by Maggie Price
Quest gurgled a moan while her eyes rolled back in her head.
The wail of sirens pierced the air.
Coughing painfully, Tory slid off Quest onto her hands and knees. Struggling to breathe, fighting the now-genuine need to retch, she rolled the unconscious woman onto her side to keep her from drowning in her own blood.
Footsteps pounded toward her. “Tory!”
Nausea ebbed at the sound of Bran’s voice.
“You okay?” Standing over her, he clamped a hand on her shoulder.
“Fine.” Looking up, she blinked to bring him into focus. His face was pale, his mouth grim. His other hand clenched the Glock, aimed in the direction where she’d last seen Heath.
“Quest,” she panted. “Quest screamed she shot you.”
“Have to check Heath,” he said and turned.
Tory frowned. There was an unnatural carefulness to the way he moved.
A few feet away, Heath lay on his side, dark eyes open and glassy. His right arm was stretched out as if reaching for the Beretta that lay an inch from his hand.
Leaning awkwardly, Bran snagged the automatic, then pressed two fingers to Heath’s throat. “Dead.”
He straightened and turned, his black parka gaping open. Tory’s heart hitched when she saw a flash of crimson.
“You’re hit!”
She shoved herself up, reached him in two wobbly steps. Pushing back his parka, she saw blood had completely soaked one side of his sweater.
“Oh, God.”
“I’ve been shot before.” He gritted his teeth. “I know when it’s bad. This isn’t bad.”
“Shot anywhere is bad.” While sirens grew louder, she tugged him toward the side of the building.
“Slug’s not in me. Just grazed my side.” He blew out a breath. Then another. “If it’d hit anything vital, I wouldn’t be on my feet.”
“Sit down. Sit down.” She nudged him into a sitting position, prodding his shoulders back against the building. “I’ve got to slow the bleeding.” For want of anything better, she pulled his ball cap off, pressed it against the wound.
He winced. “You’ve got blood all over the front of you.”
She glanced down. Crimson spattered her sweater, jeans and leather jacket. “It’s Quest’s.”
“All of it’s hers?”
“Yeah. I broke her nose. Gave her one hell of a nose-bleed.”
“Good.”
The surveillance van and a black and white swung into the alley, sirens blaring.
“Ambulance!” Tory shouted to the first cop out of the van.
Nodding, he lifted a radio to his mouth as he bolted toward them, gun aimed low in the direction of the suspects.
“Heath’s dead,” Bran advised the cop. “Cuff the woman.”
“Ambulance is thirty seconds out,” the cop said, jerking a set of handcuffs off his belt.
Tory shoved back Bran’s parka. Leaning in, she did a visual sweep until she spied a small hole in the black fabric.
“Okay, looks like you’re right. The bullet’s not in your side.” Knowing that didn’t make her hands any steadier.
“I told you it’s a damn graze.”
“Yeah, Dr. McCall, you told me.”
Beneath her palm she felt the warmth of his blood already soaking through the cap. Too fast. Too fast.
She jammed her free hand into the parka’s pockets, searching for gloves, anything to help absorb the blood. She came up with a handful of folded papers.
These’ll do, she thought and pressed them hard against the cap.
Bran grunted. “Christ, woman.”
“Sorry.” She was shaking like a wet dog in a cold wind. “I’m sorry. I need to slow the bleeding. Have to slow it.”
“I’m fine,” he shouted over the advancing shriek of sirens.
“You’re shot!” She looked across her shoulder, saw the ambulance, its overhead lights winking in rhythm. “They’ll stop the bleeding.” She nearly sobbed the words. “Get you to the hospital.”
He gripped her chin, pulled her head back around. His expression was set in almost savage lines, his eyes so bright they seemed to burn her.
“I’m not going anywhere until you and I finish things.”
Chapter 16
“Look, Lieutenant, you need to let us drive you to the hospital.”
