Page 3 of Assassin's Heart
I’d gone still without meaning to—shock had a way of doing that. It allowed Remi to get a better grip on me, to drag me back from Lydia’s body. And it was a body; I could see that now, see what my heart hadn’t wanted to accept when I’d stepped into the room. None of the spirit that had made the woman a perfect partner in raising Brooke was present in the limp flesh lying on the floor. The angle of her head told the nurse in me that her neck was broken, likely from a fall against the secondhand dresser I’d found in a consignment shop—old, heavy.
My mind understood what it was seeing, but my heart… God, my heart hurt so much.
Where was Brooke? If something had happened to her in the fight, she’d be here, right? They wouldn’t have taken her body…
The thought of my six-year-old asa bodysent a sob into the hand over my mouth. Remi’s arms gentled, molding me almost tenderly to that immovable chest despite the fact that he didn’t let me go. That softness was nearly as dangerous as the force he’d used to begin with. Dangerous enough to break me.
I jerked my legs, the only part of me that was free, off the ground and kicked them back, bending my knees sharply. The toes of my shoes barely brushed his crotch before Remi spun me toward the blank wall beside the dresser. My face planted against the pale yellow paint, I struggled to breathe with the full weight of two hundred and fifty pounds of sheer muscle pressing me forward. A hard thigh slid between mine—
“For your protection and mine, Leah,” he said.
But the rough, raw quality to his words and the surge of pleasure between my legs told another story.
I beat my forehead against the wall, and the pleasure faded. This wasn’t the man I’d fantasized about in the bed across the room. This wasn’t a romantic…whatever my libido was trying to imagine it was. Lydia was dead. Brooke was missing. It was sick to be thinking about anything else right now.
“I’m going to move my hand so you can talk, okay?” Remi said in my ear. He sounded strong, in control. Resentment sparked in my stomach, burning hot. I’d been under men’s control before, and it never worked out well for me. But tonight I had to think about Brooke.
I nodded.
Remi removed his hand, his fingers sliding across lips, cheek, jaw, and coming to rest around my throat. Only slightly less threatening than before. I opened my mouth to point that out.
“Be careful,” he warned me. “Be very careful, Leah.”
So maybe not as in control as I’d thought. I had to swallow hard against the fear threatening to steal my voice. “Why?”
“Because I want to help you.” He shifted behind me, and a heavy length pushing at the base of my spine flared into my awareness. “I can’t to do that if you keep making trouble.”
His words distracted me from his erection. “Why would you want to help me? Why are you even here?” I sucked in a deep, sudden breath, so sudden I choked. “You’re a part of this, is that it? They left you here to confront me?” I jerked uselessly against his weight. “Where is my daughter?”
I felt more than saw his head shake. “I don’t know where Brooke is. I’m not a part of this.”
I attempted to throw a look over my shoulder, but the way he held me left no room to maneuver. “Why else would you be here?”
Remi took a deep breath, the expansion of his chest cutting off my air. On the exhale he eased back. “I’m not part of this. I can help you.”
“You keep saying that.” I peeled myself from the wall and turned just as carefully as he’d moved. “I’m not hearing another explanation.”
Remi stood a few feet back, his arms locked over his chest, expression unreadable. This wasn’t the man from my fantasies, the gruff but tender man I’d known for such a short time when he’d been injured. This man was hard. Cold. Dangerous.
I reached for my cell in my back pocket.
Remi watched, his gaze showing zero satisfaction when I found my pocket empty. He held up a hand—and my cell phone.
I reached for it. “I need to call the police, Remi.”
He shook his head, keeping the phone just out of my reach. “She is beyond needing an ambulance and you know it,” he said, jerking his chin toward Lydia. “The red tape cops would bring with them will only make it harder to find Brooke.”
I forced my breath to stay even, my body still as my child’s name left his lips. I hadn’t spoken it aloud; I knew that. But Remi... “The only way you’d know her name was if you were involved. If you’re not, give me the phone.”
“I’m not involved.”
“Then give me my phone. Now.”
He slid the small black rectangle into his pocket. I lunged for it.
The next thing I knew, my hands were gripped in one of his and my jaw was in the other. He dragged me onto my tiptoes until I was almost level with him. “I’m not involved with whatever happened here,” he bit out. “I promise.”
I kneed him in the groin. Or tried to. Remi was prepared for everything, it seemed.
