Claire raced after Noah. The sand flew beneath her feet.
Noah tackled the shadow. A man. They hit the sand with a thudding impact that she heard even over the waves. Then Noah spun the guy over. “Who the hell are you?”
Breath heaving, Claire rushed to his side.
“Get off me!” The guy shouted. He tried to swing at Noah.
A terrible mistake. The swing missed.
Noah’s fist drove down. He didn’t miss. He hit the man in the face. Once. Twice. Powerful blows that were brutal with their intensity.
“Try again…” Noah snarled. His fist was poised over the man’s face. “Who. Are. You?”
“P-private investigator!” Then, he snarled, “Shit, you broke my nose!”
“I’m about to break a whole lot more than that,” Noah told him. She’d never heard Noah’s voice sound that way. Lethal.
Deadly.
Chilling.
Claire tried to peer at the private investigator’s face. She could see the round curve of his cheek. The high forehead. The thinning hair. The moonlight was strong as it shone down on them.
“Who are you working for?” Noah asked him. His hand was still poised to punch.
“Screw off!”
Noah’s fist plunged down again.
“Noah!” Claire lunged forward. She grabbed his arm. “Stop!”
“Shit!” The PI cried. There was a dark shadow streaking down his face. Blood. Definitely blood. “I’m going to sue your ass! This is assault!”
Claire tried to drag Noah off the guy. He didn’t move.
“This is private property, dumbass,” Noah bit out. “And you took the first swing.” Then Noah shoved his hand into the guy’s pockets.
“Wait, stop, what—”
Noah rose, and he had what looked like a wallet in his hand. “Guessing your ID is in here.”
The man stumbled to his feet. He put his hand to his nose, obviously trying to stop that blood flow.
Claire stood there, her frantic breaths still shaking her chest, shocked by the violence that had erupted so suddenly.
“Harrison sent you,” Noah said flatly.
The guy’s shoulders jerked.
“The senator’s dead,” Claire said. It didn’t make sense that this guy would be here if he’d been hired by Colby Harrison to—
“Not the senator.” Noah’s voice was sharp. “Ethan. You were the one sending him the pictures of Claire, weren’t you?”
Pictures? Her goosebumps got worse.
“In case you haven’t heard, Ethan Harrison is dead, too,” Noah announced and it sounded like there was…satisfaction in those words.
The man backed up. “What?”
“Why don’t you try and call your employer? You’re going find out that your services aren’t needed. No one’s left to pay you.” The waves crashed behind them. “And after you do that, you need to get out of this area as fast as you can.” He advanced on the guy.
The PI darted back.
Claire couldn’t move.
“Because I’ll give you one warning. Only one. If you ever come near Claire again, it will be the last mistake you make.”
Noah’s sudden eruption of violence…the deadly intensity that clung to him…
It made Claire think too much of her past.
Ethan had erupted into violence so quickly. So often.
Noah isn’t Ethan.
“Get the hell out of here,” Noah ordered.
“Give me back my ID and I—”
“You don’t get anything back. I’ll be turning this over to Weston Securities. They’ll learn every detail I need to know about you.”
“Th-there’s no need—”
“Yes, there is, because if you don’t stay away from me and Claire, I’ll be the one lurking in the shadows near your door. And you’ll see what it’s like to be hunted.”
The man turned then and he ran, disappearing into the darkness.
Noah stared after him. One hand was clenched around the wallet he’d taken. The other hand was fisted at his side.
The waves kept pounding against the shore.
“How do you know…about the pictures?” Claire asked.
Noah glanced over his shoulder at her.
It felt as if someone had punched her. “You said Ethan had pictures of me. That he’d been the one to hire that guy…how do you know all that, Noah?”
“It doesn’t matter.” He stalked toward her. Shoved the wallet into his back pocket.
She stood her ground when she wanted to flee.
Noah isn’t Ethan.
She’d never been afraid of Noah before.
She’d also…never seen him attack a man before. One instant, he’d been sharing his past with her.
The next…he’d been punching a man with lethal fury.
Now he seemed so contained. So controlled.
“It matters to me,” Claire said as she lifted her chin and forced her shoulders to stay straight. “How did you know that?” Maybe he’d just been guessing. Just been—
“Because Ethan looked me in the eyes, and the bastard told me that he had someone watching you.”
Her heart was racing in her chest, pounding louder than those waves.
“And I went to his cell. I saw the pictures that he had of you.”
Claire shook her head. This wasn’t happening. “When?”
“I saw him yesterday.” Flat.
The day before Ethan died?
“Noah…” Fear was there now. Fear and enough dread to choke her. “What did you do?”
Chapter Seven
Claire was afraid of him.
Sonofabitch. She wasn’t supposed to fear him. He was the one who wanted to protect her. To help her.
But when Noah took a step toward Claire, she backed away from him.
“Did you kill him?”
He could hear her fear.
“Did you kill him?” Claire asked again.Her voice was shaking.
His eyes narrowed on her. “Why does it even matter? You know you’re glad that he’s gone.”
Claire spun from him then. She ran from him.
He hadn’t meant to send her fleeing. “Claire!”
She didn’t slow down at his call. She just ran faster. Why? Because she thought that she was running from a killer?
That’s exactly what I am.
No matter how many fancy suits he put on. No matter how many hotels he opened. No matter how many charity balls he hosted…Noah couldn’t hide the truth.
At his core, he was a killer.
That’s what I’ll always be.