Run To You (8 page)

“Okay.”

“I’m serious.”

“Promise, geez.”

She pressed disconnect and dropped her cell into her backpack. She gave Malika half a second before she was speed dialing everyone she knew. Not that Stella blamed her. She’d totally do the same thing. “You broke Ricky’s jaw.”

“Right.” Beau scoffed as he squinted into the bright morning sun. “I didn’t hit him that hard.”

She stood and hung her backpack over one shoulder. “I just talked to Malika. She said Ricky’s jaw is wired shut and he’s asking questions about me and you. They’re looking at the security tapes from the other night.” Her pulse sped up and she swallowed hard. “What are we going to do?”

Fine lines creased the corners of his gray eyes. “The guy must have a glass jaw. I barely tapped him.”

That’s what occupied his brain? Not danger? Not foreboding? But how hard he hit Ricky? “It was more than a tap.”

“Are you sorry I knocked that putz out?”

She had a bruise on her arm from where Ricky had grabbed her. “No, but I obviously can’t go back to my apartment for a long time.” She saw spots in front of her eyes and sank to the bench. “My stuff is there. My whole
life
.” Her backpack slid down her arm and landed by her foot. “I just bought new bagels.”

“Are you okay?”

She didn’t have the energy to lie. “Of course not. My life sucks.”

“Are you going to pass out?”

Like he cared. “I hope so.” She covered her booming heart with one hand. “I hope I pass out and when I wake up, I discover this has all been a hideous dream.”

“Nah.” He sat next to her, and his big body crowded her space and warmed her skin. “When you wake up, your life will still suck.”

She turned her head and looked at him. “That’s not funny.”

“I know. You’ve pissed off three mob associates.”

Her mouth dropped. “Me? You broke Ricky’s jaw and now they’re looking for your black Escalade.”

“It’s a rental. I’m not worried about me.” He hit her with his elbow. “You’re screwed, though.”

The backs of her eyes stung and her vision blurred with tears. She didn’t want to cry in front of Sergeant Junger, and turned her face away. He was big and tough and not afraid of anyone.

“Are you crying?”

She shook her head. Maybe he was too stupid to be afraid, but he didn’t really strike her as stupid.

“Don’t go squishy on me now, Boots. The worst part is over.”

“What?” Her voice came out kind of thin. “How can you say that?” From where she sat, at a rest stop north of Tampa, next to a Marine she’d known for only two days, mobsters looking for them, this felt like “worst” to her. Tomorrow didn’t look any better than today.

“Yesterday morning had the potential to go sideways, and I didn’t have much of a plan B. Believe me, I was relieved when I rolled up and saw you running out of your building like crocodiles were chomping at your tail.”

“You looked calm.”

“I was calm. Calm and relieved that I didn’t have to drag you from the building.”

She sniffed and wiped beneath her eyes. “How do you stay so calm?” She’d like to be chill all the time. Like Beau. Not have a racing heart or panic attacks.

“Complete faith in my skills and abilities. Focus under fire. Lots of practice.”

She didn’t have skills and abilities like Beau. “I can carry a tune and make an excellent martini. I’m calm when I’m on stage singing or tending bar.” She shook her head and looked at Beau out of the corners of her eyes. “But those skills and abilities don’t come in handy when I’m running from mobsters.”

“Just breathe,” he advised as if it was easy. “Slow, steady breaths.” He stood and cast a shadow over her. “Everything will work out.”

“Easy for you to say.” She walked beside him toward the Escalade. “You can go home.”

“Sometimes home isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

Was he talking about his home or hers? “My apartment is small, but I like it.”

“You can’t do anything about your apartment today. Get your head in order and occupy your mind with something else. Something on deck.” He opened the door for her.

She tossed her backpack on the floor and climbed inside. On deck? “Like?”

“Your sister,” he suggested, and shut the door. “Think about your happy reunion with her.”

Happy reunion?
She’d been trying
not
to think of Sadie. Now Mr. Helper put her sister front and center in her brain. Which was just annoying. To add insult to injury, Mr. Helper plugged his Bluetooth into his ear and made business calls for the next few hours, leaving her to her own thoughts. Thoughts like she wished she had more time to prepare to meet her sister. More time to get mentally ready. More time to get her act together. Maybe get her hair cut and have a cute pedicure.

