her show herself.” Hehsilf. “Then down to San Diego.”

  Montez got up slowly, a little dizzy. “If we’re going to dig around for intel, you’re going to have to do something about that accent of yours. Sticks out like a sore thumb.”

  “Dude. Can’t believe you said that.” Piet plastered a hand over his heart, looking pained. His baritone switched to that of a suburban dad who coached Little League, with just a touch of surfer in it. Indistinguishable from a million other American male voices. He shook his head sorrowfully. “Hurt my feelings, man. Don’t do that again.”

  San Diego

  The next time Ellen woke up, he was still by her side, looking just as solid, as irremovable as before, only with a few extra lines in his face.

  It was morning, late morning of a sunny day, to judge from the buttery quality of the sunshine. The windows were open, light cotton curtains fluttering in the breeze. The wind carried in a soft, regular plashing sound. They were near the ocean.

  She moved her head, her hands. No more IV line. Her hands were free. She twisted slightly, ease in her movements. Her shoulder was a little sore, but the fiery pain was gone.

  Her gaze roamed quickly around the room then landed back on Harry Bolt’s face. He looked older, grooves etching deeply in his cheeks, smudges of exhaustion under his eyes.

  “Hi.” The deep voice was quiet, one corner of his mouth lifting in a half smile.

  “Hi.” She felt breathless. It wasn’t physical weakness. She felt better, as if someone during the night had lifted that boulder from her chest.

  The day was bright and sunny. The sound of the ocean pulsing melded with the faint sounds of a jazz sax in another room. She could smell salt water, fresh cotton and…coffee?

  She pulled in a deep breath. “Am I smelling what I think I’m smelling?”

  A smile flickered on his somber face. “Absolutely. As much breakfast as you can eat.” His hand covered hers. “Please tell me you feel hungry.”

  “Oh yeah,” she breathed.

  His hand over hers was hard and warm, so warm some heat trickled up her arm. His smile had warmed her, too.

  Um, actually, to tell the truth, his smile hadn’t just warmed her. His smile had sent a burst of heat running through her entire body, the most amazing sensation. The sensation of…of life.

  Suddenly, she couldn’t stay on her back like a half-dead creature for one second longer. She bent her legs, digging in her heels, lifted herself up on her forearms…and found herself sitting up, pillows at her back. He’d lifted her up with total ease, as if she were a child. Carefully and smoothly.

  “There you go.” He smiled into her eyes and for the very first time, Ellen realized how incredibly attractive this man was. The outsized body, the gorgeous golden coloring—even his stubble glinted gold over that square-jawed face—it all added up to one hugely attractive package. Her fear of him had masked it, but the fear was gone now and she felt it in full.

  That, in itself, was amazing. Something about the time she’d spent on this bed, drifting in and out of consciousness, had drained the fear right out of her.

  She had a sudden muscle memory of him holding her hand for hours. Days.

  “What day is it?” she asked suddenly.

  “Thursday.”

  Ellen blinked. “I’ve been out for four days?”

  “You haven’t been out all this time, no. You woke up a few times.” His eyes narrowed. “You don’t remember?”

  Maybe. Awareness was seeping back into her consciousness, a friend that had been gone too long. “Where am I?”

  “My place. This is my study.”

  Her eyes refocused on him. “I’ve been here four days,” she repeated, just to get it straight.

  “Yeah.” His lips pressed together into a thin line. “I told you this before. I didn’t take you to a hospital. You were shot and hospitals and doctors must report gunshot wounds to the police. I imagined you didn’t want that. Those men meant business.”

  “You’re right,” she whispered with a shudder. “I didn’t want that.”

  “And I didn’t want it either, because you can be sure Gerald Montez is watching hospitals and monitoring police stations.” He pulled his chair closer to the bedside, the chair’s legs scraping along the hardwood floor. He tightened his hand over hers. “He has no idea where you are. And it’s going to stay that way.”

  “Um, to tell you the truth,
I don’t know where I am, either.”

  “I told you. My place.”

  “Which is?”

  “Coronado Shores.” His eyes widened at her blank look. “You don’t know San Diego, do you?”

