by Cynthia Eden
She took a step toward him. Made herself stop. “Because you think I’ll run?” Her voice was too husky.
“No. Because I feel better when you’re close to me. I like having you close, Kat.”
Her lip was trembling. “It doesn’t make sense to sleep in the lumpy chair.” She walked around the bed. Perched on the side opposite him. Slowly lowered her body down until she was flat on the mattress. “Not when there is room for us both here.”
He turned toward her. She felt the mattress dip. “I’m not trying to learn your secrets for the FBI. As far as I’m concerned, the FBI can fuck off.”
“I don’t have the twenty million. That’s what everyone really cares about. I’ve already told the FBI everything I saw my father do. Yes, I still have to testify in court. Over and over. But the people pushing—they want the money.”
He reached for her hand.
She flinched.
His hold tightened. “I don’t give a fuck about the money.”
What was she supposed to believe? That he cared about her? No. They’d already covered that it was only sex between them. Sex that would change nothing. Emotions weren’t involved. He was doing his job. Unfortunately, his job wasn’t just protecting her. It was exposing her secrets.
She tried to concentrate on breathing. In and out. In and out.
“I don’t tell a lot of people about how I screwed up with Daniel. Hell, I only told Cole because the guy got me drunk with vodka. I understand all about not wanting to share your past or your pain with anyone else.”
In and out. She just kept breathing. But her fingers had curled around his. Traitorous fingers. What was up with them?
“Your father hurt you. You deserved someone who would love you and take care of you, but instead, hell, baby, we both know you got—”
“A monster.” For some reason, it was easier for her to say it than to hear others call him that.
“I thought I had a best friend I could trust. He was closer to me than any brother would’ve been. Hell, we were brothers. That’s what firefighting was. A brotherhood. Brothers, sisters—we were a family. And when you realized your family member—the one closest to you—is a murderer, it changes everything.”
Try realizing that truth when you’re fourteen. Until then, she’d thought her father was just a businessman.
“You aren’t alone. I’m here with you, and I will stay with you.”
Until their time was up. Until she walked into the courtroom. Wasn’t even seven days now. Time was sliding away.
The mattress dipped again. His lips brushed over her temple. “I’m sorry I hurt you. That wasn’t my intention. Hurting you is the last thing I want.”
She wet her lips. “Why?” A strangled whisper. She was nothing to him. A great sex partner, okay, sure, but—
“Because when you cry, I want to fucking destroy things. I want to make sure you never know a moment’s pain. And since I’m the one who hurt you…hell, I can’t—”
“You haven’t hurt me,” she cut through his words softly. “You’ve actually been kinder than most.”
“No, baby, I—”
“I’m really tired, Rick. Let’s go to sleep.”
Silence. Then… “Okay, baby. Okay.” His fingers were still twined with hers. “But…”
She waited.
Nothing else came.
“But what?” Kat finally asked.
“But I really liked it when we cuddled.” He sounded all growly and uncomfortable and…cute.
She found herself smiling. She didn’t mean to smile. She just did. Eventually, her eyes closed. Her breathing became easier. Sleep took her.
She slid toward him. Cuddled. And didn’t dream of monsters.
***
Rick’s hold tightened on Kat. She’d rolled toward him. Put her head on his chest. Her hand curled over his side. She’d only moved toward him when she slept. When she was vulnerable and the wall around her had fallen down.
He had hurt her. He hadn’t meant to. Making her cry was the last thing he wanted. He’d just started telling her about his past, and he hadn’t hesitated. He’d never told another lover, but opening up with her had been so easy.
Sex. Just sex.
Who the fuck am I kidding?
His arm curled around her, and he pulled her even closer.
Kat was more than sex, and he was in deep trouble.
Chapter Eleven
The bed was empty. Rick’s hand had reached for Kat, but when he just touched the cool sheet, his eyes immediately flew open. Alarm had his heart racing as he surged upright and his gaze raked the motel room. The empty motel room.
