Moments of Julian (26 page)

I jump to my feet and sprint down the
hall toward the stairs. Half a second later I hear Brian’s feet
pounding after me.

“
Get back here!” he
bellows.

There are few days that are bad to
wear five inch Louboutin’s, but today is truly the
worst.

Brian plows into me from behind,
knocking us to the ground and the wind from my lungs. We roll over
the floor, two, three, four times. Finally, we come to a stop and
Brian is pinning me to the floor with his hands on my
throat.

I try to cough, to choke, to breathe,
but he is crushing my windpipe.

There is a crazed look in Brian’s
eyes. He’s furious and possibly delirious, but he keeps looking
around us with panic in his eyes that tells me he doesn’t know what
to do now.

Realizing that I will never be able to
get his hands away from my throat, I focus on what is free: my
legs.

Using as much momentum as I can, I
bring my knee up and pound him in the back. He winces, and pushes
on my throat harder, but nothing more.

Black spots start to swim in the
corners of my vision and I know I’ve only got a few more moments
before I black out completely and Brian can toss me out the window
just like he did my computer. And as I look back at Brian, I can
tell from the resolved look on his face that making me pass out is
exactly his plan right now.

My limbs don’t want to work properly
now due to the lack of oxygen, but I reach down and curl my leg up
as close as I can. My fingers struggle with the buckle, slipping
three times before I finally release it. My fingers close around
the toe of the shoe.

In one jerky movement, I curl my arm
back, and swing the heel forward.

The slender stiletto sinks into his
eye.

An ear-splitting scream leaps from
Brian’s lips and his hands jump from my throat to his face just as
the elevator dings again.

I roll over, trying to cough and
wheeze. My vision fades in and out. But my windpipe is too bruised
and I can’t suck any air in.

I hear Julian scream my name just as
everything turns black.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-
TWO

I open my eyes and the first thing I
see is Julian.

He’s slumped sideways in a chair, one
leg tucked up against his chest. His head is tipped back, his mouth
is open and he is snoring softly.

There is also a tissue stuffed up his
nose and a huge bruise blossoming on his cheekbone.

I sit up and moan in pain, only to lie
immediately back down. My hands rise to my throat and the breath
comes in and out in painful gulps.

Julian jerks awake and is immediately
on his feet. He half trips into the bed. “The doctors said you
should probably not talk for a while,” he rushes to say with sleepy
sounding words as he stands at my side and takes one of my hands in
his. “Brian bruised your windpipe pretty wickedly.”

I have a million questions that want
to leap from my lips, but even breathing hurts right now. For once,
I think I’ll just do what I’m told and not say anything.

“
I came out of that
elevator just in time to see you jab that heel into Brian’s eye,”
Julian says, a smile curling on his lips. “It was like watching
freaking Xena, Warrior Princess or something. If I hadn’t been so
bloody scared out of my mind, I probably would have thought it was
hot.”

A smile forms on my own
lips.

“
I didn’t realize you’d
passed out for a little bit,” he continues. “We got into a pretty
big fight. As you can see,” he says, holding a hand up as if to
display his face. “He’s a bigger guy than me so he had a bit more
force than I did, but thankfully he doesn’t have the best aim and
only landed a few punches.” I reach up and very gently run my
fingers over the bruise forming on his face.

“
There were two agents
just coming into the building when your computer crashed to the
ground. They got to the top floor and tazed Brian the second they
saw him. Thankfully they both recognized me and knew I was helping
with the investigation or they probably would have zapped me as
well,” Julian says with a chuckle.

There is a knock on the door and a
doctor walks in. It isn’t until now that I fully process the fact
that I am lying in a hospital bed.

“
She’s awake,” the doctor
says looking back out into the hall. “Do you mind if the agents
come in, Miss McCain?”

I shake my head, and immediately
regret doing so.

Agent Rodriguez and Agent Fowler
stride in, businesslike and serious.

“
How are you feeling?” the
doctor asks. He looks at a printout of my heart rate and blood
pressure. I’ve got a cuff around my arm and a light thing clamped
to my finger.

“
You did say she shouldn’t
talk,” Julian glares at the doctor. If looks could kill.

“
Right,” he says and
sounds flustered. I have a feeling he’s having a busy, chaotic day
and probably doesn’t remember every detail about my condition.
“Miss McCain, you can probably talk if you feel like it, but I
doubt you’re feeling up to it.”

My silence is his answer. He nods.
“Your attacker bruised your windpipe quite badly, and would have
crushed it if he’d held you down much longer. You passed out from
the lack of oxygen, but other than that, you’ll be fine. You can
head home as soon as you like.”

I nod. Julian is still glaring at him
and I can tell he’s fighting the urge to argue with the doctor and
tell him that no, I am not fine, but he restrains
himself.

“
She’s all yours, agents,”
the doctor says dramatically and lets himself out of the
room.

“
I told her what happened
before she was brought to the hospital, but that’s as far as I’ve
gotten,” Julian explains. He drags a chair to my side and settles
into it. He crosses one ankle over the other knee and laces his
fingers behind his head and leans back.

“
From what we figure, you
found Brian trying to destroy your computer, correct?” Rodriguez
asks.

I nod. “K, that’s what we assumed.
After your boy here beat the tar out of Brian Sanders, we took him
into custody and questioned him. He wasn’t exactly cooperative, but
we got the answers we needed from the evidence we recovered from
both his computer and yours.”

