Lightning Strikes (The Almeida Brothers Trilogy #3) (3 page)

“Can we have a ride?” Nina begged, displaying the wads of cash in her hands.  “To the nearest train station?”

“Last train left an hour ago.  Station’s closed until first thing tomorrow.”

Nina leaned down on her knees, and her head fell.  Behind her, Jack’s did too.

The driver lowered her voice.  “But I do know of one hotel, just outside the city, that still has rooms available.  About an hour out.”

“Take us there,” Nina begged.

“It’ll cost ya.”

“How much?”

“Triple the noted price.”

Nina’s eyes widened, shocked that she was being swindled by someone’s grandma.  “Done!”

The woman waved with a smile.  “Hop in before someone else beats you to it!”

Nina lunged for the cab.

Jack reached for her, taking her arm in a tight grip.  “This woman is in a hot pink cab with no tags or contact information and is offering to drive us an hour outside of town. Every cab that has pulled up to this curb has been accosted by customers in seconds.  Every cab but this one.  Does that mean anything to you?”

Nina gave him a sweet smile.  “Sounds like you’ve changed your mind and have decided to stick with me?  I knew I could break you down, Jack Almeida.”  She raced to the backseat of the cab and threw it open, leaping into the back as fast as she could to avoid the downpour.  Through the open door, she gave him a look. “Don’t worry, Aries.  I’ll protect you.”

“Apparently, once the severe turbulence hit, the flight attendant in the back galley had to sit down, but she forgot to turn off the ovens.  By the time it was safe for her to get back up, the tail was already on fire!  She didn’t even smell the smoke until we were thirty minutes from the airport.   That’s why we crashed.  How did the pilots not know?  Don’t they have monitors that are supposed to detect shit like that?  It’s like,
guys
.  You had one job. 
One job
.   Land the plane.  Don’t crash.  How do you screw that up?”

Was this woman
still
talking? Clearly Jack had gone insane. It was the only conclusion he could come to after climbing into that cab with Nina.

He saw her throwing him random looks every now and again from where she sat next to him in the backseat of the cab, and he did everything he could to make sure he didn’t return her curious glances.

“So that’s why you’re bleeding,” the driver said, casting a look at Jack in the rearview.

“You had to sign a waiver to let them release you like that, right?”  Nina said, pointing to the gash on Jack’s head.  The rain had made some of the blood wash down his neck and stain his grey suit jacket.  “You could have a serious injury.  I thought a lawyer would know better.”

Jack didn’t respond, leaning on the armrest while watching as the scenery outside slowly became less metropolitan, and more backwoods.  The ride got bumpier every second, making him bob back and forth.

“Hey, Aries, do you have a phone?  I lost my phone.”

“I don’t have a phone.”

“Hey, driver?  You got a phone?”

“It’ll cost ya!”

Nina fell back against the seat, grumbling something about refusing to be fleeced by someone’s grandma, and then, silence.  Ah, blessed silence.

“So what’s waiting for you in New York?” Nina asked.

Jack didn’t answer, running the pads of his fingers along his lips.  The half soothing, half unbearable tingle the soft stroking brought to his lips was doing wonders for his patience.

“Or should I be asking… what did you
leave behind
in Cambridge?” she rephrased.

Jack remained silent.  For a moment, it seemed like she was going to accept that silence.

Of course, she wasn’t.  Silly him.

“You’re pretty dressed up for an hour-long flight; that’s all.  And you strike me as the kind of guy who’s sat in his fair share of first-class seats—enough times to know that it doesn’t warrant a four-piece suit.”  She squinted at him.  “Who are you running after, Aries?”

This time, Jack did look at her, and he worked very hard to make it clear to her how bored he was with this conversation with deeply hooded eyes.

“Or, should I be asking who you’re running
from?” She raised her eyebrows.

“What’s waiting for
you
in New York?” Jack asked.  “Why did a woman dressed like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, with a wad full of hundreds in her bra and her midriff exposed, plop down next to me in first class?”

She straightened. Her lips drew themselves into a tight line. And then, she collapsed into her seat, looking away.

“Obnoxious right?” Jack nodded at the back of her head.  “When a complete stranger pries into your life for no good reason?”

She shot him a look.  “You are so rude.  I am the farthest thing from Buffy.”

“I’m sorry.  Black Buffy, then.”

“So now I gotta be black?”

