Page 28 of Straight Shooter

“I ran. He got off the elevator as I was walking down the hall, so I took the stairs.”

“From the eighteenth floor?” His voice rose an octave.

Satisfaction touched her lips briefly. “I’m not a stranger to exercise, but I’ll admit it was intense. Beanie was struggling to keep up, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he stopped.” Her hand fluttered to his side and gripped his shirt.

“That’s why there’s sirens?” he asked, speaking over the now-piercing whine.

She nodded and chewed her plump bottom lip. “He shot at me in the stairwell. He had a silencer, but it still made quite a bit of noise. By the time we reached the lobby people were scared. I screamed at them to run and left the hotel.” She shivered despite the climbing temperature, and he rubbed his free hand up and down her bare arm. The satiny texture of her skin calmed his nerves.

Peeling himself away from her, he poked his head around the side of the brick building. People strolled down the sidewalk. Many had phones pressed to their ears or were looking at devices in their palms. No one disturbed the crowd.

Peyton’s body inched closer to his, and her hands loosely circled his midsection. He hadn’t realized how badly he wanted to touch her, to be close to her. Brock’s words drifted through his mind. I thought something sparked between you two.

A “spark” was a pathetic description of the electrical current that ran through his veins when she was near.

He wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “The sirens probably scared him off. We should get out of here while we can.”

She nodded and pressed her cheek to his chest. The contact left him immobile. He smoothed his hand over the top of her head and caught her neck in his grasp. She’d been through so much in the last day. He never should have left her alone. Staying the night in the same room as Peyton would have brought a whole new meaning to the word torture, but at least he would have been there when Beanie arrived. He could have put a stop to this shit then and there.

“Rhett,” she said quietly. “What are you doing here, near my hotel?”

He closed his eyes for a beat. He couldn’t tell her he was spying on her, but he couldn’t lie either. When he didn’t answer, she tilted her head back and puckered her brow, but she didn’t pull away from his embrace.

He flashed her a half-smile because it was all he could muster. “You aren’t happy to see me?”

Her eyelids lowered. “You’re watching me, aren’t you?”

He caught a few locks of her hair in his grasp and toyed with the iridescent strands. This close, he could see the dusting of freckles over the bridge of her nose. Her eyelashes were several shades darker than her hair, and the smooth arches of her eyebrows illustrated every ounce of her displeasure—or interest.

“Maybe.”

“You don’t trust me.”

Guilt pinched his gut. “It’s not that.”

“Then tell me, Rhett—why are you watching me?”

Rather than lie, he caught her elbow. “Let’s talk about it later. Right now, we need to get out of here.”

She made a face but let him escort her down the alley. He knew two things for certain: the conversation wasn’t over, and from here on out, he’d trust his instinct not to leave her.

Chapter

Eleven

Peyton pressed her hand to her thumping chest and nestled back in the passenger seat. One glance at the bandage showed a stain of red, but not enough to be concerning. She pushed the stinging sensation away from her mind. What the hell was Rhett doing loitering around her hotel? She gave him mega brownie points for not lying, but he hadn’t told her the truth either. He hadn’t given her an explanation at all, and despite the fact that she was unsettlingly happy to see him—she’d almost fainted with relief when she realized it was him in the alleyway—she wanted answers.

Where she came from, a federal agent in your backyard didn’t bode well for your future. Was he trying to catch her on something else? Was he listening to her calls?

She couldn’t think about it right now. Rhett drove away from downtown, and Max’s street flashed by her window. Crap. There was no way she could ask Rhett to kindly wait while she paid her business partner a visit. By the time she got off the elevator he’d have figured out who she was seeing, and Max would be livid if she led a federal agent to his door. Meeting with her old friend would have to wait a few hours.

“Where are we going?” Sunlight heated the car despite the cool air pumping tirelessly through the vents. Palm trees lined the streets, and the old Southern charm of the plantation-style houses with bright shutters shoved her back in time several decades.

“I’ve got a place not far from here.” He glanced at her, and the dusky depths of his eyes made her core tighten. “If that’s okay with you?” He turned his attention back to the road.

The memory of his naked, chiseled chest against hers blipped in her mind. Her throat thickened as desire climbed up from her belly. He looked at her again, and she forced down the saliva that had gathered in her mouth.

“Yeah, that’s fine. I mean, for now.”