She reached into her backpack on the floor by her feet and dug around for her cell. While she liked her life, she was aware that on paper she might look like a loser. A slacker. If she had more time, she might sign up for some college classes. Not just photography and pottery classes like last time, but something smart like sociology or psychology. She was already a bartender. It couldn’t be that different. She listened to people’s problems all the time, and she might be biased, but she thought she gave pretty good advice.

To keep her mind off meeting her sister and looking like a loser, she pulled out her phone and sent a few text messages to friends. She lied and told them she’d had a family emergency and would be out of town. She should probably call her mom and tell her about Ricky, but her mother would just want her to go to Las Cruces and stay with her. She should definitely tell her mom that she was on her way to meet Sadie, but her mom would read too much into it. Want to know all the details, and Stella didn’t know any details. She’d call her mom when she actually knew something.

She put in her ear buds instead and played Zuma’s Revenge on her iPad. Just north of Gainesville, she forgot she wasn’t alone and sang along to “Pumped Up Kicks.” She belted out the chorus and really got into the line about running faster than a bullet.

Her ear bud popped out and she grabbed it, only to realize Beau had pulled it from her ear.

“No,” he spoke into his Bluetooth, his mouth turned downward at the corners as his steely gaze as he stared into hers. “I’m not a fan of Foster the People, and unfortunately that isn’t the radio.” He turned his gaze back to the endless highway. “Yeah, just pick out a unit with security cameras.”

In Tallahassee, they stopped at a Subway just long enough to use the bathroom and order lunch. Stella ordered a six-inch chicken breast with American cheese while Beau ordered an enormous foot-long with tons of meat and every available veggie. Even jalapeños. Who did that? Health nuts, that’s who. Men who took care of themselves and had muscles like Superman.

After scarfing lunch, they climbed back onto the SUV and Beau took command of the music and dialed in a heavy metal radio station. Normally, Stella liked all kinds of music. Her tastes were very eclectic, but she could not stand most heavy metal. Slipknot put her into a killing rage and Pantera made her head implode. As she watched his thumbs tap the steering wheel to the heavy beat of Anthrax, she wondered if he took steroids. She doubted it, because while his arms were big, they didn’t look roid bloated. Although thick, he had an actual neck between his head and shoulders, and last night she’d felt his erection against her belly and he didn’t seem to suffer from shrinkage. Thinking about his lack of shrinkage made her think about her cotton shirt floating about her in the water, brushing her skin, her legs and breasts as he devoured her mouth.

Devoured. That was the word for his kiss. Devoured, then pushed away.

But it was best not to even think about his obvious lack of shrinkage and devouring kiss. Thinking about it stirred a knot of hunger in her stomach and a question in her mind.

Was Superman super in bed? Not that it mattered. She’d stayed a virgin for twenty-eight years and wasn’t about to give it up to the sergeant.

To keep her mind off Superman and his super bed, Stella plugged her music back into her ear and dialed in Lady Gaga. She answered a few text messages, then dropped her phone into her backpack, bored out of her mind. She glanced over at Beau, at the strong line of his jaw and profile of his nose and lips. He had a nice mouth. Strong. Devouring. She bet he was good at more than kissing.

She folded her arms across her chest. Obviously bored
and
out of her flipping mind, she looked out the passenger window. She hit the window button and the glass slid down a few inches. Beau had told her she should think about what was “on deck.” Like her sister. The wind hit her face and she backed the glass up a few degrees. She hadn’t seen a picture of Sadie in a really long time and she wondered if the two of them looked anything alike. Probably not, since they both resembled their mothers.

Her anxiety leaked out her fingertips and she tapped the window button. Tap. Tap. Up. Down. She wondered what Sadie would see when she looked at Stella. Her father’s bastard child or a sister? Tap. Tap. Up. Down. Would she see their father’s blue eyes or Stella’s darker skin? Would she see a white woman or Hispanic? Tap. Tap. Up. Down. Would she see a person who’d never really fit in anywhere no matter how hard she’d tried?

Once again her ear bud was pulled from her ear and Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” was replaced by air racing past and rumbling through the window. The wind vibrated the inside of the SUV and pierced her eardrums with a super high-pitched whistle.

