Run To Rome

Sunlight filtered through a tree along the shore, its dappled rays glinting off the golden-red highlights in her shoulder length hair. The longing to once again feel its silky softness skim across his stomach set his blood pumping.

He closed his eyes against the gut clenching need and took a deep breath, last night’s emotional realization still raw and not entirely welcome. Silent arguments flooded back, gaining strength in the light of day.

Somewhere, he recalled reading that people formed emotional attachments in dangerous, stressful situations. That had to be what he felt, considering they’d depended on each other to stay alive during the past couple days, and it wasn’t over yet. Once the danger was gone, the emotion currently constricting his chest would reveal itself to be nothing more than a coping mechanism.

She’d go home to Wisconsin; he’d head back to L.A. to begin shooting his next Shain West film in less than two weeks. Life would return to normal. It’d take longer to achieve normal without his brother, but eventually it would happen.

A sharp ache near his heart undermined his confidence. He clenched his jaw and ignored the pain to focus on Halli’s conversation.

“We’re all better than mom and dad; you, me and Ben, and don’t forget that. They’re the ones sitting in jail right now, not us.”

Trent marveled at the strength in her voice and was glad she was on his side.

“Rachel, stop it,” Halli ordered. “Everything is going to work out just like we’ve planned. Once Trent pays the ransom and trades the video for Ben, this’ll all be over and we can go home.”

Her words drew him up short and tightened his muscles like the string on a bow. Work out like they planned? Having become otherwise occupied, they hadn’t worked on their plan yet. At least he and she hadn’t.

So who had she been planning with?

Halli shifted to lean one hip against the railing, presenting him with her profile. Uneasy, he pressed back into the shadows. She held the phone low enough that he could see a smile lift the corner of her mouth.

“You haven’t spent the past couple days with him.”

Her body stiffened all of a sudden, and he noticed she held the gun in her right hand, resting against her thigh.

“He said he’d pay it and he will. You just worry about Simone, okay? Call if anything else strange happens.”

> Fingers of dread crawled along his skin as snippets of conversation hurled through his memory.

“We’re better than mom and dad.” The con-artists. So…better how?

“They’re in jail, not us.” Ben, Rachel and Halli were better because…they’d never been caught?

More pieces fell into place. He remembered thinking something about the ransom demand had been odd, that someone other than Lapaglia had made the suggestion. Someone like…her brother, perhaps? Had that been what they’d planned?

Her refusal to stay at Simone’s took on a different light. And last night. Christ, last night, she’d flipped back and forth enough times he was unclear who’d seduced whom.

“For a million dollars, it’s the least I can do.”

He thought she’d been talking about dessert when she said that, but in the end, she’d slept with him. Another case where money was more trouble than it was worth?

Anger began a slow simmer. Shy, cute little Halli had been playing him the entire time? While he agonized over the possibility of falling in love with her, she’d probably been laying in his bed dreaming of how she and her brother and sister would spend the money she guaranteed he’d pay. He was so gullible. He’d been had by the whole damn lot of them!

The knife in his back twisted brutally.

Halli had hung up and now lifted her hands to her face, phone in one hand, gun in the other. Trent’s gaze narrowed on the weapon. If he wasn’t careful, he just might have a bullet in his chest, too. But he couldn’t bring himself to care at the moment.

He moved into view, leaned his injured shoulder against the wall and crossed his arms over his bare chest.

“You look worried.”

Halli startled with a small shriek and spun to face him. The gun bounced at her feet with a couple of dull thuds.

“Oh God…sorry. You scared me!” She pressed the hand holding the phone to her chest, the other over her mouth, and stared at the gun. Her gaze lifted to his. “W-what did you say?”

Trent joined her on deck, scanning the area for anything suspicious. He bent to pick up the weapon, surprised when she did nothing to stop him. With effort, he tempered his tone. “You look worried.”

She actually looked like she was about to cry as she lifted her small shoulders. “Yeah, well, it’s tomorrow now, you know?”