by Paula Cox
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“Positive,” he told her. Eliza’s eyes danced over the wounds on his face, and when he caught her studying him, she looked away while heat crawled up her cheeks.
“So, what then? What…?” She took a deep breath in an effort to calm herself. “You were totally cryptic and vague on the phone. Not helpful at all. I don’t like being kept in the dark.”
“I don’t blame you,” he murmured in a tone that gave her chills. Eliza crossed her arms to hide them, not wanting to let him know that he had an effect on her, even here and now.
“So spill it.” She hoped she sounded authoritative—a different feat for a woman who preferred the life of a submissive. “Now.”
“I’m so sorry, Eliza,” Nash said, and she felt some of her bravado fade. Licking her lips, she looked away, unable to stay mad and look at the agony in his eyes. “This is all my fault. Every last piece of it. You’re here, in this situation, because I… I tied an anchor to your foot and dragged you into the depths.” She looked back to him sharply, her eyes wide with surprise. “I didn’t mean to. You know that we started because I was scoping out campus for my perp. I didn’t want to take things too far because I knew there was the possibility of it ending poorly, but… I did. I couldn’t help myself. With you, I just… I fell. I’m the reason your dad is hurt—”
“But you said—”
“And it’s because I was catching onto the real killer,” he insisted strongly, grasping her by her arms and leaning down to meet her eye. “Phillip Crest—”
“The vice-dean?”
“He’s the one responsible,” he told her, and something cold and sharp seemed to twist in her gut. It couldn’t be. She’d known Phillip Crest for years, ever since he was brought in to be her father’s right-hand man. He sent her birthday cards and yarn for Christmas.
“No…”
“I have video evidence to confirm it,” Nash insisted. “It shows him with the hitmen who killed my guys. Crest was going to pin it on your dad, but I think your dad started cluing into things around the same time I did, and with more people catching onto him, Crest had to act. And… He did. He got both of us last night.”
She placed a hand over her mouth to hide the way her jaw dropped, and Nash slowly released her. Even once he had let go, she felt the way his fingers had dug into her skin, the slow burn of his touch lingering.
“But he’s so… Not evil.”
Nash gave a cold laugh. “Don’t judge a book by its cover, Eliza. You have to know that by now.”
“But he…”
“He said he’d hurt you if I didn’t do what he said,” Nash told her, drawing her out of her stupor. “He forced me to bring him drugs from my club, and when I did, one of his guys jumped me, beat me, and took everything from me. The only reason I’m not still tied to a chair in some warehouse on the south end of town is because I didn’t bring all the coke he demanded. I managed to lose my escorts, who told me they’d start chopping off your fingers if I made a scene when I realized he didn’t actually have you.”
It was too much to take in, too much to process, but somehow Eliza did it. Nash had been fighting for her, even when she thought he didn’t believe her. He’d been true to his word. And she had doubted him, over and over again, when it came to her father’s safety. Even after she had left him, storming out of his apartment in a flurry of anger and tears, he hadn’t tossed her father to his Phoenixes, but continued to fight on.
His finger touched her cheek suddenly, and she flinched back, so lost in her thoughts about the world crumbling down around her that she hadn’t noticed him reach forward and brush a tear from her cheek.
“Eliza,” he whispered, the pain so evident in his voice that it made her heart hurt, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for all of this. Everything you’re going through is my fault. Even if you hate me for it, I’m going to make sure things are made right.”
She opened and closed her mouth, gawking at him, and then shook her head with a soft laugh. “Nash… I could never hate you.”
His eyebrows shot up, and before either of them could say something else to ruin the moment, Eliza stood up on the tips of her toes and kissed him, arms flung around his neck.
Both seemed tentative at first, their closed lips pressed together, until finally she took a leap and closed her eyes, her mouth parting for him in a way that felt wonderfully familiar.
And there, in the hallway of the hospital, they rekindled what they had lost—and said more than they ever had before.
Chapter 42
“You sure you don’t want a little extra there, honey?” Eliza shook her head at the cafeteria woman’s inquiry, but she seemed hell-bent on shoving an extra helping of mashed potatoes on her plate. The woman pursed her lips and held out a big metal spoon with a steaming pile of white on it. Eliza felt it’d be rude to just walk away, though she could see Nash grinning at her out of the corner of her eye. The cafeteria woman prompted her again, and when she spoke, Eliza noticed she had lipstick on her front teeth. “You sure? You look like you’re skin and bones over there.”
“Thanks,” Eliza muttered dryly. When the woman gave her a hard look, Eliza held out her tray and let the woman add another helping of mashed potatoes to her plate. Then, before she could scurry off to pay for everything, an extra spoonful of gravy coated everything. Eliza stared at the tray as she brought it back toward her, trying not to look disgusted at the fact that her tray looked like a big pool of gray mush now.
“You a student?”
She looked up with a raised brow. “Excuse me?”
