Hiding in Plain Sight (10 page)

He felt her scoot closer to where he laid on his back.

"You will get through this."  He could hear the sleep in his low assurance, flexing his hand for emphasis.  He received a soft squeeze in return.  "I will keep you safe."

"I know you'll try, Bay."

She scooted again and he felt the heat of her, could smell the floral of the lotion she used.  He felt his body relax as his mind again began to drift, to slide towards sleep.  His hand moved to bring their clasped hands to his chest.

He felt her move again and realizing where she was headed, let go of her fingers and raised his arm.

She fit perfectly against his side, her forehead resting against his neck.  And, he was asleep before he was even aware his arm had moved to her back, to hug her more tightly to him.

Chapter Ten

I awoke slowly, the glints of the morning sunlight reflecting off the mirror over the long bench with the dresser beneath in our hotel room.

The light was the first thing I was aware of, but the second was the feel of a hard thigh pressed between mine.  A hard presence against the softness, the swollen part of me between my thighs.

I seemed to be more on my back than my side, a leg thrown around his waist, the morning hardness of Bayco pressing and rubbing on my lower belly.  One of my breasts was captured in the large paw of his hand, his thumb softly flicking against my nipple over my camisole.

When I came fully awake, I realized I was thrusting against his hard thigh, my chest arched, allowing him more access to the breast he was holding and my lips, my betraying lips, were kissing, licking his neck.  I shifted and found my arms were around him, holding him close as my mouth trailed over his skin, my tongue licking as I moved.  I felt him disengage from my breast to move down to my hip to grasp and bring me against his hardness.  There was a definite hip grind that I participated in with more awareness and agreement.

That was, until he came fully awake.

His arms released me like I was a bomb and his leg slid away so fast I should've gotten a skin burn.  I just stayed where I was and watched as he dragged his hand over his face once he was completely on his back and no longer touching me.

 I slid my eyes closed, recognizing playing possum might be my only way out of this particular scenario with any kind of grace. 

I rolled away slowly, trying to act as if I was only turning in my sleep as I moved.

As I did, I heard a metallic click at the door.  I felt Bayco's head rise as he pushed me off my side of the bed with a hard hand in my lower back.

Someone was at the door in broad daylight.  Bayco had warned me that if those Milo-whatevers were going to come at us, it would probably be at night.  But daylight was front and center if all those sunbeams reflecting off the mirror meant anything.

"Bag.  Bathroom.  Now," he instructed firmly on a whisper.

I hit the carpet on my knees and gathered up the clothes I'd just draped over my backpack, looping the nylon strap around me as I scuttled, hunched over, to the small space of the bathroom.  What I was supposed to do there, I hadn't a clue, other than to cover myself.  True, I was wearing my camisole, panties and yoga shorts, but it wasn't ideal to escape in.  So, I dressed, throwing on jeans and a t-shirt.

There were thumping sounds coming from the other room and once dressed, I tried to think of a way out.  Obviously, going out the bathroom door wasn't my first choice.  So I eyed the small, slider window set up high in the motel room's bathroom.  It was tiny, but if I could remove the slider part, I might be able to fit through.  If I shimmied my hips to ease my way.  I was, at this point, damning every doughnut and pizza slice I'd every enjoyed, knowing that they may have cost me my freedom. 

Hell, my life.

I climbed up on the vanity and felt it creak as I did so.  No need to use a scale to know my weight was more than it had been fabricated to bear, I popped the screen out of the small opening and stuck my head through to assess the small driveway that ran the length of the motel units.  Nothing there except a large dumpster.

Perfect.

I threw my bag out first and watched as the dust of the unused driveway accepted it with tiny puffs.  I was hoping it would accept me just as readily.  The drop wasn't all that long, maybe eight or nine feet, so I decided going feet first would be the best bet.  I turned, holding my weight on my hands plastered to the edge of the sink.  I fed my feet and calves through the tiny window, scraping myself on the metal runners.  But it couldn't be helped.  I'd take a few scrapes along the way as long as I wasn't sent back to Louie.  I pushed with my hands and felt the first real bite of tightness about halfway between my ass and my knees.

Uh-oh.

I pushed back and felt the squeeze even though I tried twisting my hips.  Aw, shit!  Tight.  So tight I almost couldn't move.  I grabbed the edge of the vanity and pulled myself back in before twisting and pushing myself back out again.  It was a no go.

Balancing on my left arm, I brought my right arm to cover my face up as I sharply lifted my right knee up and in to break the remaining glass.  The shards fell onto the towels we'd left, tossed carelessly onto the vanity from the night before, and released that thin piece of metal that divided the window.  As it let go, I could finally move my thighs and hips through, dropping onto the uneven blacktop.  While my movements on the external parts of me snagged my bag, my internal self, gave fist-pumps of joy. 

Now, what?

I crept low and slow along the line of the building, my bare feet involuntarily lifting at every sharp point, every bit of sharp-edged trash abutting the stuccoed side.  I finally made it to the corner and glanced back behind me.  There was the motorcycle, tucked up behind the dumpster.  I recognized that if you'd come up the alley from the driveway, it would have been hidden.  Only from this particular angle could it be seen.  I took a couple of seconds to dig my chucks out of the bag and put them on as I stared at the bike.

I already knew how heavy his ride was from all the times I felt it shift beneath me when the motor wasn't on and knew I had no hope in hell in controlling it if I decided to straddle it.  Shit, I couldn't even push it.

