by Julie Miller
Was her imagination working overtime to create a threat that wasn’t there?
Was that...? Yes. The deep, rhythmic whisper of someone breathing.
She wasn’t alone.
And her company wasn’t talking.
“Who are you?” The darkness swam inside her head and she stumbled back against the sinks. “Answer me!”
Chapter Seven
“Answer me!”
“Elise?” She squealed at the sharp rap against the bathroom door and gave up her blind search for the phone in her purse. The door opened and a broad figure was silhouetted in the dim light. “Are you in here?”
“George?” Relief was so intense, it made her light-headed. “Watch out. There’s someone—”
The beam of a small flashlight swung into the room and bounced off the mirror, temporarily blinding her. She turned away.
“Elise!” His familiar grip closed around hers, pulling her to the door. “Let’s go. It’s Crazy Town out here.”
“But—”
“Now.”
Squeezing George’s hand, she held on as they jostled their way through swarming people and moving chairs. Waiters carried trays with free desserts, patrons tried to pay their checks and depart, and a few, possibly, simply departed to be chased down by the hostess and by Arturo himself.
“Quinn will cover the check,” George announced. “I want to get you out of here.”
Compared to the pitch-black bathroom, the dusky twilight out here was hard on her eyes. She squinted her lids against the growing brightness as they neared the front windows. But she couldn’t forget the smell and the sound in the restroom. She tugged against George’s forward momentum. “Where’s Mr. Titov?”
“He got a phone call. He was heading to the front door to take it when the lights blew. To be honest, I don’t know where he ended up.”
Elise planted her feet and got him to stop. “What about the man in the restroom?”
“The what?”
She raised her voice to be heard above the chaos. “There was someone in there with me. I think it may have been him.”
“Titov?”
“I don’t know. He never said anything.”
There was no need to explain why she’d be concerned about company in the restroom. George’s eyes hardened like granite and he quickly reversed course. “Come on.” When they reached the back hallway, he pushed her against the wall and bent his knees to bring his face even with hers. “Wait here. Don’t move.” Although she couldn’t read his eyes in the shadows, there was no mistaking the frustrated sigh that matched her own. Before she could even thank him for believing her implausible story, he leaned in and pressed a hard, quick kiss against her mouth and pulled away. “Right here,” he reminded her. “I’ll be back.”
Her hand had barely landed on the silk of his tie before he was pulling his jacket back, drawing his gun, leaving her. “This is the police. I’m coming in.”
Opening the door, he pushed it all the way around to the wall, ensuring no one was hiding behind it before bracing his wrists together to point his gun and flashlight in the same direction. Sweeping the light back and forth, he went inside and disappeared into the darkness.
Elise’s fingers drifted back to touch the tingling stamp of caring and promise that lingered on her lips. She held her breath, praying as hard for George to find the silent intruder as she was for him to avoid any kind of confrontation that could get him hurt.
She tried to tune her hearing to pinpoint the soft breathing she’d heard before, but it wasn’t easy. The more she tried to concentrate, the more distractions there were. The chef was herding his sous chefs and waitstaff out of the kitchen with a flashlight while Arturo Pitsaeli pushed by her in the opposite direction, carrying a broken wine bottle and muttering in Italian. Greenish security lights had come on, casting a weird glow over all their faces, obscuring their expressions into distorted masks.
“Empty. I checked every stall.” George holstered his weapon as he shooed the last waitress out of his path. “Checked the men’s, too. There’s no one there.”
Another mystery she couldn’t explain? “But he was there. I didn’t imagine it. I smelled him.”
“He could have easily lost himself in this crowd or slipped out back through the kitchen.” George leaned in close enough for her to read the seriousness of his expression. There was no confusion or pity there, only a sense of urgency. “I think distance from here is our best protection right now.” He snatched her hand and she willingly hurried into step with him as he led her back into the restaurant. “Let’s go.”
They reentered the throng that seemed to grow more crowded and less friendly by the second. She was tall in her high heels, but not tall enough to see over George’s shoulder or around the patrons standing so close to her. They hurried closer to daylight with every step, but even as Elise’s eyes adjusted, there were too many people and too much movement to focus on any one face.
“Maybe it was just one of the waitresses catching a moment of quiet away from the dining room. It may not have been Alexsandr. Or any man.” That was the explanation she was going with when George pulled her through the front doors onto the sidewalk outside. She instantly squinted against the bright sun and reached into her bag for her sunglasses. But when she released George’s hand and someone pushed her into a mother trying to negotiate a stroller and a crying child through the crowd, she decided it was safer to keep moving with the tide of people pouring out of storefronts and eateries. “Sorry,” she apologized, catching the woman’s diaper bag and hooking it securely back over her shoulder.
The sidewalk was packed. Not just with the usual spate of summer tourists coming to see the historic Mediterranean architecture, fountains and works of art, but shoppers, lunchtime guests like themselves and personnel from the local businesses. Doors were closing. Gates were coming down over storefront windows. The outdoor dining tables at Pitsaeli’s took up half the sidewalk, creating a bottleneck of pedestrians who all seemed to be heading toward the parking lot and garages beyond the next intersection. And where the side streets crossed the wide boulevard, traffic lights were blinking on backup power and a jam of cars was blocking the crosswalks.
