The Magic's in the Music (Magic Series Book 5) (9 page)

No, but he heard them squeal around the outside of the building and saw the car at the intersection when they came out the other side. No use turning left and indulging in a flat out chase. Somebody would get hurt. He glanced ahead. There was still some traffic, even this late, coming home from the clubs and restaurants in West Hollywood. But there was another gap between two buildings diagonally left across the street. It only took an instant to decide. He threaded the needle through the cross traffic, earning car horns, and slipped into the gap. The buildings pressed in on either side, barely wider than his knees and shoulders. The girl was a limpet clinging to his back. His hard-on was not reacting well to that. It’d been too long since he’d gotten laid if he could get a hard-on in the middle of a chase.

He turned into another alleyway, left this time, and zigzagged his way between buildings, hoping he wouldn’t get trapped by some chain link fence at the end of a passage.

By the time they’d made their way back to Sunset, they seemed to have lost their tail. He went one more block to Hollywood and turned east.

“Aren’t you taking me back to my apartment?” she asked, sounding dazed. She sat back. Only her hands were on his ribs now. And he had the protection of his leather coat.

He took a breath. That was a relief. Wasn’t it? He pulled in behind Lupe’s, away from the line that was still snaking out into the parking lot in front. He didn’t turn to look at her. “So, why were they after you? Who are you?”

*

Greta couldn’t get
her breath, even though they’d stopped at the back of a little hot dog shack, by the dumpsters. She’d pulled back, but an echo of the feel of his body against hers was still doing something to her that made her feel stupid and confused. The adrenalin rush from careening through alleys and parking lots and between buildings must have addled her brain. Could that account for her panties being soaked and the ache between her legs?

“What?” she asked.

“Name?” he said, his voice rough over the sputter of the bike’s engine. His back was straight and tense. The black hair that had feathered her face when they were going fast was tousled by the wind but smelled like shampoo. It hit his shoulders over the worn leather of his jacket. He hadn’t taken time to put on a helmet, if this guy followed rules at all. Slowly, carefully, she removed her hands from his sides. But her groin was still pressed to his backside. That…that was a problem.

He wanted to know her name. Hadn’t he recognized her? Maybe that was a good thing. This guy was crazy. A musical genius, but certifiable. She didn’t know him from Adam. He might have rescued her, but he could be a stalker or a serial killer for all she knew.

“Just take me home.” So he could know where she lived?
Not smart, Greta.

He shrugged. “Sure. If you think you can handle what’s waiting for you at home.” He cast a glance back over his shoulder. He had very blue eyes. He wasn’t as old as she’d thought at the club. Mid-twenties at the oldest.

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, when they can’t track us they’ll just go hang out at your house and wait for you.”

Oh, no.
God, how she hated being the object of scrutiny! Why was she even thinking about doing the
Amazing
movie? She had to get out of this life. No, that was silly. “They have bigger fish to fry than me. They were probably there for Damon Jones. They’re on their way back to the club. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

His shoulders sagged. He heaved a big breath. “And then you hooked up with the Ghost.”

She felt her eyes get big. He was right. She’d just been rescued by the biggest mystery in town. And if he wasn’t front-page material before, then in rescuing Gretchen Falk he just gotten promoted. Headlines flashed before her eyes.
Ghost Rescues Gretchen.
Big pictures of them close up.
Who Is This Man?
“Is Gretchen Having a Baby Ghost?”
For that last one, they’d find a picture where she wasn’t holding her stomach in and circle it with a ‘baby bump’ label.

There would be a twenty-four-seven barbarian horde around the entrance to her building about now. Why hadn’t she taken Bernie’s advice and hired a bodyguard or three to get her through the paparazzi moat around her castle?

“I can figure this out,” she murmured to herself rather than to him. She couldn’t call Bernie at night. He’d made that clear when he’d said his wife always answered the phone. He’d indicated that wasn’t a good thing for him. She straightened her back. “I’ll go to a hotel tonight. Tomorrow I can call Bernie. He’ll find me a place to stay until this dies down.”

Her rescuer twisted on the seat and glared at her. “Hotel? The tabloids pay front desk staff all over the city to tip them off when stars come in. I presume you’re a star of some kind.”

She hoped her face didn’t show how frightened she felt. This whole thing was out of control. She tried to gather herself together. “I’ll cope. A few guys with cameras, big deal.”

He looked disgusted. “More like every scumbag in town. Plus they’ll be posing as room service and maids and repairmen, trying to get in, and…”

“Okay, okay. I get the idea.” It sounded like hell.

“You got any friends? I mean friends the gossip rags don’t know about?”

Well, that was just the problem, wasn’t it? She guessed Jax was a friend. But she didn’t think Jax would be going home tonight. And she and Jax had been linked in papers before, photographed at charity events. Jax’s place might not be safe.
Oh, dear.
She might have dragged Jax into this mess with her. Of course, Jax would adore the attention.

