The Runaway Bride

by Adrianne Lee

  Ignoring her splitting headache, she tossed aside the covers. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  “Whoa.” Jake lunged forward, catching her as she pitched from the bed. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “‘Where’ doesn’t matter—just away from here. Quickly. Secretly.” She shook off his grip and stepped away from him. The room spun. She blinked and flailed her arms, seeking balance. One of her open hands connected with Jake’s chest, but the leverage was precarious.

  “You aren’t leaving.” He pulled her to him. Her head swam, and her hand caught, splayed on his chest. He held her still, close in his solid embrace.

  In that moment, she felt a rush of relief, felt safer than she had in a year. She gave in to the encompassing warmth, pressing against him. Gradually her equilibrium steadied, but her body trembled with a new, more frightening emotion: longing. She knew the danger of this was as life-threatening as the man determined to kill her.

  “The doctor,” Jake said, his voice husky against her ear, “wants you to stay put tonight. I’d say that’s a wise idea.”

  She felt his heart hammering against her palm. She lifted her head and as their gazes met the beat leaped, marching in rhythm with her pulse. There was genuine concern in his eyes, in every hard line of his face, and in that moment she forgot all about the need to flee.

  She stammered, “I—I didn’t think you cared what happened to me.”

  He stiffened. “I don’t.”

  But she could see it was a lie. A lie he might never admit Her throat ached. Could he ever love her as he once had? As she still loved him? Could either of them ever trust that completely again? The terrifying urgency overwhelmed her anew. She shoved from Jake’s arms. The room reeled, then went black.

  IN AN EVER-BLACKENING rage, Laura’s pursuer dialed the last number on the list of hospitals and morgues, then listened impatiently to the ringing phone.

  “Saguaro County General.” The woman’s voice sounded young, bored. “Emergency.”

  The pursuer pressed the cloth over the cell phone, speaking in a husky tone that might be male or female. “Have you admitted a woman today by the name of Laura Whittaker?”

  A snapping noise, as though the nurse were chewing bubble gum, issued through the line. “Laura Whittaker? Let’s see.”

  Hurry up! The killer scowled as the moon crept higher into the evening sky.

  Finally the nurse said, “Yes, she’s been admitted and will be spending the night for observation. She’s in room 304, bed 1. Would you like me to connect you?”

  “I’d rather pay her a visit.”

  “Okay…um, I’m sorry, though. Visiting hours ended ten minutes ago.”

  But the killer had hung up. Observation? Laura was basically unharmed? The damned woman had more lives than a cat. Well, no more. The killer growled. She’d just reached number nine.

  A glance at the map located the quickest route to Saguaro County General. The engine of the stolen florist’s delivery van hummed to life. A gun rested within easy reach. “I’m through fooling with you, Laura. The only thing the doctor will be observing about you tonight is your dead body.”

  Chapter Five

  Laura opened her eyes. She was tucked into the hospital bed, the covers pulled to her chin. Night pressed the window and a faint light crept beneath the closed bathroom door. The dim bulb over her bed cast the large room in shadow, but she could see the bed across from her had been disturbed.

  Dear God, had she been out for hours? Certainly long enough and hard enough so that another patient moving into the bed across from hers hadn’t disturbed her. Where was her new roommate? How long had she been gone? How soon before she returned? Panic washed over her. She probably had mere minutes to get out of here without being caught.

  She lurched forward, relieved to find her headache mellowed to a dull throb, the room no longer tilting with every movement. She swept aside the covers. Except for a faded hospital gown, she was naked.

  Was this all she’d worn when Jake held her earlier? The thought brought back memories she couldn’t deal with right now—no more than she could deal with the fact that Jake had once more abandoned her to the mercy of a determined killer. There wasn’t time for self-pity. She had to get dressed.

  A man moved from behind the curtain of the next bed. She yelped. Her heart kicked her rib cage. For a split second, she couldn’t move. Thought she was dead. Then recognition hit, and she nearly buckled with relief. “Jake! Thank God!”

