When She Wasn't Looking (11 page)

“So you’re not buying it.”

“It’s one thing to get lost in the shuffle of business on a hospital floor. It’s another to wait around, trying to act like you belong.”

“So Stimpson was dirty.” The idea shouldn’t have surprised her. She’d dealt with lazy cops and more than a few guys in power who seemed to despise women. But she’d hoped for better here, had the naive belief that sort of corruption wouldn’t happen in a small town on the edge of nowhere.

“He wouldn’t be the first bad cop in history.”

The disgust in Jonas’s voice mirrored the anger in her heart. “Interesting.”

He pocketed his phone. “What?”

“The way you got all low and grumbly there for a second.”

“I didn’t—”

“And if you hold on to those keys any tighter you’re going to draw blood.”

He opened his palm and stared at the rough indents on his palm.

“Have some experience with crooked officers?” she asked.

He hesitated long enough that his voice boomed and she jumped when he finally started talking. “Most of the people on the streets, the true law-enforcement professionals who sweat and bleed the beat each day, are solid. They do their jobs. Risk their lives. Don’t ask for medals.”

Like him. After such a short time, that was the definition she’d use to describe Jonas.

“I know plenty of guys who sit behind a desk and give orders. They dictate the rules of battle without ever fighting one,” he said.

Desperate to hear him talk, to catch a glimpse into the man behind the fully together one in front of her, she resisted saying anything until the quiet pounded in on her. “And?”

“People die.”

It was everything he didn’t say that mattered. “People you know?”

“Yeah.” He dangled the keys in front of her. “These are for you.”

The air had changed. The crackle of electricity vanished in a poof and she knew the “show me yours” moment had passed.

She sighed. “Let me guess. My job is to wait out here.”

“In the car with the engine running.”

“Where will you be?”

“Up there.” He nodded toward Stimpson’s front door before looking over his shoulder at the sedan again. “The guy in that car is one of Walt’s men. He’s watching the place to see if Stimpson comes back.”

“I’m confused about this plan.”

Jonas shrugged. “I’m just looking in some windows.”

“Guess that means you don’t have a warrant.”

“Walt is getting it. He’ll be here any minute.”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, good. And I thought you were running off without backup again.”

For a second the tight pull of tension across his mouth disappeared and he laughed. “Only a crazy man would do that.” Amusement echoed in every word.

“I had the same thought.”

Jonas winked at her, then waved to the officer in the car. He headed for the stairs on the left side of the building. He hit the bottom one before she decided helping him look in a few windows couldn’t put her in danger.

She’d barely raised her leg when the ground shook beneath her. A deafening crash thundered through the sky and rattled in her ears. Her knees buckled as the pavement bounced and shifted.

One minute she saw Jonas’s shirt. The next he flew backward as the railing in his hand broke free and the stairs blew apart. She tried to call his name but no words came out. Smoke choked the air and glass rained from above.

Car alarms exploded in unison with chirping sounds. People screamed and a baby cried. The roar of drums sounded all around her.

She hit her knees and threw her hands over her head. Sharp pricks assaulted her bare skin as she hid her face. She didn’t know she’d held her breath until her chest burned and she started coughing.

Her eyes itched and watered as if the smoke had worked its way under her contacts, but the raging heat had her full attention. Fire danced all around her. Flames engulfed the top floor of the complex except in the black hole in the middle. Papers flew around. Pieces of furniture littered the ground. And the sedan with Walt’s provided protection burned.

The thumping of her heart and rush of the fire muffled other sounds. She pushed up, ignoring the slice of glass into her palm. Residents stumbled out of the bottom units. Others lay on the ground not moving.

So many people hurt…
Jonas.

Her vision blurred as the smoke fell over her. She blinked and rubbed her eyes to bring the images back together. When she could focus again, she scanned the ground, trying to remember the last place she saw him. The stairs, the walls, they were gone now, but the fire inched closer and the wind kicked up.

Something moved off to her left. Dark pants. A hand. Jonas lay on his stomach with his face turned away from her.