Shit. He jumped from the bed. Grabbed for his jeans and tried to hop into them. He’d slept like the dead. What was wrong with him? He usually woke at the lightest of sounds. But Kat would be good at staying quiet while she slipped away. He had one leg in his jeans. He hopped to get in the next leg and turned to see—
Kat, with her left shoulder propped against the bathroom doorframe. She watched him, a faint smile on her lips and her brows raised.
He yanked the jeans up to his hips. Zipped and buttoned in a flash.
“Is this your normal morning routine?” Kat asked. Damn, she looked good. Her face had been scrubbed clean and her wet hair slid over her shoulders. A towel curled around her body. She was only wearing a towel. Sexy as fuck and his dick immediately jumped to full and happy attention even as he realized…
She’d taken a shower and he hadn’t heard the thunder of the water?
I am so losing my edge.
She was staring expectantly at him. She’d asked him a question, only he had zero clue what that question had been. Rick rolled back his shoulders. “Say again?” What in the hell had she said?
Her smile stretched as she motioned toward him. Down him. “The jumping routine when you get out of bed. Do you hop into your clothes every day?”
“I thought you were gone.” The words came from him before he could think better of them. As soon as they were out—
Her smile faded. “Oh. I see. You thought I’d run from you.”
Why do I always say the wrong shit? “I…didn’t see you in the bathroom.”
“I opened the door just as you started hopping, so, no, you wouldn’t have seen me. Your back was turned at the time.” A pause. “You thought I had sex with you and then ran away the next day? Is that what your lovers usually do?”
“They don’t stay the night.”
“Their choice? Or yours?”
“Both.” He took a step toward her. Then stopped. “I’m not big on…having someone that close. It’s too intimate.”
She seemed to consider that. “Sleeping together is intimate, but sex isn’t?”
Yes. No. Dammit.
Her gaze held his. “You said you wanted me close last night.”
“You’re different.” He took a few more steps toward her. Slowly, the way a hunter would approach prey.
“Why am I different? Because you thought that if you had me in your arms, you’d wake up when I tried to slip away?” Kat shook her head.
“Obviously, that didn’t happen,” he muttered.
“You were sleeping hard, and, to tell you the truth, I thought you were cute. You didn’t want to let me go when I was ready to get out of bed. I had to pry your hands loose.”
“Cute?” Rick repeated as he stood before her. Cute was insulting. Teddy bears were cute. He didn’t want her to think of him as cute. Dangerous. Sexy. Why couldn’t she call him those things? Cute was a straight-up insult.
Her head angled back. “Yeah, cute. You even whispered my name when I slid out of bed.”
He had not, had he? Oh, jeez. Rick could feel his cheeks heat. Good thing the beard covered so much of his face.
Her eyes twinkled as her hand rose and patted his cheek. “Actually, I think what you said was Kat, dear Kat, I love—”
Gunfire. Bullets exploded through the door of the motel room. Kat screamed and Rick lu
nged forward and tackled her, driving her back into the bathroom. They hit the tiled floor too hard, even though he was trying to twist and shield her. She was still on the bottom and took the brunt of the impact.
“Kat?”
Wood splintered behind him. He twisted around and saw that some jackass was kicking in the front door. The bullets had been aimed at the secondary lock Rick had secured the night before—that stupid piece of metal that would stop someone from accessing the room even if the intruder had a key to the main lock. That little side piece that most motel guests never used but he always put in place.
“Stay down!” Rick ordered as he leapt to his feet. He rushed for his own gun and when the intruder succeeded in kicking in the door—took the guy four attempts, Rick could hear his struggle—Rick attacked.
He grabbed the intruder and slammed the fellow’s wrist back against the wooden doorframe. The intruder screamed, and his gun hit the floor. Barely pausing, Rick kicked the bastard’s gun out of way before he shoved the jerk against the nearest wall. Rick’s breath sawed hard out of his lungs as he jammed the muzzle of his own weapon under the soon-to-be-dead man’s chin.
