The Wedding Trap (Second Service #1)(16)
Author: Adrienne Bell

Sorry Jordan, but your wedding night is going to have to wait since through a series of mind-blowingly bad decisions, I have passed off a felon as my boyfriend, and he’s down in my room right now, planning God knows what.

Her humiliation would be complete.

"Beth," his voice sounded a few feet behind her.

She ignored him and kept going. She stormed her way through the crowded sidewalk. She weaved in and out of the crowd, tears welling up in her eyes. Pity was a self-indulgent emotion, but if she’d ever been tempted to give in to it, now was the time.

Beth lifted her head just in time to see a man walking right toward her. She moved a few inches to the right. He mirrored her moves. Beth slowed her step. There was a look in the man’s eyes that disturbed her. Something wasn’t right.

"Beth," Charlie shouted. There was no annoyance in his voice now, only warning. Beth stopped cold. Something glinted in the man’s hand. The same glint she’d seen from Charlie’s bag. He had a gun. And he was coming for her.

She didn’t have time to run. He was only a couple of feet away. She didn’t even have time to scream.

A second later, Beth was jarred hard to the left. Charlie’s body slammed into her, shoving her into a small dark alley. She stumbled but kept her feet.

The alley was narrow, only big enough for a trash can to be pulled between two buildings. It was barely wide enough for her to see around Charlie.

He stood with his back to her at the entrance of the alley. His whole demeanor had changed. His shoulders were locked, his legs braced. He was ready for a fight.

He was trying to protect her, she realized.

The stupid man was going to get himself killed. You couldn’t punch your way out a gun fight. Even Beth knew that.

The man with the gun turned the corner, right into Charlie’s path. Beth screamed out to warn him. She needn’t have bothered.

Charlie’s palm shot out and curled around the man’s right wrist. He wrenched it back at an unnatural angle. The man’s face contorted in pain, but he held tight to the weapon. Charlie pulled back farther, until there was a sickening crack of bone and tendon. Only then did the man’s hand involuntarily drop the gun. It clattered on the pavement and slid into the drainage ditch by the side of the building.

Even with a badly broken wrist, the man still went after Charlie, punching with his left hand. Charlie ducked out of the way and the heel of his hand crashed against the man’s nose. Blood poured out, but the attacker still kept coming.

There was a lethal grace to Charlie’s movements, and his attacker’s, as well. Fists flew faster than Beth could keep track of in the small, dark space. There was no wasted movement. No time to get a reaction wrong.

He’s coming for me, she thought. It didn’t make any sense. There was no reason. And yet she knew it as surely as anything. This man didn’t just want to kill someone. He wanted to kill her. And if Charlie fell, he was going to.

But Charlie didn’t fall. Beth watched in wonder as every punch Charlie threw connected.

The man stumbled back a few feet at Charlie’s last blow. Both men had time to regroup. The attacker pulled out a shiny blade. Thin and four inches long, he held it in his palm like it was an extension of his hand. The next hit he connected to Charlie would kill him. The man smiled through the fountain of blood that poured down his face.

This fight was as good as over.

He rushed Charlie.

Charlie didn’t flinch. He waited until the man barreling toward him was close, then he slid his back against the wall and used the man’s own momentum against him. Charlie pushed against his attacker’s back. The man stumbled, unable to regain his balance. He fell past Charlie, stopping just short of Beth.

She skittered back until her back was against the wall at the back of the alley. She was trapped.

The man looked up. His eyes locked with hers. His mouth twisted up in a murderous grin. He rushed her.

Faster than Beth could blink, Charlie wrapped his arms around the man’s neck. With one sickening twist, her attacker’s head snapped to the side. A vacant look instantly filled his eyes, and his body went slack. His dead weight slumped to the ground.

Beth stared. That didn’t just happen. It couldn’t have.

She pressed her spine against the jagged brick wall at her back, desperate to get away from the body.

A body. Dear God, there was a dead body in front of her. Dead eyes looked past her, but she couldn’t look away.

"Beth."

She barely heard her name. It sounded like it was coming from far away. Her knees began to buckle. She didn’t want to fall. If she did, she’d fall on top of it.

Oh God.

She opened her mouth, but all that came out was a rush of air that sputtered at the end.

"Are you all right?" Charlie grasped her upper arms, forcing her to meet his gaze. She kept staring at the dead man. Charlie gave her a little shake when she didn’t answer. "Are you hurt?"

She looked up at him. There was concern in his eyes. Concern and something else. Fear. He was afraid she’d been hurt.

The concern confused her more than anything. He’d just killed a man, right in front of her. And he’d done it with a kind of graceful efficiency that told her this wasn’t the first time he’d done such a thing.

"Beth?"

She shook her head. "I-I’m not hurt," she said.

He looked her up and down once before trusting her words. Only then did he let her go.

“Don’t look at him, Beth,” Charlie said calmly. "Look at me."

Beth snapped her eyes back to Charlie’s face and kept them there.

"Y-you killed him." Her lips struggled to form the words.

"I did," he said. He put his hand out to her. It was covered in blood. “You’re safe now.”

"You killed him," she repeated, louder this time.

He held his finger up to his lips. She glanced behind him. Just beyond was a city street, filled with sunlight and people. Someone could walk by at any moment. Someone could look down the alley and catch them with a dead body.

"I had to. He was going to kill you, Beth."

She shook her head frantically. "Why? Why would anyone want to kill me?" The words tumbled out of her. She didn’t expect an answer, and he didn’t give one.

"Breathe," he told her. "Sit down if you need to."

Beth nodded. She derived a strange sense of calm from the orders that he gave her. Someone else was in charge, and she didn’t have to figure out what to do. She only had to listen. There was no reason in her brain right now. There was only the haunting image of life flickering out of the dead man’s eyes.

She slid down the wall until her legs were tucked underneath her.