Читать книгу The Bodyguard: Protecting Plain Jane - Debra Cowan - Страница 8

Trip clipped a crate with his elbow on the way down, landing on the unforgiving concrete floor with the panicked woman sprawled on top of him. Thank God he’d broken her fall instead of crashing down on top of her. “Are you okay—?”

“You can’t take me!” A swat of thunder echoed her protest and a heel clocked him in the shin, jarring the few bones that hadn’t already taken a beating. A dog barked in his ear, lunged at him. Trip swatted it away, but it barked again. The woman he’d come to rescue twisted on top of him, fighting as if she was the one who’d just been attacked.

“Sheesh, lady. You’re all ri—Scram!” As he pushed the dog out of his face, her fist connected with the gash in his forearm, making the wound throb, and she slipped from his grip. When he felt her knee sliding up his thigh and saw her fingernails flying toward his face, Trip was done playing hero for the night. He caught her wrist, blocked her knee and rolled, pinning both her hands to the concrete above her head and crushing her flailing legs and twisting hips beneath his. “That’s enough!”

“Get off me!”

“Miss Mayweather …” Despite the weight of his body, and the unforgiving wall of Kevlar that shielded him from further injury—he hoped—she fought on with futile persistence beneath him. Her funky red glasses flopped across her lips instead of her nose and her exposed eyes were open wide, terrified, like a spooked horse. And hell, it was his fault. “I’m sorr—” But she was still too much of a danger to him to release her outright and let her bang away like the storm outside. “I’m sorry.” What he wouldn’t give to be armed and built a little less like a tank right now. She was scared and he was probably scarier than whatever had sent her to hide in that room in the first place. “Look, ma’am—”

“No!”

“Hey!” He tried to pierce her terror with his voice. But he was breathing hard, too, and the dog was barking, and he couldn’t find the calm tone he needed. “Hey.”

“Let me go,” she gasped.

“Are you gonna hurt me again?”

Bang. The wind caught the outside door. It slammed into the bricks and every muscle in her body jerked with the sound.

“Richard’s dead. He’ll kill me this time.”

“Lady—”

“Don’t kill me.” She squeezed her eyes shut, straining against him, tiring.

Trip’s blood ran cold. Those were tears on her lashes.

“I’m not gonna … Ah, hell.” Shoot him. Make him run ten miles in full gear. Give him paperwork. But do not … do not let a woman cry on his watch. “Stop that. I’m not the bad guy here.”

“Don’t hurt me,” she gasped.

He needed to end this. Now.

“Shh. Nobody’s gonna hurt you. You’re safe. Come on now. There’s no need to be cryin’ like that.” Trip eased himself down, covering her like a blanket with his body, erasing the distance between their chests, controlling her tenacious struggles with his superior size and strength. She’d pass out from exhaustion before he even worked up a sweat at this rate.

“No,” she moaned, pushing against his shoulder as soon as he freed her hands. “Please.”

“Charlotte, you need to breathe.” He brushed a kinky tendril of golden toffee off her cheek and dropped his voice to a husky tone. “Look at me.” She shook her head and tears spilled over her cheek, flowing as steadily as the rain outside. “Look at my badge …” Nope, not on his belt. It had gone flying in the initial tumble. She squirmed valiantly, her tired fingers curling into the shoulders she’d pummeled moments earlier. He was desperate to calm her down, to stop those tears, but he wasn’t about to go retrieve it with the way she was still writhing so unpredictably beneath him. Ignoring the twinge in his forearm, Trip propped himself up on his elbow and reached for the brim of his cap. She grunted with renewed energy, shoved hard against his chest. “It says KCPD …”

He felt the dog’s hot breath in his ear a split second before he felt the pinch on his fingertip. “Ow! Back off, pooch.”

“No!”

The mutt was after his hat. “Get out of here!” He wanted to play tug-of-war? Trip closed his fingers around the dog’s muzzle and shoved him away. “Give it—”

“Don’t hurt my dog!” Charlotte Mayweather pulled her hands away and went suddenly and utterly still beneath him. The mutt pulled the cap from Trip’s startled grip and trotted off to a corner. A plea wheezed from the woman’s throat. “I’ll do whatever you want. Just don’t hurt my dog.”

She’d refused to give up the fight or listen to reason for her own safety? But she’d surrender for the dog’s sake?

Although her golden lashes still glistened with tears, her eyes were suddenly clear, focused and looking right up into Trip’s. For several seconds, his vision was filled with deep dove gray. The scents of dampness and dust and heat filled the air between them, filtering into his head with every quick, ragged breath.

