Page 46 of Slow Burn

Jim shoved aside two sullen teenagers with hair in their eyes and reached over toward her. She looked up and met his eyes.

She could confuse the issue further, play him as an abusive husband, scream for protection—no, Jim was holding the wallets, he was vulnerable. She had to play his game.

She just wished she knew what it was.

“Sondra,” he said, and grabbed her in a bearhug. “Jesus, Sondra, what happened? What’s wrong?”

“Somebody knocked her down and took her purse,” the diamond lady contributed helpfully. Jim’s face folded into a map of distress.

“No! My god, are you okay? You look pale.” Jim frowned at the guard, who’d loosened his grip but hadn’t released it entirely. “What are you doing to catch this guy?”

“We have another problem,” the guard said. “You know this woman?”

“Know her? She’s my sister.”

“From Ireland,” Robby contributed helpfully.

“Just flew in today. God damn it, I knew something like this would happen. They can spot a tourist a mile off. Did you keep your hand on your purse like I told you?” Jim gave her another hug.

“No, I forgot, it’s me own fault. I should have listened to you, dear man.” She sighed and examined her shoes, the floor, the shiny black wingtips of the security guard. “All me own fault.”

“She still has to explain the wallet,” the guard said. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him display it. Jim stiffened.

“Sondra, damn it, you didn’t—ah, hell, officer, I’m sorry. My sister is—you know—kleptomaniac. She’s under a doctor’s treatment. I guess all the stress, the strange surroundings, they must have got the better of her. Still, no harm done, right? You’ve got the wallet back. Sondra, you don’t have anything else, do you?”

“No, not a blessed thing,” she said, and thank god it was true. She looked up to meet the guard’s eyes. “I suppose you’ll be wanting to search me, then.”

The diamond lady gasped in horror.

The guard’s eyes went from blue to storm gray, and steroid-thick muscles jumped under his face.He knows, she thought.But how far will he go?

Jim put his hand on the guard’s arm, drawing a glare; for all his thin build, Jim had the look of a dirty fighter, the eyes of a sniper. He smiled.

“Buddy,” he said. “You don’t want to do that.”

The guard Jet her go. Jim’s arm went around her shoulders and guided her limping away; the diamond lady patted her reassuringly on the hand as she passed. When Robby glanced back, the guard was following at a slow relentless pace.

The exit was about two hundred feet.

“How’s the ankle?” Jim asked. She kept limping.

“Fine.”

“Think you can run, if you have to?”

“Do I have any choice?”

His arm tightened, a friendly squeeze that was half warning.

“I’ve got to dump the wallets fast. You make a run for it, get outside, get under a car and hide. He’ll be following you, not me.”

“Rendezvous?”

“Home. Ready?”

She sucked in a deep breath and jabbed her elbow into his ribs. He crumpled back with a whoof of surprise. She leaped ahead, heard the slap of leather as the security guard chased her. Jim shouted something inarticulate, and she glanced back to see him urging on the guard while he faded back around the corner. He’d be okay.

Now all she had to do was run.