Nothing to Lose(22)

            “Yeah.” She drew in a shuddering breath. “He was a cop. A homicide detective. He was killed when his cover was blown.”

            His hands tightened on her. “I knew it was bad.”

            “I saw it happen. I was eight.”

            “Ah, Jade.” His lips brushed her temple. “Baby, that’s not fair.”

            “I recovered. I was fine. I am fine. I just sometimes . . . the dark . . . I don’t like the dark.”

            “And twice now you’ve been stuck in it. No more, Jade.” He pulled her to her feet and led her to the window. “It’s time to go.” He pulled the shade on the high, long, narrow glass, which didn’t change the lighting in the room because it had grown dark outside as well.

            “There are boxes here,” he said. “You’ll climb up on them and follow me out.”

            Right. Climb up. Climb out. Check.

            Will didn’t use the boxes; he didn’t have to. He pulled himself up with sheer strength. His head disappeared first, then his broad shoulders.

            And she was alone.

            Eager to follow, she climbed the boxes and reached for the window, but it wasn’t as easy as he’d made it look. Her hair got caught on the latch, and she bashed her shoulder on the ledge, but from the outside, hands pulled her through, and then she was lying on the ground, in the dirt planter, surrounded by the myriad of annual spring flowers that had so recently bloomed.

            Will pulled her to her feet. “Come on.”

            They passed her car. She eyed the way it sat low to the ground, on four slashed tires, and automatically slowed. “Oh my God.”

            “Keep moving.” He pulled on her hand, but before they went two more steps, a telltale ping buzzed past her ear and shattered her passenger window. In slow motion she watched it splinter. “Oh my God—”

            “Shit.” Will forced her into a dead-out sprint, while pulling out his gun. “My truck. See it?”

            Another ping. She waited for the searing tearing of her flesh, but it didn’t happen. Three cars down was his truck. “Yes. I see it.”

            “Get in. Fast, Jade. And get low.”

            In. Fast. Low. That was all she could repeat to herself before he shoved her toward the passenger side, and kept her body in the protective custody of his until she reached it; then he rounded the back of the truck at a sprint before hopping through the driver’s door just as the back window shattered.

            Swearing again, Will thrust the truck in gear and hit the gas. “Down,” he demanded, and added a rough hand to the back of her neck to make sure she got down enough. As they whipped through the streets, Jade caught slivers of glimpses of the city from her low perch as shock hit.

            Or maybe it was the old shock.

            She had no idea. She’d been running on adrenaline and fear for too long now. “It’s a miracle, you know.”

            Will didn’t respond, and she glanced over at him. He was driving fast but calmly, his gaze divided between the road in front of them and the rearview mirror. His hair was whipping around, as was hers, in the wind through the blown-out window, but he might have been driving them toward a moonlit walk on the beach, he looked so casual.

            Then she took a deeper look. His eyes were ice. His jaw might have been carved from granite.

            Not so casual at all.

            And still he drove with a cool precision, taking them through neighborhoods she’d never seen before, until she was good and turned around.