Authors: Shannon McKenna
He clenched his jaw hard enough to cause nerve damage, and dragged his mind away from the hot throb in his crotch. Good timing, decency, self-control, gallantry; none of those items were featured on his resume.
He’d just pretend this was normal. Gunfights, pulling zaftig naked girls with bouncing tits out of closets. No biggie. All in a day’s work. Nina Christie did not need his engorged prick bobbing hopefully in her direction. She needed a hot cup of tea, a shot of Demerol, a trauma therapist. A police escort.
Bummer for her. All she had was him.
Nina couldn’t move. Some crucial part of her nervous system was blocked. She shivered like a baby bunny, hiding her face against the man’s shirt. Unwilling to let the moment pass.
Once he let her go, she’d be alone. Bereft even of this brief fiction of safety.
She knew it was a fantasy. It would flicker out in a moment, and reality would thud heavily down. She knew that, even while she clung to him like a strangling vine. Just a wishful feeling she’d latched onto, in a moment of weakness. So sweet. To feel protected. Just for a moment.
The guy was being a good sport about it, patting her, holding her awkwardly. Probably terrified she was going to freak out on him. She didn’t have words to reassure him. She wasn’t ready to let go yet. She pressed her face against his shirt. Her shallow, hitching gasps informed her that he was sweating, and that he smoked.
What was she doing trying to catch his scent, anyway? She shouldn’t be sniffing the guy who had just saved her from a gruesome and protracted death. She should be thanking him.
Yes.
Thanking him would definitely be in order.
She lifted her head. Her voice wouldn’t respond. Her teeth chattered. She forgot what she was trying to say, and just stared, transfixed, at the shape of his jaw, the grim lines carved around his mouth. His beard stubble. Sealed lips. Fierce green eyes. Oh.
Wow.
“Look, lady,” he said. “I’m sorry to push you, but how many of them did you hear? I saw four. Took down two, saw two head out the window. Did you hear more?”
She managed a negative jerk of her head.
I heard four, too, but I
only saw two.
She wanted to be calm, controlled. Not the cowering woodland creature, nose twitching and whiskers trembling.
Wasn’t happening. “J-j-just, ah . . . j-j-just the four,” she forced out.
He frowned, a faraway look in his eyes, profoundly still. Listening, head lifted like he was smelling the air. His green eyes had a luminous glint, like a nocturnal animal’s, gathering all available light.
“We need to get out of here,” he said.
Duh.
She knew that. She wasn’t stupid. Just mute.
“I don’t think there’s anyone left in the house, but I’m going to go and check. We need to get out of here,” he repeated, more loudly.
Yeah? By all means, check.
Tears were leaking down, clogging her nose. Oh, how she hated tears. They made her despise herself.
“You have to let go of me, Nina. So I can go check. Understand?”
His hands folded over hers. Big, warm, long-fingered, with a texture like polished wood. She was so busy enjoying his warmth, it took a few moments for the meaning of his words to sink in.
Let go.
Oh, God. He couldn’t move, because she was clutching his shirt, in a shaking, white-knuckled death grip. How embarrassing.
“I’m just going to, ah, open up your fingers,” he said. “So I can go make sure all’s clear. Why don’t you throw on some clothes?”
Throw on some—oh,
shit!
She jerked away, and thudded onto her butt on the floor, legs curled into an awkward, coy mermaid pose. Waves of heat and cold throbbed through her. It was like one of those stupid, banal anxiety dreams. Naked at the grocery store, the bus stop, the subway. Everyone leering, judging. While she shrank in on herself and tried to hide.
Silly. Like being unclothed was such a big deal, considering the circumstances. His fingers were spread out, wide and splayed, like they hadn’t been quite ready to let go of her yet.
His eyes had a pull that sucked the air right out of her lungs.
His gaze charged the air with heat, shivering awareness. Heavy, almost ominous. And it just kept getting hotter, and heavier. No end to it.
Except for the obvious end. She didn’t know how her mind actually ran that far ahead of her, but it did, all on its own, and suddenly, she saw it, in full, glowing detail. Grabbing him, greedily.
Pulling him down on top of her, right there, on the floor. Wrapping her legs around him. Clinging to his big, hard body and taking him inside. Way down deep. Never letting him get away.
Mine.