  He stepped toward her. “I’ve been waiting for you to wake up.”

  “Good. I’m better.” She swung her legs over the bed and stood, becoming aware for the first time of the stinging pain on her calf. A bandage covered the achy area. God, when she thought of how much worse she could have been hurt…She shook herself. “It’ll only take me a minute to dress.”

  “I told you you aren’t going anywhere tonight You have a lot of questions to answer.” His soft expression hardened.

  He sounded more like a jailer than a concerned friend. The thought gave her pause. Questions to answer? To him? Or someone else? Had he called the cops? Her panic climbed.

  “With or without your help, I’m leaving here as soon as I’m dressed.” Conscious of her backless gown, she bent toward the metal closet separating her bed from the next one. The only thing in it was her high heels. “Where are my clothes?”

  “They had to cut them off.”

  She swore. “What am I supposed to wear?”

  “If you’ll give me your motel room key, I’ll go and get you another outfit.”

  She blanched and glanced down at the hospital gown. “Those were the only clothes I had.” He muttered something she didn’t catch as she grabbed her shoes and put them on. Feeling totally silly in pumps and regulation hospital garb, she spun to face him, one hand outstretched. “Give me your jacket Hurry! We have to leave now.”

  He crossed his arms, but seemed to struggle to keep his expression stern. His gaze traveled the length of her, an old warmth lighting their teal depths. “I’m not lending you my jacket and I’m not taking you out of here tonight But I will pick you up some sweats and tennis shoes in the morning. After that you’re on your own.”

  “The hell with that.” She swept past him, rushed to the locker of her new roommate and flung the door open. A brightly colored polyester pantsuit hung there. She reached for it.

  “Hey,” Jake protested, grabbing her arm. “What are you doing?”

  She glared at him. “I’m borrowing some clothes.”

  “No, you’re not.” He grabbed the hanger from her, returned it to the hook and closed the closet door firmly.

  She blew out a breath and shifted her weight to one hip, holding the gown together at the back. “Why are you being so uncooperative? Don’t tell me you still don’t believe someone is after me.”

  Jake sobered. He started to say something, then clamped his mouth shut He was blocking her path to the door. She took a step to the side. He matched it. She heard noises in the hallway, voices coming their way.

  Alarmed, she pleaded, “Jake, please. It could be him.” Or, she thought trembling inside, the cops.

  “Get back into bed.”

  “No.” She tried getting around him again. He was too quick. Too determined to keep her there. Laura’s impatience and fear ignited her temper. “Is this because I didn’t marry you last year?”

  He blanched. “No. It’s not.”

  She pursed her lips. He was lying as surely as she was half-naked. She understood he’d been angry and probably embarrassed as hell when she hadn’t shown up at the church, but she’d run away only to keep herself from being murdered. How could that be unforgivable?

  She bit down her anxiety. But couldn’t swallow her temper as readily. “Then what is it, Jake? You say you don’t want anything to do with me, and yet you’ve spent the afternoon beside my hospital bed as though I might expire at any moment. What are you still doing here?”

  H
e blinked as if she’d struck a nerve. “I—I want to find out what happened at the motel.”

  She grabbed the opportunity to duck around him. She hurried to the door, but he grasped her upper arm, stopping her completely, whirling her to face him.

  She shook free of his grip, careening back, bumping her bare bottom against the cold doorknob. She flinched. “Damn it, I told you what happened. Someone tried killing me. And if you don’t let me leave, he’ll try again.”

  Disbelief reddened Jake’s face.

  Renewed desperation tore at Laura. The voices were getting louder. Coming closer. She cracked the door open and peered out. A gurney was being wheeled into a neighboring room by a man in surgical garb. Two nurses followed. From the sound of it, they were settling the patient into the room. Laura let out a whimper of relief.

  She pulled the door open farther. Jake caught her arm again. “Get back into bed.”

  “No.” She tugged out of his grasp.

  “If you don’t get back in that bed now, I’ll put you there myself.”

