The woman darted out of the private room and into the bar. I followed as quickly as I could, but I had to avoid tripping over Livy. I practically jumped over a chair, and narrowly avoided the hostess, so she had a lead of several feet on me.
I was out of the backroom in the VIP area like a shot. And the woman in front of me turned back, her eyes slightly widening when she saw that I was approaching.
She grabbed one of the busboys by the collar and shoved him toward me, then she sprinted.
No way was she going to be fast enough.
I spun around him, avoided a table with a couple on a date, then scooted around the pair of blondes who eyed me appreciatively.
Note to self: Come back for them later.
Then I bolted out the door.
I saw her running to the right, long legs eating pavement. Oh, she was a runner. Awesome. I was too. London Marathon, five years running. Former track athlete. This was going to be a Sunday jog.
She quickly darted across the street, and I followed suit, ignoring the cars blaring their horns at us.
As she crossed the park, she started to lose some of her steam, which was when I picked up speed.
Up the hill, her legs stopped working for her and started working against her.
She slowed, and that gave me just enough advantage to put on a burst of speed and catch up to her. I grabbed her by the back of her shirt, yanking her back. "Nah, uh-uh-uh-uh. You don't get to take pictures of me and my friends and not at least tell us your name." I was irritated that I was huffing and puffing.
Jesus Christ, she was fast.
"I know all about you and your friends, the kind of men you are."
As I spoke to her, I felt along her arm. Then I spread my hands across her waist, lifted her top, and pulled the wire. She grabbed for it, but I kept it just out of reach. "Uh-huh, this is the camera, isn’t it?"
What I didn't account for was her quick thinking, and her knee came straight for my balls. I turned my leg just in time to catch her knee on the side of my thigh. It still hurt like a son of a bitch. “What the fuck? Who are you?” I didn’t let her go, and she continued to struggle. I held on to her, and I grabbed and tried to pull the camera free one handed, but it wouldn't come off.
"Let me go." She struggled in my grip.
"No, not until you tell me who you are and who you work for. I'm not going to hurt you, but I can't let you run loose. So who are you?"
"Someone who's going to see all of you burn."
"Bold words for a captive woman."
"Oh, you think I'm your captive, do you?"
She elbowed me, and I doubled over. "Jesus fucking Christ."
She tried to twist free, and when my hands slipped, I hooked into her belt instead, and she fell on the ground with me. I rolled on top of her. "Stop moving. I don't want to hurt you."
I tried to yank the camera from her body. "I just want the camera. You can't take pictures. I don't know who you are, or what you want, or what story you think you saw, but it's not happening. Not today."
"I will end you."
"I'm sorry sweetheart, but aren't I the one on top of you?"
Then a jolt hit me. Right in the center of my chest, and I felt like I had been punched by Thor's fucking hammer. I jerked back, convulsing. She rolled me off easily then. "I told you, you can't hurt me. People like you aren't going to hurt me again."
She stood over me, and I could see that the messy brown hair she had tied at the nape of her neck was a wig. It was askew at the front. Her hair was darker. Chestnut maybe? It was hard to tell in the dark.
Fuck. Why couldn't I move? My teeth started to chatter, and I jumped. Fuck.
Then she reached down to my hand. I tried desperately to hold on to the camera, and we fought for it. What was a valiant fight in my head, to her was my laughingly feeble attempt to hang on, because she plucked it easily out of my hand.