His hands were outstretched, his arms wide as he moved in to give me a hug, but before he could, before he could even try to air kiss me, Aidan stepped right in front of me, and asked, "Who the hell are you?"
Stewart frowned like he didn’t understand the question.
I had to smile because we’d played a large role in a massive chunk of New York’s breakfasts together, and Aidan also owned a part of TVGM so there was no way in hell he didn’t know exactly who Stewart was. It was a power play. God, that sent shivers down my spine.
I didn’t mind him being a possessive asshole, not when it meant I didn’t have to endure a hug from my creep ex-co-worker.
Resting a hand on the center of his back, I peered around him to ask, "Stewart, long time no see."
"You know how it goes, Savannah. The news never stops. Seeing as you’re front and center of it right now, I guess you’d know that more than me." He beamed at me like he was on some kind of deranged happy pills. "I know the station’s been trying to get in touch with you."
"I’m well aware, Stewart. I have no desire to talk to the people who fired me for raising awareness about the toxic workplace that TVGM has been for the last few years." I made sure I didn’t lower my voice, and because people were listening in, the hush that fell at that moment was classic. As was how Stewart’s face fell. "I won’t be selling my story to TVGM any time soon, and if you think you can try and hoodwink me, well..." I leaned around Aidan and pressed a hand to Stewart’s chest before I gently patted him there. "...you and I both know we never had that type of friendship. Now, I hope you enjoy your meal, but you can tell TVGM from me that they can go straight to hell."
I strode off, aware that Aidan was at my back, and the doors opened wide like they were being pulled open by magic as I stalked through them.
The maître d’ looked like he was going to bow, but if he did, I didn’t notice, I was too busy storming into the private elevator. I turned around when I felt it dip slightly, and seeing Aidan pull out a pass and swipe it, I watched as the doors closed, and relaxed at once.
"I didn’t expect to see him tonight," I grumbled.
"No love lost between you, was there?"
There was a faint growl to his voice, and it was second nature to reach for his hand and to slide my fingers through his. "He never said or did anything to agitate me."
"A miracle in itself," Aidan half-mocked, making me grin up at him.
"He was just a creep. That’s all."
"That’s enough."
I shrugged. "It wasn’t that bad that you need to repeat whatever you did to my guards… You did beat them up, right?"
"Their incompetence almost cost you your life." He arched a brow at me. "What do you think?"
"And Wintersen…" I eyed him beneath my lashes. "What did you do to him?"
"Culpable deniability. I know you’ve heard of—" Before he could finish that sentence, the elevator jerked to a halt.
"Oh, great," I growled, sure that it was a power shortage or something.
Then, the lights cut out, before they flickered on again and the elevator car rattled once more, jolting us both. Aidan let out a gasp of pain which told me he’d rocked back on his bad leg.
Before I could even screech that this was weird, and I’d been in a broken-down elevator many times—this was New York, after all—it dropped.
Literally dropped.
Heart in my ears, I fell back against the corner, hands coming up to cup the wall, flattening them there. The glass was slick beneath my palms thanks to the perspiration beading my skin. My reaction was as instantaneous as the breakdown of this fucking machine.
"Aidan," I screamed when the damn thing jerked to a stop.
"It’s okay, little one," he thundered, sounding anything but okay as he fell back against the corner before sliding across to me.
His arm tunneled around my waist and he hauled me into him as the elevator car rocked once more. With his other hand, he dragged his cellphone out of his jacket pocket, pushed the button on the side, then hollered at Siri, "Call Conor!"
His arm tightened around me as the mechanics beneath us made a groaning sound that was like nothing I’d ever heard in my life, a sound that I never wanted to hear again, a noise that would haunt me for the rest of my life if I even lived that long.
My mind flashed back to Emilio Estévez at the beginning of Mission Impossible, all the while I tried to tell myself it was like that fucking ride at Disney World. The one where your stomach felt as if it were falling through your body as you were plummeted tens of floors at a time before being dragged up the tower again.
This time, when it dropped, I screamed. It was squeezed out of me by gravity, like I was an overripe orange in need of juicing.
The lights flashed on, then off, and Aidan’s arm tightened around me before he let go, and twisted around so he was facing the door. I could feel his heat, so intense, such a forceful amount of energy as if—
God.
I felt the protection coming from him.
I felt the way he pushed me into the corner, shielding me with his body.
Oh, God.
He thought we were going to die, but not by this elevator crashing.
He thought it was going to be stormed.
Tears prickled my eyes as the car came to a juddering halt, and then Conor hollered, "I’m on it!"
"Are we going to be boarded?" Aidan snarled, his ass shoving me deeper into the corner as if by squeezing me, he could make me a smaller target.
As grateful as I was, my terror soared.
What if he was hit?
What if he was shot again?
I sobbed, unashamed to be dealing with my terror at that moment, needing simply to let it flood out of me as I shoved my forehead between his shoulders.
I’d have called myself a pussy, but two murder attempts in less than forty-eight hours was just too much for me.
I pressed my arms around his waist, holding him close, needing his solid strength, his staunch resolve.
Aidan wasn’t scared.
He was in fight mode.
He was angry.
Hell, that was an understatement.
He was fucking FURIOUS.
He throbbed with it as Conor snapped, "I don’t have time to talk."
Over the thunderous beat of my heart in my ears, I could hear the pounding of his fingers against the keyboard.
When there was another groan, a creaking snarl from the mechanics beneath us, I tensed, preparing myself for that horrendous feeling of the floor being stolen out from under us, and then, out of nowhere, there was a whining, screeching noise and the entire mechanism shuddered like we were in the middle of an earthquake.
Except, we were fifty stories up.
Maybe less, considering I had no idea how far we’d fallen.
The jarring halt had Aidan releasing another snarl and I grabbed a hold of him, trying to steady him so his bad knee didn’t take as much of a hit, but it was no use.
The lights flickered, before they flashed off permanently. The elevator made a whining sound, the floor beneath us released another creak, and then there was silence. Aside from my harsh exhalations and his.
"Conor? Talk to me!" he demanded, calmer this time, which told me he thought the danger was under control for the moment.