Running From Fate (58 page)

The detective
steepled
his fingers.
“Why was Ms. Roberts targeting this particular woman?
Was she jealous because James Kelly was dating Mira and not her?”

“Hell no,” he replied freely, obviously assuming he would
be given a deal.
“That woman liked to spre
ad herself around.
I doubt she’d
even know what real jealousy was.
No,” he continued, “the reason she had a beef against this woman was that she partied too much.”

“I’m not sure I understand.”

“Well
Kim’s
dad is some bigwig.
H
e’s on a lot of committees and stuff so it didn’t look good on him
when his own daughter got in trouble
.
He got tired of bailing her out and cut off the flow of cash.
Man,” he chuckled.
“It really burn
ed
her ass.
She screamed for a week and then she went pleading to her dad
dy
.
I guess his business was in some kind of trouble because he told her the flow would start again if she could help set up a partnership with the guy, James Kelly, s
omething to do with contracts he wanted.”
He cleared his throat loudly and his hand twitched.
“You got a cigarette?”

“Sorry Joey I don’t, but maybe later.
  Then what happened?”

James was starting to get a sick feeling in his stomach.
It had nothing to do with the calculated way that Kim had gone after him, at least not directly.
He kept remembering Mira’s house after it had been broken into and the feeling of rage that had lingered over the place.
Something wasn’t right.
He shook his head and tried to focus on the questioning.

“Anyway,” Joey was saying. 
“She hooked the guy really easy and Kim even thought he might be getting ready to offer marriage.
That would have made her dad really happy.
Then that green-eyed bitch came along and ruined everything.
Kim was sure that all we had to do was get her out of the picture and James would beg to have her back.”

“What did you get out of helping her?” Devon asked.

“She told me that I’d get a cut of the money her dad gave her.”
He shrugged.
“My dad’s not happy with me right now and I needed the cash.
  I got expensive tastes.
”

“Did you help her with the notes?”

“Nah.
That was all her deal.
She thought she was real clever.
Well, except for the mouse.
That grossed her out.”

Now they were getting somewhere
, James thought.  He
might actually allow Devon to handle things. 
He let his muscles relax and leaned back
.

“Did you help break into the house?”

This time the punk looked really surprised and James felt his stomach tightening with dread.

“Hah,” Joey laughed and didn’t stop until Devon shouted at him.
He was still wiping his eyes when he talked again.
“Doesn’t matter when it happened,” he said, “because I can guarantee that Kim wouldn’t have the guts to do something like that.”
His eyes shone with unholy glee.
“I bet
that
green-eyed
bitch pissed someone else off and they did it.”
The thought obviously amused him because it set him off in
new
gales of laughter.

That was the last straw for James.
He sprung from his seat and raced for the door, a sense of impending doom dogging his steps
.
He would deal with Joey later.
Right
now all he could think about was that he had left Mira with no protection, but an old man and a puppy.
Devon
appeared
next to him as he reached the parking lot and pushed him toward a squad car.
For the first time in a long while, James prayed.

Mira sat in the deepening gloom of her living room and wondered if she should even bother getting up to finish making dinner.
Somehow, she doubted that James would be back to eat it and
Pat was gone.  D
espite his protestation
s
she had sent
him
to a hotel for the night after promising to have lunch with him tomorrow.

For now, it was just her and Zeus, who was thankfully being quiet and seemed content to just nap on her feet.
Despite the depression weighing her down she felt an overwhelming urge to just be alone with her thoughts.
When one was making a decision that could alter the entire course of her life it was best done in solitude.
With a little of her previous absurd sense of humor, she laughed silently at how dramatic
and
emo
she was being
.

The problem was that tonight she had truly realized, despite the long separation and the sometimes rocky relationship, she had been in love with James Kelly since she was seven years old.
Even when she had
firmly kept him as just a part of
her past
during her college years, while she was building a career, and through
out
her brief marriage, a part of her had always belonged to
him
.
If Kevin had lived longer things might have been different, but she wasn’t even sure of that.

