by Trixie More
The Path it was. It had to be the train to Jersey because that would be the worst fucking thing that could happen. Doug barreled down the stairs as he heard the train pull to a stop below. He jumped the last four steps to a landing, almost took a knee, turned, and shit! She was getting on the train. He vaulted over the railing, feeling his bicep pull like a mother, and his knees took the hit like it had been a bat to their caps.
He practically knocked over a little kid as he thrust his arm between the doors and got a foot onto the train. With his other hand, he grabbed the kid by the shirt and pulled him on board, letting go of the shirt like it was on fire, as soon as he knew the kid was fine and actually was supposed to be on the train. The boy’s mother grabbed his chubby arm and pulled him away, her eyes checking him out warily. Doug hunched his shoulders and started to move through the cars. He better not find Sophia in the same car as her target because he’d have to kill her. Right after he saved her.
Of all the dumb luck, she wound up on the same car as the man she was following. Sophia turned quickly to the left, keeping her back to her target. The seat nearest the back of the car was taken, so she grabbed a strap. Opening the door between cars and leaving would call attention to herself. Instead, she reached up and grabbed a strap, spreading her feet, studiously looking out the window at the gray and dirty inside of the tunnels.
The window reflected back her own likeness, and she glanced at her quarry’s image. From here, at least, she could see when he left the train.
She thought about Doug. The last time she’d seen him was two weeks ago, that day in his dusty and empty penthouse. He’d been emailing her a couple times a week. The man must be spending every waking hour on it. He was making progress quickly without the luxury of the tools guys on the job used. Too bad it was all about his money. For a moment when he’d asked if the cases were linked, she’d thought she’d found an ally, but none of what he sent helped find George’s killer. Not that it was hers to prosecute. The matter that was legitimately hers was working on some money laundering scheme. The victims were all lonely women who met a man online, fell in love with a virtual stranger—literally—and found themselves cashing checks for him. They all thought a wedding was impending, and they all thought it was great bad luck that the fella had such trouble actually getting on a plane to see them. Delays, mixed-up tickets and sudden emergencies always kept their man away. Imagine that. When the cybercrime unit froze their bank account, it was a great shock. Sophia wanted to shake them silly sometimes. How could they fall for such an obvious con? That brought her right back to Doug—another kind of con. Oh, fine. A sexy con. She just let herself think it. The man was sexy in a so-not-her-type way.
Just what is your type? The thought crept in without an invitation. To be honest, she had no clue what her type was. It wasn’t golden and glorious Ben. He doted on her and she slunk away. He told her she was beautiful, and suddenly, she was thirteen and afraid again.
Was this train ever stopping? She checked on her target. The pretzel had been demolished, the paper holder stuffed into a pocket. He was leaning back against the plastic seat, his prodigious ass splooching out of the molded seat’s curved cup. As if he’d heard her thoughts, his eyes found hers in the window.
Damn! She forced herself not to jerk her gaze away. Instead, she let herself look him in the eye impassively. After a beat, she let her eyes wander to other passengers, just like she had no interest in any of them, as if they were all just a boring diversion as she waited. She didn’t risk another glance at his face, focusing on the floor just ahead of his feet instead. The train stopped, doors opened, and the feet didn’t move. The man in the end seat pushed past her and in the car beyond, a flash of red beard caught her eye. Her body recognized Doug before she did, her stomach fluttering and her pulse jumping even as her mind was asking her if that could be him. He hadn’t been wearing a hat before, had he? She turned away, settling onto the vacated seat and was just in time to see Mr. Pretzel’s shin and foot disappearing out the door. Again!
She launched herself at the doors as they were sliding shut. She wouldn’t make it, she wouldn’t make it! She lunged, thrusting her arm into the closing gap. Damn, that hurt. She shoved her chest and shoulder into the slight space as a stranger behind her helped pry the rubber edges open.
As she slid through, trying to keep her feet from missing the cement platform, a voice behind her said, “Good thing you’re thin,” as the train pulled away. Through the window, a snaggle-toothed smile lit the face of her anonymous helper as he waved goodbye.
