Laura Kaye - Hard As It Gets

Oh, no, it was a helluva lot more than that physical distance.

Lucky for him, the parking space directly across from Becca’s place was open. He eased the Charger into it, not worrying about stealth since he planned to talk to her. Somewhere nearby, a dog unleashed a series of high-pitched barks as Rixey shrugged into his jacket, cut across the street, and climbed onto the little stoop.

He knocked—three solid raps. From the porch, he surveyed the street in both directions. The last gray light of day clung to the sky, casting shadows in front of buildings and under trees. He turned his gaze back to Becca’s house. Flowerless rectangular planters hung from the sills of both front windows. The door was solid wood, black with white trim, and had a Schlage dead bolt, he noted with approval.

Rixey knocked again and looked down. The Baltimore Sun sat rolled up in a clear plastic wrapper on the little porch’s edge. Not home yet?

Fine. He’d wait.

Back in the Charger, he pulled out his cell phone and scrolled through his contacts. Without any real intention, he swiped the entry for Shane McCallan. Once, one of his closest friends. After they’d all been discharged and sent packing to the real world, his former teammate had called and emailed more times than Rixey wanted to remember. He’d been too buried in his own physical and emotional morass, though, and had ignored every one of them. Shit. Now it felt like too much time had passed. A pansy-ass excuse if he’d ever heard one. Coward.

As the second in command, though, Rixey should’ve known. Should’ve predicted. Should’ve stopped the shit before it had come raining down all over them. If only he’d trusted his instincts. But he hadn’t. He’d trusted Merritt implicitly and dismissed the things that hadn’t made sense. No way Shane and the others didn’t resent the hell out of him for that.

Fucking coward, more like it.

He didn’t begrudge them whatever resentment they sent his way. It couldn’t possibly be more than he directed at himself.

From across the street, a car door closed with a thunk. Rixey thumbed out of his contacts and dropped the phone to his lap as he glanced out the driver’s side window.

A woman made her way up the sidewalk, an overhead streetlamp confirming it was Becca. His gaze tracked back to the car that hadn’t been parked there before. A recent-model silver Prius, which seemed to suit her just fine.

Becca jogged up the front steps, swooping down in a weary-looking movement to retrieve the newspaper. She pulled the mail out of a wall-mounted box and unlocked the door. For a moment, the interior darkness obscured her, pushing blood through Rixey’s veins at a faster clip. But then the front hall light came on and her silhouette moved behind one of the windows.

At the same time a movement darted past the darkened window immediately above her.

Not sure what he’d seen, Rixey went totally still, his gaze fixed hard and steady on the rectangular expanse of glass.

There it was again. A nearly imperceptible shifting of shadows in the dark.

Instinct flooded adrenaline through his system and he shot out of the car.

Because Becca Merritt was not alone in that house.

THE POLICE WERE going to file reports for illegal trespassing and criminal property damage. It was a giant step past the dismissiveness Becca had received when she’d gone down to the station days before to file the missing persons report, but neither was going to attract much in the way of manpower or resources. The cops had pretty much admitted that to her face before they’d left Charlie’s.

Becca passed through the first floor of her row house, turning on lights as she went. She needed food and a shower. And then she could sit down and figure out where to start and what to do. She flipped on the kitchen light and dumped her purse and keys on the counter.

As she turned, her gaze went to the doormat in front of the back door. It was crooked and sat several inches out from the door. It hadn’t been crooked when she’d left this morning, had it? She stepped closer, carefully, as if the hooked fibers might spring up and bite her. With her toe, she nudged it back into place, flush against the frame.

Her scalp prickled, all the hairs rising so high they threatened takeoff.

She blew out a breath. What’d happened to Charlie’s apartment had rattled her. And no wonder. Whoever had tossed his place hadn’t left a single thing untouched. Just the thought of that kind of violation made her skin crawl. A lump of sadness slid into her belly. Charlie was going to flip out. Maybe she could clean it up before he saw it. Only problem was, the boy knew exactly where everything was supposed to be. No matter how neat it looked to her eyes, his would see a thousand things wrong. Either way, she couldn’t save him the grief of dealing with it.

Not to mention the fact that until she figured out what kind of trouble Charlie had stumbled into, she probably shouldn’t be hanging out over there. His place clearly wasn’t safe.

Becca stepped to the window covering the top half of the back door and scanned the yard, then she tugged the pale green cotton over the glass, shutting out the night’s black gaze. She shuddered. Tonight wasn’t the first time she’d found something she was initially sure wasn’t how she’d left it. But usually she managed to come down on the side of sanity and convince herself she was imagining things.

After all, who really paid attention to the exact position of a throw rug? Or the exact angle of a stack of papers in relation to the corner of the desk on which they sat? Not her, until lately.

Enough. Time for food before her stomach ate itself.

She’d no more than taken a step in the direction of the fridge when she heard a soft thump. Becca froze, listened. The neighbor? Their houses were adjoined, after all. Except the noise had come from the front of the house, not the side wall.

Pull it together, Bec. She shook her head and reached for the fridge handle. Maybe she’d scramble some eggs. Or throw together a bowl of cold cereal. Low key was all she had energy for.

Squeak.