  Her anxiety doubled. She knew he could overpower her any time he wanted. Where was the stun gun when she needed it? Still nestled in her purse. But her purse hadn’t been in the hospital closet. God knows what had become of it. And her meager cash.

  She took a step toward him, scrambling for a plan, pretending to give in to him. “Okay.”

  Behind him, the door to the bathroom banged open. An elderly woman stood outlined there, hanging on to the jamb, apparently the new roommate. “Young man, I’m ready. Could you help me back to the bed now?”

  Jake wheeled around.

  Laura slipped into the hall. A nurse was entering a room two doors farther down, her back to Laura. Laura took off in the other direction. Ahead she could see a deserted nurses’ station. Someone with an armload of flowers emerged from one of the elevators beyond.

  From this distance, she couldn’t tell if it was man or woman. Weren’t visiting hours over? Wasn’t it too late for floral deliveries? Fear galvanized her. Trapped her like a caged animal. Danger was ahead and behind.

  Desperate, she ducked into the nearest doorway and leaned against the wall. Her pulse raced out of control. She closed her eyes, willing herself to calm down. As her heartbeat steadied, she opened her eyes and took in her surroundings, realizing she was in the very place she’d sought. A supply closet

  With a grin tugging her mouth, she hastened over to a shelf piled high with more gowns like the one she wore and with pajamas and scrubs.

  Behind her, the door opened. Laura froze, her heart climbing her throat as the door shut with a click as soft and final as the lid of a coffin. Cold flushed her skin.

  “There you are,” Jake growled.

  She wheeled around, relief tripping through her, followed by the urge to do him bodily harm. “Dear God, Jake,” she railed at him in a fierce whisper. “Stop sneaking up on me!”

  He crossed to her and caught her by the arm, his grip tighter than before, his voice, too. “Do I have to call security?”

  Laura blew out a taut breath. “Jake, think! Would I be this determined to leave if I wasn’t terrified?”

  He frowned hard, appearing finally to realize she meant what she said. He studied her face for a moment, holding her as tight as ever, as though releasing her would somehow mean relinquishing his grip on this situation. “Would it make you feel better if I stayed outside your room all night?”

  “No.” How did she make him understand? Neither of them controlled what would happen if she stayed here long enough to be caught. “He’ll go through anyone to get to me. I don’t want your blood on my conscience, too.”

  “Stubborn…” He bit out the word, then let it hang between them, a judgment to her tenacity. Stubborn as Farmer Handley’s mule. That’s what he’d called her since she was ten. It was the first sign that she’d finally dented his resistance.

  He released a sigh of his own, longer, louder and more full of resignation than hers. “Fine. I’m tired of arguing with you. I’ll take you wherever you want to go.”

  “Really?” She glanced at his hand that still held her upper arm in a death grip.

  He released her and stepped back. “Really.”

  “Thank you.” Rubbing her arm, she turned back toward the clothes shelf.

  “Pick something quick,” Jake said, a grin in his voice. “Your, um, best asset is flapping in the wind.”

  A heated blush swept Laura and she grabbed the back of the gown together. “A gentleman wouldn’t notice.”

  “I quit being a gentleman a year ago.”

  No, you haven’t, she thought, glancing over her shoulder to find he’d turned his back. You just don’t realize it. A twinge for what they’d lost tweaked her heart Perhaps he coped better believing himself as tough and ornery as he looked. But somewhere beneath the hard exterior her old Jake still existed. Would he ever emerge again?

  “I thought you were in a hurry,” he said, startling her out of her dark reverie.

  She returned to the shelf, gathering a pair of green pants with a drawstring closure and a matching pullover top. She stepped into the pants, then tossed aside the gown and lifted the top over her head. She still felt silly in her pumps, but at least now she could travel the streets without being arrested for indecent exposure. “Let’s go.”

  “Wait a minute.” Jake slipped off his jacket and offered it to her.

  She raised her eyebrows questioningly.

  “It will look more like you’re getting off work,” he explained.