So the bike wasn't my way out of here.

I took a second to think and it wasn't until I felt the sting of my hand on my lower lip more that I realized I was scared shitless. 

Goddamn. 

Think, girl!
I yelled inside my head.

The Suds-Your-Duds. 

Yeah, I could hide at the laundry mat which was only a couple of shops down from the motel on the left from where I was crouched.  I stood and straightened my bag across my chest.  From memory there was only one large window in the reception area of the motel that faced the street.  So if I could nonchalantly walk in front of it, keeping my hair down to hide my face, no one would know it was me.

With a hand on my belly, I took a deep breath as I moved from around the corner and walked a straight line out onto the sidewalk.  I kept my face tilted away, pretending to find  the boarded up and empty shops on the other side of the street fascinating until my goal was in view.  I moved to the door, seeing that it was almost filled to capacity with other women and small children.  I guess, Wednesday was the day to do your wash in this town.

Careful to keep up my pretense, I roamed the space finding all the washers engaged.  I eyed the other patrons who were watching me carefully in return.  I sighed and waved a hand before I went to the bank of connected seats, tucking my backpack underneath my chair and reached for a magazine.  I was trying for casual acceptance; just another person who needed to do a load of laundry.  But my heart was beating hard, just had it had done from the moment I heard Bayco's hard whisper to flee.

Where
was
he?

I had no doubt he had won whatever went on in the motel room.   I don't know why I felt the confidence in his abilities I hadn't seen tested.  But somehow, I knew he'd win over whoever had tried to break in.

I heard the low thrumming growls of his bike and saw him poised at the driveway of the motel.  Without a thought, I grabbed my bag and raced out the glass door of the laundry facility.  His helmeted, visor down, head turned toward me and I saw him reach out an arm.

I'd never been more grateful to see someone in my life.

Bay!

Sprinting the fifty or more feet to where he waited, I launched myself, twisting at the last moment, my ass hitting the seat before he peeled away, turning left against the flow of intermittent traffic.  I knew he couldn't hear me between the noise of the bike or the other traffic on the road, but I had to say it nonetheless.

"Thank god, Bayco," I muttered, tucked up so tight against his tank-top covered back.  "Thank you."

I felt his fingers on his left hand reach back and drag along the outside of my thigh.

 For all intents and purposes, I took it as his own brand of welcome.

*.*.*.*.*

He was caught in a dream he hadn't had in years.  Of Nadia, his woman, pressed against him as they slept.  Her sweet curves called him, her hills inviting his touch as he moved on her, pressing, rubbing.  The want he'd felt for her had always been a silver thread with the need shimmering just beyond it. 

He rubbed the firmest part of himself against her again and felt her immediate response.  Oh, how he had missed this; the feel of her sweet, softness beneath him.  His hand, overflowing with her breast, moving southward to capture the fullness of her ass as he began to skimmed over her.  But as he did so, he was aware of her mouth on his neck, kissing, tonguing his skin.

Nadia never wanted to use her mouth.  Not without hesitancy, her lips trembling as she tried so hard to touch his, reaching to find pleasure.  Something that she'd never been able to do with confidence. 

And to include her tongue with her mouth's movements, never. 

Ever. 

She said her mouth was dirty, unclean, letting him know with no uncertainty how she had been used in the internment camp.  She never kissed him anywhere, not without a lot of pauses and especially never used her tongue. If only just in light touches.

Kissing mouth to mouth had never been but a fraction of what he and Nadia had shared in their private time.

So. 

Then.

This wasn't Nadia beneath him, his brain said.  But his body, so starved for the connection, a real union, didn't know the difference and didn't want to respond to his thoughts. 

To his own cautions. 

Reese.

Fuck!

While it may have only been seconds, to him it was a lifetime as his mind screamed at him that this wasn't what he wanted, even though his body and heart were murmuring a different story.  A tale he wanted to complete, to sink into even as his mind wrenched him to the other side of the mattress.

He moved as quickly as possible, disconnecting until he was completely on his back. Without thinking he lifted a hand to his face to erase the embarrassment of making a move on her, even if it was it the grips of a dream he couldn't control.  Just as he was about to apologize, he heard the sound.  The snick of metal against metal on the door.  Someone was trying to enter their room.

Without a thought, he half-turned to the woman tucked below him, catching her wide eyed stare from underneath him.  God, she was beautiful.

"Bag.  Bathroom.  Now," he'd ordered as he pushed her with his left hand.  His right hand was reaching underneath his pillow for his Glock 19, as he, too, rolled off to her side of the bed.  As soon as his peripheral vision confirmed she was out of sight, he'd moved quickly, as silently as possible to the side of the door.  His back to the wall, he braced a foot to increase his stability, watching as the door inched open.  In the seconds between her leaving the room and the door bumping open, he wondered about their tactics. 

Always by night, under the cover of darkness. 

But not today and he could barely get his mind to accept it.

He knew the Milosevics inside and out.  They had been his business for so long, had been under his microscope, studied, learned and absorbed.  This daylight breach was not one of their known attack methods.  Known or not, though, he still had to battle them.  Protect her.

He heard a tickle of glass from back and behind him before, at the fissure of the door, he saw a gun lead an arm.  He held his breath, shifting his body as he grabbed the exposed wrist and yanked.  The hand released as soon as Brand's elbow caught the man full in the face before he twisted back to see the other man pause in the doorway.