Chapter 13

“Are you sure it’s safe?” Callie whispered, peering around at the darkness.

The rear entrance to her apartment was deserted. Distant streetlights were weak, casting a yellow glow in the alley, creating dark impenetrable shadows. I used the keys we still had to open the door.

Avoiding the ancient elevator - it was too noisy and a trap if we were spotted - I led her up the stairs, pausing at every landing to check the corridors.

Her front door opened silently. I paused, listening for anyone. Dark rooms have a feeling about them. When someone’s in the room, I know it. Maybe it’s instinctual in humans; that ability to sense another presence, a protective instinct in our genes. The apartment was empty, echoing silence.

“No. Don’t!” I whispered, reaching out to stop Callie from turning on a light. “Close the curtains.”

With a small flashlight we searched the apartment looking for anything out of the ordinary, anything that might have been left by her father. We found nothing after forty-five minutes. I was stumped.

I had no ideas left. What now?

“We should go,” I whispered.

“Kay.”

Turning the front door handle, the door exploded in knocking me back. Callie screamed.

A dark shape charged through the door, one hand holding a gun. I launched myself at him, grabbing his gun hand and ramming my shoulder into him. He grunted. The gun went off, hot pain searing my arm as I drove him up off his feet and back into the brightly lit corridor.

Without thought, I powered him into the marble floor on his back with everything I had and felt his ribs crack as I landed on top of him. The back of his head hit the floor so hard it bounced, making a wet smacking sound. He went limp.

Standing, breathing hard, I looked at him. Six-two, hard, muscled. I’d never seen him before. Blood pooled under his head. I checked for a pulse. None. Fuck!

“Callie! Let’s go!”

Turning, Callie was standing in the doorway frozen, eyes huge and staring at the dead man.

“Come on!” I urged, grabbing a cold hand.

Running down the hall to the stairs, Callie stopped, pulled her hand from mine, bent, and vomited. I tugged her back into motion and we raced down the stairs, leaving through the back door. She stopped and, bending, threw up again.

Glancing up and down the alley, I waited for her to finish heaving, then took her icy hand and led her away.

“He’s dead!” she exclaimed.

Waving down a cab, I said, “Not now. We’ll talk about it when we’re back at the hotel.”

Three cabs later, we entered the hotel. In our room, I poured Callie a glass of white wine, thinking it might be good for shock.

She drank, then choked, the glass tumbling to the floor. “You’re bleeding! You’ve been shot!”

In the rush of action and adrenalin, I’d forgotten. Taking the blood-soaked shirt off, I checked my bicep. The bullet had creased the inside of my upper arm; nothing serious. Antibiotic cream and a butterfly bandage could handle it. “It’s nothing. Don’t worry.”

“Nothing?” she exclaimed, standing. “You’re bleeding!” She dashed to the bathroom and returned with a towel. Shoving my hand aside, she wrapped it around my arm, tying it with a knot. Her hands shook.

“Callie,” I said softly, taking her hands. “It’s nothing. Just a scratch.” When I drew her into a hug, I felt her trembling. Kissing the top of her head, I reassured her, “A simple bandage will fix it.”

She whispered, “You could have been killed.” Then, leaning back and staring at me, eyes frigid blue, she exclaimed loudly, “You could have been KILLED, you idiot!”

“Risk is part of the job, Callie.”

“Let’s go away. Run away. We could hide somewhere they’d never find us. We could just disappear. They’d stop hunting for us.” In an increasing, jumbled frenzy she spit out plans, destinations, options, all driven by the need to escape danger - a reaction to what she’d just seen.

I waited her out. When she fell silent, I said calmly, “I wasn’t killed. There’s nowhere to run. You can’t spend the rest of your life in hiding. There’s only one way to make all this stop and that’s to figure out what’s going on.”

“But...” Tears glistened in her eyes. In a soft voice, she said, “You could have been killed, Hunter. All because of me.”

Taking her hand, I backed up and sat in the armchair, drawing her onto my lap. “This is not your fault. This is their fault. They are responsible for your father’s death. They are responsible for shooting me. They are responsible, not you.”

Callie melted against me, her head finding my shoulder. We sat in silence. Eventually she whispered, “Kay.”

Inside, I was concerned. Lethal danger had not been a concern before. Now it was. Anger made my blood boil. I didn’t care about the scratch on my arm, but what if the bullet had hit Callie instead of me? I needed to take the initiative. But how?

Later in bed, in the darkness, with Callie so close she was almost on top of me, she spoke. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?”

“For falling apart like that. I’ve never seen a dead body before. I haven’t seen a gunshot wound, either. I don’t like blood, Hunter. It makes me sick to my stomach. How can you handle it so easily?”

“It just is. I don’t think about it. Blood’s never bothered me. My two brothers and I got into all sorts of trouble, not fighting, just daring each other to do stupid things. Bleeding was usually the end result.”

Callie turned her face up to me. “Kiss me, Hunter. I need it.”

Smiling, I kissed her. Warm, silky lips pressed to mine, pressure growing. She moaned quietly when the tips of our tongues touched and pressed herself against me even harder. When she opened her mouth, when our kiss intensified into the sensual, I grew hard. Caressing down her back, I cupped her buttock. Callie responded, drawing her knee up to rest on top of my legs. I nibbled her lip, loving her sighs. Then her knee found my erection and she kissed me with passion.

The quiet moan was in my head, brought on by Callie’s hand settling over my erection, gently feeling the outline, hesitant, exploring, her first touch. It felt fantastic. I caressed her gorgeous buttock, soft cotton under my hand. In a moment driven by passion, I slipped my hand up and eased my fingertips under the waist of her panties. Suddenly I held her cool, bare buttock, compact and perfect. My erection throbbed against her palm and she curled her fingers, holding my shaft over my boxers. Control was slipping away. I wanted her. God I wanted her!

Ending the kiss, a Herculean task, I said, “I don’t think we should be doing this.”

“Why not?” Her hand still held my erection.

Easing my hand out of her panties, I told her, “This is just a reaction to the danger we experienced. It’s natural to have intense feeling afterwards, to seek affection and companionship. We should stop.”