“Rick! Don’t! He’s a kid!”
Kat’s voice barely registered over the pounding of his heartbeat.
She grabbed Rick’s arm. Held tight. “Don’t. He’s a kid!”
A kid with a death wish. But Rick finally stopped seeing red and realized he was staring down at bleached blond hair. Stringy, bleached blond hair. Familiar hair. A flushed face, and wild, blood-shot blue eyes. “Step back, Kat. Now.” A lethal order.
She let him go. Stepped back. “Don’t kill him. Please.”
Rick’s stare raked the pimply face and weak jaw. It was the kid from the motel’s check-in desk. “Seriously?” Rick snarled. “I have to deal with wannabe hit men in training?”
“Please, God, don’t kill me!” Tears trailed down the fool’s face. His voice broke during the plea, cracking all over the place. “I was just—don’t kill me!”
First…the guy wasn’t a kid, despite what Kat had just claimed. He might look young, but Rick figured the attacker before him was probably close to twenty-one.
Second… “You’re the dumbass who came in with a gun blazing, and now you want me to hold back?” Unbelievable.
The desk clerk’s watery eyes were about to bulge out of his head. “Yes—please!”
Sonofabitch.
Those watery eyes whipped to Kat. Widened even more.
Rick’s back teeth locked. “Kat, are you still wearing the towel?” If it had fallen when they flew onto that bathroom floor…
“Uh, yeah, I’m still wearing it.”
Okay, so the punk before him wasn’t getting a full-on view of Kat. Rick didn’t have to drive his fist at the guy…yet. “Go get dressed, Kat.”
“Only if you promise not to kill him.”
The punk nodded eagerly. “Yes, yes, please, man, promise not to kill me! Promise it to the pretty lady!”
Rick glared at the fool. “Why would I make a promise that I might not keep?”
All of the frantic color immediately bled from the jerk’s face. Rick kept his weapon in place, jabbing it under that weak, trembling chin. “Get dressed, Kat. The other motel guests would’ve heard the shots. We have to leave, now.”
The desk clerk shook his head. “Th-there’s no one else!”
Rick heard the rustle of clothing behind him. He didn’t dare look at Kat. “You’d better be planning to dress in the bathroom,” he snapped back at her.
“I’m afraid if I leave you alone with him, you’ll kill the kid!”
Do not strip in front of him, or I will shoot him. “He’s not a fucking kid. And he just tried to kill us.”
“No, no!” The punk’s eyes were so huge. Those wide eyes swung over Rick’s shoulder toward—
“You look at her right now, and my finger might squeeze the trigger. Trust me, I’m feeling real twitchy.”
The fellow’s eyes flew back to Rick.
“Good. Very good.” If Kat wasn’t leaving the room, he’d make sure the sonofabitch wasn’t watching her. “What did you mean when you said no one else was here?”
“I…” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “This place is a shithole. H-hardly anyone ever stays here.”
All right. Fine. It was a shithole. He could agree on that point.
“The other guests—it was only two truckers. They left right after dawn.”
So no one would be rushing to call the cops. Fair enough. “Want to tell me why you were trying to kill me?”
Sweat beaded the guy’s forehead and cheeks and mixed with the tears still on his face. “I wasn’t. I swear. I was only—I was only gonna make sure you stayed put.”
Footsteps hurried behind him. “I’m dressed, okay? Can we all take a breath?”
“No.” He kept his glare on the desk clerk. “What’s your name?”
“J-Joey.”
“Joey, why did you want us to stay put?”
He gulped. Didn’t answer.
Kat answered. With a sigh, she said, “He wanted us to stay put because he figured out who we are. He probably called someone and that someone told him that we weren’t to leave the motel.”
He wanted to pound Joey. “You didn’t even see her face.” He’d made sure of it the night before.
“I-I saw yours, man. And I got a tip…my cousin Quincy said some big ballers were looking for you. That you’d have a pretty lady with you and she would be worth so much money…”
Kat cleared her throat. “Did he just say ‘big ballers’?”
