Micah was changing everything. The way he treated her, protective and respectful, the way he made her laugh, his patience. He’d somehow managed to give her hope that she was finally safe and—
“Hey.”
She whirled, heart pounding, as a man stepped from behind a tree.
29
“PAUL?”
He was nearly unrecognizable. Face battered, eye swollen closed, blood bubbling in his nose. Anxiety choked Sloane’s voice. “What happened?”
“Doesn’t matter.” He took another step toward her and pressed a palm against his ribs—cracked probably. “No time. We need to get out of here, Sloane. Get far away.”
“We?”
His nod sent a fresh rivulet of blood from one nostril. He swiped at it with the back of his hand. “You. Me. We need to go.”
He had to be drunk. A bar fight or a nasty dispute over a game of poker. This was insane.
“The only one who needs to go anywhere is you, Paul. You need to go to a hospital and get yourself checked over. You probably shouldn’t drive.” Sloane glanced back at the church. The AA meeting rarely went late. This was a mess. “I’ll call 911. Get some medics to—”
“No!” Paul grasped her arm, agitation causing even the swollen eye to open. “We can’t call anyone. They’ll find me. They’ll check the hospitals.”
“Who?” Sloane asked, grateful when he dropped her arm to brace himself against the tree trunk. He definitely needed a trauma assessment.
“Who’s looking for you?” she repeated, but the moment the words left her lips, she knew. Her stomach shuddered. “Those men you borrowed money from? For the gambling? They’re still after you for those loans?”
He groaned. “It isn’t about loans. It never was.”
What?
“I got all those calls,” she insisted. “They said you owed money.”
“I found a bag of cash. Back in Sacramento, when I was setting up those poker games.”
Sloane’s legs had gone weak. “Found it? What do you mean?” She grimaced, remembering his surprise visit at the cottage. “That money you showed me, it’s from that?”
“I had to give 10 percent to the dude who held it for me when I was in Mexico. But even after that, my cut is close to 900K.” His pained smile exposed bloody teeth. “There really is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow—I found it.”
“You stole it.” Sloane snatched at her hair, anger rising. “The same way you stole my cat.”
“Hey, chill,” Paul told her. “We don’t have time for this. I’ll explain it while we’re on the road. We’ll stop by your place first.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you. You’re crazy to think I would. If these criminals find you, it’s all on you.” She took a step away. “I’m leaving.”
“You’re in this too.”
“What? Don’t even try that.” Sloane’s lips tensed. “I have nothing to do with your gambling ‘business.’ I never did.”
Paul peered over his shoulder. “The poker games in Sacramento and Tahoe are just chump change for these guys. Kind of a side hobby for some low-level guy named Viktor. The syndicate makes most of its money in New York. Online gambling, international sports . . . all of it leading back to Kiev. And Moscow. Right on home to Mother Russia, babe. It’s not just gambling. It’s girls, too. Young ones. That’s Viktor’s real specialty. Let’s just say he’s not known for his gentle touch.”
Sloane’s stomach roiled. Viktor. V. The tattoo on Jane Doe. And Zoey?
“He wants the money back. I thought I’d let things cool off long enough; then this past week I started hearing some stuff. I changed up my plans and laid low but . . .”
“He found you.”
“One of his gorillas.” Paul touched his ribs. “With a lead fist. Now I’ve got to disappear. If you’re still as smart as you were, you’ll join my vanishing act. Otherwise, I can’t guarantee your safety. I’m sure I don’t have to remind you about San Diego.”
“No one’s bothered me in months,” Sloane told him, refusing to let him frighten her that way. “Only you. And if you come near me again, I’ll call the police.” It was true now. She’d do it. “I made a huge mistake trusting you. I won’t ever do it again.”
“Sloane . . .” Paul coughed, wiped at the bloody spit it produced. “Maybe you didn’t hear me: it’s almost a million bucks!” His expression was intense. “You deserve it, Sloane, all I’ve gone through to get this. You’re worth it. We can go away somewhere, kick back, and have everything we’ve always—”
“People will be out of the church any minute,” she interrupted. “If you won’t call the medics, then you should just go. Before they see you.”