  “Thanks.” Touched by his unexpected gesture, Laura accepted the coat and slipped it on. It hung to her midthigh, the sleeves to the middle of her hands, but she shoved the cuffs over her wrists and squared her shoulders. She’d adopted an array of personae the past year, “surgical-nurse-in-bomber-jacket.” should be one of the easier ones to carry off.

  The difficulty came with her first breath. The jacket not only held Jake’s warmth, it held his scent, a mind-jarring mixture of mint and man. Her man. And therein lay the trouble. He wasn’t her man. Not anymore. Their gazes met and something tentative passed between them, something that made him swallow hard enough to jostle his Adam’s apple.

  His eyes darkened and he reached for the door. “Ready?”

  Alarmed, she sprang forward and stopped him, her hand landing on his. “Careful.”

  What was he thinking? Caution was his business. Second nature to him. He drew his hand from beneath hers as though she’d burned him. “Lead on.”

  Hurt brushed her heart She ignored it. Her life was at stake. Later, she could feel sorry for all that she’d lost As long as she hadn’t lost her life. She nudged the door open a couple of inches and peered out into the hallway.

  Again it was deserted. But footsteps were coming toward them, clipping along the hall from the direction of her abandoned room. The image of the florist who’d arrived after visiting hours flashed inexplicably into her mind. Someone to fear? Someone looking for her? Was it him? Or was she being paranoid?

  “Come on.” She tugged Jake by the arm, hurrying him into the hall. She’d rather be wrong than dead.

  A nurse sat behind the station desk, talking softly into the phone. She glanced up absently, then bent her head back to the chart she was writing on. Laura’s pulse echoed in her ears as loudly as her heels clicking the hard, polished floor.

  Near the elevators a second nurse emerged from the pharmacy, pushing a cart loaded with little white paper cups, the kind used to deliver prescribed medications to patients. She also gave them only a cursory once-over. Her mind was obviously on her job.

  Laura stole a glance behind them and spotted someone shuffling covertly into a door near the nurses’ station. The same supply closet they’d just vacated. Her skin prickled.

  She pulled Jake into the stairwell. “I think I just saw him.”

  “What?” Jake jerked back toward the stairway door. “Where?”

  “Ducking into the supply closet.”
>
  Jake’s face darkened and a keen glint shone from his eyes. As though his instincts had finally kicked in, he took a solid grip of her arm and rushed her faster down the concrete stairs. Scrambling to keep from stumbling, Laura felt the blood singing through her head. Somehow she managed to keep her balance and actually welcomed the cold night air on her face as they exited the building.

  She scanned the lit parking area. “Where’s your car?”

  “In back. By emergency. That way.” Jake hurried her around the side of the building.

  A bright-yellow florist’s van sat near the emergency room entrance, a Saguaro County police car parked to block its departure. Two uniformed cops stepped toward them.

  Laura released a tight yip. She rammed to a stop, began pivoting, meant to run back the way they’d just come.

  “No.” Jake caught her elbow and cautioned in a hissing whisper, “You’ll look suspicious. Keep moving.”

  He propelled her forward. Her feet moved clumsily. As she and Jake came alongside the police car, one of the cops waylaid them.

  “Evening, sir, ma’am.”

  “Officers.” Jake smiled.

  “You folks see the person driving this van?”

  Laura’s legs felt as wobbly as a toddler’s. The cops weren’t here looking for her. But were they looking for the florist? She didn’t know whether to be relieved or more frightened.

  “Nope,” Jake said. “That van wasn’t here when I arrived to pick her up from work. That’s my car. Third one down.”

  The policeman glanced over to where he pointed and nodded.

  “I’m Jake Wilder. BMW Securities.” He handed the cop his credentials. “What’s the problem?”

  The cop studied his papers, then returned his wallet. “It’s a stolen vehicle.”

  “I see. Well, I guess we should get out of your way.” Jake reached for Laura’s arm again, and realized she was shivering.

  “Why don’t you give me your card, Mr. Wilder,” the taller of the cops said. “In case we need to talk to you further.”