Protected In His Arms

“I went to your house, but you were leaving. I followed you here. We need to talk.”

Her throat completely closed up.

Screw the apples. Get in the car, drive away. Her pulse thumped and she had trouble thinking.

Was he stalking her? What if he followed her home? Wild possibilities tumbled through her mind. Maybe she was being hysterical.

Maybe she should go back in the store, get Keely. Keely could call the police and—

“I need your help,” he continued. “And you don’t know it, but you need mine. We don’t have much time.”

What?

“I can’t help you.” And the only way he could help her was to go away.

“I think you can. And I think you’re in danger.”

Yes, yes, so did she. From him. He was gorgeous, but a lunatic.

Very, very sad for the women of the world.

She had to get around him to get back to the store. How was she going to do that? Her mind ran jagged, panicky laps, trying to figure out the best way out of the spot she was in.

“I forgot something I meant to get. I have to go back into the store.”

“No.”

No? Her heart jumped with both feet into her throat when he set the apples down on the top of her car.

Relief socked her hard when another car pulled into the parking lot.

She was saved. Thank God.

The dark car screeched to a stop and a window rolled down. Bullets sprayed as the world rocked into slow motion and she screamed.

Chapter 3

Horror gripped Marysia but there was no time for that. The stranger pushed her, and her knees hit the asphalt as she slammed to the ground, her shopping bag flying. Panic roared through her veins and she could barely think, just crawl, desperately.

Run! She wanted to run. More gunshots cracked over her head and her heart boomed in her ears.

She heard tires screeching and a distant shout from the direction of the front of the store, the jangle of the store’s bell over the door. She whipped her head around, saw the dark car gone as quickly as it had come, scrambled up from her hands and knees.

Run! But before she could, he was there, the stranger, ripping open the door of his Impala, pushing her inside as from the corner of her eye she saw the dark car screeching back.

It hadn’t gone away. It had merely turned around in the parking lot, was coming back for more.

Diving, she took cover inside the car as more shots blasted the air. She heard a crash, then nothing. Desperate breaths clawed her lungs. Before she could do anything, breathe, think, move, the stranger was inside, shoving her over to the driver’s seat.

He had a gun. Oh, God.

He had a gun!

“Drive,” he grated.

She blinked, panic and shock drumming wildly inside her. She saw the attacker’s car in the rearview, crashed into a building at the side of the parking lot where Keely kept propane and tanks for sale.

“Drive!” He shouted this time. His hot jade eyes seared her. “Get out of here before he gets out of that car and comes back!”

“The store—My friend—”

“He doesn’t want your friend. He wants you.”

His words registered, but she couldn’t process them. Why would anyone want to kill her?

And yet…Those bullets had been nothing if not incredibly real.

The Impala sprang to life as she turned the key, tires screaming backward. The shoulder strap of her purse tangled across her chest, the bag heavy in her lap, wedging between her body and the wheel. She saw Keely and the checkout girl run back into the store, saw the attacker’s car door push open, a shadow escape, then the world behind her turned bright orange. The Impala hit the highway and she floored the gas, raw horror tearing through her.

Hardly in control of the car, she swerved to miss an oncoming vehicle. The car spun on gravel at the shoulder, and she braked to a skidding stop.

Breath backed up, harsh and cold, in her lungs.

Huge billows of black smoke filled the air behind them. Flames—

“We’ve got to go back! It exploded!” What exploded, she wasn’t sure—the attacker’s car, the propane. The store! Oh, God, the store. “We’ve got to make sure everyone is okay!”

Keely was back there! A killer was back there, too. But he was gone, he’d run away….

And there was a crazy stranger right here in the car with her.

A crazy stranger with a gun.

He’d protected her back there, though. Protected her from the attacker, protected her by forcing her to drive the car away from the blast.

“They went back in the store. They’re fine. And we’re not. Not yet. I need to talk to you. I’ll explain everything. But not here! Drive!”

Her head reeled. He was, she realized, pointing the gun at her.

“Don’t hurt me,” she breathed harshly.

“I’m not going to hurt you. I’m trying to save your life. Dammit, drive!”

She hit the gas. The car slammed forward, back on the road. They were driving with no lights. She didn’t know where the lights were. She fumbled madly for a switch, not finding it, following the road in the lights from roadside buildings, from memory.

Stay calm. He just wanted to talk, that had to be it. He wanted to talk. He was crazy, maybe, and he wanted to talk. She’d talk to him, then he’d let her go. Or kill her.

But she couldn’t let herself think that way. She had to think of ways to escape. She’d drive to the police station.