He was back to being grumpy and sent her a frosty stare from the corners of his eyes. Without a word he took control from his side of the car, rolled the window up, and locked it like she was a five-year-old.

Well, she felt as if she was five years old again. Five years old when she had no control over her life.

“When are we stopping for the night?” she asked as she flexed her shoulders.

“I was planning on driving straight through to New Orleans, but I can’t take much more.”

She knew the feeling. Her butt had fallen asleep just after they’d crossed the Chattahoochee.

Chapter Eight

S
he was a colossal pain in the ass. An even bigger pain in the ass than he’d first anticipated, and he could not wait to dump her in Texas and bug the hell out.

Beau raised his whiskey on ice to his lips and took a swallow as he pointed to the six of spades on the blackjack table in front of him. He sat at a table inside the Biloxi Hard Rock Hotel and Casino because he hadn’t been able to take it anymore.

The female dealer in a maroon blouse turned over a four and Beau sliced his hands across his cards and stayed with twenty. The dealer moved to the next player, in a god-awful flamingo print shirt and slicked back white hair. The guy’s wife sat next to him chattering on about the stuffed snapper and crawfish étouffée at a restaurant across the street. Beau lowered his glass. Stella didn’t like to fly. She didn’t like the bus. She worried about stupid things like apple cores and roadkill. She sang and sighed and played games with irritating sound effects on her iPad. To top it off, she rolled down the window just enough to fill the SUV with a brain-slapping wind and an ear-jabbing whistle. Beau had been through SERE training. Been subjected to simulated prisoner of war camp. Been deprived of food and sleep and pushed to his mental and physical breaking point, but he didn’t recall being as tortured by three days of POW camp as he’d been by spending one day confined with Stella Leon.

The dealer dealt the house a twenty-one and Beau lost a stack of orange and black chips. Around him, the bells and whistles and bloops of slot machines filled the floor. Beau slid another three hundred and fifty into the betting square. As far as he was concerned, slots were for amateurs and old ladies. It took no skill, no strategy to play slots. Just a willingness to sit in the same chair and hit a button.

The dealer slid Beau an ace of clubs and the queen of hearts. She paid out and he let the chips ride. He lost the next round and rolled his neck from side to side as the dealer scooped off his seven hundred in chips and moved to the next player. It didn’t seem to be his night. He slid several black and orange chips into the square. Hell, it didn’t seem to be his week. He was stuck with a woman who’d found the sweet spot of torture and managed to look innocent and hot as she hit it over and over again. That was the real secret weapon in her torture toolbox. The curve of her neck and waist and ass. One moment he was wondering how he could get her into a sleeper hold while driving down the interstate, and in the next, she flexed and squirmed in her seat and he envisioned her squirming against him. One second he’d been wondering how to bring the boom down on her, and in the next, she brought it down on his crotch.

He’d planned to drive straight through to New Orleans and meet with Kasper tomorrow afternoon. He could still make the meeting, but he’d had to stop. He’d had to get away from Stella. If just for a while. He’d left her in the two-bedroom suite, fussing about cost. He’d tried to explain that certain hotels comped rooms for Junger Security or at least gave corporate discounts, but he didn’t think she’d heard him over her fretting.

Beau drained the Gentleman Jack from his glass. The eighty-proof whiskey warmed his throat and stomach and reminded him he hadn’t eaten since around noon. The bells and whistles and bleeps and bloops from the slot machines filled his ears as a cocktail waitress in a tiny black outfit replaced his drink. He slipped her a twenty-dollar chip and slid his bet into the square on the table. He wouldn’t call himself a big drinker. Not like Blake or his father, but he did like to tie one on every now and then. Tonight felt like a now-and-then night.

He took a drink and felt the burn. He thought of Stella and money, or rather her lack of money. She had a trust fund she obviously didn’t consider hers, and he wondered if her father had known that the money hadn’t gone to her. He wondered if her father had cared. She’d said he never gave a shit about her, and it appeared she was right. Although he couldn’t imagine having a little girl and not being involved in her life. Not caring what happened to her. A tiny ember of anger burned right next to the whiskey in his stomach. Beau had seen a lot of horrible things in his life. He’d seen a lot of it up close and personal or through the crosshairs of a fixed scope. There were a lot of adults who deserved the horrible things that happen to them. People who asked for it because they were brutal thugs, but kids were different. Kids didn’t ask to be born into a war zone or to have shitty parents. They didn’t deserve to be disposable or forgotten.

