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The elevator dinged, saving him from the impossible task of trying to get Mrs. DeLuca to stop talking.
“You’ve got mail.” Granger handed the small pile to Bliss, who tucked it in her tote bag.
The elevator door opened, revealing several people wearing impatient expressions. The elevators seemed to be especially slow today. Bliss stepped aside to let them out.
Granger lingered behind to ask Mrs. DeLuca more about the mystery man in the laundry room. Was this a new incident, or something in the past? He lowered his voice so he didn’t alert Bliss to his concerns.
“What did he look like, ma’am? The man in the laundry room.”
“Well…a little like that.” She pointed to a man who stood at the elevator door, holding it open for Bliss. Adjusting the round horn-rimmed glasses on her nose, she peered at him more closely. “Yes, very much like that. Hey you! Mister!”
Everything seemed to go into slow motion. The man glanced over at them. A big guy in his mid-thirties, fit and muscular, with a flash of menace in his eyes. Granger lunged toward the elevator, but had to step around Mrs. DeLuca. Before he got past her, the man stepped inside the elevator and pulled Bliss with him. The doors slid shut as Bliss raised a hand to beckon to Granger.
“Hold the door,” she told the man. But he punched a button, and the doors slid shut, with Granger inches away.
Fuck.Bliss was alone in there with an unknown man who intended her harm. Granger knew it with every fiber of his FBI-trained being.
Without saying a word to Mrs. DeLuca, who was still talking about the laundry bandit who had stolen her favorite cardigan, he ran toward the stairs. He took them three at a time, all the way to the third floor, where Bliss lived. He whipped around the corner and raced to the elevator. The readout said the elevator was on the second floor. Were they getting out? Shit. He punched the call button.
He’d been so stupid. Just because he knew the deposition was a done deal didn’t mean that everyone did. If someone had been hired to come after Bliss, they might still be on that mission.
The elevator left the second floor and headed toward the third floor. He flattened himself against the wall next to it, because he didn’t want to be a sitting duck if the guy charged out of the elevator with a weapon. He was unarmed, but he knew how to make it seem that he had a gun. It was all in the attitude.
He held his breath. The door slid open. No one stepped out. Granger counted the seconds, since he knew the door would close again after five-point-four seconds. Three…four…
What if Bliss had been forced off the elevator on the second floor? What if she lay unconscious on the floor of the elevator? Terrifying scenarios flooded through his head.
The door was about to close again. Granger made a split-second decision and flung himself into the elevator.
“FBI, hands up, drop your weapon,” he yelled.
The man came at him, sheer panic on his face, something hard and metal in his hand. Bliss, where was Bliss? He caught a glimpse of sky-blue in the corner of the elevator. She was slumped unconscious against the wall, her head lolling to the side.
He chopped at the man’s arm, hoping to disable him before he used his weapon. A burning sensation tore through his side, then another. He was being knifed. The man was fucking stabbing him, but in a flailing way that told Granger he had no weapons training at all. Still, it worked. Granger chopped at his arm again and it went limp, the knife dropping to the floor.
The elevator was going down. Someone must have called it. Everything was spinning now, and Granger knew he was going down.Land on top of the knife, he told himself.Don’t let him get that knife back.
Adingsounded, unreasonably loud. Why so loud? Granger was falling, falling, then he hit the carpet with a thud as the elevator reached the ground. Right on top of the knife. He curled himself around it. No one was going to get that fucking knife away from him. Not any of the people crying out at the sight of blood in the elevator, not the man who blasted through the doors, pushing everyone out of his way.
He lifted his head to watch him go, taking note of any details he could while he was still conscious.
Then he passed out.
When he came to, he had to rip off an oxygen mask to speak to the harried nurse messing with his IV. “Where’s Bliss?” he croaked.
“Lay still and put that back on,” she snapped. “You have a knife wound. The doctors are about to operate.”
“Tell me where Bliss is right now or that mask isn’t coming anywhere near me.”
She scowled at him, assessing the seriousness of his threat. Dead serious. “Bliss? Is that some kind of street drug? Never heard of that one.”
“No. Shit. Bliss. She’s a person. Six months pregnant. She must have been with me when the paramedics came. We were together.” It occurred to him, in a rush of absolute terror, that maybe she hadn’t made it to the hospital. Maybe his attacker had managed to snag her. He struggled to get off the hospital bed. The nurse called for security, and the next thing he knew, several burly guys in uniform were wrestling him back on the bed. “Where is she?”
“I’ll check for you,” the nurse said as someone jabbed him with a sedative.Fact is, he thought as he slid back toward unconsciousness,no matter who you are, medical types always have the fucking upper hand. I should have become a nurse.
Twenty-One
Bliss woke up with tears sliding down her cheeks. She didn’t know why at first. All she knew was that powerful waves of emotion were sweeping through her like summer squalls. She couldn’t stop them, she couldn’t slow them down. All she could do was let the tears flow while she tried to reassemble her world. Beige walls. A beeping monitor. She was in a hospital.