Sitting sweaterless on the edge of a gurney in the back of the idling ambulance, Bran gazed down at his right side. The bandage just above the waist of his jeans was a stark white slash against his flesh. “You stopped the bleeding, Handle.”
“For now.” The EMT crouched beside the gurney was middle-aged with thick black hair. The wide handlebar mustache that curled up to his cheeks had earned him his nickname.
“I cleaned the gash best I could.” Handle pulled his latex gloves off with a snap and dumped them in a small hazardous materials bin. “But there’s bound to be fibers off your sweater still in the wound. Plus, those butterflies I put on will hold only so long. You need stitches. Quite a few. You have to go to the ER for all that.”
“Later,” Bran said. “Right now I’ve got business to take care of.”
That business was the image of Tory that had branded in his brain after he’d made love to her that morning. Seduced her. He had seen the same solemn look on her face only one other time—the day he walked out. What was she feeling? he wondered, as a skitter of panic crept up his spine. Dammit, what the hell was going on inside her?
“I don’t think you’ve got any business to deal with, Lieutenant,” Handle countered. “I stuck my head out of the ambulance a minute ago. The ME’s doing his thing on the dead guy. Another ambulance transported the redhead with the broken nose who was squawking about some woman assaulting her. There’s enough cops in the alley to contain a riot. As far as I can tell, there’s not much for you to do.” Handle grinned, sending the curled ends of the mustache creeping up his cheeks. “Except go to the ER.”
“The business I need to take care of is personal.” Leaving his bloody sweater for the hazmat bin, Bran grabbed his parka, pulled it on and hissed out a breath. The gash hurt like the devil. Gritting his teeth, he did his best to ease out of the ambulance without too much of a jolt to his side.
His gaze zeroed in on Tory. She stood across the alley with her back to him, talking to a uniformed cop who was writing purposefully on a notepad.
Nate, wearing a black overcoat, stepped to Bran’s side. “We’ve got the trucker who drove Heath here. And some uniforms just picked up the professor for questioning.” He frowned when the back door of the ambulance slammed shut. “Don’t you have a date with the ER?”
“I’ll go later.”
Tory swiveled at the sound of his voice. Her eyes concerned and intense, she rushed to him.
“You’re shot! What are you doing out here in the cold? The EMT said you need to go to the hospital. You have to get your wound cleaned. You need stitches.”
His stomach tightened when he saw the purpling bruise along her cheekbone. The blood spattered across her leather jacket, sweater and jeans had dried to a rust color. Because the knuckles on her right hand were raw and swollen, he grabbed her left wrist.
“Let’s go,” he said, heading down the alley toward the restaurant.
“Go where?” She gripped his arm as she labored to keep up. “Have you lost your mind, McCall?”
He spared her a glance. “I told you, we’re going to finish this.”
“You keep saying that.” A gust of cold wind tossed her hair in her face and she shoved it back. “What are you talking about? Finish what?”
Without answering, he pulled open the same door he’d dashed out of what seemed hours ago. “The restaurant’s manager lent me his office when I was looking for a place to radio the surveillance van. We can use it.”
The office was no more than a cubbyhole just inside the door. The short, burly manager working at his cluttered desk looked up at the sound of Bran’s voice.
“I need
to take over your space again.”
When the man’s gaze flicked to Tory, his eyes widened.
Bran figured her bloody clothes and bruises had the guy wondering if she was a suspect he’d taken a rubber hose to.
“Police business,” Bran added sternly when the manager hesitated.
“Er, okay, Lieutenant, go ahead.” The manager pushed out of his chair and edged past them. The door closed behind him with a sharp snap.
“All right, McCall.” Tory tugged her wrist from his grasp and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’ve dragged me down here and commandeered that man’s office. Whatever it is you think you need to finish, go ahead.”
She was standing under the office’s bright lights, and for an instant all he could see were her bruises, the blood. He held up a hand. “First I need to know if you’re really okay. Physically, I mean?”