For a woman who had as much feisty terrier in her as the dog gnawing on his cap, she’d suddenly gone all quiet, all submissive, all ready to listen to civilized reason now that she mistakenly thought her furry sidekick was going to get hurt. Trip was the one who was bleeding here. Charlotte Mayweather was one seriously twisted-thinking, incomprehensible, crazy …

Woman.

The realization short-circuited the adrenaline still sparking through Trip’s body, leaving one sense after another off-kilter with awareness. Curvy hips cradling his thighs. The most basic of scents—soap and rain and musky woman.

And those big, soulful eyes.

“Don’t go by your first impression of her,” Alex had warned.

Made sense now.

Charlotte Mayweather was a menace to herself and anyone trying to help her. And, while he wouldn’t call her beautiful, she was definitely … distracting.

As soon as his conscious brain registered what his banged-up body had already noticed, Trip pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, putting some professional, respectful, much-needed distance between them.

“I didn’t hurt the dog,” he assured her, swallowing the growly husk in his deep voice. Yeah, he had a right to defend himself, but his badge didn’t give him the right to be making goo-goo eyes at a possible victim or witness. Besides, she wasn’t his type. While Trip had never really considered exactly what his type of woman might be, he was pretty sure that pink high-top tennis shoes, flying fists and flaky eccentricities weren’t on the list.

He shifted to one side, easing the bulk of his weight off her while keeping a careful eye out for any sign of further attack. “You, I’m not so sure about. Sorry about the takedown, but you forced me to protect myself. Anything bruised up?”

She shoved her glasses back into place, masking her eyes as she scooted just as fast and far across the floor as she could, until the brick wall at her back stopped her. She whistled and the dog jumped up as she pulled her knees to her chest and hugged them tight with one arm. The dog, with Trip’s cap locked firmly in his teeth, settled beside her and her free hand drifted down to clench a fistful of fur at the dog’s nape. “Did Max bite you? It was an accident, I promise.”

“You didn’t answer …” Trip crouched where he was a few feet away, keeping close to her level on the floor instead of towering over her and sending her into a freak-out again. Her eyes darted to the black-and-tan dog and back across the warehouse aisle to look at him.

Okay, so she wasn’t going to speak rationally about anything besides the fur ball. Fixing a more sympathetic expression onto his features, Trip held up his hand and waved his fingers in the air. “Max, is it? He got a nip in, but I’ll survive.”

“He didn’t mean it. He’s not a vicious dog. His job is to keep me from losing it.” Um, maybe the pooch needed a little more training? Or was the armed charge and barely controlled panic that moved her body in those rigid, jerky motions her idea of keeping it all together? “He’s never been with me when I’ve been attacked before.”

“Hey, I wasn’t the one attacking—”

“I don’t know if he was defending me, or maybe just wanted to play—but he didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Trip breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth, forcing himself to relax—wishing she’d do the same. He was guessing she hadn’t meant to hurt him, either.

“No harm done.” There was barely a blister on the tip of his index finger, but the gash in his forearm was oozing blood through the tear in his sleeve. “On the other hand, I think your sword wound is gonna need a few stitches.” He fingered open the rent in his shirt and examined the cut. “You know, I’ve been stabbed, tasered, shot at—even dislocated my shoulder once on a call. But I’ve never had to report being brought down by a twenty-pound dog and a broadsword before.” Maybe if he kept his voice somewhere short of its natural volume and kept smiling, she’d quit inching up against the wall like that, putting every millimeter of distance between them she could. “Makes you kind of unique.”

She didn’t so much as blink at the offhand compliment, and offered not even one flicker of a smile at his teasing. “Max weighs twenty-five pounds.”

“My apologies.” Okay. So he wasn’t making any points with Alex’s eccentric friend. Better swallow his guilt and stick to police work. Her eyes followed every movement as he plucked his badge from beneath the broken crate, dusted it off and clipped it onto his belt. Trip sank back onto his haunches on his side of the aisle. “Could you at least tell me if any of that blood on your coat is yours?”

Finally giving him a break from that accusatory glare, she glanced down at the stains on her sleeves. With a stiff, almost frantic effort, she rubbed at the reddish-brown spots, turned her hand over to grimace at the slickness that clung to her fingers. With both arms, she pulled the dog up into a hug and choked back a sob. But when her eyes nailed Trip again, there were no tears—only sorrow and distrust. “It’s Richard’s blood. Maybe yours. I’m not hurt.”