“A student,” the woman repeated as an elderly couple fell in line behind Eliza, ready for their early evening meal of mashed potatoes and chicken breast. The cafeteria woman seemed not to notice. “You know… Because you’re so skinny. All you students are skinny things.”
“Uh, yeah.” She flashed the best fake smile she could, thanked the woman for her generosity, then scuttled off before any further conversations about her weight ensued. Knowing that Phillip Crest had control of Nash’s wallet, Eliza set the tray aside and paid for both of their meals, which he muttered his thanks for, followed by a quick kiss to her cheek, as they headed out into the cafeteria seating area.
The Blackwoods Hospital, located a few blocks from campus, was the biggest in the area, bringing in people from the town and the surrounding counties. Seeing as it was around the usual dinnertime hour, the place was pretty full, and they were only able to find two seats at the long table that ran the length of the window overlooking the dark parking lot below. Sleet pelted the window as they made themselves comfortable on the back-less stools, and Nash handed her a fork when she realized she’d forgotten to grab one.
“Thanks,” she said, poking at her food. Even if she wasn’t looking at him, she could feel him watching her—him and that massive bag of cocaine he insisted on carting around. Eliza wasn’t exactly sure how to feel about that latest addition to his wardrobe, but they both seemed to have unanimously decided not to talk about it. After all, she knew the only reason he had it was because Phillip Crest had blackmailed him into stealing it, using the threat of her safety to force Nash to do his bidding.
Still, she wasn’t okay with the fact that the man she still adored was lugging around a bag full of drugs. Not one bit.
Nash, however, acted like it was nothing—like he was carrying around a bag of books instead. His ease around illicit and illegal substances should have sent her running for the hills, but every time she looked in his eyes, she remembered the kind of person he was. Just because he ran in certain circles didn’t make him that sort of man. He’d proved that to her now.
At least, she hoped he had. She hoped he hadn’t duped her, and the police officers he requested to stand in front of her father’s door were actual cops sent by the actual police station, there for her father’s safety and nothing more.
“Do you know the officers they sent over?” she asked in a soft voice, pushing her food aro
und the plate a little more. Nothing on it seemed appetizing, but she knew she needed to eat something.
“No.”
“But then why—?”
“I just knew we needed someone to watch him,” Nash told her. He’d scooped some mashed potatoes of his own onto his fork, but it sat hovering in his hand between the plate and his mouth. “People like your dad. They respect him. The cops should have stationed people outside his door from the beginning.”
“What if they’d discovered, you know…” She nodded down at the grocery bag now sitting on the floor between them. “That.”
“Then I guess I’d have to man up and explain what’s going on,” he said dismissively, “but for now I want to keep things quiet. I don’t want to involve the police unless I have a good plan in mind. In case you didn’t notice, they aren’t exactly fans of bikers.”
She pressed her lips together and turned her attention back to the parking lot, watching the way icy rain peppered the cars and pavement with slickness. When the officers had arrived, they dealt primarily with her, given that she was the one who’d called for protection. Still, they’d eyed Nash as if he might explode at any moment, a bomb just ticking down second by second until something awful happened.
Again, it could have been a ploy, but it would have been tough faking that kind of obvious dislike. To his credit, Nash hadn’t done a thing to antagonize them. He’d hovered in the background, assisting her only when she’d started to flounder, flustered by the presence of two hulking men in uniform staring her down. Once they’d chatted about her father’s condition, she and Nash left, and she prayed those two men would still be there, protecting him, when she returned.
“So do you have one?” she asked some time later. Both of them had worked through some of the bland hospital food on their plate, but it was a struggle. When Nash looked at her with a raised eyebrow, she swallowed her bite of dry chicken to clarify. “A plan, I mean. What are you going to do about Crest?”
She still couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She’d known the man for years. Nash she’d known for months, but for some reason, she was more willing to believe in him than she was in Phillip Crest—especially after what had happened to her father. The man had to pay if he was truly the puppet master behind everything that had happened.
“I’m working on something,” he told her, setting his fork down and grabbing his napkin. She watched him wipe the gravy from his lips, wincing as he did. After they’d reunited outside her father’s room, she’d insisted someone take a look at his face. While Nash refused any medical help, he’d acquiesced to her wiping some of the dried blood off from around his nostrils. At the moment, he still looked like he’d been in a scuffle, but now at least it looked less fresh.
“Care to share?” Eliza asked, then took a quick drink from the Cola she’d bought alongside dinner. Best tasting part of the meal, frankly.
When Nash didn’t answer right away, Eliza looked at him, frowning, and set her fork down. He seemed lost in thought for a moment, his eyes so very far away, and when she cleared her throat, he glanced at her briefly before turning his gaze to the parking lot. Still, it was as if he was looking without really seeing.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to share any of my… plans with you.”
“What?” She shifted on the stool to face him, putting on her best glare. “Nash, you dragged me into this. I have every right to know—”
“I did,” he said fiercely, his eyes narrowed at the window. “I dragged you into this. I shouldn’t pull you deeper.”