The feelings that she had suppressed and tucked away had, apparently, just been waiting for an opening.
When she had seen him again after so many years those emotions had sprung back to life, expanding and deepening with every hour she spent in his company.

The question was
:
should she accept the half life that James was offering her, living with him, loving him, but knowing that her love wasn’t returned?
She could soak up the time spent
together and hope that one day he would come to love her and trust her.
On the other hand, she could sever her relationship with him and eventually try to find someone else.
Someone who could give her what she needed.
That was probably the more rational, safer path, but the thought made her heart ache.

With a disheartened sigh, she leaned back on the sofa and closed her eyes.
The quality of light suddenly changed, telling her
that the single
lamp
she was using had gone off.  A
t the exact same moment Zeus jumped up and ran for the stairs,
growling threateningly
.
She had a brief moment to curse herself for not resetting the alarm after Pat had gone when a muffled crash sounded from her room.

Depression was replaced by a burst of adrenaline that urged her to charge up the stairs and face down the danger
, but rationality reasserted itself just in time.
Instead, she toed of her shoes and crept quietly toward the kitchen, navigating by moonlight alone.
The large knife that she had used earlier glinted temptingly on the breakfast bar, but she bypassed it and pulled a wickedly sharp fillet knife from the knife block.  She wasn’t sure if she would have what it too
k to use
it
on a living being, but
the feel of it in her hand
made her feel better.

From somewhere upstairs, Zeus gave a sharp bark th
at ended suddenly with a pained
yelp.
A hushed silence followed and she was sure she could just hear the sound of stealthy footsteps.
Forcibly restraining the urge to hurry, Mira held the knife along her side and stepped out of the kitchen.
As she came even with the stairs a slim, but surprisingly strong arm wrapped around her neck.
She fought the urge to scream and rake her nails down
the offending arm and, instead,
focused
on taking short, shallow breaths and keeping her grip on the knife.
If she was to have
any kind of chance
at surviving
the last thing she needed was to panic.
She waited, barely able to breath, expecting
the arm to tighten and choke off
her air supply, but it didn’t.

Instead, her attacker started walking forward, forcing her to move or be dragged.
An enervating fear kept her mute until she realized that they were heading for the door.
If he managed to get her out of the house and took her away from civilization, her chances of survival would plummet.
She had to find a way to stop him.

“Who are you?” s
he finally asked, cringing when her
voice came out high and squeaky.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
The voice was
somehow familiar, but
slightly slurred.  The sharp smell of vodka washed over her
,
further restricting her breathing.
S
he gasped for air
and swore never to touch the stuff again
.

The man laughed gratingly and continued pulling her toward the door.
Suddenly, a memory clicked into place and she remembered the last time she had heard that voice.
It had been raised in anger as her ex-boss listened to the
judge
hand down a
sentence
that
would financially cripple his business
and
strip him of his license.
She still recalled the sick rage in Mitchell Haines’ eyes as he had paused in front of her before stalking out of the courtroom.
It was one of the reasons she had chosen to move across the country.

Her fear
went up
another notch and her muscles bunched, urging her to fight.
The room was now almost
pitch
black, but Mira sensed that they were coming up to the sofa.
She would have one chance.
In her present position it would be not only stupid, but almost impossible to truly injure him with the knife, but if she could somehow push him off balance and into
the sofa she might
at least
have enough
time to get away.

She mentally tensed herself,
willing her muscles not to freeze and fail her
, when a small, dark blur sho
t into view and clamped onto her attacker’s
leg.
He screeched in rage and loosened his hold.
She silently thanked Zeus and seized her chance, bumping
into him as she slipped out of his grasp.
He stumbled forward and hit the back of the sofa, tumbling over it.
The front door
was sill locked and in the dark it would probably take too long to open so she did the only thing she could think of and headed for the stairs at a dead run.
If she could make it to her room in enough time, she
could use the same tree he had taken advantage of
to climb out.