Trees banged her nemesis against the tiled wall again. On impact, his skull cracked in a horrifying thud. While he reeled, Trees plowed his fist into Victor’s nose. Her assailant’s eyes rolled to the back of his head.
When Trees let go and reached for her, Victor fell to the floor in an unconscious heap.
She looked up at her rescuer incredulously. “What are you doing here?”
“Did he hurt you?”
Laila stood mute. She’d never, ever seen anyone get the best of Victor. Not once. Not even Emilo. But this giant man who claimed to be her savior—albeit temporarily—had squashed him like a bug.
“Not much.”
“Is that Victor?”
“Yes.” Her voice sounded terrified, even to her own ears.
He scooped up the fallen knife and pocketed it, then settled Victor’s unconscious form on the nearest toilet, cuffing his wrist to the flushing mechanism and shutting the stall door. “I’d love to kill the son of a bitch, but dead bodies raise too many questions. We need to go.”
Now? Without calling the police? Then again, he probably wanted to avoid them. She certainly didn’t want to stay in this city another minute. Nor did she want to answer an officer’s probing questions. Maybe Trees didn’t, either.
She just wanted as many miles between her and the Ramos brothers as she could get.
“C’mon. I’ll get you out of here safely.”
She hated to put her trust in this operative she barely knew, who had been at least partially responsible for the violation of their safe houses, who had taken her without her consent…but she had exhausted her options—and herself—tonight. If she wanted to avoid Victor and his wrath, she had to rely on Trees.
“Can you?” She wasn’t sure. Trees had committed violence, so the hotel might have called the police. Or what if Victor’s right hand was lying in wait to end them with a couple of bullets? Did they have any chance at all of leaving here?
“We’re going to try.” Trees took her hand. “Let’s go.”
Laila looked shaken and terrified, like she was holding herself together through sheer will. “All right.”
It wouldn’t be long before her adrenaline crash…
Trees wanted to scoop her up in his arms. He didn’t dare risk spooking her. “That means you have to trust me, at least a little. Can you do that?”
She hesitated. “Yes.”
He wasn’t convinced, but he squeezed her hand, opened the bathroom door, and peeked down the hallway. It was blessedly empty. If they managed to get back to the RV undetected and unimpeded, he would deal with everything else.
Since the dinner hour had passed, the restaurant had mostly emptied out. A pair of octogenarians sat in a corner, sipping decaf. Near them, a family with little ones ate in silence, looking wiped out after a day in the parks.
At the end of the hall, Trees turned the corner and hugged the less illuminated wall, absorbing her against his body, all the way to the double doors. No one approached or challenged them. A few minutes earlier, he’d taken care of Victor’s cohort in a service hallway, knocking the asshole unconscious. He freaking hoped there was some ice in the RV’s freezer. His knuckles could use it.
Outside the hotel, they rounded the building and headed for the main road on foot.
“Did Victor hit you or…” If the scumbag had, Trees would be hard-pressed not to march back into that women’s room and kill the motherfucker. As it was, the sight of the asshole’s fist aimed at Laila’s terrified face was burned into his retinas.
She didn’t meet his stare. “He would have. So thank you. How did you find me?”
Trees gritted his teeth at the memory of filling the RV’s tank and hopping inside again, only to find Laila gone. He’d been shocked by her brazen escape—and he shouldn’t have been. She had fled her brother-in-law’s compound without even a shirt on her back. He should have expected a woman willing to give up everything for freedom, even her dignity, to run. Given what he’d witnessed of Victor Ramos’s treatment, he understood.
“When I realized you’d fled, I figured you would head for the road, maybe steal a car, and get out of this area.”
“I do not know how.”
Good to know. “Then I saw the Mercedes pull into the hotel. I followed, just in case they’d found you. Inside, I tailed Victor’s little helper.” Honestly, Trees still didn’t know how the asshole hadn’t seen him. “When I realized he had no idea where to find you, I punched the fuck out of him and kept looking. I was combing the restaurant when I heard you scream.”
“How did you know it was me?”
He’d felt her cry all the way through his body. Deep in his chest. That would probably freak her out, so he simply shrugged. “I figured no one else had cause to scream.”
The lights flashed then, signaling they could safely use the crosswalk. It was a far cry from his wild dash across the highway, in between cars and during rush hour to reach her.