Burn: A South Beach Bodyguards Book (21 page)

Stunned, I jerked back, less afraid. His hand eased up and I was able to speak around his fingers. “Juan? What are you doing?”

I realized then that I shouldn’t actually be reassured. His eyes were wide, the glassy vacant stare of an addict at the height of his high. I very carefully tried to ease myself back, wanting my face away from his. Wanting space between our bodies, and his grip on my arm to loosen.

“Where’s the gun?” he asked. “I know Harris left it here. Where the fuck is it?”

I tried to back up, fear rising, compressing my chest. His hand fell away from my mouth. “What are you talking about? What gun? I don’t know anything about it. Mickey doesn’t live here anymore. He and my mom got divorced.” I was talking too much, I knew it, but I wanted him to understand I wasn’t lying. I didn’t know anything.

“Not Mickey. Ryan. I need the gun back. Where is the safe?”

I shook my head, trying to covertly slide my hand into my purse. “I have no idea. No one tells me anything. I’m just Mickey’s stepdaughter. I don’t know Ryan at all, really.” It seemed important to distance myself from Ryan, from Juan’s anger. I had a sudden horrifying thought. “Wait. Is that why you asked me out? You targeted me?”

He made a sound in the back of his throat and the glow of his phone bounced around, landing on his chin, his cheek, his left eye, before he lowered his hand and his face disappeared again. “Of course. God, it’s not like I asked you out for your looks or your interesting personality, because you don’t have either. I needed to get in this house but with your legs crossed so tight it’s a wonder you can walk, you weren’t giving me an invitation. I ran out of time and patience. Now show me the safe.”

His slurs shouldn’t hurt, but they did. “I don’t know where it is, I swear.” My voice trembled. It was true. I had no idea where Mickey kept his valuables. Or Ryan, apparently. “But you can look in my room if you want.” It seemed crucial to placate Juan. He sounded like he wouldn’t hesitate to drop me with a fist. “It used to be Ryan’s room.”

“Fine. You go first.” He jerked my arm.

It was then I realized he had a knife. The cool blade pressed against my bare forearm. I swallowed hard and forced myself to walk towards the stairs. “Did you push me down the stairs?” I asked. Suddenly, it was making more sense, my little accident.

“You came home sooner than I expected. I didn’t want you to see me. But I’m out of time. I need the gun back.”

“Okay.” I didn’t know what else to say. I shifted my purse to the depression between my thighs as I walked, using one hand to hopefully stealthily open the flap and find my phone. I wasn’t sure what I could do with it once I had it since he obviously wasn’t going to let me call 911 but I wanted the security. The option of calling someone, anyone.

In my room I moved to the right of the door to let him pass. I got my phone out and tucked it in my waistband, under my shirt.

“Turn the light on,” he demanded.

I flicked the switch and stood there, poised to run out and down the stairs if he got crazy. Or crazier. The knife was slack in his hand as he yanked open the dresser and started rooting through my clothes, tossing some onto the floor.

“Call Ryan,” he demanded. “Ask him where the gun is.”

“What?” This was my opportunity. I pushed the button on my phone for voice command. “Call Ryan?”

My phone parroted back to me. “Calling Ryan.”

“Give me the phone,” Juan demanded, storming towards me.

Terrified, realizing that Ryan was most likely somewhere on the Beach, his phone tucked away in his pocket, I threw my phone at Juan and turned on my heel and ran.

“Fucking bitch.” It sounded like he stopped to scoop up my phone but I didn’t wait to see.

I was out the door and down the stairs, taking them two at a time and stumbling, falling onto my knees on the tile floor at the bottom, like every stupid chick in every slasher movie ever. With a speed I didn’t know I had I was back up and on my feet in a split second, but he caught up with me. He yanked me backwards by my hair, and I screamed in pain and fear. My heart was racing and tears sprung to my eyes from all the roots of my hair being yanked at the scalp. I fell against the wall, hard, slamming my shoulder into plaster.

“Stop it!” I reached back, trying to dislodge him but it only allowed him to catch me by the upper arm and twist it so hard I lost my breath from the sharp blinding pain. “Holy…”

Dropping to my knees, I gagged and almost vomited on the tiles. It felt like he’d dislocated my shoulder. I wanted to get up, but all I could manage was to drag myself away from him with my uninjured arm. But my progress was halted when he kicked me full force in the thigh, the momentum rolling me onto my stomach. For the first time it occurred to me, he might be angry enough to kill me.

Survival instinct kicked in. I didn’t want to die like this, cowering and in pain. It would kill my mother. She would never recover from losing me. I hadn’t done anything. I had barely started on my own life, and I’d spent most of it hiding in the shadows. I kicked out, up, scissoring my legs, trying to get my heel onto anything, arm covering my head as he punched me, landing a painful blow on my wrist.

“Get off of me, get off of me!” I’m not sure why I screamed, but I wanted him to know that I wasn’t going down that easily.

“Stupid bitch, give me the gun! I’m not going to prison!”

“I don’t have it!” Scrambling backwards, I raised myself to a sitting position and when he bent over again, fist raised, I reached out and yanked his long hair as hard as I could, using my other hand to scratch my nails across his cheek with all the strength in me.

He let out a howl and reared back. I tried to stand up but he knocked me down. That’s when I heard a pounding knock on the front door. I screamed. “Help! Help me!” I screamed with everything in me even as he kicked me again, catching my arm. The door shot open, clearly forced and I kept crawling away from Juan.

