The Executive's Decision (22 page)

Regan’s lip stung and she tasted blood in her mouth. Her eyes throbbed from the blows he’d landed, and her head swam in confusion and pain. She knew she could survive the rape he was planning. She could block it from her mind as she’d blocked so many other things, she thought as she felt her consciousness slipping. But did the man really plan to walk away from her afterward? No, that wasn’t usually the case. Fear cramped her stomach. She turned her head away.

Roger gripped her chin tightly, forcing her to look at him. “Don’t tell me you’re thinking of
him
while you’re with me.” He slammed the back of his hand across her cheek. She staggered as he unbuttoned his pants.

Her vision had gone cloudy, and the vile metal taste of blood filled her mouth. The room around her spun, and she was going down. She felt it. Damn it, she’d been in this position before. She’d lost consciousness at the hands of a man who’d meant to kill her. She’d be damned if she did it again. She wasn’t going down this time, not without a fight. As he pushed against her, she felt her way over Zach’s desk with her hand. There had to be a weapon.

When her hand came across the letter opener, she knew she had one. Right next to it was the key to the elevator she’d refused to take, which would be her escape if she could make it that far. She didn’t pick them up yet. When she did, she would need to take him by surprise.

When he pushed her back onto the desk, Regan casually slid the letter opener behind her back and closed her fingers around the handle.

He stepped toward her. Leered, breathing in her face. Shoved her skirt aside and braced one arm on the desk.

When he was only a moment from taking what he’d come for, she mustered all her energy and plunged the opener into his shoulder.

Roger pushed back with a scream. A red stain spread around the wound. “Bitch! You stabbed me!”

She took the vase of flowers from the desk and hurled them at his head. They hit him in the side and crashed to the floor. Glass shards shot out over them both.

Regan grabbed the key, ran for the elevator, and pushed the button, watching over her shoulder as Roger staggered to his feet.

As he found balance on his knees, the door opened. Regan fell inside, pushed buttons, and turned the key trying to get the doors to close quickly.

He was on his feet, the letter opener still lodged in his shoulder. He moved toward her as she pushed buttons and more buttons.

Their eyes met.

“Go to hell!” she yelled as the door finally moved. An unexpected strength welled up inside her. She had won, and now his gaze was fearful and angry.

The door closed, and the elevator began to descend.

Tears burned her eyes immediately. Her breath was escaping her. She looked at her arms. They were bloody from the glass that had flown from the broken vase. Her head throbbed, her mouth bled, and her vision was growing dark.

She slid down the wall of the elevator. Her mind focused enough to know she had to crawl from the elevator. She couldn’t lose consciousness. It would only be a matter of him hitting a button to have the elevator head back his way.

As the door opened, she worried that she would pass out before she could exit, so she hit the alarm to stop it from closing and carrying her back up to the office.

She saw a man’s shoes, and she crawled backward. Her vision fogged again. She had been so close to getting away. Footsteps pursued her into the elevator.

“Regan.” But it was Zach’s voice, not Roger’s. He dropped everything in his arms and rushed to her.

“Roger… Byers. Up in your office.” It was all she could say. The world slipped into darkness.

Zach gathered Regan into his arms, carried her to the car, and called security. Even before they left the parking garage, he could hear sirens from the building and from approaching police cars. The authorities would deal with Roger Byers. He'd see to that. He'd press charges, and he'd see that she pressed her own as well. No one would ever hurt her again.

How could he have let this happen to her, he wondered as he put her in the car. He’d carelessly sent her into danger. She’d never forgive him. He’d never forgive himself.

The emergency room was abuzz with chaos from an ambulance that arrived. Regan was groggy, in and out of consciousness as Zach carried her through the doors. Her eyes were swollen, her clothes a mess, and her lips were covered in dried blood. Certainly they wouldn’t make her wait to see a doctor.

When Curtis walked around the corner and saw him there with his sister draped over his arms, Zach’s heart leapt into his throat.

“Oh, God!” Curtis rushed to them. He called for nurses and was already pulling Zach through the secured doors toward a bed, where he laid her down. “Jesus Christ! What the hell happened?”

All Zach could do was watch as Curtis looked her over and nurses rushed to her. “I don’t know. I found her in the elevator like this. I was just on my way to pick her up.” He dragged his trembling hands through his hair as Curtis flashed a light into her eyes and she winced.

“Sweetheart, come back to me.” He delicately touched her face.

As Regan stirred on the bed, Zach noticed all the buttons on her blouse were torn off. He felt violently ill, and his knees went weak. God, she’d been raped.

He tried to be calm, tried to be strong for her, but the sounds of the ER retreated and he couldn’t see. Curtis eased him to the floor and made him put his head between his knees.

“Are you all right?”

“What happened to her?” he demanded, his skin cold and clammy.

“We’re going to check her out. I’m taking her to a room.” Curtis motioned to a nurse. “You take care of him. We’ll be in six.” After he gave her the room number, he pushed Regan’s bed out of the ER.

