“I’m sorry things had to turn out this way, Lucas,” Gwen said. “I don’t know what I was thinking, when I thought I could just turn up here and fix things.” She shrugged, even though her hands were still up.
“Shut up,” Sally said. “You don’t get to talk to him.”
Gwen was focused on his face like she was trying to tell him something. “Turns out, I can’t.”
Turn. She was telling him to turn. If he didn’t have a gun to his head, he would have smacked his forehead. Sally had his left arm pinned and his free arm was between them. Lucas took a deep breath.
He twisted toward Sally as hard and fast as he could, bringing up his free arm to grab the wrist of her gun hand and push it up and away from his head. The gun went off harmlessly over his head, with a crack that hurt his ears. Sally tried to bring it back down, but as he swung around, Lucas freed his left arm and brought it around, driving the palm of his hand toward Sally’s face. It connected with a small crunch, and then her arms loosened.
“Lucas, get away from her.” Gwen had recovered her gun and was holding it skyward. He backed off, leaving Sally covering her face with one hand, eyes dark with rage. “Drop the gun.” Gwen took aim once Lucas was out of the way.
“You can’t do this,” Sally said around a bloody nose.
“There’s a phone in my pocket,” Gwen said to Lucas. “Get out of the house and call the police.”
He wanted desperately to kiss her, but fished out the phone instead. “I’m leaving,” he said, and started backing toward the front door.
“Don’t go.” Sally had gone pale. “Don’t go out there, you can’t.”
He turned and ran, only because Gwen told him to get out.
Behind him, Sally screamed, “Lucas, no!”
He fumbled at the door lock, glancing over his shoulder. Sally had dropped the gun and was still screaming. He unlocked the front door and pulled—
A shattering roar ripped through the room, then he couldn’t hear anything else.
***
Gwen froze, watching the front of the house go up in flames. It was a small blast by her standards, barely rocking her on her feet, but Lucas—had he been standing right in the middle of it? Her training took over and she tried to push down the knowledge that someone she cared about might be in that fire. Everything in her screamed that she should run toward the explosion, the way she’d done so many times before. But there was still a woman with a gun to deal with.
The air was getting harder to breathe; the smell was all wrong. She was expecting the smell of gasoline and hot metal, but instead got burning wood and stucco.
Sally was still screaming, the gun in her hand forgotten.
“Drop the gun,” Gwen ordered. “Drop it and let’s get out of here.” There was a monster in the back of her skull, screaming at Gwen to shoot her, a monster that wanted to see more of her blood.
“This is your fault!” Sally whirled on her. “You killed him! He should have been with me, but you got in the way, you distracted him.” She dropped the gun and flung herself at Gwen, who had a split-second to decide whether to shoot or not to shoot.
She holstered the Sig and instead used the oldest trick in the book. As Sally got to her, she sidestepped and tripped her to the floor. Sally grabbed Gwen’s left arm to try to keep from falling, and as Sally fell, it twisted. There was a sickening crunch, and Gwen’s vision grayed with the sudden pain in her shoulder. She felt something pop and tear, and she screamed. Sally landed with a grunt, cutting her off mid-rant. Gwen followed, planting her knee hard into Sally’s lower back, driving the breath out of her. She could feel her shoulder joint rolling around, could feel the scar tissue and recently healed muscles screaming.
Her shoulder was dislocated, and she had a few seconds to try and fix it before the muscles seized up and made it impossible. The woman beneath her was dazed and struggling to catch her breath, so Gwen pressed all of her weight onto her. The heat from the fire was getting stronger, and the air was choking-thick when Gwen tried to take a deep breath. She leaned to her left side and let her injured arm hang. As slowly as she dared, she let her shoulder drop, then roll back. She gritted her teeth against the swelling tension and pain, sweat breaking out on her face as she bit back a scream. Then the tension vanished with a nearly audible pop as the joint resettled. The short burst of relief made her giddy, but she knew from experience with injured soldiers that it wouldn’t last. She would pay for that later, but at least she had two working arms.