Beau pointed to the ten of diamond and three of hearts in front of him. He was dealt a five and held at eighteen. He took a drink of his Gentleman Jack as the dealer moved to the guy in the flamingo shirt. Stella had said that her father hadn’t given a shit about her, and given that Sadie had never been told about Stella, he had to agree. Sure, Stella could be annoying and a pain in the ass, but that did not excuse Clive Hollowell for loving one child while ignoring the other.

The dealer drew twenty and scooped away Beau’s chips. Well, shit. The whiskey was doing a nice job of giving everything a warm cheery glow. Which was not a good sign. It was a sign that his judgment was impaired. A sign that he should take his remaining chips and bug out. But of course he didn’t. Not until he lost his last two thousand in chips.

He downed the last of his whiskey and tipped the dealer his last chip, He stood as sirens and flashing lights split the air. At first, Beau thought the cops were raiding the place and he turned around expecting to see some sort of takedown. A group of gray-haired ladies crowded around a row of dollar slots and one of the machines making all the commotion. Beau moved toward the crowd on his way to the concierge desk. He needed to find a thick steak and a baked potato. The closer he got, the more annoying the flashing lights. A granny had hit pay dirt and probably won enough for her and her friends to party at the buffet. Big deal.

“Holy frijole y
freakin’
guacamole!”

Beau stopped in his tracks and looked through the crowd, catching a glimpse of a familiar white tank top and shiny dark hair. Her fists pumped the air and she danced around like a prizefighter.

“I never win anything!”

A smile cracked Beau’s mouth as he glanced around the crowd surrounding Stella. Some grinned and congratulated her while a few were pinch-mouthed and gave her the evil glare. He laughed and moved toward her. That was Stella. Winning some friends and annoying others.

“Beau!” She spotted his face above the crowd; maybe it was the booze or that he was getting older, slower, but before he knew quite how it happened, her arms were wrapped around his neck and his arms were around her waist. Her toes dangled above the casino floor and her front was smashed against his. “I hit the jackpot!”

He felt a hot, lusty tumble low in his stomach and his head spun. And once again before he even thought it through, he planted a kiss on her soft, smiling lips. A kiss that lingered a little past friendly. “Congratulations, Boots.” It was the booze. Definitely the booze.

She grinned at him and he felt it next to the tumble in his stomach, the spin in his head, and the hard-on in his pants. And just like the other night in the pool, everything narrowed and focused on her. Her blue eyes and soft mouth. The weight of her hands on his shoulders and the touch of her breasts pressed to his chest. Everything around him blurred except Stella, and he fought the demand of his lust. The demand that he lower his face to hers again. To feel her mouth against his and touch his tongue to hers.

“I’ve never been this lucky.”

He set her on her feet and dropped his hands to his sides even as his body demanded he grab her and
show
her lucky.

S
eventeen thousand dollars. After federal, state, and a three percent gaming tax were all deducted from Stella’s Lucky Seven winnings, she was left with just over seventeen thousand dollars.

“I never win anything,” she said as she filled out the tax forms. She repeated her amazement as she got her picture taken with an oversize check for the casino’s Web site. She was still in shock an hour later as she sat in the padded leather booth at Ruth’s Chris Steak House inside the Hard Rock Casino. The tables were covered in white linen and set with china. A white linen napkin rested in Stella’s lap and she felt completely underdressed in her tank top and shorts. But one of her sundresses was dirty, and the other wrinkled.

A pretty blond waitress set a plate filled with a lobster tail and asparagus in front of her, and she leaned back against the tall booth. “Thank you,” she said as she watched the woman set a T-bone and huge baked potato in front of Beau.

“Can I get you two anything else?” the waitress asked them, but her attention was focused on Beau.

He looked up and gave the woman a smile Stella had certainly never seen before. It creased the corners of his eyes, and if she didn’t know him, she’d think maybe his smile was charming. “I’m good. Thank you, Sarah.”

“Okay, hon. Let me know if you need anything at all.”

Hon?
Stella watched the woman walk away and wondered what she saw when she looked at them. A handsome guy with a charming smile, and a woman in a tank top with hair that could probably benefit from a brush. She turned her attention to Beau across the table. “Do you know her?”

