I almost messed my underwear right there on the street.
I looked over my shoulder and saw her in a little courtyard by the walls of the hospital. Her blonde hair caught the dim glow of a nearby streetlamp, but the rest of her was in silhouette. She was smoking a cigarette – something I’d never even considered she might do, though it helped explain the sexy, dangerous voice. The orange tip glowed as she inhaled, then dimmed as she pulled it away to breathe out.
My heart was thudding in my chest. I was acutely aware of how vulnerable I was out here in the darkness with no one around.
No one, that is, except for the woman who might have arranged the assassination attempt on Connor’s life.
I thought about running, but I was wearing heels – not the best for sprinting. Plus, if she wanted me dead, she probably had a sniper somewhere. It would be over before I got ten feet.
But maybe I could call for backup.
I still had my back to her, so I reached in my clutch, which I’d brought to hold my phone and the money. I found the phone by touch, glanced down, and hit the ‘Send/Call’ button on the screen, which meant it would call whomever I had talked to last… which was Sebastian, when I told him about the room number. At first I prayed he would hear what was going on and send Johnny rushing down to kick her ass – but then I remembered he might not get good enough reception up there to get the call. So it might just go to voicemail.
Shit.
Then I realized, maybe I could get her on tape saying something incriminating.
That settled it. My heart was slowing down, and I realized she probably wasn’t going to do anything to me. She wasn’t stupid enough to show up in person for that.
Plus, I wanted to nail the bitch for what she did to Connor more than I was afraid of what she might do to me.
Make it count, I told myself as I gave the phone a few more seconds to go to voicemail.
“Why would you possibly want to catch me alone?” I asked, trying to sound braver than I felt. “Can’t take any incriminating pictures of that.”
“Well, I could, but I’d need you to undress.”
“No thanks.”
She shrugged and said flippantly, “It didn’t work last time with someone far more interesting in the picture with you, doing something far more salacious… so I doubt it would work this time, either.”
“So you’ve moved onto other things,” I sneered. Or tried to sneer. I don’t think the quaver in my voice helped, though.
She walked slowly out of the shadows as she took another puff. Her heels tapped on the concrete click, click, click as she entered the light, and I saw she was wearing the same glittering gown as back in the Dubai. “I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You’ll figure it out,” I said, and gave her a smile that was sugar-coated arsenic. “What do you want, Miranda?”
“A little bird tells me that you’re spreading lies about me.”
“What, that you’re a nice person?”
She smiled condescendingly. “No. That I have something to do with this evening’s tragic events.”
“See? You figured it out. I knew you would.”
“Hm,” she murmured, acknowledging my sarcasm but not replying to it. “I would never, ever hurt Connor. You should know that.”
“Actually, everything I’ve ever seen leads me to believe you would absolutely hurt Connor.”
“With stock shares and sex scandals, yes. With bullets and assassins, no.”
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe you.”
“You should believe me.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s in your best interest to do so.”
Ice water trickled through my veins and chilled me to my core.
But I remembered that I was getting this on Sebastian’s voicemail.
“How so?” I asked.
“You should do your best to stay in my good graces.”
“Or what, Miranda? You’ll hire somebody to shoot me, too?”
For a second, I thought I might have provoked her enough to say something – or maybe do something (which scared the hell out of me). There was a brief flare-up of the hatred I had seen in her eyes at the Dubai – but then it passed, and was replaced with cool disdain.
“For the record… in case those detectives you were talking to earlier put some kind of a wire on you… I would never, ever harm Connor, or pay anyone else to do anything of the sort.”
My stomach turned. “How did you know I was talking to two detectives?”
“I told you. A little bird,” she said, and took a puff on her cigarette.
At the beginning of the conversation I had assumed Miranda had heard about what I had said to Mrs. Templeton: You brought her into this hospital?! She hired the man who tried to kill your son!
But now I realized what she really meant, and I was far more frightened by that.
If she had sources in the police department… what couldn’t she get away with?
“Did a little bird tell you I came out for a walk, too?” I asked.
“Maybe. Or maybe I was just waiting, having a smoke.”
“Because billionaire hedge fund investors always hang around outside hospitals at one o’clock in the morning, right?”
“Multi-millionaire hedge fund investor. Connor’s media blitzkrieg cost me dearly.”
“Is that why you had him shot?”
I could hear the smirk in her voice. “You’re growing tiresome.”
“You’re already there. Besides, I wouldn’t say Connor did you in. I’d say it was because your assholery backfired on you.”
“Is that even a word? ‘Assholery’?”
“It fits you perfectly, but if you want something more highbrow, how about the expression ‘hoist on your own petard’?”
“Much better. I always enjoy hearing Hamlet from the mouths of gutter trash.”
“But this little piece of gutter trash beat you, didn’t she?” I whispered. “Is that why you’re here? Because you can’t stand being beaten, especially by someone so… ‘inferior’?”
She smiled, in perfect control of herself. “I’m here because I wanted to tell you something.”