Well, sort of. The pain was horrid, making her wonder if there was more damage than just the dislocation. Sally was getting her breath back, so Gwen grabbed her arms and pinned them just above where her knee dug into Sally’s back. She started shouting and struggling, trying to throw Gwen off. Despite her slightly greater body mass, Sally was no match for Gwen’s strength.
She was stymied. She had nothing to secure Sally with, and she couldn’t just keep kneeling on her back while the house burned down around them. Her belt. That would work. She shifted her knee so both it and one hand were pinning Sally’s arms, and yanked her belt from her pants. She wrapped it twice around Sally’s forearms, then secured it with the buckle. She rose to her feet, pulling Sally with her.
She gave her a hard shake. “Where’s the back door?”
***
Gwen dragged Sally around the house. Before they reached the front, she hauled her back so she could hear Gwen over the now-crackling, crashing house fire. “If he’s dead, I’m going to kill you.” She felt as if she could, and smile while doing it. Her shoulder was beginning to throb mercilessly, making her catch her breath with each pulse of pain.
Meanwhile, Sally was still shouting that it was all her fault. Gwen fought the urge to punch her in the back of the head, to shut her up. Instead she gave her another shove, and they rounded the corner of the house.
Lucas was on his hands and knees, coughing. Gwen felt her knees wobble beneath her in relief.
“Oh thank God,” babbled the bound woman. “Oh thank go—”
Gwen cut her off with a particularly hard shove, and she fell. “Shut up. Lucas, are you all right?”
Lucas’s head shot up at the sound of her voice, and he smiled. His face was smudged with soot from the smoke, and she could see a few cuts and burns along his arms, but nothing that looked serious. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen something so beautiful. “Yeah. You?” He broke off, coughing. She wanted to run to him, but she wasn’t going to take her captive anywhere near him. There’d been zip ties in the bag Lee had given her—they were probably melted inside the house, along with the bag. To one side of the driveway was a lamppost—that would have to do. She pulled Sally over and tied the end of the belt to it as securely as she could.
“I think the door was booby-trapped,” Lucas said.
“Yeah.” That was all she could say before going to her knees next to Lucas in a half-controlled stagger. He straightened up and pulled her close and kissed her. He tasted like sweat and smoke. Behind her, she could hear Sally screaming something. She could have kept kissing Lucas for possibly days, but he slid his hands up her arms and held her by the shoulders, making her cry out in pain.
“Gwen?” He let go immediately, pulling back and scanning her face in alarm.
“S’okay,” she managed. “Just my shoulder. It’ll be all right.” God, it hurt to talk, which made no sense at all. There were sirens in the distance, getting closer.
“Did she hurt you?” Lucas was talking much too loud, which made her wonder if he had some hearing damage.
Gwen forced a grin, but from the look on Lucas’s face, it came out more as a grimace. “Not as much as I nearly hurt her. God, I was so worried about you.” She leaned against him with her good shoulder, holding him with one arm. He carefully returned the one-sided hug, leaning his head against hers.
That was how the EMTs found them. Without thinking, Gwen started giving orders. “He’s suffering from smoke inhalation and has l
acerations, burns, and contusions, but there doesn’t seem to be anything worse. He’s thirty-five and otherwise in good physical shape. He’s—”
“Gwen, shut up and let them look at your shoulder.” Lucas glared at her as the EMTs loaded him onto a stretcher. “She has a recent gunshot injury to her left shoulder, and just reinjured it tonight. She’s thirty-four and otherwise in good physical shape—”
Gwen laughed in spite of herself, and in spite of the pain in her shoulder. “Yes, all right, fine.” She smiled apologetically at the EMT next to her. “Sorry, force of habit. I was a medic.”
“We recognize our own,” the EMT said. “So tell me about this shoulder.”
Lucas was smiling at her, even through the oxygen mask they’d put on him. He was safe. They both were safe. For now that was all that mattered.
