She’d been so engrossed in her thoughts that she’d lost track of time. Now, as she looked out through the darkened limousine windows, she could only see desert. They’d left the lights of Las Vegas behind.
13
“Driver!” Thad shouted into the ceiling intercom.
The limo picked up speed—going much too fast—and the smoked-glass partition separating them from the driver stayed shut. Thad scrambled past her and banged on it. “Stop the car!”
The car swerved off the highway. She clutched the bar for support as they lurched onto a bumpy road. Thad regained his balance first. “Let me have that.” He grabbed Olivia’s silky flamenco shawl and began twisting it around his hand.
Olivia snatched up her phone and hit the emergency SOS button.
Nothing happened.
“Get back!” Thad pushed her behind him and slammed his wrapped arm into the partition window, shattering the tempered glass between them and the driver into pebbles.
The limo careened, throwing them both to the floor. As Thad scrambled to his feet, she tried again to use her phone. “I can’t get a signal!”
“Cell jammer.”
The car lurched to a stop.
Thad dove toward the broken place where the partition had been, but the driver threw open the door, killed the headlights, and jumped out before Thad could touch him. She leaped for one of the passenger doors, while Thad went for the other. They were both locked. He glanced toward the limo’s bar, looking for something to make into a weapon—a wine bottle or glass—but the compartments were empty.
“Whatever happens, stay behind me,” he ordered.
“This is because of me,” she cried. “You know it is.”
“Do what I say.”
A click. The rear passenger door flew open, and the dome light went on. “Get out,” a gruff voice said.
Thad pushed in front of her and stepped from the limo. Her flamenco scarf dropped to the ground as he blocked the door with his body to shield her inside.
This was all wrong. She should be the one protecting him. She made another desperate visual search of the interior. Nothing in the bar. Nothing in her purse except a room key and tissues. She dropped her cell and scooped up two handfuls of the security glass pebbles that had fallen onto the seat from the broken partition. Even though it was tempered glass, the edges bit into her palms.
“Move over,” that same gruff voice shouted outside. She could see nothing through the windows except the dark.
Thad stayed where he was, blocking the rear door. “What do you want?”
“Move over or I’ll shoot. Both of you! Out here!”
“Stay inside,” Thad ordered her.
She wasn’t having it. Keeping her fists clenched, glass inside, she pushed against him and wedged herself out of the limo into the emptiness of the Mojave Desert.
At first, she could see nothing beyond the ooze of dim yellow light from the limo’s interior. A jet flew overhead, maybe from Nellis Air Force Base, maybe from McCarran. As her eyes adjusted, she took in the hulking shape of the man standing outside the light. He wore a dark suit, but the brim of his chauffeur’s hat concealed most of his face. Was he the man who’d accosted her at the bookstore? They seemed to be roughly the same size, but so were millions of other men.
“Step away from the car!” he shouted into the darkness.
Instead of fear, a hot rush of fury took over. “We’re not going anywhere!”
The earth erupted in front of them. She gasped. He hadn’t been bluffing about the gun.
Thad grabbed her and pushed her into the darkness. “Do what he says.”
“Why?” She was furious. Possessed by a raging wildfire. Furious with their kidnapper. With herself for involving Thad in her mess. With this cretin who was terrorizing them. “Big man with a gun!” She gripped the glass pebbles tighter in her fists. “What do you want, big man?”
“Shut up, Liv,” Thad ordered.
“Shut up!” their kidnapper shouted at exactly the same time. He spun on Thad. “Give me your wallet. Toss it over there.”
Thad did as he demanded.
“Now your phone,” the man said.
“Don’t do it!” Olivia exclaimed.
Thad ignored her. The man kept the gun leveled as he bent down to snatch them both up.
“Now that watch.”
Thad unclipped the Victory780 and tossed it toward his feet.
The man turned in her direction. “Give me your purse.”
She couldn’t get past her fury. “It’s in the limo, you moron.”
“Liv . . .” Thad’s voice sounded a sharp, warning note.
But she’d sucked Thad into what should have been her crisis alone, and she was beyond reason. “Big man wants to do drama! I do drama better than anyone!”
The man lunged for her. She let both hands fly, hurling the glass at his face.
He gave a howl of shock, and that was all Thad needed to charge him. The gun fired and flew into the air. She screamed, lost her balance, and fell.
“Liv!” Thad spun toward her.
With no weapon, the driver lurched for the limo.
The car door slammed, and Thad went to his knees beside her. His hands frantically moved over her body, and in the adrenaline rush flooding her, she couldn’t comprehend why he was feeling her up at a time like this.
“Liv! Where did you get hit?”
He wasn’t feeling her up. He was . . . “I didn’t.” She rolled to the side. “I fell.”
Thad spotted the gun and rushed with it toward the limo, but by the time he fired, the car was peeling onto the road, gravel spraying like shrapnel.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke. In the distance, the lights on a transmission tower blinked, and she heard the faraway sound of a freight train. They were alone in the thick desert dark.
As she breathed in the dusty cloud from the car tires, all her fury evaporated, leaving her with a racing heart and wobbly legs as she pushed herself to her knees. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“For what?”
“For dragging you into my problems.”
“Shut up, Liv, okay?” It was the second time he’d said that to her, but now his gentle tone made her want to weep. “Maybe he was after the watches.”
As she started to argue with him, she felt something by her hand. She closed her fingers around his watch and held it out. “A lot of effort for nothing.”
“Bastard.” He clicked on the safety and shoved the gun in his waistband. As he took the watch from her, he helped her to her feet. “Let’s go.”
One of the gel breast lifts she’d worn instead of a bra had fallen from the V of her dress. She fumbled for it, but layers of sandy grit adhered to the sticky surface, so she retrieved her flamenco shawl instead. He helped her to her feet. “Let’s go.”
Having lopsided breasts, she decided, was only a minor complication compared to the bigger challenge of trekking down a dark, rutted gravel road wearing five-inch stilettos.
Thad was thinking the same thing. “You’ll never make it to the highway in those shoes. I’ll carry you piggyback.”
“Never.” Olivia Shore, the toast of the Metropolitan, the jewel of La Scala, the pride of the Royal Opera, did not piggyback on anyone, no matter how broad and strong they were. She tossed the dusty shawl around her shoulders. “I’ll be fine.”