Heartbeats Amidst Chaos, Part 2

5. Chapter 5

Chapter five

“ D id you know your house was being watched?” Elio asked. Before him, Rissa managed to look regal and distant in her silky robe, as if they hadn’t just made out like long-lost lovers against the wall. The only hint that she had just been beautifully naked and straddling him was the flush diffused over her high cheekbones, her swollen lips, and the mussed state of her damp hair.

Elio was having more of a struggle pulling himself together. He wanted nothing more than to pull her back to him, strip off both their clothes, and finish what they started. His heart was still pounding double-time, and his erection was obvious and slow to subside.

But Rissa’s arms were crossed protectively over her chest, and she pulled back with a suddenness amounting to panic. It was more than he could have ever expected that she had come to him for even that brief moment. He would not push her.

“I figured the detectives would put someone on the house,” Rissa answered, her gaze flicking toward the curtained window.

Elio nodded. “There are cops,” he confirmed. “One in the front and one in the back. But I think there’s someone else too. Charcoal Mustang, tinted windows. Any idea who that could be?”

Rissa shook her head and bit her lip, her forehead crinkled with worry as she glanced at the window again. “How did you get in?” she asked after a moment. “And why are you here? You still haven’t answered that question, and I’m going to keep asking it until you do.”

Elio grinned as the spunkiness returned to Rissa’s voice. It reminded him of when she had scolded people right and left at the hospital in his defense. Nothing kept her down very long.

“I need to talk to you,” he said. “But I’d rather do it without the risk of someone coming to the door. Are you down to go somewhere? I’ll take you out to breakfast,” he offered with a glance at the clock on her bedside table.

Rissa’s eyebrows rose, and Elio felt a sudden, unexpected flutter of nerves. This surprised him. It had been a very long time since he had asked a girl out and felt anxious about her answer.

She was studying him in a way that made him tingle.

“All right,” she said abruptly. “I’m not going to sleep now until I get some of my questions answered anyway. Just let me get some clothes on.” Her face flushed a slightly deeper shade of pink as she turned back toward the bathroom.

She came back out in a pair of faded blue jeans and a pale pink t-shirt with a Marathon logo across the front, running a hand through her damp hair and tossing it lightly as if to speed the drying process. He found it hard to believe she was the same carefully professional and guarded angel doctor who had cared for him only hours before. With her freshly kissed lips, fitted clothes on her curvy figure, rakish hair, and challenging eyes, she looked ready for anything in an entirely different way.

Elio’s heart was still thundering, and he felt slightly lightheaded. That could still be the effects of the blood loss though. Or the concussion. Surely?

“Okay,” she said gamely. “How do we get out of here without being seen?”

Elio grinned. “The same way I came in. Side window. No one ever watches the sides of the house—just the back and the front.”

“Isn’t that because you can usually see the sides from the back and the front?” Rissa asked, following him through her house to the tall window he managed to unlatch in the small, unlit dining room.

“Not when there’s an overgrown hedge between your house and the neighbor’s,” Elio explained. Poking his head out the window, he glanced quickly to the right and left before wedging his body through the narrow space with a grunt. Rissa followed more easily. When he reached to help her and stumbled, she grabbed his elbow instead and steadied him.

He saw the doctor appear for a moment in her expression again, but she said nothing as they crept across the sheltered space along her side wall and around the back of the neighbor’s house. The sky glowed with the lingering sunrise. Aside from the clear trill of morning birdsong, the neighborhood was quiet.

They continued cutting through yards until they reached the end of the block where Elio had parked his silver Toyota, a loan from his grandfather that probably traced back to someone who had died a year ago.

Rissa slowed as they approached the vehicle, as if she was having second thoughts about accompanying him. Elio couldn’t blame her.

“Hey, it’s okay,” he said. “I didn’t let you go at the ambulance just to come back and kidnap you now.”

“Go ahead,” he added when she didn’t immediately relax. “Search the car. You’ll find no gun, nobody hiding in the back seat, nothing.”

For a moment, he thought Rissa might take him up on his offer, but after a moment, she simply said, “I’ll drive.”

“Sure.” Elio tossed her the keys. The way his head was spinning, it was probably for the best. “I know a great bakery just a few minutes from here,” he said as they climbed into the car and Rissa started the engine.

He didn’t bother to add that the bakery was owned by his sister. He didn’t see any reason to make his reluctant date even more suspicious.

Rissa appeared relieved when they pulled into the parking lot of the quaint bakery, simply called Gia’s. Even though it was barely six-thirty, an open sign blinked in the window. Elio knew that his sister and her hired help had already been at it for hours, baking the cinnamon rolls, muffins, and other fresh goods that would appear in their front case that day.

He and Rissa crossed the lot, Rissa slowing her step to match his limping gait, and he opened the door and held it for her to go first. She rewarded him with the ghost of a smile.

The aroma of the bakery folded around them, drawing them in like a warm hug.

Gia suddenly appeared from the kitchen in the back. Her thick black hair was pulled up in a messy bun and flour dusted the front of her green apron. She caught sight of Elio and smiled, surprise lighting her dark eyes as they flicked to Rissa and then back to him.

