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Olivia glanced around her and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Okay, imagine this: The judge is unconscious, leg in a tourniquet sprawled out between the cars. Nutsbe and I are hiding with him, waiting for the police and the ambulance. And Nutsbe was doing first aid on me.”
“Wait,” the fear was back in Jaylen’s voice, “you’re hurt? Were you shot?”
“Me? No, I scraped my knees like when we were kids and tripped on the playground.” Olivia planted her elbow on the car and leaned her head onto her palm; the other hand held her phone to her ear, and Beowolf sat with his back to her like a protective sentinel. “It was no biggy, except that it was such a biggy.”
“All right, not even I can follow that.”
“It was –and I would only admit this to you—erotic.” Olivia scraped her teeth over her upper lip. “Jaylen, I was so damned turned on while he hovered over me, sliding my hose off.” She looked around again to make sure that no one else could hear.
“He slid your pantyhose off in the middle of a parking lot? He did it?”
“He did it, but it was a whole thing. He kept me modest, but that didn’t help. He had these shears, and he cut the— Whew. He was lifting my leg, bandaging my damned knees. He was so focused and tender. I can’t remember a time in my life when I wanted to grab a guy and just act like a spring rabbit in the wild.”
“That’s quite the picture—Tilly, please don’t pinch me. That hurts Mommy. And I don’t like it—Yeah, Olivia, you remember we learned about that in psychology.”
“Did we?”
Beowolf budged back a bit, and his body supported Olivia’s legs. She was grateful; it made her feel less wobbly.
“I don’t remember particulars,” Jaylen said, “the take away is something about fear of dying makes a human want to quickly procreate. I could look it up.”
“Please don’t. It felt so wrong. I’m so embarrassed that I was putting out weird vibes.”
“Was Nutsbe responding to them?” Jaylen asked.
“Hard to tell.” She could now feel the tiny stones under her bare feet. Olivia needed to find her shoes. “He was smiling at me. And he kept me distracted from the event and focused on him by telling me ... some things. I just hope he thinks I was terrified, and that was the weird sizzle coming off my skin.”
“But that was factual, wasn’t it?” Jaylen asked. “I mean, I’d be terrified.”
“He’s walking over here.” Olivia changed her tone from whispering secrets to passing basic information. “I knew this would be on the news, and you’d be freaked out. I wanted to let you know I was okay. Nutsbe’s heading over here. He asked me to go to Iniquus to talk to his commander about this. I’m not allowed to drive out of here yet. But when we can, he’s going to drive my car home so he can listen to that noise from this morning. Can you call my mom and tell her all that and that I’m fine?”
“Will do,” Jaylen said. “Call me later. Love you. I’m so glad you’re alive.”
Olivia swiped off and then stared at the phone. Yeah, she was glad she was alive, too.
“Olivia?” Nutsbe was beside her, and she looked up into rich hazel eyes warmed with concern.
“Yes?” She slid her phone back into her purse. “All done with the police?”
“You’re shaking.” He observed. “That’s adrenaline coming out of your system.”
She looked down to see her hands trembling violently. Olivia blushed. Was she not living up to expectations? He wasn’t trembling.
“Human nature.” He rubbed his hands up and down her arms, and more than anything, in that moment, Olivia wanted to step closer to him, have him wrap his arms around her, and hold her tight. But she was still very aware that she was vomit-spattered, and who in their right mind would want to snuggle with that?
When the wind kicked up, he brushed the hair from her eyes. “Do you have everything you need from your car? I’ll drive to Iniquus, then if you’re up to it, you can drive my car home.”
“But—” She looked around. Yeah, when they made the plan earlier, a leg of the journey was unaccounted for.
“I’ll get someone from my team to drive me back to pick up your car, and we’ll just move along with the plan we were making when all this started.”
She turned back to him. “Like nothing happened.”
“Not like nothing happened. Something awful happened. This is just a route to get us from Point A to Point B because we can’t stand here in the parking lot forever.”
Olivia blinked at him, trying to get her brain in gear.
“Honestly, I’d appreciate you letting me handle the cars. When things are spinning out of control, it’s good to have a smaller issue, something easily fixed with a little effort and attention.”
