must have noticed his expression. “Piece of brick knicked me,” she said. “Keep moving, Vickers.”
“That a girl,” he said, and urged her faster.
Midway down the block, the yawning black mouth of an alley beckoned. Praying they didn’t encounter a dead end, Chase cut right and they traversed it at a reckless speed, their footfalls echoing off the brick walls on either side. Considering the advanced stage of her pregnancy, Lily was amazingly fast on her feet. But not fast enough. Twenty yards in, another gunshot rang out.
“They’re still shooting at us!” she cried.
“Keep running!”
“I’m spent, Chase. I can’t go much farther.”
Cursing, he pulled his pistol from the waistband of his slacks and returned fire blindly, hoping it would be enough to slow their pursuers. All the while the thought of her falling to a bullet tortured him with horrific images.
The alley opened to another side street. Chase headed right toward Chinatown, a bustling section of the city where foot traffic, greengrocers, fish markets and ethnic shops crowded the narrow streets. Left without a vehicle, he figured their best hope of eluding their pursuers was to get lost in the crowd.
“Chase, tell me what’s going on.” The words puffed out on each breath as they cut down Kneeland Street.
“I don’t know,” he said.
Digging in her heels, she stopped and jerked her hand from his. “Don’t lie to me, damn it. We’re not talking about just me. We’re talking about this baby.”
He didn’t need to be reminded of that. The fact hadn’t left his mind since the moment he’d spotted her. Setting his hands on her shoulders, he looked into her eyes and recapped everything that had happened back at Hancock Tower. “I checked the passenger’s ID and everything was cool.” Remembering, he gritted his teeth, incensed with himself for having let the man get the jump on him. “Until he pulled a gun.”
“And you have no idea why?”
“No.”
“Why did you come to the hospital?” she demanded. “Why involve me?”
Looking left and right, he guided her to an alley that would take them into the heart of Chinatown. “When the guy was in the limo, he said some things that made me think he was going to hurt you.”
“Hurt me?” She laughed, but it was a tense, humorless sound. “Why? What made you jump to that conclusion?”
“He told me I was about to lose everything that I—” Realizing what he’d almost said, Chase cut the words short. “He mentioned you by name.”
Even in the semidarkness he saw the color drain from her face. “I don’t understand. Why me? I don’t even know these people.”
“Evidently, they know me.”
“But we haven’t been together for…”
Something pinged in his brain. “Seven-and-a-half months,” he finished.
But Chase’s mind was already jumping ahead to something he’d been wondering about since the moment he’d spotted her in the hospital atrium. Until now he hadn’t had a chance to work out the timing of her pregnancy. Looking at her, on some primal level, he suddenly knew.
He knew.
His heart raced. Not because of the men with guns, but because he was remembering the last time he’d been with Lily. Seven-and-a-half months ago…
When he looked at her, he saw the answer in her eyes. He saw the truth and it shattered him as surely as any bullet. “Is the baby mine?” he asked hollowly.
His own words stunned him. He stared at her, feeling his world shift on its axis.
Lily stared back, her green eyes startled and slightly defiant. A lock of curly red hair had come loose from her ponytail. She’d always hated her hair, but he still dreamed of it. His fingers itched to tuck the errant strand behind her ear, but he didn’t dare touch her. Once he did, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to stop.
“No,” she said quickly. “I—I had an affair shortly after we parted ways. I was…careless.”
The denial rang false in every way. Chase knew better than anyone that Lily wasn’t the kind of woman to jump from one man’s bed to another. That could only mean one thing: The baby was his.
His.
Holy Moses. The supposition slammed into him like a Mack truck traveling at a high rate of speed. The scar above his eye, courtesy of shrapnel in Afghanistan, throbbed again.
“You’re lying,” he heard himself say.
That she didn’t deny it drove home the cold hard truth of it. He felt as if he’d just been punched between the eyes with a set of brass knuckles. “I deserved to know the truth.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “You did.”
“Then why—”
She gestured angrily toward the dangers behind them. “Look at what you’ve brought into my life. Men with guns. That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. This baby, my baby, deserves to be safe. I put her well-being above the truth. Above you. For that, I’m sorry. But your knowing changes nothing.”
“The hell it doesn’t.”
“You have no say in the matter.”
Chase wanted to talk about this. A thousand emotions churned inside him in a kaleidoscope of shock and regret and newfound optimism. But there was no time to voice any of them. They had to get out of this alley and to a safe place. “We can’t discuss this here.”
He reached for her hand, but she pulled away. “I’m not going anywhere with you,” she repeated.
For the first time, Chase’s temper kicked in. He was tired of being blamed for all that was bad and wrong in the world. Even more tired of being kept in the dark and denied the things that mattered most. So what if he had a dangerous job? Someone had to keep the bad guys away. “If you care so much about that baby, you’ll be reasonable.”
“Don’t you dare try to manipulate me using this baby,” she hissed. “There’s nothing reasonable about any of what’s happened.”
“Maybe not. But you know I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“How can you say that? It’s because of you that we’re in danger to begin with.”
The words stung, but he didn’t let himself react. There was no time for emotion or blame or the rehashing of ancient history. “I’m the only reason you’re alive right now. Like it or not, I’m your best hope of making it through the night.”
LILY COULD BARELY HEAR him over the hard thrum of her heart. She hadn’t wanted Chase
