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And I really couldn’t blame her.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Hope
It was a set-up.
His words had been stuck in my head that entire afternoon and evening as I sat at my desk, looking like I was working physically, but my mind was somewhere else.
Namely, in that laundry room. Then the bathroom.
Because, you know, having crazy sex thoughts at work was so smart.
That said, the guys weren’t really around anyway. They’d come back after lunch, eyeing me curiously, but saying nothing as they gathered some shit, then all headed out.
On A’s case, I figured.
It was ridiculous to feel left out.
But there was no denying that was how it felt.
I was better than them, damnit.
Though, yeah, I had to understand that there would be no explaining away my presence if his snake saw me following him around. The guys, they were nobodies. I was, supposedly, the maid who didn’t speak English.
So I kept the office open while the guys were gone, fielding calls from their other clients who wanted updates on their own cases, jotting down an appointment for a new consultation, and did some cleaning up because I had too much restless energy to sit still. I knew that if I went home too early, I would be driven half-crazy with my own swirling thoughts.
Eventually, though, my growling stomach won out.
It all went down so fast.
I’d let my guard down, paying more attention to the inside world than the outside one.
I knew better.
I’d been trained better.
It didn’t matter how familiar you were with an area, how good you were at hand-to-hand combat, how decent the crime rate was.
There was always a risk.
Especially as a woman walking alone at night.
Hands grabbed me from behind, one clamping over my mouth, the other going around my waist, yanking me up and off my feet.
“Did you really think I was that stupid?” a voice asked close to my ear, his heated breath on my face making the stale coffee roil in my stomach for one heart-pounding second.
I snapped into my training as I was yanked down an alley between buildings. The dog groomer on one side, the closed-down new age store on the other.
Both closed.
Everything was closed.
Screaming would do me no good.
Not that I would ever rely on the good nature of strangers to get me out of a hairy situation. It said a lot about human nature that we were taught to scream fire instead of rape when we were little girls. No one was going to save us. We had to save ourselves.
Pulling my knees up to my chest, I forced all my weight downward, pivoting a hip out as my feet landed, creating a small opening.
But this guy, whoever he was, he clearly had some sort of training too, because he stepped back before I could grab his leg, before I could pull, and knock him on his ass, giving myself the advantage.
To beat the shit out of him.
To get free and run.
To find out who’d betrayed A.
The hand that was over my mouth slid backward, grabbing a handful of my hair, and slamming me forward into the wall.
The cracking sound was somehow more horrifying than the pain that ricocheted across my scalp as my brain knocked around in my skull.
The pain was motivating.
Because nothing pissed me off more than someone getting the better of me in a fight.
Reaching back, I grabbed the wrist that was holding my hair, yanking downward with my body weight, twisting, causing enough discomfort to make him release me.
Not enough to make him give up, though.
He struck out, his meaty fist colliding with my side.
Once, ribs.
Twice, spleen.
The pain made me double forward, trying to suck in a steadying breath even as I tried to find my next opening as he charged at me once again.
I got in one good punch, getting a satisfying grunt out of him, before he landed one to my face, splitting my lip in the process, but at least my mouth didn’t flood with blood, making me worry about my teeth.
I ducked the next strike, going under his arm, twisting around to get on the other side of him so he wasn’t blocking me off from the opening of the alley.
Reaching down, I tried to ignore the stabbing sensation in my side. Ribs? Spleen? Both. I didn’t know. It wasn’t the time to worry. I had to survive this first.
With more effort than it should have taken, my hand finally found my knife, and flicked it open.
I didn’t pause, didn’t wait for an opening.
I charged forward, plunging the sharp tip into the hand that raised, getting a howl of pain from the man as I yanked it back out, and plunged it in once again, this time in the side, missing my mark by a few inches when he jerked away.
“Stupid bitch,” he snarled, reaching out with his good hand as I raised the knife again, knowing this was my last shot, that I had to get this right.