“Good.” So the woman had been scared spitless, but she hadn’t been physically harmed. He was so not the negotiator on his team. Give him something to blow up, break into, fix, and he could handle it just fine. But talking a woman off a mental ledge like the one Charlotte Mayweather was apparently teetering on? Ignoring the tweak at his conscience that he had as much to do with putting her on that ledge as her dead friend and an unknown assailant did, Trip focused on the things he could handle. He straightened enough to sit on the edge of a table and reached up to his shoulder to tear off his right sleeve. “Did you see the killer? Is that why you were hiding?” He paused midrip. “Ah, hell. You thought I was him, didn’t you. Is that why you attacked?”

Her eyes were tracking his movements again. “I know that assaulting a police officer is a really bad thing, but—”

“You have a knack for not answering my questions.”

“—to be honest, I didn’t know who you were, and after seeing Richard and all the blood, and the noise, and he knew my name—”

“Who knew your name?”

“The man on the phone. The man who called me on Richard’s phone. The killer knew my name. He was taunting me.” She hugged the dog tighter, and the pooch turned his head to lick her jaw. “He pounded on the door. The calls and the pounding reminded me of … he knows things about me.”

“Charlotte … I mean, Miss Mayweather.” He’d never seen a person pull herself into such a tight little ball of terror and uncertainty. He didn’t understand pounding and calls and what exactly those meant to her, but he wanted nothing more than to brush those dark gold curls off her cheek, wrap her up in a hug and prove that he was nothing like the man who’d frightened her into such a state. “He won’t hurt you,” Trip vowed, wisely busying his hands by going back to work on a makeshift bandage by breaking the last threads and peeling the sleeve down his arm. He had a feeling that touching her, or even moving closer, would send her into another panic. “As long as I’m here, nobody is getting to you. And I’m not leaving until Alex Taylor and the people you know and trust get here. Okay?”

After watching her eyes lock on to his without any real relief registering there, Trip looked away to check his watch. Surprisingly, only a few minutes had passed since he’d answered Alex’s call—and, he suspected, only a few minutes longer would pass before Alex and the rest of his SWAT team arrived to deal with this off-the-clock rescue. But Miss Hug-the-Dog over there was looking at him as if she’d been sentenced to a night of terror with the beast from some gruesome fairy tale—and he’d been cast in the starring role.

It was hard on a cop’s ego, and humbling to any man, to be perceived as the villain—especially when he was used to doing his job and saving the day. He needed the diversion of the pain that made him wince when he pressed the wadded-up fabric against the cut on his forearm to stanch the bleeding there.

The wind outside caught the door again. Trip didn’t know if it was the startling noise or him standing that made her eyes widen like saucers. But he figured an apology was useless and strode over to pull it shut.

After wedging a shim of wood between the door and frame to keep it closed, he faced her again. Yep, those suspicious eyes had followed every move he’d made. “Did you know this outside door had been jimmied open?”

“No.”

“Then the perp was in here.” He perched on the edge of the table again. “You were right to hide. And attack.”

“It’s not right to hurt somebody else like that.” She tucked the swath of curls behind her ear, exposing a flash of a big white-daisy earring. “I’m sorry. I swear I didn’t know you were a police officer. I get a little … stuck in my head sometimes.”

Trip dabbed at his wound again. “I’m not pressing charges.”

“You’re not?” She sat up a little straighter, confusion mellowing the distrust on her face for a few moments. But then he could see her gathering her thoughts as she swiped the crystalizing tear streaks off her cheeks. “You’re not pressing charges against Max, either, are you?”

“Nope.”

“Thank you.” A long silence, muffled by the cocoon of rain falling outside, followed as Trip tore off a strip from his sleeve and continued to doctor his wound. Maybe as long as he stayed calm, she would, too. He even thought he saw her hands reach out to help him as he used his teeth to help tie off the pack on his forearm. But as soon as he spotted the gesture, she pulled away and curled her fingers into the dog’s fur. “You’re Alex Taylor’s friend?” she asked instead.

“I work with him at KCPD. We’re on SWAT Team One together. Special Weapons and Tactics.”

“Alex is … a sweet guy.”

“If you say so. I call him shrimp when he annoys me. But I can count on him to have my back.”

Half a smile curved her full lips. She was testing the option, as if unfamiliar with the idea of relaxing and sharing friendly conversation. “He counts on you, too, I think. He speaks highly of Captain Cutler and your team. I’m friends with Audrey Kline, Alex’s fiancée. Audrey is with the district attorney’s office. We went to high school together.”

