Lori Harris - Someone Safe

Another shot snapped. Her knees buckled. Nick grabbed her hand, and she half stumbled in his wake toward the stairs and the cover of trees ahead.

More shots. A barrage that chewed the air, the ground. Yet she could barely hear them over the roar of blood in her ears. They weren’t going to make it. It was all going to end here. She was never going to know why. Never going to know who.

Nick faltered beside her, then, with a sharp intake of breath, went down.

In horror, she watched as his face twisted with pain. He’d been shot. In the leg.

Cursing, he rolled and unloaded the remaining bullets from his position on the ground as the two men vaulted the wall. One fell, remained doubled over. Not dead, but wounded.

Nick ejected the spent clip. He slammed in another and immediately tapped out additional rounds, forcing the remaining man to seek shelter again.

Climbing to his feet, Nick pushed her ahead of him. “When we get to the top of the steps, I’ll drop back and slow him. If I’m not there by the time you have the motor started, get the hell out of here.” His fingers tightened. “Don’t wait on me.”

Her lips thinned. “You didn’t leave me back there.”

“I don’t have time to argue.”

“Just make sure you’re there.”

Kelly focused intently on the trees ahead, the shade beneath them. The possibility of some cover. But it would also make the steep stairs difficult to handle.

Her foot was already on the top step when she saw the man on her boat and dove to the ground. She barely heard the rustle of land crabs around her or felt their hard bodies brushing against her. The man now ripped open the compartments where bait and freshly caught fish were usually kept. Fiberglass covers slammed against the boat deck.

With the next burst of gunfire, he glanced up, appeared to gaze directly at her, though she knew he couldn’t really see her.

In the next instant, he vaulted over the side of the boat and onto the dock.

“More company,” she said when Nick dropped next to her.

For a brief second, breathing hard, he watched the man sprinting the length of the dock, then glanced over his shoulder, possibly gauging how much longer they had before they were squeezed. “I’ve always liked a challenge.”

“Well, I don’t.” She wiped the sweat from her forehead. “What now?” Her lungs still burning, she looked toward the hotel, but couldn’t locate the man closing in from behind. “I can’t run much farther. With your leg, neither can you. I know a place,” she said and fought to breathe. “Not too far. A house. We should be able…” She saw his hesitation. “If you have a better solution…”

The man was at the bottom of the steps now. In seconds, he could be right on top of them.

“Nick?”

He pulled her up. “Which way?”

As soon as they stood, they were spotted. The man below held fire, perhaps briefly afraid the shadows belonged to his friends, but the man behind didn’t hesitate. Bullets ripped savagely at leaves and twigs and hunks of bark.

After half a dozen steps. Nick pushed her to the ground. Dropping to one knee beside her, he unloaded yet another clip. Explosion after explosion went off until she lost track of which protected her—the ones from Nick’s gun—and which came from the weapons of their pursuers.

A bullet slammed within inches of her hand, then closer still until she felt the heat of its impact as it chewed a hole in the soil. Her chest ached as if she’d been pummeled. She couldn’t seem to breath. Or think. Or move. Instead of seconds and minutes, time was measured in never-ending explosions.

Then deafening silence.

Nick remained kneeling over her, his left hand keeping her down, his face barely discernable in the shadows as he waited. Instead of its usual saltiness, the night air tasted of spent powder. And of fear.

He wrapped his fingers around her upper arm and bent down until his mouth was close to her ear. “When I give the signal, run. I’ll be right behind you.”

She looked around her for the first time. They were closer to the hotel’s maintenance alley than she had realized.

“Now!”

Kelly scrabbled to her feet, headed for the cover of a Dumpster as more rounds attempted to force them back to the ground. Nick followed.

They worked their way around the back of the hotel by way of the service courtyard and alley. The beach was an easy sprint just beyond and offered the cover of trees and dunes.

Ten minutes later, they ducked into a narrow lane created by tall, vine-covered fences. Nick rested behind a group of trash cans, while Kelly slumped against the side of the building, her lungs on fire. Her leg muscles, after running close to a mile in the soft sand, cramped. In fact, at that moment, there wasn’t much of her body that didn’t hurt, ache or burn.

“I don’t like it,” Nick said. “That was too easy.”

“Easy?” she managed between heaving breaths. “I’d like to see your idea of hard.” She closed her eyes. “I take that back.” She exhaled harshly. “I’d rather not.”

Nick’s expression remained grim. “Even if the one I hit wasn’t just wounded, one of the other two should have continued to chase us.”

“Maybe they were afraid of the police.”

“Men like that aren’t worried about the law.”

“You were well prepared,” she commented. “As if you were expecting them.”

“I was warned.” He placed the gun next to him on the pavement while he removed his shirt.

“You said those men might have been looking for you?”

“Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate.

Earlier, she’d noticed changes in him. But since she’d knocked on his door those differences had become even more apparent. There had been no hesitation, no change in his voice when he talked of killing a man.

Seven years ago, there had been a softness in Nick. It had been so deeply imbedded at his core it had been nearly impossible to reach, but in those last few weeks before her father’s suicide, before everything had changed, she’d seen glimpses. She suspected it no longer existed. He was now as ruthless and determined as the men following them. The bare, well-muscled chest and shoulders and the leather holster weighted with a very serious piece of steel did nothing to lessen her impression of him. Nor did the closed expression on his rugged face.

With her forearm, Kelly swiped away some of the sweat continuing to bead her forehead. What had happened in the intervening years to harden him. The job, no doubt.

“How many bullets do you have left?”

He stood to wrap the shirt around his thigh. “Enough to keep us alive a bit longer.”

The wound didn’t look so bad from where she was sitting, though she suspected, listening to his harsh intake of breath as he pulled the material tight, it was causing him quite a bit of pain.

Kelly followed suit and got to her feet. The last thing she wanted to be was left behind. “Are you going to be all right?”

“Yeah.” He started to take her arm, then seemed to decide against it. “It’ll need to be cleaned out when we get wherever we’re going. Perhaps now would be a good time for you to let me in on our destination.”

Kelly picked her way along the alley. “My aunt’s house. She’s out of town until tomorrow.”

Nick caught up and pulled her to a stop. “I don’t recall any aunt.” He tightened his fingers around her arm.

She sensed his distrust. “I’ll tell you what, Cavanaugh. You can believe whatever you want. You can put your ass right back on the ground and stay here with your leg the way it is, but, right now, I want more cover than this alley is providing and maybe some kind of bed.”

With that, she jerked free of his hold and turned and walked away. Nick caught up, fell in step beside her.