Chapter 18 #2
At the checkout desk, Peyton held my hand, and I had to admit it felt damned good that she felt confident enough to take that tiny step after all the pushback I’d gotten from her.
“I’ve called you a ride home,” Lucas said. “And I think you should reschedule your dinner.”
I’d completely forgotten about the dinner reservations. “Roger that.”
Peyton backed away. “I need to use the restroom. Don’t leave without me.”
I smiled back at her. “Never.”
“Because of the ambulance call,” Lucas said, “the LAPD got there before we could get the two who attacked you. I don’t know how long it’ll be before we can interrogate them.”
“You can start with the lady who lured Peyton out there,” I suggested.
“Constance already did. The lady is the short one’s aunt, and they paid her to put the ad up and lure Peyton out. Constance believes that’s as far as her involvement goes. The woman did hear the big guy say that the man wanted to talk to Peyton, whoever the man is, so there’s that.”
“Those two idiots don’t have enough brain cells between them to organize their way out of a paper bag, so this Mr. X must be the one pulling the strings. Could they be referring to Victor, and this is some wacko revenge play on his part?”
“Not likely, but trust me, we’ll find out when we get our hands on them.”
I had no doubt that Lucas had the tools to do exactly that.
Peyton
Constance drove us away from the hospital.
March was in the front passenger seat and I was in the back, wishing he’d sat with me.
I raised my voice to be heard. “Did they get my bike?” The lady had said it was behind the house, but I hadn’t gotten far enough to see it.
Constance checked the traffic before turning. “Pete picked it up. He was taking it to Zane’s for you.”
That was a relief. “Pete?” If they’d called him, they really had pulled out all the stops. He was Grace’s brother, just rescued from captivity in Syria, and not even a member of Hawk Security.
“Yeah,” she replied. “He wanted to help.”
I nodded, hoping I got the chance to thank him.
March turned in his seat. “Who is the man?” he asked abruptly.
“What?”
“The old lady,” Constance replied. “She said that they wanted to take you to talk to ‘the man.” She added a one-handed air quote.
It all came rushing back, including the horrible threats.
“We need to know exactly what Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum said,” March added.
“They said the man wanted to talk to me,” I squeaked out the exact words, remembering the rest of their terrifying threats. After a second, I composed myself. “That’s all they said, but I don’t know who that is. I really have no idea.”
“Anything else?” Constance asked as she turned toward the freeway entrance.
I didn’t want to relive a second of it, but these people were here for me, and March had even gotten hurt protecting me. I swallowed hard. “They intended to rape me, both of them.”
March’s jaw tensed. “The fuckers are going to pay.”
“I’m with you, cowboy,” Constance said. “The bigger threat is from the boss they work for. Don’t forget that. They need to be able to talk.”
“They’re still going to pay,” March repeated. “I’ll see to that.”
“And you have no idea who could be after you?” Constance asked. “Somebody from your past, maybe?”
March had promised to stop asking about my past, but that didn’t apply to Constance.
“No.” The two times the Strangler had come for me, he’d made a point of terrifying me ahead of time with a warning, pink roses and a note.
Today, the roses had come from the man in the front seat, my man.
“I haven’t pissed anybody off.” It couldn’t be my pursuer.
He couldn’t know I was in LA. Not even Rhonda knew where I’d gone.
“How’d you know I was in danger?” I asked March to shift the conversation.
“I didn’t,” he admitted. “I heard you were picking up your bike, and I didn’t want you riding that distance back home, especially through that part of town.”
“Oh.” I caught Constance’s eyes as she glanced at me in the rearview mirror. She was thinking the same thing as me. What if March had been just a little bit later? A shudder ran through me. “Thank you, March.”
“Maybe as thanks, you could start calling me by my first name,” he suggested.
“Thank you, Ruppert.”
Constance laughed a long laugh. “Ruppert?”
“Don’t you dare repeat that to anyone,” March snarled. “It’s not my name.”
“It used to be,” I argued. “Ask his mother. She’ll tell you.”
Constance laughed again. “You have to admit, Ruppert has a certain ring to it.”
“Maybe we should discuss your tattoo,” March shot back.
Constance looked straight ahead. “No mention of Ruppert. Got it.” There was definitely a story behind the tattoo. “I’m getting it removed anyway.”
March wasn’t done yet. “Care to show us?”
“One more word out of you, and you’ll wake up one day with your balls in your mouth.”
Yeah, she was not happy. At least Constance had stopped poking into my past.
“We’ll do our dinner another night,” March said.
“Okay.” The further in the future the better. My feelings for him were dangerous.
When Constance pulled to a stop outside March’s quaint little house, there was a light on inside.
Opening the door, the reason soon became obvious.
“There you two are,” his mother, Karla, gushed as she overwhelmed us in the entryway. “I’m going to be staying another few nights, if that’s okay. They scheduled a bunch of meetings at the Marriott down by the airport, and that’s too far a drive from home.”