Red Hot Christmas (24 page)

She had barely flicked on the Target standing lamp, when the intercom buzzed. Who could it be? No one ever visited her, and she hadn’t ordered Chinese. She pressed her finger on the talk button. “Yeah?” If the neighborhood kids were playing a prank on her again, she would give them a piece of her—

      “Sydney. You just left my office. Alejandro Soto,” said the voice on the other end, and her skin prickled as if it’d been stroked with a feather. After the way he pronounced her name, the man didn’t need to identify himself. That wasn’t an accent one heard everyday, was it?

His South American drawl was cultured, engaging, deep.
 

      “I told you everything I know,” she said, then cleared her throat trying to sound more composed. “How did you find out where I live?” she asked, and a chill skated down her spine. This was not a good thing. The last thing she needed was a stalker; even if he had the sexiest lips she laid her eyes on. Even if in person he was ten times yummier than on her screen—and all the more dangerous.
Damn it, Sydney
. Hadn’t life taught her a lesson? Men like him would always have leverage over her. They could put her away, behind bars, for things she wasn’t guilty of.
 

      “Remember you had to show your driver’s license and give them your contact information to get through security?”
 

      Oh shit. Yeah. She had almost given them a fake address, old habits died hard. But they asked to see her picture ID before issuing her a visitor’s badge, and she ended up being honest. “Okay, Sherlock. You got me.” She shuffled from foot to foot. “Why are you here?”
 

“You stormed out of my office. I was worried about you.” A sigh. “You just lost someone.”

“Thanks, but I’ll be okay. You don’t need to hand me tissues or anything,” she said, having a hard time picturing that ginormous man doing something so delicate. When he had grasped her in his office earlier, his large hands had caused an inside shiver. A man’s touch was not that familiar to her, and especially not that man’s—imposing. Mysterious. And uncomfortably handsome.

“Sydney, let me come up. I want to make sure you’re okay. Then I’ll go.”
 

Like she was going to let a complete stranger into her apartment. She heard his long intake of breath from the other end of the line, and assumed he waited for her response. She bent over the kitchen sink, the wariness of the day taking a toll on her. Until this second, she had thought her heart was problem free. Empty. Just the way it should be. Somehow, somewhere her friend had occupied a part of it—tiny enough to go unnoticed when she was alive, and big enough to increase the void now that she was gone.
 

Patty. Words got trapped in her throat.
 

A creak on the run-down laminate flooring made Sydney straighten her shoulders. Melted ice flowed through her veins.
 

There is someone here.
 

As the steps thumped closer behind her, she slid her hand on the stained vinyl countertop to reach for a knife in the sink. Her whole body tensed up. She dropped her gaze to the shiny piercing object, and stretched her fingers without moving a single part of her body but her hands. Too bad her pepper spray was lost in the confines of her backpack.
 

One.
 

More.
 

Footfall.
 

She heard Alejandro’s voice on the intercom, but couldn’t make sense of his words. The sound of her heartbeat flooded the room like a freaking ice storm. Trying hard to act before her assailant, she grabbed the knife in one swift move, ignoring the trembling of her fingertips.
 

Before she could turn around and protect herself—

She was shoved against the cabinets, her stomach slamming on the counter. The pain stiffened her body, and without a blink she grasped the knife and motioned to turn and cut the intruder.
 

“Couldn’t keep your mouth shut,” said a male voice, cold like snow, and before she spun, he thrust her against the cabinet. She barely registered that her hand hit against the tile, and the knife slid from her sweat-slicked fingers. This time, she felt like her head was piercing into the cheap wood, and ripping into pieces, the ache so powerful.
 

“What do you want?” she managed to ask, tasting blood in her mouth. She coughed, her throat thick and dry. Keeping up with the pounding of her heart, and the discomfort of being held against her wish, was too much.
 

The intercom chimed again. “Sydney? Are you there? Listen, I lost someone too. You shouldn’t be alone,” Alejandro said. “I’m coming up.”

She fidgeted against her captor, trying to figure her next move. The man clenched his hold on her so tight, she found it hard to breathe. His fingers dug in her skin, keeping them still with one hand while he pressed something against her ribcage with the other. Was it…a shotgun? The unforgiving coldness of the metal bit against her, and she gasped.
 

His bad breath fanned over her hair, and she had to swallow the bile forming in her throat. In a split second, her head was slamming on the wood. Then it all went dark.
 

***

      “Sydney. Sydney.”
 

      Sydney’s eyelids heaved. When she managed to open her eyes, a blur took over her field of vision. She passed her hand over her face, wishing she could understand what the hell was going on.
 

      “It’s okay. You are safe,” said the male voice.

      She tried to swallow, then realized her throat was drier than the Nevada desert. Clearing her throat was almost painful, but not nearly as bad as the pain pounding the back of her head. “You?” She blinked, and her eyes widened in surprise.
 

Oh no. There he was, the guy that seemed to be in the middle of all this mess…the guy who’s whispered name had sent her seeking him out…the guy who was clearly trouble…in the middle of a hospital room. She lay on the raised hospital bed, in a room with better furniture than her own. Well, no stretch there, right? Glancing at her hand, she realized she was on an IV drip.
 

“You’re okay? Thank God.”

“What the hell am I doing here? I can’t afford a fancy hospital.” She tried to get up but he stilled her.

“I brought you here. Don’t worry about the cost. I’m not having some stranger with a head injury on my conscience too.”
 