“Elio!” She swept around the glass counter to envelop him in a hug. Gia never watched the news. Though she had no doubt heard something of the bomb—the entire city had been briefly locked down, after all—she had likely heard nothing of Elio’s suspected involvement.

She turned next to Rissa, looking prepared to fold her into a hug as well, but she must have sensed Rissa’s reserve because she grabbed both her hands instead. “And this is?”

“This is Rissa,” Elio said.

He realized the situation was strange. Gia obviously assumed that Rissa was a girlfriend—why else would he have brought her to the bakery? And Rissa, glancing back and forth between them, didn’t seem to know what to think. Elio started to doubt bringing her to the bakery was the best idea, but he figured a public place would make her most comfortable. This was the only one he could be sure was safe for him.

“I’m so happy to meet you, Rissa,” Gia said sincerely. “Elio is a regular around here.” She gave him a sly smile before hurrying back to her place behind the glass case and asking, “What can I get for you all today?”

“You already know my order,” Elio said, then looked at Rissa with an eyebrow raised in question.

“I’ll have whatever he’s having,” she said. “It all smells wonderful.”

Gia beamed at the compliment, and Elio directed Rissa toward a booth tucked away on the back wall just beyond the glass case. They slid onto opposite sides of the table. Gia followed almost immediately with two plates bearing huge, fragrant cinnamon rolls dripping with frosting.

“You two enjoy!” she chirped before whisking off to the back room. Elio was sure he would be in for a quiz the next time he came in, but Gia knew when to make herself scarce. He grinned at the anticipation on Rissa’s face as she picked up her fork and immediately began breaking off her first bite.

For a wild moment, he imagined that everything that had happened up to this moment—the catastrophic series of events that brought him and Rissa to this strange juncture—had never happened at all. They were simply a man and a woman on a date.

His fantasy was allowed to last for the space of time it took Rissa to fork the first bite into her mouth and close her eyes in ecstasy at the taste.

When she opened them, her ice-blue gaze was trained straight on Elio.

“So,” she said. “Last time I’m asking before I walk away. Why were you at my house?”

Elio took a deep breath, lowering his fork to his plate. He wrestled with himself over how much he was going to tell Rissa, but he decided it was best to be as truthful as possible.

“I’m not sure you’re safe,” he said. Rissa cocked her head as she indulged in another bite of cinnamon roll, licking a drop of frosting from her lip.

“Safe from whom?” she asked finally.

“Multiple parties,” Elio said. “The police, maybe. They kept you an awfully long time at the station.”

Rissa did not respond and simply took another bite of her roll.

“My family,” he admitted, gaining a return of Rissa’s piercing gaze. “If you know who they are. . .”

“I do,” she said briefly. “But I don’t know why they should have any interest in me.”

“I told them they shouldn’t,” Elio sighed. “But they’re paranoid. They want someone to keep an eye on you, so I volunteered—to keep everyone else away. Then there’s whoever was responsible for the bombing. We don’t know who or what they are, but it looks like they specifically set me up. Which means they’re probably none too happy that I escaped. Which may mean they have the same interest in you that my family has, but for the opposite reason.”

“That sounds very confusing and ominous,” Rissa said. Elio was astonished by how calmly she was taking all of this.

“I’m sorry,” he said, staring down at his untouched cinnamon roll. “I didn’t want to drag you into this, but I know it’s my fault that I have. I never should have used you as a hostage. It was just the only plan I could come up with. And if I hadn’t escaped the hospital when I did, I would be in prison now and the detectives would be telling everyone that the bomber was safely behind bars when in reality, he’s still out there, probably building more bombs.”

He trailed off, astonished at himself for having talked for so long. Rissa was just sitting there quietly, absorbing every word he said. It was like breaking a dam to be able to just pour all of this out to someone who actually listened.

“So, let me get this straight,” she said. “I’m being watched by the police, by some other unknown group, and by you, as an emissary of the Accardi family. I’m potentially in danger from all of them. And you’re telling me all of this, why?”

Elio shifted. “I guess I was hoping we could work together,” he said. “I keep an eye on things from the outside and you keep an eye on things from the inside, and we compare notes to see if they lead us to whoever our shared enemy is.”

“Hmm,” said Rissa. She nodded at his untouched roll. “Why aren’t you eating?” Her glance was keen. “Do you feel all right? Pain manageable? Sick to your stomach at all?”

“I feel fine,” Elio said, confused and slightly irritated by the abrupt subject change. Truth be told, he did feel sick to his stomach, and every part of his body twinged with pain. He was just adjusting to tuning it out.

Rissa scanned his face with knowing eyes, but once again, all she said was, “Hmm.” It was very cryptic, and Elio had no idea what to do with it.

The warm, sexual firebrand of a woman whom he had crushed against the wall and kissed only an hour before had somehow retreated into a snow queen whom he had no idea how to read. But he was, at that moment, willing to spend as long as it took to learn.