Worth the Risk (3 page)

Chapter 3

I
hope he’s okay.

Meredith had run two hard blocks without looking back when the unexpected thought popped into her head and just about made her trip over her own feet.

Why did she care if he was okay?

He’d sat outside her house, waited for her to come out, too, then jumped on her the second he could. What she needed to care about was putting some distance between herself and those eyes of his. To get to a place where she could stop and breathe.

That’s right. Because you sure can’t breathe when he’s nearby. Or stop thinking about his eyes.

This time she
did
trip. One sneaker caught on a rock and she toppled forward, barely managing to get her palms out in front of her body before she hit the ground. They scraped along the asphalt painfully, but Meredith pushed herself up and forced her legs to move again, this time at a slower jog.

Okay. Acknowledge the attraction before thinking about him leads to a broken arm or something. Then maybe you can get over it.

And it gave her something to consider other than the burning reminder in her lungs that she’d been neglecting her cardio.

The guy—Sam—got to her. There was no denying how her body had reacted to his, how she’d felt every pore come alive as they pressed together.

Well. He did save you from landing head-first on the pavement.

Not that Meredith would admit that to him. Or that she normally went for the hero type. She had no interest in playing the damsel in distress to some man’s misplaced sense of knighthood. So maybe the attraction was fueled by adrenaline. After all, it wasn’t every day she climbed down the side of a building to avoid a guy, then stepped on said guy’s toe and ran off into the streets like a crazy person.

But she’d been attracted to him before that, hadn’t she?

Yes, definitely.

The wide shoulders, the impressive height. The way he looked at her, assessing and intelligent, but appreciative, too. Then there was his quick wit...

“Write a song about him, why don’t you?” she grumbled.

Truthfully, it’d been a long time since she’d even noticed a man. Longer still since she’d been in one’s arms. Her unintentional, chest-to-chest, utterly heart-thumping moment with Sam had been as close as she’d come in years. Literally years. Because being the sister of the woman who created the perfect system for snagging and keeping a husband made dating problematic. Some men went running in the other direction the second they found out. A few went the
other
other direction and were ready to propose by the second date. Meredith had learned to be cautious.

So, yeah. Being this attracted to someone she just met—wondering what that five o’clock shadow of his would feel like pressed to her cheek or if his lips were as firm as they looked—was unusual.

And stupid.

“That, too,” she agreed out loud.

She had more important things to worry about. Like what her next move was going to be now that she’d escaped Sam and his crooked half smile.

Dammit.

His smile hadn’t even been on her radar until right that second. Now, though... Yep. Right up there with eyes.

Meredith shook her head and spoke her sister’s name aloud as a reminder of her priorities. “Tamara.”

And saying the name made her think maybe she should call her again. Meredith reached for her purse and then groaned. It wasn’t on her shoulder where it should be.

Must’ve dropped it when I tried to do that head plant.

Which meant that Sam probably had it.

“Great.”

What was the man’s deal, anyway? Something in her gut told her he wasn’t there to hurt her. But if he was so interested in Tamara, why didn’t he just go after her directly? Or contact someone who’d spoken to her recently. Her publicist or the host of tech people who helped run her internet business. Meredith’s sister didn’t exactly maintain a low public profile, and she had plenty of peripheral friends who practically qualified as an entourage. Not so long ago, her house had even been featured in some kind of home-and-garden magazine. Tamara’s life was accessible in many ways, but coming through Meredith wasn’t one of them.

Just the opposite.

Meredith swallowed, a guilty lump building in her throat. The rift between them might not be something they advertised, but anyone who took a second would see she wasn’t involved in her sister’s life. Sam’s intelligent gaze told her
he
should have figured all of that out. So why was he still so hell-bent on following Meredith?

Unless he tried all that other stuff and still couldn’t find her.
Maybe his questions and his persistence had to do with that very fact. Tamara was missing. Meredith almost tripped again.

