Worst Nightmare

Five

Nicholas glanced at Jordan, and then back to the road. Then back to Jordan again.

She was wearing a way oversized white T-shirt with the local high school’s logo over her breast — which meant the bastard knew where she went to school, Nicholas thought furiously — and black jeans.

And she was far too quiet. He realized now he’d expected screams, pleas, a feeble defense of her “boyfriend’s” actions, something. A reaction of any kind had to be better than this prolonged silence and utter calm, the seeming lack of emotion.

Finally unable to stand it any longer, he spoke. “Do you not watch the news?” he asked tersely.

She threw him a quick, threatening look, but otherwise ignored him.

He sighed and gentled his voice on the next attempt. “Do you even know who he is, Jordan?”

“He’s my boyfriend,” she replied stiffly without looking away from the window. “Or was, at least until—”

“Jordan, he’s a convicted criminal.”

She finally turned her head to look at him, frowning. Her face was cast into almost ghoulish shadows by the lights on the dashboard, and the question came slowly and quietly.

“What... are you talking about?”

His voice was measured and didactic as he recited, “Garrett Sanders, a.k.a. Richard Murphy. Date of birth, January twenty-third 1987. Grew up in New York City, got busted as a rookie drug dealer at age sixteen, moved to Thunder Bay, Ontario with his parents shortly thereafter. Ran away at seventeen and headed for Ottawa or surrounding small towns. And kept dealing, while staying on the run. He hasn’t been caught in years.” Pausing, he glanced at Jordan. “He ever offered you anything?”

The casual way he asked the question had her whipping around fast to glare at him, the seatbelt preventing her from jumping forward in her seat. “No!” she snapped forcefully.

“Good. Jesus, Jordan, do you not see the danger in this situation?”

She bit her lower lip hard, but it still trembled; tears managed to burn in her eyes and glue her lashes into triangles. “I see it,” she whispered.

Here was the reaction he’d wanted, all right. She looked younger even than seventeen, looked as vulnerable as a lost child. Yeah, it was a reaction. And damn it all to hell and back, seeing it made him feel like a complete heel.

“Aw, shit, Jordan...”

She shook her head, swiped at her eyes. “What do I do now?” she asked, and her voice had steadied. She didn’t want his sympathy, and wouldn’t stand for pity — his or anyone else’s.

His answer was simple. “We’ll try to get away from town for a while, so that even if he tries to follow us he’ll leave our families out of it.” Hopefully. “Do you speak French?”

Puzzled, she blinked. “Yes. Why?”

“Because mine’s rusty, and we’ll need it once we get to Quebec.”

--

Jordan wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. Couldn’t have heard him correctly.

“Quebec?”

“Yeah. The actual city, not just the province.”

Ignoring the sarcasm, she stared at his profile — the sharply chiseled cheekbones, piercing wolf’s eyes, the straight, aristocratic nose, the tense line of jaw and mouth. Then she said calmly, “Nicholas Merritt, you’re fucking crazy, you know that?”

He cracked a grim smile, hands flexing on the wheel of the car. “You’re not the first to say it, Metcalf, and I doubt you’ll be the last.”

--

They drove along the empty highway in silence — and at twice the speed limit — for several more minutes; then Jordan asked, “How do you know all that — about Garrett or Richard or whoever the fuck he is?”

“I’ve got a friend in the police force. They’ve been after him for some time now, but he always gets away just in time.” He paused, then added thoughtfully, “You know, I didn’t think of it earlier, but I could make a phone call and have him picked up now.” He glanced at her as though to gauge the effect of his words; she squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and jerked her head towards his cell.

“Do it.”

Her eyes, when they met his for a moment, were as hard as her voice and glittering, spooky in the green dash light.

After a brief interval, she turned to look out the window at the highway whipping past them.

Nicholas picked up his cell.

--

Jordan was almost asleep when a vicious curse from Nicholas had her eyes blinking open, only to see him holding out an impatient hand and demanding, “Your cell phone. Hand it over.”

The hand in her pocket closed protectively around the little phone. “Why?” she questioned suspiciously.

He blew out a sharp, frustrated breath, slanted her an angry look. “Did you get it from him?”

