No Escape (16 page)

Heath caught her hand and trapped it gently. “Don’t.”

She looked at him, swallowed hard, and tried not to freak out when she realized what the dark splotches were. “I’ve got his blood on my face.”

“Not for long.”

That wasn’t any kind of answer. Lauren wanted it
off.
Now. She clenched her fist and willed herself not to touch her face, but she couldn’t help glancing down and seeing more blood spattered over the black pullover she was wearing.

“Just stay calm. We’re almost there.”

She made herself nod, but her breathing was strained.

“Where’s your room key?”

Grateful for something else to think about, something else to do, Lauren slipped the key card to her room from the back pocket of her jeans. She handed it to Heath and let him guide her to one side of the door.

“I need you to stay back just a minute.” He had his pistol in hand, covered by the loose folds of his jacket, when he slipped the key card through the slot. When the light flashed green, he pulled the lever down with his left hand and leaned a shoulder into the door. He relaxed a little and turned to her. “Okay.” He stepped to the side so she could enter. “Does anything look moved? Touched in any way?”

Lauren entered the room and looked around. Her suitcases were in the closet, her iPad on the desk on the charger, and her clothing was hung as she’d left it. “No. Everything’s fine.”

“Good. I don’t think they know about you, but I didn’t think they’d have a tracker on Sisco, either. I don’t want to be surprised again tonight.” Heath slid the pistol back into the holster on his hip.

Pausing in front of the mirror at the vanity, Lauren looked at herself, shocked at the blood that marred the side of her face, her neck and her hair. She didn’t know how the taxi drivers had missed seeing that. Then she thought maybe the man hadn’t and that the Kingston constables were already en route.

She grabbed a handful of tissues from the box in the vanity and started scrubbing at the blood on her cheek, but it wouldn’t come off because it was dried. She started to shake then, and she scrubbed even harder.

“Hey.” Heath stood behind her. “Calm down.”

“Calm down?” She glared at him in the mirror, unable to stop scrubbing. “I’ve got someone’s blood on me. It’s in my
hair.
”

“It’ll wash out.” Gently, Heath took her hands and kept her from scrubbing. “Take a shower. Everything’s going to be all right.”

She looked at him, wishing she could believe him, but he had blood on his face, too. Both of them had been
so
close to dying. She closed her eyes and saw the man getting shot again, his head snapping back, feeling the warm wetness on her face.

“Get some clothes. Take a shower. You’ll feel better.”

Lauren just looked at him, not believing that he thought a shower was going to fix everything. When she didn’t move, he went to the chest of drawers and began searching through them.

Watching him paw through her underwear broke her out of her trance. “What are you doing?”

“You need clothing.”

“Stay out of there.”

Heath ignored her, emerging with a pair of panties, sweat pants and an oversized T-shirt, all things that she liked to lounge in and sleep in. He handed them to her. “Here.”

Not knowing what else to do, Lauren took the proffered clothing.

“Shower.” Heath gave her a gentle shove to get her moving.

“Aren’t you leaving?”

Heath looked at her and spoke softly. “No. I’m not leaving. I’m going to be right here.”

For a moment, Lauren remembered the kisses in the taxi. Her body still thrummed with excitement, but it was mixed in with the residual aftereffects of the near-miss in the alley. She felt confused, not certain what Heath’s motives were.

He turned from her, though, and walked to the window. He stripped his jacket off and dropped it onto the chair by the small table, then moved a chair so he could more easily peer out the window as well as watch the news on the television he angled his way.

Not knowing what else to do, lost amid all the conflicting emotions, Lauren retreated to the bathroom. She took off her clothing with shaking hands, feeling terribly cold all of a sudden. Then she stepped under the shower spray and turned it up as hot as she could bear. For a long time, she just stood there and let the wet heat seep into her. She turned her face up to the spray and let it run through her hair, not looking down to see if the blood was sluicing from her body.

With her eyes shut against the shower, she kept seeing the gunfire again and again, but mixed in there, she kept feeling Heath’s lips pressed against hers.

* * *

“Heath?” Jackson Portman sounded tense. “Buddy, I was about to give up on you getting back to me.”

