Shattered (LOST #3)(6)

Too bad. I’m not ready to die.

She’d been trained well, after all. She knew how to survive.

So her hands slid down and when he moved another step, she knocked the lamp off the table. Just like she’d accidentally tripped over that chair a few moments ago. But when that lamp hit, the crash was loud and clear.

“You bitch,” her attacker snarled as he yanked her around to face him. “I’m gonna hurt you so much—”

The door crashed in. Sweet hell, yes.

But that knife was still too close to her. So Sarah slammed her head at her attacker. He groaned when she hit him, and the hand holding the knife jerked. She leapt back, her head pounding now, and he swiped out with his knife. The blade sliced down her arm, and Sarah cried out in pain.

Then Jax was there. He pulled her toward him, then he pushed her behind his back, shielding her. Normally, she wasn’t the shielding type, but she was bleeding and scared and Jax was pretty much roaring as he shot toward her attacker.

The guy’s fingers were locked tight around the knife. He lunged forward, and he brought that knife down in an arc, aiming right for Jax.

Jax’s hand lifted. He blocked that attack, then swung his fist into the other man. The attacker hit the floor. In the next instant, Jax was on top of him. Punching. Driving his powerful fists at the guy again and again.

Voices rose from the hallway. Right. You couldn’t exactly kick in a door and roar without attracting attention. Someone out there was shouting for security—a very good idea. Sarah’s hand wrapped around her wound. The blood dripped right through her fingers. He’d cut her so deep. She was probably going to need stitches and—

Jax still had him on the floor. She hurried forward. Sarah touched his shoulder and Jax froze, with his hand poised to punch the guy again.

Her attacker wasn’t fighting anymore. Just lying there, moaning.

Every breath that Sarah took felt icy in her lungs. “Take off his mask,” she told Jax.

Jax leaned down and ripped that mask off the guy.

Evil has so many faces. Her father’s voice whispered in her mind. That’s why you can’t ever trust what you see.

She was staring down at a kid, a boy who looked around eighteen. His lip was busted, bleeding, and so was his nose. Sarah didn’t know if she and her head butt were responsible for his injuries or if they’d come courtesy of Jax’s powerful fists, but the kid was obviously down for the count.

“Who the hell are you?” Jax demanded. “And why were you after her?”

The guy tried to talk. Blood and spittle flew from his mouth. Sarah stared at him, caught by the bright green of his eyes. His eyes were familiar to her. She knew she’d seen him somewhere before . . .

“Bitch is . . . evil . . .” the boy rasped. “Just like . . . him.”

Him.

“He murdered . . . mom . . . Gwen . . .”

That name—Gwen—seemed to echo through Sarah’s mind, and suddenly, an image clicked for her. Gwen Guthrie. A woman who’d had eyes exactly the same shade of bright green as the boy who’d attacked Sarah. His mother?

Yes, yes, that fit. Sarah had done research on Gwen. The woman had given birth to two children . . .

Before my father murdered her.

“Have to . . . kill Sarah. What she . . . deserves . . .”

Security pushed into the room. Goose bumps appeared on Sarah’s arms. No matter how many times she tried to escape her past, it just kept chasing her down. This time, the past had come armed with a knife. A very sharp one, at that.

Jax shoved to his feet. He turned, and that gaze of his—burning with a blue fury in that moment—swept over her. When he saw her wound, he swore.

“We need to call the cops,” Sarah said as the security team closed in on the boy. “He just attacked me.” Her voice didn’t shake. Her words didn’t break. There was no emotion in them at all. She couldn’t let any emotion affect her, not then. Not with all those people standing around in the hallway, whispering.

“She needs medical care,” Jax snapped. “Get an ambulance here!”

“No, I—” Sarah began.

“He sliced your arm. You’re going to need stitches.” He was holding her hand. So carefully, as if he were afraid of hurting her.

Her head tilted back as she looked up and focused on him. He’d come to her rescue, charging inside that room and probably saving her from—what? Torture? Death? “Thank you.”

His gaze searched hers. “You know who that kid is, don’t you?”

She glanced back at the boy. The hotel security had circled around him, and the guy was hunched on the floor. Crying. “I’ve never met him before in my life.” Those words were true. But even if they weren’t, Jax wouldn’t know. After all, she was a world-class liar.

Some of her father’s victims had been identified over the years. She had pictures of all those victims—and she’d seen the boy’s green eyes before. That particular shade of green was unusual, startling. Unforgettable. Those eyes belonged to her father’s first victim.

Gwen Guthrie.

POLICE STATIONS WEREN’T his scene. Mostly because he and the cops were all too often butting heads. They wanted to toss him in a cell. He wanted to tell them to fuck off. He usually did tell them to fuck off.

If it hadn’t been for Sarah, there was no way Jax would have been at the police station in New Orleans. But he’d stayed with her while she got stitched up, and even though she had plenty of protection around her, he was still loath to leave her.