Fever (6 page)

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Authors: Joan Swan

BOOK: Fever
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When Creek stood, took her arm gently and led her to the car, she didn’t protest.
Taz looked up from his spot crouched near the rear passenger side tire. He pushed to his feet and started straight for her. “You fucking bitch. This is all your fault.”
 
“Back off.” Teague smacked a hand against Taz’s chest and stepped between him and Hannah. “We’ve got more important things to think about.”
Taz’s edgy eyes cut into Teague. “Yeah, like how the fuck we’re getting out of the hell hole that bitch got us into now that those niggers jacked our ride.”
Teague’s gaze fell to the rear tire. Flat. Then it jumped to the front. Flat. Taz pushed against Teague’s hand as he reached for Hannah again. “I’m going to fuck the living shit out of this slant-eyed cunt.”
Teague had heard enough racial slurs for a lifetime. He shoved Taz so hard the other man stumbled back and hit the trunk of the car.
Taz’s dark eyes narrowed on Teague. “What’s wrong with you, man? Why is this bitch so important?”
“Not your business.”
“It is if she gets our asses thrown back in the hole.”
“That won’t happen.”
Taz leaned forward and pointed a rigid finger in Teague’s face. “If it does, you’re
mine
.”
A dark film inked Teague’s stomach. The threat reminded him of exactly why he would die before he went back to prison. It was the fear he’d lived with day in and day out at Quentin—the fear of being gutted, strangled, stabbed, beaten, raped or worse. He was convinced the twisted severity of his crime had kept the other animals at bay so far. That and the fact he benched more than three of them put together. Teague didn’t work out obsessively to kill time. He did it to stay safe. To stay alive.
“Where the fuck we getting another car?” Taz’s arms flew as they typically did when he was on the edge of “throwing a nutty.” Bad things always happened when Taz wigged, things like death and dismemberment. “Look around you, Creek. We’re in the middle of fucking mud country.”
Teague scanned the surrounding industrial area, devoid of pedestrians and traffic. He doubted there was civilization within two miles. Besides, Hannah couldn’t walk that far. He might have stopped the bleeding for now, but too much movement, too much pressure could break open the wound.
“There.” He tightened his grip on Hannah’s cuffs and started for a parking lot two blocks away where three U-Haul vans sat alongside a building. “Come on.”
Hannah resisted when he pulled her forward. He swung toward her without any effort to hide his annoyance, but she didn’t cower.
“Take these off me.” She lifted her hands and the cuffs shone in the low light. “I need to put pressure on my side.”
“Fucking A.” If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. He unlocked the cuff on her right hand and, much to his own distaste, secured it to his left wrist. “Sooner we get to the truck, the sooner you can sit.”
Taz fumed under his breath, muttering a rash of racist, cursing comments with each step toward the yard. When Teague had made the deal in prison to take Taz on as an escape partner, he’d rationalized the desperate move by telling himself he’d be rid of the jackass within hours. Unfortunately, Teague’s plans hadn’t panned out as expected, and now he was ready to ram Taz’s head into the chipped stucco wall on his right. The only reason he didn’t was because he didn’t want to burn Hannah’s wrist again.
When they reached the lot, Teague realized the trucks weren’t out in the open, but behind a twelve-foot, chain-link fence with razor wire spiraling upward another two feet at the top.
Teague ran his hand over the stubble of hair on his head. “Aw, fuck me.”
Taz picked up the padlock secured by a thick chain and slammed it back into place. “How is this going to help us?”
Teague dragged Hannah fifty feet from the entrance and pointed at the pavement. “Sit.”
He released the cuff on his wrist and fastened it to the chain link, then surveyed the barrier. A familiar sense of impotence nagged at him. If he could just harness the powers he knew he had inside, he could use his finger as a freakin’ welding torch. But no. He hadn’t found the secret yet.
“Nothing about this could be easy,” he muttered. “Let’s go.”
“You go,” Taz said. “I’ll wait here with the
princess
.”
“No, you won’t.” Teague stretched his arms overhead, gripped the fence and pressed a boot against the chain. “If you can’t help me get this truck, you can’t ride in it.”