“I landed on my cheek and my knuckles are scraped. Quest got in a lucky punch to my ribs, so I’ve got a saucer-size bruise on my left side. Other than that, I’m fine.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Physically.”
“I’m going to see you with Heath, with that automatic against your head, for a long time.” Reaching out, he brushed his fingertips along her jaw and realized his hand had gone unsteady. “I gave you my word I wouldn’t let him get near you. I shouldn’t have brought you over here with me. Dammit, he should never have gotten his hands on you.”
“It’s over now.” Her voice and eyes softened. “I keep picturing Quest aiming my gun at you,” she said, dropping her arms to her sides. “Pulling the trigger. Hearing the shot.”
“We both have some bad images from today to deal with.” Fighting the need to pull her into his arms, he moved to the desk, parked a hip gingerly onto its edge. “There’s another image of you that I’m not sure I know how to deal with.”
“What image?”
“This morning, in the motel room, what happened between us.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “I gave you…everything. All of me. I’ve never given a woman that much. No other woman. Only you. Then afterwards, I saw the look in your eyes. Heard your tone when you said we need to talk. I’ve seen that look, heard that tone only one other time.”
She frowned. “When?”
“The day I walked out. I’ve got to figure what you were getting ready to say today was bad.”
She took a step toward him. “Bran—”
“No.” He held up a hand. “I’m going to get through this.”
She halted. “All right.”
“You’re your own woman, Tory. Intriguing. Strong and tough. Tough enough that you kept yourself alive when an escaped killer wanted you dead.”
“I kept myself alive at the library when Kerr attacked me.” Her gaze flicked to the window that looked onto the alley. “Not with Heath. If it wasn’t for you, I’d be dead.”
“I can say the same thing about you. If you hadn’t jumped Quest, she’d have probably gotten off another round. Maybe scored a direct hit.” He raised a shoulder. “We needed each other in that alley. I’ve tried to make you need me in other ways. That’s another thing I realized in the motel room this morning. I can’t force you to need me, to feel something like trust or love when you don’t.”
“No, you can’t,” she said quietly.
“You say you want time to think things through. To figure out if you can ever trust me again. Trust me to stay.” He shook his head. “I’ve done everything I know to do to make you believe that I will. Time won’t change how you feel. You’re not going to wake up all of a sudden one morning trusting me when you don’t now.”
“So, what are we doing here, Bran? Are you telling me I’m out of time? That if I can’t give you a definite answer right now, you’re leaving again?”
“No. Hell, no.” He came up off the desk, ignoring the pain that sizzled through his side when he grabbed her arms. “Didn’t you hear anything I said to you in bed? I won’t ever leave you again. I mean that.” He paused to steady himself. “But meaning it doesn’t do me a lot of good if you decide you want out. So if that’s what you were going to tell me this morning, then just say it.”
“And if I do want out, you’ll accept that?”
“No.” He leaned in, his fingers tightening on her arms. “I’ll figure out a different way to come at you. To make you believe me. Get you back. I can’t let you go, Tory. Three months ago I thought I could, but I can’t. You’re who I want. For now. For the future. Forever.”
“Bran, stop. Stop now.” The hands she pressed against his chest trembled. “You’re in pain, I can see it in your eyes. Sit down before you fall down.”
“I’m not going to fall down.”
“That’s right, because I won’t let you. You’ve had your say. Just sit and let me have mine.”
With pain radiating straight up his side, he complied. “All right.”
She took a step back, blew out a breath. “Right before the phone rang in Quest’s room, I was getting ready to say a lot of things. Starting out with the observation that it’s no wonder our marriage wound up on the rocks since we started out with the odds against us. We never talked, never had a plan. We just acted. We ran off and eloped, then moved into the house you’d shared with another woman.”
“Looking back…. Dammit, I should have asked if that was what you wanted. Given you a say.”
“Yes. And when you didn’t ask, I should have told you. We never really talked, never sat the other down and just talked.”