He shook his head and picked up his fork and big steak knife. “She’s wearing a name tag.”

Not that she cared what a woman she didn’t know thought of her, but she could buy some new clothes now. She smiled as she thought of the money she’d won. “I never win anything.” She picked up her own fork and knife, but she wasn’t all that hungry due to her excitement and the huge sandwich and chips they’d had for lunch.

Beau swallowed a big bite of his potato and washed it down with his second glass of ice water. “You’ve said that about fifty times now.”

“I know.” She couldn’t stop grinning. She’d been freaking out about how she was going to pay for an expensive hotel room that was bigger than her apartment in Miami. A heck of a lot fancier, too, with the enormous windows looking out at the gulf, two cushy bedrooms, and bathrooms with jet tubs and six heads in the three-person showers. Before she’d plugged five dollars in the Lucky Seven slot machine, she worried about how she was going to pay for a Diet Coke from the wet bar. “Now I can pay my half for the room and chip in for gas.” And not have to freeload off her sister or anyone else.

“I told you not to worry about it.” He set the glass back on the table and cut off a hunk of steak. He’d been drinking, and not just water. Not that it really showed in obvious ways, but she was a bartender and picked up on it. He was just more relaxed. Less uptight. Loose, and of course she’d smelled whiskey on his breath when he’d planted that kiss on her downstairs. “You’re a business write-off, Boots.”

He’d said that, yes. She still wanted to pay her own way. Buy a swimsuit and a bikini wax if she needed one and not have to worry about how she was going to get home. Or where she was going to live. “I can hire someone to move my stuff from my apartment now.”

He raised his gray gaze to hers as he chewed. “I took care of that. I’ll need your key so my guys don’t have to pick your lock.”

A soothing piano concerto played through the restaurant’s sound system, and the clank of plates gathered from the next table filled the air. “When?”

“We’ll FedEx it tomorrow.”

She shook her head and dunked her lobster into butter. “When did you ‘take care of that’?”

“Today.” He took a bite and swallowed before he continued. “Around the time you were annoying me with ‘Pumped Up Kicks.’ ”

No man had ever taken care of anything for her in her life. “Thank you.” It felt strange, she thought as she ate her buttery lobster. New. Different, and she didn’t know whether she liked it. “I’ll pay for it all, of course.”

He shrugged. “It’s not that big a deal. I know some guys who owe me.” He dug into his potato, and normally the amount of food he ordered would have been an obvious sign of intoxication, but for Beau it was just another meal.

She took a bite and tried not to moan. Beau didn’t like it when she moaned, but the lobster was delicious. Technically, she supposed, this was the third time he’d helped her. The first time had been the night he’d punched Ricky. The second, when he’d rescued her from her apartment amid a fog of flashbang. She was afraid she could get used to having a man around who had her back. “You don’t like ‘Pumped Up Kicks’?” she asked so she wouldn’t have to think how nice it felt to have a man pick up a bit of her load.

He swallowed and reached for his water. “Last time I was on Fremont Street, it was playing in all the casinos.”

“Fremont Street, Las Vegas?”

His eyes met hers over the bottom of the glass, then he set it back on the table. “Yeah.”

“When were you there last?”

“On Fremont?” He shrugged, then turned his attention to his dinner. “About a year ago when I moved to Henderson.”

“You live in Henderson, Nevada?”

“Yeah.”

“I used to live in North Vegas. In a real crap apartment with two other girls.” She laughed and reached for her own water. “We started a girl band. The first of several that I belonged to.” She shook her head. “Lord, but I’ve sung in some real dive bars.”

He looked up but he didn’t bother to look surprised.

“But you know that. Don’t you?”

“I know your employment history.” He waved his steak knife in her direction. “And before you get twisted about all that again, you know my employment history as well.”

She pulled her hair over one shoulder and stabbed some asparagus. “I only know that you were in the military and now you’re a spy.” She took a bite and smiled.

Predictably, his brows lowered. “I was in the Marines and I’m not a spy, but I think you know that.”

Yeah, she knew that. “Did you drive a tank?” She could see him driving a tank through clouds of smoke and fire and flashbang.

He chewed slowly as he ate, as if he was weighing exactly what he wanted to tell her. “I was a scout sniper.”