parking lot. She was halfway to her car when it happened.
A figure darted between her car and Dell’s truck. He was tall, lean, and had a face chalk white with hollow, sightless black eyes and a black mouth, gaping wide open in a soundless scream.
Four
Terror gripped Jade by the throat and between one heartbeat and the next, she was transported back to another time and another place.
To the night of her attack. And this time it was worse because she knew she was weak. She was supposed to be getting better and she wasn’t. She was hiding behind the same routines, different place, and she was no better than she’d been before the first attack.
Run.
She told this to her feet. Run. But like the last time, her feet didn’t obey. And also like last time, she froze.
That long ago night she’d been snagged up in hard, gripping hands, and dragged away by gunpoint. Knowing she couldn’t survive that again, she opened her mouth to scream but only a whimper escaped.
The dark figure stopped short and tilted its head. The white face wavered in her vision, then floated disembodied as it was torn away. A mask. A zombie, she thought dimly. A cheap zombie Halloween mask.
And the figure? Just a teenager, and a young one at that. But it was too late for logic. Panic had stolen her breath, stopped her heart, and she couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t move.
From a great distance she heard the second horrifyingly pathetic whimper that came from her throat. Her legs wobbled and gave, and she hit her knees, bracing herself with one hand on the rough asphalt.
The kid reached out to put a hand on her shoulder and she further embarrassed herself by cringing back.
A woman appeared, the woman who’d been talking to Adam only a few moments before, Jade realized. Michelle something. She crouched before Jade and tried to take the kitten carrier.
“No!” Jade gasped, tightening her grip on Beans.
“Your hand’s bleeding, you must have scraped it when you fell,” Michelle said. “I’m so sorry. Timmy didn’t mean to scare you.”
“He . . . he didn’t say anything.”
“He’s deaf, he doesn’t speak. I’m so sorry. I know I should take the mask from him, but he’s so attached to his Halloween costume. He loves to wear it.”
Only seconds ago it had been terror blocking the air in Jade’s throat. Now it was humiliation. She got to her feet, still clutching Beans. “It’s okay, I’m fine.”
But she wasn’t. With the memories she’d beaten back now pounding just behind her eyes, she was barely holding it together.
“Your hand’s bleeding,” Michelle said again. “Please. Let me—”
“No.” Jade’s jaw was clenched to keep her teeth from chattering. “I’m really fine.” Whirling away, she practically ran to her car. Her hands were shaking badly, and it took three tries to find her keys in her own pocket. Glancing up, she caught sight of Dell’s office window, lit from within. He was there, looking out, his phone to his ear.
It felt like five years had passed since she’d fallen, but it’d probably been less than a minute. Had he seen her mini freak-out?
Their gazes connected, and in the next beat he was gone from the window.
He was coming out.
She couldn’t be here when he did, couldn’t let him see her like this, shaken and trembling like a baby. Knowing she had only seconds—for a laid-back, easygoing guy Dell could really move when he wanted—she talked herself through it. Don’t lose it, not yet.
Not.
Yet.
Shoving the key into the ignition, she mentally accessed her to-do list. One, pull the seat belt over the carrier. Two, shut the door. Three, open the driver’s-side door and get in.
There. At least now she couldn’t fall down again. She gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles and gulped in air. For a single heartbeat she gave into the emotions battering at her and dropped her head to the steering wheel. “Get it together,” she whispered. “Get it together.” Lifting her head, she turned the key. Her engine came to life just as she saw movement from the doors.
Dell was striding through them. She caught the glint of his dark hair beneath the bright outside light hanging above the entry way of the center.
Heart in her throat, she put the car in gear and hit the gas. Don’t look back, don’t look back, don’t . . .
She looked.
Dell stood there in the center of the lot, hands on hips, a grim expression on his face.
Her tires squealed a little bit leaving the lot, but she didn’t slow down. From in her pocket, her cell phone vibrated. Swallowing hard, she kept driving.
She was nearly a mile down the road when her phone vibrated again. Still shaking, heart still pounding, she pried her hand from the wheel and grasped the phone.
She didn’t have to look at the screen to see who it was.
