If You Leave: The Beautifully Broken Series: Book 2 (3 page)

Madison catches her breath and nods.

“I do.”

I don’t answer and I don’t ask why. I just wrap my arms around her shoulders and kiss her again.

I’m inhaling her feminine scent, sucking it down, when I’m startled by the squeal of tires. Before I can even see where it’s coming from, instinct raises the hair on the back of my neck. I shove Madison onto the floor of the taxi and duck down on top of her.

The impact is shockingly violent.

There is a crunch of shrieking metal as the door next to me is bashed in and our taxi is flung in a spin across the narrow city street, slamming to a stop against the wall of a nearby building. The car rocks to and fro for a moment, then it is still.

We‘re stunned as we sit for a scant second, trying to wrap our minds around what just happened. Steam and smoke begin to pour out from under the hood of the taxi and the driver stumbles from his seat, opening the door next to Madison.

“Quick, get out,” he says in a heavy Indian accent. “Hurry.”

I all but shove Madison out ahead of me and then pull her away from the crumpled car. There’s a hissing sound coming from the engine, then a strange crackle. I know what it means. I know from the acrid scent of gasoline that’s stinging my nose.

“Move,” I snap to Madison, and her heels click loudly on the pavement as we rush to the curb on the other side of the street. We turn when we reach the sidewalk, just in time to see the cabbie duck for cover as the front end of the cab bursts into flames.

“Oh my God,” Madison breathes, leaning into my arm, shielding her face from the waves of heat that roll over us even from this distance.

As I watch the orange flames licking the black night, as the heated breeze brushes across my face, it triggers a response in me.

I feel the now-familiar anxiety coming on and my gut clenches tighter than a vise grip. I can feel my throat begin to close up as it prevents me from getting a full breath.

Fuck.

“I’ve got to get out of here,” I mutter as my chest tightens. Sweat pours down my temples and I wipe at it, squinting as the salt stings my eyes. Madison stares up at me, her eyes filled with concern.

“Are you OK?” she asks, her fingers trembling as they curl around my arm. “We can’t leave. I’m pretty sure the police will want to talk to us.”

She gestures toward the crowd forming, to where cop cars have already begun to congregate. I can see uniformed officers milling about, a couple of them headed our way. Heat from the fire and from my own anxiety begins to overwhelm me.

“I’ve got to get out of here,” I mutter again. Her fingers are too tight now, along with everything else… my shirt, my waistband, my shoes. Everything bears down on me in blurs and smells and sounds. I can’t take it. I’m going to fucking explode. Or implode. I yank my arm from her grasp and stalk away.

The last thing I see before everything turns black is the astonished look on Madison’s face, backlit by the red-and-orange glow of the taxi fire.

The bad thing caught you.

For a brief moment I wonder if the shock of the taxi accident has gotten to me or if I’ve somehow fallen down the rabbit hole.

The guy standing in front of me has completely melted down, going from ultra-cocky and excruciatingly sexy to a complete panicky mess in literally thirty seconds.

I don’t even know what to do with him.

I put my hand on his arm, only to have him shake it off. There’s a wild look in his eye as he spins in a circle, hunting for a way out, his gaze darting around the perimeter of skyscrapers that surround us.

“I’ve got to get out of here,” he mumbles for the third time. His eyes have a glazed-over look to them that I’ve never seen before. He starts to walk away and I grab his arm again. There’s no way I can let him walk off in this state. I don’t know him, but I feel a responsibility not to do that.

“Wait,” I tell him quietly. “We’re got to give our names to the police and then we can go. Do you have an ID with you?”

He fumbles in his back pocket and hands me his wallet before he sits on the curb, staring off into space, into the flames of the burning cab. After a minute he closes his eyes tightly and drops his head into his hands, as if to shut everything out.

What the hell?

I watch him hesitantly for just a second before I trot off to give the nearest policeman our IDs. The cop asks me for my contact information, then glances over at Gabriel.

“Is he all right? Does he need an ambulance?”

I turn and look. Gabriel is now leaning forward, his head resting on his knees, his eyes still closed.

“I don’t think he’s hurt,” I answer, even though I honestly have no clue. “I think he just drank too much. We were taking the taxi home from the Underground.”

