She tried to push York away, but he wasn’t moving.
“Sorry, but there’s a shooter out there.”
“My brother is shot!”
“I’m fine, RJ—”
“Get off me, York.”
But he couldn’t move, suddenly paralyzed by the fact that—well, that this—this was his life. He’d moved with instincts, not a shade of fear as he leaped for Slava. Not a shade of fear and every intent on killing the man.
Murder in his heart.
Jethro was wrong. Violence wasn’t just a moment but was embedded inside him.
With that thought, York practically jerked away from RJ. She scrambled over to Tate, who had crawled behind the bar.
“York, get some towels!”
He ran to Tate’s bedroom and pulled a couple towels from the bath. Returned with them to the bar.
RJ ripped the arm from Tate’s shirt. A ragged tear scraped across his arm.
“I’m fine.”
“You need stitches,” she snapped.
Tate looked at York, a quick shake to his head. Stitches meant a hospital which meant questions which probably meant a gunshot reporting. And then there was the dead body in their suite.
Not the first he’d left in a hotel room. “Let’s get out of here,” York said. “RJ, I’ll get your stuff.”
She hadn’t yet unpacked, her bag open, and he had it zipped shut in moments. Tate just had a backpack, and he grabbed that too.
RJ had wrapped a towel around his arm, and now Tate pulled his suit coat over his shoulders to hide it. “Are you sure we should leave?”
“Yes,” Tate and York said, almost simultaneously.
Then Tate added, “We’ll call Vicktor and have him contact the police here. And give him our contact info. But I’m worried there’s a shooter out there waiting for a clean shot.”
York’s thought exactly.
They took the stairs down, all fifteen flights, and York grabbed Tate’s good arm the last few, just in case he decided to take a header.
York drove them in the rental to a motel outside the city limits, something small, with an inner courtyard that overlooked a peanut-shaped pool. Something he could pay cash for and sneak Tate into.
York settled Tate onto one of the double beds of their adjoining rooms and took a look at his wound. “I’ll go to a drugstore and get some antiseptic, topical antibiotic, and superglue. Maybe a bandage so you don’t wreck any more shirts, okay?”
Tate nodded. RJ pinched her mouth tight. But as he got up to go to the door, she came after him. And in a voice that wound around his heart asked, “Are you coming back?”
Frankly, she probably read him better than he had himself, because suddenly he wanted to say no. That now that Slava was dead, he planned on skipping out on them and leaving this life far behind.
But her beautiful eyes found his, and maybe the man Tate had described wasn’t gone. He knew the happy ending was worth fighting for.
Or maybe he’d simply merged with the one he wanted to be.
The one who had a taste of redemption, of hope.
“I’ll be back. I promise.”
Tate’s pride hurt more than his arm.
Although, in truth, his entire body burned every time he moved his arm—funny how something so superficial could burn through to his bones.
Or maybe it was more about the fact that he’d turned down Glo’s calls, twice now. Once last night, right before he’d taken off to Vegas, and one today, while York was patching him up.
She hadn’t left a voicemail either.
Tate had to call her back with something that resembled a good reason for declining her calls, probably right after he finished his current call with Vicktor.
RJ closed the motel room door behind her, carrying a cold can of grape soda from the machine down the corridor. She popped the tab and set it on the bedside table between the two double beds, pushing away the box of pizza, now closed, as she sat on the opposite bed.
He put his finger to his lips—pointed to the call, on speaker.
“According to my contact, they’ve already picked up the body and it’s heading to the coroner. I’ve asked him to keep me in the loop when ballistics comes back,” Vicktor said.
“It could be the same guy who killed Kobie at the wharf in Seattle.” Tate reached for the soda with his good arm.
“Your Russian friend Gustov.”
“How did he know where we were? And why did he kill Slava?”
“Maybe he missed.”
Right then, Tate knew he should take the cop off speaker. But his hand was holding the soda and the other arm was bandaged and useless and he wasn’t fast enough—
“Maybe he was aiming at you.”
RJ’s eyes widened.
Shoot. Tate made a face, shook his head as he met her eyes and spoke into the phone. “We don’t know that. And if he is, then he’s a terrible shot—”
“But you’re the only constant in both events.”
Except, and he hated to say it, but, “And York. He was there too.”
RJ caught her lower lip between her teeth.
York had gone outside after returning to bandage Tate up. He’d done a decent job, his hands practiced as he glued the wound’s edges together, added antibiotic ointment, and covered it with a bandage.
But York hadn’t even looked at RJ when he left, and Tate wasn’t entirely sure he was coming back. The man seemed particularly silent, almost broody as he’d driven them to the semi-seedy motel with lime-green walls, ancient carpet, and a painted fish over the beds.
If Tate was going to die, he would have preferred the presidential suite, but York was probably right to move them and lie low.
“Yes, right,” Vicktor said, agreeing that York might be a target. “Clearly Slava and whoever he’s working for know that York’s alive. But his position on the wharf was a considerable distance from Kobie’s. You were the closest probable target. Especially given your other run-in with Slava and the Russian mob six months ago.”
Thank you for that, Vicktor.
RJ got up and began to pace, her hands wrapped around her waist.
“If you give me the number of the detective, we’ll give our statements tomorrow,” Tate said.
“I’ll text it to you, but he’s already expecting you.”
Tate paused, then, “And I’m just confirming this, but Slava really is dead, right? No more sudden appearances in hotel rooms?”
“Yes. Chest shot, through the heart.”
Tate didn’t want to cheer, but maybe he could stop looking over his shoulder for the shadow of the Russian mob. Except, “Only problem is, there goes our connection to Sloan. We can’t question a dead man.”
“I’ll keep looking. Hang tight. I’ll be in touch,” Vicktor said and hung up.
Tate set his soda can down. Picked up his phone. Blew out a breath.
“And that’s the look of a man who knows he’s in trouble,” RJ said. “I don’t need to be an analyst to figure that out.”
“Glo called. Twice.”
“Oh.”
“She doesn’t know I went after Slava.”
RJ raised an eyebrow.
“I just thought…well, the less she knew, the better. But when she hears I got shot—”