Fuck this stress-inducing bullshit.
Chapter
5
Nell stumbled out onto the street. Her knees wobbled with anger and everything that had preceded it.
She set out, wiping tears away with the back of her hands, leaving horrendous streaks. She must look like a Halloween horror.
Mutually beneficial arrangement, her ass. Hammer out the details? He might as well ask for a fee schedule. Like a sushi menu. A combination platter. Four pieces of sashimi, maki roll, and miso soup. How much for a mind-bending kiss, heart-pounding dry humping, amazing protracted cunnilingus, and a long, hard screw on the conference room table? Should she give a discount for all the orgasms?
Crass, arrogant asshole. Reducing it to that, after he’d laid her so bare. Her heart, her fears and hopes, her deepest self, all stripped down and raw. Live wires carrying a lethal charge. As he had discovered, to his cost. She’d overreacted, maybe, but it had been all she could do not to scream like a banshee and swing her purse at his head.
Or maybe that had been just one last lingering remnant of common sense. All she had to do was look at the guy to see that she would not fare well in any sort of physical confrontation with him.
Her legs shook as she stumbled down the sidewalk. Her crotch was wet, hot and flushed and glowing with pleasure. As if all the lights had been turned on, and left on. Every step, every clench of her thigh muscles felt…well, good.
Damn him. That had been so cold, so crude, so unnecessary. He should deal with professionals, not dumb-ass romantics like her, primed and programmed to fall like a ton of rock. Embarrassing themselves and everyone else in their immediate vicinity.
She bumped into people on the sidewalk and bounced off them muttering soggy, abbreviated apologies. The colored lights were a dizzying tear-blurred swirl. She stopped at a street corner and wiped the tears and mascara away with her sleeve. God knew, this dress would have to be cleaned anyway. She might never wear the thing again at all.
She peered up at the street sign. Broadway. Good. Busy at all hours. Even though a faraway, disconnected part of her mind reminded her of her promise to Nancy and Vivi. The Fiend. It wasn’t safe.
But her wallet was so close to empty, she could not even afford a car service home, and her bank account was no better. She’d spent all of yesterday’s tip money on that stupid haircut this morning, and today’s tip money at the bank, on her break, paying down her hefty credit card minimum. And then the car service to Burke’s building.
But fear not, right? Salvation was at hand. High-level call girls pulled in a thousand an hour or more, depending on the services they were asked to provide, the level of kink. Not that she could really boast of her sexual technique, as little effective practice as she had, but hey, she could wing it, she could fake it. She had it in her blood, after all.
All she had to do was whip up a stiff fee schedule for that ice-hearted bastard, and there was the cash she needed, for the cab fares, haircuts, dresses, rent. Hell, her tuition, too. If she wanted to spend that much time on her back. Or her knees.
All she had to do was kill something inside herself. Something shining and precious and delicate. Something she’d never even known she had until that moment of astonishing connection with him. Hope.
She was appalled at her own vapid stupidity. She’d actually been hoping for love. Real love. From him. And she hadn’t let herself admit it.
She’d been walking for a long time. Her feet were aching. The busy, self-important city swirled around her. Wind swept down the street, cool against her tear-streaked face. She recognized a familiar sign. A big-chain bookstore where she loved to hang out when she had time. Standing for hours in the aisles, gobbling books she could not afford to buy. If any place on earth could offer comfort, it was that one.
Maybe she’d go in and buy something extravagant. Like the complete works of E. E. Cummings. She’d put it on her card.
And she’d stay in the place until they threw her out bodily.
Duncan dropped a few meters farther behind, keeping the pale flash of her dress in his field of vision. He’d charged out of there all fired up, with every intention of confronting her face on, right in the street, and demanding to know, exactly, in every particular, what her fucking problem was. Then he’d gotten close enough to see that she was crying.
And aw, shit. He’d lost his nerve. He might have known he was going to pay in blood for anything that good.
So he went into surveillance mode. Blank, emotions flatlined, attention focused on the target. Projecting a don’t-see-me vibe, for camo. He was nobody important, just a faceless suit in a sea of suits. Though at this hour, there was no sea of suits on the streets. The suits were vegging in front of their TVs, or packed into bars managing their stress by consuming excessive amounts of alcohol. Not a problem, though. Nell wasn’t noticing him. She was stumbling along the sidewalk, her hand over her mouth, clutching her purse. Attracting attention. A beautiful woman sobbing right out on the street. Christ.