It took an hour to have her examined. He hadn’t gotten word on her condition, but he had received a phone call from his security force letting him know that Roger Byers had been arrested. The news gave him a grim satisfaction.

When the phone rang again and it was John Forrester, he couldn’t control the fear in his voice as he had with his security guard.

“John, are you okay?”

“I’m fine. What the hell happened? What did he do to her?” John’s voice trembled as much as Zach’s had.

“He attacked her in my office. I don’t know much more. She’s beaten and barely conscious. Damn it, every button on her shirt was ripped off.”

“No.” The quake in John’s voice made Zach sick. “That son of a bitch ! I could kill him.”

“I know how you feel.” He looked up to see the nurse headed toward him. “I’ll call you when I know more.” He hung up the phone and the nurse finally led him to Regan’s room. She was sleeping, and Curtis paced the floor.

“This took too long. I’ve made a dozen calls to get someone she’d be more comfortable with to examine her, and I’m still fucking waiting.”

As worried as Zach had been that Curtis would assume the worst when he saw Zach carry her in, he was glad that at least she was beyond the lobby and Curtis was taking care of her. “Is she okay?” Zach’s voice still cracked.

Curtis shot him a fierce glance. “Does she look okay to you?”

Zach looked at her. She was almost unrecognizable now that the swelling had begun. His stomach clenched.

“No.” No, she looked horrible, and seeing the marks on her legs and her torn shirt on the chair next to him, he wondered just how bad things were. What had Roger Byers done to the woman he loved? Had he taken her against her will?

Regan stirred, and Curtis hissed out a breath.

“I feel lousy,” she said hoarsely.

Curtis moved to her, blocking out Zach. Who’d blame him? Zach wasn’t her family, and by the look Curtis had given him when he’d seen him walk through the door, he blamed Zach for what happened to his sister. Curtis touched her face and then kissed her forehead. “I gave you something to calm you. You’re fine. This was a lousy way to end my shift.”

She lifted her head and looked around the room.
“Where’s Zach?”

“I’m here.” He moved from behind Curtis and ventured closer to her bed. The bruises on her face were surfacing, and it wrenched his gut to think that because of him Roger Byers had used his fists on her.

She reached her hand out for him. “I’m sorry, Zach.”

“Oh, sweetheart, no.” He moved closer to her, tears stinging his eyes. “This isn’t your fault.” The sinking feeling in his chest was that it was completely his fault.

“What happened to him?”

“They have him. The police have him.” He wiped at his eyes, knowing he needed to be strong for her and not to fall apart.

“John—is he all right?”

“Yes, John is fine. Byers came after
you
,” he said. He had spoken to the arresting officer again only moments earlier. “He was making his point to John and me by hurting you. God, Regan, how bad did he hurt you?”

“I just got knocked around,” she said. “I stabbed him with your letter opener.” He nodded and a weak, yet proud, smile settled on his lips. They had told him Byers was injured.

Curtis stepped up to the bed. “Reg, they didn’t find anything that would indicate he raped you. But did he?”

Regan crossed her arms over her chest and let out a sigh. “No. He never got the chance.”

Zach saw the barely contained anger in her brother’s eyes—directed at him. Curtis scrubbed his hands over his face. “Damn it, Regan. I didn’t want to see you like this again. How is it I keep finding you lying in hospital rooms battered and beaten? Is this a way of life for you?”

Her eyes held fire in them as she rose in her bed. She winced. “Curtis, shut up. This is not the place or time for this.”

“When is? When I have to identify you in the morgue?”

That socked the wind out of Zach, and he turned toward Curtis. “She protected herself. I don’t think upsetting her is helping her.”

“Let me tell you what’s going to upset her and the rest of us.” He pushed out his chest and met Zach’s eye. “When we find her dead because of some asshole who thought he could use her for a punching bag.”

“That isn’t going to happen. And Zach didn’t do this. It had nothing to do with him.”

“Like hell, Reg. That man was trying to get to him by hurting you. A few more minutes and you would have been raped. A moment after that you’d be dead.”

“I’m neither,” she argued.

“No, but you can’t go through this again. Think about last time. Look at what you almost lost. Then we almost lost you. It wasn’t worth it.”

Regan shifted a look from her brother to Zach. The fear was back in her eyes, and Zach felt like an outsider, confused at their anger and their conversation.

Regan pushed down her sheet and pointed a stern finger at her brother. “One more word, Curtis Keller, and I walk out of this hospital.”

He threw his arms in the air and stormed out of the room. Zach knew he blamed him for what had happened to her. He blamed himself. But they’d been fighting about more than this attack by Roger Byers.

Zach sat quietly by her side. He stroked her hand, the traces of blood on her skin accusing him. “I’m sure they’ll let you go in a few hours. We’ll head out to my parents’ house, and I’ll take care of you. It’ll be a good place for you to rest. You need rest, Regan. In fact, I think you should take off next week. We’ve been working really hard. I’ve probably worked you harder than I ever worked Mary Ellen. I’ll make arrangements for a replacement for the week and then—”

“Would you shut up too?” She lay back against the bed.