“Oh. Oh, shit.” Suddenly understanding, she yanked the cell from her pocket and dropped it into his outstretched palm, then watched dispassionately as he lowered his window, tossed the phone out the window and into the path of an oncoming eighteen-wheeler that was the only other vehicle on the road.

When he closed the window again and cut off the roar of wind into the car, silence, heavy with meaning, reigned.

“He was tracking me.” It wasn’t a question.

Nicholas said nothing for a moment, but Jordan, always a careful observer of people, saw his jaw clench, saw his hands tighten on the steering wheel until his knuckles whitened, and had her answer — even before he said in a tightly controlled, low voice, “It’s a possibility we can’t afford to ignore.”

He seemed like he might say more, but his own cell phone rang at that moment, and he immediately answered. “Yeah.” He listened, then said, “Sorry she woke you, Dame. Just tell her it’s a long story, and that I’ll explain when I can. And you can tell her to let Scott know that Jordan’s with me.” For a second he was quiet, then he said mildly, “Damien, shut the hell up,”and hung up.

After an instant Jordan felt it was safe to ask, “Who was that?”

One corner of his mouth crooked up. “A friend of mine, who I hope you never have to meet.”

Jordan blinked, surprised at the fondness in his voice. When it became clear that he wasn’t going to elaborate, she shrugged, leaned her head against the car window, and closed her eyes.

--

“Jordan, wake up.”

She stirred slowly and then sat up, wincing a little as her neck, stiff from the nap in the car, cramped painfully. “Whatimezit?” she mumbled as she tried to blink her eyes open.

Apparently Nicholas understood the garbled English that was all she could manage upon first waking up, because he replied calmly, “It’s five in the morning, or close to it. Come on,” he added, and held open her car door and looked at her expectantly with his eyebrows lifted.

Jordan didn’t move from the seat of the Porsche. Granted, a fast sports car wasn’t designed to be good for sleeping in, and it sure as hell hadn’t been, but right then, exhaustion was weighing on her like a sack of bricks, and she was just too damn tired to move. For all she cared, Nicholas could leave her in the car, wherever they were, because she wasn’t moving. Not at five in the fucking morning.

“Five in the morning? Five o’clock in the fucking morning?” Her voice had been steady, but it rose sharply on the last word. “You asshole!” she added as she reached out to punch him, only to have him catch her hand in his larger one. Defiant, she tossed her hair back and glared up at him. “What makes you think I want to be woken up? I hardly slept!”

His eyes flashed, heated in a warning that she caught too late. “Yeah? Well, I got fuck-all for sleep, too, seeing as I was driving all night to keep your psycho, drug-dealing, trigger-happy boyfriend from finding us.”

The hard tone and simple statement of shameful fact had her ducking her head and muttering a reluctant apology.

He gave her a cool You ain’t seen nothing yet look. “You have no idea of what it really means to be sorry,” he assured her coldly. “Now will you please get out of my car before I haul you out myself and carry you into the hotel over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes?”

She didn’t doubt that he could. She stood five feet, four inches in comparison with his five-eleven. She could fight all she wanted if he did do as he threatened — and by the look in his eyes, she thought he would — but he’d still win.

Damn it.

Sighing, she pushed herself out of the seat, holding her hoodie in her hands, and shut the car door with a sharp snap. She watched him hand over the keys of the Porsche to a sleepy-eyed but eager-looking valet in a rumpled uniform, then mutely followed him into the hotel.

As she let him deal with checking them in, she reflected about the edge that had been in his voice, and felt another quick twinge of guilt. He’d driven four hours to Quebec City while she slept, and she’d complained about a lack of sleep? No wonder he’d gotten irritated.

She glanced at him sideways. The lines around his eyes and mouth were more pronounced, his features somehow drawn. His eyes were flashing and his hands gesturing impatiently — something, she wasn’t sure what, was pissing him off, and for once it wasn’t her.

“Jordan, check us in already,” he snapped impatiently when he turned disgustedly from the clerk.

She turned to him and smiled sweetly; next thing she knew they were standing in their room on the sixth floor.

“Finally,” muttered Nicholas in relief, managing to kick off his shoes before he fell on top of one of the queen-sized beds and went to sleep, fully clothed.

Jordan managed to strip to her T-shirt and crawl under the covers before exhaustion claimed her again.

This time, at least, sleep was dreamless.