She was so shocked, she panicked, and snapped right back into default mode. Gray fuzz, the
nobody here, nothing to see, no big
deal.
But the trick didn’t work on Aaro. His energy didn’t change at all. He just kept looking at her, with those hot, hooded eyes. Not leering, just looking. Long, and steady. His eyes looked . . . hungry.
She wasn’t used to it. She’d had men look at her, of course, in spite of how she dressed. Some men would look at anyone, no matter how drab. Equal opportunity oglers. Their gaze left a residue that made her want to bathe. But Aaro’s gaze didn’t make her feel small, or dirty, or worthless. In his eyes, she felt uniquely visible. Lit up, a strobe light in a disco. She could be seen through walls. Seen from space.
Her eyes darted frantically before being dragged back to his grim stare. Her room stank of gunpowder, someone had just emptied a pistol at her, and she was indulging in sexual fantasies about her rescuer?
Stress response. Put it behind her. Move briskly on. A tangle of clothing lay on the floor, swept to the ground by Pockmarks’s gun barrel. She reached, grabbed a high-necked, long-sleeved, plain gray rayon blouse, struggled into it. Groped for a baggy apron-style smock of coarse navy-blue linen, tossed it over her head. It floated down like a parachute. She tugged the loose en-semble into place with difficulty, being so sticky with cold sweat, and ventured a glance at Aaro when she was decent again. His sharp cheekbones were flushed.
“I’ll just, ah, check the place out,” he said gruffly. “Get on some shoes.” He flung the command over his shoulder as he walked out.
Nina got to her feet, caught herself against the mirror. The room bobbed like a rowboat. Her image looked pallid, foggy, and blurred. Her hair clung to her face, teased and tangled up into a big, scary snarl.
Focus.
Shoes. Glasses. They’d been on her dresser. The stuff that had been up there; lamp, stained-glass box, alarm clock, a photo of Mom, a picture of herself and Lily, a dish of rose-petal potpourri; had been shoved off, shattered onto the floor.
She fished her glasses out of dried petals and glass shards, and perched them on her nose with a trembling hand. Sandals, now.
The comfy ones that she could walk for miles in, without blisters.
Or else sprint for her freaking life, as the case might be.
She tried forcing a comb through her hair, and promptly concluded that it was a project for another moment. She pulled the snarled fuzz into a messy braid. She usually twisted it into a knot, but her shaking arms weren’t up for coiling a bun, and she didn’t want to dig through broken glass for hairpins. Not a day for an updo.
Her purse had been in the closet. She knelt to fish it out, found her phone on the floor, too, tucked it in her pocket—
“You ready?”
She spun around, hand clamped over her face.
“Sorry,” he said gruffly from the door.
Her eyes zeroed in on the gun he held in his hand, and froze there like a terrified rabbit. “I’m OK,” she whispered, lurching to her feet.
“Good. Let’s go.” He stepped inside, took her arm. “Just so it’s not a surprise. There are bodies. One on the stairs, one at the front door. Just be ready. Lots of blood.”
“B-b-b-bodies?” Of course there were bodies. She wasn’t one of them, thanks to Aaro. Focus on that. Get a grip.
“I heard shots, when I was coming in,” he said. “Sounded like they were killing you sooner rather than later, so I went for it.
Wasted them.”
Wasted them.
His tone sounded so . . . offhand.
She wavered at the top of the stairs and clutched the newel post, staring at the blood-spattered corpses. Aaro tugged, but her fingers would not let go. Her nervous system had been hijacked again.
Those men had tried to kill her. She was glad he’d killed at least some of them. She was no shrinking violet. She’d experienced violence. She saw the consequences of violence every day.
So
chill,
woman.
“Nina.” The edge in his voice jolted her, releasing her grip.
“Move.”
She picked her way over the sprawled legs of the corpse on the stairs, trying to avoid the blood trickling down the steps. A stomach-flopping wave of cold rose inside of her. Her vision went dark, sounds distorting . . .
“You OK?” Aaro’s harsh voice dragged her back. She really did not want to fall to pieces in front of that guy again.
Yes.
Her lips formed the lie, but just a feeble puff of air came out. Not enough to voice the word.