Recovering her balance and ignoring the pain in her arm, she turned to search for her mystery man, finding an angry convict instead.
Doug didn’t speak to her, instead he grabbed her arm and yanked her back away from the exit stairs. She resisted the urge to cry out, her arm already hurt from the door. Doug had a vise grip on her bicep but Sophia was still focused on not calling attention to herself so she clamped her mouth shut. She tripped along beside Doug until they were both in shadows behind a poster-covered tile column. When he stopped, he swung her around to face him.
His jaw was tight, his chin tipped up. It occurred to Sophia that the Doug Lloyd before her now was someone different. Gone was the focused day trader. Gone was the teasing flirt from the kitchen. This was the man capable of pushing Dorothy Johansen into the trunk of his car and driving off with her, capable of clawing his way from a few hundred dollars to eighteen million with nothing more than a high school education and a bad attitude. He was a man capable of anything.
Doug’s eyes were unreadable, the faint crests of his fair eyebrows remained flat, calm, his expression was a blank canvas, but his body said something else. He was crowding her with his chest, looking down his nose at her, commanding her attention in every way. She should have been frightened, all her self-defense practice should have kicked in, but instead, she was fascinated. She narrowed her eyes at him and he grabbed her shoulders, gripping them tightly and then, without changing expression, still staring straight into her eyes, his hands gentled and he smoothed them along her arms, slowly, from shoulder to elbow where they paused, holding her there for a moment before releasing her. She felt bewitched. She should have been terrified, should have been outraged, should have been reminded of another man and herself, behind a booth at a fair and she should have lashed or at least, run. None of that happened.
He inhaled deeply and something showed through, far back in his blue gaze, something like confusion. She empathized. Sophia reached out, laying the palm of her hand on his jaw, feeling the rough hair of his sparse beard. He didn’t move a muscle, but his blue eyes widened just a fraction and she stepped forward. Doug stared at her and finally, finally, he let himself look at her whole face. She felt it, she always felt it when men noticed her beauty but with him it was different. This time she believed...
She dropped her hand and stepped back, watching him give a little shake of his head. There was one more tell, a swallow, and then he was back to himself or this dangerous version of himself.
“That’s the smartest thing you’ve done all day.”
“How would you know?”
He pressed his lips together. “Because I’ve been friggin’ following you, that’s how.”
“You have no clue what I did this morning before breakfast,” she said. “It might have been extremely intelligent.”
Doug stepped into her space. “I’m not playing here.”
“Neither am I,” she said. “I don’t need you checking up on me.” She gestured to the station platform, now almost devoid of bystanders. “And now you made me lose him!” She yanked her pocketbook higher on her arm and tugged on the belt of her coat. “Don’t you ever grab me like that again. I could have you arrested for assault.”
“What the—” he stopped, twisting his neck to the side, closing his eyes for a moment as if he was praying for patience, but Sophia knew that this was a man that didn’t pray. He had no religion; how could he? The crimes he
’d committed proved that. Doug opened his eyes, shook his head again and held out his hand, palm up. Was he inviting her to take it? Her brain froze. Was that something that could happen? Could she willingly put her hand in his? He gave his open hand a slight push toward her.
“Take it, goddamn it,” he said, his expression belligerent.
Sophia folded her arms and began to walk toward the stairs. Doug let his arm drop and she watched his wide-legged walk as he moved ahead of her. He’d not gone more than five steps when he stopped cold and turned back toward her, his back straight, his fair eyebrows barely more than brush strokes across the vulnerable skin there pulled together above his short, auburn eyelashes. She felt her head tip gently as she studied the cool veins faintly visible along his temple. She returned to looking at his eyes and her breath caught. His face had the same expression she’d seen when he studied the photo she showed him. All that intense concentration was focused on her. Not on her chest, or her legs, or even her face, at least not on the beauty of her face. All that intense concentration was directed right. At. Her.