That made his emotional flatline twitch, first with guilt and then with anger. What the fuck? Why? He hadn’t intended any of this. The last thing he wanted to do was to hurt her feelings. All he’d done to the chick was give her multiple orgasms. So fucking shoot him, already. Of course, seducing her hadn’t helped with her current off-the-charts stress level.
But he hadn’t been able to stop himself. It just…happened.
Yeah, and now he was compounding his problems by stalking her. Nice. That was superintelligent. Yeah, that was razor sharp.
But his feet didn’t hear the sarcasm, didn’t get the message. His feet just kept carrying him along, keeping her a safe thirty meters or so ahead of him. Watching that mane of springy black ringlets sway and swirl with every gust of wind.
Then he felt it. Like the whispery brush of a cobweb breaking across his mind. Instinct that said, Something’s wrong with this picture.
He looked closer. Since he’d snapped into surveillance mode, part of his mind had been tracking not just her, but everything around her. That gray sweatshirt had been around for a while. Too long. Behind, but not far. Gray sweatshirt, jeans. Long blond hair. Dirty white athletic shoes. Nell paused to wait for a light. The guy slowed and gazed into a cosmetics products shop window. Yeah, right. Like that skank could be interested in aromatherapy bath salts or orange blossom body butter.
Duncan got on line at a streetside bank machine, and watched out of the corner of his eye as the guy sauntered across the street, and continued on his way, in the same direction as Nell, parallel to her.
Duncan flash analyzed the data, which had been reliably gathering only since the moment he’d given up on the idea of confronting her. That guy had been in his field of vision that entire time, and might have been there since they’d walked out of the building. Lying in wait.
Thirty-five downtown blocks. Too far to walk voluntarily, to not take a subway or a cab, to not have some other business or detour along the way. Nell crossed the street again as well, and headed over toward the Astor Place subway stop. Gray Sweatshirt strolled after her.
Nell disappeared into a big, brightly lit chain bookstore. The guy stopped, muttered into his collar, and followed her in.
Fuck. A thread of ice congealed down his middle. The guy was wired. Reporting to someone, in real time. This wasn’t some random sicko obsessed with Nell’s tits. This was a team of random sickos. A team meant organization, financing, a serious agenda. What the fuck?
He eased to the back of the line for the bank machine again and waited, as intent and single-minded as a cat watching a mouse hole. Crunching data, speculating, presenting and rejecting hypotheses.
Time warped. People swirled by, like speeded-up film. He stood motionless in the middle of it, a laser-focused eye of contemplation.
Customers began coming out in numbers. He glanced at his watch. The store was about to close. His adrenaline started to rev as Nell came out of the store, swinging a plastic shopping
bag in her hand. She looked around herself, as if trying to get her bearings, and took off in the direction of Astor Place.
Three seconds later, Gray Sweatshirt came out and followed.
Duncan forced himself to move in a casual stride. No sprinting, no primordial roars of rage. His heart thudded. Blood roared in his head. He had to pinch like a vise on the overwhelming urge to leap on that piece-of-shit dickhead and take him apart.
Nell turned onto Lafayette. Gray Sweatshirt muttered into his collar once again. Urgency began to prick at Duncan. Something was going down, and he was the only one around to stop it. He was only one guy.
So far. He pulled out his cell, and speed dialed Gant.
“What is it?” Gant snarled, in his usual bad humor. “You again? Got any more unreasonable demands to make, Dunc?”
“Yeah. Remember the chick who I’m obsessed with?”
“Yeah, the daughter of Lucia D’Onofrio. What about her?”
“I’m tailing her right now,” he said. “Stalking her, you might say.”
Gant hissed something viciously obscene in Pushtu. “And you are burdening me with this embarrassing, unwelcome, extremely personal information about yourself exactly why?”
“Because I’m not the only one who’s doing it,” he said.
Gant was gratifyingly speechless for a moment. “Come again?”
