Chapter 4 - Blood in the Water
The rain was coming down in sheets by the time the armored Maybach pulled away from the Grand Mason Hotel.
Inside the passenger compartment, the glass partition between them and the driver was raised. Grace sat curled in the corner of the plush leather seat, her shoes kicked off, the emerald necklace burning like a brand against her collarbones. Her hands wouldn't stop shaking.
"He knew," she whispered, watching the city blur into streaks of neon and gray rain beyond the bulletproof glass. "He looked at my face and he saw Diane. He knows exactly who I am."
Eliot sat beside her, his bow tie undone, the top two buttons of his dress shirt opened to reveal the corded hollow of his throat. He looked completely relaxed, but Grace could see the coiled readiness in his posture—the way his right hand rested lightly near the inner lapel of his jacket where a Glock 19 was holstered.
"He suspects," Eliot corrected calmly. "He saw the resemblance. But Warren is paranoid. He won't strike openly until he confirms whether you have the key to Diane’s Cayman account. He thinks I’m using you to bait him."
"Aren't you?" Grace snapped, turning her head to glare at him. "Isn't that what this whole circus was? You paraded me in front of him in a ten-thousand-dollar dress to see how he would react!"
Eliot turned his gray eyes on her, unblinking.
"If I wanted to use you as bait, Grace, I would have left you in that diner. Warren’s men would have picked you up, and I would have tracked them to his safehouse. Instead, I put myself between his gun and your throat. Don't confuse protection with exploitation."
"Then let me leave!" she cried, throwing her hands up. "Give me ten thousand dollars from your mountain of blood money, give me a bus ticket to California, and let me disappear! I can change my name again! I can dye my hair! I survived twenty-seven years without you!"
"You survived twenty-seven years because your mother bled herself dry to keep you hidden!" Eliot roared, his composure finally shattering.
He surged across the seat, his large hands planting on either side of her shoulders against the leather backrest, trapping her in his space. His face was inches from hers, his eyes burning with a dark, terrifying fury that made Grace’s breath freeze in her throat.
"You think you can just run?" he hissed, his voice trembling with suppressed rage. "Warren Kessler has surveillance assets in every bus depot, airport, and train station from Maine to Miami! The moment your face hits a traffic camera outside this city, you are dead! You don't have the training! You don't have the network! You are a civilian, Grace! A civilian playing in a graveyard!"
"Then teach me!" she screamed back, tears of frustration spilling over her lashes. "Stop treating me like a fragile porcelain doll you have to lock in a glass cage! My mother didn't raise a victim! If they want a war, give me a damn gun!"
Eliot went completely motionless.
His eyes searched hers, sweeping across her flushed cheeks, her quivering lips, the raw, furious fire burning in her dark eyes. The anger seemed to drain out of him, replaced by something far more dangerous—a dark, crackling heat that made the confined space of the vehicle feel suddenly devoid of oxygen.
His gaze dropped to her mouth.
Grace felt the shift in the air, felt her own heart slam against her ribs with a violence that had nothing to do with fear. He was so close she could feel the heat radiating from his chest, could see the tiny flecks of silver in his gray eyes, could smell the rain and cedar clinging to his skin.
"You really are Diane’s daughter," he whispered, his voice dropping into a rough, husky timber. "Stubborn. Reckless. Beautiful."
Before she could process the words, Eliot’s left hand slid from the seat to the back of her neck, his long fingers tangling into her intricate curls, tilting her head up.
He didn't ask. He didn't hesitate.
He brought his mouth down on hers with a fierce, punishing intensity that made her gasp into his lips.
It wasn't like the kiss in the diner—that had been a desperate tactic, a calculated distraction. This was raw, possessive hunger. His lips were hot, demanding, tasting of scotch and adrenaline. When Grace gasped in surprise, his tongue slipped past her lips, claiming her with a ruthless dominance that sent a molten shockwave straight to the pit of her stomach.
For half a second, her hands pushed against his chest, feeling the rock-hard wall of muscle beneath his dress shirt.
Then, with a low whimper that died in her throat, her fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt.
She kissed him back.
She kissed him with all the pent-up terror, fury, and adrenaline that had been choking her for twenty-four hours. She pulled him closer, her body arching against his, feeling the crushing weight of his frame pressing her into the leather seats. Eliot groaned deep in his throat, his grip in her hair tightening, his other hand sliding around her waist, pulling her flush against him until she could feel every hard line of his desire pressing against her thigh.
The world outside the tinted windows ceased to exist. There were no mobsters, no dead mothers, no million-dollar ledgers. There was only the blistering heat of his skin, the intoxicating taste of his mouth, and the dangerous, exhilarating feeling of falling off a cliff with a man who had wings made of fire.
Suddenly, a deafening *CRACK* shattered the night.
The Maybach violently shuddered. Sparks exploded against the reinforced passenger window right behind Eliot’s head.
"AMBUSH!" the driver screamed through the intercom. "Front axle hit! Two technicals approaching from the right flank!"
Eliot broke the kiss instantly, his eyes snapping open, cold and lethal in a microsecond.
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Before Grace could scream, Eliot’s body slammed over hers, forcing her down into the footwell beneath the seats, shielding her entire frame with his own broad back as another hail of heavy-caliber rifle rounds hammered into the side of the armored vehicle.
***