“You touched my face,” he said, but it was more of a question than a statement.
What could she say? She had. She remained silent.
“Would you accuse me of assault? Really?” he asked.
No. Never. What a traitor her mind was.
“If you hurt me? Yes,” she said.
“Physically?” he asked.
“Yes.”
His voice lowered. “It would never happen.” Doug tossed the words out as if they were beyond obvious. “Mentally?”
“Maybe.”
His eyes stared at her.
“What if I broke your heart?”
I’d kill you. The answer came so quickly into her mind that it shocked her and for a second she was struck mute. Just as quickly, she closed the distance between them.
“You won’t get the chance,” she said. He followed her up the stairs into the sunlight.
“So, are you going to tell me who he is?” Sophia asked him. Her ivory coat had gray streaks across the forearm where she’d shoved it through the doors.
He was still astonished by their conversation below ground. What had possessed him to ask her that? One minute he’d been trying to pull her out of sight, terrified she’d be seen with him and become a target; the next minute she’d been looking at him with the strangest expression, like she’d found something weird and unexpected, something good. When she’d laid her cool and perfect palm against his face, he’d wished his beard gone, incinerated. He wanted her fingers on his skin; he wanted her. She released him and that was for the best. There was no future for the two of them, and Doug wasn’t a one-night kind of man. Not anymore.
“Are you?” She craned her neck to see the side of her sleeve.
“Dirt’s on the forearm,” he offered, “I think the cleaners can get it out.”
She looked over her shoulder at him; the gesture was innocent enough, but he had a sudden vision of her hips in his hands, her looking over a bare shoulder at him. God. What a mess this was. He wasn’t supposed to be interested in her, at least not this interested in her.
Who am I kidding? he thought. He’d been fuckin’ dreaming about her in the joint.
He remembered the first time he’d seen her, he was at his bail hearing. He’d never set foot in a jail in his life. He remembered thinking, How did I wind up here? An ironic smirk had tried to take over his expression. He’d been asking himself that question since the day he’d been born. A sharp line of fear and uncertainty gripped his bowels as he tried to will himself not to sweat. If bail was denied, he’d be led away by the bailiff, fancy clothes or not. Beside him, William clapped him once on the shoulder and they were through the doors. Doug had turned his head to the right slowly, scanning the bench, the prosecutor’s table, the empty jury box, the first row of observers and the second row. His eyes passed over an exotic-looking woman, Italian perhaps, with almond-shaped eyes so brown, they might be black. Beneath her high cheekbones, her mouth was...unusual. Both her upper and lower lips were full, combining with a narrow jaw to give her appearance a cat-like quality. Her neck was long, her figure, perfect.
There had been nothing there to interest him. He’d been engaged to a beautiful woman, Janice, and she’d turned on him. Well, perhaps not turned, maybe fooled him from day one, never actually giving a rat’s ass about him. That was probably more like it. He’d finished scanning the right side of the room and turned his face away from the too-pretty woman to check out the faces to the left of him. From the corner of his eye, he saw the woman stand, changing seats.
His attorney, William, headed directly to the front row on the left. The judge entered, and in minutes, they were rising and moving to the defendant’s table. For once in his life, he’d wished he wasn’t first in line. He didn’t want to go to jail.
“How do you plead?” the judge had intoned.
“Not guilty, your honor,” William said.
Behind him, on the right, he’d heard something drop to the floor. While William gave the judge all the reasons why Doug deserved bail, Doug glanced at the excessively handsome woman. She was bent over, reaching for an object. Was there something familiar about her? When she lifted her head, she was looking straight into his eyes, and he’d felt a jolt of attraction followed hard by a sense of having been caught out like he’d been peeping in a window. Her eyes had been wide and shone with fierce intelligence, and that, more than her beauty, was what did him in. After that, when he thought of her, he called her Athena.
Here he was, on the street, actually walking with Athena, all these years later.
“Doug!”
“Yeah?” He looked at her and let himself smile, just because he wanted to.