“I know the counselor.” Trip had a feeling there was no problem with Charlotte Mayweather’s mental faculties, but he could see her waging a battle to keep the panic she’d shown earlier from swamping her again. He hoped he didn’t say anything that would screw up the tenuous peace between them. “My name’s Trip. Don’t know if you caught that while you were bustin’ up my face and arm.”

“Joseph Jones, Jr., Triple J or Trip.” If she’d relax just a fraction more, that’d be a real smile. Please let her smile. “Audrey told me. And please, it’s Charlotte. ‘Miss Mayweather’ sounds so spinsterish.” She touched her slim red glasses on her face. “And I’m already battling that stereotype.”

“Thanks … Charlotte. Audrey mentioned you, too. Look, I’m sorry I scared you. If you’d have just answered me … I had no way of knowing if you were stuck inside that closet with the perp—or if you’d been injured. I had to get to you.”

She stroked the dog and nodded. “My brain knows that. But sometimes I—”

A cell phone rang in the closet behind Trip, and Charlotte pushed herself straight up that wall. She hugged her arms tight around her waist. It rang again, and he could see any hope of coaxing a real smile or a little trust out of her had passed.

When it rang a third time, Trip was on his feet, digging through the mess in the closet to put a stop to the ringing. Cripes. She’d said the killer had her number. That he’d called to torment her somehow.

He snatched the phone off the floor and answered. “Trip Jones, KCPD. Who is this?”

“Trip? It’s Audrey.” He could hear the siren on Alex’s truck in the background, heard him on the radio to the other members of their team. “We’re a minute away. Did you find Charlotte?”

Trip immediately regretted snapping into the phone. No wonder Charlotte was afraid of him. “I found her. She’s …” Unpredictable. Frightened out of her mind. Unexpectedly charming. “… she’s safe.”

He glanced over to see a woman whose jaw was clenched so tight it trembled. That wasn’t right. No one should have to cope with that kind of fear churning inside her.

Trip looked her straight in the eye to reassure her. “It’s your friend Audrey.”

Although Charlotte nodded her understanding, she didn’t say anything until the dog dropped Trip’s hat and stretched up on its hind legs, resting a paw against her thigh. Looking down into the dog’s tilted face, Charlotte’s fingers immediately moved to scratch behind a tattered, scarred-up ear. “Good boy. Mama’s fine. Good boy.”

What was it about this woman that kept getting under his skin? Guilt that he hadn’t gotten the job done he’d been asked to do tonight? Frustration that he couldn’t make her feel any better, but the dog who’d stolen his hat could?

Or was it something about those haunted gray eyes that triggered all the protective instincts he possessed?

As if she was even interested in being protected by him.

“You can’t get here soon enough,” Trip admitted, turning back to the phone. “I don’t know what to say to her.”

“I warned you that she’s a little eccentric.”

“Yeah, well she’s scared enough of me that I don’t know if I’m being much help.”

The strident sound of a siren, made faint by the building’s thick walls, pierced Trip’s thoughts. The rhythm of the pulsing sound was different from the siren he could hear over the phone. Or was he hearing both sounds over the connection to Audrey’s phone? Wait. He could make out three, five, at least six different siren signals approaching—a lot more than the other members of SWAT Team One could account for.

Audrey was hearing them, too. “Did you call an ambulance? Oh, my God. It’s like a parade. Alex?”

Trip tensed, then forced his muscles to relax as he jogged toward the door and pulled it open. “Audrey, put your boyfriend on the phone,” he commanded. “Taylor. What’s going on? What are you seeing?”

Trip stepped out beneath the awning and spotted the swirls of red and blue lights bouncing off the wall of the building across the alley. Rain pelted his face and streamed down beneath his collar. So much for a low-key response to an eccentric friend’s call for help.

He recognized Alex’s truck turning into the end of the drive and parking at an angle to block the other vehicles. “Looks like we’ve got more backup than we asked for.”

Trip hung up as soon as Alex hopped out of his truck. With his gun drawn, he hurried to the museum’s back door, slowing just long enough to catch Audrey by the arm and hurry her on past the limo with the dead driver inside.

“Talk to me, Taylor.”

Alex Taylor, wearing the same KCPD SWAT flak vest over jeans and a sweater, shook his head, pushing his auburn-haired fiancée beneath the relative dryness of the awning. “I don’t know, big guy. I called Sergeant Delgado and Captain Cutler and that new gal on the team, Murdock. I didn’t call the army for backup. Word must have gotten out that it was Jackson Mayweather’s daughter who was in trouble. That means the press will be here any minute, too.”

“How is she?” Audrey asked, her face wreathed with concern.

Trip felt the heat at his back a split second before he heard the soft husky voice whisper behind him. “What’s wrong?”