  Ellen shook her head, amazed that it didn’t hurt. “No, I’ve never been here before. I’m assuming it’s along the beach, because it sounds like the ocean out there. So, you patched me up.” She moved her right shoulder, lifted her right arm, moving with ease. Above all, that horrible feeling of weakness was gone.

  She looked down at herself. She had a vague memory of wearing a huge T-shirt, but now she had on a pale peach nightgown. Pure silk. Absolutely gorgeous. Possibly La Perla. “More than patched me up. You seem to be pretty prepared for caring for women who’ve been shot. You’ve got a hospital bed, an IV line, presumably surgical instruments.” She brushed her hands along the soft peach material. “Silk nightgowns. Do you have a habit of rescuing women?”

  It was the wrong thing to say. His face froze, something, some strong emotion—grief?—crossed his features.

  Harry stood up suddenly. “No, I don’t often rescue women. The hospital cot and IV line come from my partner’s house. His wife, Nicole, cared for her father at their house until his death.”

  “I sort of remember a beautiful woman coming into the room. I thought she was a dream. Was that your partner’s wife?”

  “Yeah. They were going to throw the hospital stuff out after her father passed away but they ended up storing it. I have a medical kit for—for emergencies. Nicole lent you one of her gowns. There are several other clean ones in a drawer for you. So as you see, I was equipped to help you. Luckily, you weren’t shot directly. The bullet was a ricochet and it wasn’t even that deep. I dug it out, debrided the wound and closed it up again. You have eight stitches. I used self-absorbing thread—they’ll be gone in a day or two. They’re not perfect, you might need some plastic surgery later—”

  Ellen never wanted to be near a needle again in her life. “No, I’m good.”

  “You were out of it for a long time, but from what I could tell it was more exhaustion than the effects of the wound. Am I right?”

  She nodded. A year on the run, and then almost seventy-two hours straight without sleep. There’d been bone-deep fatigue. Ellen drew in a deep breath, sending out feelers to the far extremities of her body. She still felt a little weak, but completely rested. Another thing—

  “You were there, weren’t you?” Ellen pointed to the chair by the bed. “All the time.”

  He hesitated a moment before answering, eyes watching hers. To see how she’d react? “Yeah. Except for bathroom and shower breaks. Nicole brought me some food from time to time. But mostly, yeah, I was here.”

  Wow. Four days and four nights, on a chair. “I’m sorry. It wasn’t necessary. I don’t think that I was in danger of dying or anything. You didn’t have to do that.”

  “I did.” His eyes bored into hers, that fierce light brown reflecting the light from the windows. “At times you were…restless. You had nightmares. You’d wake up terrified, panting. I couldn’t leave you alone to wake up in the dark in a place you didn’t know.”

  Now, now she remembered. The dreams that turned so quickly into nightmares, waking up terrified in the dark, a strong steady hand holding hers.

  Warmth and strength, in the night. Not alone, in the night.

  It was the reason she was feeling…refreshed. When she’d slept, when the nightmares weren’t chasing her, it had been deep.

  She hadn’t slept one night through to morning this whole past year. She put herself into a shallow sleep, alert in some part of her brain to the noises of the night. A barking dog, a car’s exhaust, a fighting couple, a slamming door—they’d all been enough to wake her, gasping for breath, grasping for the knife she kept under her pillow. The knife that was still under her pillow in her miserable little studio apartment, which she’d never see again.

  These past nights, there had been stretches of real sleep. At some deep level, the animal part of her had known she was safe.

  For now, there was no danger to her at all, unless you counted starvation. She opened her mouth to ask for some food, but he beat her to it.

  “Okay. I’m going to get you some breakfast now.” One last, intense glance, as if to make sure that she was okay, and he stood, hand still on hers.

  She remembered he’d had on a dress shirt in his office, and now he was wearing a black tee that hugged his huge chest, the sleeves almost too small for those bulging biceps. He had an unusual figure—absurdly broad through the shoulders with big arms, very lean and narrow through the waist.

  He lifted his hand and she immediately felt the chill, which was ridiculous. Warm wind was blowing in through the open French doors.

  Ellen watched him walk away, tall, enormously broad-shouldered, T-shirt and jeans rumpled, and she felt bereft. Which was crazy. Her body might be sending frantic it’s all okay, don’t worry signals, but she didn’t know this man at all. Granted, he might not be Satan’s spawn or a spy for Gerald, but he could be anything. Mean, violent, even crazy.

