Lynn Harris - The Heartless Rebel

He would have laughed if it hadn’t hurt so damn much. “How did you get us out of there?”

“Once they knocked you unconscious, Bobby left, but he promised they’d be coming back to finish the job, which I didn’t think sounded like an option I wanted to stick around for.”

“We’re in my car,” he said. He recognized the smell, the growl of the engine, the feel of the leather hugging his body.

“I got it from the valet. One of the waiters helped me get you out and put you in the car. I said you were drunk and that I had to drive you home.”

He had to hand it to her for thinking of it. Because if they’d stayed in that room, he wasn’t too sure that Bobby wouldn’t have done a bit more permanent damage.

“And where are we going now?”

“I need to get you to a hospital. But first I thought it best we get out of Nice. Bobby knows people.”

“I know people, too.” Hell, he had his own security firm. One call to them, and Bobby Gold would be singing soprano for the next month.

“As soon as we get to the next town, we’ll find a doctor.”

Jack winced again. “I don’t need a doctor. My ribs are bruised, not broken.”

“How do you know that?”

“Trust me. I’ve seen enough injuries to know what is what.” Thanks to his father. He’d rarely received the brunt of William’s anger, because he could sense when his father was about to explode like a powder keg, but he’d seen the results of his siblings’ beatings enough to know which injuries required a visit to the hospital.

“Fine, you don’t have broken ribs. But you could have a concussion.”

“Doubt it. But if I do, the cure for that is painkillers and rest.”

Cara let out a long-suffering sigh. “Is there anything you don’t know, Jack Wolfe?”

“I’m sure there are one or two things.”

She didn’t laugh. “If you’d just stayed out of it! I could have talked Bobby into forgiving me, could have kept my job and made everything right again.”

“You are incredibly naive, Cara. You cost the man fifteen million euros. Do you really believe he would forget that? “

Her fingers tightened on the wheel. “Once I explained—”

“Explained what? That you aren’t a cheat?”

“Yes,” she said tightly. “Because I’m not. It’s no good now, though, because he believes I planned this with you. Especially since I’ve helped you get away.”

“Why were you working for a man like Gold, anyway?”

She snorted. “Are you telling me that I should have been a card shark instead?”

“Not at all. But you have a talent for numbers, Cara. Surely there are other things you could do.”

“Like what?”

“You could find a job in finance—”

“I don’t have a college degree. Besides, who are you to talk? Why did you decide to become a gambler? “

He figured he should disabuse her of the notion—but it was far too much fun to let her think he was a professional gambler. He was accustomed to women fawning over him for his money, his family name and his face. To have one angry with him because she believed he was an unscrupulous gambler? It was novel.

“Because I like taking chances.” It was true enough. He got a rush out of playing stocks. Sometimes he didn’t sleep for days as he moved between the international markets. Making money was easy. It made sense, unlike everything else in his life. He could control money. He couldn’t control the things that had happened to him, or the emotional scars his family bore.

“Well, I don’t,” she said. “I liked dealing cards. There’s no risk in it for me.”

“Apparently, there is.”

Her jaw tightened. “Tonight was a first.”

“It would not have been the last, should you have complied.”

She glanced at the gauges. “We’re going to need gas soon and I don’t have any money.”

So she didn’t want to admit she’d been in over her head. Fine. “I’ll take care of it.”

She was silent for a few moments. “Were you playing for someone tonight?”

“No.”

“Then you lost a lot of money by coming to look for me. You must regret that impulse.”

“It’s only money.”

She laughed, but it wasn’t a humorous sound. “Of course. Because there’s no one depending on you for the food on their table or the roof over their head, I suppose.”

His employees would no doubt disagree with that statement. “No, because people are more important than money. You were in trouble.”

“I really didn’t need rescuing, Jack. You gave up fifteen million for nothing.”

“If you weren’t in trouble, why are we speeding out of town? “

Before she could acknowledge the truth of that statement, they hit a bump and Jack groaned. Dear God, it felt like there was an alien trying to burst out of his abdomen.

“We need to get you to a doctor,” she said worriedly.

Jack swallowed the pain. “No. Because Gold probably is looking for us, and it would take too long for my men to arrive. Keep driving.”

Bobby Gold had the fifteen mil, but he was the kind of man who couldn’t stand to be made a fool of. He’d want Cara Taylor back so he could make her pay for her disobedience. Getting as far from Nice as possible wasn’t a bad idea.

Since there were no flights this late, and his private plane was in a hangar in London, they had no choice but to drive. Even if he called his pilot, it would be several hours yet before the plane would arrive.

He’d originally planned a leisurely drive across France on his way to Nathaniel’s wedding, anyway. He could have flown, but he knew he needed the time to think. This would be the first time in nearly twenty years that all the Wolfes would be gathered under the same roof—and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He especially wasn’t sure how he felt about seeing Jacob again.

Jacob, who’d betrayed them all when he’d left them without any explanation. Jack had looked up to Jacob, admired him—until the night Jacob had abandoned them.

“You’re in no shape to spend the night in a car,” Cara said. “A hospital—”

“Just do it,” Jack ordered.

He expected an argument, but she flexed her hands on the steering wheel and didn’t say anything for several seconds.

“Fine. Where do you want to go?”

Not where he wanted to go. Where he had to go. “England.”

IT WAS nearly two in the morning when they reached the outskirts of Lyon. Cara found a hotel off the expressway and pulled the car into a parking slot. It had taken her a few minutes back in Nice to figure out how to drive Jack’s sports car, but once she had, the silver beast was a dream. She knew without asking that it was the most expensive car she’d ever been in, much less driven.

Jack dozed in the passenger seat and she took a moment to study him. Bobby’s thugs had beaten him up pretty badly, though they’d hardly touched his face. If he hadn’t groaned from time to time, she’d have thought he felt perfectly fine. As it was, she had no idea how badly he was hurt. He said he was only bruised, but she wasn’t certain. And it was that uncertainty that had kept her behind the wheel for the past four hours. The farther they got from Bobby, the better.

And then she could talk Jack into going to a hospital.

The skin under his left eye was purpling, but even bruised, he was still devastatingly handsome.

Her pulse kicked up, and she chided herself for reacting to him. Jack Wolfe might be pretty to look at, but he was arrogant and irresponsible—and she had no time for men like that in her life, no matter how his flirtation earlier had made her want to melt in his arms.

She was here because it had seemed the best course to keep driving—especially since he’d been in no shape to do so—but now that they’d arrived in Lyon, she was determined to part ways with the enigmatic Jack Wolfe. Once she got him to a doctor, of course.