“She’s under surveillance,” he said patiently. “At least a two-man team. I’m about half a block behind the guy who’s tailing her. We’re on Lafayette. Just past the Public Theater.”
“Holy fuck,” Gant muttered. “I’ll send someone.”
“Do it fast. They’re gearing up for something,” Duncan said.
“Dunc? Do not engage with them.” He paused. “Did you hear me?”
“I heard you,” Duncan said, noncommittal.
Gant snarled yet another curse in Pushtu. “Are you armed?”
“No, but I’ll be careful.”
Gant hung up with no farewell, and Duncan hurried to catch up, having hung back to call Gant. He did not like Lafayette. It was darker than Broadway, more deserted, fewer storefronts, everything closed. He wished she’d stayed on crowded Broadway, where he could afford to be closer to her. As it was, it was a miracle that Gray Sweatshirt hadn’t made him yet. The guy might be incompetent. That, however, did not make him any less dangerous to Nell.
The cobweb whisper of alarm tipped him off again. Gray Sweatshirt’s demeanor had changed. He looked more focused. Was walking faster, as if he’d been released from some imperative, or given a new one. Beyond Nell coming toward them in the opposite direction was another pedestrian figure. A tall, rangy black man with a shaved head. They had her in a pair of tweezers. Then the car pulled up, driving slowly. Too slowly. It passed Duncan.
Its brake lights flickered, on and off, for no good reason.
It sped up. Gray Sweatshirt did, too. So did the guy coming on.
Duncan didn’t remember starting to sprint. His legs pumped with frantic speed as he struggled to close the gap. The car door swung open. The guys grabbed Nell, started wrestling her into the car, headfirst. She struggled, screamed. Duncan flung himself at the closest of the two men, the tall black guy. The man hit the side of the car with a grunt of surprise. Gray Sweatshirt’s head whipped around. “What the fuck—”
Duncan rammed a fist into Gray Sweatshirt’s nose, knocking him against the car door. In that split-second opening, he grabbed Nell by the waist, yanked her out and away from the car, and flung her in the direction of the sidewalk. She hit the ground, rolled into the gutter.
He surged back as a boot whipped past the tip of his nose, blocked Gray Sweatshirt’s swing with his forearm, rammed an elbow into the black guy’s neck. He blocked a punch to the gut, spun to take Gray Sweatshirt’s knee-jab to the groin on his thigh instead. An uppercut to the black guy’s chin sent the man bouncing heavily against the car, and he whirled just in time to meet Gray Sweatshirt’s renewed attack.
People had noticed. Yelling. A woman screamed nearby. Not Nell. Block, duck, lunge, retreat. He caught Gray Sweatshirt’s fist, whipped it up, over, around, sent the guy flying over the hood of the car. The black guy came at him again with a length of pipe. It whipped down. Duncan lurched to the side. The pipe whooshed past him, displacing air, and shattered the passenger-side window. Pebbles of glass flew.
Duncan darted in, grabbed the end of the pipe before it could work up to another swing and twisted the thing up, torquing the guy’s arm and sending him bouncing over the hood of the car. The car surged forward, pitching the guy off and onto the street. He rolled, howling.
Tires shrieked as the car peeled around the corner and sped away. The black guy dragged himself up and fled, limping, the heavy, irregular slap of his rubber-soled shoes retreating into the distance.
Gray Sweatshirt came at him with a spinning back kick. In ducking back to avoid it, Duncan lost his center, stumbled back and went down onto his knees. Fuck. The guy leaped for him, eyes lit up.
Crack. Nell had swung her plastic shopping bag, and whatever was in it had connected with the guy’s face. He let out a hoarse shout and stumbled back, hand over his nose, which streamed blood.
Duncan rolled up onto his feet, lunged to grapple—
Gun. He stopped, reeling. Fighting for balance. Hands up, open.
Gray Sweatshirt held a pistol on them, in a shaking, sideways two-handed grip he’d learned from watching bullshit action films. But at point-blank range, even the guy’s compromised aim from the stupid grip wouldn’t save them. That Glock 9mm would leave a big hole.
Duncan scooped Nell back behind him with his arm. “Easy,” he soothed. “Easy.”
