Читать книгу Last Chance Hero - Melinda Di Lorenzo - Страница 11

Chapter 1

As the bus wheezed around the second-to-last corner before her stop in her hometown of Ellisberg, Oregon, Jordynn Flannigan’s phone buzzed to life in her pocket. She yanked it out and stared down at the flashing screen.

New Message from: Sasha.

She checked the time.

4:17 a.m.

Jordynn swiped her finger across the screen, wondering what her best friend could possibly want at this time of the morning. If it could even be called morning yet. Outside, the streetlights still glowed, and just a minute or so earlier, she’d seen a flash of the nearly full moon, as well. You up? Sasha had texted.

I am. But I have a good excuse. What about you?

Don’t ask. Incident with a crayon up the nose. My fave four-year-old was sleep coloring or something. Thought I’d check in. You okay?

Jordynn’s fingers were quick to reply. She smiled as she pictured her friend’s son.

Sounds like a typical night in your house. And I’m fine.

The response came almost instantaneously.

You sure? Uncle Reed said you refused to let him give you a ride home earlier. Sane people avoid the bus.

She smiled again. Sasha’s uncle Reed, who had been her friend’s guardian since they were teens, also owned the private care facility where Jordynn worked. He often went above and beyond in the role. In fact, with her own parents gone—her dad before she was born and her mom just two years earlier—everyone in Sasha’s family kind of filled the void. Her two kids were like a niece and nephew, her husband like the brother Jordynn never had, and her uncle definitely saw himself as a surrogate parent. Sasha took it as meddling, but Jordynn didn’t mind the support.

Tell Reed I’m fine. I just worked a few extra hours tonight.

Uh-uh. No way. I’m not going to be the one to break his heart by telling him you’re trying hard to exhaust yourself.

At that, Jordynn laughed. It was true that Reed coddled her a little at work, but she could hardly feel any resentment. And in spite of his preferential treatment, she never took advantage.

It’s nice that he cares. Too bad none of his sweetness got passed down to you.

If you could see me, you’d know I’m rolling my eyes. Hard.

If it makes you feel any better, I’ve got the rest of the weekend off.

I’d kill for a weekend off. But...you know...kids.

There was the briefest pause, then another text came through.

You sure you’re okay?

Jordynn tapped the side of the phone for a second, thinking about what to say. She knew why her friend was asking. The date had glared at her all day from the tear-away calendar on the nurses’ station at work.

After a moment, though, she sighed and wrote,

Totally fine. Really. I’m just going to go home, go to bed, and not get up for at least ten hours.

There was a delay in Sasha’s reply, and she wondered if her friend was thinking about calling her out for her brush-off. But when the answer finally came, it was a five-word acceptance instead of a demand for her true feelings.

All right. Good night, BFF.

Jordynn tucked her phone back into her pocket as the bus lumbered to a halt.

Truthfully, she’d spent her shift alternating between being short-tempered and ready to tear up at any given moment. But she’d promised herself she’d get through it. And she had. She’d gone the full twenty-four hours without actually crying, and without letting the ache in her chest overwhelm her.

She supposed that was probably why she felt so tense now. The lack of emotional release, coupled with the utter exhaustion brought on by three hours of overtime tacked on to an already twelve-hour shift—almost all of it on her feet—was definitely a recipe for a bad state of mind. She was so much more than ready for her own split-level house. For her hideous, bunny-eared slippers and her cushy, oversize robe. She doubted she’d ever been so glad for a week to be over.

Still, she couldn’t quite shake a strange sense of worry at the thought of walking the two and a half blocks from the stop to her two-bedroom rancher.

Don’t let it win, she ordered silently.

She refused to give in to the melancholy and let herself think about the past. To wallow in the things she couldn’t change. Not even today, on the tenth anniversary of the day her life had become forever altered.

But as she pushed open the hydraulic doors and stepped into the chilly predawn air, her unease grew stronger. She pulled her thin coat a little tighter across her chest and glanced around quickly. The streets were empty, as was to be expected at this time of night. The neighborhood wouldn’t wake for an hour or more, and for now, the houses sat still, dark and quiet. Nothing unusual. Nothing to make her fingers shake the way they were.

Jordynn increased her pace anyway. And as her feet hit the ground, the bad feeling increased with a vengeance. It was compounded by the fact that the ring—the one she kept on a long chain around her neck—felt suddenly heavy. And the way it pressed into her sternum under her scrubs made the pressure in her chest that much more stifling. Cooler than her skin and far more unyielding, too. And when a single streetlight directly above her head flickered off, bathing her in momentary darkness, she almost turned to ran back and try to flag down the bus again.

You’ll feel better when you get home, she told herself.

