Unmemorable (Unmemorable Series)

by A. P. Jensen

  “Are you almost done here?”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Raven whirled with the duster gripped like a bat. A man with a rugged, hawk like profile, military short hair and piercing blue eyes so light they seemed silver stood three feet from her. He raised one brow and crossed his arms, stretching the salmon button up shirt he wore. Although he exuded wealth and privilege, he was built like a linebacker in perfect slacks and shiny Italian shoes. His mouth was set in an uncompromising line and he looked irritated.

  “Mr. Henson?” Raven said uncertainly.

  “That’s my grandpa. Are you almost finished?”

  Slowly, she lowered the duster, her mind lurching into gear. “Could you run your card through the door, please?”

  His eyes narrowed and she inwardly flinched but didn’t back down. All anyone had to do was push her cart to the side if they wanted to get in. There was no proof that this man was telling the truth.

  “Why?”

  “It’s hotel policy for any guest entering the room to run their key through the slot so there aren’t any… mistakes,” she said.

  His mouth hardened. “You think I’m lying?”

  Oh shit, oh shit. “No. I just want to cover all the bases.”

  For a moment she thought he was going to refuse, but he abruptly turned on his heel and walked back to the front door. She peeked over his shoulder as he pointedly put his key card in the slot and pulled it out. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the light flash, reassuring her that this was, indeed, his room.

  “Sorry. I just had to make sure,” Raven said uncomfortably.

  “Are you done?”

  “Sure. Let me grab my things.”

  Raven gathered her supplies, aware of his unfriendly eyes following her. He stayed by the front door the whole time, arms crossed while he waited. She felt herself blush with anger and embarrassment. He was making her feel like an idiot. When she normally would have left without a word, she paused.

  “Is there anything else I can do for you, sir?” Raven asked, using proper Decadent protocol before leaving a guest.

  He shook his head and slammed the door in her face. Raven glared and resisted the urge to spit on the door, which she would feel obliged to clean. She tossed her supplies carelessly on the cart and silently told Mr. Rich and Husky what he could do with his attitude. She went back to the fifty-ninth floor and maneuvered the cart back into the storage room. She took her time cleaning the cart and restocked it before she plugged it in to charge and jogged down the emergency exit stairs to the fifty-fifth floor. The room was already full with people clocking out a little early so they could meet with their families or party the night away. Raven unclipped her key card from her pocket and tossed it on the table along with her crumpled room assignment paper.

  After she clocked out, she joined the anxious group waiting for the elevator to come up to their floor. Raven heard Marie trying to recruit more partiers for the night before she walked over to Raven, who stood apart from everyone else.

  “Do you have anything to do tonight?” Marie asked.

  Raven blinked, wondering if Marie was playing some kind of joke on her. “Maybe.”

  “We’re asking anyone who doesn’t want to do the Thanksgiving thing to party with us tonight. You want my number? We’re going to go to XS at The Wynn if you’re interested.”

  Raven looked into her innocent eyes and shook her head. “Nah. I’ve got somewhere to be.”

  “Alright. Well, if you change your mind, you know where we’ll be,” Marie said.

  The elevator dinged and they all piled in. Due to the fact that most housekeepers were foreigners who didn’t know what personal space was, Raven got used to being pressed up against them in the elevator. She frowned at Marie who asked several others to join her. Raven suspected that Marie had a short-term memory because Raven spoke to the other woman many times and had the same result- Marie didn’t remember a damn thing. When the elevator opened on the ground floor, everyone ran to retrieve their personal items from the garment bags.

  Once she got her bag, Raven went to the bathroom to change out of her sweaty uniform and pull on street clothes. She dropped her uniform down the laundry chute and walked out to the parking garage. A craving for something sweet had her braving the crowds in the grocery store. The bakery section was nearly empty, but she found a single slice of rum cake.

  “Happy Thanksgiving,” the cashier said.

  Raven paused and nodded at the smiling girl. “Happy Thanksgiving.” It was the first time she acknowledged the holiday.

  As Raven approached her apartment complex, nerves and panic came soaring back. Hands tight on the wheel, Raven did a drive by of her complex, eyes moving over the cars in the lot before she made a U turn and turned in. As soon as she parked, her instincts spiked but she forced herself to get out of the car and walk to her apartment. She unlocked her door, closed it quickly behind her and put the chain on in the same motion. She turned to her shadowy apartment and heard nothing but her neighbor’s TV. The smell of turkey seeped through the walls and her mouth watered. She went to the doorway of her bedroom and flipped on the light without stepping into the room. She scanned the room and made sure the bathroom was clear before she stripped out of her jacket and folded it on the storage container. She made sure the blinds were shut tight and felt better knowing there were bars on the window.

  Raven turned up the heat before she stripped and showered. She dressed in an old, oversized sweatshirt, sweats and fuzzy socks and warmed up her frozen meal. Her shoulders were tight with tension so in an effort to relax, she turned on the TV and watched the Hallmark channel. Usually she went to great efforts to ignore any holiday but she was feeling jittery and uneasy and she decided watching something sappy would distract her. For a moment, she thought of Marie partying the night away and tried to shrug off her irritation with the younger woman for making her feel so… forgettable.

