Sandra Brown - Low Pressure

But the night’s efforts weren’t entirely wasted. He’d drawn blood. He’d left the pair of them with a lot to think about, and that was satisfying. They’d be worried now, wouldn’t they? He liked imagining them puzzling over who he was and living in dread of when he would strike again.

For weeks, he’d been trailing her like a glorified bloodhound. Sick of that, he’d decided earlier today to attack at the very next opportunity. But he’d lost track of them. All day he’d driven back and forth between her place and Carter’s, but they hadn’t surfaced.

But sooner or later, Carter always wound up at that crappy airfield, so, around dark, Ray had positioned his truck where it couldn’t be seen from the highway and had watched the road leading off it to the airstrip.

Was he smart or what? Because, sure enough, around ten o’clock, the red Corvette had come speeding up to the highway. Keeping a safe distance from it, Ray had followed it to the IHOP. Through the windows he’d watched them eat. And, forty minutes later, when Dent came out alone, Ray, disbelieving his good luck, had seized the opportunity.

No, Carter wasn’t dead. But Ray had gotten his message across. As of tonight, he hadn’t just changed the rules of play. He’d changed the whole fucking game.

“It’s a dump.”

Dent went into his apartment ahead of Bellamy, switched on the overhead light, then moved immediately to the bed and pulled the bedspread up over the rumpled sheets and pillows.

Two pillows, she noted. Each bearing the imprint of a head.

“I’m going to shower off the blood so we can see what’s what. Make yourself at home.” He grabbed a pair of shorts from a chest of drawers, then went into the bathroom and closed the door.

On the way here, they had stopped at a convenience store. Its stock of first-aid items had been limited, but she’d bought one of everything, not knowing what she would need to tend his wounds.

Now she placed the sack of purchases on the dining table in the kitchen alcove and sat down in one of the two chairs, then took a look around. He hadn’t exaggerated. The apartment was a dump. Being one large room, the areas of it were distinguished only by the flooring. The sleeping area had a different color carpet from the living area. The patch of kitchen was covered in vinyl tiles. Only the bathroom was separated by a door.

Except for the unmade bed, it was basically neat. But the meager furnishings looked like cheap rental pieces with chipped veneers and stringy upholstery. The faucet in the kitchen sink dripped with loud and regular ploinks , and the fabric panels that passed for draperies hung limply on crooked rods. There were no pictures on the walls. No books, or even shelves in which to place books or keepsakes.

It was a sad place, indicative of a solitary life.

Even sadder was that the only difference between this place and her condo in New York was the quality of the furnishings. Hers had been purchased through a decorator and had been costly. They were tasteful and pleasing to the eye.

But they held no memories or sentiment for her. Anyone could have owned them. They didn’t represent a home. They were as lacking in personality as the chair in which she sat here in Dent’s dismal kitchen.

The comparison made her feel even more despondent than she already was.

He came out of the bathroom wearing only the boxers he’d taken in with him. He was drying his wet hair with one towel and pressing another to the small of his back. There were two places on his face where the skin was split. Those cuts had been left to bleed. He’d wrapped a washcloth around his injured hand.

“How long have you lived here?” she asked.

“Two years, give or take. Since I had to sell my house. When I left the airline, I could no longer sustain the lifestyle to which I had become accustomed. Housing market was crap. I took a beating on the sale, but I had no choice.”

“Savings?”

“Everything went into the down payment on my plane.”

With the towel he’d used on his hair, he dabbed at the bleeding gash on his cheekbone just below his right eye. “I hope you don’t faint at the sight of blood. The son of a bitch made me a goddamn sieve.”

“We should have called the police.”

“We’d have made the front page of tomorrow’s Statesman . The witnesses saw me push you to the ground. I’d have probably been arrested, held while questioned, and by the time it was sorted out, we’d be news just because of who we are.”

He was right, of course, which is why she’d let him talk her out of seeking emergency treatment for him. Her father lay dying; Olivia was hanging on to her fortitude by a thread. They didn’t need to open the newspaper tomorrow and read about their daughter’s involvement in an assault-and-battery in the parking lot of a twenty-four-hour pancake house.

“Would you know him if you saw him again?” she asked.

“Heavy bastard. Solid. Left arm is covered in a tattoo. A snake with fangs dripping venom. You said the guy in the pickup had a heavily tattooed left arm that was propped in the open window. Putting one and one together…” He left her to do the math.

During the drive here, he had related to her the details of the attack. “Except I’m skipping the dirty parts.”

“Dirty parts?”

“Nasty things he said about you.”

Most alarming, he’d told her what his attacker had threatened to do. Now she said, “He wants to kill us.”

“That’s what the man said.”

“But why? Who could he be?”

“I’m thinking. I’m also still leaking.”

“Oh, sorry.” She motioned him over to the table, where she remained seated. “Turn around.”

He presented her with his back. The shorts were riding low on his hips, revealing an oozing red line like a wide smile across the small of his back.

“Dent, you should go to an emergency room.”

He peered over his shoulder, trying to assess the damage himself. “I doubt they’d believe I cut myself shaving.”

“You could claim it was an accident.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know,” she said throwing up her hands, her voice breaking with frustration.

He turned around to face her and tipped her chin up. “Hey, you reacted with nerves of steel, then drove like Mario Andretti. You’re not going to crack under pressure now, are you?”

She lifted her chin off the perch of his fingertips and, placing her hands on his hip bones, turned him around none too gently. She emptied the contents of the sack onto the table and uncapped an ominous-looking brown glass bottle. “I hope this antiseptic burns like hell.”

It must have because he hissed and cursed as she applied it. To distract him, she passed a cotton ball doused with the liquid up to him. “Dab that on your face and hand. How is it?”

He unwound the washcloth and took a look. “The cuts aren’t deep. Fingers will probably be stiff in the morning, but he could have cut them off.”

She shivered. “That’s the least of it. But why give you warning? In the time he took to issue those threats, he could have killed you.”

“Disappointed?”

“I’m serious,” she said, speaking up to him when he looked down at her from over his shoulder.

“Maybe he was afraid that somebody was watching from inside the restaurant. Or he’s more bluff than bite. Or he’s a psycho who’s lost his powers of reason. It’s anybody’s guess until we know who he is and why he has it in for us.” He checked her progress. “About finished?”

“It’s not bleeding as much.”