She struggled to stand up but her legs wouldn’t hold her. She slipped back to the ground with a whoosh. Forcing her eyes to focus, she made out Jonas’s lean frame and saw the flames edging closer.

She crawled on her elbows and knees, ignoring the crunch of glass as she went. When she got close she reached out and wrapped her fingers around his ankle. He didn’t move at her touch. Climbing, shuffling her body along the hard ground, she slid up his body and pressed a finger to his neck. A steady heartbeat greeted her.

With her hands on his back, she shook him and shouted his name. On the third shove, he groaned.

“Jonas, please, wake up.” She continued to poke and prod. They had only minutes before the fire reached them. “Come on.”

His eyes popped open. “Bomb.”

Relief zapped her strength. She fell against him and buried her face in his neck. “We have to move.”

“Are you okay?” His question came out in pants.

She lifted her head and brushed a hand over his blackened cheek. “Fine.”

“Everyone else?”

“I don’t know. Can you get up?”

“I doubt it.” He shifted his head and faced the fire. “Forget that. Yeah, I can.”

He pushed up on his forearms, his arms shaking as he went. When he pushed back on his knees, his chest heaved.

Panic swamped her. Every cell in her body shook. “Jonas, please.”

He opened his eyes again and some of the haze had cleared. “Let’s go. I can come back for the others.”

She doubted he could even rescue himself this time.

With her arms wrapped around him and his weight suffocating her, they half crouched and half crawled out of the line of the fire. Sirens wailed in the distance, growing louder. She laughed, so relieved by the welcome noise.

They were a few steps from freedom when strong arms reached under her stomach and pulled her away. She screamed out Jonas’s name and kicked out her legs.

Then the smoke closed around her.

Chapter Thirteen

Jonas moved his arms but he wasn’t holding anything but air. He blinked several times to clear his vision as he called Courtney’s name over and over again.

He could hear her screams over the blaring whistle of the incoming fire trucks. As the wind blew, a patch of visibility opened and he saw a man dragging Courtney away. The man had his arms banded around her chest as she dug in her heels to stop him.

If she could find the power to fight, so could he. Jonas crawled until he struggled up on all fours, willing his body to keep moving. He fell twice, but on the third try he rose up on shaky legs.

The smoke had blown back in, and heat seared his back. He turned to find the fire creeping in a line toward him. Adrenaline surged through him, coursing through his blood and shooting power back into his beaten muscles.

The window of smoke closed and he couldn’t see her anymore. “Courtney!”

“Jonas, here!”

He followed the sound to a car parked on the opposite side of the complex. Through the thick smoke, Courtney fought, swinging her legs and punching at her attacker. When he tried to open the passenger side and stuff her in, she smacked the door shut by balancing her feet against the side of the car.

Jonas inhaled and ran. His heel overturned, but he kept moving. With a yell, he launched his body at the attacker, hitting him square in the back. The men went down, rolling on the ground, as Courtney’s shoulder slammed into the car.

The burst of strength used up all of Jonas’s reserves. He coughed through the smoke as he struggled to see the face of the guy shoving him harder into the pavement. All Jonas could think about was getting to Courtney and carrying her out of there and finding help for the others.

He shoved and hit. Then the guy was gone. The pressure lifted, and without the knee on his chest Jonas’s breathing slowed again.

He lay on the pavement staring up at the now-dark sky clouded with a thick film. Then Courtney’s face swirled in front of him, her hair streaming down and her skin damp with sweat. She was saying something but he couldn’t hear her. Her mouth moved.

The ground vibrated. At first he only saw shoes. Hoses hit the ground around him. Rich swooped in, taking Courtney by the shoulders and wrapping her in a blanket.

Jonas blinked as firemen and police poured through the area from every direction. With a hard pop, his ears opened. He heard the spray of water and Walt’s shouts for help.

Then thick air swept over him with the darkness roaring in right behind.

When Jonas opened his eyes again, he saw ceiling tiles. Rows of white and nothing familiar. He lifted his head and scanned the room. Heart-rate monitor, a thin sheet drawn up to his stomach and a bed with rails.

He exhaled, his breath filled with fury. “I’m in a damn hospital.”