“Please . . .” He tried to reach for her hand; she stepped back. “I love you, Sloane. That’s what I’m trying to say. I need you. Give me another chance.”
There were voices now, a clutch of AA members walking their way.
“Go, Paul. Hurry.”
She reached for the Volvo’s door as someone called out to her.
“Everything okay there?”
“Fine—good. Thanks!” she called back, relieved that Paul was limping away.
In seconds, she put the car into gear and headed for the exit.
“I don’t get what you’re saying.” Micah slid his guitar onto the couch beside him. Coop hadn’t bothered to respond to text messages in a week. And now he’d finally called, sleep deprived and amped up on caffeine, to blurt some crazy story? Micah jabbed the phone into speaker mode. “What do you mean ‘Sloane is mixed up in this thing’?”
“Oh, man . . . you’re not listening.”
Micah glared at the phone, ignoring an anxious twinge. “You’re not making sense.”
“Hang on. Let me grab my notes.”
Notes? Coop had this garbage written down?
“Got it,” Coop said, coming back. “Look, I’m sorry I have to lay this on you. But if you’re even thinking things could get serious with this girl?”
Micah had ordered flowers barely two minutes before Coop called and . . . I think I’m falling in love with her. Was he?
“Get to the point, would you?” Micah ordered.
“Okay. It’s not like this nurse is a Russian gangster. I’m not saying that. But I’m in San Diego doing my research, right?” His laugh sounded incredulous, like he couldn’t wrap his fuzzy mind around his sudden fortune. “Man, the timing was laser-perfect, you know?”
“I know I’m going to throw my phone against the wall if you don’t explain what’s going on.”
“I told you she used to go by the name Wilder?”
Sloane had explained that. Mostly. New name, fresh new start.
“Well,” Coop continued, “she was a nurse at San Diego Hope. In Sacramento before that.”
“I know all this.” And Micah also knew he was done with Coop, really done now. This was—
“You knew Sloane was in a car accident in San Diego? A bad one?”
“Yep.” He’d traced his fingers over that scar.
“Incredible she survived,” Coop continued. “Her car flipping end over end after going off the coast highway. And over a cliff.”
Dear God . . .
“Rush-hour pileup, intense cliff dive, ambulances screamin’ to the trauma centers,” Coop narrated, imagining it in print no doubt. “Scene from an action flick for sure. But the real kicker is the witness statements. All those folks who saw what was really going on. An unidentified car chasing her Jetta. That phantom vehicle was on its bumper like a missile, slamming into it, scraping past other cars to get at it again, then finally forcing the Jetta over that cliff. Bang. Whoosh!”
“What—why?” Micah asked, wondering if Coop had more than caffeine on board. “Road rage?”
“Bingo. Exactly what they thought. At first. But someone got a partial plate. Or maybe there were more than a few cell pics and they pieced ’em together. I’ll have to check that for accuracy. But bottom line, investigators mat
ched it to a stolen car that was found a day later abandoned and torched. Russian style.”
Micah pressed his fingers to his forehead. “But . . .”
“Why would the mob target your nurse?”
“Yeah, what’s the connection?” Micah asked, struggling to understand.
“That’s exactly what the detectives asked Wilder. She said she didn’t know. But they’ve kept at it. The FBI and San Diego’s organized crime unit have had an open investigation for six months.”
The length of time since Sloane left there. And the reason she changed her name?
“The day before I arrived in Sacramento,” Coop explained, “there was a break in a gambling case. Big ring of illegal poker games. One of the mob minions made a deal in prison that exposed the name of a bagman who ran the Russian money around. Apparently this guy took a hike with some of the organization’s cash. To the tune of nearly a million bucks.”
“How could that have anything to do with Sloane?”
“This bagman was her fiancé.”
Micah closed his eyes.
“You don’t know me. Not everything.”