She lifted her hand to her head, and touched a bandage on her forehead. Her gaze ping-ponged between Alejandro, and the board hanging next to a sofa. The pager number of the doctor and nurse on duty were scribbled on the board, along with the name of a painkiller for her.
 

 
Whoa. She pulled her blanket up, even though she was wearing a god-awful green gown with the sex appeal of steamed broccoli. “What happened?” she asked.
 

“You were attacked. I was downstairs talking to you on the intercom, and then, nothing.”

The memory flashed back at her as if it were happening right then and there. A trickle of sweat slid down her neck. Her stomach tightened, and she stiffened. Someone had been in her place. Someone…
 

      “I got worried when you didn’t answer. I snuck in when someone was leaving the building, and when I got to your place, the door was open and you were unconscious.”
 

      “How long ago was it?”
 

      He glanced at his watch. “A few hours. I brought you here to make sure you didn’t have a concussion.” He put up a hand and patted her to stop her sitting up again. “According to the CAT scan you’re fine.”

      “I can’t pay you back. My insurance would never cover this sort of place.”

      “No need. I’ll take care of it.”

      She pushed his hand away and sat upright, clenching the sheets so tight, her knuckles turned Crayola white. Despite the sparkling clean hardwood floors and the heavy door that probably led to a waiting area inside the suite, Sydney was still confined. Her heart drummed those beats she could never get used to. Loud. Menacing. “I need to get out of here.”
 

      He shook his head. “We have to talk.”
 

      Talk? Even breathing was a stretch, she realized. Panic slicked her palms, oxygen in short supply. She tried to close her eyes and focus on good things, to let the air out. But the flash of the last time she had experienced confinement, in a prison cell, stabbed at her mind and she opened her eyes again. Her head spun even thinking about walking and her chest started tightening. Crap. There was no running.
 

      The contours of his face tightened. “Sydney, do you need me to call the nurse? You’re pale.”
 

      “No,” she said, and lifted her hand to her chest, willing the pain away. “I’m having a panic attack,” she said, and found solace at watching the dry-erase board with her name on it. While she managed to suck in her breath and let it out slowly, she read the names of the doctors. Dr. Rembrandt. Nurse Smith.
 

      A few minutes later, her blood pressure settled and the agony fled from her body like a refugee from a war camp. Phew. “I’m okay,” she said, more to herself than to him.

      A small smile ruffled his lips, and she wished she could kick him. Why would fate bring a complete stranger to see her at her most vulnerable state?
 

What if he was there to hurt her? Unlikely. Why would he take her to the hospital, when he could have hurt her in the anonymity of her tiny apartment? The idea of him in her place was odd at best. The only other man who’d gotten close to her door had been the pizza delivery guy. Alejandro’s presence in her living room would be a bright red stain on a silky white sheet. Well, maybe a worn-out cotton sheet.

      “Who hurt you?”
 

      “I didn’t see him. Male, a foot taller than me, weird voice.”       It dawned on her. The person knew where she lived. What if Alejandro hadn’t gotten there in time? She licked her dry lips. “He said I shouldn’t have said anything—”

      A low curse in Spanish flew past his lips, and he ran his hand over his face. “This has something to do with Frank, doesn’t it?”

       “I guess. I mean, I don’t really have any enemies.”
 

      Alejandro’s expression sobered, his hands were jammed in his jeans. He was a lot less relaxed than he had been in his office earlier. “Do you want to call the police?”
 

Should she call the police? Probably. But no way was she going to unless she absolutely had to. Cops weren’t worth donut holes at the bottom of the ocean as far as she was concerned. All institutions weren’t worth the fat budgets they worked from in her experience. She’d fled the foster system as soon as she learned how, and as a former inmate, she’d learned the consequences of not being heard.
 

 
“No,” she said. “Seems like someone is looking for you. And apparently I’m in the way.”
 

Shaking his head, he sighed. “Apparently.”

Who could it be? An unhappy business partner? A betrayed girlfriend?
Based on her experience with the wealthy, she could jot down a list in five seconds. The very fact he had searched for her alarmed her. This man had something to hide. “Well, whoever it is, that’s for you to find out,” she said, opting for elusiveness.
 

“Or the police.” He scratched his stubble coated chin.

She straightened her shoulders and cleared her throat before the tension claimed permanent residency. “The police?”

His gaze searched for hers. She shuffled her hands over each other at the top of her knees. She wanted to escape his assessment, her blood pressure spiking at every stretching second. A different kind of turmoil sizzled her nerve endings. She didn’t like the way his presence alone brought her so much awareness. She didn’t like it…one bit.
 

He leaned forward, his eyes sparking like he found a missing piece of a puzzle. “You’re not a big fan, I assume.”

 
“I lost my faith in the justice department.” She swallowed and didn’t allow herself to yank her gaze from his.
 

A condescending smile formed on his lips. “Why? Are you on the run or something?”
 

She uncrossed her legs. “No. And I don’t owe you any explanations.”
 

He ran his fingers through his hair. “The thing is, Sydney, I don’t want to call the police either.”

She folded her arms over her chest and drew back. Of course. Everyone had something to hide. “Tax evasion? Money laundry?”

He chuckled. “No problems with the law. The other way around. My family is very prominent in Argentina, and my uncle is running for the Senate again. I can’t steal the show and make his campaign vulnerable by a threat. He’s worked hard for reelection. Calling the police overseas and starting a circus wouldn’t do him any good.”

“So you have enemies? People who want to see you wiped from this planet?”

 
“My business opponents are too smart to try to hurt me like this.”