A Hard Man to Forget (12 page)

Laura automatically turned toward the wall. Fumbling for the switch,
she flooded the room with light.

Six bullet holes mottled the pillow and mattress.

A sudden queasiness rose up from the pit of her stomach. Laura
pressed a hand to her stomach to calm the fluttering. Only then did
she notice she was shaking again.

“That could have been me,” she said flatly. “I
could be dead right now.”

His hand on her shoulder was heavy and reassuring. “But you’re
not. That’s all that counts.”

Laura wanted to believe it was that simple. It was nearly impossible
when she was staring at the stark evidence that someone wanted to
hurt her. Someone had come into her room and tried to kill her.
Relief that he hadn’t succeeded didn’t take away the
horror of what could have been.

“Why weren’t you in the bed?” Simon asked.

Laura glanced over at him. Was that regret she heard in his voice? As
always, his eyes were unreadable and opaque.

“I wasn’t comfortable sleeping there. I was over in the
chair.” She pointed to the seat where she’d huddled and
carefully watched his reaction.

Something flickered across his expression. She couldn’t tell
what it was. A chill snaked down her spine all the same.

“It’s a good thing you were,” was all he said.

Laura shook her head, trying to dismiss the sudden anxiety that had
fallen over her. “I don’t understand. Why would someone
want to hurt me? And how did he get in?”

“I don’t know, but we can figure that out later. Right
now we have to get out of here. It’s not safe.”

Fear surged inside of her. “What do you mean?”

Simon stepped away from her to peer out into the blackness beyond the
bedroom door. “I mean that he has to know he didn’t
succeed in hurting you. He was barely out the door when you called
out my name. He could be back at any moment. He could even be in the
house. You’re not safe here. Neither of us are.”

A hard knot formed in the base of her throat. “What should we
do?”

“I don’t know yet. Get dressed. We’ll figure it out
in the way.”

He didn’t have to tell her twice. She dressed quickly, all too
aware of Simon standing sentinel in the doorway. Her ears caught
every noise emanating from deep inside the house. Every creak and
groan made her heart leap in her chest. Even the most innocent
sounded sinister, each one possibly heralding the return of the
gunman from deep in the darkness of the house.

Six bullets. He’d run out, and he’d still kept firing.
All he had to do was reload and he’d be back. Back to finish
her off, and Simon this time.

“I’m ready,” she whispered once she was dressed.

“Good. Let’s go.”

She glanced up and down his broad, naked back. The fear coursing
through her couldn’t prevent the flicker of awareness low in
her belly. “Don’t you need a shirt?”

“There’s a coat next to the door to the garage. It’ll
have to do.” He reached a hand back to her. She gripped it
tightly. “Hold on to me. If something happens, though, run. Do
everything you can to get away.”

“I can’t leave you—"

Dark humor laced his voice. “This time, I want you to. Do
whatever you have to to stay alive.”

There was no time to absorb his words. A moment later, he pulled her
with him into the hall.

They moved in tandem, Simon staying in front of her all the way. She
clutched his arm, not wanting to lose him in the darkness. The house
seemed more sinister in the dark, shrouded in impenetrable blackness,
the silence absolute. The shooter could be anywhere. It felt like
they were utterly vulnerable. At any moment she expected gunfire to
shatter the stillness of the house.

Thunder crashed outside. Laura jumped. She bit back the squeal that
rose in her throat.

“Easy,” he murmured, so low she felt the rumble vibrating
through his body more than she heard it. “It’s just
thunder.”

She nodded quickly, though she knew he couldn’t see her, and
clutched his hand tighter. That was all she needed, for a
thunderstorm to descend while they were trying to escape.

They paused at the top of the stairs. Lightning flickered across the
night sky. The burst of light shone through the wall of windows,
illuminating the room. Illuminating them, she thought tensely. Making
them perfect targets.

“There,” Simon said. She had to wait for the next flash
of lightning to see what he meant. When it came, she followed the
line of his outstretched finger.