“…which is?”
“Stop telling lies about me.”
“I haven’t told a lie yet, Miranda.”
“You have, and you should stop.”
“Or what?”
She didn’t answer with words; instead, she dropped the cigarette on the sidewalk and stepped on the glowing ember with the heel of her shoe… then slowly ground it out.
The message was crystal clear: I was the cigarette. Or would be.
“Take care, Lily,” she said with a faint smile.
The way she said it, you could interpret it as a cold ‘goodbye’… or as ‘watch your back.’
I knew which way she meant it.
She turned and walked away, her heels going click, click, click.
As though on cue, a Rolls Royce glided up to the curb, silent as a cat. She got in the back and closed the door without another look at me. The car sped away and left me standing on the sidewalk, my heart hammering in my chest.
I reached in my clutch and found the phone was still going. I hung up the call and was just about to run inside the hospital when a beat-up Honda Civic roared around the corner. A young guy in a backwards baseball cap rolled down the window with a hand crank.
“Hey, you the chick who ordered the deli?”
As soon as I paid him and got the food, I went inside the hospital’s main entrance. It took me an extra ten minutes to wind through the hospital corridors and find my way back to Connor’s room… but it was worth it.
17
“Jesus,” Sebastian muttered.
The three of us – me, Sebastian, and Johnny – were all standing in the hallway outside Connor’s room. Sebastian had just finished playing the voicemail back on his phone. Johnny refused to leave Connor, so we’d had to move from spot
to spot like we were using a divining wand until we finally enough reception to play back the message. It was muffled and staticky in places, but most of the conversation came through.
Johnny frowned at me after it was over. “Why did you go outside?”
“You know I went to go get the food!”
“You could have walked through the hospital.”
“I would have if I thought that psychotic bitch was going to be waiting for me.”
“Yeah, well… don’t go outside unprotected again.”
“You were going to send me home,” I pointed out. “She could have just as easily gotten me when I walked out to catch the cab, or when I got to my apartment. Besides, she didn’t do anything – and she’s not going to do anything, not when there’s this much heat on her from the – ”
“Alright, alright,” Johnny gave in. “Just… be careful.”
“Believe me, I will. But what do we do now?”
“About what?”
“About the recording!”
“She didn’t say anything the police would care about,” Sebastian pointed out.
“She clearly threatened me!”
“Unfortunately, no.”
“She ground out the cigarette, which she obviously meant to be me!”
“But you can’t tell that on the recording. All she says is ‘take care.’”
“Yeah, the way a guy in The Godfather would!”
Johnny sighed. “I know everything you’re saying is right, Lily, but the fact is, she never said anything that incriminated her.”
“And I’m not even sure the recording would be admissible in court,” Sebastian added. “In fact, you might even get in trouble if we brought it to the police.”
“Why?!”
“Wiretapping laws. If you record a conversation in California, all parties have to have knowledge and agree to it. If you do it secretly, you could get jail time.”
“You have got to be kidding me. She can do whatever the fuck she wants – ”
“No one said it was fair,” Johnny interrupted. “You just have to remember that she never fights fair – and unfortunately, in this case, the law would be on her side. Not to mention she never said anything that would incriminate her.”
“Damn it,” I sulked, even though I knew he was right. ‘Technically’ right, anyway. “We’re going to let Connor hear it though, right?”
“He’s asleep.”
“Well, not now, but when he wakes up – ”
“Maybe in a few days,” Johnny cautioned. “I don’t want to upset him. Not now.”
“Okay,” I agreed. That was entirely reasonable. Then I turned to Sebastian. “But you’ll save the voicemail, right?”
“Of course,” Sebastian nodded. “And I’ll have legal go over it. If they think we can use it against her, believe me, we will. As long as you don’t have to go to prison and be all Orange Is The New Black.”
“I love that show!”
“So do I… but watching it. I don’t want you living it.”
“Okay, okay,” I muttered.
“Now that that’s settled, where’s my pastrami on rye?” Johnny asked as he reached for the paper sack I’d gotten from the delivery guy.
18
There were already two lounge chairs in the hospital room that folded out into makeshift beds. Orderlies dragged in a third, and Sebastian, Johnny and I all said goodnight and turned out the lights.
I curled up with a blanket and slept fitfully, waking every time the nurse came in to check on Connor – who never once woke up. Apparently the painkillers they were giving him were really something.
After 6AM, I couldn’t fall asleep again. The hospital was already alive with increased foot traffic and chatter out in the corridor.
Connor was still unconscious. Johnny was already sitting up in his re-transformed lounge chair, ever the dutiful sentry. Sebastian was nowhere to be seen.
“He’s out in the lounge, making calls,” Johnny said when he saw me looking around.
“Oh,” I mumbled, and wiped my bleary eyes.
“The cafeteria’s open. You going down to eat soon?”
“I guess. You want anything?”
“If you don’t mind, some bacon and eggs would be great,” he said as he handed me a couple of twenties. “And maybe ask Sebastian, see if he wants anything.”
