“I’m staring at a dead body,” Trace told him. “I just thought you might want to know about that.”
“What?”
Claire was trying to peer into the darkness of the hotel.
“I made it to New York about three hours ago.” Trace’s voice held a hard edge. “My agents and I came out to have a little talk with Sloan Hall.”
“I’m about to have my own talk with him,” Noah snapped. Dead body? What the hell?
“That’ll be hard,” Trace murmured. “Seeing as how the guy is missing half his head.”
All of the distant noise seemed to quiet right then. The car horns muted. The rush of traffic eased. Noah focused completely on Trace’s voice. “The dead body? It’s Sloan?”
“He’s in some flea-hole of a hotel. My agents tracked him. Seems the guy had to visit the hospital last night for a broken nose.”
“How long has he been dead?”
“Judging by the smell, at least a few damn hours.”
Noah hadn’t heard Sloan’s voice clearly on the phone. The guy had been whispering. Trying to disguise his identity?
Claire was about to slip inside the small opening near the old door. “No!” He grabbed for her arm.
“Uh, what?” Trace asked. “What are you yelling about?”
Noah didn’t answer him. Every instinct he had was screaming at him.
This meeting wasn’t about blackmail. It wasn’t about Claire’s innocence or guilt.
It was about them being lured to this hotel. To this empty, abandoned spot.
“Claire, come on!” But he didn’t wait for her to come. Noah wrapped his arm around her stomach, and he lifted her up against him. He ran, nearly falling down those stairs.
Get away. Get away. Get—
The explosion sent chunks of the old building spiraling into the air. The boards covering the windows shot out. Shards of glass rained down on Noah, and he tried to hunch his body over Claire’s. But the blast had him flying through the air, too, and all he could do was hold her, as tightly as he could.
They hit the ground. Hard enough to rattle his bones. He felt blood sliding down his right arm, and a board slammed into his back.
Claire was beneath him. The flames from the explosion scorched his skin as he tried to keep covering her.
One explosion so far, but there could be more.
I have to get her out of here.
“Come on, Claire,” Noah whispered. “We have to make a run for it.”
Claire didn’t respond. When he lifted her up, her head sagged back weakly. “Claire?”
Her eyes were closed. Blood trickled down the side of her head.
No!
He lifted her up and ran then, as fast as he could toward the fence that circled the property. Another explosion had the ground trembling beneath his feet, but Noah didn’t stop. He kept going. Kept holding her as tightly as he could.
Then he was free as he slid through the opening in the chain-link fence. He rushed across the street. Traffic had stopped. People were screaming, running, but he barely saw any of them. They were just smoke covered blurs to him.
He put Claire down on the sidewalk. “Baby?”
Her eyes were still closed. He brushed back her hair. Blood was on his fingers, and it smeared across her cheek. But when he moved her hair, Noah saw the gash on her head. About an inch long, and already, the skin around that wound was turning a dark, bruised purple.
Sirens screamed in the distance. Help, coming in fast.
“Claire.” He put his hand to her throat. Her pulse was steady. He checked for other injuries but only saw the gash on her head.
Be okay, baby. Be okay.
***
They hadn’t gone in the building.
They’d been so close, but Noah had stopped just steps away from the entrance. He’d gotten that phone call, and the guy had started to pull Claire back.
He’d had to detonate then. There had been no choice.
A few steps. Noah had been so close to death.
But not as close as Claire.
As he watched, she was loaded into the back of an ambulance. Noah was with her. Standing so close. Jumping into the back of that emergency vehicle when she was pushed inside.
He’d wondered just how close Claire and Noah truly were. Now he realized…
Claire has got to Noah, too.
She had a real talent for drawing in her lovers. Winding men around her finger. Batting those blue eyes and getting them to do anything for her.
Lie.
Steal.
Kill.
But Claire wasn’t going to twist him. Her days of playing games—those days were long over.
He’d missed her and Noah this time.
Next time, they wouldn’t escape. He’d make sure of it.
***
Claire felt like she’d been hit by a truck. She opened her eyes slowly and winced at the pain. Her head throbbed and nausea rolled in her belly as the room before her came into focus—
And then that nausea just got a whole lot worse.
“A hospital,” Claire whispered, surprised by the slightly hoarse sound of her own voice. “No, not—”
“It’s okay.” She turned her head at that deep voice. Noah was beside her bed. His fingers had curled around her wrist. “You’re not alone.”
He’d ditched his coat. He wore a white shirt, one that had flecks of blood over the sleeves. Actually, one sleeve was cut nearly to the shoulder, and she could see the outline of a white bandage on his arm.
The shirt was also stained gray—with soot? Ash?
“The hotel,” Claire said as the memories pushed through her mind. “It caught on fire.”
His lips tightened. “Two bombs were planted there.”
Her heartbeat kicked up, and the machines near her bed began to beat even faster. “The PI tried to kill us?”
Noah shook his head. His face looked harder, the faint lines near his eyes deeper than before. “Sloan wasn’t the one who set up that meeting.”
The throbbing in her head got even worse. “But you said—”
“I thought I was talking to Sloan, but it turns out that guy was already dead when I got that phone call to set up our meeting.”
She jerked beneath his hold.
“Easy,” Noah murmured as his fingers kept stroking her. “You’ve got a concussion. You have to be careful.”
The concussion would explain the jackhammer in her head. “How did he die?” Her voice was stronger. “What happened to him?”
Noah glanced away from her.
No, no, no—
“He was shot in the head.”