Chapter Seventeen
In between nurses and doctors coming into the hospital room to poke and prod at him, Lucas faced questioning by two detectives, which he bore with as good a grace as possible. “As good a grace as possible” wasn’t very good, given the evening’s events and that no one would tell him anything about Gwen.
“Mr. Wheeler,” said the older of the two, “can you explain to us again what happened in your hotel room?”
Lucas thudded back against the bed with a frustrated sigh. The fact that he was sitting here at all was ridiculous. He had barely a few scratches and a patch of skin that had been reddened by the fire. The doctors kept saying something about possible hearing loss, but it was just a ringing in his ears; it would go away. “There was a knock at the door. I thought it was one of my crew members, so I opened it. It was, but the next thing I knew she had a gun on me and forced me to leave with her.”
“And how long had Ms. Morris worked for you?”
“Just over two years with me.” Lucas tried to put the eerie, possessive look in Sally’s eyes out of his mind. As they’d wheeled Lucas away on the stretcher outside the house, she’d been screaming, “I love you,” over and over.
“And did you have a relationship with her during that time?”
God, why did that matter? “I slept with her once. I was high.”
“Were you high when she kidnapped you?”
“No, I’ve been clean for nearly five months.” He glared at the one asking the questions. “You wanna ask me what I was wearing at the time, too?”
The detective wrote some things down, and his partner spoke up. “How did you get away?”
“My girlfriend broke in and rescued me.” The first time he’d said that, they hadn’t believed him.
“Any idea how she knew where you were? Or why she didn’t call the police?”
“I don’t know, you’ll need to ask her.” Lucas didn’t want to talk about this part. It felt too much like they were trying to pin something on Gwen, newly out on bail.
“We will.” The first detective flipped back in his notebook. “The investigation of the fire is still pending, but they have found evidence that the house was rigged to blow. Crazy bitch.”
Lucas opened his eyes and gave the younger of the two his best smile. “Look, she hurt my girlfriend, and I haven’t been able to find out how she is. Can we please ask someone?”
“I’ll check,” the younger one said, and stepped out.
“Excuse me, Detective, are you finished?” Lee poked his head around the door. “I’d like a chance to visit with my brother, please.”
The remaining detective smiled—the first warmth Lucas had seen from him. “I think we’re done for now. We’ll be in touch with you if we need more, Mr. Wheeler, but frankly, Ms. Morris is doing plenty of talking on her own.”
Lee waited until the man left. “You okay?”
“Have you seen Gwen yet? How is she?”
“Yeah, you’re okay.” Lee smiled and settled into the guest chair. Without his suit and tie, he actually looked their age. He also looked exhausted.
“You look worse than I do,” Lucas said.
“I’ll tell you why sometime,” Lee said. “I haven’t seen Gwen yet, but the doctor came out and was able to talk to us. She’s fine. Morris dislocated her bad shoulder while they were fighting.” His smile broadened into a grin. “She relocated it herself and kept fighting. She’s quite a woman.”
Lucas felt a warring glow of pride and rush of anger that anyone would hurt her. “Back off, Leighton.”
Lee shook his head. “You have nothing to worry about. Unless you screw this up.” He gave Lucas a look that clearly said, Don’t screw this up.
“But she’s all right.”
“Yeah, I think so. Shaken. They think she might’ve torn something in the fight, so they’re running tests. She might end up needing surgery.”
“Tonight?” Lucas sat up.
“No, no. Eventually.” Lee crossed his foot over his knee and leaned forward. “Listen, you owe that woman. She was scared shitless going in there after your ass, but she did it anyway. She’s amazing, and if you ever forget it—”
“Not a chance,” Lucas said. He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. His jeans were still on under the hospital gown. He untied the knot at the back of his neck and pulled the gown off, tossing it onto the bed.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting dressed.”
“Get back in that bed,” Lee said. “Listen, Morris doesn’t seem to be interested in lying about what happened. She’ll probably confess to taking the money, which will get Gwen off the hook.”
“Good.” Lucas opened the tiny storage closet in the room. “Where the hell did they put my clothes?”