Dell.
With her vision already far too blurry for safe driving thanks to the tears she refused to acknowledge, she hit ignore and kept going.
Jade made it home and knew exactly how lucky she was to do it in one piece given her condition. Running on panic and adrenaline, she stumbled out of her car and got to her door before she remembered.
Beans.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she murmured after she’d run back to the car for the kitten. “God. I’m the worst kitten mom on the entire planet.” Hugging the carrier close, she ran up the walk, up the stairs, unlocked the door and disabled her alarm.
Inside, she hit the switch that lit up the place like Christmas and then stood stock-still, her hand on the wall for balance.
Everything was in place and she was alone. Her purse hit the floor and she slid down the wall to sit on her butt next to it, gulping in air, still hugging Beans in her carrier.
“Mew.”
Beans wanted dinner. Understandable. But Jade’s mind was doing a rewind and repeat.
Dark parking lot.
Dark face mask.
Dark growling voice in her ear. “Do as I say, bitch, and I won’t hurt you. Yet.”
Dark fear as he emphasized the words with the cold muzzle of a gun thrust under her jaw.
Frozen with fear, she tried to turn her head to get a look at him, but he stopped her cold. He ran the tip of that gun from her jaw along her throat, over her collarbone and down, skimming her breast. “Let’s go,” came the low, rough voice. “Unless you want to spend some time out here with me first . . .”
The only sound in her loft was her harsh breathing until Beans gave another soft, questioning “mew.”
Jade opened the cage and let the kitten out. Beans wound her way around Jade’s legs, giving out a rumbling purr. She accepted a scratch behind the ears and then trotted off to the kitchen nook in the obvious hope that the bowl fairy had filled hers.
Jade let out a choked laugh and thunked her head back against the door. One little thing, a silly zombie mask, a frigging kid’s Halloween mask, and she was back to a complete wreck, worse than ever.
Her first instinct was to run. Hell, that’s how she’d ended up here. After the attack, she’d run to get her head on straight. She’d gotten in the car and driven west.
She’d ended up in Sunshine.
And she’d never left. She’d found this sweet place to hole up and had taken a job she was way overqualified for, just so she could do something well.
A safety net.
She’d needed the confidence booster, and at the time, she’d truly believed it a very temporary move. She just needed to find herself again, that was all.
She thought she had.
Clearly she’d been wrong. Clearly she’d been living in Denial City. She’d built herself a little fantasy here, a temporary geographical cure, that was all.
Now she had to decide what to do about that. She could pack and go. Again. Just get in the car and go. Maybe south this time. Arizona. California. Hell, she could hit Mexico and keep going if she wanted. She wrap
ped her arms around her knees and dropped her head.
But running meant once again leaving everyone and everything that mattered. And she’d already done that. She didn’t want to do it again.
The knock at the door had her jerking upright as if shot. She stared at it, still as stone.
“Jade, it’s me.”
Dell, of course. Who else?
“Let me in, Jade.” She covered her mouth and shook her head, like he could see her.
After a moment, the knock came again, less patient now, again accompanied by his low, unbearably familiar voice. “Jade.”
“Mew.”
Jade stared down at Beans, who was once again doing the head bump against her legs. “He’s never been here,” she whispered to the kitten. “Why’s he here?”
Because he saw your freak-out in the parking lot, you idiot. Because he came down to check on you and you sped off into the night. Because you didn’t answer your phone.
Pick one . . .
Leaning her head back on the door, Jade closed her eyes and fought with the conflicting urges to open the door and throw herself at him for the comfort she knew his very nice arms could provide or to continue to huddle in a pathetic little ball and pretend the world didn’t exist.
“I can hear you breathing,” he said.
Slowly she stood up. She could feel Dell on the other side, tall and strong, warm. Calm.
Waiting.
And he could outpatience Job, too. Once she’d seen him outwait a furious gelding who’d been out of its mind after being stung by a bee, so enraged that everyone had truly thought the poor thing would break its own leg, or worse.
Dell had stepped into the central pen while the horse ran in circles around him, and when the horse finally exhausted itself, Dell moved in, getting the thing to literally eat out of the palm of his hand.
