Lisa whipped around. That wasn’t a drunk driver. The car was still with them. It had dropped back after that last turn, but was steadily regaining speed.
A loud crack resounded. The glass in the back window shattered. Lisa screamed.
Rafe shoved her head down between her knees. “Stay down!” The car jerked again, this time to the left.
“They’re shooting at us!”
“Yeah, I figured that out.” He swerved around a parked car, pressed on the gas and tore down an alley between
two large buildings. Tires squealed. Metal pinged as shots rang out again.
“Get your seat belt on!”
Lisa’s blood pulsed. She scrambled for the belt, locked it with swift fingers. She looked up just as they shot out of the alley.
Pedestrians scrambled on the sidewalk to get out of the way. Rafe whipped the car to the right. Her hand braced against the dashboard. Through wide eyes she spotted a Cadillac coming from the other direction.
Her breath caught. Oh, God…they weren’t going to make it.
Metal clanged against metal as the Caddie clipped the side of their rental. The front right tire hit the curb. Rafe swore. His hands gripped the wheel as he tried to overcorrect.
They rolled before Lisa even felt the impact.
“Lisa?”
The hand against her shoulder shook her hard. Lisa’s eyes shot open at the jolt.
It took a moment for her head to clear. When it did, she realized she was upside down, hanging from her seat belt. Blood rushed to her forehead. Pain cut across her abdomen and shoulder as fuzzy memories of the accident flashed in her mind.
She craned her neck so she could see Rafe. He’d already unhooked his belt and was trying to get hers undone.
“Oh…God.”
“Hold on. I almost have it.” Muscles strained in his jaw and shoulders as he worked the seat belt free.
Someone had tried to run them off the road. Someone had shot at them.
A tangy scent hit her nostrils. “What is that?”
His head darted up. Fingers paused on her belt. He looked through the open space behind them where the rear window used to be. Seeing the disbelief race across his features, she twisted as much as she could so her gaze could follow.
A car—the one that must have hit them—was on fire.
“¡Hijo de puta!”
He glanced back at her seat belt and worked faster.
Gas. Oh, shit. They were leaking gas.
“Hurry!” she yelled.
He swore again and yanked the belt harder. As Lisa looked back through the window, her heart rate kicked up in her chest.
Hurry, hurry, hurry…
The belt gave with a snap. She landed hard against Rafe’s chest. His arms closed around her, and in an instant he was wriggling them both out of the vehicle-turned-fire hazard.
When he was all the way out, he grasped her hands and yanked hard. “Go!” He half pushed, half pulled her away from the car.
“My pack!” She turned before he could stop her, dropped to her knees and reached back inside the vehicle.
“Fuck me! Let it go!” He gripped her around the waist and pulled violently. The pack slipped from her fingers.
Lisa kicked and struggled out of his arms. “I need it. Dammit, I almost had it!”
He swore again and pushed her hard away from the car. Her butt hit the pavement just as his head and shoulders disappeared inside the vehicle.
Shouts caught Lisa’s attention, and her gaze darted to the burning car only yards away. For the first time, she saw the trail of gasoline trickling from the rental.
She scrambled to her feet.
“Rafe!”
He jerked out of the vehicle and ran toward her, backpack in hand. Strong arms caught her around the waist and thrust her down behind a parked car halfway down the block.
Gasoline met flame. Fire raced along the ground. The rental ignited in a fireball of metal and glass, and the scent of burning rubber scarred the air.
Tires squealed somewhere behind the burning car.
Rafe’s head darted up. Before Lisa had time to grasp her surroundings, he glanced over the hood of the pickup they’d used as cover. In one swift movement he grabbed her hand and pulled her with him.
She shot to her feet as he set off at a dead run.
His legs were longer. She had a hard time keeping up, still reeling from the accident. Just when she’d matched his pace, he jerked her to an abrupt halt and darted into a smoky tavern.