Grumbling, Taz climbed the fence with Teague. Swore when he nicked himself on the wire. Ranted when he dropped to the ground and twisted his ankle. By that time, Teague was already at the truck, peering in the window. As long as Taz was on the opposite side of the fence from Hannah, Teague didn’t give a shit what the ass did.
“How you gonna get in?” Taz asked. “How you gonna start it?”
Teague looked around the lot for something to break the window. “Don’t tell me you don’t know how to hot-wire a car.”
“I never have to. Just stick my gun in the driver’s face and say
get out
.”
The gun. Teague pulled the weapon from his waistband. “Great idea.”
He looked past the fence in all directions. Dead quiet except for the distant swoosh of freeway traffic. He stepped back several feet and pointed the weapon at the window, angling the muzzle down at the floorboard. His finger hesitated on the trigger, apprehension tightening his gut. He’d never fired a gun and didn’t want to start now. But with no other adequate choice, Teague closed his eyes, turned his head and fired.
F
IVE
T
he gun kicked Teague’s arm back. The blast rang in his ears. Glass shattered and sprayed the truck’s interior. He peered around the neighborhood again while his heart hammered, half expecting a rush of cops, or at least a few shocked spectators. But no life stirred beyond the fence, and the only thing Teague heard was Taz laughing.
“Yee-haw. Creek, you are one resourceful prick.” Teague put a hand against the muzzle to test its temperature. When he decided it wouldn’t scald him, he tucked it back into his jeans. With a pop of the lock, he opened the door and dove beneath the dash. He yanked wires, checked colors, used his fingernail to strip the plastic covering away. A twist of the reds, and he was ready for the big moment. Teague positioned the third red and a single brown wire in either hand.
Please start
. He touched the wires together. A mechanical grind sounded near his head.
“Yes,” he hissed. “Come on, baby.”
Another grind. Another.
“We don’t have all night, Creek.”
“If you think you can do better, get your ass down here.”
Sweat dripped across Teague’s forehead and he wiped it away with the back of his hand. This wasn’t working. He needed more amperage. More spark.
He closed his eyes, focusing. He visualized a fiery, electrically charged ball of power deep in his gut. As he channeled the energy, the globe spun and fizzed and popped and grew. Golf ball to tennis ball. Tennis ball to football.
He settled the two wires together, squeezed his eyes shut and gave a mental push.
The engine rumbled and turned over, then quit. Teague gritted his teeth, tightened his fingers and pushed again.
Grind. Grind. Whoosh.
The engine roared to life and kept going.
“Woo-hoo.” Taz slapped Teague’s back. “You’re the man. Now what about the fence?”
Teague uncoiled from the cab, sweating, nauseous. He pressed one hand to the side of the truck to steady himself.
“Run it.”
“You drivin’?”
“No, you are.” No way was Taz sitting next to Hannah.
Teague checked her spot on the sidewalk. She was huddled on the ground, still and quiet, her arm hanging limp from the fence. The sickening guilt that had leaked through his barriers the instant he’d wrapped that chain around her neck was back, dousing the residual heat from his powers and leaving him cold.
He gripped the front of Taz’s shirt and shook the jerk to attention. The last thing Teague needed was Hannah’s arm ripped from the socket. “You make sure you wait until I unhook her from the fence.”
“Whatever.” Taz jumped into the cab and revved the engine.
Teague climbed the fence, picked through the razor wire and dropped to the ground next to Hannah. He unlocked the cuff, inspecting her face for signs of shock. She was pale, her eyes glazed, but fire still sparked beneath.
“We’ll stop and get you fixed up before we move on.” He hooked the free cuff to his own wrist.
“Why did you involve that idiot in the first place?” she asked, her gaze fastened on the truck behind Teague. “He’s an anchor. You’re the one with the muscle and the brains.” Her eyes skipped to Teague’s face and sharpened. “Or do you need him, too?”
Brains? She thought he had brains? Laughter swelled in his chest and he almost let it out. Only nothing about this was funny. Not one goddamned thing.