“Yes, you are.”

His gaze shot to the chair next to his bed. Courtney sat in jeans and a T-shirt, with her legs tucked up under her and a magazine on her lap. Her skin was pink and shiny, and her hair was pulled back off her face.

“You’re okay.” He meant to say the words in his head, but when she smiled he knew he’d said them out loud.

She held up her hand and showed off a white bandage. “Minor stuff.”

He looked closer and saw the dark circles and tiny cuts on her forehead and hands. Her left eye watered and she rubbed it twice in the minute since he woke up and saw her. Her elbow balanced on the armrest but her whole side moved when she did, suggesting an injury to her ribs and maybe her arm and back.

She was hurt.

He tried to get up and his chest caved in. Coughs shook him until he couldn’t see. When he leaned back again, Rich and Courtney loomed over him wearing matching looks of concern.

Jonas hated pity. After his partner got shot, everyone in his division at DEA stopped talking when he walked by. There were whispers and awkward private comments about getting a raw deal.

He’d gone from an excellent shot to the guy who failed to pull the trigger on time. From being on probation over an innocent incident in one case to forced temporary leave over another. He knew how to shoot and when to shoot, but the bogus lawsuit over the kid left him questioning his judgment, and in that second months later his partner paid the price.

Henry McCarthy, dead at thirty-one.

“Tell me what happened today,” Jonas said.

“It’s simple.” Rich stationed his body at the end of Jonas’s bed. “Someone blew up Stimpson’s house and tried to take you with it.”

Knowing people were hurt and in trouble while he was strapped to a bed ate at Jonas’s insides, hollowing him out. “Injuries?”

“Stimpson is dead. We’re not sure if the fire killed him or covered up the homicide.”

“Everyone else?”

“The officer in the sedan.” Courtney swallowed the last part of the sentence. She clamped her lips together as if the idea of saying one more word pained her.

Rich cleared his throat. “It happened during the day, so most people were out. We have some folks in the hospital but nothing life-threatening.”

“You’re one of the worst,” she said, the anger clear in her voice.

Rich nodded. “And you look like crap.”

Jonas didn’t care about that. He’d been injured before, spent time in the army and tracked down drug dealers with the DEA. He was in good shape. His body would heal.

The damage to Aberdeen might not be as easily fixed. People here expected calm and safety. He’d been on the job six months and delivered the exact opposite.

But the bigger issue had to do with the woman standing by his side. “What about the guy who took Courtney? Any idea who he is or where he went?”

“Good Samaritan, maybe?” Rich threw it out there but his eyes said he didn’t believe it.

She snorted. “More like kidnapper.”

“And this used to be a nice place to live,” Rich joked.

She slipped back into the chair and rubbed her eyes. “Before I got here, you mean.”

Rich sobered. “No, before a killer came to town.”

Jonas watched the byplay. Where Walt sent out warning signals, Rich stepped into protection mode with Courtney. Jonas appreciated both tactics but neither would keep her safe. They needed more information. Fighting the unknown had proven too dangerous for everyone in town.

“Can you describe him?” Jonas asked her.

She rubbed her hands up and down her arms. “He grabbed me from behind. I didn’t see anything.”

Jonas tipped his head back against the pillow and closed his eyes. He tried to conjure up a view of the guy, but couldn’t. For all his training, his skills failed when he needed them most. “And I was too busy trying to get to you to concentrate on getting a description.”

“And then there’s the part where you were almost unconscious.” She reached out a hand but laid it on the railing instead of touching him.

His gaze went to her fingers before skipping back to Rich and his stupid smile. Jonas wondered if he’d ever regain his equilibrium. He had a job to do, but his performance suffered whenever she walked by.

He shook his head and tried to get his mind back on track. “What do we know?”

“You need to stay in here for a few…” Rich raised an eyebrow. “Why are you shaking your head?”

Never going to happen.
“I’m leaving as soon as the doctor signs the papers.”

This time Courtney wrapped her fingers around the metal bar to his bed in a hold tight enough to crush it. “We don’t even know what’s wrong with you.”