“Smart,” the cop tells me. “There’s too much drunk driving out there. Good to call a cab.”

“Except for when the cab explodes,” I mumble as I put my driver’s license back in my purse. The cop smiles wryly.

“Yeah. Good point. At least no one was hurt.”

I eye Gabriel uncertainly as I head back toward him. I’m not too sure about that. He’s still got his eyes closed, but his foot is tapping wildly against the pavement.

When I reach him, I kneel down in front of him.

“Gabriel, did you hit your head in the crash?”

Because that would make sense. Maybe. Would a concussion cause someone to freak out like this?

Gabriel looks up at me. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I need to go home.” He doesn’t even sound like himself now. He’s speaking in a strange monotone, completely unlike the husky sexy voice he had before.

It’s freaking me out.

I sigh. Because I can’t leave him here.

“Where do you live?”

He just stares at me.

I realize that I’m still holding his wallet, so I open it up and look at his driver’s license. His address isn’t that far away. We’re actually within walking distance. Thank God. I don’t want to get into another cab anytime soon.

Reaching down, I tug on Gabriel’s muscled arm.

“Come on,” I tell him. “I’m walking you home.”

He comes with me without protest, pulling at his collar.

“I can’t breathe,” he mutters to me. I look up at him. His collar isn’t too tight.

“You’re going to be OK,” I assure him.

Although I’m not sure of that myself.

I hold on to his arm, although I don’t know why. After we’ve walked a couple of blocks, Gabriel starts muttering incoherent words under his breath. I can’t understand him, but when I ask him to repeat them, he just looks at me.

This is
seriously
freaking me out. I highly doubt I should be walking anywhere alone with this guy. Why in the world didn’t I just tell the cop to deal with him? I’m clearly not equipped to handle this situation.

“Is there anyone I can call for you?” I ask him, hoping that there is. He just looks at me again, almost like he doesn’t understand.

When I look into his eyes, they are vacant and glassy.

Like he’s not there.

I gulp hard.

Within a minute we’ve reached his building and I’ve never been so happy. A doorman recognizes Gabriel and greets him by name.

“He’s not himself,” I say by way of explanation, because I’m honestly not sure what to say. “I’m walking him to his condo. Can you tell me his condo number?”

The doorman is actually kind enough to walk us up to the condo and then unlock the door for me with his master keys. I smile at him.

“Thank you,” I tell him simply as I walk Gabriel through the door. Gabriel isn’t speaking at all by this point.

The doorman looks at us.

“If you need anything else, let me know,” he tells me, staring at Gabriel curiously before he takes his leave.

That’s interesting. He’s obviously not used to seeing Gabriel like this, so maybe it really was an injury in the accident. Maybe he
did
hit his head. For a second I wonder if I should call an ambulance.

But Gabriel is already walking back toward his bedroom, mumbling. I can see his neatly made bed through the open door. I follow along at his heels and almost run into him when he abruptly stops and slams his fist into the wall. His movement is strong and unexpected and packs enormous power. So much power that he shakes the entire hallway and leaves a hole in the wall.

I gasp and freeze when he turns to me. Fear floods every part of me, every last nook and cranny of me. Because as Gabriel turns his face, a small illogical part of me almost expects to see someone else. Someone terrifying.

My father.

My heart pounds in my ears and memories from long ago flit through my head. Fists and blood and arguments and fear.

But of course Gabriel isn’t my father. And so I force my breathing to slow and my heart to calm down, even as I balance lightly on the balls of my feet, poised to run if I have to. I swallow as Gabriel looks at me.

“I hate this,” he tells me. His cheeks are flushed, his eyes are slightly glazed and his hand is still curled into a fist at his side, his knuckles scraped. I eye it and take a step back, because I know what can happen with a fist.

“You hate what?”

Emotion fills his eyes, something dark, something pained. “I hate the way it controls me.”

I definitely feel panicked now. “What controls you?”

But he doesn’t answer. He just walks into his room and drops onto his bed. He’s calm now, quiet. As though he didn’t just punch a hole in the wall.

As though he didn’t just tell me that something controls him.