But oddly, the closer she got to her house, the worse she felt. By the time she’d crossed the first two blocks, her heart had started to race with worry. And when she hit the end of her own block and put her driveway in view, her feet didn’t want to move another step. With a dry mouth, she pushed one shoe forward. Then the other. She made it to the very edge of the stone steps that led from the lawn to her front patio. And the next few steps wouldn’t come. Because Jordynn spotted a true reason to be concerned.

The light on her porch—the one she always left on—was gone. Not turned off. Not burned out. Gone completely. The bulb and the vintage case that gave it the unmistakable orange hue were both missing.

Her eyes flicked around in a vain search for a logical explanation. She found nothing. Not even shattered glass on the ground.

It wasn’t an accident.

As the realization hit her, Jordynn took a step back, fumbling to reach for the phone in her jacket. Her hand didn’t even get as far as her pocket before her back hit something solid.

Not something. Someone.

It took her a second too long to figure it out. Quicker than she could even get out a whimper, a hand slammed over her mouth. A rough, distinctly masculine palm.

She fought to get away, twisting, and dropping her purse and all its contents as she tried to throw an elbow into his stomach. The man bent away easily, and his hand stayed in place. She made another attempt to free herself, this time driving her foot backward. It was a futile move. Her shoe tumbled to the ground, and her sock slid uselessly off his pants. And suddenly, she was pressed against him, her arms pinned to her sides.

“Move again, and die,” warned a gruff voice. “Scream, and die. In fact, do anything I don’t like...and die.”

But the three-part warning wasn’t even necessary. Because when he eased away, the cold tip of a blade digging into the small of her back provided motivation enough. She held very still, praying that all he wanted was her money. Her silent hope went unmet.

The rough hand came down, and a heartbeat later, a cloth took its place. Her assailant shoved the fabric between her teeth, then back farther. Jordynn wanted to gag, and fought the urge. She didn’t dare make a sound. But as he forced her hands behind her back and lashed them together with a plastic tie, she couldn’t stop the tears from forming in her eyes and spilling over to her cheeks.

Will it make him mad? she wondered. Is crying something he doesn’t like?

A few seconds later, it didn’t matter anyway. Her attacker slipped a hood over her head, covering up the evidence of her near-silent sobs. Then he spun her around and gave her a little shove, and Jordynn realized why he’d covered her face. He was going to take her somewhere, and she wouldn’t stand a chance of knowing a thing about how they got there.

“Walk,” the man growled.

Jordynn tried to obey him, but with the tears coming even harder, and the choking sensation growing worse, disorientation reigned. When she lifted her foot, it caught on one of the pathway stones. She stumbled, just enough to send her to her knees.

Above her, the man holding the knife snarled.

A chance. This is a chance.

But it wasn’t. The moment she managed to get to her knees, thick fingers landed on top of the hood. He gripped it together with her hair and dragged her back. She hollered against the gag in her mouth. Muffled. Pointless.

I’m going to die. I moved and I screamed and he didn’t like it and—

The wild thoughts cut off as a snarl reached her ears. She was sure it hadn’t come from the man who held her, because he went still, then released her abruptly. Jordynn fell sideways, slamming to the grass and knocking off the hood, giving her a clear view of the strange scene unfolding in front of her. First, a flash of movement caught her eye. Then, from up the walkway—and she could almost swear the figure had come from inside her house—a distinctly human form flew toward her and her assailant. It flew straight into the man holding her, and he let out a yell as he was knocked sideways.

And now there were two men in her yard instead of one. The first was on the ground. He was short and whip-thin, his furious face angular and almost birdlike. The second was on one knee, and he was just the opposite—a bear of a man, with a square, beard-dusted jaw. He wore a ball cap pulled low, and under its edges, Jordynn could just see a curl of sandy hair. As he pushed to his feet, his muscles strained against his fitted T-shirt.

When the first intruder stood, the second one lifted his face up under the cap, and Jordynn thought there was something familiar in his gaze. And strangely, the flash of familiarity actually sent a pleasant tingle up her spine. After a second of staring at her, he dipped his hat down, obscuring his features. And for some reason, that just made her want to see more of him. It surprised her to realize it. Checking out men was low down on her to-do list. Nevertheless, there was no denying his appeal. The strength in his tense jaw. The fullness of his lips. The raw power in his physique. Even in the very dim light, she could see how attractive he was.

And in spite of the fact that Jordynn didn’t know who he was, and even though she knew she ought to be more than a little frightened about what he was doing outside her home in the first place, the all-over tingle became an unexpected—and unwanted—buzz.

She swallowed nervously.

Then he lifted his head again, the baseball hat tipping back to expose his face. He took a small step forward, and Jordynn’s breath caught in her throat. She knew why he seemed familiar. And why she felt such a strong, singular attraction to him.

