Joan Swan - Shatter

Holland nodded and called to the other neighbors loitering on the sidewalk, “She’s okay. Go on back to bed. I’ll wait for the police.” Then to Halina, “Honey, maybe you should stay put for a few more minutes. We’ve got an ambulance coming.”

Mr. Holland’s gentle voice, his steady warm hand on her shoulder, made suppressed emotion bubble to the surface and tears burned Halina’s eyes.

“Can’t take chances with a head wound.” Mitch’s curt delivery and cold tone directly opposed the nature of the comment, making him seem like a careless prick. He stood, pulling Halina to her feet. “Every minute counts.”

The street tilted and Halina slanted with it. She gripped Mitch’s arms.

“Heather?” Mr. Holland stood back, darting an unsure glance between Halina and Mitch.

“I’m . . . I’ll be okay.” She pulled from Mitch’s grasp, her emotions in a knot. She didn’t want to go with him, but she didn’t like the idea of staying here to see who followed this blue-eyed attacker, either. “I’d rather go to the hospital on my own than in an ambulance.”

Mitch turned her toward the street. They were halfway down the driveway when she realized they were headed toward the wrong car. She stopped, muttering, “Wait, my car’s—”

“Your car has been inhabited by Cujo.”

She twisted away from Mitch and forced herself to remain standing. The growing anger helped. “I should have known this wouldn’t work.”

“Halina, we don’t have time—”

“I guess I’ll make time .” She moved toward her car, pressing a hand to the pain in her head. “Mr. Holland, would you mind moving my friend’s car to the curb if he’s not willing to do it?”

The jingle of keys tinkled in the night, then Mitch was beside her again, his voice softer. “Halina, we don’t know how many of these guys are out there.”

“I don’t need you. I can take care of myself.” The truth of the words dug holes in her heart. She was so tired of taking care of herself. Of isolating herself. Of being so completely alone . “I’ve been doing it for”— my entire life —“seven years.”

He trapped her against the car, covering her hands, the front of his body pressing against the back of hers. Touching her. Everywhere.

“That was your choice, Halina.”

His murmur hummed in her ear and shivered across her skin, reminding her of all she’d given up. All she’d let go. All she’d handed to all those other women. Woman after woman after woman. All within weeks of Halina’s departure. All the most accomplished, the most gorgeous, the most well-bred women.

As if he’d had enough of the ordinary with Halina and was ready for the truly spectacular. As if he’d been taking advantage of all he’d realized he’d been missing. As if her leaving had been the best thing that happened to him.

He couldn’t know how that clawed at her deepest insecurities from childhood, or that she would even know he’d moved on, or that she would care even if she did know.

And it was all irrelevant to what really mattered: his happiness, his health, his safety. That’s why she’d done all she’d done—and she’d been wildly successful.

But she’d never expected to have to witness him doing it all so publicly. So flamboyantly. So . . . excessively. She’d never expected to have to watch other women get to enjoy all she’d given up.

Her chest squeezed, yearning for so many things she couldn’t have. But he was standing here, touching her, and it was so hard not to lean into him . . . and just . . . let go . . .

“You can’t drive, Halina,” he said. “And you can’t stay here. Sorry, baby. You’re stuck with me.”

Mitch closed the passenger’s door, breathing hard, his heart slamming against his chest wall.

Note to self: Don’t stand that freaking close to her, dipshit.

The shepherd had crawled halfway into her lap, and she had her face pressed into his thick fur. She looked so . . . vulnerable.

How could she look vulnerable after he’d just witnessed her disarm and pummel a guy who had two weapons?

Mitch’s brain was twisted two hundred degrees and flipped on its axis. This woman was a complete stranger; if she didn’t look so much like Halina, he wouldn’t believe them one and the same.

Then she turned her head and laid it on the dog’s shoulders. Blood spattered her cheek. Matted a section of her hair. Still, with her face relaxed again, she was so clearly the woman who’d lain beside him in bed for nearly a year. The woman who’d loved to press herself against him when she slept. The only woman who’d ever made him think of the future.

A lead weight lay at the bottom of his stomach. He knew better than to jump to conclusions—especially in this convoluted situation—but it was pretty clear she hadn’t been working for Schaeffer. Even though she might have been hiding from Mitch, it sounded like she’d been running from Schaeffer.

He rounded the hood and waved to the scowling Mr. Holland as he emerged from Mitch’s rental at the curb. “Thank you, sir. I’ll be back for it as soon as I can.”

Mitch paused to crouch beside the gunman and grimaced at his appearance. He patted the guy’s pockets. Empty. Pulling his phone from his jeans pocket, Mitch photographed the unconscious man’s battered face, then pressed the man’s blood-laden fingerprints to the glass front of his phone.

By the time he opened the driver’s door, the huge dog was trying to climb into Halina’s lap. The bottom half of his body was hidden beneath the dash as he sat on the floorboard. The upper half was draped across Halina, his big head resting in the crook of her elbow where she had her arm wrapped around his neck. The beast had to weigh well over a hundred pounds.

His golden-brown eyes sharpened and a low growl hummed in the dog’s throat as Mitch slid into the driver seat.

He paused before closing the door. “Halina, order him not to bite my dick off or go for my jugular.”

She turned her head toward Mitch, but kept the side of her face against the dog’s neck. “ Tikhiy, boy.”

Mitch shut the door and backed out of the drive. “Where’s the nearest emergency room out of town? You need to get your head looked at.”

“In more ways than one,” she muttered. “But I need to get to my storage unit first.”

“What’s in your storage unit?”

She only gave him an address in the neighboring town of Bellevue.

Before he searched for directions, Mitch tapped into an app on his phone and sent a scanned image of the fingerprints on the glass to Kai, who’d been the one to share this cool toy. Through his military contacts, Kai would get answers on this guy’s identity faster than any other source. And the sooner they discovered who their attacker had been, the sooner they could uncover the root of this danger.

The attacker had said he was the new game in town, but Mitch believed this would ultimately end at Schaeffer. Just because the man was lying in a military hospital in Washington, DC, in a coma didn’t mean he hadn’t put this plan into action before his accident.

After retrieving directions from his phone for the storage unit, Mitch set a safe and sane pace through the mostly sleeping neighborhood to avoid notice.

He was completely off balance now and needed a million answers to as many questions. Stopping at the red light marking the intersection of the main road, he rubbed his eyes and took a deep, cleansing breath to get himself back on track.

His lungs filled with . . . Halina—a unique musky sweetness beneath the gentle scent of perfume. One Mitch had given her so long ago. The very first perfume she’d ever owned.