3. Evie #2
He hesitated for a moment, looking adorable and awkward, and for a split second I thought about asking him if he wanted to come cuddle. But then reality grabbed me like a fishhook in the lip, and I snapped out of that delusion.
With another curt nod and a half-smile, he spun on his heel like a good cadet and left.
Frustrated, nervous, exhausted and confused, I toppled backward into the luxurious pillows behind me, sighing and grumbling over the enigma that was John William Burke.
I slept better than I thought. I wasn’t out the moment my head hit the pillow by any means, but when my alarm woke me up, I didn’t feel nearly as mentally or emotionally trashed as I anticipated.
I felt well-rested and ready-ish to take on the day and all the traumatic, triggering things on the docket.
Burke was already up when I came out of my room, dressed and ready for the day.
It was late August in Washington state, so I chose a pair of dark wash, stretchy skinny jeans—sorry Gen Z, I know skinny jeans are out, but this millennial will never stop wearing them—and a white tank top.
This wouldn’t do for the deposition, but it would suffice as a mall-wandering outfit.
Sitting at the island in the kitchen with plates of breakfast food scattered in front of him, a shirtless Burke scrolled on his phone.
“Ordered food,” he said with an extra splash of rasp to his voice than normal. “Dig in.”
“I’m assuming you need help getting a shirt on?” I asked, sidling up next to him and grabbing a triangle of buttered sourdough toast.
“Please.” He sipped his coffee. “You said when you were going to stay at my place that you’re a coffee girl, so I ordered you a latte when I heard you up. Should be here any minute.”
His level of thoughtfulness hit me hard in the solar plexus, and I had to keep myself from swooning.
So I shoveled food into my face instead.
As he said, my latte arrived within minutes, and it was perfect.
Humming in delight, I sat back down at the kitchen bar beside him.
“Have you ever had to give a deposition?”
He grunted and shook his head. “No.”
I pouted. “Me either.”
Pivoting his big frame to face me, the ridges of his well-defined abs scrunching with the way he was sitting, he offered me one of his classic Burke half-smirks. “You’ll do great. I don’t think Gabrielle will leave you high and dry. She’s going to have your back in there the whole time.”
“What about you?” I asked the question before I had time to really think about whether I should ask it.
“What about me?”
Dammit, I needed to follow-through now. I went and opened my dumb mouth, so I had to finish this conversation, as painful as it might be. “W-will you be there? Will you come into the deposition with me? Have my back too?”
His lips formed a thin line, and his gaze shifted down to the countertop for a moment as if he were trying to figure out a way to gently let me down.
“Never mind,” I said quickly, waving my hand. “I’m sure you won’t be allowed in there, anyway. Gabrielle will be fine. Forget I asked.” I grabbed a bunch of plump red grapes off the fruit plate and popped one into my mouth.
“If I’m allowed in, I’ll come in,” he said. “If I’m not allowed in, I’ll stay right outside the room. I won’t leave. I promise.”
With a mouthful of masticated grapes, I smiled at him. “Thank you.”
We were out of the hotel and at the mall within the hour, lined up with the other eager beavers of the morning who wanted to be the first into the mall when it opened.
Normally, I was never that kind of person, but we had a full agenda today, so I didn’t care that we stood in front of the automatic doors at eight fifty-five.
Burke scanned the area like I were the president and he were head of the Secret Service.
Even with his left arm in a sling, the man was an intimidating force.
He screamed protector just the way he walked, stood and moved his body.
Nothing was random. Everything, probably down to a sneeze, even, was calculated and thought out.
He didn’t do a damn thing without mentally assessing the risks beforehand.
I found an outfit suitable for the deposition at the first store we went to, so after that, Burke and I had a couple of hours to kill before we met Gabrielle. Something that I both appreciated, but also dreaded. It just gave me more time to fret over what was to come.
“Do you want to go back to the hotel?” Burke asked as we climbed into his truck in the mall parking lot. “To get changed and relax before your deposition.”
I nodded. “Probably best, yeah.”
He pulled out of the parking stall, having reversed into it.
We were at a stop sign still on mall property when two masked me, both of them waving guns, approached us on either side of the truck.
