Suspicious Activities

Pain exploded along her chin and elbow on impact, but Nikki knew enough about the kind of men who would assault a woman at home alone to know that they probably didn’t like when their prey fought back. Adrenaline spiked through her, coursing in parallel to the horrible realization that she was caught vulnerable, as she scrambled back to her feet. She slung herself around to face her attacker, putting the tub between them and her even farther from the only exit.

“Who are you?” she questioned, voice cracking despite her resolve to try to grab some control. The man was slightly hunched in pain, holding the side of his face now covered in red wine. Or blood, she couldn’t tell which. She searched the rest of his face for any flare of recognition, but nothing about him seemed familiar. Around the same age as her thirty-four, the man looked gruff with his goatee and slightly wild dark hair. His clothes, however, were as normal as if he was going to the park to play ball. Yet he’d taken a pit stop by her place to—to what? Use her for batting practice? Either way, she didn’t recognize the man in the least. Certainly not the blood-curdling snarl he let out before lunging for her again. Never mind the tub between them.

Nikki used his misjudgment against him. She grabbed the wooden tray from across the tub and swung out at him with it. Another roar tore from his lips as the plank hit his outstretched fist hard. The two of them recoiled from each other, one in pain, one in fear. She might have been thwarting his attempts to hurt her, but she was also making him angrier. Once he decided to pick up his bat again, how long could she really hold him off?

Nikki pictured her handgun in the top drawer of her bedside table, two rooms away. If she could manage to put some distance between them, she’d have enough time to grab it and turn on him. Judging by the almost tangible rage building around him, it was her best option. Without waiting any longer, Nikki threw the wooden plank with everything she had at the man’s head. It forced him to shrink back in defense, throwing up his arms and cutting off his eye contact with her momentarily. She used the small window of opportunity and rounded the tub.

“I don’t think so,” the man ground out as she ran straight for the doorway. Nikki felt his hand in her hair seconds before she was yanked backward. Instead of slamming into him, she slipped on the water trail she’d left behind and lost her balance much sooner than her attacker had probably wanted. He let her go as her side connected to the floor with a slap. Pain, more harsh than when she’d first fallen against the tile, blossomed along her body. She tried to suck back in the air that had been knocked loose at the impact, her coughing interrupting the rhythm of the current song playing from her iPod.

This time it was Nikki who was slow to recover. The man reached down and grabbed a handful of her hair once more, pulling up until she had no choice but to get to her feet.

“I wanted to bring a gun,” the man said, eyes for the first time roaming the length of her body. “I also wanted to do it in the parking lot. But no, pain was what I was asked to deliver and it had to be in the bathtub. Lucky me you were already in the bath.” He smirked.

The fear Nikki was desperately trying to keep back flooded through every inch of her. Nikki, the woman who started a security agency aimed at providing safety against situations like this, was being bested in her bathroom. Naked, too.

She froze.

The hand in her hair tightened. Tears sprang to her eyes.

Fight back, her mind yelled. Do something!

But she didn’t. Fear had clinched like a vise around her heart.

The man smiled wickedly.

He never even saw Jackson Fields coming.

* * *

HE WAS STILL facing Nikki when Jackson’s fist slammed into him. The hit connected with his jaw. It had enough force to make the man stagger toward the tub. In the process he let go of Nikki’s hair, already howling in pain. Or maybe anger. Jackson didn’t care about dissecting the emotion.

Nikki had water dripping off her and slipped as she tried to scurry away from her attacker. Jackson reached out, no time to care that she didn’t have a stitch on, and wrapped his arms around her. Nikki’s eyes were wide as he steadied her.