  Raven plopped down on the lumpy love seat, ate her chicken and vegetable meal and blanched while she watched the movie. It was so fake. Raven changed the channel and relaxed as a news reporter’s voiced filled the small apartment. Raven watched a good-looking man report details on a gruesome murder that happened not far from her apartment. When the news turned to creative recipes for leftover turkey, she flipped the channel to unsolved investigations and relaxed against the cushions. Raven’s gaze strayed to the kitchen counter where her only concession to the holidays was. The rum cake called seductively to her, but she was distracted by a series of bizarre, heinous clues left behind by a serial killer.

  “Sick,” Raven muttered.

  A hard pound on the front door rattled the flimsy wood in its frame. Rising quickly and soundlessly from the couch, Raven walked into the kitchen and pulled out a pellet gun from a drawer. The pounding continued and she waited, legs braced apart, facing her front door. She glanced at the time on the microwave clock, 8:25.

  “Bastard,” Raven muttered.

  There was a long silence and then footsteps sounded on the metal stairway as the stranger made their way down the steps to the parking lot. Raven stayed where she was, adrenaline coursing through her body and the need to fight pounding in her heart. Living alone for as long as she had, in the places she’d been forced to live, taught her that you could never be too careful. No matter how often it happened, she never got used to people pounding on her front door, cornering her in parking lots or following her to the car after buying groceries. A woman living alone was free game for anyone, but Raven made sure she wasn’t easy in any sense.

  After pacing the floor and peeking out through the blinds down at the parking lot, which was empty, Raven placed her rum cake on the nicest plate she owned. She cursed people who would try to pick a fight on Thanksgiving when people’s guards were down. Raven settled into a corner of the love seat, tucked her feet beneath her and took her first bite. Against her will, Raven’s eyelids drooped. She savored the piece of cake and couldn’t stop the satisfied hu
m that came from her throat. Deciding that she was in heaven and that bastard could come back and break in as long as he left her rum cake alone, she took another bite. Her eyelids fully closed this time and she let the taste of butter, rum and cake consume her. A car revved in the parking lot, a holiday commercial played Here Comes Santa Clause and she wiggled her toes in ecstasy and let out a silly giggle as she opened her eyes… and choked.

  A man stood not two feet from her, between her and the TV. Without thinking, she hurled her plastic flower plate from Target at him. Clutching her fork in one hand, she jumped over the back of the couch and braced herself for anything. Cursing her housekeeping habits, which caused her to put the gun back in the kitchen drawer, Raven clutched the fork like a dagger. The man was tall and big. With only the light from the TV behind him, his face was cast in shadow. He wore a trench coat that concealed everything and his silence and stillness was freaking her out.

  “Get out of my house,” Raven ordered, keeping her voice cool though her heart pounded in her ears.

  How the hell had he gotten in? She didn’t need to glance at the door to know it was still locked. Raven hurled the fork and heard it hit the wall as the bastard moved his shoulder, avoiding it easily. It sent alarm bells through her because the move was too practiced and smooth. She ran to the kitchen, which was the only source of light in the apartment. She opened the drawer, pulled out the pellet gun and aimed. Her stomach dropped when the man took two steps forward and the light revealed his face. It was the linebacker businessman from the penthouse.

  “What the hell are you doing, psycho?” Raven shouted.

  “Keep your voice down,” he growled.

  In the back of her mind, Raven congratulated herself on her panicked aim. Moist rum cake smeared his chest and part of his neck. The other part of her mourned the loss of that precious cake. She braced her feet, held the gun steady with both hands and aimed for his neck.

  “Get out of my apartment and go back to your penthouse suite at Decadent.”

  Something flickered in his eyes. “How do you know where I’m staying?”

  She sneered and gripped the gun tighter. A shot from her pellet gun wouldn’t kill him but it would hurt bad enough to distract him so she could make a getaway but… what would a millionaire want with her?

  “We saw each other not even three hours ago, asshole, and I’m off the clock so if you don’t get out, I’m going to call the cops.”

  She ran her tongue over her teeth and considered him. She didn’t have patience for this and she was at a total loss as to how the big bruiser got into her apartment. She was wary but strangely, not afraid.

  He blinked. “We’ve met?”

  She cocked a hip. Was he deliberately being stupid? “Yeah, I was in your room and now you stalked me here, apparently. If you’re looking for a hooker, you’re out of luck. Not my line of work. There’s lot of willing women so there’s no reason for you to barge in here.”

  “I was sent here.”

  That statement sent chills through her.

  “Get out. Now.”

  His face was way too calm for her liking. On impulse, she pointed the gun down and pulled the trigger. He let out a muffled yell, grasped his left leg and went down on one knee.

  “You have thirty seconds to get out before I go for a more sensitive area,” she said pleasantly.

  “We don’t have time for this. They’re going to come back-.”

  “Twenty nine, twenty eight.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Twenty two, twenty one.”

  Her temper flared to new heights when he continued to stay where he was, kneeling on her floor covered in rum cake. Maybe he didn’t believe that she’d pull the trigger. One should never test a woman holding a weapon, even if it was just a pellet gun.