“
You are aware of his
relationship with Gretchen O’Bell,” Agent Fowler continues. “He
used her to get to your personal information. Gretchen herself has
been cleared, we have no more reason to believe she had anything to
do with this. While their relationship seems to be genuine, he took
advantage of her.”

They launch into explanations of
tracing bank accounts and computer signatures and a bunch of other
stuff that I am sure Julian understands, but all goes right over my
head. I simply give small nods and let them keep
talking.

“
We’ll need you to testify
if this goes to court,” Rodriguez says. “Guys like this usually try
to deny charges, but it’s pretty hard to fight such red-handed
evidence. But for now, they’re both at county. It may take a while
for all this to settle down.”

“
You get better, Miss
McCain,” Fowler says. “The local authorities will be in touch
soon.”

Without a goodbye, they both turn and
leave the room.

Julian turns to me and takes my hand
in his. He holds it up to his lips and rests both there.

“
Gideon was by earlier.
I’ve never seen him looking so pathetic. He feels horribly that he
didn’t try to defend you more. He wants to have a meeting with you
as soon as you’re ready,” he says with a smile. “I’m pretty sure
you’ll be able to ask him for pretty much anything you want and
he’ll give it to you.”

A smile curls on my face.

That Sage McCain I’ve missed the past
few weeks resurfaces. The one who is ambitious and proud and not
afraid to piss people off to get what she wants.

And I know exactly what I will ask for
when we have that meeting.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-T
HREE

“
Okay, favorite ice cream
flavor?” Julian asks. His eyes flick up from the book he is
holding, to my face.

“
Is there anything besides
cookie dough that is worth eating?” I say with a
grimace.

“
Only if you like eating
straight sugar granules,” he says with a wrinkle of his
nose.

“
Give me that,” I say,
reaching for the book. When Mom found out what happened and
Julian’s involvement that “certainly saved my life” she seemed sure
she had met her one and only future son-in-law. She brought over a
care package while I “recovered”, including a book of
101 Questions to Ask Your Significant
Other.

“
What song,” I say
dramatically as I glance up at Julian over the book, “reminds you
of me.”

“
Oh, this is a hard one,”
he says, rubbing a hand over his scruffy chin. “Uh, I’ll have to go
with Heartless by Kanye West.”

“
Julian!” I scream,
offense dripping from my voice as I launch a pillow at his
head.

“
Kidding, kidding!” he
laughs as he takes the hit. “Um, okay, seriously? Rise Up by Diane
Birch.”

“
Wow, a non-rock song?” I
say, a smile curling on my lips.

Julian shrugs. “Doesn’t mean it isn’t
a good one. It fits.”

“
You mean love don’t come
in black or white?” I say, my voice dropping.

“
Never,” he says as he
crosses my room and climbs up into the bed with me. He places a
knee on either side of me, his hands just to my sides. He pushes
the book into my chest as he leans forward and gently presses his
lips to mine. “Next question.”

I grin as he backs up slightly,
resting his head on my stomach and lying on top of me. His weight
is comforting, strong.

“
How do you feel about
public displays of affection?” I read.

“
I am in the affirmative,”
he says, his voice muffled from the sounds of the
blankets.

I chuckle and run my fingers through
Julian’s hair.

“
K, my turn,” he says,
propping himself up on his elbows and reaching for the book. I hand
it over and study his face as he scans the questions.

The first day I came home from the
hospital, I couldn’t talk. The second day my voice was barely more
than a whisper. Yesterday was a bit better, and today it is nearly
back to normal.

I could be doing something more
productive. The rest of my body is functioning just
fine.

But the honest truth is that the last
few days have been some of the best of my life. It’s just been me
and Julian, with the occasional visit from Mom and Dad, or Drake
and Kaylee and the kids, or Lake. Kale has tried to make himself
scarce since Julian has been sleeping over and here at all
hours.

But mostly it is just us. Us and this
ridiculous book.

“
K, here we go,” he says,
a smile curling on his face. “Another girl openly hits on me. How
do you handle it?”

“
Well,” I say, lacing my
fingers through his hair again. He rests his chin on my stomach and
looks up at me. “I can only get possessive if you’re actually
mine…”

“
Sage McCain,” Julian
says, a smile on his face. “Are you asking me to be your
boyfriend?”

“
You did pass the seven
gates of friend and family hell with flying colors,” I say
seriously. “Although to be honest, I don’t really have any idea
what flying colors really means.”

“
Don’t change the topic,”
he says as a wide smile overtakes his face. He inches up and we are
nose to nose. “I’m pretty sure I just got promoted from a dot, dot,
dot to boyfriend.”

“
You got that promotion
somewhere back in China, I have just been making you work to
realize the change had happened,” I breathe as he presses his lips
to mine.

“
So this means I can
officially change my Facebook status into ‘in a relationship’?” he
says in a ridiculous voice.

“
Ugh,” I groan. “Are you
going to be one of
those
types of boyfriends?”

“
I just committed
the
Sage McCain, the
unconquerable woman,” Julian says as he presses his lips to the
base of my ear. “I intend to let the world know of my
accomplishment.”

“
I can hear you through
the wall!” Kale yells, disgust in his voice.

“
Kale! You need to move
out!” Julian yells.

“
Shutting up!”

My phone starts vibrating on the night
stand. Julian reaches for it and looks at the screen.

“
Gideon,” he says as he
turns it and hands it to me.

“
Good afternoon, Mr.
Maxwell,” I say with every confidence in my voice.

“
How are you feeling
today, Sage?” he asks. Mr. Maxwell is a confident man, but today,
there is hesitance in his voice. “You sound better.