Midnight Man (Midnight #1)(26)

Her planner!

Frantic, she scrambled for it, flipped through the pages and…there it was!

Shaking, she punched out the number, hoping she was getting it right. Hoping her shaking hands wouldn’t betray her. What if she’d punched the number in wrong? Ah. The line connected and started ringing. Make it be the right number, she prayed.

One…

Did she hear a small thud in the next room? Oh, God.

Two…

Come on, come on!

Three…

“What’s the matter, Suzanne?”

She nearly dropped the phone in relief at hearing that deep voice. So calm, so matter of fact. Some part of her was glad that he seemed to be always a step ahead of her. He’d already entered her number in his cell as a contact and already knew that she wouldn’t be calling him after midnight unless she had a problem.

“John,” she whispered. “Where are you?”

“About three blocks away,” he replied. The deep tones seemed to vibrate through the phone. Just hearing his voice made her feel better. Less panicky. “Why?”

“Please hurry. There’s a man in the house. He was in my office a few minutes ago. John, I don’t think he’s a burglar. He wasn’t trying to steal anything and he’s—he’s armed.”

“Where are you now?” His voice was still calm, but she could hear a deep rumble in the background as he gunned the engine of his SUV and the squeal of tires as he rounded a corner.

“In the bedroom,” she whispered. She clutched the cell with wet hands, as if it were a lifeline. “The last room down. I locked the door.”

“Okay, this is what I want you to do. Put a chair under the handle. Don’t move furniture—that would make too much noise. Unscrew the lightbulbs on the lamps. Do you have a walk-in closet?”

“Y-yes.” She got the word out through chattering teeth.

“Get in and lock the door to that from the inside. Move to the very end and wait there for me. I’m coming. Do you hear me, Suzanne?”

“Yes.” Her voice shook. She bit her lips. “Hurry,” she whispered and broke the connection.

She only had one chair and placed it under the handle. It was pretty but flimsy. By the time the intruder made it to her bedroom door, he might not be worrying any more about making noise. The chair would hold a determined man back only a few seconds. She quickly unscrewed the light bulbs from the three lamps in the bedroom before heading for the closet door.

For the first time in her life, Suzanne cursed her tidiness as she locked the door behind her. How much better it would be to crouch in a tangle of old jeans, ratty tee shirts and discarded dressing gowns, instead of the bare floor of her superneat closet trying to hide behind two rows of shoes, neatly lined up and no defense whatsoever, unless you counted the killer stilettos on one pair of Manolo Blahniks which she’d bought in a moment of insanity and had never worn.

She crouched and waited. And bitterly regretted that she’d never taken a self-defense class, though she wasn’t sure what she could do against an armed man.

Wonder Woman would have known what to do. So would Xena the Warrior Princess. And Charlie’s Angels. They’d have known how to disarm an armed man and then they’d kick butt, but there were three of them and only one of her.

She moved slightly, brushing a lavender sachet dangling from a satin ribbon she’d hung from the rod. She closed her eyes in the dark, breathing in the sharp scent. She’d made the sachet herself from lavender gathered in her parents’ retirement home in Baja. It smelled of summer gardens and sun and earth. Her hand touched a cashmere shawl she’d worn to a production of The Mikado with Todd. She fingered it, taking comfort from the softness and warmth.

She didn’t want to die.

She wanted more summers with her parents, more theater evenings with Todd. More summer picnics, more skiing vacations. More evenings out, more evenings in.

More.

Life was so sweet, so rich, the highs and lows of it. She loved her parents, she loved her home, and she loved her friends. Her career was just taking off. She was going to live a hallway away from the sexiest man she’d ever seen. She’d been shocked at the sex they’d had, but it had made her feel alive in every cell of her body. She wanted more.

She didn’t want to die. Oh, God, she didn’t want to die.

How far away had John been? Three blocks? Even driving fast, how quickly could he get here? Was he parking now? Running toward the house?

With a sudden disconcerting sense of certainty, Suzanne knew that as fast as a human being could make it—that’s how quickly John would come for her. Whatever could be done to protect her against an armed intruder—that’s what John would do.

There was no one else in the world right now she’d rather have coming to her rescue than John Huntington.

Where was the intruder now? Her living room was very decorated, too, with two sofas, armchairs, occasional tables, footrests, floor vases scattered all over. If the intruder wanted to proceed stealthily, all the objects in the room would slow him down considerably.

If he didn’t care about making noise anymore though, then he was moving fast. Had he simply turned on the lights, tired of bumbling around in the dark? If he knew she was home, then he also knew there was only one other place she could be. If he wanted to, he could break down her bedroom door, wrench open the closet and shoot her in the space of a minute.