Sloane said she hadn’t been married but never mentioned a fiancé. She’d only explained the name change because he’d asked. She said it was because of the circumstances of her mother’s death and her stepfather’s incarceration. Or had Micah only assumed that? Was her militant insistence on privacy really because . . . ? “Are the police looking for Sloane?”
“They hadn’t been. But now that they’re looking for her ex, I expect they’ll want to question her again. Apparently Sloane and this guy broke up while she still lived in Sacramento. Close to two years ago. It’s assumed he’s running. He’d be a fool not to. These are evil dudes. They were probably threatening to hurt Sloane to put pressure on her ex. Flush him out. A cliff dive is pretty persuasive.” Coop’s tone gentled a fraction. “She may not have known what he was involved in, Micah.”
He needed to believe that in the worst way. “So they’re trying to find this—”
“Paul Stryker.”
Knowing his name made it real. Could Sloane still have feelings for him?
“I was right,” Coop added, a chest swell in his voice. “It’s all connected and traces back. I’ve been working 24-7 with the paper’s senior crime reporter, and we’ve got it tied together and fact-checked. From the sex trafficking here to the gambling in Sacramento and even that ugly accident in San Diego. Burned-out cars are a mob signature. If they’ve got their sights on someone, they don’t care about collateral damage. There were two on-scene fatalities in the San Diego pileup. And the girl driving Sloane’s car was—”
“She wasn’t driving her own car?”
“No. The reports showed a coworker was driving. Because . . .” Coop’s voice trailed off.
“Because why?” Micah got up from the couch and began pacing. He needed to move to think. “Why wasn’t Sloane driving?”
Coop’s breath puffed against his phone. “It wasn’t in the official reports. But I stopped by San Diego Hope. Sloane wasn’t popular there.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Micah asked, anger sharpening his tone. He wasn’t sure who he was mad at: the Hope staff for breaching privacy, Coop for baiting them, or Sloane for—“What did they say?”
“It was just one person. And you’ve got to understand that the other employee, the one who was driving, was really well liked. The kid ended up with serious head injuries, months in rehab, and still has some problems. It was pretty obvious this guy I talked to blamed Sloane.”
“Why? For what?”
“For being drunk, Micah. So drunk her teammate took her keys and insisted on driving her home. Which essentially put this other employee on that freeway and over a cliff. From what I heard, it wasn’t the first time Sloane got that drunk. Her coworkers saw it as a big problem.”
God, no . . .
Micah closed his eyes against an image of Stephen’s dead body. And the face of his convicted killer in court.
“I’m sorry, man,” Coop told him. “I know how this must make you feel.”
“You can’t know.”
“I mean, you dated her and now—”
“Wait.” Micah hauled his fingers through his hair; his mind was spinning in too many directions. “You told the investigators in Sacramento that you know where Sloane is? You gave them her new name? That’s why you’re telling me?”
“No.” Coop sighed. “I probably should have. You haven’t said much, but I had a hunch it wasn’t just one date. I thought I should check with you first. Hey . . . you’re not actually serious about this nurse?”
“I don’t know,” Micah said with an honesty that made his heart ache. “I don’t know what to think about any of this. Obviously I don’t know her.”
“Well, I figured I should at least warn you,” Coop said, finality in his tone. “It’s an important story. With a link to Jane Doe and the motel fire here in LA, it will be top news in the Times. Print and online. TV will pick it up too. The tie to the Sacramento gambling and the unsolved San Diego incident will be exposed. There’ll be a photo of Paul Stryker. Along with a mention of the victims of the freeway tragedy. Including Sloane’s former name.”
Micah’s gut lurched. “When?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
Sloane pulled Marty into her lap, then drew him up against her, comforted by his softness. His tongue made a snagging swipe at her chin before he blinked his yellow eyes and settled down to the serious task of kneading the sleeve of her pajama top. Barely nine thirty on a Friday night and Sloane was already in her sleepwear. She had seen no point in changing back into clothes after showering; she’d raced to do that the moment she locked the door behind her. There’d been a bloody handprint on her shirt.
