Your friend was collateral damage. They will send another as soon as they discover this one failed. We have to take cover. Now.”
“What are you talking about?” Jaci asked, wiping at her tears and staring at the man shrouded in the shadows. “Who are you? And what people are trying to kill me? I’m no one. I swear it. This is a terrible mistake. I’ve never even had a parking ticket.”
The man stepped out of the shadow and the street lamp revealed the angled, achingly familiar and devastatingly handsome face of the man who’d ruined her for all other men and had set her on the path of destruction without a care. “Jaci...come with me, now.”
“Nathan?” The name slipped from her lips like the lyrics of a song she’d never forgotten, from shock at coming face-to-face with the man who’d broken her heart so callously two months ago. “What are you doing here?”
“There’s no time to explain,” he answered brusquely, motioning her with a curt movement. “Let’s move.”
New tears burned her eyes, but these weren’t tears of grief and horror. Those would come again later. The tears beginning to course down her cheeks were of pain and anger, hatred and humiliation. She’d rather die than accept a finger’s worth of help from him.
“Screw you, Nathan.” She didn’t want him to save her. Anyone but him. “I’ll take my chances.”
His mouth firmed in a tight line, plainly displeased with her answer. “Not an option,” he said, shocking her. Quick as a snake, he twisted her into his arms and plunged something sharp into her neck.
Then there was nothing.
* * *
Nathan Isaacs never wasted time weighing the means against the ends. The situation was simple: he wasn’t leaving without Jaci, no matter if she agreed or not.
Which is why he’d come prepared with a syringe filled with a heavy sedative.
He hefted Jaci’s limp body and ignored the way her tight skirt rode her thighs and exposed entirely too much leg. His grip tightened on her body, but otherwise, he kept his gaze sharp and wary. His only intent was getting her to safety. Besides, he didn’t need to see what he could plainly remember.
Nathan had no trouble recalling those long legs or those full breasts. Hell, they were imprinted on his brain, likely seared into his soul. He remembered with painful clarity the way her green eyes lit up with laughter and how she had a tendency to chew her lip when worried. He’d memorized every line of her body, every frown line in her forehead.
He flashed back to the taste of her flesh in his mouth, the sound of her breathy cries when she’d reached her climax.
Oh, yes, Nathan’s recollection was crystal clear in that regard.
The memories of their time together fueled his nightmares and teased his dreams.
He hadn’t left her behind because he’d lost interest; he’d left her behind to save her.
And yet trouble had gone looking for her just the same.
Someone wanted her dead.
Because of him.
“I’m sorry, Jase,” he muttered, laying her gently in the backseat of his car. “I never wanted my life to come after you. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”
Fat lot of good his apologies and grand gestures did them both now. An innocent woman was dead and Nathan was going to have to convince Jaci to let him protect her until he could find other means.
Well, by the time the sedative wore off, they’d be long gone, deep into the Los Padres high country.
And there wasn’t much she’d be able to do about that by then.
She was going to be pissed—but alive.
That’s all that mattered.
Chapter 2
Jaci’s head throbbed in time with the beat of her heart and her mouth tasted as if someone had stuffed it with an oily rag. She dragged her hand across her lips, still a bit sluggish in the brain, and tried to get her bearings.
Birds.
She could hear the shrill chatter of birds somewhere. She struggled to open her eyes and when she managed to peer blearily about at her surroundings, she realized with a frightening start that she had absolutely no idea where the hell she was.
Bright morning sunlight streamed in through a dusty window and the air in the room smelled musty, as if the place had been closed up for a while and only recently reopened.
Her neck ached as if someone had pinched her and as she rubbed at the sore flesh, she recalled bits and pieces of the previous night with horrifying detail.
Sonia. Dead.
Her hand flew to her mouth and she sucked back a wild sob. How had the evening taken such a devastating turn? One minute they’d been enjoying a nice buzz from too many drinks sent their way and the next her best friend since junior high was dead. It was all too much to take in without dissolving into a moaning, sobbing mess. She wasn’t the kind of woman to break into hysterics under most circumstances but she was fairly certain she was about to have a grand-level freak-out any moment as the last thread holding her nerves together frayed in spectacular fashion.
Jaci blindly fumbled around her, searching for her cell phone. She had to call the police and report it. What time was it? Likely they’d already found Sonia’s body, left behind in that alley like trash. God forgive her, she’d left her best friend alone. Where the hell was her damn phone?
“If you’re looking for your cell, I tossed it,” came Nathan’s voice from the doorway, his tone matter-of-fact and brooking no argument. He held two steaming coffee mugs in his hands but even as his gesture may have appeared kind given the circumstance, Jaci didn’t know how to accept his offer considering their history.
She stared, unable to process everything at once, as Nathan walked into the room, bare to the waist, wearing faded jeans, offering a short explanation. “Your phone has a GPS and is traceable. Sorry, but I had no choice but to ditch it. Besides, you shouldn’t be contacting anyone until I know it’s safe to do so. In the meantime you are going off the grid.”
“What the hell is going on?” she whispered, scooting away from him, rejecting his offer of coffee, though she sorely needed it. She clutched a pillow to her chest, as if that would protect her from him, and glared through a sheen of tears. “Someone shot my best friend and he was going to shoot me. You show up and k-kill that man and then kidnap me for some reason when two months ago, you couldn’t stand to be near me another second. I don’t understand what is happening,” she couldn’t help but cry with a pathetic mewl that would’ve embarrassed her if she hadn’t been suffering from shock. “I’m in a nightmare and I can’t wake up. God, help me,” she said, sniffing back tears. “She’s dead. Sonia is dead.” Even as she murmured the words and knew it to be true, the reality felt forced.
“I’m sorry about your friend,” Nathan said with genuine remorse that confused her. “I hadn’t realized that the two of you had slipped out the back into the alley or else I would’ve been