George lifted the woman’s stroller past the fence surrounding Pitsaeli’s sidewalk café, accepted her thanks, then pulled Elise back into step beside him. “Don’t talk yourself out of what you saw.”
“But I didn’t see him. Even when you opened the door that first time, he could have been behind it. She could have been. No one could have—”
“Stop it. I know you. Practical. Levelheaded. Resourceful. I don’t think you imagined it for one moment.”
“But I haven’t been myself lately. You know that, too.”
With a grumbling curse, he pulled Elise around the fence as well, into a small pocket empty of humanity for the moment. George stretched his neck above the crowd and looked up and down the street, assessing the situation before pulling out his cell phone. “This is a madhouse. Electricity on the whole block must be out.”
He punched in 9-1-1, but they couldn’t wait there long. With the hundred-degree temperature, the stucco reflected even more heat. If dots of perspiration were already beading between Elise’s breasts in her cotton dress, then George must be boiling in his jacket and tie. Nodding as if he’d read her thoughts, he took her hand again and led her back into the flow of people.
The press of pedestrians was almost suffocating. Despite the slippery heat of their adjoining palms, Elise laced her fingers with George’s and held on tighter while he made a call to Dispatch. Raising his voice to a commanding timbre to be heard over the din, he identified himself and ordered street patrol and backup crowd control as well as the utility department into the area pronto.
Spotting a familiar uniformed officer beside his black-and-wh
ite cruiser across the street, Elise walked the next several steps on tiptoe and pointed. “That’s Denton Hale’s partner, Gary Boyd. We can get them to help.”
“Good idea.” Shifting course, George pulled her around a bronze statue and flowers decorating a planter in the middle of the wide sidewalk.
But her grip loosened as they jostled through the crowd. Someone stepped on her heel. “George?”
With a hop, she tried to keep the leather pump on her toes. But someone elbowed into her side, knocking her off balance, and she lost both George’s hand and her right shoe.
“Wait.” In a blink they were separated by a family rattling off panicked directions to each other in Chinese or some other Eastern tongue. Panicking a bit herself, she bent down to pick up her shoe. But a man’s foot lumbered past, kicking it away into a trample of feet. “Hey!”
“Elise?” She heard George’s shout and straightened back up.
She bobbed up and down as the crowd carried her farther from the sound of his voice. She caught a glimpse of his distinctive silver and brown hair and raised her hand over her head so he could see her. “I’m over— Ow!”
A hard shoe ground her bare toes against the concrete. Pain shot through her foot and she nearly toppled over.
“You stupid—”
A gloved hand snagged hers. A voice whispered against her nape. “I’ll save you, Elise.”
That voice.
“No!” Elise stumbled as the hand dragged her back through the crowd. “Let go of me!”
But the moment she spun around and would have seen his face, he released her or she was knocked free. Several people surged between them, blocking her view. She caromed from one person to the next, some cursing her, some helping, all keeping her from the truth.
“George!” She finally threw herself against the wall of the nearest building. Limping on one shoe, protecting her injured foot, she hugged the wall and inched forward.
When a hand clamped down on her shoulder, she screamed. The crowd retreated from the shrieking woman the way a line of ants swerved to avoid a puddle. But the hand on her arm stayed put. She clawed at the grip.
“Easy. Easy, Miss Brown. Whoa. Are you okay?”
Elise froze. It was a full voice, not that creepy whisper. Blue uniform. Black gloves tucked in front pocket. Bare fingers against her skin.
Panic rushed out on a quick breath and she tilted her chin up to read the apology in Shane Wilkins’s green eyes. “Elise?”
“Shane? Thank God it’s you.”
“I was eating lunch at the sub place down the street when the lights went out and I heard the all call...” His gaze dropped to the ground. “Ma’am, you’re bleeding.”
The scrapes on her foot were inconsequential. “A man grabbed me. Where’s George...the deputy commissioner?”
“Elise!”
He pushed through the edge of the crowd and she threw her arms around his neck. “George!”
“I’ve got you.” His arms latched around her back like a vise and he carried her back to the wall before setting her down. “What’s wrong?”
When her feet touched concrete and his hands settled at her waist, she hung on to his lapels and kept him close. “He’s here. He just grabbed me.”
“I grabbed you, ma’am.” Shane threw up his hands in surrender, apologizing again. “Sorry I startled—”
“No. In the crowd... I felt... He said...” Elise peeked between the two men, searching for a face she didn’t know in an overwhelming sea of faces. George’s body was braced around hers, but she could feel the bumping and pushing.
He brushed aside the hair that stuck to her cheeks. Maybe they were damp from heat. Maybe they were damp from tears. Either way, those stone-gray eyes didn’t seem to like what they saw. “We’re getting out of here. Can you walk?”
Elise managed a jerky nod before George tucked her to his side. She willingly wound her arm around his waist beneath his suit jacket, clinging tightly to the belt beside the holster he wore. What little strength she had left ebbed into his and he half led, half carried Elise straight into the swarm of pedestrians. His body was a shield that protected her from figments of her imagination and the crazy mash-up of hot, sweaty bodies filing past.
