He waved the knife at me, and a new customer who’d half entered the café saw and immediately left.Yeah, thanks for calling the police or helping, you inconsiderate bastard.
My heart pounded in my ears as the knife blade shone inches from my chest. Giving in pushed every principled button I had. I wanted to punch his stupid, thieving face. But I also didn’t want to die. Hating myself for doing it, I handed him my phone.Grrr.
He looked at the damaged screen. “This is bullshit.” He threw it across the room. It bounced off the wall and landed on the tile floor with athwack, a piece of the phone protector shooting off. My mouth dropped open. Maybe I could’ve kept using it with only a couple of cracks, but there was no coming back from this. There was only so much that Scotch tape could do.
Fury pulsed loudly in my ears, overcoming my fear. First I couldn’t get a job, no matter how hard I tried, and now this. I would’ve achieved more by staying in bed—at least I still would’ve had my phone. “What the heck? I worked hard to buy that. Do you know how long I saved? I can’t afford?—”
“I don’t care. Give me your wallet.” He held his hand out. When I hesitated, he leaned forward, nicking the point of the blade into the delicate skin at my throat. I jerked back, my hand springing upand slapping against the sting. I drew it away and looked at the tiny bloom of red smeared on my palm. It wasn’t fatal, but the next one might be.
I swallowed.
My breaths came faster.
A drop of pee escaped.
He shouted, “Give it to me. Now!”
I winced.
The front door opened with an accompanying tinkle. The mugger’s head turned toward the sound. In the second he was distracted, I braced myself, squeezed my pelvic floor, and kicked him good and hard in the balls—my Doc Martens might be holey, but they were mighty.
He grunted and doubled over, gripping his nether region with one hand while the knife dangled uselessly from his other hand. Shame he hadn’t used both hands and accidentally stabbed himself in the crotch.
Before I knew what was happening, whoever had come in the front door was on him—thank goodness they’d decided to help. Finally someone with some decency.
The newcomer—a tall, broad-shouldered businessman—tackled him, the knife clattering to the floor as they went down in a heap of testosterone and adrenaline. The lady next to me kicked the knife across the floor, away from the would-be mugger.
I would’ve called the police, but my phone lay dead on the floor under a chair across the room, like my hope for a job and dry underwear. “Can someone call the police?” I pleaded.
The manager, who’d come to stand at the counter, said, “Already done.” Why he wasn’t helping the brave stranger, I had no idea. Come to think of it, there was another guy in here who could’ve helped, but he was currently sneaking out of the place with his female companion. People disgusted me. If you didn’t helpwhen someone needed it, who would help you in your time of need?
Apparently only one person.
My gaze was drawn to the fight on the floor. The brave stranger who’d tackled the thug had thick, dark hair and wore an expensive black suit. Straddling black-beanie dude, he drew his arm back and punched his face, one, two, three times, the blows stunning the guy. Mr. Corporate jumped off him and turned him over so the man was face down on the floor. He yanked both arms behind the mugger’s back and knelt on him.
When he was sure he’d gotten the situation under control, our savior looked up, taking stock, his tie askew.
I gasped.
Sapphire-blue eyes met mine, their intensity dazzling me. His lips were closed, his square jaw set hard as he held onto the struggling man beneath him. With the hero’s broad shoulders and muscular build, that thief was going nowhere.
My blood thumped at the pulse point in my neck, and it wasn’t from fear. Our protector was hot. Way out of my league, but that never stopped me from staring.
“Curtis. Thank God you’re here.” The rich woman next to me hurried to his side, breaking our “moment,” which was probably just me drooling and him making sure a random stranger wasn’t hurt.
He looked her up and down before his gaze settled on her pale face. “Aunt Steph, are you okay?”
That’s when it hit me. This knight in shining armor was actually a knight—Curtis Knight, to be exact, CEO of Knight Advertising, one of the biggest firms in the world. And he was galaxies out of my league. If my mother had told me not to shoot for the stars, he was the sun of a distant galaxy, light years from my world. This was the one time I’d agree with her. He was successful, a god of great ideas in marketing circles, creative, gorgeous, fearless…, and Iwas a nobody with no job, no phone, and nothing except holey Docs and a steadfast bladder.
But he was also rich, and rich men were assholes. That fact was enough to douse my blazing attraction. There’d been chatter on socials about him being a real jerk to some woman who’d worked for him. It sounded like a similar story to me and Mark. They’d dated, he’d gotten sick of her, and she’d lost her job.
I averted my gaze to the mess on the floor, which used to be my phone, and felt my neck where the blade had pierced. It had already dried—I would live to job hunt another day. I had my wallet. And my life. For that, I was grateful.
I knelt on the floor and picked up my destroyed phone. I’d try to get the sim card out later. I felt Curtis’s eyes on me, probably judging me for being pathetic enough to crawl on the dirty floor for a broken electronic device. If he was in my situation, he’d probably get his secretary to buy him another one and get angry when it wasn’t the color he wanted.Dickhead.
At the counter, the manager, hair ruffled as if he’d been running a hand through it, flicked his gaze from Curtis and the crook to two cops, who were hurrying through the front door. Satisfied everything was under control, the manager grabbed a takeaway cup and brown paper bag from the counter. “Donut and hot chocolate.” The barista had continued working through the melee? Wow. That was some kind of work ethic, but maybe he was making up for the onion-discussion time-out.
There was no way someone as high class as Curtis’s aunt would order a donut and hot chocolate. Still on the floor, I put up my shaking hand. “That’s mine.”
