phone out of his hand and tossed it.
“Hey!” He made a grab for it but missed the phone by a mile as it sailed past him into traffic. “That was a three-hundred-dollar phone.”
“Sorry.” She kept walking. “I’ve heard the cops can use GPS to find you. Anyway, yours was bugged, so…”
“So the cops can trace us from the calls I make?”
“Not anymore. Here, use this disposable. I’ll buy you a new phone later if you like. But right now I need to…contain everything as much as possible.”
“What’s really going on, Bridget?”
She looked away from the concern in his face. “As soon as I figure it out, I’ll let you know. You want the phone or not? We should keep moving.”
Rafe stared at the phone for a few seconds before taking it from her. Bridget listened for a moment to make certain he wasn’t calling the FBI, then let her mind drift as they made their way along the avenue. The increasingly crowded sidewalks made the police’s job a lot harder to find them, and they could dash into a store if they saw a cop car coming. Unless it was an unmarked car. She should have been feeling defeated at this point, but she didn’t. She felt…cautiously optimistic. As if she might have a fighting chance. She wasn’t sure why, because, for sure, Rafe had even less of a clue than she did of how to get out of this mess.
She didn’t even know exactly who had initiated her trouble. Whatever was going on was too sophisticated for Dejarnatt. It had a scope far beyond his own greedy needs.
Which left—not going there. Not until she’d run out of choices. And that’s what the bastard was doing, wasn’t he? Backing her into a corner until she had nowhere left to turn.
Her breath stalled in her throat. Omigod. What had she done? She had to get away from Rafe. She’d put his life in danger without realizing it. She slowed her pace, her feet suddenly feeling like blocks of concrete as she put her hand on her stomach and bent over, praying she wouldn’t throw up. She’d been so consumed with hate for Dejarnatt and how he’d crushed her brother and what he might be trying to do to her, she’d allowed herself to be blinded to other possibilities.
“Hey, there.” Rafe snapped the phone closed and crouched down by her side. “Are you okay?”
No. And she probably never would be again.
“’Course I’m okay.” She gathered the last bit of her energy and pushed herself up to her full height.
“I got us a ride out of here. A limo, no less. In five minutes, we’ve got to be in front of Max’s Men’s Wear just down the street.”
“Who?”
“An old friend who owes me a favor. You can trust him.”
“To be safe, we’ll watch him wait for us, and at the last minute when it looks like he’s ready to leave, we’ll run out and get in the car. Got that?”
She turned when he didn’t answer and wished she hadn’t. His beautiful eyes looked reproachful and sad. “You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” he said.
There was a time, so long ago she could barely remember, that her world had felt safe. She’d hoped that finally she and Darcy had managed to get back to that place of being ordinary—having friends, a job, the same apartment for more than three months.
She touched the back of his hand with her fingertip. “When I first met you I thought it was Dejarnatt trying to mess me up. But I think I’m in big trouble, and you have to get away from me, Rafe. You can’t help me. You’ll only slow me down.”
She pulled air in through her teeth, and it sounded like she was whistling. Anything to hold back the damned tears. “There is one thing I need you to do for me, and that’s why I called. I need you to go see Darcy in jail. He’s in danger, too. Tell him, I said he’s back.”
She grabbed his hand. “Promise you’ll tell Darcy.”
“Who’s back?”
When she didn’t answer, his frown deepened. “I think you need help, Bridget. Look, I know Gage is tough, but he’s a good