Nick walked around the front of the car to the curb just as she was shoving a quarter into the meter. “I’m just lucky like that.” He pulled her to him for a quick kiss before releasing her and starting the short walk to Joe’s Jewelry. “Is there anyone else out there you know who can get robbed and somehow manage to get laid out of the deal?”
Nixie laughed and shoved him playfully in the chest. “Oh, shut up.”
When she shoved him, Nick grasped her hand in his and laced their fingers.
“You know what, Nick? I think—” Nixie’s sentence was cut off with a strangled yelp of surprise when Nick shoved her roughly to the side. She tumbled to the pavement, scraping her palms and tearing her nylons. “What the…” She trailed off as she looked up just in time to see Nick bounce off the front of a moving van. “Nick!” she screamed in horror.
The driver of the van threw it into park and hopped down to the pavement. “Bitch!” A vaguely familiar voice screamed with rage.
Nixie looked up to see Sarah Spade stalking angrily toward her.
“I don’t get dumped.” Sarah growled with a feral snarl. “I do the dumping. I say when a relationship is through.” Sarah stood over Nixie, her tiny hands balled into fists. “I understand the urge to slum it every once in a while. I totally get it.”
Nixie’s eyes narrowed. Slumming it? That’s what this chick viewed her as?
“This is ridiculous, though,” Sarah continued as if she hadn’t seen the glare. “Nicholas looks…his face says that…” She trailed off, unwilling to admit that Nick looked as if he was actually in love. Her features straightened out, took on a calm look. “Well…if I can’t have him, no one can.”
With that said, Sarah pulled out the biggest gun Nixie had ever seen…not that she’d seen many. She’d seen a paintball gun, once, and had managed to shoot herself in the foot.
Sarah spun and marched toward Nick, the gun pointed alarmingly at his chest.
Nixie struggled to her feet and, in a move that was braver than she felt, charged at Sarah. She jumped onto the model’s back, dragging her to the ground.
Sarah shrieked in rage.
As they tumbled to the pavement, the gun went off, blasting chunks of brick out of the building in front of them.
The gun fell from Sarah’s hand and skidded out of reach. With a snarl, she rolled to face Nixie. “He’s mine!” She screamed like a wounded animal. Reaching up, she grabbed two fistfuls of Nixie’s hair and pulled with all her might.
Nixie yelped in surprise but quickly recovered. Eyes narrowing angrily, she used the palm of her hand and drove it into Sarah’s nose.
Sarah howled in pain and her hands released Nixie’s hair to cover her own nose. Though she covered her face, blood began seeping through her fingers. “I’m going to kill you!” She screeched her threat and then attacked.
Nixie and Sarah rolled back and forth on the pavement. They fell into the embarrassing female habit of scratching, biting, and pulling hair.
Time seemed to stop as Nixie desperately clawed for her own safety. They rolled and struggled. Finally, she managed to get on top. She straddled Sarah’s waist and shoved her head back against the pavement.
An instant later, arms grabbed her around the waist and hauled her away from Sarah.
Nixie fought against whoever was grabbing her, unsure if it was another assault or not.
“It’s Clark!”
The person holding her hollered out his name, as if it should mean something to her. Clark … Clark … Officer Clark.
Nixie stopped kicking and spun to face him. “She attacked us! She’s crazy.”
“I know,” Clark reassured.
“You know?” Nixie asked accusingly.
“A robbery and a drive-by shooting to the same people in the same day is too coincidental. We had an officer trailing you, doing surveillance.”
“Oh.”
Clark’s partner finished handcuffing Sarah while a third officer opened the back of the moving van.
When it slid open, Nick weakly complained. “Hey! That’s my stuff.”
“It’s mine!” Sarah shrieked, struggling against the officer holding her. “You are mine, Nick!”
Nick staggered to his feet, hobbling unsteadily.