She gave a soft sigh, then placed her hand on his arm. The light touch seemed to send a jolt through him, and he flinched back as if surprised by her closeness. When their eyes met, she tilted her head to the side.
“Nash, I’m in as deep as I can get now,” she insisted gently. “I know everything. I know that you didn’t mean to involve me. Hell, if I was someone else’s kid, I’m sure we’d still be carrying on as we were, but… I’m not someone else’s kid. I’m the dean’s daughter, and I deserve to know what you’re going to do about the man who tried to kill my father.”
Her cheeks burned with passion, but probably not as bright as the passion in her eyes. Someone had tried to butcher the one family member she had left. She had no intention of sitting on the sidelines, not anymore.
Nash studied her for a long moment, then, without a word, reached up and wove his fingers through her hair. Unwittingly Eliza leaned in to his touch, her eyes threatening to drift closed so she could lose herself in the moment. But she held strong, silently pleading with him not to set her aside. Silently hoping he knew that she trusted him, that she would do whatever she could to help—even if that meant staying out of the way, for the most part anyway.
Moments later, he leaned in and brushed his lips against hers. This time, there was no hesitation. Despite the fact they both tasted like dry chicken and watery mashed potatoes and gravy, their lips parted with an urgency she’d never known from a lover before. There was so much about Nash she’d never experienced in a man before, and here she was, falling back into his arms again—willingly, at that.
“I can’t tell you my plan yet,” he started, and when she tried to protest, he kissed her again to silence her, and when he broke away, he whispered, “because I don’t have one. Not a whole one, anyway.”
“Oh,” Eliza muttered, her cheeks flushed. “Right.”
“But I do know that I’m going to keep you safe,” Nash insisted, and in that moment, she saw the passion in his eyes, one that blazed so brightly that it made her tremble. He brushed her cheeks with his thumbs affectionately. “No matter the cost, I’m going to keep you safe. Is that understood?”
She nodded, and right then and there decided that she would keep him safe, too. “But how are you going to do that?”
“By giving Phillip Crest exactly what he wants,” he told her, and when her eyes widened, he smirked and chuckled, then added, “Well… almost exactly what he wants.”
Chapter 43
“So… You own this place, huh?” Nash glanced back at Eliza’s question, then gave a nod when she raised her eyebrows curiously. “Kind of an obvious name.”
“I didn’t choose it,” he insisted, ushering her into the front door. “I just didn’t argue it when the time came to vote on it. We all own Phoenix Rises collectively.”
“Well, I guess there are worse names out there,” she said once she was inside. Nash shut the door hastily behind him. He wasn’t surprised to find that Phillip’s handlers weren’t still waiting for him across the street, but he couldn’t be sure there weren’t other eyes watching him from seemingly vacant windows, inside seemingly empty cars, inside seemingly harmless shops. He probably should have left her at the hospital, behind the closed door with police officers stationed out front, but he knew the club bar was the one place he could be totally sure she was safe. Micky had already agreed to watch over her—and if there was anyone in the world Nash felt he could trust right now, it was Micky.
Besides, the bar was a fortified safe house for all the members of the Steel Phoenix Motorcycle Club. While their boys might have been getting killed on runs, not even Phillip had tried an assault on the premises. It looked hapless and a little rundown from the outside, but everyone inside was carrying heavy weaponry at any given moment. The windows were bulletproof glass—illegally installed, of course—and most nights the place was heavily packed with die-hard bikers, who’d give their lives for the well-being of their brotherhood.
Eliza would be safe here, and Nash would find precisely what he needed to take down Phillip Crest once and for all.
He wasn’t the least bit surprised to find the place more packed than he’d left it. Micky must have called in the cavalry, because everywhere he looked, Nash saw tried and true members of the Steel Phoenix MC—not a townie or drunk from outside the club in sight. The conversations settled somewhat as he walked in, Eliza trailing behind him. When they’d first met, if she had been in a
place like this she would have followed like a meek lamb. Tonight, she moved with grace and confidence. Nash knew she was nervous, but she had learned to hide it well.
His chest swelled with pride, and he tried his best not to smile like an idiot when he looked back at her.
“Gang’s all here,” Micky announced, as Nash worked his way through the crowd toward him. Nash gave him a nod and reached back for Eliza, who readily slipped her small hand in his.
“I don’t have a lot of time,” he told his old pal, nodding to the doorway that opened to the basement stairwell. “I just need to get some supplies, then I’m off.”
“Can I help?” Micky asked. Those gray-blue eyes flitted back to Eliza briefly before fixing on Nash, who nodded.
“Please.”
There wasn’t time to stop and fill all the other higher ranking guys in on what was happening, so he planned to leave that to Micky—and Eliza, if she felt like talking. He knew Phillip would be waiting, and even though Eliza was finally safe, her father was still at risk. Sure, there were armed guards standing at his door, but what would happen if Phillip fucking Crest strolled up and insisted he was there to visit his friend and superior?