***
At least the painkillers were working. Gwen felt disconnected from most of reality. She kept replaying the sight of Lucas kneeling on the ground with her, clearly okay. It made waiting through the poking and prodding and testing easier. A pair of police detectives had come to talk to her, but she hadn’t managed to make much sense before a nurse shooed them out.
The hospital bed wasn’t the most uncomfortable thing she’d ever lain on, but it wasn’t anything luxurious either. She shifted, trying to find an easier position. She closed her eyes and took stock: the pain in her shoulder was a distant thing, like something happening to someone else. There was a torn ligament, she thought she’d heard someone say.
“Gwen.” She opened her eyes to see Lucas standing in the doorway, shirtless and disheveled. She smiled and thought it might be a particularly good drug dream.
A nurse burst in behind him. “Mr. Wheeler, you haven’t been discharged yet.”
“And I’m not going anywhere,” said Lucas, walking over and nudging her with his hip so he could sit on the edge of the bed. He picked up her right hand—it seemed he really was there. “I’m staying right here.” He leaned down and kissed her, slow, openmouthed, and thorough. Gwen heard the nurse’s disgruntled huff as she tugged the curtain blocking the door closed. The opiates dulled her senses, but even so she felt the lingering rush of adrenaline, of having cheated death. The moment Lucas’s tongue touched hers, she arched up, using both hands to pull him closer, nearly toppling them off the bed. It occurred to her that letting him actually climb on the bed with her might not be the best idea—in fact, it might be a spectacularly bad idea—but she was too high and too turned on to care.
Another tug and Lucas was lying on top of her. “Gwen. This is—” It was halfway between a groan and a question.
“Shut up,” Gwen answered, pulling his mouth back down to hers. The motion sharpened the pain in her shoulder, but Lucas was warm and was settling against her and Gwen thought about the thin layers of gown and cheap hospital linens that kept them separate and thought even harder about moving them aside, but then he was nipping at her jaw and she couldn’t think at all, much less formulate a plan.
“Jesus, I can’t leave you two alone for a minute.” Gwen peered around Lucas’s shoulder to see Craig standing in the doorway, looking simultaneously amused and disturbed. “Gwen, are you trying to get
arrested again?” He threw something across the room that hit Lucas in the back. “Lucas, put your shirt on.”
“She started it,” Lucas muttered, but sat back up next to Gwen, pulling on the shirt and buttoning it. For her part, all Gwen could do was grin.
“‘She started it,’” repeated Craig. “Sure, maybe, but she’s also stoned off her head. Look at her eyes. You don’t have that excuse.”
“I’m not stoned,” Gwen said. “Besides, it was just a kiss.”
“Right. Well if you two can keep your hands off each other for five minutes, we’d kind of like to visit,” Craig said.
“Sure,” said Gwen, giving Lucas a dopey grin before settling back again and squeezing his hand.
Craig beckoned out into the hallway and in came Cathy—Gwen thought this was probably against some regulation or another, but regulations seemed extra flexible where the Wheelers were concerned. It took several minutes for Gwen to reassure them all that she was fine, and by the time she was done, she was drained. She lay back and closed her eyes while Lucas told them everything.
“And so apparently Gwen thinks she’s Rambo or something, because she gets her shoulder dislocated, fixes it, then ropes Sally up and drags her out for the police. I would have just shot her.” He looked down at Gwen with exasperated affection. “Do you always do things the hard way?”
She grinned up at him, feeling suddenly giddy. “I’m with you, aren’t I?” Her grin spilled over into a giggle, and she couldn’t stop it. Then he was laughing with her, and something in her chest loosened.
“I don’t see how you can laugh at this,” Craig said, folding his arms. “You both could have been killed.”
Gwen looked up at Lucas, then over at Craig, feeling the giddiness subside. “We weren’t though,” she said. “That’s … why we’re laughing.” It was a reaction she knew well from Afghanistan. The fact that Lucas understood it too meant more than she could put into words.
“I still can’t believe—” Cathy paused, leaning against Craig. “How could it have been Sally the entire time? How did we all miss that?”
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