“Who was he?” The arch of her pretty eyebrows moved him not at all, but the acceptance in her face almost broke him. He couldn’t think of another person who looked at him like that except Alice and Tommy.
“Have you eaten today?” he asked.
Pedestrians flowed past them, the October air was crisp, and the sky blue between the buildings, the light breeze following the people as they moved in and out of the storefronts. Traffic was light right now and it was easy enough to steer Sophia across the Avenue. For one moment, with his legs able to stretch out, without any plan for the afternoon. With a woman beside him he admired, Doug felt odd, kind of...content.
Sophia matched his pace. With her hands in the deep pockets of her coat, she stayed even with him, pulling out her cell phone and moving closer. Then, he felt a jolt to his arm. Another. Bump, bump. She was fooling with him, nudging him in the arm, a girlish grin on her face. Her head was bent over her phone and it looked like the entire conversation was just emojis. She looked girlish, happy and trusting. Bump, bump.
“Who’re you texting?”
Glossy hair slid over her shoulder, and she gathered it in one hand to pull it behind her. It looked like liquid silk in the sunlight, her professional, polished fingernails in sharp contrast to the child-like expression on her face. She glanced at him and that happiness hit him full force.
Rose-tinted lips, full and womanly, came together into a much more sophisticated smile. The force of it was directed at Doug and it spoke to him, tightened his groin, made his pulse jump but it cost too much because it came at the loss of her uncensored expression of joy.
She slanted a glance at him, but she couldn’t hold it together and a laugh escaped her. “My brother.”
One more button press, and the phone was tucked away. “He was checking on me.”
“Well, that’s good. Someone needs to. What in the hell possessed you to follow the man I was meeting?”
“You did.” She bumped him again, causing something inside his very being to let go, to relax and just settle. The feeling was so unusual he almost stopped in his tracks.
“I didn’t want you anywhere near him,” he answered. “The restaurant’s just over there. Are you hungry or not?”
“I could eat,” she said. Doug moved behind her to get the door, but she pulled it open and held it for him. “After you.”
The place was busy but not fully packed, so they were seated quickly. She ordered a salad with shrimp. He got his usual—eggs over easy, bacon, and home fries, with hot, black coffee—leave the pot. As he gave his order, he was acutely aware of Sophia watching him. It was all he could do not to pull her over the table to him. He was struck by the most intense desire to get his hands on her, to just hug her to him. It was sexual, of course, he’d been handling things himself, so to speak, for three years now, but the underlying emotion was so foreign he almost couldn’t name it. Couldn’t have named it, in fact, except there was Alice. He had Alice, so he knew what this was—a groundswell, a surge almost tidal in its breadth—of sheer gratitude. Gratitude for the camaraderie, for her unabashed interest not in his failings, not in his money or his plans, just—him, as he was. Bah. He was an idiot.
“What are you lookin’ at?” he asked harshly. She didn’t falter. If anything, her eyes twinkled at him. Gleeful, mischievous humor there.
“You enjoyed that. I mean, truly enjoyed that,” she said, full of discovery as if she’d figured out where he kept his stash.
“What?” He wasn’t sure what she was talking about.
“Why? Was it because you got to tell a woman to bring you food? You like ordering people around?” She tipped her head. He got it, she’d watched him order his food and now, she was baiting him. She’d hit on something real.
He felt one side of his mouth kick up in a smile. “You caught me.”
“No!” She was laughing now, sitting back in her chair. “Reaaaally. Interesting.”
“No, not really, you widget.” He couldn’t stop the smile from coming. He didn’t want to do this, but there was no stopping it now. He fuckin’ liked her. Shit. His grin widened and he just—gave up. “I’m getting breakfast at, what is it?” he glanced at his watch. “Something like three in the afternoon? I’m ordering my eggs just the way I like them. I’m not getting dry as dust toast. I AM getting the home fries. She’ll leave a full pot of coffee on the table. Get it? I’m choosing my own damn meal, the way I like it, when I like it.”