What the fuck is wrong with him?

Ignoring my still-racing heart, I bend in front of him.
I can do this
.

“Does your head hurt?” I ask him. When he shakes his head, I look into his eyes. His pupils seem the same size. I heard somewhere that if you have a concussion, it makes the sizes of your pupils uneven.

Physically he seems fine. No bumps, no scrapes, no bruises. I stare down at him uncertainly. He stares back, but it’s like he’s not even seeing me.

I sigh, long and loud.

“Let’s get your shirt and jeans off, at least,” I finally tell him. “Then I’m going to go.”

He stands up obediently and unbuttons his pants, letting them drop to the floor. When he sits back down, I strip his shirt off over his head, then fold down the covers on his bed.

He immediately drops back into it, curling onto his side and closing his eyes.

As I cover him up, I can’t help but glance at his body. It’s sculpted and cut, and it’s apparent that he works out. A lot. He has the body of a triathlete. Or Olympian. Or Greek god, maybe. He’s got a tattoo on his bicep, a skull wearing a beret over a pair of crossed swords. Words are scrolled above and below it. “Death Before Dishonor.”

Hmm. Where would he get that? Is he a marine, maybe? He doesn’t have a marine haircut, though.

I sigh again. This whole turn of events is so unfortunate. If I was gonna have a one-night stand, this was clearly the guy to do it with. He’s freaking hot.

At this exact moment he moans and thrashes, throwing off the covers as he mutters into his pillow.

He’s also apparently crazy because
something controls him
. God. Just my luck. I meet a hot guy who hears voices or some shit.
Or
he hit his head and he’s just delirious.

I shake my head as I pick up the covers and pull them back up over him.

I take in his clenched jaw and furrowed brow. One part of me wants to call an ambulance to be on the safe side. But another part of me thinks it’s not my place to do that, especially since I don’t know if he needs it. I don’t even know if he has insurance.

I honestly just don’t know what to do.

Finally I decide that I’ll hang around for a just a little while, to see if he gets any worse.

It’s the least I can do. I wouldn’t feel right otherwise. If he wakes up and acts dangerous, I can be out of here in half a minute.

I find the bathroom so that I can pee and it is surprisingly clean for a guy’s bathroom. It’s decorated in various shades of gray, even a gray-tiled floor. There’s no evidence whatsoever of a woman’s touch, so he must be unattached. Or at the very least unmarried. At least he’s not a scumbag like the married guys who troll the clubs for a piece of ass.

Out of curiosity I open the medicine cabinet. Q-tips, razor, razor blades, shaving cream, and a bottle of sleeping pills with his name on them. There’s nothing that would suggest that he’s crazy. There’s no psychotropic prescription pills or anything.

That’s good, right?

I walk back out into the dining area, looking around with interest. Everything is neat, modern, masculine. On one wall is a mahogany case, as tall as I am. It’s so shallow that it can’t hold much, so it piques my interest. I open it and suck in my breath at the neatly lined-up guns facing me.

Holy shit. Is he expecting WWIII? Who in the world would have this many guns? He’s crazy after all. As I’m backing away from it, unreasonably afraid of the guns, a certificate catches my eye. It’s lying on a short stack of paper at the end of the black-and-white granite kitchen counter.

I stop and look at it and find that it is actually a diploma, issued a few years ago by the United States Army Ranger School, and it’s got his name on it.

Gabriel is a Ranger. Or he
was
one. One or the other. Either way, that explains the amazingly cut body. And the tattoo. And the guns.
Thank God
. I feel an incredible amount of relief right now… apparently I’m not in the home of a psychopath.

Unless he was kicked out for being crazy, which seems like a real possibility at the moment.

Yikes. I’m suddenly incredibly uncomfortable being here.

I walk quickly back down to his bedroom, which is decorated just like the rest of his house—gray tones, dark wood, masculine.

He’s still sleeping and he’s no longer muttering. I stare down at him for a second, watching him breathe.

He seems fine now.

Fine enough for me to leave him alone without feeling guilty, anyway.

Before I can rethink it I’m out the door, down the stairs and on the street again, breathing in the cool night air. When the doorman waves at me, I walk over to him.