Star Witness - By Mallory Kane Page 0,49

showed one bar. “Let’s send a text.” If the phone managed to get the text sent, then Lucas would at least see it once service was restored.

Harte nodded. “I’ll send it to Lucas and Ethan.” He quickly entered a message. In Delaughter’s Drugs near B & B, hiding from armed men. Send help! He pressed Send and pocketed his phone. “Give me yours. I’ll send the same text. That’ll be two service providers—two chances for it to get through.”

Another loud rattling of the windows announced the wind picking up again. Harte grabbed Dani and pulled her down behind the counter. “We need to be careful. One of these gusts of wind is likely to throw something hard enough at those windows to break them.”

They sat together, shoulder to shoulder. Dani closed her eyes, basking in the heat Harte’s body gave off and trying to pretend that she didn’t want him to pull her close and make hot, sweet love to her. But as much as she wanted him deep inside her, she craved his warmth and strength surrounding her even more. When he held her in his arms, she felt as if nothing could harm her.

“Harte? Where do you think they are—the men?”

She felt his shoulders rise and fall. “No telling. I tried to keep up with which direction and how far we ran from the warehouse. I think we made it about ten blocks. That’s a big circle they’ve got to search.”

“And you’re sure they were sent by Yeoman?”

“Don’t know who else it would be. Like I said before, I think Stamps would have more sense. Yeoman, on the other hand, deals in physical force. It’s what he knows.”

“It doesn’t make any sense. Why would he think killing me would solve his problem?”

Harte assessed her. “You’re the only person who can connect him with your grandfather’s murder. In his world, shooting you is the easiest way to get rid of you. It’s incredibly hard to prove somebody shot somebody without an eyewitness.”

She shivered and Harte immediately put his arm around her.

“Cold?”

His heat soaked into her, making her feel aroused and languid at the same time. “A little,” she said, “but mostly, I can’t shake the feeling that they’re right behind me, breathing down my neck.” She shivered again. “Should we be doing something—getting farther away maybe?”

Harte didn’t speak for a moment. He ran his palm up and down her arm. “I wondered about that. If Lucas or Ethan gets my message, they’ll come here.” He settled back against the wall and tightened his hold on her. “Look at it from those goons’ point of view. They’re looking for a needle in a haystack. And that car can’t be drivable after they rammed it into that freight door three times.”

“So they’re on foot, just like us. I guess that’s a good thing.”

“And like I said, they’ve got an awfully big area to search, and they have to search every building on each and every street.”

“They know which door we went out.”

“Yeah, but we made at least two right turns. We couldn’t see anything, which means they couldn’t either. If they’d been able to see us, they’d have shot at us.”

The wind rose again, whistling around corners and roaring past the broken door. “Here we go again,” he said. Rain pelted the glass windows, flung there by the whipping winds.

“Those windows are going to break eventually,” she said.

“They might,” he agreed, “but that’s why I put us here in the cashier’s cage. It’s metal, bolted down and we’ve got bulletproof glass protecting us.” He gave her arm a reassuring squeeze.

“Okay,” she said, not sounding convinced.

“Hey,” Harte said. “Trust me.”

She snuggled in closer to his side. Harte held her and listened to the storm. He could feel the tension in her stiff limbs, her fingers that were curved into a fist against his skin, her shaky breaths.

Lightning flashed almost continuously and the roar of the thunder and wind was near deafening. Above their heads, a vicious screech overrode the sound of the storm.

Dani jumped. Harte cupped the back of her head and pressed it to his chest, resting his cheek against her hair. “It’s okay,” he murmured, although he doubted she could hear him. “It’s going to be okay.”

He risked a glance upward, fully expecting to see that part of the roof had blown off, taking the ceiling with it. The screeching had sounded like nails being ripped out. But the ceiling appeared intact. With all the rain and wind, they’d know