  Though as she was telling herself this, even she didn’t take herself seriously. A violent, crazy man didn’t spend four days and four nights on a chair in case a woman he didn’t know woke up alone and afraid.

  There were clattering noises and more good smells. Of bread and cinnamon, the dark chocolaty notes of coffee underlying them.

  Ellen looked down at herself. Her shoulder itched, but it didn’t hurt at all. She lifted her arm and sniffed. Someone had given her a sponge bath. She smelled fresh, of soap. She shifted the nightgown and looked at the neat bandage on the upper right chest. The bandage looked freshly applied. Curious, she lifted the tape and saw a wound with small, neat black stitches. The scar wouldn’t be that big.

  The skin was clean and clear around the wound. No infection.

  Underlying all of that there was something else. A—a lack of something. Fear. She wasn’t afraid.

  Fear had been her constant companion this past year, day and night, expecting at any moment the incursion of masked men, the punch of a bullet or the hot slice of a knife across her throat.

  She’d been afraid and lonely every single second of the past year.

  Right now, she wasn’t afraid and she wasn’t alone. For a small span of time, she was utterly safe. She didn’t even question it, this switch inside her that had been thrown. The switch from Harry Bolt is dangerous to Harry Bolt is safe. As crisp as an electrical switch. Darkness to light.

  She couldn’t stay long, of course. His business, and the business of his partner, Sam Reston, the one married to the beautiful Nicole, and presumably of the other partner she’d never met, Mike, was to spirit her away. Set her up in a new life. So as soon as she was completely recovered, they’d put some new documents in her hands and point her on a new road.

  Alone, of course. There was no question of that.

  There was no doubt in Ellen’s mind that as long as Montez was after her, she’d be alone. And that might possibly hold true for the rest of her life.

  So the important thing now was to savor every second of this time, while she wasn’t alone. While there was a man willing to sit by her bedside night after night and who was right now rattling pans in the kitchen.

  Though the temptation was there to simply bask in this feeling, she knew she had to become well enough to get going soon. Every minute spent here was a luscious, golden temptation. She couldn’t afford to get used to this—to having someone look after her. To having a dangerous man on her side.

  Now that her head was clear, flashes of memory were coming back. She couldn’t remember every detail of what had happened outside her hotel but the heart of it was that Harry Bolt had come running toward her and had killed three of Gerald’s men to save her.

  A man like that on your side would make anyone feel safe.

  She couldn’t afford that. Couldn’t afford to get used to the feeling o
f safety.

  Get well and get out.

  Step number one was to stand on her own two feet.

  Okay. She’d been walking her whole life. How hard could it be to get back on her feet?

  Ellen threw back the blanket, slowly shifted until her legs hung over the bed, looked down and swallowed. Whoa. The floor was way, way down. She’d never been hospitalized before. Who knew hospital beds were so high?

  How to do this? Maybe one leg at a time? Shifting her hips, she reached down with her right leg, stretching to find purchase on the shiny hardwood floor. Ah. One foot planted on the ground, now the other—

  Harry appeared at the door. “What would you like—hey!”

  Ellen placed her left foot on the ground and her knees buckled. She gasped, stretched out her hands to break her fall and found herself swung up against a hard chest.

  Her startled eyes met his. How had he moved so fast? He’d been at the door then he was right beside her to catch her fall. She hadn’t even seen him move.

  A memory stirred. Harry racing at what seemed like the speed of light toward her, gun out, already shooting…

  The man was fast.

  He was scowling. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Um…getting out of bed? I’m not an invalid. And you yourself said the wound wasn’t serious.”

  Harry’s scowl smoothed out as he looked down at her in his arms, golden eyes glowing.

  “You’re scared,” he said softly. “You’re scared of being weak. You’re scared he’ll find you when you can’t fight back.”

  Oh God, it was like he was looking right into her soul. “Or can’t run away.”

  “You don’t have to be scared about that,” he replied, in a matter-of-fact tone. “He’s not going to find you. No one’s going to find you. No one’s going to hurt you, ever again.”

  Ellen glanced down at the floor, so shiny and stable and safe. That safety was deceptive, just as everything else was. She couldn’t even stand on her own two feet on that floor.