She shoved her hair behind her shoulders. “That’s what I should have done when it came to Danny, too. Talked things over with you. Given you a chance to get involved. I just didn’t want to burden you like my mother had my father. I was afraid you’d view me as needy and weak.”
“I wouldn’t have viewed your coming to me as a burden.”
“I know that now.” She dipped her hand into the pocket of her jacket. “I see a lot of things now that I didn’t then.”
He narrowed his eyes when she pulled out pink papers, folded and stained in places with blood. Then he remembered her desperately digging through the pockets of his parka, jerking out the papers and pressing them against his bleeding wound just as the ambulance arrived. He checked his pocket, found it empty. There’d been two sets of papers inside.
He lifted a brow. “You looked at those?”
“While I was pacing outside the ambulance.” She opened them gingerly, stiff along the folds with dried blood. “They’re hard to read because of the blood, but I could tell enough to know they’re loan papers.” She looked up slowly. “You cosigned a loan for Danny. Helped him buy a car.”
“Kid’s got a job, seems sincere about taking care of Jewell and the baby. He came to me about the loan after you were attacked. He said with Heath out there trying to kill you that you had enough to deal with. I agreed.” Bran dipped his head. “You think the fact he came to me for this makes me feel like you’re a burden? That you look weak and needy in my eyes?”
“Before all this, I probably would have.” Her mouth curved slightly as she refolded the papers and handed them to him. “Now, I’m just glad I didn’t have to deal with another one of Danny’s problems at the time. And your shouldering that didn’t take anything away from me.”
“You didn’t know about the loan this morning,” he pointed out, stuffing the papers back into his pocket. “So it’s not what you were getting ready to talk about before Quest’s phone rang.”
“True.” She moved toward him, stopping when only inches separated them. “After we started sleeping together again, I kept thinking how wonderful it was to be back with you in bed. But we never had problems in bed, so all we were doing was having glorious sex. Our problems were still there.”
She looked away for a brief instant. When she remet his gaze, her eyes were darker. Smoky. “So, this morning when you took me to bed, everything was the same. And after, nothing was the same. Your tenderness touched me in places you’d never touched before. You took me to a p
lace I’d never been. A place we’d never been.”
She stepped closer, leaving a whisper of space between them. “You said you gave me everything that was inside you. You didn’t have to tell me that. I felt it. And while you gave, you also took. Every ounce of my control. It didn’t make me feel weak or needy to give it up willingly.”
He closed his eyes. Opened them. “The way you looked at me after. The way you sounded. I thought it wasn’t enough. I gave you all of me, and I thought it wasn’t enough.”
She cradled his cheek in her palm. “How could I not look and sound so serious after what we’d shared? You melted all my doubts. Showed me that being with you, surrendering to you, didn’t make me less than what I am.”
Needing to touch her, hold her, he slid his hands beneath her jacket, settled them at her waist. “What are you, Tory McCall?”
“A woman who needs one particular man to make her feel complete. Whole. I trust you with way more than just my life, Bran McCall. My heart and my soul are in your hands, too. I love you. I need you. I always have.”
He tugged her into the wedge between his thighs, gathered her against him, kept her there, while relief swept through him. He pressed his face to her throat. “We’ve wasted a lot of time being at odds.”
She held on, her arms around him. “Too much.”
“We’ll both probably forever keep reaching for the controls.”
She laughed softly. “We’d be idiots to think anything else.”
He held her away from him, brushed his lips over her brow, her cheeks. “Who winds up grabbing the controls is going to take some juggling. Compromise. As long as we end up heading in the same direction, we should be okay.”
“We should be more than okay.” She traced her fingertips along his jaw. “What we can’t rebuild, we’ll build new.”
“Deal.” Tenderness welled up inside him. She was precious to him. Vital to his life. “We both got a second chance today. In that motel room. Out in that alley.”
“Speaking of out in that alley, there was another set of papers in your parka.”
He smoothed a palm down her hair. “I wondered if you were going to mention them.”