It occurred to Jack that she’d done it.  She’d sucked him in.  How had he let this happen?  Even as he told himself to disengage, he spoke again. “Well, you are black.”

“That’s racist.”

“Took you ten whole seconds to pull the race card.  That’s gotta be a new record, huh?”  He jammed his eyes shut and begged himself to stop responding.

Thankfully, she didn’t test his rapidly dissolving self-restraint and scoffed in response.

Good.  Scoffing was easy to ignore.

The driver peeped at them through the rearview.  “You two don’t know each other?”

Both their eyes flew to the rearview.

“Unless being seated on an aircraft next to a living breathing disaster qualifies, no,” Jack said.  “We don’t know each other.”

“I was scared,” Nina spat. “God.  You are such an asshole. 
Robot
.”

Jack looked away from her.

“I’m just trying to make it up to you, dude.”

He closed his eyes.  Tight. 
Do not engage, Jack.  Do not engage.

“Look,” she sighed.  “I don’t get the opportunity to sit in first class a lot, alright?”

“
No
.”  He threw her another dry look, but his voice hitched as he feigned shock.

“In fact, it was my first time ever… After hearing my pathetic sob story, the gate agent took pity on me and gifted me with an upgrade.  I thought my seat mate might’ve had the same compassion, but I got a
robot
trapped in a GQ model’s body instead.”

Jack blinked. GQ model?  He willed himself to look away from her, and it was harder than it had been before.

“What do you do for work?” she asked.

He smiled in disbelief, wondering if she was one of those women that
craved
abuse.  The more he ignored her existence and denied her his attention, the harder she fell all over herself to get it.

“You must be a lawyer,” she said.  “You’ve got that sanitized, soulless aura about you.  Only a good lawyer can pull it off.”

Jack shot her a look.

“So I’m right.”  She nodded.  “An Aries lawyer.  Yikes.  Feeling bad for the wife.”

He watched her eyes fall to his empty ring finger and, once again, refused to take her bait, rolling his eyes before catching the smiling driver’s eyes in the mirror.  “Driver, please, for the love of God, hurry.”

“Yes!” Nina cried, watching him from the corner of her eye.  “Please.  Hurry.”

Noting the tone of the room, the driver smartly clicked on the radio.  Classical music filled the air.  From beside him, Jack heard his seatmate scoff again.  Obviously, if it wasn’t some form of hip hop or trap music, Nina the Vampire Slayer simply wasn’t interested.

As the first few notes of Beethoven’s
Moonlight Sonata
found him in the backseat, however, his fingers moved with each note.

***

“Do you play piano?” Nina came to her toes, trying to catch Jack’s eyes.  “I saw your fingers in the back of the cab.  You were hitting every note against the seat.”

Silence.

“Why do you hate me so much?” she demanded, arms crossed next to Jack as they waited in line at the hotel.  Under crossed arms, they both clutched their vouchers.  “Honestly?  I just paid for our cab ride up here.  Why do you hate me?”

“Besides almost getting me killed?” Jack jammed his eyes shut the moment the words left his mouth.  After an infuriating plane crash and cab ride with this woman, he’d made a secret vow to himself to stop entertaining her shenanigans.  Her questions.  Her face, who’s beauty was becoming more and more apparent to him every time he was idiotic enough to sneak a look at her.

“That wasn’t on purpose.  It’s not like I wanted to put you in danger.  But this…”  She motioned to him, up and down.  “You?  Acting like a massive jerk… that
is
on purpose.  And it’s pretty much confirming that you weren’t going after something in New York, but running from something in Cambridge.”

He jammed his eyes shut and counted to ten.

“Maybe a woman?”

His eyes fluttered open, and he shook his head with a laugh.

“Did she leave you, or did you leave her?”

He bit his bottom lip, the smile vanishing from his face.

“I’m guessing you left her.” Nina’s voice lowered.  “I can’t imagine any woman leaving a man like you.  The kind of man closed so tight there can only be the brightest beauty once you finally manage to crack him open.  Women rarely walk away from beauty like that.”

When the hotel receptionist raised a hand from behind her podium and nodded to him, Jack yelped out loud, racing to the counter.

“Thank you.”  He gave the receptionist a helpless look.  “I need a room.  Any room.  I don’t care which one.   Here’s my voucher.”  He slammed down the voucher the gate agent had given him.  “I have no qualms about bed bugs, dirty sheets, or broken appliances.”