  “Fifteen, three, zero.”

  Raven prepared to squeeze the trigger just as all hell broke loose. The window beside the door shattered. Glass sprayed everywhere and Raven and the bruiser hit the floor, hands over their heads. Gunfire blasted and Raven could hear the shells bouncing on the floor. Curiously deaf, Raven raised her head and watched the linebacker draw two guns from his trench coat. He used the couch for cover and motioned her towards him. She shook her head and started towards her bedroom at an army crawl. Something grasped her ankle. She tried to kick him off, rolled over and pointed the pellet gun in his face.

  “Let me go!” she shouted, but she knew he couldn’t hear her over the gunshots.

  Someone slammed into the front door and she knew it wouldn’t hold long. She kicked the rich boy in the head and scrambled away when he released her. She made it into her bedroom, kicked the door shut and locked it. She slipped the pellet gun into the stretchy waistband of her sweats, shrugged into her jacket and dragged her storage container over to the wall. She hopped on the lid and with her hand wrapped in her long sleeve, she punched through the glass of the rectangular window high up on the wall. She didn’t care about her hands, which were shredded by jagged pieces of glass as she hauled herself up and balanced on her tummy and looked down at a sheer drop two stories high. Frigid air hit her face and her heart thundered. Her stomach lurched as the front door splintered and gunfire and yells echoed from the living room.

  Raven closed her eyes and launched herself out of the window. She tucked herself into a ball with both arms protecting her head and landed painfully on a hedge that gave beneath her weight. She was careful not to make a sound as she rolled off the hedge and hid between the building and foliage. The gunshots stopped above her and the ringing in her ears began to fade as she checked to see if she broke anything. All good. She crept through the hedge, knowing it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out how she escaped from the apartment. She rounded the apartment building and peeked into the parking lot. There was no sign of anyone, which freaked her out more than anything else. She thought of taking off on foot, but she was bleeding and barefoot and wouldn’t last long in the cold. She used other cars for cover as she wove her way around and between them. When she reached her car, she crouched beside the car and swept a hand on the inside metal over the tire and found the magnetic key she stashed there. Hands slippery with blood, she put the key in the lock and listened before she pulled it open. She was about to slip into the driver’s seat when she heard a sound behind her.

  Before she could turn, a man pinned her to the ground. Her face smashed into cold concrete and stars exploded behind her eyes. He didn’t make a sound, which made her heart skip with fear. He tried to pin her hands behind her back and she felt cold handcuffs slip over her skin. With a burst of adrenaline, she twisted her hands out of his hold and rolled under the car opposite her own. It was a truck high enough for her to roll beneath and the man cussed as his head banged against metal. She grabbed the pellet gun from her waistband and when the man crouched down to look at her, she shot him full in the face. He reeled back screaming and she heard more running footsteps. She scrambled forward and shoved the wounded man to the side. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw a man closing in fast. She yanked the door open and even as she tried to get into the driver’s seat, a shot fired and she gasped as pain exploded in her right shoulder. More shots rang out as she sat down hard in the driver’s seat and forced the key in the ignition. She reached out to close the door but a big body appeared beside her.

  She raised her pellet gun with a trembling hand and it went flying when the man karate chopped her wrist. Instead of yanking her out of the car, the man lifted her and tossed her in the passenger seat where she sprawled. Before she could get her wits together, the engine roared and the car was in motion. She stared at the linebacker who drove the streets like a mad man.

  “What do you want?” she asked, teeth chattering in shock.

  Her shoulder sent ricochets of pain through her and she shook convulsively. She could feel the sweatshirt sticking to her body as blood poured from her gunshot wound and her hands dripped blood over her legs and car seat.

  “Where�
��d he shoot you?” he snapped.

  “Left shoulder. Are you going to kill me?”

  “I think you did that all by yourself. You could’ve died from that fall out of the bedroom and running to your car was a dumb move.”

  “This hurts like a bitch,” Raven said woozily.

  “Stay awake.”

  “I’m dripping everywhere. I can’t afford to have this cleaned. It’s going to stain,” she fretted.

  “Stay with me. What’s your name anyway?”

  “If you don’t know me, why were you in my apartment?”

  “All I knew was your address and that you’re female.”

  “And what do you want with me?” Raven slurred, leaning heavily against the car door.

  “I’m here to protect you.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Raven woke because someone was stabbing her in the shoulder. She swung her fist, connected with something soft and heard shouting. She opened her eyes as both of her arms got pinned. She squinted her eyes against the glare of bright light and looked to her left. The linebacker pinned down the arm sending shockwaves of pain through her.

  “That hurts!” Raven bellowed. “Let go!”

  “Stop squirming and throwing punches at the doctor and I’ll consider it.”

  Off to the side, there was a pudgy guy with a rhinestone shirt holding a bloody washcloth against his nose. To her right was another stranger holding down her arm. He splayed her hand flat as he tried to extract glass from her bleeding hand. When her hand automatically flexed, he sent her an impatient look. She looked away, took in the room and jerked.