“Wilkins, can you take point and get us across the street to the parking garage?” George didn’t wait for a confirmation before his shoulder shifted beneath her cheek and he waved to another officer on the scene. “Hale, we need your help.”
The ground suddenly dropped from beneath her feet and she clutched at George’s chest. When her bare foot grazed against hot asphalt, she understood that George had lifted her to step off the curb and carry her across the street. She felt a hand on her elbow and turned. Denton Hale’s face swam in and out of focus above his blue collar. Maybe she was suffering delirium from heatstroke.
“Is she all right?” He looked from George to her as he helped her cross the street. “Ma’am, you look mighty pale.”
“She’ll be fine.” With a boost onto his hip, George took her full weight and climbed over the concrete median. “Wilkins. Clear that entrance. I’m on the first floor, third row in. Hale, get those cars out of the intersection.”
“Yes, sir.” The officers answered in tandem, rushing away in a blur of blue and a hail of shouts and whistles.
“This way, sir.” Shane waved them forward, scattering the people gathered at the entrance to the parking garage. “Move along. This is a police emergency. Coming through.”
The relative coolness when they reached the shady side of the boulevard revived Elise a little. “I can walk,” she offered.
“I know.” Although he eased her feet down to the ground, he never relinquished his hold around her waist or slowed his pace. “My car’s back there.”
“Got it, sir.” After George hit the remote to unlock it, Shane opened the door and George lifted her inside behind the steering wheel.
A sharp whistle drew her attention to the street. “Let’s move it!” Denton Hale tapped the hood of a car and waved it on through the intersection, clearing the lane in front of the garage exit. When his gaze met hers through the windshield of George’s Suburban, he touched the brim of his cap in a salute to her and Elise nodded her thanks.
Meanwhile George was dismissing Officer Wilkins. “You’d better go assist with crowd control, son. Make sure that utility truck gets through.”
“I will, sir. Ma’am.” He, too, acknowledged Elise before jogging back to the entrance.
“You have good people working for you.”
“I do.” When George climbed in behind the wheel, Elise scooted across to the passenger seat. The effort seemed to drain the last bit of energy out of her and she sagged against the tan upholstery. Her eyes felt gritty, unfocused. George reached over to pull her purse off her shoulder and drop it to the floorboards at her feet before starting the engine and turning on the air. “There’s only one employee I’m worried about right now.”
“He touched me. He was in the bathroom with me when the lights went out. And in the crowd, in those few seconds you and I got separated, he grabbed my hand and...” She looked down at her hand as if it were an anathema. “He whispered my name.”
She was vaguely aware of George sliding across the seat. Or maybe he was pulling her closer, because he lifted the offending hand onto his thigh and rubbed it between both of his, blotting out the memory of another man’s touch. “Can you describe him for me? Do you remember anything about him?”
She’d heard. She’d felt. But she hadn’t seen anyone.
A tear spilled over and burned a path down her cheek.
“I’m not crazy. He was there.”
“It’s okay. We’ll figure it out.” He wiped away the tear with the pad of his thumb and leaned in to kiss her temple. “We’ll find the answers we need.�
��
But when he pulled away, Elise felt a moment of such profound loss that she snatched at his jacket to keep him beside her. She palmed his tie and collar and the strong column of his neck before grasping his jaw between her hands. She looked deep into those handsome eyes, traced the firm line of his mouth with her thumbs, slipped her fingers through the silky salt-and-pepper of his hair and came back to frame his warm skin again. “You’re real, aren’t you, George? I see you. I can touch you. I hear your voice.”
“Yeah, honey, I’m real.” The lines beside his eyes deepened as he offered her a reassuring smile. His chest expanded with a steadying breath before he brushed aside a lock of her hair and tucked it behind her ear. He turned his lips into her palm and pressed a ticklish kiss there. “Do you feel me? Do you feel this? I’m right here. And I’m not going anywhere.”
He wiped away the next tear that fell, and the next. And then he stroked the pad of his thumb across her mouth, urging it to open, giving her a taste of her own salty tears when her tongue darted out to soothe her sensitized lips. If this tenderness was a figment of her imagination... Her eyes filled with sorrowful tears. “George? I need...”
With a groan that vibrated through the air between them, George leaned in to replace his thumb with his mouth. His lips moved deliberately over hers, sampling, healing, demanding. He thrust his tongue into her mouth, giving her a taste of the rich cappuccino he’d drunk after their meal. He threaded his fingers into her hair, branding her with his hands and mouth as he angled her head back against the seat and moved his body into hers.
The encompassing heat seeping into every pore shocked her to her senses. With an answering hum in her throat, she slid her fingers across his crisp hair to clasp them behind his neck and pull herself further into his kiss.
She opened deeply for him, danced her tongue against his. Catching her bottom lip in a soft nibble, he held her in place as he dragged his hands from her hair, skimming them down her body. Her small breasts leaped beneath the lace of her bra and her properly tailored dress to thrust into the heat of his palms. And when his thumbs teased the tips into hardened pearls, she cried out at the arrows of pure wicked heat firing deep into the heart of her.