Goose bumps erupted across her skin, and her heart flew into her throat. She knew that squeak. Staircase to the second floor. Top step just right of center.

Someone was in the house. Coming down her front stairs. And he had to have heard her arrive home a few minutes before. Adrenaline spiked, sharpening her senses and kicking her heart rate into a sprint.

Hide? Flee out the back door? Grab a knife? Confront? Was squeaky-stairs-guy alone? Were there others? Her gun taunted her from its storage box in her bedroom upstairs. It had been a housewarming gift from her overprotective father upon the purchase of the row house—but it might as well have been in Bangkok for all the good it was doing her right now.

Thoughts ricocheted through her brain, the rapid fire momentarily freezing her between the options.

Then she was in motion. Wincing at every little noise she made, she picked up the landline and dialed 911. Afraid to risk even a whisper, she sat the receiver speaker down on the counter to muffle the operator’s voice. When she didn’t respond, they’d dispatch the police and an ambulance to the address associated with the phone number.

With help hopefully on the way, she tiptoed toward the back door. As she passed the butcher block, she eased a thick blade from the wood and prayed to any and every god that might be listening that she didn’t have to use it. Because the only way she could was if she were within arm’s reach of her intruder—which also meant she’d be within reach of his arms, too. Though he probably had something better than a knife.

Shit, shit, shit. So not helpful, Bec.

But likely true.

Squeeeeak.

Oh, God. That’s the fourth step from the top. Get out now!

Holding her breath, she slipped her cell into her pocket and approached the door. The minute she opened it, the noise would tell the intruder exactly what was going on. In case he pursued, she’d have to move fast and not look back. A plan took shape—out the door, down the steps, run to the sidewalk and then back toward the alley. Then she’d just keep running until she found a place to hide or heard sirens.

It was possible she was going to have a heart attack first, the way the damn thing was booming against her sternum.

She reached for the doorknob.

It started turning on its own.

For a split second, her brain couldn’t process the information.

And then it did. Someone was coming in the back door. She was trapped.

It all happened in a blur.

The door eased open. A man all in black stepped out of the darkness with a gun.

Becca swallowed her scream and lunged with the knife.

Light reflecting off steel.

That was all the notice Rixey had that something sharp and bladed was coming his way.

He holstered his gun with his right hand and reared back as he caught her striking wrist in his left. He forced her hand backward over her shoulder, the position bending her over the sink. The pressure on her joints loosened her grip, and he whipped the knife from her fingers and clamped a hand down on her mouth, his body holding hers in place.

“Sshh, Becca, it’s Nick Rixey. Someone’s in your house,” he whispered, lips against her ear. Her pulse beat against his skin everywhere they touched. “I’m gonna let you go, but stay quiet.”

She nodded, her breath puffing fast over his knuckles.

Dropping his hands, he eased off her. Her eyes were wide blue saucers in her face, and her pulse visibly jumped on the side of her throat. Distrust poured from her gaze as it raked over his face, but then she pointed a shaking finger toward the arch that led to the next room and mouthed, On the steps.

“Stay here,” he whispered, pushing the knife back into her palm to give her a sense of security. He was going to do his best to make sure she didn’t need it. Gun in hand, he sidled up to the wall where the kitchen met the dining room. In a smooth set of motions, he swept his gaze and his gun over the room, clearing it.

A snick sounded ahead of him, followed by a rattle. The door.

Leading with his gun, Rixey followed the sound in time to see someone jet out the front door. He bolted in pursuit. He reached the stoop just as a body dove into the back of a dark-colored sedan sans lights. Tires squealing, the car sped down the one-way street, ignored the stop sign, and careened around the corner.

Sonofabitch.

Rixey secured the front door, eyeballed the dark stairs, and hustled back to the kitchen. “It’s Nick,” he said before he turned the corner. Didn’t want to have to dodge that butcher knife again.

Air whooshed out of her as she lowered her hands, her knuckles white around the hilt of the weapon. “Gone?” she said, her voice little more than breath.

“Someone left out the front door, but I haven’t cleared the rest of the house.” She smoothed back wisps of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail. The movement drew his gaze to a mark on her temple, and ice crawled down his spine. “What happened to your face?”

She fingered the angry red scrape, barely touching it, as if it was as tender as it looked. “Long story.”

Later. Becca would tell him that story later. Along with the rest of it. Everything he hadn’t let her say when she’d first come to him at Hard Ink yesterday. Guilt flooded acid into his gut. Jeremy’s assessment was right. He was a dick. And worse. Had he given Becca a chance, she wouldn’t have been standing there hurt, scared, and clutching a knife like it was the only thing that stood between her and the great white beyond.

She blew out another breath, and her muscles went all loose. She turned, dropped the blade, and bent her toned body over the counter, elbows on the laminate surface and shaking hands holding her head. “Holy shit,” she rasped. “Okay. Okay.”

His gaze skated down the arch of her back and landed on the round swell of her ass, jutting out toward him. The thin material of the green scrubs left little of her curves to the imagination. His fingers twitched and his cock stirred with interest.

Which was wrong on about forty-seven levels.

“How is it that you arrived to my house right when the intruder was here?” she asked, looking over her shoulder.