“I need him, too.” Teague helped her up, put an arm around her waist. “He’s the one with people on the outside. He’s the reason we had a car, money and clothes.”
“You don’t have people?”
Teague’s mind drifted to the team of firefighters who’d once been his family. Before his perfect life had been blown to hell. Before that damned warehouse fire. Five long years before. Luke had already turned on him, and the other five had suffered enough. Everyone had suffered enough.
“No, I don’t have people. I don’t have anyone.” He pulled her against his chest. “Cover your head.”
She pressed her face to his shoulder. Her free hand clutched his shirt in a way that made him feel needed. Something he hadn’t experienced in so very long. Yet she needed him in all the wrong ways, for all the wrong reasons, taking all the sweetness out of the emotion and twisting it into another source of guilt.
Taz revved the truck. Tires screeched. A second later, the explosive shriek of metal on metal filled the air. But all Teague could focus on was the way Hannah squeezed closer until her body was flush with his. She was warm and strong. She was intelligent and gorgeous. She was way too good for Luke.
Hannah lifted her head and looked toward the street. A tremor rocked her delicate frame, drawing out Teague’s protective instincts. He was so tempted to trash this asinine plan, ditch Taz, find a safe place for Hannah and call the whole thing done.
One fleeting thought of Kat wiped that option right out of his mind.
“I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” she said, her voice feathery soft.
“We’ll be rid of him by morning, then things will smooth out.” He put up a mental shield. Focused on his goal, on what really mattered. “All goes as planned, you should be home by tomorrow afternoon.”
That thought should have thrilled Teague. And the prospect of seeing Katrina’s perfect cherub face smiling at him, of hearing her little voice calling to him, did make his heart ache with anticipation. But he had mixed feelings about letting Hannah go. And those mixed feelings became even murkier when he thought about letting her go back to Luke.
Hannah searched his face with a clear look of cynicism, and he couldn’t blame her. He climbed into the cab, positioning himself in the center of the bench seat, and leaned over to pull her into the cab beside him. She grimaced with the movement, but didn’t complain. Once she was settled, Teague uncuffed his wrist and secured her hand to the passenger’s door. He didn’t need to be in those cuffs a minute longer than necessary.
They drove to the handicapped GTO a few blocks away and threw their things in the back of the U-Haul.
“Directions,” Taz said as he pulled onto the main street.
“Stay on Thirty-Three. Head for Los Banos. There’s a Walmart there.”
Taz looked at Teague as if he’d turned black. “Why Walmart?”
“We need supplies.”
Taz didn’t respond. All his excitement from the confrontation with the gang and the carjacking had drained, leaving him in a hole, burrowing deeper by the minute. Teague let it go, hoping Taz came out of it on his own. Hannah laid her head against the seat and closed her eyes. After a few minutes, her head slid sideways and rested on Teague’s shoulder.
“I think we got a problem, you and me.” Taz finally spoke after fifteen minutes of cool, dark silence. “I think that chink is more important to you than I am.”
Teague didn’t look at Taz, didn’t show any emotion. “She’s a bargaining chip, nothing more.”
“What you want bad enough to put up with her?”
“Not your business.”
“I ain’t goin’ to no Walmart.”
“You don’t have to go in. It would probably be better if you didn’t.”
“I’ll drop you off and go find myself a whore,” Taz said. “I know where they hang out in town.”
Hell, no. Taz was not disappearing with this truck. “She’s in no condition to sit around and wait for you to get back. I’ll drop you and pick you up when we’re done.”
“You’re a bossy sonofabitch, Creek. I’m gettin’ tired of it.”
“We agreed on the inside. My rules, your contacts. If you don’t like it, I’ll drop you back off at the GTO and make a phone call to the cops to let them know where you are.”
“I could do the same for you.”
Teague thought back to Hannah’s comments at the fence. “But you won’t because you know you can’t do this without me. After tomorrow, you can make every goddamned call on every goddamned day for the rest of your life. For now, you have to live with me.”
They rode in silence for the next fifteen minutes. As they came up on the outskirts of Los Banos, Taz made a few turns and slowed where three women stood clustered around the stairwell of an apartment building—two black women, one white.