“I’ll take that as a no.” He looked absolutely disgusted. “How about this Bernie?”

“He’s my agent…I…I can’t call him at two in the morning.” She shuddered to think about the lectures, the pointed comments about unprofessionalism. And his wife.

Suddenly, she was afraid this guy would just leave her there. “I’ll go to a motel. There are plenty of…of less well-known places east of here.”

*

There sure were.
Like his flop house motel for instance, with hookers on the corner and drug dealers in half the rooms. He gripped the handlebars within an inch of their lives as he flashed on taking this girl to his room. He’d take off the tight, little short jacket, and slip off the straps of that shimmery little dress she’d been wearing in the club, watch it slide off her shoulders and pool on the floor. Was she wearing a bra? He hadn’t been able to tell through his leather jacket. Didn’t matter. A little lace-cup bra action would be fine. And then there were those spikey heels. Christ, his cock was going to burst right here and now. Maybe she’d go into the bathroom to undress. She seemed pretty prim and proper. He got an image of the bathroom door opening…

What the hell was he thinking? Take a woman like this to a dirt-bag motel? Sure, she’d just love the statement that an avocado-green and gold bedspread that hadn’t been washed in twenty years made in conjunction with the orange draperies. Maybe he could take a black light to the place, and she could watch it pick out every bit of jizz that had been spilled.

With what she’d been doing to him all night, he should just leave her here. It was public. He could hear the people talking in line as they waited for their famous hot dogs out in front of the shack. Cars were coming in and out. The lights were bright. She wasn’t really in any danger. She could take her cell phone out of that tiny purse and call a cab. She’d be fine.

His stomach lurched.

Oh, God in heaven.
The realization struck him like a baseball bat. He’d been sick when he’d decided to leave the club—as in vomit-all-over-the-bathroom-and-the-alley sick. He’d felt like puking up his guts, right until he’d heard her scream and had gone after her. Then he’d felt fine. Except for his massive hard-on. But when he thought of dumping her—blam. It’s hurling time.

He knew by heart all the stories of how sick Tris had gotten when he’d let Maggie go back to Nevada alone. Or how Drew had felt when Michael had left her in the Florida Keys.

Jesus.
She was it; the One his family had been waiting for him to find since he’d hit puberty, the One who was supposed to unlock his magic gene. His Destiny.

Not if he could help it. He didn’t want any of the crap that came with that. The last thing he wanted was to get locked into the life that was destroying his family. It was his life, damn it, even if he wanted to throw it away. And he wasn’t going to go quietly into some pre-planned, fated, sex-based attraction he hadn’t even chosen. Hell, hadn’t arranged marriages gone out with women’s rights? Well, what about his rights? Didn’t he have a right to choose how to live?

He realized he was breathing heavily. He wasn’t even seeing his surroundings anymore. All he could think about was escape. He couldn’t risk being around her any longer. Not if she was what he thought she was. Maybe he wasn’t yet locked into her.

“Excuse me, aren’t you…?”

With a start, he saw that three or four people had sidled around to the back of the hot dog shack. He felt her stiffen behind him.

“Damn it!” he said, opening the throttle. He couldn’t just leave her here. He couldn’t take her to a fancy hotel, or a place like his flophouse either. The urge to protect her surged up from his loins like…like nothing he’d ever felt before. The bike jerked forward, making the inquisitive intruders jump back.

“Where are we going?” she yelled over the roar of the engine, panic in her voice.

There was one safe place to take her, damn her and him and the whole fucking world.

“My parent’s house,” he yelled back as he headed east to pick up the 101 Freeway.

‡

At the base
of the freeway entrance, he stopped the bike. Greta was a mass of nerves. This whole night had been so freaking weird. She knew she should probably scream and run away. At least get off the bike. Maybe she could flag down a cop if she could find one before some unsavory character found her. She could call Jax and tell her to get her ass out of bed with Derek and come to the rescue. If Jax had her phone on. Maybe she was desperate enough to call Bernie. And stand on this deserted freeway entrance and wait for Jax or Bernie to get here? But it wasn’t deserted. What was that movement in the shadows under the ramp? Oh, great. She’d be waiting next to a homeless camp at one in the morning. Just dandy.

The Ghost lifted a booted leg over the handlebars of the bike, and went around to unstrap his saddlebags. He pulled out a helmet and handed it to her. “Put this on.”

She gripped her lip between her teeth.

“Okay, look,” he said, giving a disgusted sigh as he lowered the helmet. “You don’t know me. I get that. I look a little crazy. Hell, I am a little crazy. But I’m not leaving you at some flophouse or even a cabstand in the middle of the night. You don’t seem to have any friends. So unless you want to run the gauntlet at your apartment, you’re going to my Parents’ house.”

“I can’t impose…” She didn’t know his parents either. Though it was kind of sweet, when you thought about it, that he was taking her someplace he considered safe.