His voice came back into focus again some moments later. He was cursing. She could tell from the tone, the punching cadence, though the language was incomprehensible. His fingers bit into her arm, hauling her up. She’d fallen? Yikes. It would seem she had.
The wall thudded against her back, propping her up. She watched as Aaro ran back up the stairs, bending over the corpse and rifling it. He came away with a pistol and a magazine. He shoved the gun into the back of his jeans, the magazine in his pocket, and strode down to crouch over the body in the foyer, where he repeated the performance.
“Don’t the, um . . . won’t the cops need to see the . . .” She licked her lips. “For ballistics testing, I mean? Shouldn’t you leave those?”
“They might be useful. I’ve got some firepower with me, but more is better, and I don’t have time to mess around procuring them. Might as well take these.”
“But, ah . . .” Her voice trailed off as he ran his hands over the man’s body, and shoved up a pant leg. He unbuckled an ankle holster from a hairy ankle, and held the pistol out. “Want it? It’s a Micro Glock. Good size for you. Small, easy to use.”
She recoiled. “Oh, God, no.”
“Suit yourself.” He shoved it into his jacket pocket, and took her hand again, pulling her stumbling through the dining room and the kitchen. He pulled the back door open, peered out, and gestured for her to follow him into the alley. “Let’s go.”
She gaped, blinking in the flood of afternoon sunlight streaming through the door. “But, ah, shouldn’t we wait?”
“For what? For them to come back with reinforcements?”
“Don’t be a smart-ass,” she snapped. “I mean, for the police.
Won’t they need, you know, a statement? Don’t we need to file a report about what happened, look at mug shots, all that?”
“Not if I can help it,” he said.
“But . . . but . . .” She gestured over her shoulder.
“Yeah, there are bodies in your house, and you’ve got a choice to make. I owe Bruno a favor. If you come with me, I’ll protect you as best I can until we connect with the bodyguard Bruno’s arranging for you. Or you can wait for the cops. In either case, I’m out of here, with or without you, in the next ten seconds.”
“But I . . . but why—”
“Aaro is not my real name. I’ve been cultivating this identity for twenty years, but in New York, I’m likely to come into contact with people who know my original name. If my new name gets linked to it, my cover is blown. My savings, my livelihood, my property, all of it gone. I’d have to start from zero again with fuck-all, and I’m too old for that. The favor I owe Bruno is big, but not that big. So choose.”
“Ah, but I—”
“Quicker.” He peered out the door again. “Walk out the door, or stay and take your chances with the authorities. I can’t tell you which option is more dangerous, because I don’t fucking know.”
Nina was aghast. She had to make a life-or-death decision now?
“It just feels wrong, to disappear,” she faltered. “Don’t they need us to tell them what happened?”
His shrug personified pure masculine arrogance. “They don’t always get what they need. A phenomenon commonly known as
‘tough shit.’ Familiar with it? You should be. It’s smeared all over your life.”
Anger prickled up her spine. “Don’t condescend to me, Aaro.”
“Stay, then. Tell them all about it. Hope it works out for you.”
He vaulted down the stairs without a backward glance.
Bastard.
Her hands fisted with rage, but even so, the decision made itself in a flash.
No way was that guy walking away from her. No. Freaking.
Way.
“Don’t leave!” she blurted, voice cracking.
He did not turn his head. “Then haul ass.”
She scurried after, and he seized her arm, pulling her along in an awkward, scrambling trot. “Could you just give me a ride to New Dawn?” she asked. “It’s only fifteen minutes away. I’ll call the police when I get there, and tell them what happened, and then I—”
“Shhhh.” He spun, scanning the area. “Shit,” he muttered.
“What?” She twirled, too, but heard nothing and saw nothing.
“They’re watching us,” he said. “They’ll follow.”
She looked around wildly. “But where? I don’t see—”
“Me neither,” he said. “I feel them. They make my balls itch.”
“Oh,” she said inanely. “Must be nice to have an early warning system. Are you sure it’s not just a fungus?”
He yanked the car door open. “Don’t bust my balls while I’m trying to keep you alive. It fucks my concentration. Get down.”
He looked thunderously annoyed, but that seemed to be his default expression, whether holding her naked body in his arms or frisking corpses to scavenge their firearms. He grumbled something guttural that sounded viciously profane as he slid into the driver’s seat.
“What did you just say?” she demanded.