The man standing in front of her looked enough like the man she loved—the man she’d lost a decade ago, today—that they could’ve been brothers. He was bigger. Way bigger. Older, too. And there was something darker and more guarded in the way he held himself than she’d ever seen from the man who’d given her the ring that she wore around her neck.

But the eyes...

Jordynn swallowed again, swaying a little on her feet. That warm, mesmerizing hazel that picked up the glow of the moon and reflected it back... She’d never seen the shade on anyone else.

But it can’t be him.

Her mind had to be playing the cruelest of tricks on her. Because the man Jordynn loved had died ten years earlier.

* * *

Jordynn Jean Flannigan.

For a minute that lasted a lifetime, Donovan Grady couldn’t do more than stare into her eyes, watching the heart-wrenching fear play through them. His guilt held him as fast as his awe.

His plan had just been to check on her from afar. To assure himself she was alive and well, but not to give her a chance to recognize him. For some reason, he hadn’t really thought about what would happen if she did. If his suspicions became fruitful—as they had—forcing him to get close and giving him no choice but to interact.

Maybe you just wanted so badly to be wrong that you didn’t consider the consequences.

Now that it had happened, the sight of her in the moonlight floored him. It sent thoughts of caution to the very back of his mind.

He waited for her to whisper his name. Or cry it out in confusion. Instead, she stood very still. Too still. Not showing a single emotion.

Maybe she doesn’t know you.

The idea cut into him.

Of course, he knew he looked a lot different than he had ten years ago. Two inches taller. Eighty pounds heavier. Hell, he hadn’t been more than nineteen when his world had changed forever. Barely a man. It wasn’t just the sudden, belated growth spurt, either. A decade away—a decade of pretending to be someone else—had changed him. Inside and out.

Still. He would’ve been able to pick her out of a crowd of a thousand. A crowd of a million. He’d held her face in his mind every night for the past decade. That didn’t mean she’d done the same. He hadn’t even wanted her to hang on to his memory.

He tore his eyes away from hers, but only succeeded in moving his gaze to the rest of her face.

Ten years had turned her from the pretty eighteen-year-old girl he remembered to a ravishing twenty-eight-year-old woman. Still naturally beautiful, still clean-scrubbed and makeup free. Still perfect. It left him tongue-tied, every part of him frozen. Except his pulse, which raced through his body with long-buried desire. From his spot just a few feet away, he just stood and appreciated the sight of her. The fiery cascade of her red, red hair and the subtle curves of her athletic build. Her sky blue eyes, and the curve of her lips—that he knew to be as soft and warm and tempting as silk—working furiously against a piece of cloth that had been jammed into her mouth.

A dirty rag. Hell.

She didn’t deserve to have it stuck between her teeth like that.

Donovan finally took a step toward her, determined to help her pull it out.

Before he could get any closer, Jordynn’s assailant smashed against his hip and dragged him back to reality. This wasn’t a romance, waiting to be rekindled. This was a life-or-death situation.

As Donovan stumbled, he didn’t have time to curse his own distractibility. He spun to the side, shook the other man off, then dropped to a low crouch and prepared for a second lunge. He didn’t have to wait long. With a wordless growl, the attacker came at him again. Donovan feinted to the left, the slammed out his right arm, knocking the smaller man to the ground. He gave the man no time to recover. He leaped forward to pin him to the ground, a knee in his chest and a forearm under his throat.

“Give it up,” he growled.

Under his elbow, the guy let out a choking laugh. In under a second, Donovan understood why. A sharp pain pierced his side.

A knife. Dammit.

He tried to no avail to get his arms around to dislodge it. The burn of the blade only increased as it dug in farther, and Donovan would have no choice but to let go if he wanted to pull it free. He couldn’t do that fast enough, either. A knee came up and slammed into him just shy of his groin. With a pain-filled grunt, he shifted out of reach. It was enough to give the assailant another temporary advantage. The smaller man dug his feet into the ground and slid up. Then he delivered a vicious kick to his chest, winding Donovan.

As he heaved in a breath, he finally did take a minute to curse himself. Stupid, to go in overconfident. Even stupider to assume the man was unarmed. Lucky, though, that it was something other than a gun.

Take what luck you can get, he told himself grimly.

He finally righted himself and reached around to yank out the blade. The wound was superficial, but it would still need attention. He knew he’d have to deal with it later. The other man had already started toward Jordynn once again, and she appeared to be fixed to the spot. Frozen in fear, maybe.

No way. No way in hell.

He tossed the knife to the ground, and as it landed with a dull thud, he wasted no time. He dived at Jordynn’s attacker’s legs. Together, they slammed to the grass, sending dirt flying.

“No more chances,” Donovan said as he came up to his knees.

He drew back his fist and smacked it into the other guy’s jaw as hard as he could. The blow sent the man sliding backward up the grass, where he groaned once, then stayed there, unmoving.

Donovan leaned down.