Nixie rushed to his side, helping to support him. She fawned over him, tenderly running her fingers over scratches and scrapes, making sure there wasn’t any lasting damage.
“How dare you put your hands on him.” Sarah hissed. “He is mine!”
Nixie frowned. “Then why’d you hit him with a moving van?”
“I was aiming for you!”
“That’s enough,” the officer holding Sarah warned. He led her to the nearby police car and opened the back door.
“Hey, Sarah,” Nick called out.
She looked up with wild, hopeful eyes as she was forced into the backseat.
“Nixie kicked your ass.”
The door slamming in her face cut off Sarah’s screaming response.
“We’re going to need you to come by the station to make a statement,” Clark informed them. “This time, please make an effort to come in.”
Nick humbly promised to swing by the police station as soon as he got back from a trip to the hospital to make sure he hadn’t damaged anything.
As the squad car holding Sarah pulled away, Nixie realized that Joe was standing outside his building with a startled look on his face.
Her eyes widened and she hobbled over, still supporting Nick. “Joe! I can explain why I’m late. I have a really good reason. Honest. I…”
“It’s fine,” he said, cutting her off. “Just…take the rest of the week off. Take care of…” He waved his hand at Nick. “Think of it as a paid vacation.” He backed away from them as if frightened, quickly retreating to his store.
“Do you know how much sex we can have in a week?” Nick asked.
Nixie turned to him, brows furrowed. “You just got hit by a moving van.” She didn’t want to add that the police had confiscated the van, but more importantly, all of his possessions inside as evidence. “How can you be thinking about sex?”
“Because watching you battle to defend me was hot.” He daubed at her lip, his finger coming away with a bit of blood. “You were a warrior woman.”
Nixie rolled her eyes. “Let’s just get you to the hospital.” On his pout, she added seductively, “That way, once we leave, I’ll have doctor’s orders to keep you in bed all week.”
Nick rewarded her with a wicked grin.
Epilogue
Three Months Later
“I’m not ready! I’m not!”
Nick grabbed Nixie’s face in his hands and kissed her firmly. “You are ready.”
They were outside a theater that was holding a premier for some new movie. The red carpet stretched out for what looked like a mile in front of their limo, filled with eager reporters.
The week after the incident with Sarah, who was now locked away in a nice padded psychiatric ward, tabloid pictures had surfaced of Nixie being hauled off of Sarah by Officer Clark. The photographer had gotten an embarrassing shot up Nixie’s skirt. The magazines published pictures of her exposed black lace panties. Since then, she and Nick had been avoiding the press. Now was the time to come out and look fabulous on the arm of her rich, handsome, and sophisticated boyfriend.
“You can do this,” Nick encouraged as he swung the door of the limo open and pulled her out to stand next to him.
Nixie blinked back the flashes of light from the cameras. She almost went dashing back into the safety of the limo, but Nick wrapped his arm around her waist. “You look breathtaking,” he assured.
With a deep, shaky intake of air, Nixie nodded and let Nick guide her down the red carpet. She was halfway done, halfway to safety when the worst happened. Her clumsiness kicked in.
Her shoe got caught in the carpet and she tumbled to her knees. As her hands hit the ground, she felt her face heat up in embarrassment. She’d just fallen over…on the red carpet.
Strong arms suddenly scooped her up and Nixie found herself cradled against Nick’s chest. He held her loosely in his arms, preparing to carry her over the red carpet, like a groom would carry a bride.
“Is it odd that I want to ravish you right now?” he whispered in her ear.
“Yes.” Nixie giggled. Her eyes strayed from Nick as he began walking toward the building, carrying her in his arms as if she was weightless. She cautiously observed the onslaught of reporters, anticipating their awful questions. What did it feel like to fall in front of millions of people? What is someone like Nicholas Morgan doing with you? She shivered as a million more horrible thoughts like these ran through her mind.
“Nixie!” The female reporter closest to them called out. “Whose shoes are you wearing tonight? They are adorable.”