Missing?
That’s a leap. Isn’t it?

She had no real reason to believe Tamara was anywhere but in the middle of a too-relaxed-to-answer-the-phone spa day. Except she
had
answered the phone, Meredith reminded herself. And she’d asked for help. Not typically needed for a pedicure.

She stopped short in her jog as a sudden, dark sense of foreboding shook her, sending a shiver up her spine. The terrible sensation grew even worse when she looked around and realized her haphazard flight had taken her from her own slightly rough neighborhood to the edge of an area that was downright seedy.

The run-down buildings that lined the street and the litter-crowded sidewalk between them made her wish she’d taken her chances with Sam and his questionable motives. Instead, she was sweaty and tired and stuck with no ID, no cash and no phone.

And no choice to do anything but go home.

She’d be lucky if the blue-eyed man turned over any of her stuff without a fight. She could easily picture him handing over each item, piece by piece, in exchange for whatever it was he felt like asking.

If he’d even bothered to stick around.

As Meredith resigned herself to the fact that she didn’t have another option and turned to head back, she spotted a navy sedan. It was on the next street over, but she could see it perfectly through the sparse trees, and something about it gave her pause. Maybe its general out-of-place-ness.

Maybe it’s Sam. And your purse.

She cut across the road to the median, then took five steps toward the car before she got a good view of the driver. It wasn’t Sam at all. It was a redheaded man with a cigarette hanging from one corner of his thin lips. And if Meredith had felt a chill before, it was nothing compared to what she experienced now. There was something deeply disturbing about the way his gaze fixed on her, and if he cared at all that she was staring back at him, he didn’t show it.

He kept his eyes on her, butted his cigarette against the dash, then tossed it out the barely cracked window. She swallowed nervously and took a step backward.

The sedan inched forward.

Uh-oh.

Another step, another few inches.

Whoever he was, he was going to round the curb and come at her.

You need to run!

The urgent internal suggestion was different than the one that made her choose to avoid Sam. This one was pure fear.

But when Meredith turned to go back up the street she’d just come from, she spotted a small group of men at the end of the road, and the paranoid part of her brain was sure that every one of them looked as dangerous as the driver in the car.

Meredith spun back again. The sedan had reached the curved part of the median now, and the driver’s head had turned sideways as he worked to keep her in view.

Run!

This time, the suggestion came as a scream. And Meredith had no choice but to obey.

She slammed down one foot in front of the other, but made it only a half a block before an old, rusted-out truck came flying down the wrong side of the road and screeched to a stop in front of her. The driver’s-side door squeaked open and a masculine hand dropped out at eye level.

Meredith knew without even looking who was attached to that hand.

“Get in!” Sam barked.

“Wh—”

“Now!”

Meredith took a breath, placed her hand in his and let herself be yanked straight into Sam’s lap.

* * *

Sam gritted his teeth.

He seemed to be doing that a lot since meeting Meredith Jamison.

Right that second, it seemed impossible to do anything else. He tried to unclench his jaw and failed.

When she’d stomped on his foot, he’d chased after her for all of ten feet before realizing he didn’t stand a chance of catching up. Not in a neighborhood she knew and he didn’t, and not with the ache in his toes.

He’d limped back to his Bronco, irritated as all hell, and tried to come up with a plan. He’d barely made it into the driver’s seat before the navy sedan whipped by. He didn’t question why he knew it, or even stop to ask himself
how
the man in the car was tracking her, but he was one-hundred-percent sure following that sedan would lead him to Meredith. His gut told him it was true, and his gut was rarely wrong. This time was no exception.

Minutes after his careful pursuit of the car started, he spotted Meredith. And as the ginger-haired driver started toward her, Sam’s gut hadn’t been content to just be right. It had pushed him to intervene. Quickly.