The one on Burke’s side yanked open his door and, with a gun to his head ordered him to get out of the truck.
Meanwhile, the one on my side cut my seatbelt with a knife and already had me halfway out.
“Burke!” I screamed. “Burke! Help!”
I was fully out of the truck now, being dragged across the parking lot to a waiting van with the sliding door open, when a gunshot from the cab of Burke’s truck echoed around us.
I screamed, kicking and scratching at the masked man who had me by the arm.
Everyone in the parking lot along the sidewalks was scrambling for cover. Some people had hit the pavement, and others were hiding behind their vehicles.
Nobody was coming to help me, though.
Nobody, but Burke.
By some twist of fate, my muscly bodyguard in a sling wasn’t the one who took yet another bullet to the body, and I could vaguely see a body lying beside his truck. He came barreling toward my captor and me, the first man’s gun in his hand. “Let her go, or you’re going to fucking regret it, pal.”
The man who had me snorted and jerked me closer to the van.
Burke wasn’t messing around, pulled the trigger and got my assailant in the shoulder. The exact same spot Burke caught a bullet just two days ago.
The man instantly released me, crying out in pain. He dropped the gun in his hand, and I crouched to pick it up, pivoting to point it at the driver of the van who instantly threw his hands in the air.
Burke pointed the gun at the man on the ground at my feet, but turned to me. “You okay?”
My chest heaved as adrenaline pumped hot and fierce through me. “Yeah … I think so. You?”
“Didn’t get shot again, so … yeah.”
The whoop whoop of sirens in the distance eased my nerves even more, and soon the comforting sight of blue and red lights came into view.
There were enough witnesses around that there was no question who the perps were, but I couldn’t keep myself from glaring at all the people who suddenly decided to do the right thing and come forward. Where were they when I was being hauled out of Burke’s truck toward a van? Cowering. That’s where.
With the passenger seatbelt out of commission, I was forced to sit in the back, however, all the chaos that came with giving our statements to the police and proving who we were and why we were in Seattle, robbed us of any downtime at the hotel.
We were driving like mad toward the law offices, with me changing in the backseat as Burke wove his way through vehicles and probably broke a few speeding laws.
But we made it with ten minutes to spare.
“I need to go freshen up,” I said to him as we headed for the front doors of the big, shiny building downtown. “This is not how I wanted to present myself on camera.”
“There you are,” Gabrielle said, meeting us in the lobby. She gave me a stiff hug. “It had to be Wyndham Croft who hired those goons. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
Of course, we called Gabrielle on the drive over and filled her in on what happened. She said if we needed more time to get to the deposition, she’d do her best to stall.
“I need to go freshen up,” I said to her. “I changed on the drive here.” Fiddling with my hair, that was half up and half down, I tucked a strand behind my ear. “I’m sure I look a mess.”
“You look beautiful,” Burke said so matter-of-factly that both Gabrielle and I spun to look at him, our jaws slack. He cleared his throat, his cheeks going adorably pink. “What I mean is … you look fine. But if you need to go freshen up, I’ll stand watch outside the bathroom. After I check inside.”
At this point, I wasn’t going to argue with anything he said. We were just attacked in broad daylight in front of countless witnesses. Wyndham Croft was clearly threatened by my testimony and willing to do whatever it took to keep me quiet.
Burke went into the women’s bathroom ahead of Gabrielle and me, scoping out the stalls. “It’s empty,” he came back out saying. “You can go in.”
With an amused snort, Gabrielle led the way. I dug into my purse to pull out some of my emergency makeup. A little concealer, a little blush, some mascara, and tinted, plumping lip gloss. Then I redid my hair, used the washroom, and washed my hands.
“You’ve got this,” Gabrielle said, smiling at me as we both faced the mirror. “Just answer the questions as they’re asked and take all the time you need to do so. If anybody tries to rush you, look at me and discreetly touch your nose. I can call for a recess at any point.”
My smile of acknowledgment was brittle. “Thanks.”
“You ready?”
I huffed a humorless laugh. “No, but that doesn’t matter.”
She looped her arm through mine. “That’s the spirit. Now let’s go castrate the patriarchy, one sonofabitch at a time.”