Thoroughly unconscious. As expected.

He turned back toward Jordynn.

She was gone.

Unreasonable panic washed through him.

His eyes flew around the outside yard in an arc, searching. No movement caught his eye. No flash of red hair. Nothing.

She had no idea of the danger she was in. That the man who’d attacked her was probably the least of her worries. The tip of the damned iceberg. If she’d taken off, she wouldn’t stand a chance in hell of staying safe.

He spun back toward the house, and on the second sweep, he found her. She’d made it to the front porch, where she’d crouched down behind a bush. The gag had fallen from her mouth, but her hands were still bound, and she was eyeing him nervously.

Thank God.

But Donovan’s relief was short-lived.

Before he could say a word, Jordynn’s jaw dropped open, and a high-pitched scream filled the dawn air.

He sprang forward, intent on stopping the noise. Seeing little other choice, he yanked the discarded rag from the ground, then knelt down beside her and shoved it back toward her mouth. Her teeth gnashed down hard against his skin.

Pain shot through his hand, but the pang of guilt at his own invasive action was worse. This was the woman he’d promised his heart to a decade ago. Just thinking about hurting her made his gut twist. Actually doing it was like a knife with a jagged edge, slamming into his rib cage.

Forcefully, Donovan pushed both the guilt and the physical pain to the back of his mind. He had to make her stop. To make her listen.

So tell her what happened.

But he couldn’t make himself do it. Not yet. Not like this.

As she continued to yell, punctuated now by gasping breaths, he held fast to the cloth, then gripped her head and worked the fabric between her lips. He got it all the way in, and held it there until she stopped struggling. Without letting go, he leaned back just enough to give her some space, but not so far that she could make an escape attempt. She sat still, her eyes squeezed tightly closed, her chest rising and falling with her rapid breaths. Donovan relaxed his grip a little, inhaling deeply. It was a mistake. Her sweet scent filled his nose—she wore the same delicately floral perfume he remembered so well. The light aroma that sometimes seemed to linger in the air when he woke from a pleasant dream.

Startled by his strong reaction, Donovan lost his grip on her completely. She jerked away, then sent a vicious kick at his knee—forceful enough to knock him to the side—then scrambled in the other direction, hitting the patio with a muffled cry.

Bloody hell.

Donovan shot up. Three long strides brought him to her side. With a grunt, he leaned down, grabbed her elbows and dragged her to her feet. She tried to yank herself away yet again. Donovan held firm.

“I’m trying to help you,” he said, his voice soft and even. “I’m not going to hurt you, and I want to take that gag out and untie your hands. But first, you need to promise me you aren’t going to scream. Can you do that?”

She kept her eyes shut. Like maybe she could will the sight of him away. After a second, though, she nodded once.

Gently, Donovan reached out to tug the cloth from her mouth. He felt her tense as he did it, and he couldn’t blame her. The situation was surreal for him, too, and he wasn’t the one being visited by someone he thought to be dead.

Wordlessly, he moved behind her, his fingers seeking her wrists. Even though he’d touched her twice over the past few minutes, this time it was different. Maybe because of the intention behind it. Donovan held the zip tie between his thumb and forefinger, squeezing it repeatedly to make it weak. He could feel the thrum of Jordynn’s pulse underneath his attention, and even though he knew it had to be the result of her nerves, it sent heat through his own veins. With gritted teeth, he continued to work until he was satisfied that he’d compromised the plastic enough to break it. Then he lifted his leg and slapped her wrists against his knee. The cord snapped with almost no resistance, and Donovan stepped away.

“You okay?” he asked.

She drew in an audible breath. “You’re not him.”

“Jordynn.” He turned her around to face him.

She shook her head, and continued to hold her eyes closed. “Please don’t be real.”

“Jordynn—”

“Stop saying my name.”

Her voice held a tiny bit of rebellion, and part of Donovan was glad to see she was as strong-willed as ever. A bigger part of him was worried that the longer they stayed on her lawn with an unconscious man at their feet, the longer they’d risk being caught. The longer he’d risk being caught. He sure as hell hadn’t come all this way to let that happen.

“We can’t stay here,” he said.

“Were you in my house?”

Donovan frowned at the seemingly unrelated reply. “Yes, but—”

“How did you get in?”

“The key you keep inside the garden gnome.”

“When’s my birthday?”

He smiled. “December 20. But you celebrate it on June 20 so no one tries to double up your birthday and Christmas gifts.”

At last, she lifted her lids. Her too-blue eyes went wide. She stared at him for three long heartbeats. Then her baby blues rolled back in her head. She slumped to the side, and Donovan caught her. With a sigh that was one part pleasure, one part resignation and one part worry, he lifted her gently with both arms, snagged her discarded shoe from the grass and started up the walkway.

And he had to admit, holding her close made him feel like no time had passed at all.