Page 74 of Uncharted Desires

There was a loud ringing in his ears, then there was nothing but black. As West tried to open his eyes, his entire body protested in pain.

What the hell had happened?

He felt the hard cement beneath his hands as he tried to push himself up, and a firm hand pressed on his back, stopping him from moving.

“Don’t move, sir,” the voice said.

Every muscle and bone in his body ached, as he tried to clear the fuzziness form his brain. He had been on the phone with Kat; he remembered that. She had told him to get out of the car, which had seemed ridiculous, but something in her voice told him to listen.

He squeezed his eyes shut, willing the splitting pain in his head to go away.

Why won’t this fucking ringing stop?

He forced one eye open, and then he saw the car. It was on its side, the front completely blown out. Two other cars had run into it, and their drivers looked to be okay standing next to their vehicles.

Then it all came flooding back to him.

He had yelled at the driver to get out, which had made the driver none too happy. West recalled promising to buy him a new car.

Then they’d both heard a pop from the front, and West knew that sound wasn’t good. The driver said the brakes weren’t working. West flung his door open, tucking and rolling out of the moving car. Luckily, it wasn’t moving too fast in the midday traffic.

West had stood just in time to see the driver maneuver over to the passenger side, flinging himself out. As West had run up to check on him, the car hit a large truck and the entire front had blown up. The explosion had knocked him back, and now here he was lying on the pavement, barely able to string two thoughts together.

He groaned as two men, presumably EMS, rolled him slowly to his back. He heard the two speaking in Indonesian and had no idea what they were talking about. Most likely what to do with him. He would be fine in a minute. He just needed water and some Advil. Now if he could just convey that sentiment to these guys.

“No . . . let . . . me . . . through!” A voice pierced through the din of the ringing, and West felt his entire body come back to life.

She was here.

And then there were hands all over him. Her hands.

Kat was crying and practically lying on him, and he could feel her tears as they slid down his neck. “You’re okay,” she said between sobs. “Oh my god, I thought you were dead.”

“Excuse me . . . miss?” one man said.

“No!” West heard her slap his hand away. “Just give me a minute.”

West smiled at his feisty, adorable Kat, and slowly opened his eyes. “What? You worried about me, sweetheart?” His voice was scratchy and barely audible.

Another tear slipped down her cheek as her hand brushed a strand of hair out of his face. He nuzzled his face into her palm. “I’m just glad you listened to me.”

West grunted as he tried to sit up. “Help me up.”

“Uh, sir . . . that’s not . . .” He said in surprisingly clear English.

West gave the EMS guy a look and pushed himself up to sitting with Kat’s look of disapproval clear. “You need to be checked out by the doctor.”

“I’ll go in a minute. I need to know how you knew the car was rigged to blow up.”

Kat sat back on her heels and held West’s hand, looking down at where their fingers intertwined. “I’d rather not be the one to tell you.” She huffed a strand of hair from her face, training her golden eyes on him. “What do you remember about the night you fell off the yacht?”

West’s mind was cloudy, much like the night on the boat, and suddenly one piece came together in his mind from the night he went overboard. It had been dark, but he had seen a shadow. Something had moved behind him and he had turned, and that’s when he remembered. The shadow, the outline of a face. A face he knew almost as well as his own.

It hadn’t been Declan.

“It was Luke! He pushed me off the yacht.”

Kat nodded as her hand moved up and down his arms.