He paused long enough for Lisa’s eyes to adjust to the smoke and swirling lights. A band in the corner was playing a bad version of Clapton’s “Cocaine.” Patrons filled the bar, and the dance floor near the stage was packed with bodies. Glasses clinked and voices resounded through the crowded room. A woman sitting at a table to Lisa’s left laughed and threw her head back.
The door behind them wrenched open. Startled by the blast of cold air, Lisa turned and saw two men frantically searching the maze of smoke and people.
Her pulse jumped. Rafe tugged her toward the back of the bar before she could get a close look at either man. They skirted tables before tearing out a back door and racing across an alley.
Her lungs burned, but it was obvious Rafe wasn’t slowing down for anything, especially not for her to catch her breath. The memory of that fire convinced her she wasn’t slowing down, either.
On the other side of the block he pulled her into the shadows. They hugged the concrete building, moving swiftly, putting as much distance between themselves and the explosion as possible.
His pace didn’t slow until they were a good six blocks away from the accident. He finally loosened his death grip on her arm, letting go long enough so he could look around to make sure they weren’t being followed. Satisfied, he signaled a passing taxi.
Lisa leaned forward, braced both hands on her knees and tried to draw air into her searing lungs. She could still taste the smoke from the fire. Her ears were ringing, her eyes stung.
Streetlamps cast shadows across the concrete. Cars
whizzed by on the pavement. Garbage lined the gutters in the dilapidated neighborhood, and a Walgreens sign flickered down the street. Rafe pushed her into the cab before she could get her bearings and figure out just where the hell they were.
“Where to?”
Startled by Rafe’s gruff voice, she rattled off Shane’s address on Sheridan Avenue near the waterfront.
When the car pulled out into traffic, Rafe darted a look behind them. On a deep breath he finally settled back in the seat, dropped his head against the headrest and closed his eyes.
Lisa tried to do the same, but her pulse was racing, making it hard to feel anything other than mind-numbing fear. Pain finally registered—in her back, in her legs, in her arm. If it hadn’t been for Rafe, she’d have gone up in flames right along with that car.
He stretched out his long legs, groaned. The backpack landed with a thud near her feet.
And that’s when it hit her.
Holy crap. He’d saved her life.
Not only that, but he’d pulled her pack from the vehicle before the explosion. He’d gone back for it knowing he could have been caught in a raging inferno. He’d gone back for it not knowing what was inside.
A wave of unease rolled through her as she glanced toward her feet.
If he’d known what was in that backpack, he’d have grabbed it and run. And she had a pretty strong hunch he wouldn’t have bothered to pull her to safety first.
Rafe waited while Lisa unlocked the door to her brother’s third-floor apartment. Her hands were shaking. She was having trouble getting the key in the latch.
The adrenaline was starting to go. He knew the signs all too well. She was about to crash, and from the look of her, she was going to hit hard.
He slipped the key from her hand and turned the lock himself. She didn’t protest, confirming his suspicions, and the door gave with a pop. He pushed it open and let Lisa go in first, then watched to make sure she didn’t lose it right there in the doorway.
She hadn’t said anything in the cab on the way over, which meant she was still processing everything that had just happened. Better for him. When it all finally hit her, he had a feeling the heat from that fire would barely register on the Celsius scale in comparison. The woman had a mean-ass temper. He’d already seen it in living color.
She stopped in the middle of the living room. Rafe stepped around her, dropped the dirty backpack on the floor near the couch and headed for the kitchen. He flipped a switch on the wall. Three small triangular lights over the granite island flickered on, illuminating the stainless-steel appliances in the adjacent room.
He moved to the cupboards and opened them one by one, searching for any kind of alcohol to deaden her senses before reality settled in.
“Oh, my God. Someone was shooting at us!”
Too late. He needed to work faster.
He flipped open another cupboard, swore under his breath when all he found was canned food.
“What the hell did you do to make someone try to kill us?”
Temper sizzled just under his skin. “You automatically think that was about me?” He pulled open another cabinet, a jolt of relief rushing through him when he spotted a bottle of Jameson.
