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Street noise filled her ears as she landed in the store’s rear courtyard. A sprinkle of quiet students in wooden lounge chairs glanced her way, then back to their phones or books, unconcerned by her sudden and probably wild appearance.
Rita followed the picket fence at a crouch. She peeked over the top once, after a strong internal pep talk to convince herself it was important to see the bad guy before he saw her.
She stopped at the rear gate and pressed her forehead to the cool wooden slats. Anxiety twisted her gut and paralyzed her limbs. Maybe she didn’t have to go out there again. Maybe Cole could meet here where she was.
She rubbed her sweat-slicked palms over her jeans, one by one, juggling the phone with each move. Then she hunched her shoulders over her cell phone and sent a text to Deputy Garrett.
Where are you?
Cole’s response was immediate. I’m at the library. Where are you?
Of course. He’d gone straight to their meeting place, like she should have. The silence and lack of bodies hadn’t frightened him the way it had her.
Rita pulled in a restorative breath and let it out with resolve. Everything was okay now. The library was just down the alley and across the street. She only needed to leave the safety of the fence and get on with it.
She nodded at her screen, then typed On my way.
The phone rang in her shaky hand as she shoved the creaky gate open, creating an escape hatch from the enclosed bookshop patio. Cole’s number appeared on her screen.
Her heart settled at the sight of it. “Hi.”
“Hey.” Cole’s voice was strong and steady. “I’m standing outside the library. Tell me where you are, and I’ll come to you. You don’t have to walk alone.”
“I appreciate that. I might be wrong, but I think one of the men I saw last night is here, too.”
“Where?”
“Possibly in the café across from the library. I got nervous and left. Now I’m leaving the bookshop on River Drive. I cut through when I thought I was being followed.” And if she made it to Cole fast enough, she might make it home without a nervous breakdown.
Rita rolled her shoulders back, borrowing from his confidence.
She stepped into the midday sun and examined the passing faces. “I don’t see him now. It was probably nothing. I might be losing my mind, actually.”
“You’re not.” Cole assured her. “You’ve been through a trauma. Give yourself some credit for brilliance.”
“Brilliance?”
“You called me for help.”
Rita snickered. “An ego to go with the face. Isn’t that always the way?”
“You like my face?”
She smiled against the receiver, enjoying the sudden and blatant curiosity in Cole’s voice. He had to know he was handsome. According to the rumors, not that she listened, there were four Garrett brothers, all gorgeous, all lawmen, and all terminally single until recently. But that was fine. She didn’t need a date. She needed a protector, and the rumors about the Garretts being unstoppable forces of nature were repeated with as much fervor as those about their sexual prowess.
Those were the rumors she’d put her hope in.
She hurried away from the courtyard. Through a wall of ambling jocks and across the little street. The weight of her situation rolled away as the school’s library sign came into view. The door was only ten yards away, just around the next corner. Safety was so close she could throw a stone and hit it. “I see the fountain,” she said. “I’m almost...”
The sound of a revving engine cut through her words. A black sedan moved down the street in her direction.
Her mouth opened as the car bore down on her, but only a strangled sound emerged.
“Rita?” Cole barked through the receiver.
Her limbs were leaden as the car tore through the alley in her direction, increasing in speed and chasing students out of its way with a growl.
Her heart ached through to her backbone.
“Rita!” Cole hollered. “Move!” His voice echoed through the phone’s speaker and in the air. Cole appeared in the distance, running full speed from the café where she’d seen the creepy man. “Run!”
Adrenaline shot through her limbs like lightning bolts, propelling her suddenly away from the car, around café tables on the sidewalk outside a pizza shop and down the narrow street once filled with students. She pumped her arms and legs as the engine roared closer and lunged for the historic marble fountain moments later, tossing her phone and bags before colliding smartly with the fountain’s edge and soaring headlong into the recycled water. Her shins and palms were on fire from the collision before her head cracked against the carved angel’s feet.
Her face submerged and, for a moment, there was nothing but icy water everywhere.
She arose with a gasp, pulling in lungfuls of oxygen and scrambling around the fountain’s center.
The sound of squealing brakes and screaming people snapped her thoughts back into focus. The car!
“Stop!” Cole’s demand rang through the chaos, much closer now.
She wiped her eyes and spun in search of the voice she’d only known a short while, but could somehow pick out of a wailing crowd.
The engine revved once more as the car changed direction and roared softly into the distance.
She collapsed backward into the water, fighting an onslaught of tears. Her limbs trembled and her teeth chattered. She sat upright, knees pulled to her chest, overcome with panic and confusion.
Dozens of people stared openly, pointing their cell phones in her direction. Her brother was going to die of humiliation when he saw the footage and be infinitely angry she hadn’t opened up to him about what happened at the docks.
She dropped her head forward and begged her mind to think.
How could she possibly explain this away?
A set of strong hands wrapped around her elbows and hoisted her from the water with a whoosh.
Rita screamed. Her feet found purchase on the ground outside the fountain, and she locked her palms together on instinct to thrust against her assailant’s chest, sending him back several steps.
Cole relented, palms up as he widened his stance and waited. “Hey. It’s just me.” He watched silently as her scrambled brain put the pieces together.
“Cole!” Recognition hit, and Rita flung herself at him. She buried her face against his shoulder and exhaled the suffocating terror from her lungs. “I thought I was dead. I thought he’d kill me right here in front of everyone.”