“Fuck you, you fuck.” The guy’s trembling voice was thin and high, bubbling and phlegmy with the blood running down his throat. “Back off, or I’ll shoot you like a fuckin’ dog. And then I’ll shoot the bitch.” He backed away from them, gun wavering. He swung it in a wild arc around himself that sent all the looky-loos who’d gathered around into a screaming, scattering panic. Like a bunch of startled pigeons.
“You don’t need to shoot,” Duncan said quietly. “Who hired you?”
“Some stupid fuck. Shut up. Don’t talk to me.” The guy backed away farther. “Back off. Everybody. Get the fuck back.” He turned, suddenly, and ran like a double-jointed cheetah, his legs a blur.
Nell sagged down onto the sidewalk. Duncan sank to his knees to break her fall, held her up. He fished his cell phone out of his pocket and realized, embarrassed, that his finger shook too much to punch in the number. Shit. He was getting soft. Going civilian.
It took a few tries, but he finally got Gant’s phone ringing. Then the car pulled up, and Gant himself unfolded his long, lanky self from the seat, holding up the ringing phone. Duncan stopped the call and dropped the phone back into his pocket. The asshole was long gone, but he relayed the info with weary precision. “Three of them. One’s rabbiting down Great Jones Street. Blond, six one, jeans, gray sweatshirt, goatee. Armed and dangerous. Glock 9mm. The other two are long gone. One was a black man, tall, thin. He ran, too. The car was a silver Jeep Cherokee. Busted front passenger window. Didn’t get the plates. Didn’t get a look at the driver.”
Gant relayed the info his radio. He was a square-jawed guy, with cold blue eyes and sandy hair, buzzed off short. He looked down at Nell, still curled up on the sidewalk. “This is her?” he asked.
Duncan pulled Nell to her feet. “Nell, Lt. John Gant, of the NYPD.”
She swallowed, coughed. “Ah, hi.”
“You okay, miss?” Gant asked.
“Been better,” she croaked. “I’ll be fine. I think.”
“Did he hit you? Hurt you?”
“She broke his nose,” Duncan announced, in ringing tones. “She broke that pig-fucking son of a bitch’s nose.”
Gant blinked at the fierce pride in Duncan’s voice. “Uh, wow. Hot damn. How’d you do that, miss?”
Nell held up the plastic shopping
bag, and fished out a massive volume that she could not even hold in one hand alone. “The complete works of E. E. Cummings,” she said. “Just picked it up at the Barnes & Noble. Ten percent member discount.” She startled to giggle. “Oh, God. I had no idea what a good deal I was getting.”
Her face crumpled, her hands covered her face. Duncan stared at her in helpless dismay. Fuck. Again. Gant gave him the hairy eyeball, and jerked his hand toward Nell, snapping his fingers sharply.
“Hug her, you asshole!” he mouthed.
Duncan scowled at him and grabbed Nell, wrapping his arms around her. She stiffened against him, but she didn’t jerk away.
And her soft body felt amazingly good next to his. He was panting, raw and zinging with combat adrenaline, bruised and pounded and scraped and generally fucked up, but still, she felt so goddamn good.
His arms tightened. He inhaled the smell of her hair and then focused on the blood and imbedded grit and grime on his own filthy knuckles. She shook in his arms. A fine, high-frequency vibration.
Don’t get yourself all excited, butthead. She’s traumatized.
Gant harrumphed. “Fucking cretin,” he muttered. “Have to tell you everything.”
Duncan flipped his friend the bird behind Nell’s back, and pressed his nose into those perfumed curls again. Inhaling her.
The next couple of hours were long and hard, down at police headquarters. She spent a long time on his cell phone, pouring her heart out to her sisters, first one, then the other. Hashing the whole thing out and filing the report took a tediously long time, and after a while Duncan started eying Nell’s pale, stiff face and staring eyes and wondered uneasily if he’d been stupid not to insist that she get medically evaluated. She’d said she was fine. Maybe a bruise or two. But he hadn’t considered psychological damage. He was as tough as boot leather himself. Used to rough treatment. He’d forgotten what a tooth-rattling shock violence was to normal human beings.
Her hand was icy cold. He rubbed it between his. “I need to get some food and a good stiff drink into her,” he said to Gant. “Can we finish this up another time?”
Tasting Fear Page 26