Now Meredith was lying flat across his lap, her rear end stuck under the steering wheel, her chest pressed against the outer edge of his thigh and her legs still dangling out the door as he attempted to make a getaway. As awkward as the position was, she still felt good pushed into him like that. Very good.

Sam put the truck into Reverse and pressed the gas pedal as hard as he dared and
gritted his damned teeth
. He spun the wheel—ignoring the little yelp from Meredith as it raked over her backside—and repositioned his vehicle so it faced in the right direction.

Then he heard the squeal of rubber on asphalt, and his teeth were forgotten as he glanced in the rearview mirror. The sedan picked up speed on the other side of the median, the driver struggling to beat him to the curve ahead.

Let him beat me. Then I can give him a little of what he deserves. See if his car can handle being slammed into by the Bronco.

The vicious thought struck Sam by surprise. Typically, he avoided confrontation. He’d fight if he was backed into a corner, but violence was a defensive, last-minute maneuver.

He just wanted the wannabe stalker to pay for... For what? Chasing down some girl he barely knew—
less
than barely knew—and scaring her? Because he thought she was
pretty
?

Yeah, maybe,
Sam admitted.

Annoyed at himself, he slammed down on the brakes and came to a full stop.

“What are you doing?” Meredith’s voice was breathless and muffled by the truck seat.

More teeth-gritting. “You’re seriously questioning me
now
?”

“You stopped.”

“For a good reason.”

Sam put his hands on Meredith’s hips and pulled her up, then shoved her sideways, forcing her to the passenger seat. She flailed for a second before righting herself and shooting him a dirty look.

“You might want to put on your seat belt,” Sam offered before she could speak.

He yanked his door shut and did a cursory shoulder check. The sedan had rounded the median completely now. In the not-too-far distance a siren roared to life, and Sam knew someone had called the police.

Super.

He had no interest in explaining himself to the local PD.

With a silent growl and another glance in his rearview, he hit the gas. He spun the wheel and took the Bronco up and over the median. The abrupt move sent Meredith skidding across the seat and back into Sam’s lap.

Well, I
did
tell her to buckle up.

With another pull on the wheel, Sam turned the truck on a diagonal across the road.

“Brace yourself,” he said.

Meredith’s face filled with panic, and at last she clicked the seat belt into place. Just in time. Sam accelerated again. His Bronco flew along the pavement, careened over a lawn and turned. He revved the engine and kept going. Up one street, down another, looking in the rearview every few seconds. So far, the sedan hadn’t caught up. The sirens, though, were getting closer.

Maybe they’d scared off the redheaded driver.

Hopefully.

Sam took the Bronco up another street and scanned for a place to hide the vehicle. He spied a narrow alleyway behind them.

Good enough.

He shifted to Reverse, but Meredith’s soft hand landed on his wrist. The contact made his pulse jump even higher than the increasingly loud sirens. It also made him pause. Which, judging by her next statement, was her intention.

“Not that alley.”

“No time to be choosy, sweetheart.”

Meredith rolled her eyes and released his arm to point at a sign. “It’s a dead end. We’ll get stuck.”

“Fine. A
little
time to be choosy.” Sam put the truck back into Drive and sped past the next two buildings, then stopped in front of another alley. “This one meet your needs?”

“
Our
needs,” she amended. “Unless you suddenly stopped wanting to get away from that creep. And yes. It’ll work. Sweetheart.”

Sam fought an unexpected grin as he made the turn, pulled the truck out of street view and cut the engine. He closed his eyes for one second, but before he could take a single, calming breath, he heard the telltale squeak of one of his rusty doors.

Seriously?

His eyes flew open just as Meredith’s door slammed into the building beside them. She sent a guilty look his way, then slipped toward the narrow opening.

Sam smacked open his seat belt and reached out a hand, which found purchase in the waistband of Meredith’s jeans. She pulled forward, exposing skin and lace. Sam pulled and his knuckles brushed both. With the contact, a jolt of heat shot up his arm, and he let go, startled by the force of it.