Cole’s broad, warm hands found the small of her back and pressed her to him. “You’re okay, Rita.” His heart thrummed beneath her ear, chest rising and falling in quick bursts.
The sound of her name on his lips sent a shiver down her spine. The soft scents of spearmint, earth and aftershave that wafted off his heated skin didn’t help.
She peeled herself away with burning cheeks. “You’re soaked.” She brushed the sodden fabric of his uniform shirt with shaky hands. “I’m soaked and now... I’m so sorry.”
Rita locked her knees in frustration, and the tears began to flow.
“Hey.” Cole pulled her back against him and stroked her sopping hair. “I won’t let anyone hurt you. Okay? But you’ve got to trust me.” He took her hands in his, and led her away from the wretched fountain and massive crowd. “First, let’s get you out of here. I need to call this in, and you need something dry to wear. I’ve got towels and a first aid kit in the gym bag in my cruiser. How hurt are you?”
“I’m not.”
He turned her palm up in his, both their hands now painted with her blood. “No?”
“Scrapes. From the marble.”
He nodded stiffly. “What else?”
Her legs were sore and her head was fuzzy. “Bruises. Ow.” Her vision blurred. “I think I hit my...” Rita’s knees buckled and the world went black.
Chapter Six (#ub3f5438b-1665-5899-846f-dd74f072bd4c)
Cole stroked wet hair from Rita’s face as he buckled her into the passenger seat of his car. This day had gone from strange to downright bizarre in a matter of hours. Luckily, Rita would be okay. “Hey.”
Her eyes flitted open then pulled shut.
“Rita?” Cole pressed a palm to her cheek. “You with me?”
She squirmed, apparently confused by the seat belt. Her eyes widened and her arms swung for him.
Cole dodged the blow. That wouldn’t happen again. He collected her wrists in one of his hands and put on his warmest smile. “You shouldn’t hit lawmen. There’s a law against that. Plus, it hurts.” He made a show of rubbing his chest where she’d landed the earlier hit.
Color rushed to her cheeks. “Sorry.” She squirmed to take in her new surroundings. “What happened?”
“You passed out. I carried you to my car.” Cole tugged her safety belt, making sure it was securely latched. “How’s your head?”
She groaned.
Cole flashed a penlight in her direction. “Can you follow the light?”
She squinted, but got the job done.
“Okay.” He lifted a finger before shutting her inside the cruiser and rounding the hood to the driver’s side. Behind the wheel, he twisted for a look in her direction. “You were chased by a lunatic in a black sedan. Tinted windows. No plates. Any chance you got a look at the driver?”
She shook her head.
“You would’ve been killed if you hadn’t dived into the fountain. You hit your head doing that. Then you hit me. Then you passed out. And here we are.”
She rubbed her eyes and groaned.
Cole pointed his cruiser toward the bridge, waving to a set of campus security officers. “Those guys showed up as I was hauling you off the street. I barely caught you before you hit your head again.” He chuckled. “You were right in the middle of telling me how well you felt.”
“I think I have a concussion.”
“You don’t.” He smiled, happy to know that was true. She was fine. Slightly banged up, but all things considered, Rita was stellar. “It wasn’t the head injury that knocked you out, but that goose egg is going to look a lot worse before it starts looking better.”
Rita dissolved against his passenger seat. Her fingers sought the wound. She winced when she found it.
“Shock will do that to people. The fainting, not the goose egg. Anyway, you’re fine now.”
“Except someone still wants to kill me.”
“Yeah.” There was that. He ground his teeth. He needed to fix that. “You’re having a bad day.”
She laughed humorlessly, eyes fixed on the world outside her window. “Very bad.”
“And you’re all wet.”
“I need to go home,” she said.
“Already on it.” Cole took the bridge back to Shadow Point at half the speed he’d used to arrive in Rivertown.
Rita closed her eyes. “Why are you so calm, and how do you know I’m okay?” Her teeth chattered.
Cole ached to stroke the curve of her clenched jaw. “You’re with me now. You’re definitely going to make it, Horn.”
She rolled her head in his direction, blinking through tear-filled eyes. “And how can you be sure I’m not concussed?”
“Medical school.”
Rita’s rosebud mouth pulled into a droll expression. “Of course.”
“I dropped out,” he said, “so I’m not a doctor, but I was a medic in the army, and I’ve been bandaging up my brothers all my life. My uncle’s an EMT, too, so that helped.”
Rita straightened in her seat. “Wait a minute. You quit medical school to be a deputy?”
“Law’s in the blood, I guess.”
“I guess,” she agreed. “Clearly also a hero complex.”
“Not the first time I’ve been accused of that. I guess we have something in common.”
Rita wrinkled her nose. “What?”
“The hero complex.” He watched for understanding that never came, then tried again. “What do you call what you do?”
“Paperwork?”
“No,” he corrected. “Feeding stray cats and making lunches for the homeless. You know all their names, and I don’t even know all the bailiffs. What do you call yourself, if not a hero?”
A wave of pink spread over her cheeks. “Nothing. I’m just...trying.”
Cole worked to redirect his thoughts from that blush and all the other ways he’d like to summon it.
A few creative images came immediately to mind.
Rita’s lips parted. She dropped her sweet hazel gaze to her lap before raising her eyes to him once more. “I try to make a difference.”
