Never Trust A Lady

It was as Tom had said-she could run that fast. Imagine-at her age!

“Why don’t you let me cany that damn bag?” Tom asked in a bumpy voice as he ran, matching his stride now with hers. He no longer had the briefcase, she noticed. He’d also ditched the baseball cap and sunglasses.

“No way, you can run faster than I can.”

He grunted, glanced her way and then ran for several paces in silence before growling, “You think I’d take the damn painting and leave you to Campbell, is that it? What the hell kind of guy do you think I am?”

“I don’t know,” Jane managed to say. “That’s pretty much…the problem.” She ran a few more steps. “I think… you owe me…an explanation.”

“Yeah, well, this is hardly the time or place for it. Look who’s got his legs back.”

One brief, wild glance over her shoulder confirmed it: Campbell had just turned into the narrow residential street behind them, running hard. “Oh, God,” she moaned. Her chest was on fire and she was developing a side ache. “He’s gaining on us, isn’t he?”

Her companion didn’t answer that but instead veered suddenly, yanking her after him as he dodged between two parked cars. She gave a horrified squeak as they narrowly missed a collision with a bicyclist, skittered on across the street with her heart in her throat and almost tripped over Tom’s heels when he ducked into an even narrower cross street. She was following blindly now.

Hawk had had a reason for choosing this particular street He’d spotted a moving van parked about halfway down the block, facing out, taking up most of the pavement. He could see that the doors on the side facing the sidewalk were open, and that the interior of the van was all but filled with boxes and indeterminate shapes shrouded in packing blankets. And also that no one was in sight.

A quick look over his shoulder told him Campbell hadn’t made the turn into this street yet, although he couldn’t be far from it, and had surely seen them do so. And Jane was tiring; she couldn’t keep this up much longer. It wasn’t a hard decision to make.

“In here.” Jerking Jane up beside him, he pushed her ahead of him into the van.

There wasn’t much room; the van seemed to be fully loaded, though whether going or coming he had no way of knowing. After wasting precious seconds in search of a nook or cranny big enough to hide them both, he shoved Jane down into a space between a washer and dryer and what appeared to be an upright piano wrapped in blankets. He then squeezed in after her as best he could, pulling a blanket over the part of him that didn’t quite fit.

And not a moment too soon. In the sudden breathy stillness, he could hear the sound of footsteps slapping on the pavement outside the van.

“Not a sound,” he hissed. And then there was silence, so heavy it seemed to thunder with the beat of his heart.

It was stifling under the blanket. The footsteps grew louder, scraping past, finally, only inches from their hiding place. They receded, but only a short distance, then stopped…hesitated… scuffled around first one way, then another. And then came back.

Hawk uttered a very nasty word under his breath. Feeling Jane’s body jerk slightly-whether because of the language he’d used or the gravity of their situation, he couldn’t be sure-he reached out a hand to touch her, to steady and caution her, while with the other he found the comforting shape of the gun nestled in the small of his back. Braced and ready, he waited.

The footsteps drew nearer…and nearer. Slowly this time. In his mind’s eye, Hawk could see his adversary, see the suspicion in his face, feel the tension in his body as, so cautiously, so carefully, he advanced, knowing his prey was cornered, but suspicious, too, of traps and ambushes. He could see him in the doorway, now, every nerve, every muscle vibrating, his own breath suspended… One foot, now, on the floor of the van-he could feel it give a little with the weight…then-

Suddenly, just like that, he was gone. In the distance, Hawk heard voices, low and casual, bantering voices. The movers were returning.

He let his gun hand relax and with the other, the one still touching Jane, gave her a couple of reassuring strokes and encouraging pats.

But relief was short-lived. He barely had time to register it in his consciousness before a new series of sounds elevated the short hairs on the back of his neck and sent a fresh shot of adrenaline into his system. First, a loud and prolonged squeak, metal on metal…then a reverberating clang…and another…and then a sliding thunk. And finally…dead silence.

“Uh-oh,” said Hawk, and muttered that word again.

“They’ve shut us in,” said Jane, her voice small and air-starved.

Hawk drew his head out from under the blanket and into total darkness…“Yep,” he grunted. “Looks that way.”

“Sh-shouldn’t we do something? Yell, or bang on the door?”

“Yeah, and then what? They let us out, listen to our explanation-you’ ve got one, I suppose?-and assuming they buy it, drive off and leave us here? Campbell’s still out there, you know. He won’t have gone far. He knows we have to be here somewhere.”

Just then, there was a belly-deep roar, like a growl from the throat of some gigantic beast, and then a low, continuous rumbling. Under their hands and knees the floor of the van had begun to vibrate.

“Oh dear,” said Jane. There was a pause, and then a surprisingly meek and tremulous. “So, what do we do now?”

“Hope and pray it’s not a long-distance move, I guess.”

There was another pause during which the van lurched from one side to the other, but in an almost stately manner that reminded Hawk of a very large and tipsy lady.

And then in an altogether different voice, one he couldn’t quite interpret, he heard Jane say, “Tom? Would you stop stroking my bottom, please?”

He snatched his hand away from her as if she’d bitten him, and muttered, “Sorry,” under his breath.

“Under the circumstances, I forgive you.” And now there was no mistaking her amusement. That teetering-on- the-brink-of-laughter quiver in her voice was contagious, too; he could feel the almost-forgotten sensation building inside him like an oncoming sneeze. Well, hell, he supposed it was one way to react to a crisis.

“Let’s get the hell out of this hole,” he said in a monotone, fighting hard against the influence of that insidious itch.

Squirming backward until he’d managed to free his shoulders, he stood up gingerly, feeling the blackness above his head for obstacles. “Damn,” he said gruffly. “Wish we had some light.”

Jane’s voice drifted up from somewhere near his feet. “I have…a flashlight, if I can just-”

“You’re kidding! You do? Where?”

“I always carry one. I grew up in California-earthquakes, you know. It’s in my bag. Just let me…okay, I’m out. Now, where did I…oh, here it is.”

She came crawling out backward on her hands and knees, kneeling on his feet, brushing against his legs. He tried to give her more room, but there just wasn’t any; his back was smack up against a wall of boxes. When he leaned over to help her up, he got a mouthful of her hair.

“Mmpf. Ptoo, ” he muttered, spitting it out.

Breathless and obviously still quivery with laughter, she whispered, “Oops, sorry,” and rose to her feet, clinging to his arms and unfolding her body along the front of his.

“Tight quarters,” he said stiffly.

“Yes, isn’t it.”

Her hair was on a level with his face again. This time, he kept his mouth closed, and discovered that he could appreciate the tickly softness of it on his lips and chin. And the smell of it…nothing he could place, just a part of that indefinable “nice-woman” smell he’d noticed before.

His stomach growled suddenly. For Hawk, that had always meant one or the other of two different kinds of hunger, and he couldn’t have sworn, at that moment, which one this was. It had been a long time since breakfast, but even longer since he’d had the sweet scent of a woman in his nostrils and her breasts brushing up against his chest like this, and her legs shifting to make room for his…

“I know-I’m starving, too,” Jane said with a sympathetic chuckle, certain she at least knew which hunger his juices were giving voice to.