“You girls workin’ tonight?” Taz called toward them.
“You know it, baby,” one of the black girls answered. “Come on over.”
Taz set the brake and pushed open the door.
“Hey.” Teague caught his arm. “Leave me some money.”
Taz peeled off a dozen bills and pounded the remaining wad into Teague’s hand. Teague caught his partner’s grip and infused heat into the connection until Taz looked him in the eye. “I’ll be back in an hour and a half. If you’re not here, I’ll assume you’re going the rest of the way on your own.”
Taz yanked out of Teague’s grip, and shook the burn from his hand, casting Teague that anxious you-freak look. Sometimes others’ suspicions about his abilities worked to Teague’s advantage. “I’ll be here.”
Teague scooted to the driver’s side, dislodging Hannah’s head from his shoulder. She woke and straightened in the seat, her eyes sleepy, making her look sweet and sexy all at the same time. “Where are we?”
“Go back to sleep.” As Teague pulled away from the curb, he glanced back at Taz. The animal had one arm around each black girl, and the threesome walked toward the stairwell. Teague hit the brake. “Shit. That’s no good.”
Hannah groaned as she shifted in her seat.
“Goddammit,” Teague muttered as he watched Taz and the two black girls disappear into the building. The single white girl strolled off around a corner.
“Oh, God,” Hannah whined. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
Her tortured voice brought Teague’s attention around. The color in her face had paled several shades in the last hour. His gaze drifted to the bloodstains on her shirt, which made him realize there was no real decision to be made. He pounded the gas and headed toward Walmart.
“You need something in your stomach,” he said.
“Yeah, like stitches.”
Teague’s mouth quirked. With Taz gone, a certain relief settled in. One less wild card to worry about. “I was speaking of food and water, but stitches would be good, too.”
“If I eat, I’ll throw up.”
Teague sighed and rubbed at the stubble on his head. He hadn’t shaved his skull in a week, and the new hair growth made his scalp itchy. “Do you argue with everyone or am I just lucky?”
“You’re about as lucky as I am.”
“That’s not a good sign.”
“Tell me about it. Where did that jerk go? You said he’d be gone tomorrow morning.”
Teague was too tired to make up a lie. “He went to get laid.”
His statement was met with extended silence.
“He has a girlfriend here?” she finally asked.
“No.”
Another silence. Then, “Why didn’t you go get laid, too?” He darted a look at her, surprised by her candidness. And irritated with the zing of heat in his groin. “Because I have more important things to take care of.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “There’s a man on the planet who believes there is something more important than sex?”
Teague bit the inside of his cheek to fend off the growing lust the subject brought on and pulled into the parking lot of Walmart, stopping the truck a respectable distance from the store.
“You really
did
want to go to Walmart? I thought that was a code name for something.” She turned confused eyes on Teague. “This is the last place on earth I’d expect you to stop.”
“Where
would
you expect me to stop?”
“I don’t know, a liquor store, local drug dealer’s house, a McDonald’s drive-through ...”
“I didn’t eat McDonald’s even before I went to prison.” Her lips turned, just barely. The lids of those sultry eyes lowered, almost imperceptibly. The effect was a little dreamy. Extremely sexy. “Then you’ve missed out on the best French fries on the planet. Mmm.”
His throat squeezed. Mouth went dry. That hum nearly popped the button on his damn jeans. Fuck, he so didn’t need this. “You don’t look like you’ve ever eaten a fry in your life.”
“I just don’t eat them all day, every day. Why are we here again?”
Hell, if he knew. All his blood was somewhere below his belt.
“We need supplies.” He pressed his fingers to his eyes and forced his mind clear. “I think I can get them all here.”
“How long have you been in prison?”
He dropped his hand, opened his eyes and stared out the windshield, half sure he’d imagined the question. But when he looked at her, she peered back with such keen interest, Teague was convinced she was waiting for an answer. In a sick way, he was glad she’d asked, because every degree of heat she’d fueled immediately chilled.
“Too long.”
“For what?”

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