“Told you I’d call.” Heath sat in the chair looking through the window out at the parking lot. Nothing was moving. The street out in front of the hotel only had occasional traffic.

“Get anything?”

“Gibson is our guy. The man we took down tonight—Sisco—confirmed that Gibson is killing the women.”

“Wait a minute.
We?
”

“Yeah. Lauren worked herself into the snatch. Saved my butt, actually, but everything went sideways on us.” As Heath relayed the story, he couldn’t help thinking about Lauren in the shower. The water ran steadily, and he knew it was tracing every curve. He kept thinking about the kisses in the taxi, as well. He’d kissed her to shut her down, to keep her from speaking. At least, that was what it had started out being. At the end there, he wasn’t sure what that was about, but she had seemed to be getting into it.

“This guy Roylston was the one that pulled the trigger?”

Heath played the scene over in his mind again. There had been too many variables in play. He hadn’t been expecting to be found, hadn’t been expecting Lauren to be there, and he hadn’t expected everything to turn so violent so quickly. His first instinct had been to get Lauren safe, not identify the shooters.

But he felt certain he’d seen Roylston’s face revealed in the muzzle flashes.

“Yeah, I think so. Things happened pretty fast once they arrived.”

“Sisco getting dropped like that is gonna send a message to the rest of Gibson’s bodyguards. They’re all expendable.”

“I know, but something about the shooting doesn’t feel right.”

“What do you mean?”

“Back at the jail, Sisco’s partner came to pick him up. If he’d been worried about Sisco talking, he could have opened fire on both of us.”

“Maybe Lauren ran the van into him before he could.”

“No. He had time to shoot. He was trying to protect his partner. Doesn’t make sense that he would kill him so easily a few minutes later.”

“His partner probably got picked up by the police out in front of the jail. He probably wasn’t even there, so he didn’t have a say.”

“Maybe not, but his response felt different than those guys back in the alley. Roylston and his crew came to kill somebody.”

“Could be you triggered that reaction out of Gibson by confronting him.”

“This wasn’t Gibson. He’s too interested in gaming me. He’s a guy who wants to taunt every chance he gets, then slide the knife in slow. If you met him, I bet you’d read him the same way. This thing tonight was a burn. Roylston, if that was him, was happy to sacrifice one of the bodyguards in an attempt to get me.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“It does if Roylston doesn’t like the way Gibson is dealing with me. The guy’s got the money and the connections, Jackson. He could be in the wind, gone too far and too fast for me to follow. My pockets aren’t as deep as his. He could leave me at the starting gate. Instead, it’s like he’s baiting me.”

“All the more reason to regroup and bring it home, buddy.”

“I know. I’m giving that some serious thought.” Heath gazed back at the bathroom. “I need to get Lauren clear of this whole mess before she gets hurt.”

“Good. Because I’d like you to come home, too.”

Heath peered out into the darkness, but he wasn’t seeing it. He was seeing that crime scene with Janet. “This guy killed Janet. I can’t let him get away with it.”

“He’s not going to get away with it, bro. You know you’ve got the right guy. Now it’s just a matter of police work.”

“Police work’s not going to reach from Atlanta.”

“We’ll find something. We’ll keep turning things over till we do.”

“You and I both know that the captain put everything we could into that investigation. There was nothing at that scene that ties to Gibson. We don’t even know what his real name is, and without probable cause, we won’t be able to get it. We haven’t been able to get through his lawyers.”

“I know, but I also know all of this takes time.”

“I’m putting pressure on him here. Things are happening.”

Jackson sighed. “You’re gonna get hurt there, Heath. That woman is going to get hurt. You don’t want that to happen.”

Heath didn’t reply, but he knew it was true. Protecting Lauren Cooper was becoming very important to him.

“You put enough pressure on Gibson down there that you almost got killed. This guy isn’t going to let anyone interfere with his games, and he’s got a group of heavy hitters working for him. You’ve seen their rap sheets same as I have. They’re not guys you want to meet in dark alleys.”

“They won’t get me again like that. The tracker surprised me.”

“Heath, the next time Roylston surprises you, it might be from behind with a bullet into your ear. Step back from the ledge. Get some perspective.”

Everything Jackson said made sense. Reluctant as he was, Heath knew it was the right thing to do. “Okay.”