The receptionist made a face that reminded Jack of the face the gate agent had made several times at the airport.  “Don’t…” he started.  “Don’t hurt me.”

“I’m sorry.”  The receptionist’s lips curled down.  “But unfortunately, we can’t accept this airline voucher.”

Jack took hold of her counter.  “I was assured by the airline that almost
killed
me this afternoon that this voucher was good at any hotel in the city of Chicago.”

“And you left the city of Chicago, sir, about a mile back.  You’re in Monroeville now.”

“We’re in a ‘ville?” Nina came up next to Jack at the podium.  “That’s never good news, is it?  ‘Villes are where chainsaw massacres and zombie apocalypses happen.  How did we end up in a ‘ville’?”

Jack motioned to Nina.  “I am not
with this person.”

“We can’t accept the voucher, but I’d be happy to sell you a room, sir.   I can assure you our prices are very reasonable.”

“They had better be in this slum—”

“Don’t mind him, miss,” Nina spoke over Jack as the receptionist’s mouth popped open.  “He’s a lawyer.  An
Aries
lawyer.”

The receptionist nodded her understanding.

“You see…” Jack slammed his hands against his empty pockets.  “I was just involved in a plane crash, Miss, so I don’t have my wallet.” Jack cut his eyes at the sound of paper crinkling and swallowed back a groan when a wad of money reappeared in Nina’s hands.

The receptionist gave him a smile.  “Perhaps there’s someone who can wire you the money?”

“He’s wearing a twelve hundred dollar tuxedo and has a
fresh
manicure.  Of course he knows someone who can wire him money.”  Nina shot him a look, and when she saw the expression on his face, she looked back at the receptionist.  “But whoever that person is, has left him running for his life.”

“Are you still here?” Jack met her eyes.

“I’m also assuming he doesn’t have his ID since he doesn’t have his wallet,” Nina said.

Jack’s face fell.

The receptionist frowned.  “Unfortunately, sir, I can’t sell you a room without photo identification.”

Nina leaned forward, playing the wad of bills between her hands, and smiled at the receptionist.  “I’ll pay for his room, and mine.”

“I would rather sleep on the floor.”

“Unfortunately, you can’t sleep on the floor, sir.”

Jack gave the traitorous receptionist a glare.  “I would rather sleep outside, on the sidewalk, in the rain.”

“Unfortunately, you can’t sleep there either, sir.  This is private property, and our security will have you promptly removed.”

“So I’ll pay.” Nina beamed.  “It’s the least I could do for the guy who saved my life right?”

Jack buried his head in his hands with a groan.

“I’m not a man, Jack,” Nina said.  “I’m not going to do a nice thing for you while secretly expecting you to spread your thighs and degrade yourself in return.  This is simply a gift from the heart, from one deeply traumatized Delta Airlines passenger to another.”

“Shoot me?” Jack pled, looking up at the receptionist. “Please?”

The receptionist typed away on the computer with a smile, but that smile was gone as quickly as it came.  “Darn.  It looks like one of our last two rooms was just booked through an online agency.”

Nina and Jack were both stunned, frozen solid.

“Guess word is spreading fast amongst all the
other
traumatized passengers.” The receptionist clicked her teeth.  “The two of you can stand here and argue about it some more, but this last room might go fast—”

“We’ll take it.” Nina jumped in before she could finish.

The receptionist clicked away.  “Done.”  She smiled, reciting the total to Nina and watching as she stumbled through her cash.

“So now that I don’t have a room will your security still throw me off the premises if I decide to sleep outside on the sidewalk?”

“Unfortunately, yes, sir, they will.”

“You’re not sleeping on the sidewalk, my God.”  Nina handed the money to the receptionist before digging into the green bag on her hip and fishing out her picture ID.  “You are
such
an Aries.  You’re sharing the room with me.  I’m assuming it’s a double bed?”

“It is.”  The receptionist nodded.

Nina nodded too, taking in the sight of Jack’s chiseled jaw as he turned his head away from her.  “We’re going to man up and share the room.  The first train leaves at six a.m.  That’s a short twelve hours we’ll have to spend with each other before we’re out of one another’s lives for good.”  She waited for him to look at her, and when he didn’t, she threw a hand out.  “Or you can sleep out in the rain like a fucking idiot.”