The Defender blinked.
I could have probably left the gassy part out. I shrugged to myself and scratched at the back of my neck. “Anyway… just… leave if anything happens, okay? If I scream or something, go out the back door. I’ve got a spare key for my car in the wheel well. The title is in a small safe in the back seat.”
He said nothing as he kept staring at me.
Glad we got that sorted.
I gave him a long, irritated look as I turned the burners off and made my way to the living room. I rubbed my face and tried to think. There was nothing about me on social media. I had a website because you weren’t legit with customers if you didn’t have one, but it had the name of my LLC on it. I hadn’t met anyone new in a long time. The only thing different about my life was my houseguest. Could it be someone for him?
Then again, if they could hurt him, what was a locked gate?
I tried to tell myself that everything was fine. I hadn’t done anything to give myself away. Maybe I’d gotten a little lazy with carrying my pepper spray around and keeping the back dead bolt locked, but I hadn’t slacked off with any of the other measures I’d always taken. Maybe they were lost.
Stomping down the dirt driveway, I slowed down as the gate came into view. He was right, there was a big box truck there. Putting my hand up over my eyes, I squinted and kept walking toward it. Who was it? My PO box was in Albuquerque, and that was under my business too. I usually checked it every two weeks; I was already past due for a visit.
I forgot my wig.Dammit.
Through the windshield, I could see two figures sitting there. I was pretty sure they were wearing black too. Black hats, black long-sleeved shirts, and they both had sunglasses on. Why were they just watching? Why weren’t they trying to come out and talk or going into the back to get a package? All my things were delivered under a made-up name. Pulling out my phone, I did a quick search in my email for orders I might have forgotten about.
But the closer I got to the gate, the more this odd feeling came over my arms and the back of my neck. When was the last time those had prickled? What I was pretty sure was The Defender’s anger had made my skin react but in a totally different way.
My stomach cramped, hard. Nausea punched a path straight up my throat, so violent I almost stumbled.
Shit.
Shit, shit,shit.
No.
The hair on my arms rose, and so did every single other fine hair on my body. I shivered out in the morning sun, and I knew. I knew.
I turned, and I fuckingran.
And it was then, immediately right fucking then, three long strides in, that I saw that The Defender had followed me out. He was standing at the open doorway, one hand on each side of the railing, his body stooped. His nose in the air.
“Run!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “Go!” I shouted like a fucking banshee. “Don’t let them get you!” I screamed, my voice cracking in panic and worry and desperation.
Please, please, please, let him get away,I thought as I ran for my fucking life.
Because that was exactly what I was doing.
Just not in the direction I should have. Because I couldn’t let them get him. That was what I’d understood. There was going to be no running away.
More of just trying to distract them away from him.
Fuckkkkk!
I’d remember for as long as I lived, that he stood there on the deck, barely able to stand just as a sound exploded across the sky at the same time something hit me in the backhard—so damn hard, oww, oww,oww—once, twice, three times,sending me flying forward.
Just like in the movies when a bomb exploded.
I went airborne for what felt like two minutes but was more than likely just a second before coming to crash, skidding across the hard ground.
My ears rang.
My mouth tasted like… iron. Like blood?
And oww, oww, oww, my ribs… myback.I tried to take a breath, but the pain was unreal. But somehow, even as my vision blurred and my back was on fire and hurt like the worst hell, I lifted my gaze and looked for him.