The water in the bathroom stopped running.

Heath sat up a little straighter. “I’ve got to go.”

“Fine. Give me a call in the morning. Let me know when I can expect you here.”

“Will do.” Heath hung up the phone and sat in the darkness crowding the room.

* * *

“I’m not leaving.” Feeling somewhat refreshed from the shower, Lauren stood in front of Heath. She hadn’t known what to expect when she stepped out into the room, but she had certainly not expected him to still be there, though she hadn’t liked the idea of him leaving. She just thought he would have.

Heath sat in the chair at the table. His elbows rested on his knees as he leaned toward her. “This isn’t about just you leaving this time, Lauren. It’s about
us
leaving. It’s not safe here. Gibson or Roylston or someone else will be gunning for us.”

“You mean, they’ll be gunning for you. They don’t know I was involved.”

“You don’t know that.”

“They’re not here.” Lauren hung on to the outrage she felt. That emotion was the only thing getting her through the residual fear left inside her. “If they knew about me, I think they’d be here right now.”

“Maybe. And maybe they’re biding their time because the heat is on them right now because of Sisco.”

She shook her head. “You’re not going to scare me. I’m not going to let you.”

“Now is the time to be scared.” Heath spoke in a level tone that Lauren hated. He was making too much sense. “This response tonight, it was way more than anything I figured would happen. Gibson is hitting hard and fast.”

“That’s fine. That’s what we want him to do, right?” Lauren knew she was right and held to her conviction. “Come at us and make a mistake?” She thought hurriedly. “In fact, can’t that shooting in the alley be used against him? Aren’t the police going to investigate him because one of his people was killed?” A chill ghosted through her as she said that. She wrapped her arms around herself to stay warm. The heat from the shower was already leaving her, but she was still hypersensitive to Heath’s presence.

He pointed at the television. “Gibson’s people have already got their story in place. Sisco was grabbed outside the jail by persons unknown. Gibson’s lawyers say he doesn’t know anything about it and random acts of violence aren’t his responsibility. Since Gibson has nothing to do with the case, he’s not going to get involved.”

“What?” Lauren couldn’t believe it.

“The police can’t do anything but question Gibson about his employee. There’s nothing to tie Sisco’s death to him.”

“Gibson’s people killed that man.”

“Maybe.”

“I saw Gibson’s bodyguard there. He was the one firing the gun. I can testify to that.”

“Are you sure it was him?”

“Yes. You saw him, too.”

“I saw a guy that looked like him. Without physical evidence that concretely says Roylston was there, it would be our word against his. A good attorney will bring up the fact that the alley was dark, that bullets were flying, that the headlights were in our eyes. Those are all things you can sell a jury on, if it ever got past a judge, and you can bet Gibson’s attorneys won’t let it go that far.”

“If we go in, we can tell them he was the one that killed Sisco. If Roylston knows we’ve identified him, he might get scared. He could plead out and tell the police Gibson sent him there to kill Sisco in exchange for a reduced sentence.”

“Did Gibson send Roylston there? That’s a jump. This could be something Roylston did on his own to protect his security perimeter. Or maybe Gibson sells Roylston out and says Roylston was working on his own. Again, this might not roll back over onto Gibson. On top of that, Roylston’s a mercenary. He’s not going to be able to work in his field if he gives up his employer. He gets paid to take the hits. I think he’s going to like his chances of running free better than a trial.”

Frustrated, Lauren realized that was true.

“Even if the police believed us and arrested Roylston, he’d be out on bail and gone before his trial. Either he’d be out of the country, or maybe Gibson would hire someone else to take him out, if he didn’t trust him to keep his mouth shut.” Heath’s voice remained a soft growl. “Even worse than that, if we offer testimony about what Sisco said and the fact that Roylston
might
have been there, we’d have to explain what we were doing there in that alley.”

Lauren closed her eyes in defeat. She hadn’t thought of that.

“We’d have to admit we kidnapped Sisco. The police know the man was taken. We’d end up in jail before Gibson did. And I don’t think anyone would be interested in testimony from admitted kidnappers working on an agenda to pin your sister’s murder and my partner’s death on Gibson.”