“You’re damn right. No one’s ever tried to kill
me
in downtown Chicago before!”
He found glasses, poured a generous shot in each and pushed a tumbler into her hands. “Drink.”
“I’m not—”
“Drink it,” he said louder.
She studied him a second as if judging his mood, then
downed the shot in one long swallow, her fight-ready eyes never wavering from his.
“Again.” He refilled her glass before she could protest.
She glared at him but drank the second without argument.
He swallowed his shot, set the glass on the counter and braced both hands on the granite as he tried to settle his own nerves. “Contrary to what you might think,” he said as calmly as he could, “I don’t like guns. I don’t like people who use guns, and I make it a point not to get too chummy with anyone who does.”
“So why was someone shooting at you?”
“I don’t know.” He took the glass from her fingers and set it on the island before she got smart and cracked it over his skull.
“Bullshit.”
Her eyes were still blazing, but some of the fight had slipped from her voice.
“I’m not kidding.”
She laughed—a smug, disbelieving sound that only jacked him up more—as she stepped away from him.
“Look, lady. In the last two days since you showed up at my door, my house has been trashed and I’ve been very nearly roasted like a Thanksgiving turkey. Neither one is an everyday occurrence for me. So why don’t you tell me who the hell
you
pissed off, and we’ll see if it gets us anywhere.”
She turned to face him again. “That’s rich. Blame this on me. You’re the thief!”
Adrenaline rush or not, the woman was bordering on hysterical. He moved around the counter toward her, pausing only when her words finally registered.
Maria’s warning ran through his mind:
Treasure hunters will pour out of the woodwork to beat you to the last goddess. You could lose everything.
“Who have you told about the Furies?”
“What?” she asked, like it was the stupidest question ever.
“Who did you tell?”
“I don’t know.” When he only stared at her, she frowned. “Shane.”
“Anyone else?”
“No, Slick,” she mocked. “I didn’t go around advertising the fact I was looking for Alecto.”
“Neither did I, but you weren’t exactly careful about your Internet searches. I traced you. Someone else might have, too. Anyone see you in Jamaica with the relief?”
“The guide I was using. But he didn’t know what it was.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
He ran a hand across his chin, thinking. “You tell anyone you were headed to Florida to find me?”
“You think someone followed us from the Keys?”
“If you really didn’t trash my house? Then yeah, maybe.”
He took his first good look at her since they had gotten to the apartment. City lights twinkled behind her in the picture window. Her face was hidden in shadows, but her eyes were wide with understanding and just a hint of fear. He could practically see the cogs turning in her brain, the realization that whoever had chased them earlier might have been following her and not him.
And looking closer, his gaze darting over her tense shoulders and body held rigid, he finally noticed the gash in the upper right arm of her jacket.
“Mierda.”
He crossed and tugged the suede jacket down her shoulders.
“What are you doing?” She struggled against his grip.
“Relax,
querida.
I’m not trying to cop a feel. You’re bleeding.”
“What?” She looked down.
He pulled her into the kitchen, lifted her around the waist and propped her up on the counter to get a better look before she could protest. Her V-necked sweater was sliced at the arm. She had a good-sized scrape across her bicep, blood oozing steadily from the cut. “Where does your brother keep first-aid supplies?”
“Um…” She placed a hand over the cut as her face paled. “In the bathroom, I think.” She nodded toward the hall.
“Stay here and don’t fall.”
The look she sent him was laced with mild irritation.
Indignation was good. He headed for the hall. At least it meant she wasn’t going to pass out on him. He could deal with a little blood. Scraping her off the floor was another matter entirely.
He rummaged through the bathroom cabinets until he found what he needed, and returned. Placing the items on the counter, he eased between her legs and focused on the wound.
She stiffened when he fingered her arm, reminding him she had to be sore after everything she’d been through. He’d handled her roughly after the accident. But dammit, she hadn’t listened to him. She’d darted back into that car without even thinking, all for her stupid backpack.
He should have let it burn. But getting it himself was the only way he’d been able to get her away from that car.