Take Me Under (31 page)

“I wasn’t lurking,” she argued, that bright gaze lowering to his bare chest and shoulders for a moment, before she finally lifted it back to his face. She drew in an unsteady breath, then blasted him with a sharp, “I was waiting for you to get home!”

Ryder made a low sound of frustration in the back of his throat, and this time her gaze drifted to the scar that ran from his temple to the middle of his right cheek. Something he didn’t quite understand moved through those green eyes, but she didn’t flinch. The last time she’d seen him the scar had been raw and fresh. It was still ugly as sin, but looked a hell of a lot better than it had then. He never even thought about it much anymore when he was with a woman, but he quickly felt himself go hot under the skin, as if he was actually embarrassed for her to see his face like this.

Fucking ironic, considering she was the reason he had the scar in the first place. Not that he’d ever tell her that. But every time Ryder looked in a mirror, he was reminded of just how dangerous his obsession with this girl could be.

“Why are you here?” he growled, his nostrils flaring with a fresh surge of fury as he stared her down. “What the hell do you want, Lily?”

She bristled with irritation. “Wow. You’re just all kinds of kindness and warmth, aren’t you? First you manhandle me, then you maul me, and now you’re being rude. Is that any way to greet an old friend?”

“Cut the crap. You were hardly manhandled or mauled, and we were never friends. Your old man made sure of that. So what the fuck are you doing here?”

She started to pale, losing that pleasure-flush that had been in her cheeks, the angry tension that had been riding her slender frame gone as quickly as it’d come. “Believe it or not,” she said quietly, licking her lips, “I’m here because I need your help.”

“Bullshit,” he snarled, fisting his hands at his sides so that he wouldn’t do something stupid. Like reach out and grab her again. “I’m the
last
person in the world you need to get near. Go back home to your daddy and leave me alone. Whatever problem you’ve got, he’ll take care of it.”

“I . . . can’t.”

“Why the hell not?” he exploded.

She blinked again, and this time a tear spilled from the corner of her eye. “Because he’s dead.”

Ryder shook his head, thinking he must have heard her wrong. “What are you talking about?”

She took a deep breath, then exhaled in a shuddering rush. “Heller’s dead, Scott. Rado killed him eight days ago.”

Rado? Just the sound of that terrorist bastard’s name put an icy feeling in Ryder’s gut. Of all the scumbags in the world, Yuri Radovich was the one he hated the most. But the man was supposed to be dead. Ryder knew, because he was the one who had killed him.

“That isn’t possible. Rado is dead, Lily.”

A wry smile twisted her lips, the raw pain in her expression making him flinch. “Yeah, that’s the same thing my father believed. Until the monster waltzed onto our boat and slit his throat.”

“Jesus.” His head was starting to pound like a bitch. “You’re sure it was him?”

She sniffed, and jerked her chin up in response.

A fierce scowl wove its way between his brows. “Then why the hell am I only just hearing about this? Why hasn’t anyone informed the old unit?”

“Because I doubt anyone but me knows at this point, and I’ve been on the run,” she told him, her tone tight and clipped and anything but calm. “I don’t have my cell phone, but even if I did, I wouldn’t have called you because who knows if your phone calls are being tapped and traced. I’m sorry for just showing up out of the blue, but it’s not like I had any other choice. Even if I’d had a computer and could have emailed you, there’s a chance he could be monitoring your account. You know what he’s like—how extensive his reach is. And I didn’t have time to come up with some other brilliant way to contact you because I’ve been doing everything I could just to make it here in one piece!”

“On the run from what?” he demanded, finally noticing how tired she looked. How shattered. “What happened, Lily? Why doesn’t anyone know that Heller is dead?”

Her voice shook as she explained. “I was with my father and his girlfriend, Nancy, in the Bahamas when Rado made the hit. We were staying on a friend’s boat, moored in some cove, when he and his men found us. He killed my dad and Nancy and had them thrown overboard.” Her voice started to crack, but she took another deep breath and went on. “Then he tried to kill me. He actually took quite a lot of pleasure in explaining why I had to die and exactly how he and his men were going to do it. But I . . . I got lucky and managed to get away.”

Ryder worked his jaw, guessing there was a hell of a lot more to the story than that . . . and dreading what he knew was coming.

“Do you understand why I’m here?” she asked, stepping toward him, those incredible eyes shimmering with too many emotions for him to name. “You’re the only person I could think of who stands any kind of chance against him. The only person I trust. And I know I don’t have any right to ask—I know you don’t owe me anything—but I’m asking anyway.”

In a flat tone, he said, “You want me to protect you.”

It wasn’t a question. Ryder knew damn well that’s why she was there. He just didn’t know what he was going to do about it. The situation was complicated as hell. One of his worst goddamn nightmares come to life.

Because while Ryder might be capable of protecting Lily Heller from Radovich, he didn’t have a fucking clue how he was going to protect her from himself.