Free Blind Run by Patricia Lewin

years out of practice, Decker wasn’t a man to toy with. If things had been different, it would be Decker doing the hunting. Fortunately Marco still possessed one piece of leverage, and he had every intention of using her.
    As he watched, Decker grabbed a duffel bag from behind the driver’s seat, circled the truck, and opened the passenger door. The kids climbed out.
    Marco wondered how Decker planned to get past the building’s security—not that there was a rent-a-cop alive who could stand against Ethan Decker if he chose to take him down.
    As the three approached the front entrance, Decker leaned down and picked up the girl. She draped herself across his shoulders as if asleep, and all three disappeared into the building. With two sleepy children, Decker was going to charm his way past the night watchman.
    It might just work. Decker had a talent for slipping into places where Marco would have needed firepower. And if Decker’s plan didn’t work this time? Well, Marco suspected, nothing would stop him from getting in to see his ex-wife and protecting her from the likes of the Spaniard.
    Marco smiled and reached for the door handle. It was an illusion he’d enjoy destroying.

CHAPTER SIX
    SYDNEY OPENED HER EYES and lay very still, unsure what had awakened her. Then she heard it again, the same insistent buzzing that had pulled her from her dreams. Someone was at her front door. She sat up and checked the time. Five A.M.
    The buzzer sounded once more, three quick stabs of an impatient finger.
    Warily, she climbed out of bed, slipped on her robe, and started toward the front of her apartment. Who could be at her door this time of the morning? She considered dialing nine-one-one but quickly dismissed the idea. With the night watchman at the desk downstairs, it had to be one of her neighbors or Charles. Though it wasn’t like him to show up unannounced in the middle of the night. Maybe there was a problem in the building, or someone with a medical emergency. She usually kept to herself, but several people on her floor knew she was a doctor.
    As a precaution, she got her cell phone from her purse and slipped it into the pocket of her robe. At the door, she took a deep breath before saying, “Who is it?”
    “Sydney, let me in.”
    Her stomach tightened. The voice was low, masculine, and hauntingly familiar, a voice she hadn’t heard in three years. She must be imagining things.
    “Who is it?” she repeated, pressing one hand to the wood frame while the other gripped the fabric at her waist.
    A brief hesitation. “It’s me. Ethan.”
    No. She wanted to say it aloud but simply shook her head and backed away. It couldn’t be.
    “Sydney.” His voice was insistent, drawing her back to the door, though she wasn’t about to open it. She wasn’t even sure it was Ethan—or so she told herself. It had been three years, and voices could be faked, imitated. Couldn’t they?
    Reluctantly, she looked through the peephole. On the other side, she saw the shape of her ex-husband, strangely distorted through the tiny glass. She pulled back abruptly, her heart pounding in her chest. “What do you want?”
    “Open up. We need to talk.”
    “I have nothing to say to you.” She managed to sound more in control than she felt. He had a lot of nerve showing up here after what he’d done. Did he think she would welcome him with open arms?
    “I’m not leaving.” He pressed the buzzer again. “Now let me in before we wake the entire building.”
    “Go away.” She pressed her hands against the door, hating him for doing this, for showing up on her doorstep after three years of silence.
    “Sydney.” He pounded on the door.
    Damn him!
    “Stop,” she said, knowing he would keep on until he’d awakened everyone on her floor. “Give me a minute.”
    She hesitated, slipping a hand into her pocket and closing it around her cell phone. One brief call and she wouldn’t have to deal with this, with him. It would serve him right