Page 108 of Dead Girl Running

Max. It was her Max. He had to make it. He had to. She loved him so much! Then—

The present day rushed back in, but everything was blurred, overlapped.

She was in the bustling city park.

She was in the penthouse suite.

Max was moving in slow motion. He wasn’t going to make it—

Max was moving in slow motion. He wasn’t going to make it—

40

Max tackled Mara, low and hard, knocking her off her feet. The pistol roared, the shot blasting over Kellen’s head. Plaster showered from the ceiling. Max and Mara rolled across the room. Max slammed Mara against the floor.

Mara pulled a small, sharp, deadly knife.

He lifted his big fist and punched her in the face.

Her head snapped back, and she went limp.

“Kellen!” he shouted.

“I’m here,” she whispered.

Gasping, he looked around at her.

He was the man who had tried to save her.

He was the man who had failed to save her.

He was the man in the hotel.

He was the man who had saved her.

His face was harsh, primitive with fury, with bloodlust, with…passion for her.

She had forgotten him, but now she remembered.

My God, how she’d loved him.

They looked at each other, just looked, a moment of gratitude…and recognition.

Then his head snapped back to look at Mara, the collar of her hoodie clutched in his fist.

Kellen wanted to believe Mara was unconscious. But she didn’t dare trust that even Max’s full-fisted punch could take out the Librarian, so in an overly loud, unsteady voice, she said, “Restrain her.”

He did. He took Mara’s pistol and secured the safety and slid it into his jacket’s inside pocket. With a key he found on the coffee table, he went into the living room and came back with handcuffs—those used to bind Carson, she guessed—and dragged Mara to the cast-iron screen set before the unlit gas fireplace and used the cuffs to secure her hands behind her back.

Carson Lennex appeared. On his cheek, a round red burn marred his classic features. His button-up shirt stood open, and three burns dotted his chest, leading in a line to his nipple. He limped into the room. Everything about him was angry. To Max, he said, “Please. Allow me.” Kneeling beside Mara’s feet, he used the curtain cord to tie her ankles and her knees. To Kellen, he said, “She came up here with a message that you had sent her. I said,For the hieroglyphic tablet?She said yes. I invited her in.” He sounded outraged when he said, “I fed her her lines!”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Lennex.” Kellen spoke through broken gasps. “When I realized what could happen, I did everything I could to save you.”

“I’m ashamed to know I’m such a fool,” Carson said.

“You didn’t tell her where the tablet was.”

“No. Damned if I’m going to help an archaeological looter and thief.” He had been tortured for his passion, for archaeology, and he had come out the victor.