Thip. The sound of a silencer was familiar to his ears. Stumbling to a stop, he stared with horror and complete incomprehension as blood sprayed from the bullet shot to the back of her head. She crumpled to the ground and fell out of Cruz’s sight.
“Jesus! No.” Heartbeat manic, Cruz vaulted over the shiny black hood of her car. She was sprawled facedown on the sidewalk. Blood pooled beneath her in a sickening, ever-widening red puddle.
“No!”
Nearby, a pedestrian screamed, a high-pitched sound that echoed deep in his soul. Cruz fell to his knees on the sidewalk beside her, gathering her limp body to cradle her in his arms. “Please . . .” He felt individual ribs on her narrow back through her linen jacket as he clasped her tightly to his chest.
A sob wrenched its way up his raw throat as scalding tears blurred his vision. White blurred into red.
“No,” he whispered hoarsely into the wet, sticky mess of her hair as he pressed her slender body tightly against his chest, rocking her, eyes squeezed shut. Tears burned like acid on his lashes.
She’d been hit. God fucking damn it. She’d been hit. The stupid fucking LBO had gone through, and she’d still been hit. His nightmare.
A torrent of grief flooded his body in a dense black wave of anguish too intense to contain. “Mia!” His voice was broken, hoarse.
The press of people and the susurrus of their voices were beyond Cruz’s ability to separate or even comprehend.
Running footsteps. Sirens. Noise. Screams.
As a kid, he’d mourned the violent death of his mother, been ripped apart emotionally for years afterward, but this . . . this was worse.
Someone grabbed his shoulder, shouted something unintelligible. Shrugging him off, Cruz growled low in his throat, holding her even tighter as they tried to take her from him.
She’s dead, he wanted to yell.
He’d never see her shining blue eyes laughing up at him again. He’d never see that private smile she gave him like a gift when they lay naked and satiated. He choked back the raw pain and it sounded like the cry of a wounded animal.
The overwhelming urge to look at her pressed like an anvil on his chest. He wanted to feel the silk of her hair against his fingers as he pushed it off her face so he could see her beauty one last time. But he knew, with sick bile rising in his clogged throat, that if he did, he’d never sleep again. Hell, he probably wouldn’t anyway.
“The paramedics are here, buddy,” some guy said sympathetically as the siren shut off abruptly. He smelled it then. Not tuberoses. Blood. Death.
The clang of the gurney, rapid footsteps on the sidewalk, someone talking on a comm.
The man tugged at his shoulder. Cruz shook his head. Tightened his hold. He’d promised to protect her.
Promised. He had failed her. Failed them.
There wasn’t a damn thing on this earth that could ever fill the void of her loss. Or mitigate his overwhelming guilt for allowing this to happen on his watch. Fuck him. Fuck. Him.
They had to pry his fingers off her. Had to shove him aside, a police officer holding him back, so they could lay her onto the gurney and check her vitals. The EMT turned to look at Cruz and sadly shook his head. “Don’t—” he cried, anguish making him feel wild and feral as they zipped up the black plastic bag with a grating death knell sound so final, so gut-wrenching, he couldn’t draw a breath. “Don’t,” he whispered soundlessly, crouched where he was on the crowded sidewalk.
Frozen. Paralyzed with grief. Dry-eyed.
They wheeled her away. His eyes tracked her until the doors slammed shut. He stared after the ambulance until it disappeared. No siren.
He couldn’t move.
People milled about like dark ghosts on the periphery of his vision. He was aware of the police presence, of people taking pictures with their phones, of the cool fog lifting, and of the sun’s light, but not of any feeling of warmth.
The small black void where his heart had once been expanded to fill the rest of him.
• • •
Numb and feeling wooden, Cruz gave his statement to the police. The limo driver had taken off. They had an APB out on him. What the fuck did it matter now? Finding her killer wasn’t going to bring her back. Time stretched, then was truncated. Nothing felt real as he stood there on the heatless sunny street, pedestrians washing around him as if he were a rock lapped by the tide.
He’d never hold her again, never bury his face in the fragrant crook of her neck, never—
No familiar, heady scent of tuberoses.
His gaze dropped to the wide bloodstain on the sidewalk, then swiveled to look at the tinted windows of her building. His heartbeat suddenly started to gallop.
Turning away from the detective who’d just closed his notebook, Cruz sprinted to the wide double doors, shoving the cold pink glass open with both hands. A curved black marble counter, manned by two surprised-looking security guards, stood between him and the two banks of elevators across the wide expanse of the checkered black-and-white floor. “What floor is Miss Wentworth on?” he asked without slowing down.