Rick’s fury was boiling out of control. “You called your cousin. You told him we were here. Then you came in with a gun. I think I should shoot you right now.”
“I wasn’t going to kill anyone! I shot the door because you had that stupid second lock in place! I was only going to use my gun to scare you so that you and the woman would stay here until my payment arrived!”
Rick leaned in closer to Joey. “Do I look scared?”
“N-no…”
“Joey,” Kat sighed his name. “You’ve made a terrible mistake.”
He gulped. “I-I see that now. If you’ll just get your b-boyfriend to let me go…”
Rick shook his head.
“Oh, God,” Joey whimpered. “God.”
“You’re not going to get the payment you want,” Rick told him flatly. “Your cousin called people higher up the food chain, and soon they will all be racing over here.” He paused. “What do you think they’ll do when they find you…but the lady and I are both long gone?”
Joey shuddered. “Man, man, I am so screwed!”
“Yeah, you are. Night, night, asshole.” He yanked back the gun and slammed his left fist into Joey’s face. Joey crumpled like a rag doll and fell to the floor.
Kat moved closer to Rick and stared down at the prone desk clerk.
“I used my left hand,” Rick muttered. “Didn’t hit as hard as I could have.”
Her gaze darted up to lock with his. He couldn’t read the emotion in her eyes.
“I’m not your father, dammit. I wasn’t going to kill the sonofabitch.” Not unless killing him had been necessary. “But I couldn’t have him rushing after us so I knocked his ass out.” His gaze swept over her. She was in jeans and her t-shirt again. Her shoes were on. Okay, fine, now he had to get his ass fully dressed so they could get out of there. Rick spun away and finished dressing in a blink. He grabbed the burner phone and caught Kat’s hand in his. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
She hurried to keep up with him.
He put the burner to his ear. Called Cole as they ran through what was a completely deserted parking lot. If they left the motel on foot, the bad guys coming after them would have the advantage. They’d be tracked down too fast. And if they left in a car…hell, the only car was a piece of shit sedan near the motel’s office. Rick was betting it was Joey’s ride.
The team coming after them would
know to look for Joey’s vehicle. It was a lose/lose situation.
“Yo,” Cole answered, voice tense. “What can I do?”
Rick rattled off the address of the motel. “Get Wilde agents and the cops out here. There’s an unconscious idiot in room seven, and he’s about to be swarmed by his buddies—folks who were looking for me because it looks like I’ve made my way onto the mob’s most wanted list, too.”
Cole swore. “I’ll get them there ASAP.”
“We’re clearing out. I’ll call you again when we’re secure.” But with eyes everywhere, just how secure could they be?
He glared at the sedan. Such a piece of shit.
Keys jingled near him. His head whipped toward Kat. She held car keys in her hand. “I took these off Joey while you were getting dressed.”
Of course, she had.
“I know you have that rule about stealing cars. Probably like rule eight or something from that list you were spouting at me, but this is a desperate situation.”
Damn desperate.
Her head inclined toward the car. “There is no way that car has GPS tracking on it.”
They’d be lucky if the dented, rusty heap even cranked.
“And he did shoot into our motel room. Doesn’t he deserve a little payback for that move?” She jiggled the keys one more time.
They had to get out of there, fast. No other ride was around.
“I’ll steal it. You can just come along for the ride.” She rushed toward the POS car.
A moment later, Kat jumped in and had the engine—well, not purring, but sputtering to life. With no other option coming to him, Rick climbed into the passenger side.
He was stealing a car.
No, he was stealing a POS.
“Buckle up,” Kat told him, voice oddly cheery. “I like to go fast.”
In that thing? Good luck—
She shot forward. Turned out, the POS could haul ass.
***
“Wake up, dumbass.” Something hit Joey.
He groaned.
Something hit him again. Right in the face.
His eyes fluttered open.
And he saw the guy crouched before him. The guy slapped Joey.