Page 89 of Betrayed

“Do you want to take my Highlander?” she had offered, as Mari stalled halfway down the inclined drive, rolling several feet when she hit the clutch instead of the brake. When she had finally stopped, both pedals practically imbedded in the floorboard, Lexie approached her window and tried again. “Mari, hon, I can drive the Mercedes until one of the guys heads back to Houston, or until Arturo can come to get his car.”

“No.” She waved, sounding a lot more confident than she was, but she was determined to do this. “I’ve got it figured out,” she assured her through gritted teeth.

After several greenhorn starts, she made it out of Lexie and Jonas’ sprawling sub-division and thirty minutes later, reached the four-lane highway in one piece. But with her arrival in Houston, she faced the same gear-shifting challenges—seriously, who needed seven gears?—and was never happier to see the drab backside of her shop.

Once parked, with the engine off, she closed her eyes, breathing deep and slow, taking a moment of Zen. But only one, since it was almost time to open.

Mari gathered her purse, tucking the canary-yellow copy of her lesson in metric conversions deep inside then opened her door. She was immediately treated to a whiff of something hot or burning. Leaning toward the hood, she sniffed then groaned as the odor got stronger.

“Fan-freakin’-tastic,” she grumbled. “If I’ve burned up his clutch, that’s even more fuel for the fire, which will undoubtedly be applied to my butt.”

She slammed the door and bit her lip, circling the expensive car for smoke or other visible signs of damage. Finding none, she decided whatever she’d done couldn’t get worse while parked, and started for her shop, every other step stopping to tug at the hem of her too-snug borrowed skirt that kept riding up everywhere.

It had been a decade since she’d worn a denim skirt, let alone one so short, her dress last night being club wear and an exception, not to mention worn deliberately to tick Arturo off knowing word would get back to him. That he’d seen it was a surprise, and she suspected part of the reason for his passionate reaction. But unprepared to stay the night left her selection of clothes that morning limited. Lexie was a couple of inches taller and model-slender, so she hadn’t a prayer of squeezing into the younger woman’s jeans, not with her mother-of-two hips.

In hindsight, maybe she should have opted for sweats, but in either case, she wouldn’t have to suffer them much longer with a shop of size and age-appropriate clothes at her disposal. She hurried toward the back door, glad for the early hour and lack of other cars in the lot. Doing the walk of shame in her dress from yesterday would only inspire talk among her shop neighbors, worse if one of her gossipy customers saw her. Word would spread so fast, whether by calls, texts or social media, they would undoubtedly overload the cell phone towers, melt servers far and wide, and likely crash Facebook for good.

At the rear door, as she dug in her purse for her keys, a nagging feeling made her wary, and she glanced around.

Adri’s car wasn’t there, not that she wanted any more awkward conversations with the traitorous woman, but it was inching up on opening time and she ordinarily would have been there hours ago.

The nagging worry got worse. Something wasn’t right.

She glanced up at the security camera, a little reassured, but she’d feel better if she spoke to someone. With keys in hand, she dug back into her purse for her phone. She needed a quick check-in with Arturo before heading inside, just in case.

Mari powered on her phone. She’d turned it off deliberately to save the 10% remaining battery power. Again, not expecting an overnight stay, her charger was at home and Lexie didn’t have one that matched her phone. So, to conserve battery power for emergencies on the road, she shut it off.

As soon as it rebooted, it started buzzing and dinging with all sorts of alerts. There were three missed calls from Arturo, two from Lexie, and one from Jonas, as well as a slew of texts. She checked the most recent one first.

Arturo:Why aren’t you answering your phone, dammit?Major developments. Go directly to the hotel. Absolutely no stops. Call me when you get there.

Uh-oh.

“Marilee Hoffman?”

She spun around to face the owner of the deep British accent. Fifty-ish, handsome, and huge, she hadn’t heard him approach. Several inches taller than Arturo, and thicker, he needed no padding to fill out the shoulders of the suit coat he wore, which looked like it was custom made to fit.

She preferred Arturo’s less obvious power and strength, but a man like this would turn heads. She couldn’t make out his eyes behind the dark shades he was wearing, but he had a friendly smile.

“I’m sorry. Have we’ve met?”

“I was an associate of your late husband.”

“Oh?” That put her on instant alert. If he worked at BSE, maybe he was after Derek’s intel as well. Arturo’s warning of major developments set off alarm bells in her head, as did “absolutely no stops.” Her phone went off, ringing and vibrating in her hand.

“Durand, most likely,” he commented. His chin dipped down, and although she couldn’t be sure with the dark shades, she knew he was making a slow assessment of her body, especially her bare legs almost the entire length of which were exposed in her borrowed skirt. The bad feeling worsened, and she took a step back.

“You know Arturo?”

His grin turned from friendly to malicious. “Oh, yeah. Me and Artie, go way back.”

The sneer in his voice told her they definitely weren’t friends. By now, the alarm bells were deafening. She turned to run, but he grabbed her arm and relieved her of her still-ringing phone.

Her purse strap slid off her shoulder and her big bag landed with a clunk on the ground. Without its protection, what little it offered, he stared at her breasts in Lexie’s too-snug T-shirt. “Durand always had good taste in pussy.”

She flinched, twisting her arm to get free. Surprisingly, he released her, but his other paw-like hand came out and curled around her throat as he pushed her hard against the outside wall of her shop.

“Don’t even think about running,” he threatened as he brushed aside his sport coat to expose a gun tucked into his belt.

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