Her breath hitched in her throat.

Wet footprints marred the carpet.

“Come on,” Simon whispered. He gripped her hand tightly.
They began to move again, inching down the stairs with painstaking
slowness. She endured every awful crash of the thunder. Every time
the lightning slashed the night, she followed the line of footprints
further and further into the room. It led down toward the wall of
windows, past the living room, right to—

“Simon!”

He saw what she did an instant later.

A figure stood on the other side of the glass, a dark silhouette
masked by the night.

Without a word, Simon lunged forward, pulling her after him. She
stumbled but somehow managed to stay on her feet, propelled by his
burst of speed. She raced after him, down the opposite hallway to the
garage. It was attached to the house, accessible through a door in
the kitchen. She knew they were moving fast, felt her hair whip in
the air behind her. It still felt like they were moving too slow,
that any minute a gunshot would echo in the air, striking her in the
back, knocking her to the ground—

It never happened. Suddenly the door was there, looming in front of
them. Simon threw it open and shoved her through first, glancing back
behind them. There were two vehicles parked inside. He pushed her to
the closest one. “Get in. Hurry.”

As if he had to tell her. She jerked open the passenger door and
jumped inside.

By the time she slammed the lock down, Simon was sliding in on his
side. He’d tugged on a coat, the front still open on his bare
chest. He ignored it, pulling his door shut at the same time he
started the ignition. The engine squealed, then came to life with a
roar.

Laura dared to release a shuddery sigh of relief. “Is that it?
Are we safe?”

“Not yet,” he muttered through his teeth. He reached up
for the garage door opener clipped to the sun visor. Laura snapped
her head toward the windshield. The garage door remained closed. Her
pulse leapt in her chest.

Oh God
. He could still be out there. They were nowhere near
being safe. Not even close.

His hand poised above the button, Simon gunned the engine. “Get
down,” he called above the roar of the motor.

Laura threw herself forward in her seat just as he released the
button. She anxiously peered over the dashboard. The door began its
jittery climb upward. Breathless, they both watched its progress.
Waiting for the sight of two legs. A torso. A gun.

It was too dark to see. The opening door revealed only darkness.

Finally, thunder gave way to lightning. The outdoors were lit up in a
flash of electric white energy.

No one stood there.

She didn’t have time to be relieved. As soon as the door
ascended high enough, Simon shifted gears and sent them crashing out
into the night.

Rain battered the vehicle, the sound too similar to the gunfire she’d
been expecting, and Laura huddled on the floor. The car lurched and
jolted in every uneven spot in the road. Simon didn’t slow at
all, taking every curve in the drive at a relentless pace.

She looked up to find a grim look of determination on his face, his
jaw set and his teeth gritted angrily. His eyes darted back and forth
from the windshield to the rearview mirror, never letting either out
of his sight for more than a second.

Instead of reminding her how dire their situation was, his expression
brought her an unexpected measure of comfort. It said he wasn’t
going to let anyone or anything stop him from getting her to safety.
At that moment, Laura knew everything was going to be all right. This
man would do anything to keep her from harm.

Hesitantly she pushed herself into the seat, while still keeping her
head down. She looked up just in time to see them break through the
trees surrounding them on all sides—the trees lining the
driveway, she reasoned—and onto a two-lane highway. There were
no other cars on the road, hardly unexpected for the middle of the
night.

Laura twisted around to look behind them. The road remained empty.

She glanced at Simon. He too was focused on the stretch of highway
behind them and the turnoff to the house.

Neither of them said anything for over a minute. They both waited,
anxious to see if anyone came after them.

Finally, when nothing emerged from the driveway and the entrance
dropped out of sight, Simon eased his foot off the accelerator the
slightest bit. They continued to barrel through the night, but no
longer at such a breakneck pace.

Laura took a deep breath, willing her pulse to slow. “Do you
think he’ll come after us?”

“It’s possible. I think we’ll be safe if he does.
We’re too close to town now. He shouldn’t be able to
catch up with us before we get there.”

