Already Taken (Laura Frost FBI)

CHAPTER THREE

Laura reached out a hand toward Nate—

He grabbed hold of the rail and held it, pushing himself back to the right posture, staying on the right side of the railing.

He was safe.

Everything seemed to happen at once then, the world coming back to normal speed in a single rush. Laura realized she was lying on top of the man she had tackled sideways, and her hip and shoulder smarted where she’d bowled right into him. He was fighting to get free, probably to go after Nate again. He was shouting something she couldn’t understand. The train was screeching by below them, coming to a stop. Her breath came in ragged pants as she tried to recover from the extreme physical exertion it had taken to get here in time. Her head pounded mercilessly.

Nate jumped forward, grabbing the stranger by the wrists and forcing them behind his back as Laura scrambled away. She struggled to breathe, each inhale rasping through a throat that was raw from shouting, tucking her blonde hair back behind her ears as she tried to right herself. The world felt like it was tilting sideways. For a moment she thought she was going to fall off.

Nate clicked a pair of handcuffs on the stranger’s wrists. The man was still yelling incoherently, screaming up at the sky as he twisted over his shoulder, still trying to get to Nate. With all his easy strength, Nate held him pinned by those cuffed arms, stopping him from getting up.

“Laura?” Nate said.

She looked at him. It felt as though he was very far away.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

No, she wasn’t alright.

But she was. She was because she had done it. She had saved him.

It was over.

Nate pulled a phone out of his pocket, barking instructions into it, calling for backup to take the stranger away. The man had finally stopped yelling, lying still on the ground, his own breathing a furious gasp that came again and again as he rested, having seemingly used up all the fight he had.

“Why are you here?” Nate asked, moving to sit on the ground next to Laura. He kept one leg outstretched, resting it on the stranger’s back to keep him still.

“I saw it,” Laura said. Her voice scraped against the inside of her throat and rattled against the ringing sides of her skull. “It’s what I’ve been afraid of, all this time. I finally saw it. I came as fast as I could.”

Nate stared at her. It was like she could see the pieces moving into place in his mind. As clear as if she’d had a vision from behind his eyes.

“How did you know where to find me?” Nate asked.

“I called Rondelle,” Laura said. She put a hand against her own throat, as if that would ease the rawness there. She needed water. “He said you were called out. Didn’t know where. I was going to drive all over looking at every bridge in town. But then I saw it again. The railing. Heard the train. Knew where to come.”

Nate blinked at her. He looked at the man on the ground. As if knowing that he was in the spotlight again, he gave a desperate shaking, trying to get his arms free and Nate off him and get up. He swore a long string of curses and racial epithets and then gave up.

“Shut up,” Nate muttered. He looked at Laura, then at the railing, then back at the man on the ground. “He tried to push me over.”

“I saw you falling,” Laura said. Her voice cracked. Not just from the screaming. It had been one of the worst things she’d ever seen in her life. There was a top five of hits in her mind: the death of her father from cancer and the shadow of death he’d carried before he was even diagnosed; the death of Amy Fallow, beaten to a pulp by her father, which she had been able to prevent; the case that made her start drinking; the case that made her an alcoholic; and this.

The second time she’d managed to stop someone she cared about deeply from facing a horrible demise.

She’d done it.

It still wasn’t sinking in.

Nate was staring at her like she was an alien with three heads. “You… actually saw this in a vision?”

Laura stared at him numbly. If he didn’t believe her now, he was never going to. “I told you,” she said.

He looked away. The railing. The man on the ground. Back to Laura. It was a circuit, like a pattern his brain had to complete so he could carry on putting all of the pieces together.

“No one else knew where I was,” he said. “I didn’t tell anyone. I didn’t put it into my GPS. I parked at the station and walked up here—you wouldn’t have been able to know where I was.”

“I saw it,” Laura repeated. She felt dull around the edges, like a knife that had been used too many times. Her breathing was back under control, her headache beginning to fade. She thought she had some painkillers in the car maybe.

“It’s the only way,” Nate was saying, kind of to himself. “Laura…” He reached out slowly. He touched her arm. The bare skin of her wrist. She wanted to flinch away, unwilling to see the shadow of death again.

But there was nothing.

Only peace.

“You saw this in a vision,” he said.

It wasn’t a question. From the tone of his voice, Laura knew that he at last understood. He at last believed her.

“All it took was saving your life again, huh?” Laura said, feeling like she was coming back into herself a little, seeing the humor in it.

“Yeah,” Nate said distantly, then looked back at her sharply. “Again?”

Laura gave a weary chuckle. Oh, if he only knew the number of times she’d done something stupid to try and stop him from being in danger.

Nate looked off into the distance, then back at her. The stranger on the ground had stopped trying to resist. He was lying looking up at the sky, like he knew he was looking at it for the last time.

“You know him?” Laura asked, nodding in his direction.

Nate nodded. “Arrested him about five years ago on a drugs charge. Before I was partnered with you. He just got out of prison, said he had some information for me.”

“Wanted you dead,” the man muttered, his voice finally low and slow enough that Laura could understand it. “You ruined my life.”

“No, buddy, that was all you,” Nate said, shaking his head. Below them, sirens were coming closer, racing toward where they were. Backup.

“He would have done it,” Laura said. It probably wasn’t necessary. Nate had felt the lightest part of that shove, the part that Laura hadn’t quite defused. He must know the rest.

There was a pause, a moment of silence between the three of them. The rest of the city was noisy enough. Another train was coming in. The sirens reached a crescendo below and then shut off as the cars stopped.

Laura looked at Nate. He was looking back at her but quickly glanced away. There was something in his face… something that stung.

“Nate?” she said.

“Uh, yeah,” he said. He scrambled to his feet, dusting himself off. He loomed over the man who had tried to kill him, reluctant to leave his side but also very obviously eager to get away from Laura. “I’d better make sure they take him in and get all the details right.”