--

Next Day

“Hey. Hey, asshole. Wake up.”

Jordan sighed and studied the prone figure on top of the bed, lying face down in the pillows. It was almost two in the afternoon, for Christ’s sake. How much sleep did the man need? She’d been up since noon herself and had already eaten, showered, and given herself a tour of the entire hotel. She’d spent the last half hour trying to wake Nicholas — to no avail.

She sighed again, then narrowed her eyes. “Nicholas... wake up,” she urged, giving his shoulder a hard shove.

She saw his eyes open, saw him snap into a sitting position; then next thing she knew she was lying on the bed with him above her, straddling her and pinning her down. He didn’t seem half-asleep, but rather wide awake and hostile.

Her heart was jumping in her chest, but she made sure her tone was steady and caustic when she said, “Jumpy, Merritt?”

He blinked, then rolled off of her and sat at the end of the bed, letting his head fall into his hands. “Shut up, Jordan,” he muttered darkly, voice muffled by his hands.

She sat up and crossed her legs, tossed her hair back, and smirked. “Is that how you pick up a girl? Tackle her? Or do you save that for the morning after?”

He lifted his head only enough to give her a scathing look, and repeated, “Shut up.”

Smirk still in place, she asked pleasantly, “And you’re going to make me shut up... how?”

Nicholas rubbed his hands over his face and turned to face her, looking up as he said casually, “My threat from the restaurant still stands.”

Jordan snorted and crossed her arms and bounded up to stand on the floor. “Some threat — it’s completely empty. You wouldn’t follow through.”

He stood and moved towards her, something unreadable flickering in the whiskey-coloured eyes and the tiniest of smirks tugging at the corner of his mouth. “How do you know what I would or wouldn’t do?”

Her nerves were screaming now that he was so close, but pride made her stand toe-to-toe with him and sound bored when she shrugged and remarked, “It’s kind of obvious.”

He stepped closer still, trapped her between his body and the wall, bracing his arms against the wall on either side of her. He lowered his face until it was inches from hers, held her gaze. After a long few moments he muttered, “Yeah? How obvious is this?”

She opened her mouth to answer — and instead found his mouth on hers.

For a moment she thought of drawing back, hitting him as hard as she could. Then he angled his head slightly to one side, changed the pressure of his lips.

So she groaned — and then gave.

Jesus Christ, she gave. She pressed against him, her slim little body snug against his, and opened her mouth so that he could taste her.

Nicholas’s hands gripped the side of her face while need sent black dots dancing across his vision. It took everything he had not to simply lift her up and cart her back to the bed. He could have done it, could have had her now — he could feel it in the way she moved against him, the hunger of her mouth, hear it in the sounds she made in her throat.

He dragged his mouth away, nipped the side of her neck. She drew in a quick breath, fisted her hands in his hair and boosted herself up to lock her legs around his waist. He staggered, managed to turn so that it was his back against the wall and not hers. His hands — oh, Christ, his hands — skittered up the T-shirt she still wore, rubbed up her sides. She moaned, then pushed at his shirt so that she could sink her teeth into his shoulder.

“Jordan.” His voice was rough, grating out past a raw throat.

“Un-huh.”

“We have to stop.” Nicholas blinked, eyes almost crossing, when she rocked hard against him. “Jesus,” he managed, and almost gave in then.

But for no reason that he understood, the image of her in the car, with tears beading on her eyelashes and her eyes so wide and lost, flooded his mind, and he abruptly remembered that she was still a girl, only seventeen.

“Christ, Jordan, come on. We’ve gotta stop this.”

She drew back, blinked. And then her eyes hardened, going from blazingly hot to Arctic-cold in the space of an instant.

“You can’t tell me you don’t want me,” she snapped, voice strangely flat, with a pointed glance below his waist.

Nicholas clamped his jaw shut, strode for the bathroom door.

Obvious? Yeah, he’d been that, all right.

Way to go, Merritt. Way to fucking go.

--

WOOT! Look at me go, managed another chapter!! Sorry it took so long! Don’t hate me! Review, please! Thank you! I offer you... a hotel banquet. Haha!

- ML

P.S. More Life’s Little Chances should be along soon, I hope. Maybe even as early as tomorrow — but let’s not get our hopes up too much.