She closed her eyes, concentrating on the clean scent of her shampoo and the peaceful rhythm of Marty’s paws. She’d come too far to let Paul Stryker’s unwelcome intrusion make her feel dirty and drag her back to a lifestyle she’d vowed to leave behind. It was a hateful identity she’d shed, a snake escaping skin left shriveled on the rocks below that seaside cliff. It had taken every ounce of her reserve to walk away and find a new life. Paul Stryker couldn’t show up at an AA meeting, claim she was still part of his dark activities, and expect her to simply follow him. Because he’d had some kind of epiphany himself?
“You deserve it, Sloane. . . . You’re worth it.”
Since when was Paul Stryker the measure of who Sloane was and what she deserved?
She nuzzled her cheek against Marty’s fur. She’d meant what she said to Paul. She’d call the police if he showed up here again. It would mean opening herself up to questions. But it would be worth it.
Because of Micah.
She glanced at her cell phone lying on the couch beside her. There were no new messages. Only that one he’d sent earlier about his plans for their Saturday. He hadn’t answered her text with the happy face icon. Or the one she’d sent when she’d pulled on her pajamas after her shower. But Sloane wasn’t concerned. Micah’s work meeting probably went late, and it would be like him to check in with the crisis team dispatcher even if he wasn’t on call. Maybe his phone ran out of juice. Or he was playing his guitar and didn’t notice.
Sloane pressed a kiss on Marty’s head and closed her eyes.
The doors were locked, her bloodstained blouse was soaking, Paul was gone, and Micah Prescott only believed the very best of her. The look in his eyes, his whispers, his kisses, proved she was worth so much more than she’d ever, ever imagined. The best man she’d ever known was planning their Saturday together. Sloane was safe.
Tomorrow was a whole new day.
30
WHAT’S THAT NOISE?
Sloane pulled down the quilt and squinted toward sunshine streaming through her window, then at her bedside clock. Her eyes widened. Nine thirty? She hadn’t slept this late since the last time she dragged herself home from partying.
Was som
eone knocking on the front door?
It flooded back, the reason she’d had trouble sleeping last night: The AA meeting, Paul accosting her in the parking lot, battered and bleeding. And his irrational insistence that she go with him, vanish.
She slid from the bed, grabbed her robe, and padded toward the door, telling herself he wouldn’t show up here in broad daylight. She’d made it clear she’d call the police. Paul wouldn’t take that risk. He was smarter than that. He’d be out of state by now.
She slid the last lock back, opened the door.
“Flowers for—” The senior-age deliveryman peered around an autumn bouquet and seemed to notice Sloane’s attire and sleep-tossed hair. He averted his eyes, finding sudden interest in the wicker vase. “I’m sorry if I woke you, miss. You were first on my route. By some miracle, the traffic wasn’t bad, so I’m a little earlier than I expected.”
“It’s okay,” Sloane assured him, relief and surprise making her feel wobbly enough to lean on the door handle. “No problem.” She smiled as she caught the sweet fragrance of the brilliant orange, burgundy, and golden roses. “I’m not sure I’ve had a better wake-up call. Are these mine?”
The man returned her smile. “If you’re Sloane Ferrell.”
“That’s me.”
“Then it’s my pleasure, Miss Ferrell.”
He waved as he ambled back down the drive, leaving Sloane with a vase of flowers and a happy rush of goose bumps. This had to be from Micah. Roses, tiny red berries, and sprigs of eucalyptus. So beautiful. She reached for the card, thinking even a handful of dandelions would beat a shipping carton of Lucky Charms. Then she read the message:
To start our day together. Love, Micah
Love.
Sloane stood in the foyer, door still half-open and vase hugged to her robe, and read the card again. She let her gaze linger on the signature. That he’d had the florist write love didn’t actually mean he loved her. It was used so often, so easily. She stiffened as Paul’s words came back.
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