The Collector
Page 83

He carried her straight to a sofa. “Let me see where she hurt you.”
“Luke already fussed with it. She grazed me, that’s all. She just wanted to scare me, which she did. She really did. But that’s all she did, and she didn’t get what she wanted. Bitch ruined my shirt.”
“Lila.”
When he lowered his forehead to hers, she let out a long sigh, and felt the light-headed sensation pass.
Rooted again, she realized. She wouldn’t float away because he held on to her.
“Earl Grey scores again.”
“What?”
“He poked out of my bag, startled her. I was timing it to use Trench Coat Man, but Earl Grey was better. Who expects to see a dog poke out of a purse, especially when you’re focused on abducting someone in broad daylight? He startled her, and I shoved her, then I punched her and knocked her on her ass. And I ran. She was wearing heels, which tells me she’s vain and overconfident. She underestimated me, which makes her another kind of bitch. I have to get up.”
She pushed off the couch, scooping the dog out of her purse, and paced up and down the floor with him as she might with a fretful baby.
The anger came now, such a relief. Anger and insult bubbled up and boiled the lingering fear away.
“She didn’t think I’d give her any trouble. She figured I’d just go along with her, trembling and weak and stupid. She comes at me in the middle of the morning in the middle of Chelsea, and doesn’t expect me to fight back?”
She spun on her heel, paced back. Eyes firing, her face no longer pale but flushed with righteous fury.
“For God’s sake, I’m the daughter of a lieutenant colonel of the United States Army, retired. I may not know kung fu, but I know basic self-defense. I know how to handle a weapon. I know how to handle myself. She’s the one who landed on her ass. Who’s the bitch now?”
“She cut you.”
“She taunted me.” The panic, the mild shock, the shakes, all gathered together to re-form into that sheer, boiling rage. “‘We’re going to have a little talk,’ she says in her snotty, superior voice. And if it’s not satisfactory, well, she’ll just have to do her job. Which is killing people. She wanted me shaking and crying and begging like Oliver’s poor girlfriend. Well, she didn’t get it, did she? She may have ruined my best white shirt, but she’s going to think of me every time she looks in the mirror or sits down for the next couple days.”
He crossed to her, then just stood with his hands in his pockets. “Finished yet?”
“Nearly. Where’s Luke?”
“He went to check on Julie.”
“That’s good, except now she’s going to be upset and worried.” Glancing down, she saw Earl Grey was asleep with his head on her breast. “All this drama wiped him out.”
She went to her purse, took out his little blanket to spread on a section of the couch, then tucked him in for a nap.
“I was going to do just what I did—shove her and run. But I would’ve needed a trip to the ER and stitches. She’d have given me more than a poke with the knife. But Earl Grey gave me just that instant, just enough, so I could do it, and not get hurt. I’m taking him to the pet store and getting him whatever he wants.”
“How will you know what he wants?”
“We have a psychic bond now. It’s almost a Jedi thing.” More settled, she sat on the arm of the couch, watching over the dog as she looked at Ash.
“I’m pretty good at reading people. I observe—I always have. I’ve always been the outsider—the new kid in town always is. So you learn, or I did, to watch, to gauge, to get a read. And I’m pretty good at it. Whatever I had told her, if she’d gotten me to that private place she told me she had for our talk, she’d have killed me when she was done with me. She’d have enjoyed it. It’s her skill and her vocation.”
“I’ll give her the Fabergé, and we’ll be done with it.”
“It won’t be enough, not for her. That’s what I’m telling you. It might be enough for her employer, and she does have one, she mentioned one. But it’s not going to be enough for her, especially not now.”
She rose, went to him, ready now, she realized, to be held, to hold. “She has flawless skin. Up close, her face is just breathtaking, and her skin’s perfect, but there’s something wrong with her eyes. In her eyes,” Lila corrected. “I have this character in my books. She’s feral, whether in human form or wolf. I imagined her eyes like this woman’s.”
“Sasha.”
“Yes.” She nearly laughed. “You really did read it. I knew what she was when I looked in her eyes today. She’s a killer. It’s not just what she does. It’s what she is. Feral, and for her the moon’s always full.”
She let out a breath, coldly calm now. “Ash, we could give her the Fabergé tied up in a ribbon, and she’d still kill me, and you, and anyone who got in the way of that. She needs it, the way you need to paint and I need to write. Maybe more than that.”
“I need you safe, more than that.”
“Then we have to finish it, because until we do, until she’s in prison, neither of us will be safe. Believe me, Ash. I saw it in her eyes.”
“I believe you. Believe me when I say until she’s in prison, you don’t go out alone. Don’t argue,” he snapped before she could. “The next time she won’t underestimate you.”
It irritated, hampered, but it rang true. “You have a point there.”
“What did you mean you can handle a weapon?”
“I’m an army brat,” she reminded him. “My father taught me how to handle a gun, how to shoot. Maybe I haven’t done either in five or six years, but I could if I needed to. And I can box a little—more, I know basic and effective self-defense. Some jerk tried to mug me about a month after I moved to New York. I kicked his balls into his throat. They’ve probably yet to fully descend.”
“You always manage to surprise me.”
He gathered her in again, held on to comfort her and himself. He thought she wouldn’t need a gun if and when they came upon the woman again. He’d never struck a female in his life, had never considered doing so. But he’d make an exception for the one who’d spilled Lila’s blood.