He was right. Already she could see houses beginning to pop up along
the roadside, the sign that they were close to Rockwell.

His reassurance allowed her to concentrate on the question she hadn’t
had time for during their escape. “I don’t understand.
Who would want to kill me?”

“I don’t know. No one even knew you were at the house
except Will and Aimee.”

Aimee. A chill ran through her at the thought of the other woman.
Laura remembered the way she’d looked at her with hatred in her
eyes. She found it all too easy to imagine the other woman as their
gunman.

“Are we so sure the shooter was a man?” she asked softly.

Simon sent her a look. “I know what you’re thinking. I
can’t stand Aimee either, but that doesn’t mean I think
she’s capable of murder.”

“But do we really know it was a man?” Laura pressed. “I
only saw an outline of a person. I thought it was a man at the time,
but that could just be because I assumed the shooter was a man. Now
I’m not so sure. Are you?”

Simon seemed to consider her words. “No,” he said
finally. “The person who shoved me was strong, but that doesn’t
mean anything. He—or she—had momentum on their side. And
in bulky clothes, it’s harder to tell the difference...”
He sighed. “I don’t know. It could have been a woman just
as much as man. That doesn’t mean it was Aimee.”

“So you think it was Will?”

He laughed in disbelief. “Why would he want to kill you?”

“I have no idea. But if they’re the only two people who
knew I was at the house... I don’t suppose they would have told
anyone about me?”

“I doubt it. If they had, we would have had plenty of visitors
last night. The news that you were back wouldn’t have been
taken lightly.”

“So it has to be one of them.”

Simon didn’t say anything. She could practically see him
thinking, trying to find some other explanation. From the severe
downturn of his mouth, she knew he couldn’t come up with one.

“It’s hard to believe someone I’ve known for years
could be a murderer.”

“Harder than it was to believe your wife left you for no
reason?”

Weariness set in on his features. “No. Nothing could be harder
than that.”

Suddenly exhausted herself, Laura turned away to peer through the
rain outside the window. Lights twinkled faintly in the gloom. They’d
reached Rockwell. A gas station, a school, a post office flew by.
Nighttime lighting illuminated the buildings, but the streets were
deserted. There was something eerie about passing through it like
this, so empty and quiet.

Laura tried to catalogue all the sights in her mind, tried to match
them up with memories. It seemed like a nice little town, she thought
with some wistfulness. Not as small as she’d imagined. A single
stoplight suspended by wires swung back and forth in the wind over
the central intersection. A number of businesses lined the central
drag.

Had she walked the sidewalks? Shopped in the stores? The same longing
she’d felt all day swelled inside her, the deep-seated need to
belong to someplace, to
this
place.

She recognized some sights from the photo albums. Otherwise, nothing
seemed familiar. She was too tired to be disappointed. After
everything she’d learned that day, she was beginning to accept
that it was going to take more than visual reminders to cue her
memories. If there was anything her for to remember, she reminded
herself somewhat belatedly.

Laura spotted a sign designating the police station up ahead. Simon
turned off more than a block before they reached it.

Surprised, she glanced at him. “Where are we going?”

“The hotel.”

“There’s a hotel here?”

A shadow of a smile passed over his lips. “It’s not very
big. More like an inn. Rockwell does a reasonable amount of tourist
trade. You might have noticed the antique shops and craft stores we
passed.” Laura nodded. “I thought we could get checked in
and I’ll call the sheriff.”

“Why don’t we go straight to the police station?”

“This is a small town. No one’s there at this time of
night unless there’s someone in a cell, and I can’t
remember the last time that happened.”

The hotel was exactly as he’d described it, a three-story
building that looked like a large house. Most of the windows were
dark, but a couple of lamps in the picture window on the main floor
cast their comforting glow into the night. The sight of them sent a
shudder of relief through Laura’s system. She finally allowed
herself to believe they were safe.

The main level was empty, with only the dim night lighting piercing
the gloom. No one manned the front desk.