It was the cops. I sobbed, breath caught in my throat, bile churning in my stomach.

I heard the “Hands up!” order to Juan. I heard the scuffle as they forced him down, more barked orders. But I just kept crawling, wanting away from the chaos. Away from him.

There was a hand on my shoulder and I jerked away. “Hey, just lie still, okay? It’s okay.”

It was a cop, black uniform filling the space in front of me. The lights came on, blinding me. I blinked, then started to cry. Everything on my body hurt, but I was safe. I lay my head down on the cool tiles and let it ease the burn in my cheeks.

“An ambulance is on the way.”

I shook my head. “I don’t need an ambulance.”

“Is this your boyfriend? Does he hit you a lot?” The cop’s voice sounded tired, like he’d already realized this was a thankless domestic abuse case. I wondered how much of that they saw on the force. Probably more than anyone would ever imagine in such a beautiful and upscale community.

I didn’t feel like explaining anything to him. I just wanted to crawl into bed and sleep. With Ryan. That made me cry harder.

“Look, he’s not telling us anything. You need to tell me what happened.”

“Isabel!”

That drew my head off the floor. It was Ryan, looking frantic as he came into the house and rushed over to me.

“Back off,” the cop said, holding his hand up. “Who are you?”

“I’m her…brother.”

Hardly. But let him say what he needed to say. I tried to sit up, but Ryan urged me to stay put. He pushed my hair back. “Are you okay? Please tell me you’re okay.”

“I’m fine. Just sore.”

“Can you get her to tell you what happened here?” the cop asked. He sounded annoyed.

“Yeah, just give me a minute. Alone.”

The cop rolled his eyes. “Fine.”

Ryan studied my face. “Is. What happened? Why would Juan attack you?”

“He kept saying something about a gun, that he needs it back. That you have it. What is he talking about?”

For a second I just stared at Isabel, my thoughts muddied. My heart rate was still coming back down to normal after my frantic drive to the house. The thought that anything could have happened to Isabel… It made me want to punch walls and kick shit and yell. Loud. Like a bear. She looked battered and bruised and scared and that did things to me. It made me want to pick her up and hold her and cradle her all night. I never should have left her.

“I don’t think I even know Juan. Why would he want a gun from me?” From what I’d seen on my way up the driveway as they escorted Juan out he’d looked high as a fucking kite. It looked like a meth high to my inexpert eye.

“Weren’t you talking about a gun with Alejandro? One that went missing?”

Shit. The gun from the poker game. But why now? And why wouldn’t the guys just come to me and ask for it back? Or just write it off as a loss. I was turning it around in my head when the cop came back over to me.

“Hey, did you know your sister’s boyfriend has a warrant out on him? Murder.”

My grip on Isabel tightened. “No. I had no idea.”

“Gang related. He’s been underground, bouncing from one location to another. Miami PD hasn’t been able to find him. Guess he figured he’d hang out in the Gables.”

Twenty bucks said the gun I’d won in the drunken poker game was the murder weapon. Fuck.

The officer looked down at Isabel. “Where did you meet him?”

“Online.”

His expression softened. “Look, you seem like a nice girl. Run a background check on guys you date. This guy has three arrests for assault and two for armed robbery.”

Isabel looked to me, searching my face. She wanted me to tell the police that it wasn’t that simple. That Juan had targeted her to get to me.

“I don’t know Juan,” I told the cop. “But Isabel said he was asking her to get the gun for her, and I’m thinking maybe he’s talking about a gun I won in a poker game about a year ago. Does that fit the timeframe?”

“Yes. Where is the gun now?”

I stood up, every instinct in me knowing this was dangerous. Involving the cops in any of my personal business or in Mickey’s business was risky, but it was the ethical thing to do. They would need ballistics on the weapon to make conviction easier. “It’s in my safe. I just tossed it in there the night I won it and I haven’t touched it since then.” I helped Isabel sit up. “I’ll go get it.”

“I’ll come with you.”

Of course he would. A couple of EMTs came in the front door then so I figured I could leave Isabel. They would tend her injuries. I didn’t see anything obvious, but she looked pretty banged up. In my dad’s old office, I opened the wall safe, which was behind a hideous painting of George Washington on the river. When I opened it, the gun was still there, exactly where I had drunkenly put it, then totally forgotten about. I stepped back. “It’s all yours.”

He pulled it out by the tip and yelled to his partner for an evidence bag.

Back in the living room, Kim and Mickey had arrived and there were tears and Isabel being put onto a stretcher. She was having trouble breathing and the EMT told me he thought her ribs were bruised.

There was a flurry of activity, Mickey ordering me to watch the house, Kim crying. Isabel looking pale and small. The cops using their radios and making notes and then everyone was gone and I was alone.

Again.

Always alone. It was what I deserved. This was my fault. I had almost got Isabel killed and it was no one’s fucking fault but my own. Some bodyguard. I couldn’t even keep the woman I cared about safe. That gave me exactly zip to recommend me for boyfriend status I brought nothing to the table.

I’d always known that. Nothing had changed because I’d had sex with Isabel. But I had left myself think for a few seconds that it could change, and that was why I’d bolted. It had scared me.

Going upstairs to my old room, I stood in the doorway and eyed Isabel’s possessions. She was such a good girl. Just a nice, stable, sweet, kind girl.

Not meant for me.

I was not her type.

She would realize that eventually, but most likely she had realized that tonight. Right now she was putting two and two together that I was responsible for her attack and she would hate me, as she should.

It would hurt, but it was better this way.