Jade’s cell phone rang, and shock, it was Dell.
Since he wasn’t going to give up, she answered with, “Jade’s unavailable at this time. Go away.”
“Jade—”
“Leave a message at the beep,” she whispered, trying for sarcastic wit, which is where she felt the most comfortable while completely coming undone.
“I want to talk to you.”
“Sorry, you’ve been rerouted to the Office of Too Freaking Bad.”
He hung up on her and she breathed a sigh of relief. Which turned out to be too soon because his voice came through the door. “Open up.”
His voice was low. Calm, assertive. And she actually turned to face the door before she stopped herself. Don’t be the horse that needs taming! “Stop woman-whispering me.”
There was a pause, as if he was considering his options, weighing each against her mood. But unfortunately his silence was as compelling as his voice.
Dammit. “Go,” she said, even though he hadn’t spoken again. “Please, Dell. Just go away.”
“I can’t do that.”
She began to mentally compile a new list: Dell’s negative qualities. Stubborn. Single-minded. Nosy . . .
“I’m busy,” she said.
“You’re not.”
“Yes, I am. Very, very busy.”
But Dell had gone to the No Bullshitting School of Life and wasn’t buying. “Jade, you’re standing there right this minute, just staring at the door.”
“I’m sitting.” She let out a sigh, really hating it when he was right. “I have a date.” The only date she’d had all year had been with her secret stash of Ben & Jerry’s.
And Netflix.
And maybe once or twice with her pulsing five-speed showerhead.
“Just tell me if you’re okay,” he said.
No, she was most definitely not okay. In fact, she was an inch from a second meltdown and she desperately needed to be alone to have it, thank you very much.
“Jade.”
Her throat burned so badly she couldn’t speak so she nodded like an idiot even knowing he couldn’t see her. “Yes. I’m okay.”
“Open the door and prove it.”
Goddammit. She tossed back her hair, lifted her chin and forced an impassive expression before pulling open the door. “What?” she asked. “What is it?”
He said nothing, but his dark eyes swept over her, doing a quick and efficient visual exam.
“I could take a picture for you, if you’d like,” she offered.
Those warm brown eyes lifted to hers, the briefest flash of humor momentarily dislodging his concern. “If I thought you meant that . . .” Belying the teasing in his voice, his eyes stayed serious, and he lifted her hand to eye the scrape that she’d cleaned and bandaged. He took a step forward to cross the threshold but she put her hand to his chest.
“We need to talk,” he said.
“Yeah, now see, that’s the last thing I want to do.” She meant to shove him away but she’d been so shaken for the past hour, so on edge, she felt momentarily confused when she felt the warm heat of him, the easy strength radiating beneath his shirt.
And suddenly all she wanted to do was lose herself in that heat and strength. Almost against her own will, her head tilted back and she stared up into his face.
At his mouth. Because she knew now. Knew how it felt on hers. Knew the power of their connection.
As if he felt it, too, he went still as stone, then dropped his gaze to her mouth as well, and for the first time since the parking lot, she warmed—thanks to him. She didn’t even realize she’d leaned in toward him until with a low groan and a curse, he put his hands on her arms. “Jade.”
Galvanized into action by sheer mortification, she broke free and turned her back on him. She scooped up the kitten, pressing her red face into Beans’s fur. “I told you, I’m busy.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow, then,” he said quietly.
Tomorrow was far too many baby steps away to think about at the moment, but she nodded. When he said nothing else, she turned back to him.
A mistake. Just another one in a long line of mistakes today alone. Because Dell had a way. For as unflappable and affable as he was, he had instincts honed as sharp as any wild animal, and he saw right through her. “You’ll call me if you need anything,” he said. Not a request.
A demand.
If she called, he’d be back here in an instant. She knew that. They butted heads, they teased and pushed buttons, but there was no one better than Dell in a crisis. She could count on him, she knew that. She just didn’t want to count on him. She wanted to be able to count on herself. God, how she wanted that.
“Jade.”
“I’ll call,” she said. “Go.” God, please, go. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” She’d have promised him the full moon if it would make