“Charlotte!”

Trip’s impulse to shield the woman taking shelter behind him was thwarted when Audrey scooted past him and caught Charlotte up in a tight hug. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry about Richard. Are you okay?”

Charlotte’s denial was a quick shake of her head. “It’s happening again. It’s like before.”

“Before what?” But Trip’s question went unanswered. Again. Vehicles screeched to a halt out on the street’s wet pavement. Car doors opened and closed. There were shouts and a few choice curses.

“What’s going on?” Charlotte tipped her chin and blinked against the rain, throwing the question to Trip as if the approaching chaos was all his fault. “Why are all these people here?”

“I’m guessing it’s the response to your 9-1-1 call.”

“I didn’t call anyone but Audrey.” Charlotte was hunched over, holding tight to the dog’s collar. “I don’t want to see anyone. I want to go home.” She hid behind Trip as the first uniformed patrol officers dashed around the corner into the alley lot. “I don’t like people.”

He spun around to keep her in sight. “You don’t like people?”

“I don’t like strangers. I can’t handle people I don’t know, especially all at once.”

“They’re here to help.”

“Like you did?”

Ouch. The big gray eyes nailed him with the accusation.

Give it up, Jonesy. You’re not going to win this gal over tonight.

“I’m sorry.” Apology colored her voice, and she reached out as if she was going to touch him. But she quickly snatched her hand back to her chest. “I shouldn’t have said that. All the rumors you’ve heard about the crazy woman at Mayweather Mansion are true.”

“I don’t listen to rumors—”

“It’s not your fault.” The woman was going into panic mode again. “Audrey? What am I going to do?”

“C’mon.” Audrey wrapped her arm around Charlotte’s shoulders and turned her toward the door. “Let’s get you back inside. Alex, keep them away if you can.”

“I’ll do my best, sweetheart. I’m gonna need you, big guy.”

After stowing his Glock back in its holster, Alex squeegeed the rain from his sleek black hair and put up a hand to hold back the officers hurrying toward them. “I’m Alex Taylor, SWAT Team One. The scene is secure, guys.”

One of the uniforms kept coming. “Is that your truck? You’re gonna have to move it. I’ve got two ambulances on the scene, with orders to get them in here.”

Trip stepped forward, making a bigger blockade. “You need a coroner’s wagon, not an ambulance.” He nodded toward the BMW. “The vic is an elderly gentleman. Richard …?”

“Eames,” Alex supplied the missing info. “Gunshot wound to the head.”

The officer glanced inside the car, clearly questioning Trip’s authority. “I’ll have to check with my superior.”

“Do that.”

That took care of the first two officers, but the second wave was pulling up at the end of the alley, grouping up to assess and discuss the scene. The response to one frightened woman’s call for help was bordering on overkill.

“Just how rich are the Mayweathers?” Trip asked.

“Jackson Mayweather is worth more than you and I both will make in a lifetime—and then some. Once word gets out that his daughter has been harmed again …”

“Again?”

Alex grinned ruefully. “You read all those books and yet you don’t know front-page news? Charlotte was kidnapped when she was seventeen. Tortured. Ransomed for millions of dollars. Testifying at her kidnappers’ trial was the last time she made an official public appearance. According to Audrey, a situation like this could send Charlotte back into seclusion for … forever, I guess.”

Kidnapped? Tortured? Trip felt the blood draining from his head at the memory of him wrestling the terrified woman to the ground. “You didn’t think I needed to know that before you sent me over here? I could have done some real harm.”

Alex’s dark eyes narrowed, surveying Trip from head to toe and back up to his bare arm and the makeshift bandage there. “Maybe we need that bus, after all. What happened?”

“Don’t ask.”

More people arrived on the scene, this time ranking detectives wearing suits and ties. A pair of EMTs, carrying their boxes of gear, followed close behind. The crew of a news van was already unloading equipment and setting up shots.

Alex’s deep breath matched Trip’s own. Any chance of secluding Charlotte from the cops and the media was quickly spiraling out of control. “If Charlotte didn’t call 9-1-1, who did?”

Trip looked at the phone still clutched in his hand. He remembered Charlotte’s instant terror at the idea of the killer calling her again.

“I think I know.” Trip lifted his gaze, sweeping the rooftops and bricked-up windows before he advanced to meet the red-haired detective striding toward them. The bastard was still here. The man who’d killed the driver and forced Charlotte to arm herself with an ancient sword was someplace close by—maybe even a part of the frenzy—watching, feeding off her terror. “Get the team on the radio. We need to set up a perimeter.”