Blamed Read Online Free Page A
Book: Blamed Read Online Free
Author: Edie Harris
the ventilation was absent. Beth frowned, noticing for the first time that it was definitely cold in here, the uncomfortable kind of cold that meant the furnace had been turned off for an extended vacation, the owner returning from balmy Tahiti to a meat locker instead of a living room. Except she doubted this particular owner was currently taking vacay on a tropical island.
Three bullet casings in the corner snagged her attention, indicating the shooter had been hiding behind the piano. Whoever it had been hadn’t bothered to bus the scene, which meant—
Which meant the shooter either didn’t care about getting caught...or was still here.
That was when she saw the blood. A trio of droplets marred the hardwood floor, leading away from the piano. More red appeared in the massive kitchen, and she flowed silently past the marble countertops, rich wood cabinetry, and huge appliances.
Overcompensating much?
She let herself smile as she passed the laundry room and half-bath. It would be absolutely karmic if a guy as gorgeous as the one living here packed a peanut beneath his belt.
The hall split off into two rooms, one of which appeared to be an empty office. To her left, opposite a linen closet, was the partially closed door to what looked like the master bedroom, and from deep within, she heard the first noises since entering: the steady
drip-drip-drip
of a faucet not turned all the way off.
Blood marked the door.
Dread curdled her stomach as she inched inside, noting the wide-open balcony as she cleared the room. With the muzzle of her gun leading the way, she skirted the armoire and entered the attached bathroom. The dripping grew louder, angrier, more ominous, and the Beretta shook in her hands. Chest tight, lungs pumping, she stared at the closed shower curtain circling the elegant claw-foot tub. At the streaks of blood on white fabric.
Oh,
hell
no. She’d seen Hitchcock movies—she knew how this shit went down. If anyone was still in the apartment, process of elimination said that person was behind the bloodstained shower curtain.
Options, she needed options. The Beth of one year ago would have already mentally articulated half a dozen actions and outcomes, but the Beth of one year ago had gone to ground, and for very good reasons. This Beth, the Beth with shaking hands and choppy breathing, was more than out of shape physically—she was out of shape psychologically, as well. She wasn’t made for danger and intrigue any longer.
Damn it. She should have let Mark feed her dessert tonight.
The infamous Faraday nerves of steel having long since deserted her, Beth made her decision and prayed it was the right one. If not, she’d be dead, and that would piss Tobias off like nothing else: flying halfway across the world for nothing.
She shifted the gun to her left hand and exhaled. Knowing she’d only have a split second in which anyone in the tub would be surprised and blinded, Beth smacked the light switch on the wall before lunging forward to fling back the shower curtain.
And came face-to-face with the business end of a nine-millimeter Ruger.
Her man was sprawled in the tub, pale-faced and bleeding from a gunshot wound in his side, but his aim was confident, his arm steady. “Neighbor,” he drawled casually, but there was a hard glint in his ice-blue eyes.
Beth had almost had herself convinced, before this very moment, that the man on whom she trained her gun
wasn’t
a spy. She’d almost believed that those little zings down her spine whenever they’d nodded a greeting to one another had been basic attraction, not like recognizing like. Perhaps the quirked half-smiles when they ran into one another at the Starbucks two blocks over weren’t because Beth had caught him following her, but merely because they were in the same place at the same time,
again.
Maybe when he had come into the Institute gift shop to buy the print of the painting that even now hung haphazardly in his living room...maybe it had
Three bullet casings in the corner snagged her attention, indicating the shooter had been hiding behind the piano. Whoever it had been hadn’t bothered to bus the scene, which meant—
Which meant the shooter either didn’t care about getting caught...or was still here.
That was when she saw the blood. A trio of droplets marred the hardwood floor, leading away from the piano. More red appeared in the massive kitchen, and she flowed silently past the marble countertops, rich wood cabinetry, and huge appliances.
Overcompensating much?
She let herself smile as she passed the laundry room and half-bath. It would be absolutely karmic if a guy as gorgeous as the one living here packed a peanut beneath his belt.
The hall split off into two rooms, one of which appeared to be an empty office. To her left, opposite a linen closet, was the partially closed door to what looked like the master bedroom, and from deep within, she heard the first noises since entering: the steady
drip-drip-drip
of a faucet not turned all the way off.
Blood marked the door.
Dread curdled her stomach as she inched inside, noting the wide-open balcony as she cleared the room. With the muzzle of her gun leading the way, she skirted the armoire and entered the attached bathroom. The dripping grew louder, angrier, more ominous, and the Beretta shook in her hands. Chest tight, lungs pumping, she stared at the closed shower curtain circling the elegant claw-foot tub. At the streaks of blood on white fabric.
Oh,
hell
no. She’d seen Hitchcock movies—she knew how this shit went down. If anyone was still in the apartment, process of elimination said that person was behind the bloodstained shower curtain.
Options, she needed options. The Beth of one year ago would have already mentally articulated half a dozen actions and outcomes, but the Beth of one year ago had gone to ground, and for very good reasons. This Beth, the Beth with shaking hands and choppy breathing, was more than out of shape physically—she was out of shape psychologically, as well. She wasn’t made for danger and intrigue any longer.
Damn it. She should have let Mark feed her dessert tonight.
The infamous Faraday nerves of steel having long since deserted her, Beth made her decision and prayed it was the right one. If not, she’d be dead, and that would piss Tobias off like nothing else: flying halfway across the world for nothing.
She shifted the gun to her left hand and exhaled. Knowing she’d only have a split second in which anyone in the tub would be surprised and blinded, Beth smacked the light switch on the wall before lunging forward to fling back the shower curtain.
And came face-to-face with the business end of a nine-millimeter Ruger.
Her man was sprawled in the tub, pale-faced and bleeding from a gunshot wound in his side, but his aim was confident, his arm steady. “Neighbor,” he drawled casually, but there was a hard glint in his ice-blue eyes.
Beth had almost had herself convinced, before this very moment, that the man on whom she trained her gun
wasn’t
a spy. She’d almost believed that those little zings down her spine whenever they’d nodded a greeting to one another had been basic attraction, not like recognizing like. Perhaps the quirked half-smiles when they ran into one another at the Starbucks two blocks over weren’t because Beth had caught him following her, but merely because they were in the same place at the same time,
again.
Maybe when he had come into the Institute gift shop to buy the print of the painting that even now hung haphazardly in his living room...maybe it had