“You got it.”
Before I left, I went in the bathroom and checked out my appearance.
Oh my God, I really need to get home, shower, and change…
I stopped by the 8th floor lounge. In the bright morning light, it looked nothing like the spooky room where Mr. Templeton had made his midnight confession. Sebastian was pacing back and forth, talking relentlessly into the phone. He was still wearing his tux, too, and it was rumpled and now bowtie-less, but he didn’t look nearly as out of place as I did.
When he saw me, he said “Hold on,” and put his hand to the phone. “Is Connor okay?”
“Yeah… he’s not awake yet, so I’m going down to the cafeteria. You want anything?”
“Yes, that would be wonderful – a scone if they have it, a bran muffin if they don’t, with raisins if possible, and a venti vanilla iced soy milk with whipped cream.”
My half-awake brain couldn’t handle that. “W– what?”
He huffed in exasperation. “A venti vanilla iced soy – never mind, I’ll write it down.”
“This is a hospital, not a Starbucks.”
“You’d be surprised.” He wrote down his order on the back of a business card. “Do you have money?”
“Yeah, Johnny gave me some.”
“Good. Thanks.”
“No problem.”
I took the card and turned to go.
“Oh, and Lily?”
I looked back to see what other incredibly complex item he wanted to add to his order. “What?”
“Try not to run into Miranda or any more Templetons on the way there.”
I flipped him the bird and walked out of the lounge.
19
I checked the lounge on the way back, but Sebastian wasn’t there. When I got back to the room, I saw why: Connor was awake.
“Oh my God, are you okay?” I asked as soon as I walked in and saw him sitting up.
“Did you not go home?” he asked, confused.
“No, I stayed here.”
“Wow… you must really like me, huh?”
“Eh, you’re alright.”
“It’s the hospital robe, right? Couldn’t get enough of my groping my bare ass.”
“You groped his ass?” Sebastian asked, and both his and Johnny’s eyebrows raised. “Last night?”
I just blushed furiously.
“Yeah, you don’t get none ‘o that,” Connor said to Sebastian.
“Oh please,” he said, rolling his eyes, “I’ve seen far better asses.”
“No you haven’t,” I said, shaking my head.
“I’m fairly sure I have.”
“No. Trust me. You haven’t.”
“Quit telling him that,” Connor said. “Now he’s going to try to get a piece ‘o that.”
“Instead of the rampant homophobia, how about thanking me for staying the night, too?” Sebastian said petulantly.
“You stayed the night?”
“YES.”
“Man, you are all dumber than I thought.”
Sebastian crossed his arms and scowled.
Connor relented and tilted his head to the side. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”
“Not enough,” Sebastian harrumphed.
“And you, too,” Connor said to Johnny. “Thanks.”
“You don’t have to thank me.”
“I know you’re not as sensitive as Sebastian, but I figured I better cover all my bases.”
“Well… I’m just trying to make up for letting you get shot,” Johnny said somberly.
“Yeah, about that – ”
“Connor,” I warned him.
Connor shook his head. “You people can not take a joke, do you know that?”
“Oh, and you can,” Sebastian said sarcastically.
“Yeah. It’s getting shot. Puts everything into perspective. You should try it sometime.”
“I think I’ll pass.”
“You sure are in a good mood,” I marveled.
“If you were on his drugs, you’d be in a good mood, too,” Sebastian scoffed.
“Maybe that’s it…” Connor said, as though a secret had just been revealed to him.
“I’ll go get the doctor,” Sebastian said. “Or a nurse, or something.”
Connor leaned over to me and said in a loud stage whisper, “Once he’s out of the room, you can grope my ass all you want.”
“Oh God,” I sighed and closed my eyes. “You’re really feeling a lot better, aren’t you.”
“Damn straight. Now, what did you bring me to eat?” he asked, eyeing the styrofoam container and plastic bag I had brought back from the cafeteria.
20
After we shared our breakfasts with Connor, Dr. Sarpara came in. He wasn’t pleased to see the three of us, and he was dubious as to whether the patient had actually stayed in bed all night, but he gave a good report on Connor’s progress.
“Now that you know I’m not going to die, you can go home and get some rest,” Connor advised me once the doctor was gone.
“No. I’m staying with you.”
“Well, at least a shower, then.”
“…that might be a good idea,” I conceded.
“You look like we had wild sex last night.”
“Okay, now I’m definitely going home.”
“Hey, I don’t mind – I like people knowing we had wild sex last night.”
I had to cover his mouth with my hand to get him to shut the hell up.
After he eventually promised to behave, I took my hand away. We chatted for a little while, then I kissed him goodbye and took off.
Once I got home, Anh demanded a complete debriefing. I took a shower first (which was heavenly), then gave her the rundown of what had happened in the last 16 hours.
“Are you okay?” she asked, wide-eyed, after I had finished my tale.
All That He Loves (Volume 2 The Billionaires Seduction) Page 32